mountain masala

Creator, Companion, Comforter

I thought I'd offer this up again for Trinity Sunday. Tune: Morning Has Broken.

God of Creation
Gentle life-giver
Present at birth, and
all through our days
Author of sunrise
Song in the night sky
Here in this place, we
offer our praise

Jesus, Companion
teacher and healer
friend of the grieving,
suffering, the poor
Stand with your people
whisper among us
promise of mercy
goodness for all

Spirit of Comfort
blow through Creation
stir up new life, breathe
peace through our world
Healer of hearts, and
hope for tomorrow
weave all our sorrows
into new dawn

Here we give thanks for
life in its fullness
blessings received
your gifts to us all
Make us a people
filled with compassion
selflessly giving
serving your world

Make sure you break the lines as shown above or the metre doesnt work. Trust me.

(c) Craig Mitchell, 2010. May be copied for non-commercial use with attribution.

Bearded Gypsy Band

Ellen is playing drums with Bearded Gypsy Band. Here are a couple of recent performances. Go to the website - they're palying in a town near you (Ellen is sharing drum duties so she's not at every gig though).

 

new music

have come across some really excellent music in the last month.... all worth a listen.

"Mid Air" - Paul Buchanan - the former lead singer of The Blue Nile offers an intimate, chilled, piano-driven album that sounds very much like Peter Gabriel's recent work. lovely

"Songs Without Words" - Paul Armfield - gentle folky baritone. very pleasant.

"So What" - Jerry Garcia and Dave Grisman - the late Dead man and the jazz mandolin player recorded a whole bunch of tunes that Grisman has been releasing. brilliant folky jazz tunes.

"Oh Fortune" - Dan Mangan - Canadian singer-songwriter - has just won Canadian best alternative album and best new artist awards. Don't know who he sounds like, but he's brilliant.

"The Very Vest of Etta James" - Etta James - yeah!

"Quill" - Bison - cinematic 'chamber folk' for those who like The Decemberists - pay what you like over at NoiseTrade.

"Moonfire' - Boy and Bear - yeah I finally decided to get on the bandwagon. get a free track here.

"Last" - The Unthanks - I'm really into English folk music at the moment.

Plus some early Neil Young, who I finally acquired a taster for, and some Keith Jarrett - classical and ambient works.

Up the Top End

Since the start of last week I've been in Queensland, interviewing congregational leaders, lay and ordained, about Christian education and discipleship. This has included a 'church plant' in association with a church school, a revitalised suburban congregation, two churches in Townsville - one a long-time charismatic congregation, the other more 'mainstream' but seeking to be renewed, and an aboriginal community in Mapoon, far north Queensland. Diverse, rich, stimulating conversations, with a host of insights for other churches. I was fortunate to get an afternoon at Rowes Bay north of Townsille, where there were a couple of dozen kite surfers putting on a spectacular show for passers-by.

Chocolate and Red Wine

I was invited to set the weekly food challenge for a Facebook group to which I belong, so I suggested cooking with red wine and chocolate (you know, actually putting them in the food. So I got home from Tasmania on Saturday and made a mess in the kitchen on Mother's Day making this at home... (Got up the next morning, cleaned up the mess, and flew to Brisbane...)

A mole is a Mexican sauce, and a chocolate chilli sauce with chicken is a Mexican thing. I looked at a number of recipes and then adapted one from Gordon Ramsay (the one in Canberra)

Here's my adaptation

2 litres of chicken stock
400g shallots
2 cloves of crushed garlic
2 sprigs of thyme
1 bay leaf
2 tsps black peppercorns
2 tsps raspberry vinegar
1 bottle red wine
40g dark bitter chocolate
4-5 dried Ancho chillies
8 garlic cloves

Cut open the dried chillies and remove seeds. Toast on a hot, ungreased pan for a few seconds each side. Add hot water and redydrate for 30 mins. Toast unpeeled garlic cloves in the pan until blackening. Drain chillies and puree with garlic in a food processor. If you don't have dried Mexican chillies, you'll have to experiment with fresh chillies or dried. Just remember to add them later in the reduction process below, otherwise the whole thing will be far too hot.

Saute shallots and garlic in a small bit of butter. Add thyme, bayleaf and peppercorns and cook until softened. Deglaze pan with raspberry vinegar and then pour in wine. Add chilli and garlic puree. Boil until reduced to about 100ml - syrupy in consistency.

Add chicken stock and boil until reduced by 3/4 to about 600ml. Pour through a sieve. Return to pan, add the chocolate and stir until melts. If needed, thicken with a little cornflour. Do not allow to boil.

Research Interviews

I've just started travelling all over Australia over a 6 week period interviewing about 20 congregational leaders, ordained and lay, about Christian education - for the research project that I'm undertaking for our national Assembly and as a PhD thesis through Flinders University. Last year I conducted pilot interviews with several people. Now I've started the formal reseaerch and interviewed six people - all excellent conversations.

My research question is: What dynamic characteristics of educational leadership and of learning communities are significant for effective education for Christian discipleship in the Uniting Church’s postmodern missional context?

A question for you to ponder: Do faith communities and their leaders see lifelong learning in the beliefs and practices of Christian discipleship for the mission of God as central to their ‘reason for being’?

For the purposes of the study, Christian education is defined as the theory and practice of teaching, learning and formation in life-long Christian faith and discipleship, both for individuals and communities of faith. (Thanks to John Littleton for the suggestion of the last phrase).

The term "Christian education" seems problematic for the Uniting Church at this time, hence I am using it as an umbrella concept, and inviting people to speak in their own terms about growth in faith and discipleship.

I wrote a catch-phrase for an interim report that went: Fostering life-long discipleship through informed practice in intentional community for missional living in postmodern society.

That might sound like a bunch of cliches, but it summarised a number of aspects of the study.

This is the first of two rounds of the qualitative study, of which I'll say more. I'm travelling to every state and territory in order to interview church leaders whose congregations are diverse in terms of location, size, theology, culture, style and mission emphasis.

It's a wonderful privilege, and i hope to share some of the journey with you. Stay tuned...

Masala Recipes

"The Age" online has three masala recipes in it today - find them here.

Coconut Pork

I'm part of a Facebook group that occasionally sets food challenges, and last week's was to cook with a coconut product. Apparently coconut is a very healthy food. Clearly as you'll see below I decided to add unhealthy things to it... I just want to say that I dont cook like this every night...

BBQ Pork Belly with Rum, Lemongrass and Coconut

This recipe comes from Masterchef's Adam Liaw's cookbook "Two Asian Kitchens".

You'll need 1 kg pork belly. Score the pork diagonally on the underside. Slice into 3-4 cm strips, then cut off the rind.

Mix the following together.

150 g palm sugar, chopped
200 ml fish sauce
200 ml dark soy sauce
6 stalks lemongrass, white part only, thinly sliced
100 ml dark rum
6 french shallots, sliced thinly (I used 1/4 large brown onion)
6 garlic cloves, minced
60 ml sesame oil
1 tbsp ground white pepper

Bring the above marinade mix to the boil and simmer for 15-20 mins until reduced by half. Then add 125 ml coconut cream.

Marinate the pork in the mix for at least 2 hours.

Roast pork or cook on a BBQ (as I did). Meanwhile strain the marinade. Take 3 cups of marinade and simmer for 3 mins, then allow to reduce by half. Add 2 tsp cornflour mixed with water to thicken.

Serve pork with sauce and fresh coriander. I also served sweet potato slices, jasmine rice cooked with coconut milk, ginger slices, coriander roots, kaffir lime leaves and garlic cloves. And pork crackling, slivers of red chilli and zucchini on the rice...

Coconut Apple and Quince Crumble

This is a standard apple crumble with a few changes. I chopped fresh coconut in a food processor and then dried it in a hot frypan - stirring until it was about to brown. Some went into the cooked apple, which was then topped with some home made quince jam. Some went into the crumble topping which also included brown sugar, panko crumbs and some rolled oats (which are an essential part of any apple crumble topping!) On top is shaved fresh coconut, toasted in the oven. The combination of fresh coconut and quince made this a nice change from one our favourite desserts. And the individual serving thing looked good! 

Alive@5 Plays!

Last Sunday's Alive@5 was on the theme of Play, chosen as an expression of the season of Easter. Since our "Interactive Easter" event obviously had sombre elements, this evening was more about celebration.Our minister, Phil, has just started long service leave, so this has been a good prompt to involve others more in the planning and leadership, and to work on some changes that we've talked through prior to him going away.

One key change is to have one or more arrival activities, on the basis that people with children almost never arrive on time. While Messy Church does this, our overall program/approach differs, in that we want people to experience the biblical narrative in some way/s before they explore/respond, for several reasons...

So we started with parachute games (above) as folk arrived, and we have several play activities on tables.

The introduction consisted of a number of short and mainly funny video clips about play - most were TV ads - among them highlighting the need to spend time together and that might mean turning off the "screen" among other things.

Chicken, Orange and Apricot Tagine

OK so I'm still on a cooking roll. Here's the Moroccan Chicken, Orange and Apricot Tagine from a couple of nights ago. I made up this recipe and here it is! Serves 4 people.

Ingredients

1 medium brown onion, cut into wedges
4 cloves garlic, peeled and bruised *or halved)
1 x 3 cm piece of root ginger, peeled and sliced thinly
1 cinnamon stick
chicken pieces  (on or off the bone, just vary the cooking time)
moroccan spice mix (you can make your own but on this occasion I used Masterfoods)
2 medium carrots, peeled and sliced diagonally
1 tsp crushed or chopped chilli
1 cup dried apricots
1 tbsp orange zest
1 orange, sliced
2-3 tbsp honey
handful of fresh coriander, chopped
1/2 cup toasted pine nuts or slivered almonds
yohgurt
couscous
orange blossom water