Tag Archives: Potato bake

Week 52 2012 Christmas

I hope I have one more post for 2012 to close out the year. This post however, will focus on the lead up and execution of Christmas 2012.

The last weekend was another quiet one. I didn’t have much to do besides wash clothes and clean the apartment. I’d completed all my Christmas shopping and so I enjoyed a weekend of lounging and watching DVDs. I ended up seeing the end of series three of Breaking Bad and watching what in the US is the first series of Strike Back. Apparently in the UK, there were six episodes shown before the US saw the seventh episode which it calls the first episode. I don’t understand the reasoning. The story can be found at IMDB and Wikipedia.

Because I was travelling for Christmas and New Year I needed to go through the contents of my refrigerator. Toasted sandwiches are always a good weekend lunch option.

Tomato, tinned red salmon and pumpkin seed bread.

———-

For dinner I had a scotch fillet steak.

I served it with a mango salad that also had salad leaves, cherry tomatoes and lots of Australian feta cheese. I made a light gravy from the marinade which was sherry, oil and soy plus some honey and mixed herbs and some minced garlic. I thickened it with some corn flour and used a little red wine to deglase my fry pan. I like my steak rare so this got about 90 seconds on each side and was rested for 10 minutes.

———-

On Saturday night a storm brewed but we didn’t see any rain. The clouds though were very pretty. I captured this image from my balcony but there were some much better ones from other IGers.

———-

I forgot to mention in my last post, that on Thursday evening when dining with my friends they gave me a book for Christmas. http://garydavidlum.com/2012/12/22/week-51-2012-christmas-party-season/

I like watching Jamie Oliver on television and if you search this blog for Jamie Oliver you’ll see a number of references. http://garydavidlum.com/?s=Jamie+Oliver&submit=Search I’ve heard though with Jamie Oliver’s recipes that sometimes they’re wrong, that is, quantities can be significantly off. This doesn’t always get corrected. If you know enough to know that’s fine but if you’re pretty ignorant like me, that can spell disaster.

———-

WARNING Sad Image

One of the saddest images I’ve captured is this one. Last week I posted this image of a friendly blue tongued skink. Sadly it was run over in my apartment car park.

From last week

What I came across on Sunday morning.

———-

I love pistachios

Snack time.

———-

Another toasted sandwich for lunch.

This time with blue cheese because like bacon and butter, everything tastes better with blue cheese.

———-

On Sunday night I cleaned out the refrigerator.

Salmon with mango salad and blue cheese.

———-

Normally when I’m walking back from the post office you can see heaps of people at work.

Barren on Christmas eve.

———-

There are no calories for the next two weeks.

Caramel doughnut.

———-

I was tempted, but this was for a work friend.

Jam filled doughnut.

———-

Because a work mate was ill last week when we went to the snag stand, we went back with her on Monday.

Spicy cheese kransky on brioche. This was delicious. Our plan is to eat through the entire menu.

———-

I finished work early on Christmas eve and I went to the airport as soon as I could.

A White Christmas snack at the Qantas lounge.

———-

I also had a couple of chilli beef pastizzi in the lounge

They were a little hot.

———-

I managed to secure an upgrade on flight QF960. The flight was meant to leave a little after 1745 however a couple of storm cells hit Canberra and to keep the ground crew safe they were evacuated from the tarmac and we stayed in the aeroplane for more than an hour connected to the aerobridge. If you follow me on Twitter you’ll see were we able to use our telephones.

For dinner I had the crumbed beef. The crumb also contained feta cheese. While the beef was well done and tough, everything else was very nice.

———-

When I got to my parent’s place I put out presents for them and my girls (who I’ll see later this week).

———-

It’s Christmas Day. I had a poor night’s sleep, not through Christmas excitement, but because I’m sleeping on my childhood bed. Dad woke up early and we sat together for a couple of hours while he told me stories.

I had a light breakfast in anticipation of a big lunch. The breakfast of champions, vegemite on toast with a couple of coffees.

———-

And so lunch preparation begins…

This is chicken after we’d tightened the skin with boiling water.

———-

Mum made a 1000 islands dressing for our lunch time prawns. If you click on the image you can work out the ingredients in a chat with Hilah from hilahcooking.com

———-

The poultry preparation continued with a duck drying and draining.

———-

The bowl may not look elegant but that mattered nought.

———-

I love prawns.

———-

I could not help capture an after image.

———-

The duck had a reasonable neck attached. You can tell my intent by the strategically placed Chinese meat cleaver.

———-

I want a role on The Game of Thrones as an executioner.

———-

Because everything is better with bacon.

———-

Side by side, don’t they look a treat (and very cute too).

———-

Mum makes a mean stuffing. Check out https://www.evernote.com/shard/s183/sh/b0224e03-ecac-4ec6-93cd-7f8246b75d18/45f16c08058a64d34147000cbd21095d for the details. I had my eye on the Maryland at the top of the image. It has the cloaca attached. I love a chook’s cloaca when it’s been roasted.

———-

With the duck added. I like to cut the breast off and slice it. It makes it easier to eat because you bite end on into the grain of the meat. Do you see the size of the duck’s neck and cloaca? I’d already bagsed (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bagsed) them.

———-

Because of the small size of Mum’s kitchen and oven, rather than roasted vegetables, Mum made a potato bake yesterday and we heated it up in a small toaster oven at lunch time. We also had broccoli, asparagus and peas.

———-

This is my plate. Mum made a nice orange flavoured sauce too. It was sublime.

———-

The neck has such nicely flavoured meat. I also managed to dissect out the trachea too. This started a nice little chat on twitter and instagram.

———-

So that’s it for now. Mum decided against making a pudding or a pavlova. This evening we’ll have fruit and some cheese. I’m pretty grateful. I don’t really want to blow out. I can fit into a pair of shorts I like to wear at Christmas time so I’m happy holding back a little.

I hope everyone reading this blog had a wonderful time if you celebrate Christmas. I hope your day was full of happiness and peace and good food.

Merry Christmas friends,

Your friend and fellow blogger

Gaz

Things and places mentioned in this post

Kransky sausage
Wiki entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kranjska_klobasa

Strike Back
Wiki entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_Back_%28TV_series%29
IMDB entry http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1492179/

Pastizz
Wiki entry http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pastizz

Another week in Instagram and schoolies week (garydavidlum.com)

Wonderful Wagyu rib eye (scotch) fillet

4 Replies

I had intended this meal for tomorrow night but I will be away for most of tomorrow and won’t be back until late. It seems so indulgent, decadent to have a Wagyu steak two nights in a row.

I had some left over vegetables in the refrigerator I didn’t want to waste. I made it look a little nicer by crumbing some bread and cheese and putting it in the oven to heat through and brown on the top.

Last night I followed a recipe, tonight I tried a variation. I heated the oven to 100 °C and put the vegetables in. After 30 minutes I heated up the stove to high and got my my saucepan and oil hazing. I had already dried the meat surfaces with paper towel and seasoned with salt and pepper. I seared one side for sixty seconds (that is, I counted to 60 slowly) and then turned and put straight into the oven. I left it there for 30 minutes and pulled it out. I put the meat on a warmed plate and covered with aluminium foil to rest for 10 minutes. I turned the grill to high and browned the top of the vegetables. The rest is history.

Rather than a long page of images, here is a slideshow to enjoy.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Two nights in a row. There’s nothing wrong with that.

Maestral Mediterranean and Seafood restaurant in Weston (garydavidlum.com)
High steaks: Seattle’s Met rejoins the pure Wagyu beef club (bizjournals.com)
Is This the Best Burger in the World? (esquire.com)
Allen’s Steak Festival (goodfoodrevolution.wordpress.com)

Steak anyone

4 Replies

On the weekend we went to Costco and amongst other things bought steak. We bought New York strip steak. This cut is becoming more popular in Australia.

On Sunday night Bron cooked. Last night I did. I love steak.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

How to Perfectly Grill Steak (thedailymeal.com)
How to Cook the Perfect Steak (arealfoodlover.wordpress.com)
I love steak (garydavidlum.com)
Steak at Kingsleys steak and crab house in Canberra (garydavidlum.com)
New York strip steak with whiskey-mushroom sauce (whatsyourdiet.wordpress.com)

Christmas with my kids, parents and one of my brothers

8 Replies

For the last few years I’ve visited my girls the week before Christmas to spend the weekend and have our own special Christmas. It also coincides with my Mum’s birthday so it’s a joint celebration.

This year my youngest brother, Mr40 decided to make wonton soup for an entrée. Mr40 prides himself on this wonton soup however, we discovered he doesn’t follow Mum’s recipe to the letter. He doesn’t slap the pork mince. For more information check out My Mum’s wonton recipe and read what I’m talking about.

Mr40's wonton soup for our Christmas lunch entrée

It was pretty good.

If you thought I limited myself to this one small bowl you'd be mistaken.

Lunch was pretty good. In the morning I went out and bought prawns (tigers and kings) and then peeled them. Mum roasted chickens, made a potato bake, coleslaw, devilled eggs and a fantastic stuffing.

Christmas lunch

For dessert Mum made a sunken orange cake with a lovely orange sauce and ice cream.

Orange cake

You would think we couldn’t eat dinner. Well you’d be wrong.

A light dinner of cheese and fruit

This was then followed with rocky road made by Mr40′s wife.

Rocky road

After digesting dinner we slept and then woke this morning to Mum breakfast of French toast, bacon and scrambled eggs.

Breakast after a big feast. French toast, bacon and scrambled eggs.

Friday Favorite’s…The Walking Dead and Wonton Soup (kiariddicktaylor.com)
Spinach Wonton Ravioli with Alfredo (tofuparty.wordpress.com)
imabonehead: Sichuan Red Oil Wontons (Wontons in Chili Oil) | Easy Asian Recipes at RasaMalaysia.com (rasamalaysia.com)
imabonehead: Vegan dumpling – Crispy Cabbage Wontons | Calm Mind Busy Body (calmmindbusybody.com)
GIF: This Isn’t My Wonton Soup… (icanhascheezburger.com)
Asian-Inspired Petite Pies – The Baked Pumpkin Wontons Represent Culinary Fusion at its Finest (TrendHunter.com) (trendhunter.com)
Culinary Experiment #1: Peach Wontons (anitamgeorge.wordpress.com)
Chefs Gallery, Sydney (dbites.wordpress.com)
“I don’t know what to do about Christmas!” (debpentland.wordpress.com)
What Makes My Christmas (kelsifarrington.wordpress.com)
A Christmas I’ll Never Forget (thriftysocialworker.com)

A really great tweet up

12 Replies

Prologue

About a month ago Meredith @macjam1 asked a bunch of us to her place for a Christmas barbecue.

Canberra has a really good and very active group of tweeps. There are circles within circles. I’ve found myself spending a lot of my twitter and facebook time with a small group of friends based in Canberra. We’ve met a few times already and have become firm friends. Some of us know each other through listening to @markparton on @2CC and others have work connections. Mostly though it’s through twitter and facebook. In addition to this group we also have some close twitter buddies in Queensland and Victoria who one day we will visit.

The barbecue

Each of us had in mind something to bring along while @macjam1 and her husband provided an excellent venue and more meat that we could throw a stick at. The weather ended up being great after forecasts of rain and cold. The afternoon and evening air was fresh but not cold. The sound of mosquitoes was held at bay with Aeroguard and Citronella candles.

The food was heavily influenced by most of us recently taking to various weight loss programs. Some are doing variations on low carbohydrate systems, others are exercising like crazy (cycling and Zumba are popular) and there are those on combinations. We started with combinations of spicy sausage and mushrooms cooked on the barbecue along with a cheese ball and Turkish bread and dips. Then @NatMcNazz brought along these awesome Parmesan cheese biscuits flavoured with chilli and fennel.

Fred the tooth pick holder was popular

This image reveals @tinythecabbie ‘s hand

Turkish bread and dips

Here is a close up of Fred and his partner Cork

Fred and his mate

The tooth picks later became popular with the kids who lit them in the candles and then played with fire (all under close adult supervision of course).

There was so much great food. By the time it was dinner time, I’d already eaten enough for a few nights anyway. Our gracious hosts and other friends had brought along enough to feed us all including children and then some.

Plate one for me

The coleslaw brought by @Bron99 was awesome and not traditional. I the potato bake was fantastic. Creamy and good. I haven’t had a snag and hamburger for ages. So this image has been captioned Plate one for me because I ended up going back twice more. My second plate was piled high with coleslaw and potato bake and a piece of honey soy chicken. The third plate was mainly coleslaw and another piece of chicken.

Then came the desserts. I’ll just list them through photographs.

Pavlova, Australia's greatest invention. I LOVE PAVLOVA!!!

I can never resist pavlova. It brings back so many happy childhood memories.

This white chocolate cheesecake was amazing

@Bron99 made this lovely white chocolate cheesecake which came with a strawberry coulis.

Apple pie

I confess my eyes were bigger than my belly. I wanted apple pie but after the pavlova and cheesecake I could not go back for the apple pie.

Chocolate wafers, jaffas and spearmint leaves

I do not know what this is called but @TinyTheCabbie brought them. So colourful and everyone raved about them.

My plate of dessert

I have with much sadness and self condemnation have to admit I could not finish this lovely plate of food. My grandmother’s voice echoes in my head about the starving children in Africa, but after the gluttony of snacks and then three plates of dinner, my dessert stomach (also known as the œsophagus) failed me and certain sphincters sending signals to my brain to stop eating or eject food upwards.

At the end of the evening, we had a tweet up photograph which I won’t upload because I don’t have everyone’s permission to share. Suffice to say it is a great photograph and it was a wonderful and happy evening.

I think I can safely post one blurry image of a subset of us who preferred the company of mosquitoes so they could talk about the others

Some of the tweeps

It really was a fantastic evening.

Epilogue

This morning I woke up feeling full. What better way to celebrate a new day than with brunch. Off to Black Pepper we went for a Black Pepper big breakfast.

Black Pepper big breakfast poached eggs, bacon (lots of bacon), chorizo sausage, mushrooms, tomato and a potato cake

Did I say there was lots of bacon?

Lots of bacon

Yep lots of bacon.

My Favorite Coleslaw (claimingliberty.wordpress.com)
Blue Cheese Bacon Coleslaw (shanehalbach.com)

Chicken wings

My succulent roast lamb shoulder

3 Replies

It’s been a busy week, albeit a short week with a public holiday on Monday. Yesterday I spent most of the day at work trying to catch up. I didn’t get very far. Today I was going to do more but thankfully got caught up watching Bathurst and then the Wallabies play the Springboks.

This morning when I went grocery shopping I came across a bit of lamb shoulder. It’s not often you see shoulder amongst all the legs (maybe I don’t look hard enough). Like pork, I think the shoulder of a lamb is more succulent and juicy than the hind leg or rump.

Lamb shoulder

It was a bit expensive.

Price tag

I really love the feel of handling meat, especially when it’s room or better, body temperature.There’s nothing like feeling the muscle fibres and having a knife in your hand. I really like butterflying a leg of lamb and dissecting the muscle compartments with my fingers. My boning knife is my favourite tool when working with lamb.