success!

Hey I thought my mission to learn how to make crepes was going to be an epic quest complete with training montages and crumpled up crepes being thrown into the wastepaper basket. Yes I know I'm mixing my genres but I'm in shock because I had my first go this morning and I am full of the glow of success. This is when mum's theory really pays off.

Crepes for beginners
3/4 cup plain flour
2 eggs, beaten
2/3 cup milk
2/3 cup water
1 tbsp oil
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp vanilla
pinch of salk

Beat the eggs and whisk in the flour, milk and water. Add the other bits and whisk it all real well so there's no lumps or nothin. Leave it to stand for 20 minutes. Or if your breakfast buddy shows up looking hungry like mine, 10 will have to do.

This batter is so thin it scared me but it works. Really.

Heat a crepe pan (yeah right) or heavy frypan (ok!). Add a little butter. When it's hot pour in some batter and tilt the pan so it spreads real thin. Mine went all sorts of funny shapes, dunno how you get them round.

Now the trick is to not cook them too much at all. Keep the heat pretty low. We want a very light brown on the first side and then just a few spots of brown on the other. This way they are nice and soft not crunchy like from those lame "creperie" places that have sprung up all over town. Add more butter when they start to stick.

Ok eat them now. We had a choice of blueberries, cream, maple syrup and of course, marmalade. You don't need to be so excessive. This recipe makes 10 crepes. I think I should have invited someone else to help me and Bindy eat them. Now i think I have to go lie down and recover.

I love webstats.. not just knowing someone actually comes here, not just the amusement of the strange search terms that bring you here but also occassionally looking at how many of you are, like me, doing this on work time.

So hands up:
Who's my fan from the Department of Premier and Cabinet?
Who's at News Ltd in Sydney?
Griffith Uni?
But wait, who the hell is visiting from the House of Rep's in the big ole U S of A?

my mama said

My mum often says that it's not a good idea to get your hopes up - then you might get disappointed. And if all doesn't go terribly wrong, well you'll be pleasantly surprised. People tell me this is not a good way to approach life but more and more lately I think she be onto something.

Recent examples:

1. Stick It - now, if I hadn't been expecting this to be the best film of the last 5 years would I have felt its hopelessness so deeply? Gutted.
2. Kimchi and Bab - Lish has been talking up this Korean for at least a month, without even trying it. I dropped in there for lunch today and found the Bibim Bap quite average. And only 2 side dishes served with it. Sad.
3. Last night. Cafe Romantica. Pizza. Beer. And then that stupid stupid penalty. Still, weirdly because I had been expecting the roos to get thrashed I felt ok about it. Is it really lame to just be happy with how well they played up until then?

Meanwhile some internet treats:
I know people have told me that Go Fug Yourself is not as amusing as I find it. But their touching tribute to Aaron Spelling via ugly fashion is too good. So if you were a Brenda and Brandon fan check out the 90210 fug legacy for some excellent package action from Bran or the Brenda special for a superb look at menswear gone femmey 80s style.

Tal made these cookies and had them couriered down to Romantica to sustain the fans. So good. Buttery and orangey. I am still confused that this jen-jen with a cooking blog is not the jen-jen.

Dear dear sandy is going off - not only did he post an excellent looking recipe for jackfruit curry but now he's becoming a mp3 blogger. I'm going to head up to Sydney on the weekend and try and have exciting enough conversations with him that I end up on the blog. Although he mostly blogs about annoying conversations. Hmm....

And some text message poetry from Sam who couldn't get out of bed to come to vegan yum cha because she was too hungover:

Cant deal bad equals cant leave bed for puke

(Actually John had to write it because Sam was too sick to text.)

THE GREAT DEBATE #1: fluffy vs. thin

Ok so being audience responsive as always, I thought I better address the mega issue of fluffy versus thin. No not hair types.. fluff beats thin there like rock to your scissors. I’m talking pancakes. Specifically I’m talking pancakes you make at home – eating out is a whole different post.

I’ll admit I’ve had some longstanding thick pancake loyalties which have been challenged by some recent crepe experiences. I’ve been forced me to look at where these prejudices come from. I think in my family of origin (to use my newfound therapist’s vocab) pancakes uncomfortably straddled the line between thin and fluffy. They were eggy but not crepes, they were thick but not fluffy. I mean, I’m no ingrate, I’m happy my dad made us any pancakes at all and his birthday special – with bits of apple in the mix – was pretty fine. But let’s just say when I discovered that with a bit of baking powder, some melted butter and a good whisking wrist you could get big fluffy pancakes that soaked up lots and lots of syrup I was as happy as a kid at the pancake parlour. (Lets not talk about when we dared Robin to scull the jug of syrup at that establishment).

So yeah, thick pancakes for me are all about the soaking up of real pure maple syrup. Sometimes though, I’ll admit it, they can be just a little too much to chow down on first thing. And not that popular with the ladies. Despite this creeping sense that maybe I’m backing the losing side, I’ve not yet strayed from my fluffy ways, partly because I’ve been intimidated by figuring out how to make crepes.

But the other morning I had crepes made for me that were so perfect and eggy and buttery and light. Wrapped around “the best marmalade in the world” they were just too good to be ignored. You know, you can eat a lot more crepes than pancakes. Which means a lot more marmalade. Time to learn how to make crepes?

So dear readers, let the debate begin…

Ps – I have also been getting into pikelets lately – maybe fluffiness but smaller. At the beach we had them with 5 types of jam and cream and that was a darn fine spread.

Pps – I suppose also, that faced with the dilemna of wanting to make the best of a gifted bottle of organic maple syrup, as I am now, I might also opt for some French toast. Made with challah or greek egg bread of course. Dusted with cinnamon… now that’s not sounding too bad at all.

crazy sticky bitter goodness

Sometimes I think working with my mate Lish is the only thing that keeps me sane at work. But I worry that actually somehow together we make each other insane. Like whose idea was it to make marmalade at 9 o’clock on a school night? It seemed like a good plan for a while but at 1 in the morning, half dozing, half watching the soccer as we waited for it to reach the crinkle stage.. well right then it didn’t seem so sane. We started to think of all our friends who hate marmalade. What were we doing? Why? Would it ever set?

All this is forgotten though when I see the look on people’s faces as they taste the product of our insanity and enjoy what one dear eater called “the best marmalade in the world.” And I have been obsessively eating it all the time. Oh it's so so good! Starting the day with this baby on tal's excellent crepes made my saturday. And don't even get me started on how great it is on croissants. Yes, maybe I did take a jar to babka the other day so I could have it on their croissants. Is that more insanity?

Mandarin Marmalade
(if you’re not lucky enough to have a mandarin tree handy use whatever citrus you can lay your paws on)

Marmalade is real easy, it always seems to set even if you have the panic moment that it won’t. All you need is a big wide and preferably heavy pot. I’ve seen a recipe that didn’t have my flesh scooping step but this is how my friend Clare taught me and it’s always worked for me.

So all you need is some fruit and lots of white death sugar. We started with 5kg fruit and made about 13 big jars of marmalade. It took about 4.5kg sugar. Ok, lets get started...

• Put three saucers in the freezer. (No this is not part of the insanity – you’ll see)
• Cut the fruit in half (across not lengthwise) and stick in a pot with enough water to cover.
• Boil until the fruit is soft but not falling apart.
• Drain and let them cool a bit. Unless you are crazy (see above) and want to burn your fingers.
• Now you need to remove the seeds. This is kinda fiddly – use a fork or something. It don’t matter if you miss a few, you can scoop em out later. Keep the seeds.
• Now scoop the flesh out and keep.
• Cut the peel as finely as you can be bothered.
• Weigh the peel and flesh. Throw it in the pot with the same amount of sugar – yup scary amounts of sugar is what i'm talking about.
• Put the pips in a bit of muslin or a clean tea towel, tie it and throw it in the pot.
• Bring to the boil slowly letting the sugar dissolve but then boil the fuck out of it for a long time. Watch the soccer. Drink tea. Stir it a bit so it don’t stick.
• When it’s starting to look a bit thick you need to start testing it. Put a small dollop on one of your frozen saucers and wait. After 30 seconds push the top with your finger. If it crinkles it’s ready. You see the saucer is very cool – it simulates how your jam will be when it has cooled. If it’s not crinkling stay calm and keep cooking, it’ll set.
• When it’s ready put it into warm sterilised jars and stick lids on it.

Now serve to wide acclaim and convert all your marmalade hating friends into lovers. I mean, marmalade lovers.

cupcakes for the ladeez

Now, with my reputation I am used to people asking me for advice about getting girls into bed. Oh yeah, that happens all the time. So I was not surprised to read Shannon's comment requesting a cupcake recipe. I think probably she's gonna do something really inadvisable with my advice but that my friends, is beyond my control. However let it be said that I would prefer in general that you all used my recipes for good and not for evil (or self-destructive angst creation).

So... Cupcakes.

Yes they are all trendy again but like stripy tops that doesn't mean they ain't good. And when the hipsters move on to the next hot thang cupcakes will still be sweet and small, conveniently portable and a hit with all those who like a bit of childhood nostalgia.

Now, as I said in the comments, I mostly like to just use a good cake recipe and stick it in cupcake shape. This recipe is the exception - I don't think a batter this plain would work in cake form but in a cupcake it's all you need. In fact, it's all about those cute little paper cases, the icing and silver balls.

This recipe comes from my sister Marion. She brought some along to a family night once when we were watching But I'm a Cheerleader. You know the bit where they discuss what their "root" is? And they're all talking about gender stuff and why they ended up queer? Marion turns to me and asks "what's your root?" We discuss the family myth that everyone wanted me to be a boy. Then Marion says "I always knew I was a girl" and ta-da..... pulls out a tupperware container full of these cupcakes all iced in bright pink. Yes, a perfect family moment - they were almost the exact kitsch pink colour as the uniforms the girls have to wear in the movie.

Anyway, I never let my gender identity get in the way of baking. But maybe you've felt constrained by the need to seem tough all the time? To wield the power tools not the appliances? Well this recipe is so easy you can start breaking outta that gender binary right now. If you wanna get the girl get your toughest apron out and get in the kitchen.

ain't afraid to bake cupcakes

• 1 1/2 cups self raising flour
• 1/3 cup castor sugar
• 1/3 cup brown sugar
• 125g soft butter chopped into bits
• 3 eggs
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
  

for the icing:

• 1 cup thick double cream
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• pink food colouring

Light the damn oven and turn it to 180C. Get some tough little patty cases with really butch flowers or something and put them on a tray.

Beat all the ingredients up like you would some chick who you saw looking at your lady. Or maybe use an electric beater actually and beat them for 4 minutes on a medium speed cos violence is never cool.

Spoon the mix into the cases, they should be 3/4 full. Cook those fuckers for 20-25 minutes until they rise up to tell you that you rule, and they should be golden.

Let them chill out until they are as cool as you.

Mix the cream with the sugar and pink icing. Spread on the cupcakes and top with some silver balls.

Now go give some to your lady with some cheesy line like “cos you’ll always be my cupcake.” That should make up for being a stupid dumbass.