Mom reaches a milestone

I wish I were there with my mom on her birthday, having a chat over afternoon tea.

We are separated by a 20 hour plane flight, but are still so close because of these memories of lovely times spent together.


I love you, Mom!

Took my boys to the zoo today

I have always liked going to the zoo, and fortunately Melbourne has a superb zoo that gives the animals plenty of room, recreating their habitats as much as possible. The Trail of the Elephants replicates the feel of an Indonesian village, and you follow a jungle-like track through thick bamboo and other rainforest flora to get to where the elephants have a huge swimming pool, a mud pool, an elephant barn and other facilities. The boys hadn't been to the zoo since a school excursion years ago, before the Trail of the Elephants was opened, and I really wanted them to see it. They enjoyed it very much, and it was good to see that they had their favorite types of animals: Toby liked the orangutangs and Ben liked the cats.

Food blogging??

So, just after I uploaded my last post about how important food has been to us over the years, I chanced on a whole group of blogs devoted to people talking about food. Some are professional writers, and their blogs are so interesting to read. I'm afraid of the time I'm inevitably going to spend reading them though. Some of the ones I like:

The accidental hedonist:
http://www.accidentalhedonist.com/
Chronicles of a curious cook:
http://www.cheapcooking.com/blog/
A girl's gotta eat:
http://www.aproposofnothing.net/food/
Kitsch'n'Zinc:
http://kitschnzinc.blogspot.com/
Cook sister!
http://cooksister.typepad.com/cook_sister/

And then of course there are the numerous cooking shows, but the one that we always watch is the bizarre but hugely entertaining Iron Chef, a Japanese cult show that treats cooking as a competition, complete with sports-like commentary and a time limit of one hour.
Here's a link to one of the many Iron Chef sites.
This one is about the Kitchen Stadium:
http://web.archive.org/web/20030605110826/www.ironchef.com/ironlocation.shtml

And from an Iron Chef fan site:
You’re an Iron Chef fan if…

* You can't cook dinner unless your spouse first shouts, "Allez Cuisine!"

* You can't cook a meal unless you have a challenger.

* When you taste something you like, you giggle and exclaim, "The flavors dance in my mouth!"

* You start every sentence by saying, "If memory serves me correctly..."

* You ask for an ice cream maker for Christmas so you can try out a good trout or scallop ice cream recipe.

* You learn to sew in order to dress like Kaga.

Time goes by...

Where did the first half of the year go? We are now mid-winter and past the winter solstice. At uni we're enjoying a relatively student-free campus as the mid-year exams are over and no classes are on. However, that means that our own two uni students are home, and as Mel usually works from home, the house is no longer "mine". So off I go to work, happily and in the knowledge that I will arrive home to a beautifully cooked meal - husband is a great cook, and the boys are developing good skills. Last night Ben prepared a lovely roast chicken and potatoes, with a salad and homemade dressing. No bottled stuff in this family! The boys may not turn out to be foodies but they do appreciate well cooked food. So sad to witness families not sitting down to meals together, instead heating up something in those dreadful microwaves at odd hours to suit the individual. They're even building houses these days with minimal kitchen facilities (can't call them kitchens) as people move more towards fast food, prepackaged food, eating out a few times a week, and so on.

Well, this post has taken an unexpected turn, but this does fit into the title "Time goes by..." Food: it has been the recurring theme of our courting and marriage, starting in 1969. How much we have shared our pleasure in preparing, serving and eating food, with each other, and with family and friends over the years. The enjoyment of food has been the cement in our relationship, we have great memories of past meals, although Mel's memory for specific dishes eaten years ago has always amazed me. But it's all part of our history, even the pots and pans we bought as students in Berkeley are some of the ingredients of our family history (ok, so the boys laugh at us when we reminisce about how long we've had this or that kitchen utensil - are we crazy, or what). But it's a shared history, and so much fun to look back on.

This was taken at our 10 acre block last year. We're having breakfast (see faithful coffee pot on the table, bought in Alice Springs in 1990 - yawn). We tend to spend as much time as possible outdoors, which is another recurring theme of ours. Look at that sky, can't see that sitting indoors. Ditto the stars and moon in the night sky. Glorious.
Click on picture to enlarge.

Long weekend in Bendigo

We stayed at the venerable (1897) Shamrock Hotel in the center of town, walking distance to fantastic restaurants such as Bazzani's, good breakfast venue in yet another converted bank (Mully's Cafe), and the wonderful art gallery with its own cafe. We did manage to do things other than eat and drink (Bendigo pottery, eucalyptus distillery, the talking tram). Want to go back for more!


Our room was at the top right of photo.......We sat in these chairs in the lounge.
Me sitting in the lounge. Mel and his mother enjoying our picnic lunch in the hotel room.

Isn't this lovely?

Orzo, rissoni, whatever you call it, rice-shaped pasta is great!

I love this pasta because it's like having two starches at the same time. And let's face it: the rice shape makes it so much easier to eat than other pasta shapes. Here's a recipe Mel made last night.

1 ¼ cups walnut pieces
good olive oil
2 cups orzo
170 g (6 oz) firm feta, crumbled
2 quarters preserved lemon, sliced (see below)
rocket leaves (didn't have this on hand, but results were fine without)
sea salt and pepper (what's with this sea salt lately in so many recipes??)

Heat a little olive oil in a pan over medium heat and fry the walnuts until golden.
Cook the orzo in boiling salted water for 11 minutes. Drain and place in a warm serving bowl. Sprinkle over the feta, the preserved lemon and walnuts. Top with a good handful of rocket leaves and drizzle with olive oil. Grind over some black pepper and serve immediately.

The recipe is from a book lent to me by Dennis, another colleague of mine. Don't you appreciate these men who cook? Dennis is best known for the cakes he bakes and brings to work. One has become a Forbes Family Favorite, and we refer to it simply as "The Dennis Cake". I'll post the recipe one of these days.

**WARNING on the preserved lemon: MIX WELL! Last night Mel made this again, but some of us got more preserved lemon than we would have liked. In some recipes I've seen instructions to rinse the lemon first.

Another Forbies Folly...

At long last, the Japanese teahouse is finished!

And it's portable, so if and when we move...

There is also a light behind the moon window, and at night it looks really beautiful. Unfortunately my attempts at taking a photo of it last night didn't work, but I'll get the live-in Kokak person to have a go.

How do librarians choose the books they want to read?

As a matter of course we are inundated with book titles, so it's more a matter of being very selective (and despairing of ever getting around to reading everything of interest). I collect book reviews from the newspapers, and used to put them in a database which I would print out and bring with me to the library. That became too tedious to update, so I'd just cut out the reviews and put them in a binder. Very messy and un-librarian-like. I still do that but often have to wait ages for books to become available.

No, I am not a librarian who orders books just because I want to read them. But I do go through the library's New Titles Lists which are published every Friday. That's a work-related activity as I send lists to academics who might be interested in particular titles. If I do see something I personally want to read I can reserve it electronically, thereby having a ready-made reading package waiting for me the following Friday.

Another method I use is to read all the books by an author if I've enjoyed one of their books. I'll read them one after another so I can really get into their style.

Sometimes I just resort to a bit of serendipity - shelf browsing. That's how I found Ruth Jhabvala's Booker prize winning "Heat and Dust". I've read most of her books because of that one chance encounter in our 1.5 million volume library. Ok, not so chance, as I knew where the Indian literature in English was, and was in the mood for it that day. And one of the best places for serendipity is in the returns area, especially if you're lucky enough to work in a university library where students will be reading a good selection of titles. That's how I came across Alice Sebold's "The lovely bones".

Up until last year when he retired, my colleague Max was a great source of reading suggestions at short notice. Sometimes I'd be about to leave for home when I'd realise that I needed to replenish my supply of reading matter, but had no list at hand. No problem: I'd just ask Max, who would never be at a loss for titles. The best book he ever recommended was "The surgeon of Crowthorne : a tale of murder, madness and the Oxford English dictionary". Does this sound like something librarians would find a good read? Oh dear. It was also comforting to find out that Max shared my dislike for a book that had won a major award, namely "The life of Pi", which won the Booker Prize. I miss Max, not just for his reading suggestions, but also his love of reading, which is not a given amongst librarians, believe it or not. And Max brought to librarianship a very healthy bullshit detector, always a good antedote to the corporatisation of the library world.

The day at Mt. Macedon

......................................The gazebo where we escaped to



Sun and rain at the same time!

Also some hail thrown in...

Typical!!

Yep, that's Melbourne. Last Sunday we drove to Mt. Macedon to escape the heat, but after briefly walking around in a lovely private garden open to the public for the day, the heavens opened. Fortunately we were close to a garden gazebo where we waited out the rain, and the temperature didn't drop too much. We've had some more warmish days since, but I think we'll be in for more autumnal weather from now on.

Yesterday I celebrated the start of a whole week free of teaching library skills classes - good to clear up the debris that piles up on the desk during the start of the semester. Today it's my turn to work the Saturday shift, but I'm looking forward to Sunday and Monday off.