A new pot and and the break up

This weeks culinary post involves change in our lives. The (now ritual) Sunday night cook up with the youngest son has branched out nicely with such dishes as hand made gnococci with 4 types of mushroom sauce and even a lasagne with 7 types of roasted meat in it. In the search for new dishes, new authors are sought out and this week a Chinese dish was presented for production.

Regardless of how you view me, at heart - I'm Lazy guy.

This means if I can only use one pot then all good. If not I will immediately invoke the " I cooked you have to clean" rule. This is especially true if it was a messy dish that required every pot and pan in the house.

So the idea of a one pot meal has intrigued me greatly. The main problem is I have never had a "one pot"

Its something that has eluded me until now. I was admiring an earthen ware pot in the store near me, the sales lady called out to me from behind the counter " Very good pot, can do everything" then I thought what the assistant then said was "one is in Chinese and one is in English, you need the English one" So I started sorting the boxes in to piles of Chinese marked boxes and English marked boxes. Turns out what she actually said was " one side is in Chinese and the other side is in English just turn the box over"

Now I have to throw out something out because the cupboard is full and because clutter is not good
As per this post you need to be organised you can't keep everything. Problem is I'm chicken.

I don't know which item to move out in the cupboard to make room for my new baby.

So I delegated the task. I left the pot on the bench above the cupboard and waited. And as per standard operating procedure, the beloved cleaned the cupboard and found room for the pot. The mere fact that something did not have a place was just too much for her to bear.

So now I don't have the guilt of having to look at the pot or item that was discarded and say " Thanks but it's time we broke up as I need to use other pots "

Its essentials a win / win situation.

I'm just to soft when it comes to this sort of thing.

Anyway on the the recipe.

2 Brown onions chopped
50g ginger
some coriander stalks chopped
3 cloves of garlic
60ml oil
1.25 kg of shin or brisket cut into 4cm chunks
2 tsp Chinese 5 spice powder
6 star anise
1 tsp peppercorns
1/2 cup of brown sugar
1/4 cup light soy sauce + 2 tsp dark soy sauce
2 tsp tomato paste
700ml beef stock

Jasmine rice to serve.

Preheat the oven to160c

Grind up the ginger, coriander and garlic in to a paste ( I used the mortar and pestle because it's fun )

Heat up the pot on the stove top with the oil, cook the beef for 3-4 mins in batches and set aside.

Lower the heat to about half and cook the paste you made with 1/3 of a cup of water for 3 mins. Add the star anise, five spice and peppercorns, cook for another minute and then add the soy sauces, sugar, tomato paste and the beef. Sir thoroughly and then add the stock so it just covers the beef. Bring to to boil then put on the lid and transfer the pot to the oven for 2.5 hours.

It will look like this - sort of a stew

Remove the beef from the mixture with a slotted spoon and set aside in a warm spot. Boil the remaining sauce on the stove top until it reduces to at least half the volume and thickens up a little.

Put back in the beef  and you're ready to go. Serve with the rice.

Getting the kids to eat new things....

There is a plethora of studies around the introduction of food and food types in the first two years of a child's life on earth. Most of them to point to the direction that is - that the kid will pretty much put anything in their mouth *  - so why not get them to try all sorts of food and get used to it ?

And with out putting too fine a point on it we have extended family members who have very, very narrow food tolerance ranges. So we are painfully aware of the outcome of not being at least a little adventurous.

We have always had a mantra in the house " It's not a restaurant fella, that's what 's for dinner". Which really serves two functions. The first is -  we don't have time for everybody to have a separate meal prepared and secondly -  try different things it's good for you.

And when I look back at my food experience's as a child it would certainly indicate a predilection for eating well.

I'm blessed to be married to a very good cook and I've been told that I'm not too shabby myself. So it's fair to say a dish like this is common place.

Prosciutto wrapped white fish with lemon mayonnaise and asparagus

And all catering for parties is done by The Beloved with us constantly in her way ably assisting  including such jobs as
- Hand deep frying one by one Won ton wrappers, only to have the box they were in dropped and they all shatted
- Picking off the tiniest pieces of fennel and adding the to the the exact tip of a salmon mousse hors d'œuvres without denting the tip.

But it doesn't always go the way you want. The beloved once tried an eggplant dish on us, we all took the first mouthful and well, the look of horror said it all. But persistence beats resistance and we got more adventourous.

Any way our youngest grabbed this spirit of adventure and starting helping out with cooking. It's now at the stage where he and I cook over the weekend.

But not just anything.

Nope we get down the cookbooks and pick really stupidly difficult awesome stuff. Take this effort

Jamie's Hunter Lasagne

Here is the recipe and as you can see its a cracker.

The recipe is very thorough and we had to really get some substitution going on, as I just didn't find a hen pheasant nor did I find a pigeon that I was happy to touch let alone eat.

Also I pretty much used ever pot and pan we had over a 5 hour period. It was truly exhausting. Try Roasting four types of meat and then try separating them into what resembles a big bowl of hair even before making the sauce.

Any way all I'm saying is encouragement seems to breed learning. I'm just concerned about the level !

So as I watch him leaf through "Heston at Home" I just hope that it's a dish that doesn't require anything to be ordered from a science store or that requires a permit from customs.

*( I've seen a cousin eat a cockroch so it must be true)

Entertaining. It's like flying a plane you know

My earliest memories of dinner parties that my parents held are my sister and I getting up early  the morning after when the sophistication has gone and all that's left is some  Carrs Water crackers with a slice off egg and a small teaspoon of fish roe on top. The "caviar" has stained the egg slightly black but it's still a mouthful of adulthood - snuck while they are still asleep. The remnants are cleaned up quietly and the room is done.

The next room holds a a treasure trove of half finished deserts, dirty coffee cups with their rims gently marked with lipstick of all shades and in the center of the table - the ultimate prize - Tulip After dinner mints. The rectangle white box and the mint - in a small brown envelope - was what we were here for. You could sit up in the big chairs around the table and slide the mint out of the envelope and then put the envelope back in the box. The perfect crime.

After all how were they going to remember how many had been eaten ?

The rooms still smelt faintly of cigarette smoke and stale perfume. All of which to us was just another example of complete sophistication.

The diner parties were strictly off limits whilst they were in full swing. If you were going to interrupt it you better have either Ebola or have been the victim of a shark attack. Children were to be not seen and certainly not heard

My parents were the masters of entertaining, everything was perfect, from the gold rimed Noritake dinner set to the individually polished silver cutlery. The guests would arrive and champagne corks and polite laughter would pepper the evening, and then after a while they would all move from the lounge room to the dining room to consume delights prepared earlier.

Image courtesy of http://3.bp.blogspot.com

Well that was the 70's and 80's. Fast forward to today and the pressure to entertain well is akin to being a pilot of a 747. One wrong move and lives are at stake.

I'm blessed to be married to a woman whose attention to detail makes OCD look like a common cold so I'm ahead of the crowd from the start. But don't think that makes it any easier, nowadays Masterchef and every other TV chef proclaim to be able to make even The Incredible Hulk able to cook up a five course meal in 30 minutes or less. So the expectation is already set.

And to make matters worse the meals have to good for you as well, because the minute you re-create Adrian Richardson's Crackling Wrapped Pork Roast  with mash and tarragon salad, some one pipes up with the calorie count and the next thing you know the forks start going down on the table.

Now days portion control is a major point of contention. Serve up an American portion and you'll be howled down, serve a big plate with the food as a desert island swimming in an ocean of sauce and people will look to you for assurances that there a  lot more courses to come. You simply can't win.

There's now even a movement of people who only use ingredients that are transported  less than 100 kms away from where they are, which is fine but that would mean I would have to start keeping cows and banana trees in the park around the corner. Which would be pretty hilarious watching all the people walking their dogs in the park trying to stop them from eating cow pats.

image courtesy of gorenm.com

Anyway entertaining has certainly changed and if the people you are inviting over have even the remotest interest in food and you don't want them to get  Social Commitment Phobia when you invite them over, you can't just slap some Coles sausages on plates and hope for the best.

No,  you are going to have to do research, preparation and planning. Which means you have to get all those cookbooks down from the shelf and read them.

Again I'm luckily ahead of most people as we have been given a plethora of cookbooks over the years from which to research from. I often wonder with all the millions of cook books purchased/gifted if anybody actually makes dishes out of them (besides us) or are they simply used as a conspicuous display of knowledge.

So next time your better half says " Hey we should have our friends /family over for [insert occasion here] " I'd think twice especially if they don't like Coles sausages....

Bring back the tradition ( please ? )

When I was a youngster there was a tradition. It occurred on Sundays and it was never missed. No , I'm not talking about church (its not that kind of blog) I'm talking about the Sunday roast. Served up sometimes for dinner but mostly for lunch. There was a great deal of formality around this , the arrival ( dressed nicely of course) the pre-meal catch up , the seating and finally the ceremony of carving at the table.

Picture courtesy healthyfoodguide.com.au

It used to vary between Chicken , Lamb and Beef, but the method and the output was always  the same.

Picture courtesy themeatbarn.com.au

Now my Grandparents struggled a bit with the concept of how much food  two growing grand children (both of whom were training in a swimming pool 6 days a week ) can consume. I remember they once served 1 roast chicken to 8 people.
It did not end well , Mum was scraping food off her plate surreptitiously to my sister and I ( we kept returning the brussels sprouts )  whilst trying to keep her wine glass full.
So it was not uncommon for my parents to purchase more food (usually McDonalds) on the way home to keep us quiet and interested in maintaining the tradition.

You all know that I love gourmet cooking and you all know my wife is a kitchen goddess so please don't think I am saying lets get plain , no all  I'm asking you to do is put down that  "Sugar Cured King Fish with a Mussel  vinaigrette " for one day and bring back the roast  (ensuring enough for all ) and celebrate being together with the people that mean the most to us over a simple and nutritious meal.

 And hey, if you cook too much , don't worry,  the leftovers are just as much fun as the roast itself !