Nourish Me

what actually matters

I was talking with Phoebe after yoga late last monday night, chatting about food and the politics of it all at the end of a class, about the awful (god, how) paleo diet and the energy that food picked, then cooked and eaten fresh as possible brings to the table. It's hardly surprising that Phoebe is a vegetarian. She's the spiritual kind of yoga teacher, not the sweat-it-out-in-a-gym kind. It was quite nice to have a sensible conversation about food for a change.

There's some pretty farking weird stuff going down in Healthfoodland at the moment. I want to stick a fork in my eye about Belle Gibson.  

How to eat responsibly? Simple. This, from Michael Pollan, is all you need to know:

Eat food. Not too Much. Mostly plants. 

It won't cure cancer, but it might help prevent it, and you'll be energetic enough to enjoy all the Good Things that life throws your way. It's easier to hop on the latest food trend wagon than it is to face up to what is true, to what actually matters. Just eat your vegetables, okay. And if you don't happen to like vegetables? Grow up. 

(note to self: during winter, when planning for summer, try to remember that yellow tomatoes suck... :') 

april the first

Two older men - the word elderly confers a status neither deserves - in as many weeks have expressed appalling, bigoted attitudes toward powerful women while browsing in the shop, in conversation you see, and both times I have pulled them up and told them - calmly - that I will not tolerate those ideas. The first subsequently stole the book he was so proud of being a hateful part of, the other, just yesterday, backed right down and spent a good sum of money. Sensed he'd gone too far. The real shame, of course, is that neither of these men are likely to change their thinking any time soon. I tell the story to illustrate this simple point: the less we tolerate ideas so abhorent to our own, the more we open our hearts. Twenty years ago I'd've been too scared to say anything in response. These days? No fear. 

The equinox now behind us, my gaze shifts internally with the season. This new moon - the beginning of the astrological calender - has me thinking hard about some of the things unlocked of late. Truth be told, my gaze has been inward for some time; I will be 43 fairly soon and time feels precious in a way that it has not before. In dreams I search for keys to unlock some long held stuff, stuff that, annoyingly, is just as elusive in waking hours, but that's not stopping me. I'll get to the bottom of my creative-spiritual-sleeping isss-ewes when the time is right.

Sounds a bit heavy, but honestly, it's just the normal internal dialogue written out loud.

 

We've been renovating on the hill. That's contributing to bad sleep, I am sure, as well as a lack of rhythm. I had an hilarious conversation with another male customer, one who is delightful and au fait with the female of the species, who makes his living as an artist. Chatting at the back counter about Goya and other important things, I told him at one stage that I am embarrassed to be having middle class conversations about renovating. John kindly reminded me it's my sacred space up there, where creative work gets done and that it should be made into a bigger space - however modestly one is doing so. Letting Go is turning out to be the theme for this year. 

 

 

Wish I had some food to share, but apart from vats of hummus (beetroot hummus is the current fave) and 101 ways with zucchini and tomatoes, we're eating super simple food. Here's something interesting, though. I used to be addicted to potato chips (what the Brits call 'crisps') but of late, no longer desire them. At all. I do not know what happened, but I'll take it.      

 

A HUGE thank you to all involved in the International Court's decision on whaling. Made me cry with joy this morning. Hooray!  

 

how to make an apple cake

Head out into the garden, along the boggy side where the mint grows in its almost wild state. If you're lucky, the cockatoos may have left some fruit on the secret tree in the back corner.  

You only need three, maybe four just to be safe,

but pick the tree clean anyway, 'cause they'll be back soon enough.

Little blighters always are.

Peel, core, then weigh those apples, because Nigel says so. (Sarah, darling, scroll down to the very bottom of the page) His wholemeal, apple and marmalade cake from Tender | Volume II is worth taking your time over. Trust me.

Break the eggs. Faff around with your lightmeter and the laundry sink for a bit, before whisking, and continuing on your merry baking way. 

And there you have it; a sophisticated, lusciously damp cake with the kind of crumb that people will chase around a plate, that also keeps very well, and owes quite a lot of its charm to the dedicated use of wholemeal flour. 

The kind of cake I love.

 

(the suggestive tomato is just a bit of fun...)

 

 

plenty

The Thursday before the Easter long weekend is always a happy jumble of  madness and excitement and, in our part of the world, a feeling that, at last, the harvest is in. That Good Friday this year just so happens to fall on the same day as the first Seder of Pesach meant that an early morning visit to the organic vegetable shop was crazy-good. A beautiful older woman sidled up next to me, basket heavily laden, and asked if I'd ever made chicken soup. We discussed the pros and cons of peeling the carrots and parsnips, whether swede would be a good addition (I think not, but perhaps I am wrong) and it was one of those gorgeous food chats I so love. 

Made my morning, truth be told. That and the visual plenty that boxes overflowing with apples and pears, quince and persimmon, fennel and celeraic (andandand) can make a cook feel.    

Right at the end I spied fresh horseradish, in a bucket  just beneath the herbs - if we didn't have so much parsley, I'd've gone nuts for the autumnally-fragrant dill draped softly above it. Only the loveliest of specimens came home. Horseradish is an essential part of the Seder plate, you see, represents the bitterness of the Jews' slavery under the Egyptians. That I grabbed it knowingly made me happy upon reflection; means I've been with these blokes long enough to have absorbed at least some of their 5000-year plus culture.

The light here is beautiful right now. This season of plenty is by far my very favourite. 

Happy break, guys. May it be energising and renewing for all.     

P.S. YOU guys. Thank you for all of your mint suggestions - I feel as though I am armed, now, with some of the best ideas. Wonderful stuff, people.   

radishes

Guests one late May weekend, Peter's sister and her husband Steve. Fossicking in the garden turned up perfect, tiny radishes, the kind reserved almost exclusively for chef platings and highly stylised food shots, each globe no bigger than a fingernail. Choosing just the right moment to tease your radishes from the soil is crucial. Nigel Slater's advice is the best I've found:

"Radishes are ready to pick when you see their shouders nudging through the surface of the soil".

As with anything so utterly beautiful, the less you do, the more you reap. The larger, spikier leaves can go into dinner, but leave the smaller, sweeter ones in tact. Entirely edible handles. Loathe as I am to say this, say it will: shop-bought here simply will not do. 

Eaten, rather unstylishly given how pretty it all looked, at the sink, tasting and adding and enthusing as we went.

radishes for a crisp appetiser (or a girlie sort of lunch for one) 

Arrange just-picked-and-washed-and-dried radishes in a single layer on a wide, shallow plate. Drizzle with some good olive oil - something you like the taste of, raw - squeeze over some lemon juice, add coarse sea salt generously and, Michelle and Steve thought this key, some cracked green olives.

Later I thought that tiny snippets of anchovy might be good, but they'd need to be nice, i.e. probably expensive. Also, I am slowly making my way through Andrea Reusing's "Cooking in the Moment" (it's o-kayish - don't rush out) and she uses ume vinegar in some of her salads, which reminded me how much I adore ume vinegar, and, in tiny droplets, it'd be worth a thought in place of some of the salty things above.

(orchard)

the nashis do not last long off the tree; the pears and the crabapples do.

a little wilderness

Two road lead to the Blue Mountains. The Great Western Highway takes you through the vast, flat plain of suburban western Sydney, fast and furious, all a blur, straight to where the tourists want to be. The other is the Bells Line of Road, a slow wind upward to where it is misty and cool, bellbirds chiming clear from their hiding spots, high among the trees that line the hairpin turns. We always wind the windows down to hear them, hushed, waiting for that first heralding call.

We are bird lovers every one of us, in my little family.  

Bilpin, where the apples grow, was our destination, just me, mum, dad and Miki, a furry little ball of warmth pressed up against my thigh in the back seat on a grey Friday morning. Striped Fuji's (a glorious, butter-yellow flesh) were the mission, but we what we were really looking for was Autumn Proper.

Hard to avoid, really. A serious hedge is my next project, I swear.

On the way back, we took a right into Kurrajong, heading to Bowen Mountain, in search of a little wilderness. Blink and you'd miss it, so unassuming is the signage. Honeysuckle Cottage.

The kind of garden nursery I dream about. Romantic, yes, but not so prettypretty to be without purpose. I like a useful garden. Culinary herbs - bronze fennel, angelica - medicinal herbs, and heirloom vegetables meander among overgrown roses (old ones, not much in the way of frou-frou here) and salavias, flowers gracefully bending, seducing tiny, lightweight birds. Primroses in shades of butterscotch and gold. A place to explore, to get lost in. Heaven.

 

Just heaven.

 

up early

at mum and dad's, late april. 

signs of autumn

A pot of quinces poaching on the stove, a fug of vanilla wafting slowly through the house.

Hefting home, each time I venture out, a new squash, another pumpkin.

Apples and pears and persimmons (those I love). And mandarins.

It's a riot of flaming reds and oranges out there. 

bounty

from this,

to this

in just six months. it's an extraordinary planet we share.

(inspired by tea)