There is a market post in the works, mostly speculating on why on earth it suddenly seems to be autumn in the marketplace – seriously, pumpkins, venison, kale, more pumpkins, carrots, pumpkins again, mushrooms – hasn’t Melbourne noticed that spring is only a few weeks away? Our seasons aren’t just upside-down from the Northern Hemisphere, they are sideways and kind of weird.
Anyway, in lieu of actual content, last night’s Birthday Dinner menu:
Olive bread
Chicken in a pot with Aioli
Roasted Potatoes, for which I really must write the recipe sometime, since I can make them in my sleep and everyone loves them (except Andrew who doesn’t like potatoes. Odd man.)
And, the pièce de resistance – with resistance being the key word here, because it certainly resisted all over the inside of the oven in a spectacular and fairly appalling fashion – gingerbread brownies with strawberries, cream and caramel coated hazelnuts, plus gratuitous toffee, because I couldn’t just sit there and let it set in the saucepan, now could I? That would be wasteful.
Is this dessert not a thing of beauty and a joy forever? Or at least, a joy as long as it stays on the plate and the palate, which wasn’t all that long, really…
Isn’t it beautiful? It would have been even more beautiful if I hadn’t knocked over the hazelnuts before they were set and broken half the spikes. Oops. And if I had managed to make non-explosive cupcakes, though the random oh-good-grief,-what-do-I-have-in-the-fridge brownies were still very good.
The moral of the story? Practically anything suddenly looks classy if you add toffee to it and put it on a nice plate. Wisdom for the ages…
(The other, even more important moral of the story? Get a self-cleaning, pyrolytic oven. They are the klutzy cook’s best friend…)
Another gratuitous picture, because I am very impressed with myself right now.
Right, back to the trenches for me – this blog is either going to be very quiet or very chatty over the next few days as I go into mad wedding-cupcake-planning mode. Wish me luck!
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This time last year…
Recipe: One Step Up from Takeaway Chocolate Rush Festival Truffles Again, and a Little Gloat