Christmas in Adelaide

Merry Christmas

I spent Christmas with Liam's family and up in the Adelaide hills, we opened a few bigger presents at home and then took the car up the hill to have more present opening and a scrumptious lunch. We had Turkey AND roast pork with roasted stuffed pumpkin, beer bread, roast vegies, purple cabage and the most important cauliflower cheese. after all that food we went for a cooling dip in the pool and I tried out my new rashie (top so stop you getting sunburt when swimming). we chilled out in the evening with the corpse bride dvd, I do love that film.

On boxing day we headed back up to the hills but this time we took our bikes on the train, it's great bikes travel free if there is space. We had lunch with Liams family, amazing chick pea patties but I didn't get the recipe, followed by a bit of wine blending. Liams' sister and her husband were flying out today so we waved them off and set off on our bikes, soon we were going down Shepards hill road past Marion and on to Brighton beach, the beach was really busy and I felt free wheeling was cheating so we followed the coast around to glenelg and took a wiggly bike path back to Richmond rd in the city. All up we rode more than 20km and I am thinking of investing in bike shorts with some padding!!

Lamb Rogan Josh

Ok as I'm atempting to keep track of recipes that work,
I cooked this today and it came out tasty!
It's from Bowl Food I cycled down to the Indian Spice Centre on Goodwood Rd. They have really cheep bulk spices and so many amazing things it was hard to stick to the shopping list.

Rogan Josh
1kg bonned leg of lamb
1 tbs ghee or oil
2 onions chopped
1/2 cup plain yoghurt
1tsp chilli powder
1tbs ground corriander
2tsp ground cumin
1tsp ground cardamom
1/2tsp ground cloves
1tsp ground turmeric
3 cloves garlic crushed
1tbs grated fresh ginger
400g crushed tomato
30g Slivered almonds

1. Chop Lamb into 1 in cubes trim off excess fat.

2.Heat oil in large pan, Cook onion for 5 min until soft.
Add yoghurt, spices, garlic, ginger, tin of tomato and 1 tsp salt, simmer for 5 min

3 Add lamb, stir well till all coated. cook over low heat for 1-1.5 hours until meat is tender (my meat was quite fatty so seemed to take a while to become tender, I cooked for 3.5 hours) Remove lid and simmer until liquid thickens.

4.Toast some almonds to sprinkle over the top.


This was a nice spicy-ness for me,
the recipe also said to add 1 tsp garm masala once cooking finished mixing well and serve with almonds and fresh corriander, but I abandoned the recipe and just served it with the almonds.

December

So December is here already. wow.
This week I have mainly been trying to get Christmas presents posted to the UK before the last post on Friday.

So a few weeks ago me and the boy bought bikes. It's great Adelaide is so FLAT!!! there are very few slopes and nothing you could call a hill in the city. I've been riding to work even on night shift as there are so many great Bicycle paths. I got really groovy bike lights which go on the tyre valve so cars can see you from the side mine are mulicoloured. It's only about a 20 minute ride, but I'm feeling so much healthier for it.

Also, having a bike makes me go and do little things like popping to the supermarket on my bike to pick up a few things rather than taking the car or putting it off till we need loads of stuff as riding is so easy!!

We rode to Henley beach where we saw 22 Kite surfers. It was amazing. I'm not sure if it was a competition or something but so many all the way along the coast between west beach and Henley. we stopped for an ice-cream at Henley as we felt we had earned them. After the Henley ride we fitted out cycle computers which are great as they tell you how fast you are going and how far you've ridden which really pushes you to go that little bit further or try a little bit harder.

Yesterday we played Laser tag at zone 3 on South Road. It was great I haven't played since I was at Uni. I ended up 9th out of 20 and our team won 1 out of 3 games. I'd forgotten how much fun and how much energy you use up playing this will have to do this again.

Reading: The Kite Runner
Work: Going on to Afternoon shift
Wine: $2 Cleanskin white Chardonnay from dan Murphy
2star
Moods: on the rise.

Lamb and Mushroom Kofta

I found this recipe on a flyer from the mushroom shop, have been meaning to try it for a while, finally got around to it last week. was very tasty.

Lamb and Mushroom Kofta.

Serves 4
Cooking time 20 min
1tbs Olive oil
300g Cup Mushrooms, finely chopped
3/4 cup flat leaf Parsley leaves
1 small red onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1tsp ground coriander
1tsp ground cumin
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
400g lamb mince
olive oil cooking spray
Warm naan bread, yoghurt snd tabouli, to serve

1. Heat large frying pan over high heat, Add oil and mushrooms cook whilst stiring for 5 min or until tender. set aside.

2. Combine parsley, onion, garlic and spices in a food processor (oh how much easier this would be in a food processor!) process until finely chopped. add mushrooms and mince use the pulse button to process untill combined (or in my case put in big bowl and mix with wooden spoon) Season with salt and pepper

3.Use wet hands to mould heaped tablespoons of mixture around 8 metal skewers (at this point I had to run to the shop across the road to buy metal skewers) squeezing mixture tightly. place on a tray and refrigerate for 30 minutes if time allows.

4. Preheat BBQ on medium high, spray skewers with oil turning to coat all sides. BBQ for 10-15 minutes. serve with warm naan yoghurt and tabouli.

This came out well next time I will make them spicier by adding chilli and more cumin. We had these with home made Hummus and salad too.

Forky Tailed Issues

We are having some issues in our flat at the moment with what I call Forky Tails.
They are little bugs about 3cm long with a forked tail.
Today I found a dead one in the hall. yesterady a living one in the sitting room and a living one and a dead one in the bathroom.
Today I hoovered the Kitchen, Sitting room and Bathroom really well.
I gave the bathroom a good scrub, It probably all needs doing.
I didn't mind them so much when they were on the grapes I was picking as they ate the millie bug.
Last weekend our Neighbour pulled down the Passionfruit vine. The back garden looks so bare and way less private. I wish we had had a BBQ before it happened but it can't be helped. Liam thinks this is where the Forky Tails have come from as now there home is gone they are looking for a new one. He may well be right.
At the weekend we went to a 2nd Hand book sale and bought 5 carrier bags of books for $5 it may be time to buy a new book shelf.
Work Afternoon Shift
Wine Oxford Landing Rose
3 stars
Moods. Good-fair

Yikes

Oh My.

I kinda abandoned this thing and never came back.
well now i'm back in Adelaide and i have broadband so i have no excusses.
I'm not sure where to start or what direction to go in.
I thought i might do a catch up. lets see how it goes.

So Melbourne for the Grand Prix. I went for all 4 days and had a fantastic time. It was cold and rainy but strangly with enough sun to get burnt? The noise of the cars was thunderous. It was a fantastic race with LOTS of crashes and even when the cars were off the track they had some amazing V8 ute racing, it seemed very australian! After the race i walked along the track and watched michael schumachers ferrari be karted away on the back of a truck it was very smashed up. I did the british backpacker tradion of going to a neighbours night at the elephant and wheelbarrow. I met Steff, Boyd and Stuart, unfortunatly harold was sick and couldn't make it :( but i got my photo's taken with them and had a few beers.

I headed north to Echuca a small town on the murry river to pick grapes but unfortunatly work was scarse and I only stayed a week. Really nice town with the nicest backpackers i've stayed in it had an open fire and everything. I got my next grape picking job just outside Robinvale but it turned out the owners wern't very nice and when they punched a belgian backpacker and broke his glasses i thought it might be time to be moving on.

Back to South Australia for a short escape to the Clare valley for Liams birthday. Wonderful wineries were far too tempting and ended up buying a bottle in nearly every place. We stayed in a cool little cottage up on a hill with a fire and spa! Unfortunatly I was too hungover to stop in wineries in the barrossa so will have to save them up for another day.
Flew up to Brisbane then on to Townsville to visit friends backtracked down to Bundaberg and picked Tomatos for 3 weeks. Awsome backpackers Footprints. Flew up to Darwin (my Airmiles are pilling up) and spent 3 days camping in Kakadu national park, lots of pretty waterfalls. did many top end attrations including the deckchair cinema where a possum tried to eat my crisps. i also dicovered cold rock ice cream where they mash sweeties into your icecream. woderful in the humidity.

Took the Ghan Trian down to Adelaide via Alice springs and I did a 5 day tour of the rock and slept in swags at -4deg C i forgot it was the middle of the desert and would get cold at night! i was very happy with my beanie and water bottle filled with hot water i ignored all the howling dingos and slept happily through the night! really enjoyed the Red centre. back to Adelaide and worked in a coffee shop for 3 months and then landed a chem job in a lab. worked there for 5 months. Had a trip to Kangaroo island for my birthday and up to Brisbane for Christmas My mum flew out and surprised me. and over to Sydney for a wedding and trip into the blue mountains in February 07.

In May me and L went to Cambodia for 3 weeks our first proper O.s. holiday. It was a bit of a culture shock and very memorable. the temples the people the beaches adn the rain!

In September 07 I left Australia for New Zealand.
New Zealand was lovely I worked in a great Belgian Beer cafe in Auckland, which has the downside of tasty Belgian beer taking away all you wages! ah well fun times!
I bought a camper van called Karl and me and Liam traveled the south Island for 3 weeks over Christmas. It was great, i think my favorite memory was the Helicopter ride up to fox Glacier then hiking around till our toes went numb. We Zorbed, jetboated and jumped off a bridge in Queenstown. will have to go back with more time and money!

It was then time for a quick trip back in the UK (sorry to all the people i didn't get a chance to see, you'll just have to come here!) Mainly I was home in Shetland packing up stuff and visiting family old and new (so many new cousins while I've been away!). My mum sold the hotel Yesterday! HOooray!!! although it'll be really odd to go back to the bar and not have to collect glasses or just run to change a keg. So the most northerly hotel in the British Isles no longer belongs to my mum. she is happily retired and says she's going to sell all the clutter from her house on e-bay!

Me, mum, Chelsea (my niece) and my auntie Joan all flew out to Australia together.
Joan has family in Melbourne so we left her there and headed up to Brisbane to see my Brother his girlfriend and there 3month old Baby boy Oliver. Very cute.
Me and Chelsea went off on adventures leaving mum to hold her new grandson, First we went to Magnetic Island amazing peaceful backpackers attached to a wildlife park and wonderful beaches but unfortunately no swimming as it was stinger season and a boy had been stung. But we took a tour out to the reef and saw Coral and star fish, very cool. once back in Brisbane we went surfing, abseiling, wet and wild water park, Australia zoo had a fantastic time!

Now back in Ad working for a chemistry company and wondering what to do next?