Little Flutters

When I was a young teenager, every school holiday my father and I used to travel an hour into Sydney to visit the library. We lived out near the suburbs of Blacktown and while it would have been easier to go to the local library, my father and I were convinced that Sydney’s books were magical, brand spanking new and packed with ten times more knowledge than the battered versions we had at the local. Maybe it was the journey that made the books that much worthwhile, or maybe I’m showing too much of my nerd streak right now.

The Sydney library had the most extensive Anne Rice collection I’ve ever seen. The goth that I was drooled at the collection. These books took commitment to carry around, they were bigger than the bible and weighed twice as much, yet I found myself borrowing and re-borrowing them, I even lugged a couple to Sri Lanka and back! My parents were so proud of my vivacious reading, if only they knew what I was reading; delicious illusions of immortality, love between men whispered in French, bisexuality and explicit slivers of porn. One of the books even had a lusty hermaphrodite in it. I’m laughing as I think about my informal education.

Eventually it got to this stage where I was re-borrowing these books but getting frustrated because other (presumably) teenagers were putting holds on my books. Filled with the romance that these novels imparted, I wrote on a Post-It note something similar to this:

Hi there,

I don’t know you, but I love Anne Rice. My favourtie book is Merrick. What’s yours? I also like Dimmu Borgir and Cradle of Filth. Do you like death metal?

Enjoy this book

Lots of love, a fellow fan

Yes, I’m serious. I stuck that to the inside cover of a library book in the hope of finding a kindred spirit. Needless to say, I didn’t, although when I checked last, nobody removed the note.

Ten years and a one-way trip to Washington D.C later, I was borrowing this library book to find someone has left a shopping list in there. I couldn’t be more stoked.

A shopping list is completely voyueristic. One can only guess at the type of person who felt the need to write cheese and crackers twice. And on the back of a church’s form. I’m imaging a fit woman in her 50s with blue-tinted hair and wrinkles around her eyes. She has to be F-I-T, look at her diet.

Click through for higher res version.

Click for larger pic.

This brings me to our first ever adventure on Little Flutters.

I want your shopping list! I want us to reach out to complete strangers like a love-sick teen, to show a window into our stomachs. To look for similarities and hope for a connection.

I will only link if you want to, otherwise it’s totally anonymous. It can be scanned or photographed, let your creativity reign.

Send to tash@littleflutters.com and have some fun with this.

Lots of joy and hugs,

Tash

Make the extra effort to do this recipe. You won’t regret it. It could be your staple dish to make when people come over. The great thing is once all the toppings are on and you’re good to go, you leave the pizza to rise one more time for half an hour. That gives you enough time to clean up, platter up some appetizers and have a beer.

You’ll need:

• Olive oil
• Semolina (make the purchase, it’s worth it)
• 1 3/4 cup warm water
• 1 tablespoon rapid-rise yeast
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 41/2 – 51/2 cups bread flour
• 3 tablespoons tomato paste
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 1 sprig of basil, chopped
• chives, or any herb you prefer
• artichoke hearts
• char grilled capsicum (red peppers in U.S land)
• sliced red onion
• sliced ham and/or Italian sausage. Use chorizo if you can find it.
• sliced mushrooms
• goats cheese, sliced
• parmesan cheese, grated
• cheery tomatoes, sliced in half

1. Line a baking sheet with baking paper. Smear olive oil on the sheet and dust with semolina. In a mixer bowl, whisk by hand the warm water and yeast. Let it stand for three minutes so it disolves.
2. Whisk in sugar, eggs, oil and salt. Add flour, mix with a wooden spoon and knead if necessary to form a soft dough. Put the dough back in the bowl, sprinkle a little bit of olive oil on the top and cover with cling wrap. Put in a warm place, such as the top of the fridge, for 1/2 an hour.
3. Chop all of the toppings to any size you like. In a small bowl, mix the tomato paste, garlic and basil. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface and let rest for ten minutes. Lightly roll out the dough to a large rectangle or circle.
5. Brush the surface with tomato paste mixture. Distribute toppings.
6. Turn oven to 350 Fahrenheit (175 Celsius). Cover the pizza with cling wrap again and let rest for 30 mins.
7. Bake until golden brown on the edges, approx 25 minutes. Cut, enjoy.

Some cookie recipes require you to mix, fridge, cut, fridge, cook, cool. Well, I say “screw that!”. I know you want to cook a Sunday indulgence, but nobody wants to stand around for that long. This is a basic, delicious choc chip cookie that will keep for a week and a half, if you have any sense of control that is.

These were delicious, soft and doughy on the inside with a crisp, brown sugar taste on the outside. Next time, I’m adding more choc chips!

Gather to your bosom the following:

• 2 and 1/4 cups baking flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup softened butter
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 3/4 cup brown sugar, pack it in baby.
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups choc chip cookies
• 1/2 cup of any nuts you like, I put in sliced and toasted almonds.

1. Preheat the oven to 375 Farenheit or 190 Celsius. Sift the flour, baking soda and salt together in a medium sized bowl. Put the butter and white sugar in a bowl and using a mixer, beat until it’s incorporated well. If you’re feeling like the hulk, whisk by hand. Add the brown sugar and mix again. Add the teaspoon of vanilla extract, more if you like your vanilla.
2. Break and add the eggs, beating after each one. Don’t taste it by the spoonful after this.
3. In thirds, add the flour mixture. It should be really thick now. It will taste floury but don’t freak out. Using a wooden spoon, gently mix in the choc chip chocolate and nuts. If you use your mixer, be wary of blitzing the choc bits into tiny, tasteless pieces.
4. Plop tablespoons of the mix onto an ungreased baking tray. The cookie will expand to nearly triple the size of what it is now, so leave space accordingly.
5. Cook for nine minutes, leave to cool on the tray for two minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.
6. Eat two immediately with a glass of milk.
   

When storing left overs, use an air tight container with a slice of bread. The bread controls the moisture, making sure your cookies stay fresher for longer.

You can store the uncooked dough for a week in the fridge and two months in the freezer.

Let me know if you make it!

I called these everything scrambled eggs because you can put almost anything in them. I would draw the line at strawberries or chocolate however. Anything savoury is fine.

Before I give you the recipe, I just want to take a moment. Look at these eggs, dear reader. They’re 100% white. It’s straight out of a nursery book. The States continues to amaze me. Interestingly, all of the organic and cage-free eggs are brown. Could white eggs be a form of chicken stress?

This is what I had lying around my kitchen:

• eggs
• a dash of milk
• sliced mushrooms
• leftover grated cheese
• sliced red onion, about 1/5th of an onion.
• 1/2 an Italian sausage, if I had chorizo, I would have used that.
• some chives, chopped. Add basil, garlic or oregano if you’re so inclined.
• cherry tomatoes, I used hierloom tomatoes, they come in lovely green, red, orange and yellow colours and taste like little juicy bits of heaven. I haven’t seen them in Australia, though. Sorry Aussies!
• salt & pepper
• dash of sweet chilli sauce
• roughly 1 tsp butter
• chop sticks
• a big ass pan

1. Break the eggs. What you saw at the start of the post is one generous serving. Three or four eggs per person please. Season with salt and pepper. Add a dash of milk. Just eyeball it.
2. Make sure everything you’re adding is in itsy bitsy pieces. Nobody wants a big piece of onion in their mouth. Chop away.
3. Add the herbs, onion, sausage and mushrooms first. Then gently mix in the tomatoes and cheese. Because my love has really odd mouth buds and I feel guilty over my low tolerance of chili, I add around a tablespoon of sweet chili sauce to give a little bite.
4. Heat the butter in the big ass pan until it’s sizzling then add the egg mixture. Leave it for a minute to settle a bit.
   
5. Get your chopsticks. Instead of using a spatula, I want you to hold onto these babies like it’s 1999. Use the chopsticks to break up the egg batter. These work like a dream when it comes to getting the perfectly sized scrambled eggs. If chopsticks and spatula had a scrambled egg showdown, the spatula would be in tears before the yellow had turned brown.
   
6. Keep on mixing until you start to see brown bits in the mix. Take off the heat and serve with whatever you want. Enjoy!
   

What’s the craziest thing you would put in scrambled eggs? What have you actually tasted that wasn’t half that bad?

I took a long break, sorry, the Australian Summer called and I answered. For three whole weeks I stayed and got crispy. It was wonderful. I didn’t wear jeans, not once, all through out the Christmas and New Year celebrations.

Admittedly, I’m feeling home sick now that I’m back in Washington D.C. It must have something to do with the minus degree average temperature. I spent today moping about in tracky daks and indulging in hot dogs and smoothies. Jet lag is a bitch, but only when you’re getting into your schedule back home.

So, without further ado, here’s something uber easy that would make going back to regularity and routine seem not so bad. Serve this with coffee for afternoon tea or show up unannounced with this wrapped in a warm cloth.

You will need:

I asked Jodi Holiday from Sympathy for the Kettle what makes a perfect cup of green tea. She dished up everything she knows about the perfect brew.

How to tell you’re buying the good stuff: When drinking green tea, you are essentially drinking dried tea leaves. Non-organic will effect the taste, so organic and freshness is important. Holiday warns “A lot of small tea gardens will not be certified organic due to inability to meet organic certification…yet they are still perfectly organic. Know your tea and what you are putting in your body.”

Buy packaged tea that has a shelf date or ask where your tea comes from. If they don’t know, don’t buy it.

Loose tea is fresh for a year without loosing vibrancy.

“Know these important attributes when buying tea and you will start to see the difference between quality tea and blah.”

Do you strain or stew your tea?

Strain black and herbal teas. “Green, oolong or white leaves, I leave the tea leaves in the pot or cup infuser basket and keep on adding more water.” Never stew or brew on the stove.

“Popular Asian belief is water should be well below boiling; merely hot so it doesn’t scald or burn the tea leaves so you don’t lose nutrients and taste.”

Making the perfect cuppa.

Asian culture measurements use a few grams per 8 to 32 oz (230mls to 950mls) of water. “Size of green tea leaves vary and some people like it strong and others light. You can resteep the leaves over and over again.”

In Japan, Taiwan and China the first infusion of teas are not consumed. The second and third infusions are prized as the most tasteful. Some Chinese start their day with a few grams of tea and refill that same tea for the rest of the day. This is awesome to do in Winter. Keeps you warm and hydrated. “The first infusion has the most caffeine yet antioxidants and vitamins are continually released through multi-infusions.” said Jodi.

You can add milk to all your teas, if your palate agrees. “There have been studies that show milk breaks down the enzyme in the molecule that aids in preventing heart disease.” But that shouldn’t stop you adding milk if it makes your tastebuds tingle.

“I like to drink tea pure rather than with a sweet on the side.” Jodi recommends this Orange Blossom Cake to make when company calls.

What do you drink?

“I prefer Matcha, Japanese ground gyokuro leaves, in the morning. I make it as a latter, mixed with water, honey, steamed milk and soy. Makes a great satisfying tea latte.”

Chargrilled capsicum (or peppers, for y’all Americans) is caramelised goodness that is perfect for picnic trips and sandwich stuffing. Rather than a bitter, sharp taste, grilling the capsicum gives it a sweet, mild flavour. Roanna Goanna, my 14-year-old sister showed me how it’s done; quick and easy with plenty of time to roast some marshmallows. The things we make younger siblings do…

First, grab your capsicums. If you’re a clean freak, give them a good scrub. I figure that you’re going to peel off the skin, so what’s the point.

Turn a gas stove or a grill (boiler) on. If you’re using the stove, put any wire rack you have over the direct heat to minimise mess. Put the capsciums on there. Turn every couple of minutes.

Roast marshmallows.

Once the capsicums have reached an all round blackness, take it off the heat and put in a bowl. Cover with cling wrap.

Wait until the capsicums are cool, about half an hour. The steam makes the skins slide off.

Peel. Don’t wash them unless you want it flavourless. You can core capsicums by running a knife around the stem and pulling them off. Take off all the white pith and slice into chunks.

Thanks goes to Roanna Gonna for not burning the house down while wearing a “chef’s uniform” and inhaling marshmallows.