(no subject)

[freyakitten]

More impressions (having done more brain processment) and incidents that I found amusing from last Sunday...

• The toddler (<12 months) being held up to see by a parental unit, and beating time... On said parents' head. Good sense of rhythm.
• Meeting up with my sister at Carols after the concert, showing her my boots as part of the narration of the nights' events. Being (gently, 'helpfully') told that "They're stripper boots", and responding, "No, they're Demonias. If I were wearing Pleasers, you could say that." Getting the 'oh my god, I was just trying to help you be more like me, and you don't care' look. Laughing at the incredulity on said sister's face because I let her know that her advice meant nothing. Asking for the benefit of her advice on the bottles of wine in front of her, and thereby cutting off the incipient scene at the knees. Freya: 1, Sister: 0. This year. BOOYEAH!

Works' Christmas do was on Thursday. They know how to reinforce the feeling that they care about their workers, they do. Probably because they actually care. We got Christmas presents, and champagne, and beer, and nibbles, and then walked down the road to the Elephant & Castle to be fed dinner. It was very good and I was duly impressed and have eaten mostly fruit since, because I'm not hungry. I keep having the feeling that it's dinner time, but then again, my body is still processing the massive good food infusion. I love fish. Can't get enough of it. Tend not to buy it, because I don't get around to cooking it before it goes off. So I had the Fish. And it was Tasty Fish.

Think Cat in Red Dwarf in whichever episode includes the line "The fish of the day is trout a la creme. Enjoy your meal" after having finished said Tasty Fish.

The sticky date pudding was also to die for. And the chicken camembert (sample was forthcoming). We took the bus home, with pockets full of candy canes.

Comments

[penguin2.livejournal.com]

What on earth is sticky date pudding, anyway? It seems to be dead popular here as a dessert, but since places seem to serve it all chocolated up, I can't investigate with my mouth. I have to say that the concept of dates and chocolate sounds eww-y...

[freyaw.livejournal.com]

Basically a steamed pudding, with dates as a major ingredient. Properly, there should be no chocolate, it should be accompanied by caramel or butterscotch sauce. Without the heresy that is whipped cream from a can! There are as many varieties as there are cooks - the easiest way to make it inedible is to make it too rich.

Bastards' favourite version involves large chunks of chocolate, toffee-like ingredients, and is stupidly heavy and rich.

Here is the Burkes' Backyard version: http://www.burkesbackyard.com.au/2004/archives/2004/food,_health_and_nutrition/sticky_date_pudding

[penguin2.livejournal.com]

Thankee! The SO loves dates, so I'll give it a go. Might even try some myself, though usually I don't care for puddings...

Good choice of music BTW :-)

[freyaw.livejournal.com]

The only places it is proper to eat puddings at Christmas time around here are airconditioned heavily, until you need to wear a jumper.

It's just wrong to be eating hot pudding with (ugh!) custard in temperatures over 30C.

My mother, when she moved here from New Zealand, promptly created her version of Christmas pudding, which involves icecream instead of flour. A little too much nutmeg, this year, and not enough alcohol-soaked dried fruit, nor nutty things.

[penguin2.livejournal.com]

That wouldn't be my style - I hate hate hate ice cream! We had trifle instead, which I made with chunks of fresh (mostly tropical) fruits, Marsala-soaked sponge, homemade vanilla custard and strawberry jelly. Trifle is one of the few desserts I actually like.

We also had a gorgeous turkey (fruit and ginger stuffing, and I cooked the bird in mead and cherry juice), which, because I cook it by steaming under foil and then finishing "naked" *just* long enough to brown the outside skin, was utterly-to-die-for juicy...unlike the previous day's one at my Anglophile friend's house - she comes from the Cardboard Turkey school of cookery - and masses and masses of fresh veg, spuds, roast carrots and pumpkin, mixed salad, sweet and sour red cabbage...won't have to cook again for days and days :-)

[freyaw.livejournal.com]

Mum traditionally does a duck (which can just be stretched for four people if there are lots of veges and Mum and my sister stick to their diets) stuffed with fresh cherries and cooked as you describe. With cherry sauce as well as gravy (yummy fatty from scratch gravy, not that salty flavourless travesty known as Gravox which I despise and detest - do you detect a hint of obsessiveness? :P ). She never does enough potatoes, though. Having experimented with quantities ;) my father and I (together) can eat up to five kilos of roast potatoes within 24 hours of their being cooked, no matter how many other things are cooked.

The last time I had Dad over for dinner while Mum was at church, I cooked the same amount as I cooked for both the Bastards' parents and two family friends. Dad left less food behind. I find it difficult to cook in normal people quantities ;)

Bastards' great-aunt made him a trifle for Christmas. I hate them. If made with fresh ingredients, such as you describe, they're not bad, but the custard is still not worth the after-effects of lactose intolerance.