Buy Local Eat Local

In an effort to buy more local produce I've joined a local food buying group. We've got quite a few popping up all over Brisbane. We try and order fruit, vegetables and eggs from local farmers. We've also got local dairies, bakeries and grocery suppliers on board and some of our members even sell their own stuff too... meaning our trips to the supermarket are less frequent and we spend a lot less of our money there.

Gelato in Albert Street

Happily for the ice cream shops in this part of the world, it's never too cold for gelato or ice cream.

Juice Bar Art

Watermelon carvings outside the juice bar in the Brisbane Square markets.

Happy Mother's Day!

Breakfast was made for me this morning by my 13 year old daughter. It's 2 pancakes with jam in the middle and icing sugar on top!

(Luckily for her there were plenty of off-cuts to eat. Unluckily for her dad there's a pile of washing up)

Dog Food Cake With Brain Icing

We had a bit of a neighbourhood party on Sunday - which co-incided with one of the local dog's 10th birthday. We told the kids it was a dog food cake with brain icing. In the end their curiosity got the better of them!

Corroboree Preparations

Continuing on with the Sovereign Embassy story... it's still there, just in a different part of Musgrave Park. They have 3 tents: one for men, one for women and a kitchen tent. The controversy seems to have died down and on Sunday there was a Corroboree to help celebrate National Sorry Day. It was a beautiful autumn day - warm in the sun but chilly in the shade. I hung out for about an hour or so but things were taking their time getting off the ground. I was especially looking forward to seeing some dancing but I had to leave before it all started. The BBQ food was all donated by the local church and elders ate first.

Kids' Painted Eggs

 

 While we were away camping, one of our talented friends set up an "art camp" for all the kids. One of the activities was painting hard boiled eggs with food colouring. That dark red one with the green circle was my favourite. Painted by Darcy.

Early Lunch

 

I made this one up today: Chilli tuna omelette with cherry tomatoes, red pepper, spinach, cheese and smoked paprika. Delish!

Snag A Vote!

It's State Election time today in Queensland and the competition is fierce between polling stations as far as who is offering the best food. A friend of mine said that he was going to travel around South Brisbane today doing a survey to see which polling station offered the best food! My daughter's school houses our local polling station and capitalised on the opportunity for a fundraiser so we set up some BBQs and a home made cake stall. We even put some of the kids to work, selling breakfast rolls to the queue of voters while they were standing in line... It's great having a captive audience!

On the BBQ menu today...

Sausage in bread: $2
Bacon and egg roll: $5
Rocket, haloumi and roasted tomato roll: $5

Keeping Watchful Eyes On The Ice Cream Cake

When the temperature outside is really muggy like it was over the weekend, the only real solution is to stuff your face with ice cream cake. This one was lemon sorbet on the outside and chocolate ice cream in the middle....yum!

Lunch Special at The Red Hen

Crispy skinned salmon with lemon and garlic roasted potatoes and a pear and pea puree. The pear aspect was interesting. I'm not sure it worked for me but the rest of it was just fab. Particularly the potatoes.

Heritage Tomatoes

These are also called Heirloom tomatoes. I suppose $10 a kilo a bit more expensive than the bog standard tomatoes you can buy in the supermarket but they taste better too. And if you like, you can save a few and squash them into the ground for your own home grown! The difference between these and the normal hybrid varieties is that these seeds will produce top quality fruit season after season. 

I am still working on that possum-proof enclosure.

What I like about 'tu'.

One of the things I love about growing turmeric in Brisbane is that for several months of the year it hides away. The only sign it's there is when you dig underground and find the orange root which looks a bit like ginger or galangal and is excellent grated on just about anything. Then, in spring, tiny green spears poke through the soil for what seems like only a moment before they shoot upwards and unfurl these huge thick leaves. After a season or two you start getting the flowers which, as you can see, are really beautiful. But the BEST thing for me is that they seem to thrive with no attention whatsoever. My kind of plant.

My favourite recipe using turmeric at the moment is Parsi Scrambled Eggs. It's the breakfast of champions. Use the powder in the cooking and then grate the root over the top. Delicious!

P.S. Australians born in Australia tend to pronounce this plant/spice without the 'r' and with the 'tu' and in Tuesday. ie ' Tu-meric'. We all know that this is wrong and that the correct pronunciation is with the 'r' and the 'tur' as in 'turban': Turmeric. Feel free to argue with me but I know I am right.

Anyway to make the title work I've adopted the Aussie pronunciation.

Paul brought us back some yabbies from Somerset Dam

If I had been on the ball a bit more, I could have entered this one in the Animal theme day yesterday but my mind was elsewhere. They are like mini lobsters. As a matter of fact, I was tucking into some this time last year. Excellent in a curry or just chargrilled on the BBQ with lime and chilli. Mmmm.

Again, apologies to vegetarian readers.

Yesterday's Birthday Lunch at Pearl Cafe (and Animal theme day!)

My thanks to Joanna. I had completely forgotten about the theme day but she pointed out in the comments that as today's City Daily Photo theme day is "Animal" I could still enter! (apologies to my vegetarian readers)

Being that a friend and I share the same birthday, we felt like we should make a bit of an effort so we trotted off with a few of our frocked-up mates to the Pearl Cafe in Wooloongabba. I had the ploughman's lunch because I am a bit sentimental it reminded me of home.... except it was much fancier than any ploughman's lunch I've ever had in England. There was smoked Wagyu, leg ham, homemade pickles, pommery mustard, cornichons, sourdough, French butter, mature cheddar and a mouthwatering dark brown pickled onion which I think was preserved in balsamic vinegar and a watercress salad. It was glorious.

It probably should have been washed down with a mug of real ale if I was being a purist. I plumped for several glasses of ice cold sparkling wine instead. You need it in this heat, really.

Click here to view thumbnails for all participants and hopefully to see pictures of animals more alive than this one.

Salad Days

Bloody Marys all round! With plenty of Worcester and Tabasco. And Vodka.

Tea and Cupcakes at Donna's

 Donna had cooked a surplus of fairy cakes for one of her kids' end-of-year class parties... so I helped her out there. Not normally photo-worthy until she brought out the fancy china. Dead posh or what?

Baby Paw Paws

Going out for dessert with Oriana

Oriana had the "lavender creme brulee with frangelico grapes and marble tuille". I went for the "'Spanish-style doughnuts with espresso ice cream and spiced chocolate sauce" (pictured).  It's really hard to take a photo of your dessert when you are salivating as much as I was.

We decided that the creme brulee was a bit eggy. But the espresso ice-cream made my eyes cross with pleasure. And the French waiter was gorgeous.

 The restaurant was Luxe in fortitude Valley.

Dinner at Alegria

We went out for tapas last night in Milton at Alegria and the highlight for me was this salad. There was goats cheese, baby beetroot, radicchio, "petite herb" (I don't know what that is but it included fennel), green beans and really crunchy garlic croutons. 

 

Absolutely top notch!