...

4 attempts, a bakers dozen of eggs, 1 litre of sunflower oil and I can say I've successfully made mayonnaise!

Im almost ready!

I've just completed hour 5 of the Michel Thomas corse for iPhone! Yippee!

French Nouns and their definite Articles

When I was younger I never realized how effective 'Look, Cover, Write, Check' was. I'm memorizing French nouns along with their gender of articles and this method is working like a charm. I write a list of say 15 words or so and memorize them within a week. Then change the list to new words once I've got those down pat. Here are some I'm working on:

Mad as a hatter

The party was a magnificent success! There was tea, nibbles and sweets galore. Red Queens, Rabbits, a few Alices, Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum, A White Queen and a Mad Hatter. 'Drink Me' potions, 'Eat Me' cake,

Derp!

It seems Im living life in ADD. I have so many dreams, passions and aspirations Im trying to do that Im getting sidetracked by all the other dreams, passions and aspirations Im wanting to do that I only DO half of the things Im trying TO DO! GAH! Its frustrating. Anyway Ive done a few sketches, STARTED reading The Pillars of The Earth (Ken Follett - its amazing by the way), attempted a painting, sluggishly wadded through books of French grammar, wrote up an exercise and diet regime (that I will stick to religiously - No more Tim Tams for me), continued with my 100 day Bible reading plan, cooked a risotto which resulted in my breaking the stove, signed up to tennis lessons, stressed a tonne for my visa/tried to come up with an alternative solution, tried to master a piece of emotionally charged sheet music by the brilliant Beethoven ANNNNND I just accidently burnt my hair on my bedside table tea lights. Fuck life. Im going to watch Little Women in bed and conk out.

Spring

The sun is out, it's been in exile and is desperate to shed light.

The temperature is slowly rising...

There's hope for us after all!

Origami!

For my gorgeous little sisters 9^th birthday we are having an Alice in Wonderland tea party. And yours truly is the mad hatter. Its slowly creeping up and I haven’t thought of any costume designs yet but Im sure ill be able to razz up something on the day. Anyway, for the decorations we need 100+ cranes and other beautiful origami shapes so were slaving away all night folding and folding. We ended up making around 20 cranes each so we’re halfway there.

As I was searching for instructions on how to create shapes I stumbled upon these aperture lamps by Claire Norcross. They’re at a store called Habitat in Paris! If only I had known about them when I was there I definitely would’ve popped in and seen them.

It hailed today

Hobart is greyer than ever today.

It hailed while I watched on in wonder.

Listening to this makes it alright.

Listening to: Arcade Fire - The suburbs

Lomography

Digital film has taken the world by storm, there are many more people embracing a passion for photography than ever before. So, is film photography dying? Lomographic society begs to differ. And I for one am riding on the train with arms flailing incessantly.

Im in love with lomography.

 

Quel est-il? Pretty much lomography is taking a cheap plastic ‘kodak’ camera and POSSIBLY making an interesting and artistic print. You must be very cleaver in choosing the right subject, lighting conditions, etc, and know how to make use of the cameras defects. There is an extremely fine line to creating a good lomography image. Lomography cameras, like the Holga and Diana are made almost entirely out of plastic. They sometimes have problems with light leaks, soft focus or colour fringing because of the poor quality lens, however its this aspect that will create a parfait image IF you know how to take advantage of these defects….key word: IF.

I wanna give it a crack!

Listening to: Led Zeppelin - Whole lotta' love

Serge Gainsbourg - Les Sucettes

Les Sucettes; a song written in 1966 by Serge Gainsbourg for a budding singer - France Gall, is a song about a girl sucking on an anis-filled lollipop. Unfortunately, the underage Gall had no clue that the song was an innuendo for oral sex, apparently her guardian’s didn’t either. Or peut-etre they were in on it too...

High fashion perler beads by Sabine Ducasse

"As DIY crafts go, perler beads are about as simple as they come — lay them out, sit an iron on top for a few seconds, and they’ll stick together. (We won’t say ‘easy’ because even perler beads are easy to screw up.) While our creativity was limited to ironing 2-D representations of our favorite cartoon characters, designer Sabine Ducasse’s Melting Pot collection wraps a wearable, iron-melted sheet of the little dots around a person. Ducasse’s retro style pops off her model, bending around the shoulders like a set of pixelated wings. Even the styling is retro, in an 8-bit, psychedelic way, but Ducasse’s throwback to old toys was modern enough to win her a scholarship at the International Fashion Academy. The contest’s “East Meets West” theme was perfect for the French-born, Shanghai-based designer, whose collection saw the hemispheres and the decades literally melt into each other."
                                                                                                                     - wired.com

 

 

The Flag Of Japan

Spread the word to raise funds for Japan

www.japan-flags.com

Listening to: Simon &Garfunkel - Bridge over troubled water



Je parle français!

Oui, d'accord seulment un peu. I bought a baguette and a wheel of camembert. It was nerve racking and exciting. I forgot the word for a plastic bag so opted to juggle my wares to the car. Go team!

Coconut Chicken Curry

 

I stood before the mountain of curry gastronomy and took my first timid steps. Halfway through I almost admitted defeat and cried out in frustration to my maman “My curry tastes like shit!” in which she raised a sarcastic eyebrow “Hmmm, have you tasted shit before...” and preceded to give me her non-text-book-acquired wisdom of ‘How to fix anything’. A pinch of this, a splash of that et VOILA! A curry I can admit I made, with chest puffed out gallantly and a strut that would knock Naomi Campbell off the runway. This recipe is quick, easy and uses basic ingredients but still has a wicked depth of spicy taste and heat.

Ingredients

2tbs veg oil
750g chicken thigh fillets, trimmed & cut into thirds
2 potatoes chopped into cubes
1 lge handful of green beans
1can of bamboo shoots
1 onion sliced into thin wedges
2 garlic cloves chopped finely
1tsp ground turmeric
2tbs red curry paste
1 lemongrass stem, trimmed, bruised & thinly sliced
1sml red chilli, deseeded & sliced thinly (if you like hot curries add another chilli or seeds)
1can of coconut milk
15 fresh curry leaves
1cup fresh coriander leaves
½ lime juiced
Cooked Jasmine rice (I cooked mine with a can of coconut cream and thinly sliced spring onion)
Coriander sprigs & lime wedges to serve

 Method

1. Boil potatoes in seasoned water
2. Heat oil in a wok or frying pan over high heat. Add half the chicken and cook for 3 to 4 minutes or until golden. You want to sear the chicken without cooking it the whole way through. Transfer to a plate and cook the remaining chicken.
3. Reduce heat to medium-high. Add onion and garlic, using a wooden spoon sautee until the onion is transparent. Add turmeric, curry paste, lemongrass and chilli. Cook for 1 min or until aromatic.
4. Stir in coconut milk and curry leaves. Add potatoes, green beans and bamboo shoots. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat to low. Return chicken to wok and simmer for 15 - 20 minutes until chicken is tender. Stir.


Easy as pie right? I then translated the recipe into French which took longer then making the actual curry!

 

Im a glutton for punishment I know

 

Listening to: Aretha Franklin-I dont want nobody

A bit of heavy reading

Im reading or should I say translating un petit livre by Gustave Flaubert titled Un Coeur Simple. Ive done un traduction of the first page and its very interesting. Translating french into english is no easy feat let me tell you! When you translate word for word the sentence more often than not doesnt make sense, however I will prevail!!!!!!!!!!

Listening to: Francis Cabrel - L'encre de tes yeux

Oooh Yeahhhh...

I want to try every single one of these...!

Listening to: King Harvast - Dancing in the moonlight



Weekend Indulgence: A simple salad

With so much to do stuck inside typing documents/reading and studying my French textbooks/watching newly acquired seasons of sex and the city ;) and my general laziness confined to the space of my bed, I haven’t done any outside projects. Still I did manage to plant some annuals in my garden bed, as well as some tomatoes, basil, parsley, rosemary and lettuce. The lettuce has taken very well with their spot because I’ve harvested them 3 times since planting them! The crisp tender leaves taste best sprinkled with fleur de sel and a whisper of vinaigrette and olive oil. This evening I added a few cherry tomatoes, a perfect complement to the delicate leaves. There is a special pleasure in eating food straight from the garden, something you have planted, tended and harvested, n’est ce pas?

Listening to: Creedence Clearwater Revival - Have you ever seen the rain?

Au revoir

I can smell the croissants baking even now on this side of the world...

Im not there yet but I will be soon!

Listening to: Craig David - Unbelieveable

Alliance Francais Blog

If you enjoy blogs then this one sponsored by the AllianceFrançais is one Ive become obsessed with recently. One could say it’s a Francophiles delight!!! The blog itself is contributed by the Alliance Français staff, students, teachers and their members. There are movie reviews, discussions about art, music and culture in general, and posts about the joys of travelling and living in France. There are posts of local interest, but theres also posts that would interest readers no matter what country they reside in. One of my favourite posts is this one:

"Too Little, Too Late

by Guest on Jul 8, 2011 • 2,765 views 12 Comments

Why knowing just a little bit of French can spell big trouble

Had I seen this picture back in 1987, I would not have learned the hard way that knowing a little bit of a language can be a dangerous thing. It was that summer when my husband (still just my boyfriend) and I took what turned out to be a glorious vacation, a week of cycling in the Loire Valley. I was conjuring up my high school French, even then a distant memory, and he was relying on me to do the talking. And actually, I wasn’t doing half bad. We figured out how to get our bikes from Orly to Paris and then on to Angers by train, found charming hotel rooms and delicious meals in one town after another, and enjoyed the chateaux and sunflowers along the route.One night in Orléans, tired after a day of riding, I spotted cervelle d’agneau on the menu.

“Great!” I thought. “Agneau is lamb and I love lamb!”

But when my meal arrived, it wasn’t a lamb chop. It wasn’t even a slice of mutton. It was unmistakably a lamb’s brain, albeit swimming in butter. So I did what any hungry cyclist would do. I ate it. I’ve never forgotten the word cervelle. (And I’ve never ordered it again either.)

By Anne Schwartz"

LOLLLLL! I really hope this never happens to me. Luckily I have a boyfriend who Im sure will bloody well tell me if Im eating brains or not! Sheesh! So if you have time check this blog out.

The basil arm workout

I work in a place that is filled with people consumed with a passion for food. Their passion is infectious and I often learn many new things about vegies, meat, pastry, bread and other fascinating facts about food. The two owners are constantly researching new food ideas and creating new meals, pastries, breads, etc. It’s inspiring to see so much ardour in someone’s life. Today I taste tested a baked grapefruit with caramelised sugar, yesterday it was a spiced wallaby pie, the day before it was a ‘mighty mulligatawny’ soup! The BEST goddam soup I’ve had in all my 22 years!  -btw Im attempting to make this soup soon so Ill post about it. Everything at the store is locally sourced in Tasmania or are from non-commercial businesses and everyone who works at the store love to cook, buy local and in season and share recipes and ideas. Last week it was kumera (sweet potato) this week the conversation was centred around basil and what to make with the masses we had.

Pesto, obviously!

However, instead of making ordinary pesto with pinenuts we suggested pistou - a simpler version of pesto with basil and olive oil blended to the desired consistency.

The ironic thing is that Pistou is an olive oil based basil sauce from the south of France (mon amour) that closely resembles pesto. True pistou is made by hand, you tear the basil leaves in pieces, then add them to a mortar and pestle with olive oil (garlic can also be added) and grind them together until you’re left with a silky puree of basil and oil goodness.

We (namely them) shared some of our favourite ways to enjoy pistou. The one I tried for breakfast this morning was with poached eggs on sourdough baquette drizzled with a good serving of pistou. I must admit I got a mini arm working out from all the grinding but it was definitely worth it. Peasant fare, to be sure but absolutely bangin'!

I sprinkled it with parmesan cheese to give it a bit of oomph!

Now where to buy a food processor...