on Britain’s Got Talent… and it’s amazing. Watch this! Nessun Dorma is one of my favourite pieces of music.
I am gluten free
Tessa: I just discovered this great new website called I am gluten free . Webmaster Ellen discovered that she was celiac a few years ago and has thrown herself into re-creating gluten free versions of yummy and delicious treats she used to previously enjoy. I just tried her blueberry muffins and they were truly fantastic. I didn’t make the streusel topping but thought they were absolutely yummy as did Dave. Next I’ll be trying her GF chocolate chip cookies. I’ll let you all know how that goes!
Filed under Recipes
The Pope Hat
Tessa: There’s something about the Pope wearing that crazy pope get-up that you just have to admire. There he goes all around the world giving big-assed speeches in those crazy outfits. I wonder if he ever wonders, if the rest of us are wondering just exactly what he’s doing in those crazy things. I wonder if he wonders, if we wonder, just who is designer is? One thing I know for sure, it’s definitely not Stella McCartney!
And what the heck does he have on underneath all that stuff? Tights? Does he wear jockeys or shorts? If they’re shorts are they the fitted cute kind that show off the bum in a nice way or are they the lose cotton ones that you can get at Walmart three for $12.00? Is there a special pope outfit that Benedict wears when he gets up in the morning, you know before his morning pee and maybe after breakfast. Is he really wearing the pope outfit when he’s idly nibbling at his biscotti thinking about big worldly pope problems like discouraging all those crazy people from using birth control, figuring out how he can bomb Africa so he doesn’t have to deal with that nasty AIDS problem, all those naughty uncelibate priests forced forced forced to diddle little boys and girls, and why is there so much administrative drudgery and pencil pushing associated with sainthood?
You know the Pope actually reminds me a lot of me. I used to walk around with a towel on my head thinking that everybody thought that the towel was my long beautiful terrycloth hair. I would spend hours trying to catch glimpses of myself as I walked by windows thinking how great my long hair looked. Then, because I was also a weather prophet, I would stand in front of my brothers and sisters and make pronouncements, not unlike the Pope, about things like the weather, and anything else I thought I could get away with. And for awhile people indulged me (especially my mother) because they thought it was cute. But then, like the Pope, I didn’t want to take the towel off my head, even when I went to bed or at breakfast while I pondered my empire. Soon I was saying crazy things, and my mom took me aside and we had a little talk. “You’re losing touch with reality sweetie. I know you love your ‘hair’ but I don’t know how to tell you this but it’s not really your hair. It’s fake. And you know those weather pronouncements that you’re extorting money from people for, they’re not real darling. We’ve been playing along with you to help build your confidence. And well to be quite frank, partly because you’re so delusional, we haven’t known how to deal with this little bump in your development… but sweetheart it’s time to take off the hat /hair/towel/conehead and get in touch with reality. What do you say?”
As you can see me andel padre have lots in common. Well, when I was eight anyways! But the pope is 80. I think he can take off the hat, get out of that get up and stop with his ridiculously conservative pronouncements. The world has moved on.
Filed under Random Musing
Gluten Free Corn Chapatis
Tessa: When I stopped eating wheat there some things I really missed and as a lover of Indian food chapatis were one of them. But you know the old saying when one door closes blah blah blah. Well, it’s true. The Modern Ayurvedic Cookbook by Amrita Sondhi has a recipe for spelt chapatis and corn chapatis. I can’t eat spelt either so you’ll have to buy the book to get that one but I will share the corn one with you!
1 cup ground corn flour
1/2 tspn salt
1 tbsp ghee (or olive oil)
1 tbsp plain yogurt
1/2 cup corn meal (cooked)
1/2 cup cold water (you might need more)
In a large bowl, combine corn flour, salt, ghee and yogurt then mix. Add cooked cornmeal and mix again. Add water 1 tbsp. at a time and knead with your hands to form a dough. If too moist add more corn flour. If too dry add more water one tablespoon at a time. Divide dough into 6 evenly-sized balls. Rub hands with a little olive oil and on a lightly floured surface, shape balls into a 5 inch flat circles.
In a dry heavy bottomed non-stick frying pan on medium high heat, cook each chapati for 2 or 3 minutes on each side. Set aside in ovenproof dish. Repeat with remaining dough. If pan gets too hot reduce the heat. Experiment to determine optimal heat. Separate chapatis with wax paper and brush with ghee if you have to keep them warm in the oven before serving! Rip into them any time you’re ready! (Her vegetable curry is very nice you could try it with that!)
Black Bean Soup
I’ve been making this black bean soup for years and Dave and I both love it. It’s super easy to make and takes almost no time.
6 cloves garlic [roughly chopped]
1 large yellow onion
1 tbsp. olive oil
2 large carrots
salt and pepper to taste
1 tbs. Mexican chili powder
1 tsp. cinnamon
4 cans black beans [19 fl ounces or 540 ml]
1 can diced tomatoes [28 ounces 796 ml]
1 litre of organic veggie stock
4 green onions [finely chopped]
sour cream
Chop the garlic and the onions and saute in a large pot over medium high heat until translucent. Add chili powder and cinnamon, salt and pepper. Then add the carrots and cook two or three minutes. Strain the beans and rinse under water and add them to the pot and stir around a bit. Then add the can of tomatoes and the veggie stock. Simmer on medium heat for about half an hour to forty minutes. If the soup is too thick add a little bit of water or bouillon to it. Once the soup is done allow it to cool. Then blend the soup either in a food processor or a blender until smooth. Serve with a dollop of sour cream and garnish with green onion. In truth Dave and I are never that consersative with this soup and we eat it with nacho chips and if we’re feeling super decadent some grated old cheddar cheese. YUMMMMM. You can also freeze leftovers which is nice. Now go wild!
Intergalactic Travel
Tessa: So last night Dave and I are walking out in the trails behind our house and it’s a beautiful night, still a little cool but the sky is indigo and the air is moist and smells like spring. You can smell everything growing and blooming and it’s nothing short of delicious because I’m with my boy and our dog and life just doesn’t get much better than those moments. So we’re chatting and Dave starts telling me about this movie he saw as a kid, he was 10 but still remembers it well. It’s called Cocoon and it’s about people who decide to give up everything on earth to become immortal intergalactic space travellers. Then he pauses on the trail and looks deeply into my eyes and just when I think the night can’t get much better because I’m going to be kissed amidst all the beauty of this moment, he says, “I think about it a lot.” “You think about what? ” “You know getting on a space ship. Going to another planet. Maybe to planetron. I always think about that movie.” “But we haven’t even traveled here yet.” I say. Then he tells me about the scene in the movie between the grandpa and the grandson and how they’re out fishing and grandpa says to the boy “I’m going away son.” ” When will I see you again?” asks the boy and grandpa says, “Never son and that’s just the way it’s gotta be.” And off he goes to intergalactic glory. So all of this begged the question which I then asked, “Would you go?” “Yes,” he said. “But I’d beg you to come.” That’s nice. Dave already has one foot on his space ship! Then we kissed but somehow I was still perplexed.
Filed under Uncategorized
On Beauty: Zadie Smith
Tessa: I just finished reading On Beauty by Zadie Smith. Usually before I post a review or comments about a book I go on line and read a few other reviews. Both Salon.com as well as The Observer wrote lengthy and glowing reviews so I’ll refrain from doing the same here. Needless to say this comes as no surprise as the book was both the winner of the Orange Prize for fiction in 2006 as well as shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2005.
The book has been hailed as a brilliant homage to EM Forster’s Howard’s End for it’s study of contemporary upper class academic culture with all of its foibles and pretensions. Set mainly in New England but also in London On Beauty traverses the ups and downs of two long feuding families the Belsies and the Kipses.
Howard Belsey, ostensibly the lead character in the novel, is a British professor at a New England liberal arts college. His area of specialty is the deconstruction of the myth of Rembrandt’s genuis, an area if study that has made little impact on anyone outside his immediate circle. He is married to a wonderful black american woman called Kiki with whom he has three children.
His nemesis is Dr. Montague Kipps, a black conservative academic of caribbean descent who has earned his stripes in the British op-ed pages by writing against affirmative action, and seeks to deliver a series of lectures called Taking the Liberal Out of Liberal Arts.
Neither of these characters are particularly inpiring but what they do is serve as a cultural representation of two spectrums of contemporary, cultural and social thought. To that end the book does get you thinking about the issues and ideas related to this. For example, in a free country where freedom of speech is hailed do liberals in the interests of guarding against anti-hate have the right to curtail this very right.
Howard’s and Monte’s posturing on these topics as well as the nature in beauty in art leaves you wondering who cares? Really who does care about whether Rembrandt is hailed as a genious or decried as far less? And in the post September 11 landscape and the ensueing illegal war in Iraq and the almost constant nonsense that hails from the White House and more, who truly gives a crap?
So I guess that’s why it took me so long to read. Who cares about these people? As a measure for where we are culturally in our hallowed ‘educated’ communities I think Smith does a brilliant job of penning a very good satire.
The character that did touch me in the book was Kiki, Howard’s wife. She was from Wellington but not of Wellington which I actually read somewhere else but it rings true. She is not like anyone else there including her own shallow husband. A large black woman, her kind of smarts hails from within and has much more to do with life knowledge and empathy than with book learning. I liked her and thought she was the story’s redeeming character.
For all of the reasons listed above I think the book is a good quick read but my next selection won’t be about deconstructing the dreadful, full of hot air ‘upper classes’.
Filed under Book Reviews
101 ways to torture your husband
Dave: Tessa and I decided to take an evening class together. I voted for oil painting, woodworking or pottery. Tessa voted for Indian cooking, jewellery making or yoga… we needed a second vote. My next choice was co-ed ball hockey, Tessa picked … 101 ways to torture your husband. After a third round of voting we agreed on Pilate’s for core strength. Seeing as we both have many sports injuries, that have now turned into carrying the groceries injuries or getting out of bed to go pee in the middle of the night injuries, it seemed like a great idea.
I pulled on my best pair of cutoffs and grabbed a towel (who needs a mat) and off we went. Once in the gym I noticed it was me and eighteen women, all in very stylish workout gear (except for Tessa who had her baggy track pants on with gravy stains). The teacher told us to put our hands on our mid section, just below our bra straps, and take a deep breath so our breasts stuck out……. I could hear the ball hockey game starting down the hall.
After an hour of breathing, pelvis thrusts and exercising the muscle that holds in your urine, it was time for the body lifts… okay I’m not sure what the official name is but it’s when you lie on your back and lift everything so only your shoulder blades and feet are on the floor. It seemed easy enough… until my hamstring decided to pull… I think only the people immediately beside me heard the muffled scream coming from my tensed body. I thought this class was supposed to give us strength not injury… Tessa was having a good laugh watching me struggle. I wondered what all the other husbands were doing. I limped to the car after class… not before asking the teacher for a good hamstring stretch and if we would get a full refund if we dropped out after the first class.
I wasn’t sure what to expect going into this class, but I have to admit, I felt great the next morning and we both had an amazing sleep. I have a full week to rest my hamstring before our next class of: 101 ways to torture your husband.
Filed under Random Musing
Gluten Free Flour Mix and Pastry Recipe
Tessa: After years and years of suffering horrible stomach pain, bloating, the runs, chronic fatigue and massive stomach aches, I finally figured out that I can’t eat gluten. It was a long rocky road getting there and truthfully I wish that I had figured this out at the beginning of my life rather than the middle of it. The good thing about it is that I was so desperately unhealthy by the time I figured it out that when I was finally able to put two and two together, ie. the impact that this would have on my life as an avid cook and eater, I was too sick to care and extremely grateful to be out of pain. Continue reading
Filed under Desserts and Cakes, Recipes
Japanese Indestructible Underwear
Tessa: While Dave is off having adventures, I’ve been holding down the fort with the help of my Japanese Indestructible Underwear. There’s nothing like a piece of clothing to give you the fortitude to get through life. Friday at work was going to be a long day so I knew I was going to have to have some extra support so I went off to work wearing my Indestructibles. And you know when the going got tough and the Gravlax was giving us all the big finger and you wanted to take the dish and turf it out the window for a visit with the bobcat, I thought about my Indestructibles which have been with me for 15 years. Say what you will about Japanese products but they have staying power like nothing else. I bought them when I lived in Japan and have had them ever since. Two pairs. These days they’re pretty much retired and only called on for very special occasions like Friday. Yet like Rosie, Agatha and Salad, they have a kind of spark and durability that I admire. So screw all the crappy products that fall apart after one wash. These babies are like new and like all my other ladies they give me power!
Filed under Random Musing
Condofire 