My weekend has been the usual giddy whirl of domestic drudgery. It started at lunchtime on Friday when a nice man in a truck dumped three cubic metres of soil on the road in front of our house. My (handily underemployed) brother and I spent the next four hours shovelling the dirt into the wheelbarrow and taking it down to the backyard. I did my share of shovelling but James did the wheelbarrow bit, thank goodness.
So then I had a garden bed full of soil and people coming by for a quick Friday night catch-up. I made hamburgers ... it was the limit of my culinary abilities at that point.
Yesterday morning Phoebe and I went up to our local farmers' markets and I did a shift on the school sausage sizzle (the markets are held in the school grounds). We also bought lots of plants.
And then last night, because it was my MIL's actual birthday (last weekend was just the party!), we had her and FIL and SIL round for dinner. I did a peppered standing rib roast which I'd never done before, served with roast beetroot, roast potatoes, green salad (from my garden) and fresh sourdough bread, with chocolate creme brulee for dessert.
I was fretting horribly about the beef (still getting the hang of my swanky new oven) and also thought I've overcooked the creme (first time I've done a chocolate one - gilding the lily perhaps, but MIL has a terrible sweet tooth). But it all ended up as close to perfect as you need for a family dinner. I was so worried about it that I forgot to take photos, but it looked and tasted pretty impressive.
This morning, still in food mood, after Hol's soccer game we went into the city for yum cha (dim sum). I have been going to the same yum cha restaurant in Chinatown for 20-plus years - today when we walked in they told us they had a 'new system' whereby you order what you want. Well, dammit, if that's what I wanted to do, I wouldn't be going to yum cha, would I? So we left and went somewhere else, which had the right vibe, and food on trolleys trundling by with pleasing frequency, but the food wasn't up to scratch so now we're on the hunt for a new yum cha restaurant.
And that's about as much excitement as I can handle, so now I'm off to iron shirts.
How I amuse myself when I should be working
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Echo, echo, echo...9 years ago
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Under the greenwood tree9 years ago
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3 comments:
I can't believe it, no more East Ocean? Whoever heard of a proper dim sum place that didn't wheel by the options, setting you salivating and ensuring you order far too much (therefore increasing their profit). I'll have to take the family to your new place in November. God, I can't believe it ... after all these years
I envy your cooking abilities. We have so little time to cook (and so few people to feed) that I tend to go with the same few well-worn recipes.
Ma, I knew you'd be outraged! It's the end of an era, for us ...
Pseu, I don't truly think my cooking abilities are anything special - but I do love to cook, so, as I think I've mentioned before, I use Saturday - the one day I have time - to try a new recipe, even if it's only the four of us for dinner. The rest of the week, trust me, we're on the well-worn path too!
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