Last night....

Last night was smoked mackerel and pasta. I found out, as I had surmised due to the length of time finding out anyway, that I had come second in the competition to get a job that I really wanted, and am disappointed in that. The warmed cherry tomatoes that I cooked burst in our mouths with brightness and freshness, and it was that, and the fullness and bite of the just-right pasta and lemony olive oil (expertly drained by Babe), rather than the richness of the smoked mackerel that gave me the most happiness, and made me keep going back for more bowls of comfort.

My sadness is of course shallow in comparison to the news that I just found out, that a dear friend has lost her mother. I let her know about our baby’s upcoming first birthday party. Maybe celebrating the life such a young human being can give a tiny little bit of balance to such news, and indirectly pays tribute to the life of people who have left us. I do hope that’s not trivialising the sadness of death and loss.

Yiddishe momma

Babe struggled with my request for idlis and sambar this morning for my birthday breakfast. We both think that in retrospect, she should have translated, in her head at least, the idlis, sambar and coconut chutney into little pancakes, hot fruit sauce, and cream. Preparation would have been so-much easier for her, as the idlis were ready made and frozen, which makes them so much more accessible. As it was, there were tears of betrayal from babba, who is not used to her mother making breakfast; and tears of being overwhelmed from Babe as the baby threw her milk cup on the floor just as Babe spilt sambar out of its bowl and onto the microwave.

Babba enjoyed her three bites of idli (no sambar), before eating more familiar fruit and yoghurt. Babe couldn’t stomach it at all for breakfast. I loved it, even though the first bite confused my body a miniscule amount, which expects does not expect that kind of thing until after midday, when I have exercised my palate already.

At work, in my usual workplace, and far more satisfying than in the previous weeks when I have been seconded, I developed a ravenous hunger mid-afternoon. The 2 idlis that I took for lunch were nowhere near enough, maybe because of the 17km bicycle ride in each direction. I brought 2 muesli bars, a caramello koala and a nougat bar, one by one, none of which killed off the hunger. My legs started to give way halfway home on the bike, and even the marvellous rich, gooey chocolate tart from cacao on Fitzroy Street, which was my mini birthday cake, was not enough afterwards.

The baby amazed me with her awareness of being full. She loves chocolate, and after crying with confusion as we lit the candles and sang happy birthday to me, she smiled when she had a teaspoonful. She was offered a second spoonful, which she refused, having had a dinner of broccoli, peas, chicken soup, and a banana for desert.

I’m also going to have Babe’s amazing chicken soup and kneidlach for dinner. Since she’s become a Jewish mother, she can really cook like a Jewish mother. Not like an Indian Jewish mother, who she sadly cannot mimic, hence the tears at breakfast, but like a yiddishe momma. It really is good, and happened just in time.

Bacash: a birthday dinner

A really good birthday meal at Bacash. When I left home with Babe, I was still stressed after a couple of days spent ruminating about the disappointment that working in mental health is currently bringing me, and the fact that my 18 year old brother-in-law said that he would vote for John Howard at the next election, because “Australia’s better than it was 10 years ago”, which I think is bullshit. I wish I didn’t care, but I do. I was thus unsure whether my general fed-upness would allow me to be able to enjoy our booking.

We had a nice walk down the hill from the car, under big green trees to the restaurant, on a refreshing evening that followed another hot, humid day, and I started to feel a little better. There is a striking exhibition up on the walls at Bacash by a photographer named Jason Kimberley, entitled Coolibah Tree. It is brilliant and transcendental, and shows extraordinary staged shots of the Australian outback. They took my breath away, and I climbed further away from misery.

To eat, we chose sublime garfish nori rolls to start with (garfish, smoked salmon, raw prawn, pasley and garlic, snap fried and served with a soy chilli sauce). Babe was sure that we shouldn’t eat the head and tail, but we did anyway, as the cheese and spinach topped oysters that we ordered were quite yucky, so I wanted something to take the memory away. The waitress congratulated us on eating the offaly bits, so maybe it isn’t the normal thing to do (they did look decorative), but they were just too good to leave - dense, fresh, fishy and garlicky.

I had whole flounder with chips and salad as my main course, and Babe had an escabeche of ocean trout, spiced with orange, caramelised onion and star anise. The flounder was one of the best things that I have ever eaten. I think that the simple accompaniments added some ballast and balance to it – a good green salad, and excellent salty chips, but the flounder was magical – just butter, salt and grilled black fish, I think. Just writing about the experience makes my heart quiver. Babe's baby-pink trout was delicately spiced, sweet and interesting, sitting on top of soft, waxy and buttery potatoes. I tried Babe’s Rose, which had a primeval taste to it (I’m not sure if that’s an acceptable flavour description for wine), and got a glass of it for myself.

For desert, we couldn’t wait for the desired soufflé, as the baby was at home, usually gets fed at 10pm, and we didn’t want to leave grandparents with an angry and upset babba, so shared rich and well made ice cream (hazelnut, strawberry, mandarin and another berry); and a lemony jelly and cream, topped with lemon granita in a glass.

The service was slow and really non-pressured, which I really liked, as we were able to spend longer in the restaurant, and unwind more fully. The tables were very close together, so we found other people’s proximity disconcerting at first, however we quickly grew tolerant of it. Indeed, I felt more tolerant of people in general after such a great meal. I eavesdropped easily on a conversation at the next table (a couple of millimeters away) when Babe went to the toilet, about private schools, and found it interesting, and the group talking most endearing, so maybe I can negotiate the next little while with a little bit more lightness and generosity of spirit.

An all too clinical experience.

I had time for lunch today, however I find that eating without other parts of life being gratifying is not a fulsome pleasure. I had a Szechuan sweet potato noodle soup with beef, chicken, and tripe. The description was more interesting than the product. I suspect that the Szechuan peppers were absent, as the thrilling numbing that they give was absent, and it tasted just like a good, standard, Chinese soup, rather than one of the most distant frontiers of difference that Szechuan food is. It also burnt my tongue, as I ate alone in a clean meeting room and read a mental health policy manual. There wasn’t a lot to do today, apart from waiting for crises, and I don’t like resolving acute crises much anymore, particularly when I don't have a decent notion of the history of it. I'm not a firefighter. I felt empty on the way home, not from lack of food, but from a lack of satisfaction at work, and the last day of a four-week stint with another mental health team, which I found jading and uninspiring.

The nicest thing that I ate today was the swiss seed bread with just a smidgeon of peanut butter on my arrival home. I like the crunchiness and wholesomeness of the seeds, which remind me of eating an orange poppy seed cake without the stickiness and succulence. Having said that, some kind of orangey herb from the soup lodged in my teeth, and it provided an interesting flavour on my cycle home.

A request for steak

Babe asked for some steak for dinner. We had a long dispute about what to get whilst at Queen Vic. I suggested a tiny piece of really good wagyu steak for the three of us to share, along with salad leaves and plenty of potatoes. Babe, being closer to her Russian peasant roots than I am to mine, thought that this would not suffice for the three of us (the baby was too share the steak salad, which I think is a lovely thing to do). Given our lack of wealth, she thought that we should get a tray of Scotch Fillet for the same price as one piece of steak that I wanted. In the end, we made a compromise with which neither of us were happy, and brought a pale red piece of porterhouse. The butcher had nicer looking ruby porterhouse at the back, however I was in a bad mood and did ask for it. Babe rightly accused me of being passive aggressive, and went off to buy the original piece of wagyu that I had chosen. I was happy once I figured that it was not just done in anger.

We had to wait in for the electrician on our return home, and then, after a swim with the baby where we all moved our muscles and felt happier and more contented, I cooked. I had earlier brought some baby beetroot, which given the fact that Babe needed to eat early and go to work, I boiled skins and all. I also boiled some little cocktail potatoes, and put a mound of baby spinach leaves in a big white bowl. The steaks remained in the fridge whilst I made a mustard dressing, a Vinaigrette with a dollop of Dijon mustard added before the salt, vinegar and olive oil (in that order). I got our wonderful Weber Q (the couple in the picture obviously use the BBQ in the living room, which strike me as extraordinarily risky) hot outside in our courtyard, and crushed a mound of garlic.

I pasted the hated pale and insipid porterhouse with it, and also added a little to the tender and much loved wagyu, covered both with salt (I thought that this wasn’t so good for the baby, however she eats feta, so how much can occasional salt hurt, seeing as we are a sodium conscious family anyway). I stuck the much thicker Porterhouse on the Barbie, and waited a while, draining the potatoes and beetroot. I turned the Porterhouse over after about 5 minutes, and a minute later, added the wagyu. When I took the both off, the wagyu was still Bleu and a beautifully rich purple, and the Porterhouse a more desirable colour than it had been, with some pinkness still inside.

I added the potatoes and beetroots to the leaves, which sighed and melted, and cut the steak. The Porterhouse had a nice chargrilled flavour on the outside, although was metallic and unexciting all the way through. The wagyu was rich, winey and full, and hit it off with the acidic dressing. I should have made more potatoes, and I was right – one wagyu steak and some more carbs would have been just perfect. We also had a glass each of very cheap red wine, which was more than drinkable.

The baby was hungry after her swim, and had chicken soup, left-over lamb chop, fruit puree and cheese on cruskit, and had her steak put away for another day. She will get Wagyu one day, but on this occasion, it will be a little piece of porterhouse. I hope she loves it, and I will cook it with more than a little tenderness for her, and will think more highly of it than I did today.

Porridge refusal and some dissapointing boreks

Not too hungry this morning, and the baby did not feel like eating porridge again. She has dismissed our offers of porridge, a food that I thought would mark the start of every morning of her childhood over the next few years, for the last four days. So I did not have to make porridge this morning. Instead, she was offered banana, yoghurt and raw oats, which she rejected in favour of a breast feed. I had a cup of orange pekoe tea, and 3 ryvita crackers (the multigrain sort) with tehina.

I thank Babe for the suggestion of tehina instead of peanut butter, which I love, but find too heavy and, in large quantities, junky. I’m not good at just taking a smear of it. Tehina is more refreshing than its muddy looks are evidence of, and doesn’t invite big globs to be smeared on things. I found the tea the best part of the breakfast though.

Lunch was just some boreks in the otherwise brilliant foodhall of Queen Vic Market, and I had the same experience with them as I alway do, although I am aware of their colossal reputation – I always find them oily and not too generous with the fillings, and tend to be disappointed and full after eating them.