ohmigod! santos made me my very own cupcake!
thank you, kind lady! if only i could be there to lick it clean!
[picture originally uploaded on her flickr page]
Monthly Archives: March 2005
3
this afternoon, a sunny sunday afternoon, around lunchtime, my little mother walked up the street to the fish shop in the mall to procure some prawns with which to fry up some kuay teow, penang style. on her way home, less than a block from the front door, a slightly built aboriginal youth with short curly hair and dressed in a red-and-white horizontally-striped shirt came up behind her, shoved her to the ground, grabbed her handbag and ran to the council flats a short distance away, from whence he was spirited away in a white car. people still push little old ladies down in the street? but she is resilient; hours later, after the police interview, the mugshot viewing, the walking up and down the neighbourhood streets in a vain attempt to find her handbag, she was frying up noodles at the stove. the bastard hadn’t taken the prawns.
oh what a bounty of new junkfood products have crossed these lips of late. you may recall the melted-butter-twisties-corn-puffs alert from several weeks ago. i found them, finally. after wrenching the packet open, i realised that they were meant to mimic melted butter flavoured popcorn. however it was like eating extremely salty packing material. tchk.
there are three new sorts of tim tams: one with a truffle cream filling (maybe a truffle creme filling), one with a chilli chocolate filling, and the one i did buy, the black forest tim tam. dark chocolate on the outside with a slightly gummy thread of “cherry” flavoured goo on the inside. feh.
there is possibly the best kettle chip ever! kettle chips are the tastiest chip to begin with, and the sour cream and sweet chilli ones really raised the chip stakes. but now that they come in wasabi and soy flavour, there is just no need to spend any more time in the chip aisle wondering which bag to get. this is a salty and tangy and crunchy chip, with a subtle wasabi effect. none of that nose-clearing, face-scrunching bravado that pepsimax sorts in sushi restaurants display, dredging their bits of fish in the little green mountains. hurrah!
there is this:
according to the text on the back of the package, the chips are “combined with your favourite chinese flavours. so you don’t have to leave home to experience the taste of your favourite chinese restaurant.” these chips were not discernably beefy (or special saucy), but they were kind of alright. the chinese fortune that i found inside said “someone called larry will call you soon”.
so. the thing about the ice cream sandwiches, is that the stall was manned by jeremy piven. ok, no, it was manned by a guy called patrick who resembles jeremy piven. there was nothing before him on the counter but a large container of marinated olives and gherkins (from the marinated olive and gherkin stall in the next aisle) which he ate with a toothpick. next to the counter was a freezer thingy.
he started making some “hi how are ya” smalltalk, but i couldn’t concentrate because i was distracted by the poster over the freezer thingy. six fat discs — six different ice cream sandwiches. i think he figured the only way to get my attention was to wave a small plate of samples in front of me. “this is our new flavour this month,” he said. “it’s banana ice cream and banana bread on the outside.”
nellie, come and have one immediately!
“oh i need one for the walk home,” i said, “but i don’t know which one to get.” there was a coffee one, a couple of vanillas (different cookies), a berry yoghurt…
“the double chocolate,” he said without hesitation. “if you like chocolate, get the double chocolate.”
“but the banana one was so banana-ey,” i said.
“but you’ve already tried that one. get the chocolate.”
“um.”
“the chocolate.”
so i did. it was belgian chocolate ice cream sandwiched between chewy chocolate cookies. it came, a neat package wrapped in paper. i held it for ten minutes, nurturing, anticipating, and then it was melty and creamy and good.
patrick lived in guangdong for a year, years ago. he speaks chinese, probably better than i do. his first ice cream machine was a handcranked rock salt and ice one. he makes his ice cream out of home. he’s on the verge of expanding, moving into premises. his partner in ice cream, the other guy pictured in the logo, is freakishly tall, maybe six-foot-nine, and is known as “stick”. all this you can find out while buying an ice cream sandwich.
at lunchtime, armed with visiting olds, the kid and i trundled across the M5, the park and another horrible main road to the growers’ market at fox studios, only to find, having thought about hot bacon and sauerkraut all morning, that — oh tragedy! the pierogi man no longer holds a stall there. hmph.
luckily, the disappointment was quickly tempered by an assortment of free samples from the chevre man, a tasting plum from the plum man, some nibblets of nougat from the nougat lady, and a tiny sliver of ice cream sandwich from the ice cream sandwich guy.
there was no free anything at the pie shop, however having bought a duck pie for me and a lamb pie for my father, and then having asked the pie lady which was which, she replied, “the duck pie has a little duck on it.” and indeed it did:
it was very salty, and contained bits of peas, carrot and corn too uniform in size to be anything other than a frozen variety. or maybe they are just perfectionists back at the pie-ranch. indeed, the pastry crust was perfect. whatever. what i really want to tell you about is the ice cream sandwich guy, but i am really quite sleepy and too full of turkish banquet dinner to go any further, and will have to revisit this pressing issue sometime in the morning.
so to end my lunch post, i shall direct you to this dollop of investigative journalism on school lunches around the world (via da*xiang)
today i beat up a door. today i stepped out onto the sidewalk and wanted to run. away. anywhere. because i dislike running, though, i walked very quickly, and found myself heading in the direction of kmart. i haven’t been swimming in almost a year. i haven’t done yoga — aside from the occasional cluster of sun salutes and a cursory stretch every now and again — in over five months. my body is atrophying. my backbone is clenchy. i find myself buying strings of paper lanterns and overpriced (though very beautiful) christmas lights, because everything else seems so dark, dammit. some days i find myself in a place even cake cannot reach.
today i thought i’d catalogue the jams in my moth-infested pantry.
already opened in the fridge and in various stages of gone-ness are:
apricot jam — the last centimetre at the bottom of the jar
raspberry conserve — more than halfway gone
cherry jam — i would like more of this to be gone, but its strange and unjammy liquid state and lack of cherry flavour have kept me from fulfilling its destiny
papaya and macadamia nut jam — a gift, this remains barely eaten after many months; it has a strange solid texture and is studded with distracting fragments of macadamias
rhubarb ginger conserve — almost as unsuccessful as the papaya macnut jam
the jams-in-waiting are:
cottees apricot conserve
hanks pear cinammon jam
harrods christmas mature thick cut marmalade with orange liqueur
harrods ginger extra jam
les palais des thés rhubarbe au thé vert du japon
luxardo 170% fruit marasca cherry preserve
st dalfour gourmet pear 100% fruit spread
young maid cherry jam
young maid raspberry and cashew jam
this is of course not counting the two kinds of honey, cinnamon sugar, vegemite and chocolate sprinkles that grace my bread from time to time. and then, hidden under a pile of clothes on the dresser upstairs is a jar of chocolate body paint (with saucy stencils) that i was given at christmas. the list of ingredients suggest that it could be used as a breadspread instead.
meanwhile, what the hell hints have i been exuding that made chocolate body paint an appropriate gift?
so. fourteen jams in total. one with 170% fruit. it must be a sign of… something, i’m sure. i think, perhaps, i need a new loaf of bread.
