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i was ready to leave at 11, but due to dawdling on everyone’s part — though least of all, mine — it wasn’t until after noon that i left the house, and when i reached the top of the street, i saw the bus pull up at the stop, and then pull away. this turned out to be a good thing, because i walked a few more blocks, to starbucks.

it’s been a few weeks since the new promotional banner appeared on the footpath: for “coffee with a taste of the tradewinds”, the banana caramel frappucino. i was sceptical at first; i mean, banana and coffee! and also, i had sworn off coffee (again) a couple months ago after a raspberry mocha knocked me out for half the day. but then five minutes later the jaunty yellow banner won me over. i had just been biding my time. today was it!

the chalkboard behind the counter said “we’ve gone bananas!”, and in case you doubted the conviction, there was also a drawing of two bunches of bananas. so, apart from the banana caramel frappucino, there was banana caramel cream, banana caramel bread, banana cake and banana chocolate chip biscuit slice. do not think that there would be no customer so obsessive as to tailor a complete banana-themed meal; just before xmas i snuck in there and had a gingerbread frappucino and a slice of gingerbread loaf — a dense brick frosted in thick cream cheese and bright orange candied ginger.

it wasn’t until i was mid-way through ordering that i looked up at the menu board to check the prices and discovered that there is also banana mocha frappucino, which immediately cancelled out the banana caramel frappucino. sitting in the corner, reading annie proulx, i was pleased to find that it tastes like chocolate and banana paddle pops.

such are the little pleasures to be had in a child-free afternoon. there was also: a fantasy about buying a new teacup; a slow trawl through the borders magazine aisles; the following conversation:
“oh, and may i also have a brownie please?”
“would you like a big one or a small one?”

posted by ragingyoghurt on 19 March 2006 at 6:22 pm

permalink | filed under around town, drink, snacks

what is a blog for if not to taunt a sibling on the other side of the world about treats you just found on a chinatown expedition? after a wanton display of white rabbits — lychee white rabbits — which i instantly coveted, nellie was nice enough to actually send me some.

you know white rabbits, no? the milky chewy candy wrapped up in a slip of rice paper? i was about to say that the lychee ones are even better, being somewhat less cloying and milky, but perhaps it is more accurate to say they are different. a little sharper with a mysterious and subtle… hmm, what’s that flavour? aahh. lychee!

a package of candy in the mail is a sweet surprise, but candy arranged snug in a blue leather candy purse (from orla kiely no less) is an interactive experience involving placing said purse on a worthy surface and savouring its beauty, unzipping and zipping and unzipping and removing piece by piece the candy, noting the differences between the original white rabbit wrappers and these ones (smiling lychee duo atop a banner reading “lychee” in chinese and english, with a tiny white rabbit logo along the edge), and then placing each little baton neatly back in its place. and then repeating the sequence over the next couple of days before finally unwrapping one and eating it, slowly. well, that was my experience.

a much more awful experience is taking a dud powerbook into the apple service centre at broadway, where the girl on reception will negate everything the phone support guys have told you over the last two days, and ask if you would like to book your brand new dud in and have the problem assessed in seven to ten working days.

“you ask like i have an option,” i said. “why, what else can i do?”
“yeah, no, yeah, you have to book it in.” she was blonde, but also, she was young.

if i want it seen to faster i can pay $80 for a rush service. she will not let me use her phone to call the support line, or the store, to verify all she has told me. “the apple shop and the apple phone support and us, we are all separate agencies and have nothing to do with each other. and we cannot call and speak on anyone’s behalf. ever. we can’t let you use our phones because it will tie up our lines. and we do not seem to have a phonebook we can lend you.”

resisting the urge to break her or the shiny white computer on her desk — or let’s be honest, the chunk of aluminium alloy weighing me down, i embarked on a chinatown expedition of my own. specifically i wanted meats. chinatown meats! but i was open to anything else that might throw itself in my way.

in front of a sweet shop i made the kind of abrupt stop where your whole body goes rigid, and then anchored at the feet, the top of you wobbles a bit and vibrates to a halt. they had constructed a stove in the window and were cooking up a storm of obanyaki. four flavours of obanyaki: redbean, custard (“the best in sydney”, is what the sign said), chocolate, and green tea. “delicious!” said mr. sign, and “buy three for $5!”, which i thought was diabolically clever, because which flavour does one leave out? in fact, none, because i played into their dastardly plan, and came away with custard, redbean, two chocolates and two green teas. “thank you. have a great day,” said the smiley counter girl.

and then meats were procured: char siu and siu yok and, because i couldn’t decide between soya chickane — i typed chicken, and this is what came out instead — and roast duck, i got a half of each. and green sauce. and because the bubble tea merchant is just a few doors down, and there was a sign outside that said, “happy 4th birthday easy way, 20% off all drinks”, i added some mango blended ice (for the boy) and pickled plum blended ice (for me) to my trusty shopping bag.

who’s the postergirl for that modern affliction of buying stuff to make you feel better? that would be me, doing lucky dips for obanyaki at the bus stop. it was the custard one, and may well have been the best in sydney, still warm and cakey on the outside, and creamy-gooey hot custard within.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 3 December 2005 at 7:58 am

permalink | filed under around town, cake, candy, drink, grumble, nellie, shoping, snacks

i finally gave in to the sandwich board outside starbucks yesterday, the bright red one that announced, “christmas drinks are here!”. the larger-than-life pictures of creme brulee frappucino and mint mocha frappucino looked most enticing, but two weeks after the sign appeared i still hadn’t ventured in because not being a great fan of minted whatever, and feeling somewhat dubious about the potential egginess of a creme brulee-flavoured coffee, what i really wanted was a gingerbread latte.

still, i thought i should give the creme brulee a try, for the cause, and so a bit tentatively, i trundled (with pram) up to the counter and ordered one. a small one. just in case.

but because i am not so good with prolonged eye contact, immedately after placing my order i cast my gaze down to the counter… and saw a laminated poster of three christmas drinks. they did have the gingerbread after all.

“oh! you have the gingerbread!” i exclaimed.
“yes,” said the countergirl.
“um. oh. i’ll have that one then. i actually did want the gingerbread.”
“that’s cool. do you still want just a tall one?”

[ i find only one thing ridiculous about starbucks, and it is that the small drink is called “tall”, because apparently an espresso is counted as “short”, so. let’s not even talk about “grande” or “venti”. ]

i was impressed at the quick-thinkingness of the countergirl. there was no reason for her not to think that since i had actually really wanted the gingerbread frappucino, i would now order a bucket of it. but, no, thank you.

however, since i was with child, and had to keep said child away from my whipped cream, and feed her her hot chocolate from a spoon, and sneak some reads of my 50c newspaper, and make sure she wasn’t eating the red crayon there in the sunny starbucks courtyard, i was somewhat distracted, and will no doubt have to return another day and give it another go.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 23 November 2005 at 9:32 pm

permalink | filed under around town, drink, kid

it’s been a maccha kind of weekend.

first up, a saturday rendezvous in a pretentious frainch bakery with saffron, who immediately plied me with a brown paper bag tied up in pretty green ribbon.

perhaps you are unaware that when i moved house the other month, it took most of a large packing carton to hold my extensive brown (and white and pink and… you get the idea) paper bag collection. yes, i purged myself of stacks and stacks of magazines and somehow couldn’t put a single brown paper bag into the recycling bin.

um, anyway. so the brown paper bag was good, but inside was, as the girl herself said, “a lamington degustation. heh.” — better.

several hunks of sponge cake, a tub of red bean paste, a tub of maccha icing and a package of shaved coconut. intriguing, no? it’s just, there was a green tea lamington challenge sort of put out there, and a rising to the challenge, and a last minute maccha mishap… and thus, a serendipitous hamper. and saffron, i think it could still come together as soon as i go out and get a tub of cream.

cream will make it all better.

although i fear i will devour the yummy sponge before i get myself organised.

my mum arrived from warmer climes later in the day, and plied me with a lovely cardboard box, wrapped in beautiful japanese paper, wrapped in more beautiful japanese paper, in a gorgeous japanese print paper bag.

perhaps you are unaware that when i moved house the other month, it took quite a bit of a large packing carton to hold my extensive cardboard box collection… i’m not kidding. and of course you already know the story of the paper bags. sigh.

inside the box was a tray of minamoto kitchoan daifuku: six maccha-white chocolate and six dark chocolate. and two ceremonial toothpicks for impaling them like the sacrificial desserts they are. i had to immediately excuse myself and make a pot of genmaicha, and soon a fat, green thing was in my mouth. it tasted of green, then cool, and its core was soft white chocolatey.

at this point i want to share with you this message from the president of mitchoan kitchoan: “flavorful desserts can do much to bridge hearts when people get together. sometimes the dessert itself can serve to invent fresh topics of conversation. the joy of eating is only one of many roles a dessert or confectionery plays. it can enhance the moment when people cross paths, or it can convey a person’s true feeling toward someone very special.” yes.

sunday found us — sisters, mothers, daughters in a group of four, sitting in a bustling starbucks after the rest of the shoping centre had shut itself up. the baby had a hot chocolate all to herself, or at least the four centimeters of chocolate crema you get on half a cup of hot chocolate ordered off the kids’ menu. i’ve always found that i’m saddled with more hot chocolate than i want (yes, it is possible) when i buy one at a shop, so this is now my preferred hot chocolate. and only .85.

but my favourite starbucks treat is still the green tea frappacino, though sometimes i think it could taste a little more green. as my aunt observed this afternoon after sampling a spoonful from my cup, “it tastes like powdered non-dairy creamer”. but it’s green! specifically, that green.

and so, this third maccha confection brought the weekend to a close. there is a fourth for later: maccha biscuits studded with red beans, bought during a “supermarket sweep”-type frenzy earlier in the day, at a very cool asian grocery in chatswood. i’ve just looked at the receipt, and in fact the shop is called “miracle supermarket”, which it is.

if memory serves me correctly, my exchange, in mandarin, with the boss lady at checkout, went something like this:

“your stuff is really exciting!”
“exciting meh?”
“yes, there’s all this pocky i’ve never seen before!”
“oh, haha, thank you.”

i’ve never made anything with maccha, not even the tea itself. it’s mostly due to laziness, and partly due to not knowing which brand to get. as saffron apologetically explained, the one she bought tasted like rancid water. mmm. perhaps, santos, you could recommend a brand? you who seem to have had spectacular success with this, and this and especially this. i salute you.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 16 October 2005 at 9:38 pm

permalink | filed under around town, cake, drink, snacks

this morning, the first day of winter, i found myself in the city, walking briskly up the blustery corridor that is martin place. it wasn’t just the need to get out of the cold that spurred me on; specifically it was the need to get out of the cold and into the lindt shop. i believe the full and proper name for this establishment is “lindt concept store and café“.

[ the phrase "concept store" irritates me, alongside "free gift", "authentic recipe", "special collector's issue" and "actual photos!". the other month i saw a sign in a window amidst a fancy apartment complex, which said "concept store opening soon", as though it didn't matter what the store was selling. i suppose it is possible that they actually would be selling concepts. but i mean, a store that sells the stuff whose logo is out front! what a concept! rrrr. ]

the lindt shop’s been in business for months and months, but every time i’ve been past, it’s been closed. this would be acceptable if i showed up every tuesday at midnight, but i’ve only ever pressed my nose up to the cold and dark glass doors on weekend teatimes. today, aladdin’s cave finally opened. there were display cases along three walls (and a display island in the middle) and they all held chocolatey treasures that i wanted, all gloomy bear claws. in the end i showed moderate restraint, and when i stepped back out onto the street, i had a couple of madagascar dark chocolate truffles, a couple of pistachio truffles, a couple of 70% cocoa dark chocolate macaron, and a chocolate orange macaron. and a vanilla champagne macaron. and a dark hot chocolate, which was like drinking a hot lindor ball, mmm. like i said, moderate restraint.

what i left behind glass were: a raspberry-dark chocolate lindor ball, a creme brulee chocolate bar, an eclair, and a 70% cocoa dark chocolate tart adorned with a royal blue sash, like miss universe.

they will be mine, oh yes.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 1 June 2005 at 3:56 pm

permalink | filed under around town, chocolate, drink, grumble

who doesn’t like new junkfood products? not me, oh no. the other evening i was simultaneously queasy and pleased to walk past a billboard with homer (simpson, not the greek philosopher) advertising a new variety of twisties. the flavour of these twisties was…

i’ll tell you later. but what about the fanta spider? remember way back in april last year, when i was captivated? the fanta people (who i believe are actually coca cola) recently relaunched it: the orange flavour is no longer just orange spider, but choc orange spider. yes! chocolate flavoured fizzy! why is there not more of this?

however, i was distracted by the pink, so i ended up with strawberry spider, which is not a bad thing, because then i ended up with this:

a mini ice cream soda, with chocolate fudge sauce down below, a couple scoops of buttermilk vanilla, and pink fizzy all the way up. i suspect, nellie, it beat that neopolitan frappacino that never was.

and the new twisties flavour? it’s melted butter.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 29 January 2005 at 5:27 pm

permalink | filed under drink, ice cream, snacks

look nellie, look. those Stroopwafels you gave me are the perfect size for the yoghurt mug, um, that you gave me.

why is the biscuit perched on the cup? i’m glad you asked, for i can now read to you from the package:

“the history of this Wafer dates back to 1700 and the town of gouda in holland. late one afternoon, an industrious baker prepared the first stroopwafel on his stove using a small, round waffle iron and the dough and spices left over from his day of baking pastry. as he finished his work, it occurred to the baker to enhance his waffle with thick, rich caramel syrup, and so the Caramel Wafer was created… the appeal of the Stroopwafel has remained strong with the unique taste sensation of the moist and flavoursome wafers having a truly international look.

“enjoy Caramel Wafers with a hot beverage by placing one on top of a steaming cup of hot coffee [here i used tea] and allowing the caramel filling to melt, or simply eat as is. either way this sweet, creamy, buttery wafer is absolutely delicious!”

and truly it is. at first i was concerned that after taking a bite, the biscuit would be too small to balance so prettily on the rim of my mug, but then i took another bite and another and then it was gone. not a problem after all!

posted by ragingyoghurt on 27 January 2005 at 4:53 pm

permalink | filed under drink, nellie, snacks

on the way home from such trivial saturday morning activities as “looking in shops” and “buying two magazines”, i stopped in at the organic food place to get a bottle of ginger necktar. this is a tasty beverage, made of ginger, lemon, honey and “energised water”, by an outfit called, appropriately enough, “ginger necktar drink company”. i’m not sure why it’s spelt “necktar” … but thinking about it now, i’m guessing it’s because you can’t actually get nectar from ginger so this cunning mis-spelling removes any sort of “you told me it was nectar” finger-pointing on the part of the consumer.

“that’s shree dollars,” said the guy behind the counter; his mouth was full of something.

“um. three dollars?”

“yes,” he replied, after swallowing.

i was fumbling in my wallet for exact change, when i thought i heard him say, “would you like a bean?” and when i looked up, he was holding a long bean at me.

“oh yes please!” i said.

it was a cold and crisp bean. raw. the most refreshing bean i ever did have. i told him so.

he beamed. “where have you bean all my life?” he said.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 22 January 2005 at 6:31 pm

permalink | filed under drink, shoping, snacks

in the longstanding tradition of homemade bittersweet sundaes in the last hours before she gets on a plane, we put on a modest display of ice cream, chocolate sauce, crushed walnuts, raspberries and a cherry on top. the photo was taken by nellie, because i was quivering with so much anticipation that my pictures were all out of focus.

at the airport, in defiance, we flaunted our frosty starbucks beverages before the boy, whose opinion is of the “damn american multinationals who think they can show the world how to make coffee” variety. “that’s why we’re not getting the coffee,” we had retorted, before flouncing off in the direction of the neon mermaid via the krispy kreme stall. so now we had a grande green tea frappacino, and a tall strawberries and cream frappacino — in fact nellie had ordered the new neopolitan frap, but the exhuberantly gay counter boy was far too busy being camp to put the chocolate and vanilla in, feh — and a small box of sour cream doughnuts and pumpkin spice doughnuts, for later.

two weeks ago when i made the doughnut dash while waiting for nellie to come through immigration, the featured-doughnut tray was bare, and i had been waiting weeks to try the special festive offering. “you don’t have the pumpkin spice doughnuts?” i asked. “um, not today,” said the counter girl. i was so surprised and disappointed that i could not get my question out: “why would you not have the featured doughnut!?” and then she said, “we usually have them, but somehow they didn’t show up today.” i was so surprised and disappointed that i could not get my question out: “what!? you don’t bake them here!?” and then she said, “oh, you like them?” and i had to express my disappointment at never having tried them, and my surprise that they hadn’t shown up today, and my disappointment at not getting to try them once again.

anyway.

we sat and watched some planes and then nellie held the baby for one last time, bopped her on the head and called out “babboo-babboo” before disappearing past the sliding doors with the last of the strawberries and cream frappacino. there was no extended bowing and waving today; there was a hungry baby to feed.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 5 January 2005 at 11:50 am

permalink | filed under around town, boy, drink, kid, nellie, snacks

last year, maybe the year before, i bought a wire-bound notebook: dusty pink, with a faint houndstooth-checkered pattern running through it, like the material of a suit a granny might wear. in the top right corner, under a magenta foil-stamped row of six olde worlde milke bottles, is the slogan, “dairymen are the cream of the crop!”. in the bottom left corner, under a tiny silhouette still life of a pitcher, a milk glass, milk carton and a wheel of cheese with a wedge cut out of it, is the poem…

“Love is like more than an emotion, / it’s the substance of our being / Each morning as I awaken your (sic) the reason / I smilke, Your (sic) the reason I love / A friend is someone who knows the song in your heart and can sing it back to you whe you have forgotten the words.”

[edit: what i meant to type was "your the reason i smile". evidently the milk, which is all i think about (and smell of) these days, is more pervasive than i realised.]

i thought that this notebook, after languishing a year, maybe two, in my amusing notebook box, would be a most appropriate logbook for my breastfeeding diary (date, time, duration, side).

yesterday at 3.45 in the afternoon, maeve drank for twenty-eight minutes, eight minutes on the left and twenty on the right. then she had a vomit, which although moderate in volume, was nowhere near the torrent of the day before, which came up in four great gushes and took even the child by surprise, judging by the look on her face. this time she seemed unfazed so we loaded her into the stroller and walked into chinatown.

we caught the lift up to happy chef, and ordered bowls of soupy noodles (me: wonton and mushroom with rice noodles; the boy: spicy beef and wonton with egg noodles), and then after, we stopped by the bubble tea place and got bubble teas to go (me: jasmin milk tea with pearls; the boy: taiwanese style lychee milkshake). we walked home the long way, and then split up at the last set of traffic lights, the boy to get some DVDs, me, maeve and the stroller to get another bumper packet of nappies. maeve was still asleep when we got home. we felt like very normal people.

there have been eight feeds since, all varying in length, but generally a punctual two hours apart. in the notebook, on the top right corner of each page, next to the six olde worlde milke bottles, “You look brilliant like morning sunshine”.

posted by ragingyoghurt on 28 November 2004 at 9:48 am

permalink | filed under around town, boy, dinner, drink, kid

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