Busy busy

So tonight is the last night we'll have to spend in our flat. This whole moving process seems to be taking forever! Probabaly because my little corolla is just that - little, and not all that much stuff fits inside it. Or maybe it's because not everything is in boxes, for example, today I'll be piling all our dresses into the backseat and hanging them up as soon as I get to the new house. Our coffee table books I put in the boot without a box because they make a box way too heavy, and I carried them in in smaller piles. And, it was a sweltering hot day yesterday and I thought I was going to collapse. Then I remembered the south's heat wave and realised it wasn't actually that hot, I'm just a wuss.

Regardless of my wussiness, I am so so glad I took this week as a holiday, rather than going to work and trying to move our copious amounts of crap at the same time. We need to do a big Lifeline run I think. I also need to not ever buy anything ever again. Except the thing is, most of the crap I've found that is mine I've been moving around since highschool.

So somewhere in amongst the cramped calves from running up and down stairs, to the blood blister on my finger from dropping a box of vintage crockery on it, and the brusies on my hips from whacking myself on our cast iron bed frame - I have to eat lunch. And in the interest of getting rid of as much perishable stuff in the freezer/fridge as is possible before I dig out our esky to clean which is currently under the stairs getting pooed on by geckos, I opened the freezer and pulled out the most empty packets I could find: edamame and those weird vegan prawn substitutes.

This was pretty tasty, actually, and really not that great for you. But who cares, I'm moving house.

Vegan prawn and edamame pasta
Serves 1

Ingredients:

100g spaghetti or other pasta shape that is hiding in your pantry
Margarine for frying
1 clove garlic, chopped
1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes
1 tsp dried dill
5 vegan prawns, chopped up
handful of frozen edamame, defrosted and shelled
black pepper
olive oil

Put pasta on to boil. When it's nearly done, melt the margarine in a small saucepan and fry the garlic and herbs for a minute. Add edamame and prawn pieces. Cook until prawn pieces are done, not long. When pasta is ready, drain, and stir through the prawn mixture. Drizzle olive oil over top and season with as much black pepper as you like.
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Nadine asked yesterday if I was even a little nostalgic about leaving the flat. We have been here for two years after all. I said no. Though I will miss the colour of the kitchen cupboards:


Excuse the messy picture. This was probably taken over a year ago when I first discovered my camera had a panorama function.

 I won't, however, miss my pantry. Or my bench space. =D

Some Food We Ate This Week

I love food. I love thinking about food making food and eating food. I love having enough of a variety of stuff in my 'pantry' that I can come home and just throw some ingredients in a pot and call it a nutritional meal:

This is a pantry curry-like meal, it was so quick to make, neither of us knew what we felt like and this sort of thing is usually what I make in that sort of situation. Bonus points for having tins of tomatoes in the pantry and not having to go to the shops! I don't measure anything for this type of throw together but here are the ingredients: about 1 1/2 cups cooked chickpeas, 1 400g tin crushed or chopped tomatoes, most of a medium sized cauliflower, onion, carrot, the end of a bag of mung bean sprouts, spring onions, about half a block of soft tofu I found lurking in the fridge (it disintegrated), and a fair chunk of garam masala powder and some dried chilli flakes. I think I served it on brown rice. No garlic left, decided I didn't care. Oh, I also grated some fresh ginger in the last few minutes of cooking because ginger makes everything better.

Terrible photo, I was in a rush to eat it.

This meal I planned! All day at work I'd been thinking about how I haven't had eggplant for a while, so by the end of the day I wanted it pretty bad. I also felt like lentils for the same reason - they are so quick to cook and are delicious, why then don't I use them more often? So I picked up my copy of Appetite for Reduction and found Lentil & Eggplant Chilli Mole on page 242. Mmm cocoa powder in a non-sweet dish. It always freakes me out a little, I mean, it sounds gross. It really does. But I have made a mole before (I'm sure I would have posted about it, it being so weird to me and all but I can't find it), decided I like chocolate spicy things and this one had both eggplant AND lentils in it so it was a winner. I served it with the suggested Corn and Scallion Corn Bread from page 244 of the same book and it was delicious. I love corn bread. I should also make THAT more often! 

The supermarket didn't have any of the big eggplants left so I had to buy a kilo of the little lebanese ones. I swear there was like a hundred of them. Cutting up one big one is sooo much easier than slicing a million little ones. They were the same price though, so it was okay. I thought it wasn't all going to fit but it cooks down quite nicely. One thing I find confusing about US recipes - the amount of chilli powder called for. Often it'll say a few tbsp of the stuff! (I just read this recipe again and it specifies mild, there's my answer.) Australian chilli powder (I just buy the stuff from the fruit shop) must be like a bazillion times hotter than American, a tsp or two is usually plenty, and I like spicy heat.

Onto a breakfast! I can't remember when exactly I made this, probably Sunday. For a plethora of deliciously interesting pancake recipes, go to Chocolate Covered Katie's blog. These are the Apple Pie pancakes, but Nadine had stolen my apple I had my sights on so I used a grated pear instead. Just as delicious I am sure! I made the Vanilla Ice Milk too, sort of - I should have frozen it the night before but I didn't, so I was lazy and had semi frozen blended almond milk on top of my pancakes. The semi frozen almond milk was freakin delicious by the way - almond milk is probably going to be my ice cream milk of choice when I finally buy my ice cream maker. I have no patience for the freezing and stirring business.

I'm so glad I love to cook. I have no idea what else I'd be doing with my spare time!