why I'm a bad mother

Living with Deb has taught me many things, one of which is how to imitate a killer American accent. Even my kids are impressed when I use it..which led to a conversation about how they too could learn to speak American.

I told them that the main problem is that as Australians we seem to have very lazy pronunciation. We don't sound our letters very well.. so a word like - water - becomes "war-ta". If you want to do a good generic American accent you need to sound out every single letter.

I told my 19 year old son to start off with an easy word, such as blacker - then move on to try such words as harder, wider, faster, longer.. so he could get the "r" sound right..

As he was repeating those words, it struck me that what I had him saying sounded like the script from a very bad 70's porn movie and what's worse, as soon as the thought had entered my head, the words bypassed my mind's safety switch and went straight out of my mouth.

*blush*

Luckily he has a great (or is it warped?) sense of humour and started to laugh - but I think I'm definitely in line for the bad mother of the year award and 2011 has barely even started...

Gluten Free Chocolate Cream Pie

I wanted to try and make an American style Chocolate Cream Pie and as it's Australia Day today, making an American style dessert after our BBQ at lunch seemed like just the right fusion of Aussie and Texan.

To start with, I made my usual crumb base from GF biscuits, but to enhance it and give it a more chocolatey touch, I decided to add a tablespoon of cocoa to the crushed crumbs before I added the melted butter. I then made a gloriously rich chocolate custard pie filling and topped the whole thing with my version of Chantilly cream.

As we here all own a full set of sweet teeth, the pie went down a treat. "Chocolate Pie? This is more like Billionaire's Pie," was actually what Deb said between bites.

Here's how I did it.

I got one packet of Freedom's Coconut Crunch Biscuits which I crushed with a pestle in a nice big bowl. I added one tablespoon of cocoa and then poured over 1/4 cup of melted butter.

I mixed the crumbs with the butter until they were well saturated and then pressed them into a 30cm pie tin. I personally use a non-stick pie flan with a push up bottom to make getting the pie out easier, but you could just as easily use a spring-form pan.

I chilled the pie crust in the fridge whilst I made the chocolate custard filling.

To make the filling I mixed 1/2 cup of corn flour (make sure it's CORN flour not "wheaten" corn flour) with 1/2 cup of sugar and 2 tablespoons of cocoa in a saucepan. I slowly added 3 cups of low fat milk and a slurp of sweetened condensed milk (I'd say that slurp was about 1/4 cup worth).

Using a whisk, I mixed and mixed until the milk and corn flour mixture was smooth with no lumps. (using real corn flour helps enormously here). Still whisking like mad, I heated the custard mix over a low heat.

In between stirring I broke up a 200g block of Cadbury dark cooking chocolate and buzzed it in a microwave safe container until it was melted. I'd stop to check it every 20 seconds or so and give it a good stir it as I went along.

When the custard started to get nice and warm, I poured in the melted dark chocolate and whisked it altogether. Don't panic if it separates a bit because as the custard warms the chocolate will melt right into it - just keep stirring. When the custard starts to boil, it will thicken up considerably and quickly - keep mixing until the custard boils briefly, then remove from the heat.

In a separate bowl I whisked up 3 egg yolks with a fork and then I poured half of the hot chocolate custard into the eggs, remembering to keep mixing like mad. When it was all combined, I poured the egg mixture back into the rest of the chocolate custard mix that was left in the saucepan and stirred it over a low heat for about a minute, after adding a tablespoon of butter and a teaspoon of vanilla.

Pour and scrape the chocolate filling over the pie crust and smooth the top. Refrigerate for at least 3 hours until cold and set.

To make the Chantilly cream topping, whip 600ml of thickened cream with 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence and 1 teaspoon of caster sugar. Top the cold pie with the whipped Chantilly cream and sprinkle with some cocoa or better still - chocolate shavings.

The pie serves at least 10 people with one decadent slice each.

excuse me, your flag is showing..

Deb and I were driving home the other day when we passed a car that was literally covered with the Australian flag. They had somehow managed to run the flag down from under the rear window, over the boot and down to freely fly over the bumper bar. They'd cut out a nice rectangle sized hole to pop the licence plate through and there was a white Southern Cross decal over the back window. Over each door flew a little Aussie flag, four in all.. making it, without a doubt, the most patriotic car I've seen so far as the Australia Day holiday approaches.

The only trouble is, that that kind of patriotism makes me get a little buzz of something akin to fear in the pit of my stomach.

Whenever I see our flag plastered over a car or a house, or indeed a person's body I get kind of wary about the sort of person I'm interacting with.  Do they fly the flag out of the love of our diversity as a country, or a deep fear of that very same thing? I often wonder about the whole "Australia - Love it or leave it!" sentiment. That worries me too. I think one of the things that makes a better country is the right to be able to criticise it and even to dislike certain facets of it. That ensures you don't blindly exist in a cultural vacuum and can see where things need to be improved or changed.

I guess I'm leery because I'm not quite sure when the flag fliers' national pride crosses the line and becomes something for me to personally fear.  Do they recognise my right to be who and what I am, or will they angrily pigeonhole everything that they don't agree with as being un-Australian? As an out lesbian, does my gayness offend them to the brink of violence? Would they sit and they scoff at my vegetarian tofu skewers sizzling on their BBQ? Would they run my Buddhist arse down with that flag bedecked car if they had the chance? Does that Southern Cross tattooed on their shoulder speak of a universal cosmic kind of tolerance, or a fear that the country's going to be overtaken by dykes and fags and Greens supporters?

This Australia Day as we fire up our own BBQ under the rainbow pride flag bought as a souvenir from Mardi Gras, I find I want more than to be just tolerated as a minority around here; I want us to be accepted totally for the unique and diverse slice of Australian life that we are.

So in our neighbourhood, the rainbow flag will proudly be flying - even if it's against the wind.

Our pond Lotus

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."

      ~Oscar Wilde.

The first lotus bloom of Summer has opened and it's just so gorgeous that I had to take a picture and post it. It's sights like this that make me forget the troubles I've had lately and I can see that out of the mud, with seemingly no effort at all, something beautiful has bloomed - I might take that for an allegory on life.

one of my little foibles..

Oh gosh I love airplanes.. I get excited by the takeoff rumble of the triple tailed four engined Lockheed Super Constellation -

**"Connie" was found in Arizona and was rescued by HARS engineers and lovingly restored to her "Queen of the skies" glory over four years and is now hangered at our local regional airport.** 

I'm dazzled by the sleek silver of a Lockheed Electra (Amelia Earhart owned an E10)

and the curve of a beautiful gull winged F4U Corsair.

and oh god, the roar of a PBY Catalina (also a local and restored by HARS)

I'm hooked and so totally retro, it hurts.

gardening and other forms of therapy..

I've had some hostility thrown at me lately, but in keeping with Gautama Buddha's example, I realised that the person throwing the not-so-nice attitude at me has their own personality problems to work out and they were perpetuating their own suffering by tying their worth to the situation.

How I reacted to what was thrown at me was entirely my own karma.. so I chose to disengage, be silent and let the facts speak for themselves.

When I have problems and issues that need sorting, I get out in the garden. I'm lucky I live in a place where you can garden all year; no snow here.. no frost either.. I let my agro out on the weeds I as pulled them and I got my hands in the soil and did some planting, which is the best recipe for grounding yourself that I know of - bringing new life into the garden and letting go of what has gone to seed.

Friendships can be like that too. Starting as seeds, growing with care and blossoming with mutual respect and appreciation. A good friend can bring out your beauty, a bad one will cause you to wither inside.

..So I let go of what has gone to seed. I wish this person no ill and I hope that they finally "get" why they're in the position they are in.

This is a picture of the lotus in our fish pond, last year there was only one blossom, this year there will be two.

Buddha sits serenely on the deck; a good example for me to follow. Siddhārtha Gautama once said, "I don't accept your ugly words, your dirty words - If I don't accept them, what can you do? All this garbage you have come with? You will have to take it back to your wives, to your children, to your neighbours. You will have to distribute it because I refuse to take it. You cannot make me angry unless I accept your humiliation, your insult." He went on further, "Ten years ago I was not conscious; if someone had insulted me he would have lost his life. I had no idea that insulting me was his problem and that I have nothing to do with it. I can simply listen and then go on my way."

My nan's prized cycad is doing well in its new location. It must be upwards of 70 years old and still going strong. I call it my dinosaur plant!