Blogger, Penguins, Books

Weird, I tried to access my Blogger account yesterday and was told there had been unusual activity on my account and I had to verify who I was by phone, I had to give them my phone number and they phoned instantly with a verification code. Then I had to change my password, what a palaver. I find this password stuff to be a pain in the you know where. OK, banks and various financial transactions, yes you need a password, but really, it goes too far.

Dunno about where you are, but it has got pretty chilly this weekend. 9:00 a.m. on Sunday it was 4°C and that is not very warm at all. However, the forecast is calling for much higher temps during the week and next weekend, if you can believe what they say of course. Talking of chilly, I discovered on Saturday something I didn’t know, not all penguins live in sub zero climates, in fact most of them don’t. Maybe everyone knows that but me, but I was very surprised. There are penguins who couldn’t survive in 4°C apparently. Jack Hannah who is the Director Emeritus of Columbia Zoo, had a little blue penguin with him when he was on GMA on Saturday morning. He said in fact there are more species of warm weather penguins than there are cold weather varieties which are the ones most familiar to us.

Wonders will never cease. I am presently reading the latest and last Earth Children’s book by Jean M. Auel The Land of the Painted Caves and I am enjoying it more than the last couple even though it is composed of a lot of descriptions of painted caves in one region of current day France. What particularly fascinates me, her books are set in the Ice Age and yet many, if not all, of the cave paintings were done ages before the people of that time. I must admit I wasn’t sure if I would ever get to read this book or even if Jean M. Auel would get round to writing it. I am not sure how long it has been since The Shelters of Stone, but its years.

Mushroom Canada’s latest offering

Polpette di Fungi
by Mardi Michels of Eat. Live. Travel. Write.

2 eggs
1 tsp baking soda
50 g freshly grated Parmesan
50 g Panko breadcrumbs, plus extra for rolling
1/4 cup  chopped plain parsley
1/2 cup finely diced fresh mushrooms (crimini, button, whatever you like!)
Pinch sea salt
Freshly ground black pepper
Olive oil for frying
A jar (about 700mL) of your favourite pasta sauce

1. Beat the eggs and the baking soda with a whisk.
2. Slowly add the cheese, the breadcrumbs, the parsley and mushrooms to the egg mix. Season with sea salt and pepper and fold gently until all ingredients are combined.
3. Using a teaspoon form small balls of the mixture, then roll them in the extra Panko crumbs.
4. Heat the oil in a frying pan, add the egg balls 2-3 at a time and fry over medium heat until golden brown all round. You will need to turn them to make sure they brown evenly.
5. Drain on a paper towel and continue until all balls are fried up.
6. Heat your pasta sauce over medium heat and then add the balls when the sauce is bubbling. Turn the heat down to low and partially cover the saucepan. Continue to heat for about 7 minutes - the balls will be warm through and will have absorbed some of the sauce.
7. Serve topped with fresh basil.

Have a great day

Spam, Bear Problems, Books.

On Saturday I got two emails, Dearest in Christ, and Beloved in the Lord. Really!!! Whoever sends these, do they honestly think any intelligent person is going to respond to such stuff. Especially as the body of the emails is usually badly written with lots of mistakes. Most of such emails get filtered out, but occasionally some get through.

Bears seem to be having a hard time of it lately, there have been many reports of bears in peoples back yards, even a picture of one swimming in a pool and playing with a tennis ball. Funny to see, not funny if its your pool. There have been reports of mother bears attacking to protect their cubs and then the story in Norway of a polar bear attacking a bunch of kids and mauling several plus killing one. In the latter case the ice caps are melting and this is driving them elsewhere to seek food. Bears in North America are having problems because of the extreme heat not forgetting habitat destruction. Also if you are going to be hiking where bears live, you are risking attack. I feel very sorry for the bears, and am not sure what can be done to prevent these bear/human interactions.

Now I am reading A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin book 5 of his Song of Ice and Fire series. Considering the last book came out in 2006 its not surprising I am having a few problems with it. I haven’t read too many chapters yet, and there is a cast of characters at the end of the book so maybe I can sort it all out. I have decided there should be a law that all authors have to write a full book or series right through to the end before they are allowed to publish it. 5 years is way too long since the last book and there is yet another to come. Not only that, this book runs parallel to the last book, A Feast of Crows, it  isn’t exactly a sequel. Odd. I am awaiting another book which has been a long time coming, the sequel in the Jean M. Auel series which started with The Clan of the Cave Bear, a great book, her subsequent books have not been as good. Her last novel was 2002.

Having decided I like quinoa (kinwa) this recipe appeals to me.

Quinoa Taco Salad

By The Gluten Free Goddess
WebMD Recipe from Foodily.com

My vegan quinoa taco salad is sans tomatoes. And bean-free. No customary black beans here. But if you love black beans with a white hot passion, add 'em in. You can also add crumbled goat cheese on top, if you desire.

Ingredients

1 cup quinoa cooked in two cups water
Extra virgin olive oil, as needed
Juice from 2 juicy limes
Sea salt, to taste
2-3 tablespoons fresh chopped cilantro or parsley
1 half small red or purple onion, diced fine
1 small yellow bell pepper, cored, seeded, diced fine
1 cup roasted corn kernels (I used frozen, roasted on a cookie sheet for 6-7 minutes, then cooled)
1 large head of crisp romaine lettuce, washed, dried, sliced crosswise
Gluten-free tortilla chips
1 large avocado, pitted, peeled, diced

Instructions

Cook the quinoa per package instructions. Fluff the cooked quinoa with a fork. Scoop the quinoa into a bowl.

Drizzle the cooked quinoa with extra virgin olive oil and toss to coat. Squeeze on fresh lime juice and toss again. Season the mixture with sea salt, to taste.

Add in the fresh chopped cilantro, diced red onion, diced yellow pepper, and roasted corn kernels. Stir lightly to distribute. Taste test for seasoning adjustments.

Line four salad bowls or plates with the fresh romaine. Spoon the quinoa salad on the center of the lettuce. Add the diced avocado to each plate. Tuck in a few tortilla chips around the edges.

Serve with an extra lime wedge.

More Options:

Add a cup of chilled, drained black beans, if you like your taco salad super hearty.

Add sliced red or yellow cherry or grape tomatoes, if you desire.

Sprinkle with the cheese of your choice.

Serve with your favourite salsa on the side.

Total Servings: 4

Nutritional Information Per Serving

Calories: 240
Carbohydrates: 41.2g
Cholesterol: 0mg
Fat: 4.4g
Saturated Fat: 0.6 g
Fibre: 5.4g
Sodium: 24 mg
Protein: 6.7 g

Have a great day

Completing Someone Else's Story, Books in General, Lunch and Oysters

I have just finished The Well of Ascension which is book two of the Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson and have started book three The Hero of Ages. These are excellent books and extremely well written with a completely different magical concept which totally explains why the family of Robert Jordan would ask this young author to finish the Wheel of Time Series. However, I cannot imagine anyone taking on such an undertaking. He will have to totally immerse himself in Robert Jordan's world by reading and re-reading all the previous books he has written, eleven of them, and presumably making story boards of all the characters and what they have been doing and what has happened to them in every one of these eleven books not to mention the prequel novel and the companion book. The final book is to be published in three volumes the first in November 2009. I wish Brandon Sanderson all the luck in the world with this venture but I don't envy him the job one little bit. I have seriously been thinking about re-reading these novels myself because I really don't remember what happened to everyone in all the books other than the principle characters. There are a lot of smaller stories running alongside the main one and trying to keep them straight is difficult enough for me and I don't have to make sense of it all in order to write the sequels. He does have Robert Jordan's notes and I believe an outline of where he was intending to go with the story. But what a job! I am not too keen on stories with lots of books involved for the simple reason that I figure either I or the author will not be around to finish up. Robert Jordan being a case in point. George R.R. Martin is another who's books are taking a long time and Jean M. Auel is one of the worst offenders of all. One wonders if she will ever finish her Clan of the Cave Bear series whether in my lifetime or not. I guess I have kind of got to the stage of not caring one way or the other with her novels. Pity really as the first book was such a wonderful story. There are other novelistrs who's books are so far apart, I totally forget I have read the first one. I guess I should sympathise more with the authors as from all I understand from those authors I 'talk' to, it is not an easy business to be in. However, I assume when you start on these endless epics, you have some idea of where you are going and some kind of outline planned. I've said it before, I prefer duologies or trilogies and even they can take a long time from start to finish. Maybe I should start reading only books by authors who are dead and gone and who's novels I know are completed!!! My apologies to all you authors out there who do happen to read this, I know you have a pretty difficult time of it and I know I could not do it. We are off to have lunch with some friends we haven't seen for a while. We are going to Cora's in Cambridge. We know nothing about this restaurant so will tell you about it later. Yesterday I saw a programme on Food TV with a check preparing oysters I was green with envy seeing him scarf down these lovely delicacies which I haven't eaten in a long while. Used to get lots of oysters in the Carolinas, but if you find them here they are very expensive. He made Oysters Rockefeller, which I have never eaten, and oysters on the half shell with a Mignionette Sauce, both dishes looked delightful. The last time I had oysters was at Heathrow Airport in London about 3 years ago. Only got two on my whole plateful of seafood, but they were delicious. Oysters Rockefeller Source Emeril Lagasse Serves 6 (the way I eat oysters, you would need a lot more for this amount of people) Ingredients 1. Rock salt 2. 2 1/2 dozen oysters in their shells, freshly shucked and drained, the deeper bottom shell rinsed and reserved for baking 3. 1 recipe Rockefeller Sauce Base (see below) Directions 1. Preheat the oven to 400°. Spread a 1/2-inch-thick layer of rock salt on a large baking sheet and across the bottoms of 6 large plates. 2. Arrange the reserved oyster shells on the baking sheet. Put 1 oyster in each shell and top with 2 to 3 tablespoons of the sauce, spreading the sauce evenly out to the edge of the shell to completely cover the oyster. (Alternatively, transfer the sauce to a pastry bag fitted with a plain tip and pipe the sauce over the oysters.) 3. Bake until the sauce is lightly browned and the oysters begin to curl around the edges, about 20 minutes. 4. Using tongs or a spatula, carefully transfer the hot shells to the salt-covered plates and serve immediately. Rockerfeller Sauce Base Ingredients 1. 6 ounces spinach, stems removed and rinsed 2. 1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter 3. 2 3/4 cups finely chopped yellow onions 4. 1/4 cup finely chopped celery 5. 1 tablespoon minced garlic 6. 2 tablespoons Herbsaint or other anise-flavored liqueur, such as Pernod or Pastis 7. 1/2 teaspoon salt 8. 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 9. 1/2 cup cracker meal or cracker crumbs 10. 5 drops green food coloring (optional) Directions 1. Bring 1 quart of water to a boil in a medium pot. Add the spinach and cook until very tender and the water is green, 5 to 6 minutes. Drain the spinach in a colander set over a large bowl and reserve 2 3/4 cups of the cooking liquid. Let the spinach sit until cool enough to handle, then finely chop, and set aside. 2. Melt the butter in a medium pot over moderately high heat. When the butter is foamy, add the onions, celery and garlic and cook, stirring, until softened, about 3 minutes. Add the reserved spinach water, bring to a boil and cook for 1 minute. Add the chopped spinach, liqueur, salt and pepper and simmer, stirring occasionally, until the mixture reduces slightly, about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat, add the cracker meal and food coloring, and stir well to combine. Cool completely before using. The sauce can be made ahead and refrigerated for up to 3 days. Have a great day.

Snow Yet Again, My Reading, Tomato Curry

Would you believe we got another couple of inches of the white stuff yesterday, its supposed to be Spring for goodness sake, we have had enough. Spring here tends to happen almost overnight though, one minute there is not a bud in sight and the next the trees are in full leaf. Not a lot will happen til the snow has gone I don't suppose.

I am presently reading The Dark Materials Trilogy, from which the movie Golden Compass was adapted. Its good, but in some places, very slow going. The concept is certainly fascinating. I am beginning to understand the protests against the story from religious groups, but it is only a story after all. I got very irritated when people took The Da Vinci Code literally, can't readers differentiate between fact and fiction? I wasn't, personally, very impressed with that book, couldn't see what all the fuss was about. It takes all kinds, just as well we don't enjoy the same books or they would never get read.

Some authors seem to get an idea and then appear to strain to get that idea across which makes the story less appealing. A classic case in point is the Cave Bear series by Jean M. Auel. Her first book The Clan of the Cave Bear was absolutely brilliant and really worth reading. Her subsequent books have contained flashes of the original brilliance interspersed with boring repetitions of descriptions she wrote in her first book. She told us what the grasslands were like in book one, also about stone knapping tools and so on, but these things are repeated endlessly in subsequent novels, unnecessary. She is taking forever to produce the later books, whether she is suffering from the proverbial writer's block I don't know, but there are years between her recent books. I think writing a trilogy is great, then start something new, don't go on book after book with the same old story. Robert Jordan is another who is doing this in his Winds of Change series. Originally it was supposed to be seven books but I think we are up to nine now. He is not a well man these days so whether he will ever finish these stories, is anyone's guess.

From reading the blogs of several writers lately, I understand there is a lot of angst in writing a story - I couldn't do it myself I know, so maybe I am being super critical. I have a friend who has written an excellent book, I have read it, but hasn't managed to get it published. A pity.

On an uncritical note this curry is one of those I haven't made, but think sounds so good that I saved to do at some time in the future. I love tomatoes in any shape or form anyway, so I think this will be delicious. To get good tomatoes you may need to wait for the summer, depending where you live.

A Tomato Curry
Source: Nigel Slater

Servings: 4

onions - 2 medium
groundnut oil - 3 tablespoons
garlic - 4 juicy cloves
a hot red chilli
brown mustard seeds - 1 teaspoon
ground turmeric - 2 teaspoons
cumin seeds - 2 teaspoons
a 'thumb' of fresh ginger
crushed tinned tomatoes - 400g
tomatoes - 8-12 (large, but not quite beefsteak)
thick yoghurt - 100g

Peel the onions and chop them roughly, then let them cook slowly in the groundnut oil over a low to moderate heat. Peel the garlic, slice it thinly and add it to the onions. Chop the chilli finely, then add it, with its seeds, to the onions. Stir in the mustard seeds, turmeric and cumin seeds and continue cooking. Peel the ginger and cut it into matchstick-sized shreds. Add it to the pan and let it cook briefly, then add the tinned tomatoes, 400ml of water and a grinding of black pepper and salt. Turn up the heat and bring to the boil, then add the whole tomatoes.

Turn the heat down to a gentle simmer and leave to cook, covered with a lid, for twenty-five to thirty-five minutes, turning the tomatoes once or twice during cooking. You want them to soften but not totally collapse. Add a little more water should the mixture thicken too quickly.

Push the tomatoes to one side, then stir in the yoghurt. Let the sauce heat through, stirring gently, but without letting it come to the boil. Serve with rice or warm naan.

Have a great day.

As a kind of PS, I don't know what it is about my blogs which attracts enema cleaning ads, very odd I think.