I buy corn when I have run out of hay to feed my bunnies. It's so cheap and I feel that giving them corn allows them to exist temporarily in a Beatrix Potter-esque world with vegetables on demand, nibbled in the dusk, safe from Mr McGregor.  I like to let the bunnies imagine that they are real outdoor rabbits. That's why I don't even take the husks or the silk off the corn; it gives them a more authentic experience.


Apparently corn is bad for bunnies, but these two also once ate the mesh of an entire screen door, and have never had any issues with... actually, with anything they have ingested.

I haven't eaten corn off the cob for a long time. It was banned whilst I had braces, but after that I only really ever ate it at music festivals and the Easter Show, dripping in saturated fat and delish salt. Burned in my memory is the sound of my brother's girlfriend chanting, coooooooorn, coooooooooooooooorn, whilst we schlumped through ankle-deep mud and rain at Splendour in the Grass circa 2003. Of course, we used to go before it was cool. And we used to eat a lot of corn.

Anyway, whilst camping recently, we ate a salad of fresh corn, black beans, tomato, avocado, lime juice and coriander (similar to this recipe), and I was reminded that corn is very delicious and is suitable for more than consumption by rabbits or people fuelled by bad weather and alcohol. But what to do with it?

Luckily, for Christmas I was given a beautiful book that focuses on vegetables and what you can do with them when they're in season. Perfect for the people with an overly productive garden and not enough ideas.



It is so visually appealing, with lovely matte pages and woven place markers, and my favourite, an index organised by ingredient.

Mmmmn, delicious starchy vegetables.

The perfect cookbook - one that makes you feel inferior about both your cooking and your gardening skills!

By the Book - Week Nine - Phaidon, Vegetables from an Italian Garden

Pasta with sweetcorn, pancetta, and baby spinach

Ingredients
300g pasta (the recipe calls for 'ruote', wheels, but there were no wheels to be found)
2 tablespoons olive oil plus extra for drizzling
250g sweetcorn kernels
150g baby spinach
3 thin slices pancetta or bacon, diced
salt and pepper

Method
Cook the corn for 5-10 minutes or until tender (or in my case, microwave for 4 minutes).
Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Add the pasta and cook until al dente.
Drain and tip into a salad bowl, drizzle with a little oil, and stir in the sweet corn. Add the spinach leaves and set aside.
Heat oil in a small pan. Add pancetta/bacon and cook over high heat, stirring frequently, until browned and delicious.
Remove from heat and sprinkle pancetta/bacon over the pasta.

It sounds much more impressive as Ruote al mais, pancetta e spinaci novelli. But I won't tell anyone if you don't.

I had half a red onion in the fridge so added that to the bacon, and I skipped the step that called for 'refreshing' the pasta under cold running water because that seems very strange to me, but apparently it's what you do when making a pasta salad?   Of course, I topped it all off with parmesan because I am a glutton.


I thought this was pretty delicious, and very fast to make.


The girls weren't entirely convinced though.

❤

The excitement of this Tuesday's crepe cake left me without any desire for cooking. I ate takeaway for dinner on at least 3 nights. Possibly more, but it's all sort of blurred together in a sodium-filled haze.

But it's Sunday, and I told myself that I would cook dammit, and so, while this isn't from a book that I own, it's adapted from a recipe card currently on the kitchen counter and was a good way to use up a whole lot of bits and pieces that were approaching the danger zone. Halloumi is too delicious to waste (now that I understand how to cook it, and buy only the brand Pittas, which is not too salty), and a bunch of mint these days costs the approximate equivalent of a week's rent so I can't quite bring myself to feed all of it to the bunnies after using but a single sprig. Also, I am home alone, so it's the perfect opportunity to eat cous cous.

It's a sort of bubble and squeak for modern life. Because ....halloumi!
I am on fire with the dad's jokes lately!

Not quite the book - week seven

Chickpea, tomato and halloumi squeaking salad (adapted from this recipe)
 

Ingredients
1 tin chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1 tin diced tomatoes
Dried chilli flakes
Four medium tomatoes, quartered
Some cous cous (I used and Ainsley Harriot one because they are pre-seasoned and there was a packet also sitting on the counter top)
Small bunch of mint, finely chopped
A slab of halloumi, sliced
Olive oil
Balsamic vinegar

Method

• Before you get hungry, put the tomatoes on a tray and drizzle with olive oil and a splash of balsamic vinegar. Put the tray in the over ~120 degrees. You don't need to pre-heat, just put them in and leave them until they've reduced in size (~1 hour). Roughly chop, then put the bits to the side once done (try not to pick and pick until all of the pieces are inexplicably eaten). 
• Place the halloumi slices under a hot grill, turning them once or twice until the surface is bubbly and browned. Put the halloumi to the side as well. 
• Over high heat, put the tin of tomatoes and the chilli flakes in a large frying pan and jiggle around until the liquid has started to reduce (I also put in a few teaspoons of sugar to take some of the acidity out of the tomatoes). Add the chickpeas and then let it bubble away until it reduces and thickens. 
• While that's happening, pour hot water over the cous cous in a large bowl and cover it loosely. 
• When the cous cous is nice and fluffy, add the roasted tomatoes and the mint. 
• Put a scoop of tomato/chickpea on the bottom, follow with a scoop of cous cous, and sprinkle the chopped halloumi on top.

It only takes about 30 minutes and there's enough for left-overs. It makes you win at life.

❤

I went to a hipster cafe, and I enjoyed it.


That might not sound like a big deal, but it is. Not only because I am anti-hipster, but because I was able to go there without planning the route in minute obsessive detail, without panicking because I was there before everyone else. I was able to stand in the line for a buzzer by myself, was able to sit in the garden surrounded by other people without my heart racing, and without any feeling of terror or hopelessness. Was able to wander, and to eat, and take some photos without feeling as though all eyes were on me and I was found wanting.


Around this time of year, 8 years ago, things were not going so well.


I started to lose weight because I stopped going to the grocery store. Because other people were too scary. I did not leave the house except to go to uni and work. For 12 months I lived 200 metres from the beach, and I went to the beach 3 times. The first time for five minutes before I felt so physically uncomfortable that I had to leave, trying not to run. I lost friends, because I stopped going out, but I didn't tell them that I wasn't going out because I was sick, and lonely, and sinking.   A lot of factors collided, head on, and the result was a mess.

❤

By the way, if you are struggling with anxiety, or life in general, I recommend that you check out The Happiness Trap. It is a stupid title and the book cover is awful, but the idea that some thought patterns are not bad, but are just there, and need to be reduced to background noise, was a turning point for me at a very dark and down time. 
I found ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) far more beneficial than CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy), in spite of the evidence at the time insisting that CBT is the cure for social phobia and anxiety. I have no doubt that CBT works for some people, and in some situations, but I was not that person. 

If you ask the Internet, the crepe cake was invented by a high-end bakery, Lady M Cake Boutique, on Manhattan's upper east side. I have my doubts about this origin story because I can't believe that no one thought of stacking crepes and filling them with something delicious prior to 2002, but they've trademarked it, so it must be true...?


Mille crêpe is a French cake, made with with one million crepes. Or maybe one thousand. French isn't my strong point. Hundreds of crepes layered with pastry creme, or whipped cream, ganache, anything. There are as many options as there are crepes in the stack.


There is a Swedish version too, pannkakstårta, but I'm sure they stole the idea from Manhattan. Or the French. Anyway, those Swedes love turning things into cake. Their version is more low key; filled simply with cream and lingonberry jam. There is also Swedish sandwich cake, Smörgåstårta, which I never tried because a) it is a special occasion cake, and b) I don't believe that fish roe, boiled egg, prawns and sliced ham is a good combo. But that's just me, and I'm sure 9 million swedes would disagree.

I have dreamed of this cake, but I've always worked in small offices and my apartment is small and cramped, full of stuff and dominated by two rabbits, so I don't invite people over. BUT, my colleague's birthday this year falls just one day after Pancake Tuesday, and there are at least 6 of us on a quiet day, so finally, an excuse to make it!


It's actually quite simple, but it's time consuming because you have to cook 100 crepes. Or maybe 20....I lost count. Turns out I am quite bad at making crepes, and am deficient in the necessary flipping skills, so I adopted a trick I'd read online and used two pans. Rather than attempting to flip, you just up-end one pan over the other. The added benefit of this technique is that you can set up a mini production line and cook two at a time.


You can make the crepe batter and the filling in advance. In fact, crepe batter is better when it's had a chance to rest, and the filling is easier to work with when it's cold. I used this recipe for the crepes (and just made up the proportions for the chocolate ones at the bottom). Had I not ruined, and then eaten, about 6 of them one batch would have been enough, but I ended up making one full batch of plain, and then a half batch of chocolate ones.

I'd read that filling is easier if you use an offset spatula, which I don't own, so I'm happy to report that the back of a spoon works just fine. The goal is to spread the filling right to the edge, making the layer thinner in the centre (which helps to avoid making too much of a sloped dome). I had to check my level a few times, and I started to get a bit lopsided, but with some calculated filling on the next layer or two you can correct the angle.


I had wanted to make a citrus filling, maybe some lemon curd and a little whipped cream, but I was over-ruled and instructed to use chocolate and hazelnuts. I'm not a huge fan of chocolate cakes, but I do adore Nutella.

I was going for ombre, so the bottom couple of layers are pure Nutella. For the other layers I whipped 500ml of cream, adding some icing sugar, vanilla and a splash of Frangelico. I divided the whipped cream roughly into three. One third became a hazelnut creme, with a few large spoonfuls of Nutella folded through; another third got a heaped spoon of cocoa to make a plainer chocolate flavour; and the remaining third was just cream. Delicious, wonderful cream. Starting with the hazelnut creme I worked my way up, making the layers lighter and lighter. All told it takes about an hour to assemble.



I'll be honest with you: by the time I was done I didn't care what the cake was going to taste like because it was so damn pretty.

(But luckily you cannot go wrong with Nutella... it was extremely tasty)

❤

Back to the Women's Weekly Great Fast Recipes, because it's hot here and I'm all tuckered out. And also there was a tub of yoghurt in the fridge slowly, sadly, approaching its best before date. Nothing like a little bit of lamb and yoghurt, although I remember when these would have been called "rissoles" or "fancy works burgers".



I was going to skip the beetroot and swap it out for tomato, but at the 11th hour I had a poke around in the cupboard and found a tin of beetroot that was in a similar state to that of the yoghurt.

I haven't eaten beetroot for a long time, except for in juices on those occasions when I make a short-lived declaration to eat fewer carbs and be a better person. I'm so glad I found that lonely can in the cupboard, because without it tonight's dinner would have fallen flat. The sweetness, and the acidity, brought it all together, cutting through the fattiness of the lamb mince (I don't think that Woolworths got the memo about reducing saturated fat intake, because you could have run a car off what was left in the pan when I was done cooking).

When I was little I adored tinned beetroot. I could eat a whole tin, plus juice, given the chance. One day I did just that, and the following day my parents received a somewhat frantic call from daycare, worried that I required urgent admission to hospital for suspected internal bleeding...oh, that bright, delicious, red juice...

By the Book - Week six - Women's Weekly Great Fast Recipes

Lamb patties with tzatziki and beetroot (click for the original, much better written, recipe)

Ingredients

I didn't go to Japan last year, and so for the first time in years I've found myself without a novelty calendar (the purchase of which is the main aim of most of my trips to Japan). This is a serious problem because February 2016 is shaping up to be a wonderful month, and ought to be brought to life on paper.

These free printables do not have 3D animals with fuzzy, tactile surfaces. They do not have real astroturf. They have no moving parts, they do not make music or lights, nor can the left-over pieces be used to construct a realistic to-scale model of a famous Japanese castle and/or peacock. And there are no rabbits wearing hats.

What I'm saying is, these are not Japanese novelty calendars, but they're pretty sweet nonetheless (click the picture to be taken to the designer's website, where you can download the scaleable image - plus the other months - for printing).

One.

If you want to start with a blank slate, then you want the minimal calendar from Small Paper Things. Hmmmn think of all the things that could be decorated with all that washi tape  I   you own....

Two.

Oh So Lovely has 20 different designs for this calendar, and they are all awesome!

Three. 

The Crabtree & Evelyn one has a little coupon code, in case you feel the need to buy some perfume this month.

Four. 

Tiny strawberries are called smultron in Swedish, and they are far superior to standard strawberries (jordgubbe). Download a mouthful for the month at This Little Street (tiny lemons for April!)

Five.

Tiny desk calendar from My Fabuless Life. I think this is what I need on my tiny desk right now.... I'm so glad we have a colour printer at work. Not that I would ever print personal documents at work...Not the like person down the hall who is really, really into caving. We looked her up on the interweb. She is very dedicated to caving. She presented at a conference.

But if you don't like any of the calendars that I found, there are lots more here. And this beautiful floral water colour one by The Cottage Market, which has notes pages and to-do lists. You can thank me later.


Actually...wait...I spoke too soon:

Six.

Origami Panda Family Calendar. I think we're done here.

PS. While you're at it, why don't you make some valentines? Your secretly admired will appreciate it ❤

Design is Yay is a little oasis of printables. If only I had more spare surfaces in my life...