My Bloggable Day

Things I miss about Melbourne

Posted on June 12, 2014 by Bec

Yesterday I finished compiling a list of Melbourne restaurant, bar, cafe and activity recommendations for my housemate. I capped it at three pages long. I’ve been feeling pangs of homesickness ever since. Obviously I’m really happy with where I live, but there are things I miss.

Having more than one or two bar options

Rooftop Bar, Melbourne

It’s probably a stretch to call Kalgoorlie’s night spots ‘bars’. They are pubs, sometimes with dance floors. Don’t get me wrong, I love a big night out at the Gold Bar. But variety is the spice of life, and sometimes I wish I didn’t have to go to the same sticky-floored venue with topless barmaids (known as Skympies) as I did the week before. And the week before that.

The gross Yarra looks so pretty at night

Appreciating the sunshine

A glorious day at the Botanic Gardens

Western Australia is a bloody sunny place. Even in winter. And as stupid as it sounds I often wish there was less sun, so that when it does come out, I appreciate it more. Every afternoon when I’m driving home from work I’m almost blinded by the endless sunshine hitting my windscreen at just the wrong angle. Give it a rest sun.

Good, cheap coffee

Coffee at Manchester Press

This one seems obvious, but it’s surprising for me because I don’t even like coffee that much. I don’t drink it every day but when I do purchase a cup I’d rather it didn’t taste like burnt water. Or cost $5. The place I go to is generally pretty good, but it’s not consistent. The worst coffee I’ve ever experienced in my life was down in Esperance, I almost wanted to ask the barrista what process they went through to make such an offensive beverage. But I didn’t.

The food

Bagel, also at Manchester Press

There’s a reason I put on 5 kilos every time I go home for a week. There’s so much variety, and it’s so cheap! I want to eat it all.

Going to the MCG every weekend

Le Sigh

It was my second home.

My family and friends

Obviously. And now because I feel like it, a few more glorious photos of the World’s Most Liveable City:

See you in two weeks!

Posted in Melbourne, Misc | Tagged Homesick, Melbourne, Things I miss | Leave a comment

Things that happened on the weekend

Posted on June 9, 2014 by Bec

Friday night

I risked fracturing a very new, very young relationship by showing my true colours and throwing the mother of all tantrums when Carlton lost to Geelong by less than a goal in the dying moments of the game. Think loud huffing, swearing and one instance of throwing my spectacles at the couch. Promptly went to sleep afterwards (the only thing that could numb my pain, also tantrums are exhausting) next to a very patient man.

Saturday

Woke at 5am when said patient man needed to head to work and went home and passed out for a few more hours. The previous evening a distant memory, I rose and headed out for breakfast.

Mmmm French toast

With this lovely lady and fellow member of the #girlgang.

Cecilberry

Also known as Em. After breakfast we went shopping and I purchased my seventh or eighth horizontal black and white striped dress. Seems reasonable.

“I don’t have anything like this”

After that I slogged it out at the gym, showered and went to the house of Lauren and Dave, where Em is house sitting at the moment. Lauren and Dave are currently traversing part of the continent of Africa, hey guys!

Em fluffed up my hair to fit the brief of ‘mid western American local politicians wife’ that I so often strive (and fail) at.

In the bathroom of Lauren and Dave (before the fluffing).

We attended a dinner that I gushed over on my blog yesterday.

Pork

Panna cotta

After dinner I experimented with some terrible nightclub photography on the Gold Bar dance floor.

Claire’s soul trying to escape her body like it ain’t no thang.

In the pink.

Sunday

Not pictured; the consumption of ‘special fries’ (fries with sour cream, cheese and bacon) in the wee hours, the subsequent Hungry Jacks’ breakfast a few hours afterwards, cleaning my entire house from top to toe whilst listening to Fleetwood Mac, declining an invitation to See The Fault in Our Stars for fear of excessive public crying and my very average ‘throw leftovers from the fridge in a pan and hope for the best’ dinner.

The end

Posted in Misc | Tagged Weekend | 4 Comments

Dinner for 6 and learning what ‘sous-vide’ means

Posted on June 8, 2014 by Bec

Last night my chef friend Zach trialled a pop-up dinner for 6 and I was lucky enough to be one of the ‘guinea pigs’ on the receiving end of gourmet foodz. Zach and his parents are behind the most delicious fish and chip shop i’ve ever experienced (the burgers, oh my) so I was pretty excited. We enjoyed three courses of amazing Italian, matching wines and ~~loose~~ intelligent conversation.

Things kicked off with a round of potent Vesper Martinis, James Bond style.

Shaken, not stirred. Seriously.

We took our seats for entree; a crispy thin crust pizza with prosciutto, mozzarella and rocket aaaaaand

A mountain of DIY bruschetta ingredients:

#thatgarlic

To go with a stack of lightly fried bread:

All bread should be fried.

Cheers!

Clink.

Just one course in we were feeling pretty jolly.

It may have taken about 15 takes to get a straight-faced photo of Em and I.

Nailed it

But thankfully we had a patient photographer.

Thanks Dylan.

Meanwhile Zach is making delicious things happen in the kitchen.

We were served pork belly, that was cooked via the sous vide method (cooking food sealed in airtight plastic bags in a water bath or in a temperature-controlled steam environment for longer than normal cooking times, cheers Wikipedia!) at 65 degrees for 36 hours. That isn’t a typo. 36 hours. More than a day.

The result was melt-in-your-mouth pork belly. Divine. It was paired with delicious leek risotto.

And an apple, honey and dark soy reduction. My mouth is actually watering as I type this.

It was the best pork belly I’ve ever had. No jokes.

Le Sigh.

I already liked dessert when I saw it was coming in jars.

We had panna cotta (not ricotta, as I was going to write…) with rhubarb coulis, lime, toffee shards and a candied rhubarb stick.

Mmmm shards.

It was a perfect, light dessert to top off the meal. Apparently it was the second batch, as Zach wasn’t happy with how the first batch set. Love that dedication!

It was a very fun, very delicious evening. I’m not much of a chef (more of a baker) so it was fascinating to learn new things, like cooking in vac packs dunked in water, who knew?!

Thanks for inviting me Zach, I’m here if you need someone to sample more food. Any time. Some time next week?

How was your weekend?

Posted in Food | Tagged dinner, Food | 3 Comments

7 hilarious & interesting lists from around the internet

Posted on June 6, 2014 by Bec

It’s Friday, which means it’s almost the weekend which means it’s almost:

How cool is that marquee sign from A Beautiful Mess?! I wish I could make one. If only I had ‘nailed’ woodwork at high school.

Anyway, a few Fridays ago I began doing up lists of interesting stuff around the internet, and then I went one week without finding awesome links and it kind of died… But now it’s back! Because it turns out you guys love clicking on stuff that takes you away from my blog, which I don’t take personally… Much. Haha.

7 Reasons Why You Will Never Do Anything Amazing With Your life
Well this is depressingly honest, but interesting.

37 Signs You Grew Up in Australia in the 90s
Yes! To everything except we were only allowed Coco Pops on the holidays, and only my sister got a Dollarmites account…

12 Courageous Things Every Person Should Do Before Turning 30
I can’t wait to tell someone “No” without giving a reason. Or apologising profusely.

16 People Who Totally Got What Was Coming To Them
Snort out loud funny.

15 Stereotypes About Journalists That Are Absolutely True
Mostly true.

50 Completely Unexplainable Stock Photos No One Will Ever Use
I couldn’t actually breathe I was laughing so hard for a while there.

7 Habits of Truly Charming People
Note to self.

Have an excellent weekend!

Posted in Misc | Tagged Links I Love, Lists, The internet | 3 Comments

Deconstructed Rice Paper Roll Salad

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Bec

Before I got into the habit of prepackaged soup for lunch every day, I used to be pretty darn great at making my lunch. Mostly because I love food but I am also really stingy when it comes to buying it from crappy overpriced cafes.

On Wednesday I had leftovers from Vietnamese rice paper rolls and used them to create a pretty epic salad. It tasted just like dinner the night before, only without the fuss of rolling the ingredients into a sheet of sticky rice paper.

I give you, the Deconstructed Rice Paper Roll Salad:

So delicious. So easy for an office lunch.

At home:

The night before, poach some chicken breast. Do this by placing the chicken in a saucepan, covering the chicken with water and bringing it to the boil. Reduce the heat and let simmer for 10 minutes. Turn the stove off and let the chicken cool slightly, then remove from the saucepan and use two forks to shred it finely on a chopping board. I used 400g of chicken and it was enough for 8 rice paper rolls and two salads.

Chop up some ice berg lettuce, cucumber and avocado and grate some carrot. Put it all in a container with the chicken to take to work the next day.

At work:

Boil the kettle and soak some rice vermicelli noodles while you get the rest of your ingredients together.

Put everything in a bowl and once the vermicelli is soft, add it as well. Take some Hoi Sin sauce (and chilli or Sriracha if that floats your boat) and sprinkle about a tablespoon on top. I added some water to my Hoi Sin to make it runnier and easier to ‘sprinkle’.

Add some coriander to the top and you’re done! A quick and deliciously fresh office lunch. And it tastes just like a rice paper roll.

I used to work at a Thai/Vietnamese restaurant that made rice paper rolls. I was there every Sunday and Thursday night from about age 14 to 17 and made a whopping $8 an hour. I think my former boss Sylvia would be proud, maybe. Perhaps if she weren’t quite so stern and didn’t spend so much time trying to set me up with customers’ sons.

Posted in Food | Tagged Healthy Lunch, Rice Paper Roll Salad, Salad, Vietnamese Food | 3 Comments

Triple Peanut Butter Cheesecake

Posted on June 5, 2014 by Bec

Sorry for those waiting desperately for this recipe! It comes from Phoodie, which is a food blog so excellent I implore you to go over and have a look now.

Gone? Good.

Now, the Triple Peanut Butter Cheesecake is certainly not for the fainthearted. As I said in an earlier post, there is peanut butter and peanut butter chocolate in the filling. Some more peanut butter chocolate is sprinkled on the top (which is a chocolate ganache). And also some chopped peanuts, for good measure.

Behold:

If like me, you don’t have easy access to Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, Whittaker’s Peanut Butter Block will do nicely.

I’m not even sure I can find a word strong enough to describe how good it is, ‘delicious’ doesn’t seem adequate…

It’s so rich, a tiny slither is more than enough (which is something I never thought i’d catch myself saying). Let’s just say it lasted a group of 7 people more than a boozy long weekend, and we even returned home with leftovers.

The cake was for my housemate Bec’s birthday and was very well received by the cohort lucky enough to try it. I highly recommend it to those partial to the chocolate/peanut butter combination. Otherwise try these for size:

Oreo Fudge Cheesecake

Choc Cherry Cheesecake

Milo Cheesecake

Posted in Food | Tagged Cake, Cheesecake, Recipe, Triple Peanut Butter Cheesecake | 7 Comments

Esperance Winter Weekend: Part 2

Posted on June 4, 2014 by Bec

The next morning everyone woke, surprisingly, not worse for wear. After hanging around in the kitchen reliving the previous evening’s exploits we went in search of food. We ended up in a cafe, but after sitting there for 10 minutes (and not being served I might add) we realised there was somewhere else we’d rather be:

Classy

On the foreshore, with drive-through fast food.

At least the view was good.

After downing Macdonalds and Red Rooster in the sunshine, a few of us decided a good old fashioned mountain climb would be a great idea.

We drove to Cape Le Grand National Park, about 55km out of Esperance. I’ve enjoyed Cape Le Grand’s unspoiled, pristine beaches many times, but never once ascended the 262m that make up Frenchman’s Peak.

What started as a gentle walk quickly turned into a steep, rocky incline. Wearing Converse trainers and no socks was a bad idea.

We made it to the first stop, base camp, perhaps? Which was a giant open-ended cave.

To get to the summit we had to edge around a deep incline, and scale another vertical (exaggerating? nah) climb.

Terrifying.

The views from the top were well worth it.

The self timer wins again.

The entire park is devoid of mobile phone signal, except it seems, at the very top of Frenchman’s Peak. So convenient.

“I swear this is really important…”

The walk down was almost worse than the walk up. I am really not a nimble person, and to say I descended with the grace and agility of a mountain goat would be an outright lie.

Claire seems to be enjoying it.

Apparently I looked like I was walking for the first time. Such supportive peers I have.

Arriving back on flat ground was quite a relief. We drove on to Hellfire Bay for a tranquil stroll to reward our mountain climbing efforts.

The peace was broken only by the horrible squeaking sound caused by the dragging of feet across super fine sand. “STOP IT!” I wanted to yell, but didn’t, knowing it would only egg certain people on…

We got to the end of the beach and sat.

And took a couple more timer shots.

We drove back to the house and enjoyed an evening of curry and board games. And so ended my 14th trip to Esperance in 2.5 years! We’ll be back.

Posted in Misc | Tagged Cape Le Grand, Esperance, Frenchman's Peak, Hellfire Bay | 4 Comments

Esperance Winter Weekend: Part 1

Posted on June 3, 2014 by Bec

This weekend just gone a bunch of us embarked on what is now an annual winter weekend at the beach. Part tradition, part early birthday celebration for my housemate Bec, we made the four hour trek south to enjoy some crisp coastal times.

Having Friday off, my extra long weekend began with a lazy morning, a bagel and the content knowledge that my car new car stereo had been installed (thanks Lewis!) and I wouldn’t be driving south in the cone of silence.

First-road-trip-together selfie!

We arrived in Esperance just in time to catch the last cotton candy-esque light at Twilight beach:

Magic.

The rest of our crew arrived in stages and we sat around the dining room table, devouring cheese, wine and delicious pizza whilst listening to my hastily assembled ‘Golden Oldies’ playlist (far too much Rod Stewart, even for my liking).

Saturday morning started as all good mornings do: with the smell of sizzling bacon wafting from the barbecue.

Jordan was in charge of team bacon/chipolatas:

Jordan and Claire

Kadn cooked some impressively perfect poached eggs and Bec nailed ‘three – medium brown’ on the toaster.

Kadn, Bec and Scott

The winners were our stomachs.

Toast Jenga

#BACON

We decided to work off breakfast (or attempt to do so) with a seaside frolic.

At a deserted lookout we managed, using the camera’s self timer, to capture a group photo delightfully reminiscent of a late 1990’s teen drama cast photo:

Kalgoorlie Creek? The Goldfields Gang?

Just moosin’ around

Only one person braved the icy water.

It wasn’t me.

After stocking up on provisions we went back to the homestead and sung ‘happy birthday’ to Bec around a Triple Peanut Butter Cheesecake I prepared earlier.

It was pretty intense! Very rich. Very delicious.

There is peanut butter and peanut butter chocolate in the filling. Some more peanut butter chocolate is sprinkled on the top (which is a chocolate ganache). With some chopped peanuts, for good measure. It was ridiculous. I shall post the recipe later this week.

After the cake (and the subsequent sugar highs and lows) we all had a bit of a lie down. We had to gather strength for the evening ahead. Which involved beer pong, dancing and rounds of flip cup:

Good times.

As well as a trashing of the kitchen bench:

Delightfully messy.

And another group photo using the self timer, with the camera balanced precariously on the kitchen range hood:

Clever.

We then jumped in taxis and headed for Esperance’s one and only watering hole. There we danced to a cover band and stuck around for the dubiously named nightclub (the ‘snake pit’) to open. Andrew and I ducked out early with Bec and Scott and left the others to the dance tunes, laser show and ill-advised rounds of shots.

To be continued…

Posted in Misc | Tagged Beach Weekend, Cheesecake, Esperance, Food, Long Weekend | 6 Comments

I live in the land of ridiculous sunsets

Posted on May 28, 2014 by Bec

On my evening run last Thursday I was heading over a bridge facing this:

Looking south east

‘Pink waves!’ I thought, ‘how pretty’.

Then I turned around, looked in the opposite direction and saw this:

Looking north west (no filter!)

Jaw dropping, eye-searingly beautiful.

We are very spoilt with sunsets in this part of the world, especially in winter. I don’t know what causes them or if perhaps the chemicals from the nearby smelters* play a hand, but they are incredible. And the photos barely do them justice.

(*I watched Erin Brockovich yesterday, so I’m probably in a bit of a pessimistic mood regarding the chemicals pumped into the air by local companies)

I’m recovering from a cold still.

Have you seen my list of amazing global sunsets yet?

Posted in Misc | Tagged Kalgoorlie, Sunsets | 6 Comments

Overestimating the power of my mind

Posted on May 27, 2014 by Bec

I’ve always been a ridiculously enthusiastic proponent of ‘mind over matter’. But, having never once done anything practical to strengthen my ‘positive mind power’, it seems rather implausible that I should wake one day being able to heal myself with positive affirmations. This doesn’t deter me.

Like the day I decided I could meditate my way out of a hangover… It didn’t work. It seems all that vomiting really messes with channeling one’s inner chi. Then there is my ongoing project to become ambidextrous, via the belief that I can simply assign the same confidence I have in my right hand, to my left hand. Cue spilled milk everywhere.

Anyway, on Friday I could feel the tightness in my throat signalling an impending cold. ‘Mind over matter… Mind over matter… Mind over matter’. I chanted internally like a Hare Chrishna chanting through a shopping mall. Nothing was going to stop me from enjoying an awesome weekend because I BELIEVED I could. Didn’t I deserve an amazing weekend?! OF COURSE I DID. With the power of my mind (and perhaps some alcohol, for its disinfectant qualities) I would go shopping and out for breakfast, lunch, dinner and to the races! And my cold would retreat faster than Miley Cyrus’ dignity and future prospects at the VMAs last year.

Shopping? Sure!

Socialising? Why not?!

Well. I have once again been foiled by overconfidence in my mind’s abilities. The Secret? I haven’t unlocked it. Cold: 1. Bec: 0.

I woke on Monday morning barely able to move. I called my housemate and colleague Bec at work “Hi Bec,” I croaked and spluttered like an ogre with tonsillitis. Silence. “It’s me”. Silence. “It’s Bec!” I managed before collapsing in a coughing fit. My cold had left me not only incapacitated but audibly unrecognisable. Fantastic.

I have no idea whether I would have been just as sick if I had spent the weekend resting in bed, it is possible that I might have been. And I didn’t actually feel as bad on the weekend as I did on Monday.

Still. No more double-ended-candle-burning for me. No more mind-over-mattering basic biology. For the rest of the winter I’m going to act like a responsible adult, which includes not attempting to swim in the icy depths at Esperance this weekend…

Wish me luck! Remedies for the common cold…? Share below!

Posted in Misc | Tagged Cold, Mind over matter, Sick, Sickness | Leave a comment