FRIDAY 11th MARCH
Well it was Mardi Gras this week (here in Sydney it takes on gay conotations so I didn't actually go to see it). However the distance I walked today felt as though I had walked all the way to New Orleans and back again. Anyway it was a damn good Fats Domino song and I thought it was about time I introduced a musical motif in the daily report.
I had a quick bath with a book - so maybe it wasn't that quick, and after some coffee and toast with marmalade I took Reilly for the morning stroll. There is an option of turning left or right as one comes into the park area just opposite the house. Normally I turn left as that leads into the park proper, but as there were some people walking around in that direction and Reilly has a habit of rushing towards strangers and barking at them (in my opinion in a friendly sort of way - but possibly not interpreted as such by the people involved), I turned right. A few days ago in Macquarie Fields an Alaskan something or rather rushed up to an 18 month old child on the swings and badly savaged it. Apparently the owner at first tried to deny it was his, but has now been charged and the dog has been put down. All this made me suspect that people may be more wary when seeing a dog rushing towards them barking like mad. So we went right and walked all the way to the end, which is a main road. On the way back I noticed that the path was all clear to the left so we walked all the way to the end of the park and back again. Basically two walks in one. We may have an answer to the mystery as to why there are a number of dead small birds lying around on the pathway to the main park area; a falcon was spotted in a tree in the garden by Jeannette. Now I wouldn't know a falcon if it slapped he round the face with a wet dish cloth, but Jeannette's ornothological knowledge is far in advance of mine, so I bow to her superior knowledge. It has obviously been on a bit of a killing spree!
Having refilled Reilly's water bowl and resisted the temptation to spray Reilly with the water hose, I made a shopping list. Here I need to backtrack. Apparently the company who have taken on Robert on 3 months probation belong to the "Brethren" religious group. No TV's no radio, no smoking, no swearing, but Robert seems to like it there and they definitely want to teach him to drive a manual car so he can sometimes go and do some deliveries for them. Robert is now threatening to say grace before meals! Anyway that is all an aside. The fact of the matter is that it is Lent, and Jeannette, with her Catholic background, has decided to give up salt completely (of which she eats far too much) and meat on Fridays. Robert has joined in with this Friday abstinance. As a result I offered to do my prawn curry for the evening meal. I made a list of everything I needed to buy and walked off to Woolworth's at Plumpton. I got some Greek yohgurt for a raitha but could only find mint jelly not mint sauce. I couldn't find cocanut milk, but found crispy cocanut flakes, otherwise I found everything else I needed. There was quite a bit of bit and it got quite heavy on the way back. My feet felt as though they had definitely walked to New Orleans!
By the time I got back it was about 2.30pm so I decided to get things ready and peeled the potatoes and boiled them. I then placed them in a frying pan and sprinked garlic powder, curry powder and cummin seeds, added a chopped up onion, leaving everything ready to cook the Bombay potatoes. I chopped up a red pepper (or as they call them here, a capsicum), and added a few cloves of chopped up garlic and left all that ready in a bowl. I mashed up the coconut flakes into a powder, and got out all the cooking utensils I would need apart from the rice cooker as I didn't know where that was (I had purchased basmati rice as I was told that was what Robert liked and indeed I am partial to it myself). I mixed some mint jelly into the yoghurt and chopped up a cucumber and mixed it in. I tasted it and it was a bit sweeter than I expected. I then found mint sauce in the fridge which was brown in colour and poured a dollop of that in. It took some of the sweetness away so I added some more. Gosh, I feel a bit Delia Smithish describing all that!
I watched a re-run of of the West Indies v Ireland game, but the Irish were unable to repeat their heroics against England. Robert was the first home and chided me for not finding the cocanut milk, which he told me was in the Asian section. He told me he was popping out to the shops and asked if there was anything I wanted and I asked him to get the cocanut milk. After he was gone Jeannette's daughter Jerri and her boyfriend Pat called in wanting something from the garage. They stayed until Jeannette came home and then settled in the kitchen area, precluding me from starting cooking. Robert came back a bit later and joined them. I retired into the summerhouse until the area was clear, and then started cooking. Robert had failed to get the coconut milk, having run into a friend enroute and been diverted to a pub before ever reaching the shops! I still had some yohgurt left so I mixed that in with the powdered coconut flakes and it seemed to work quite well. I had marinated the prawns in lemon and garlic for several hours previously, and added tomato paste and more garlic to the mixture. Along with the Bombay potatoes I did curried mushrooms, and Robert cooked the rice, and made some popadoms. I still had a bottle of Chardonnay in the fridge which went down well with the meal, whilst Rob and Jane stuck to Shiraz. Everybody seemed to enjoy the meal and we had raitha and potatoes left over for another day.
I discovered a number of posts on Xandra Sherman's facebook describing her trip from Panama City, where she stayed with her step-brother Jocelyn and his partner, before moving on down to Peru visiting Machu Pichu, Arequipa - the White City, going to the rain forest, taking trips in canoes down the waterways as well as a journey on the Andean Explorer train, to name but some of the places and things she describes I'm making copious notes, before I start finalising my plans for South America.
I watched the England v Bangladesh game and was later joined by Robert. I eventually gave up and went to bed about 1.00am - there being a 7.30am start in the morning - but Robert watched it through to end - another England defeat to the alleged minnows!
No comments:
Post a Comment