Cooking

As much fun as you might think it is to not work, it gets boring pretty quickly. I've been having a hard time finding a job, any type of job (within reason). So, as of now, I am still unemployed.

Most jobs down here are advertised online, so job hunting doesn't take that much time out of the day. To fill the rest of my time, I've really started exploring my love of cooking.

Both Chris and I really enjoy cooking. And one of the perks on living in a land of never ending sunshine is the fact that you can grow things year round. No need to worry about frost, hail, or cold weather. Needless to say, we're taking advantage of the growing conditions! We don't have a plot to grow a garden, but we have a great balcony that's perfect for a herb garden. There's nothing better than walking a few metres to your balcony and picking fresh herbs to add to your meal. We have 8 pots filled with thyme (Titus), chives (Clive), rosemary (Ronny), oregano (Optimus), parsley (Peter), mint (Manny), dill (Dilbert), and two pots of basil (Benny and Boris). As you can see, we've named each one. It adds a personal touch! And lucky for us beginner gardeners, they basically grow themselves. Just a bit of water and a shot of Miracle Grow once a week and we have ourselves a herb garden to be proud of!

Basil is basically a weed here, and both of our basil plants have really taken off. So, the other day I decided to make pesto! Super easy and super delicious. Toasted pine nuts, garlic, fresh parmesan cheese, lots of basil, a pinch of salt, and olive oil...plus a good blender or food processor. Before you know it, you have delicious, homemade pesto! Typically you add the pesto to pasta, but there are so many other things you can do with it...add it to baked potatoes, on top of steak, on sandwiches...whatever you can imagine! It was my first time making pesto, and I think it turned out pretty good. The best part? There are loads of basil leaves left on our plants, so another batch of pesto might be in order!

My other cooking interest I've taken to? Bread. My uncle loves to bake bread, and every time Chris and I go over for dinner, he always has a freshly made loaf for us to sample. Whether it's ciabatta or sourdough, it's always delicious! I thought I would give it a try and made a herb loaf a few weeks ago, but it was really dense. Not light and fluffy like bread should be. After a bread baking lesson from my uncle, I decided to give it another go! So, today, I made French baguettes. After being in France for 4 months, we really got spoiled by the delicious bread. Baguettes were our favourite! There was nothing better, and nothing that felt more French, than strolling down to our local boulangerie and picking up a fresh baguette to have with dinner. In fact, it was the only French phrase I really mastered. "Une baguette madame, s'il vous plait".

So making actual French baguettes was a big deal for me. I was a bit nervous and skeptical, but after plenty of recipe searching on the internet, I found one I wanted to try. It was going to be time consuming: two rises requiring a total of 4 hours, plus the actual mixing, kneading and baking time. I was in for a day of baguette baking! The ingredients were simple, but I knew it was technique that would decide if my endeavour would turn out. I started at noon and made sure to remember all the techniques that Uncle Errik had taught me! I stuck to my recipe and made sure to trust my hands, as most of bread making requires how the bread feels in your hands-not too dry and not too sticky. It's hard to judge, and I guess today I got it right because just after 4:30pm I had three beautiful looking baguettes. The hardest part of the whole experience? Waiting for Chris to come home before I sampled my creations!

I made a delicious Moroccan sweet potato, carrot and chickpea soup to go along with my baguettes. And I have to say, it was a pretty delicious meal. The baguettes were perfect (at least to me they were)! They were crispy on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside. Victory! And, after eating one of the baguettes with our dinner, there are two more in the freezer ready whenever we want them! I feel like a champion bread maker! I guess the true test will be if I can have the same success next time I make bread. I won't worry about that now though, I'll just take my bread victory and enjoy it!

Happy cooking to everyone! I hope you enjoy it as much as we do!

Andrea

Walking in the Rain-forest

On Monday, Uncle Errik and my cousin Larissa took us on a hike in Springbrook National Park, about 100km South of Brisbane. The park is essentially a rain-forest and has lovely trees, ferns, and waterfalls! We did the 4km Twin Falls Circuit which takes you past two waterfalls and through really neat rock clefts and jungle like scenery. It looked like a place that Tarzan would live...swinging vines and everything!

The weather was a bit overcast and cool, but it was perfect for hiking..and for NOT seeing snakes. Errik said it would be too cold for them. Thank goodness! The last thing I'd want is to run across a snake on the path.

The park was beautiful and I love to go back and do some of the other hikes they have. Since the park is ~1km above sea level, you get some great views all the way to the ocean. I took a few pictures. The quality isn't the greatest, but you get the idea.

Andrea

Here is a description/history of the park courtesy of my Springbrook Visitor's Pamphlet:

"Rising to a height of more than one kilometre, Springbrook dominates the western skyline of the Gold Coast. It is an area of exceptional scenic beauty with ancient rain-forests, panoramic views and waterfalls. Its geological origins date back to the vast shield volcano that was last active 10 million years ago. Seen from Best of All Lookout, Mt. Warning, aboriginal name Wollumbin-the 'cloud catcher', is its remnant core.

The mainly coastal dwelling Kombumerri people frequented the mountain, as evidenced by stone tools they left behind. European settlement began in 1906. These white settlers were dairy farmers who cleared the forests to grow pasture. Now the residents are encouraging the forests to return."

Our Weekend So Far

Hello everyone! Andrea here. I decided it was time once again for me to add a few tidbits about our Australian life.

This weekend is a long weekend down under and so far, we've made the most of it!

Yesterday was a beautiful, sunny, warm Saturday so we started our day off by heading to our neighbourhood park to kick around our Aussie Rules Football. We picked one up a couple weeks ago and have really enjoyed going out on the weekends to get some exercise and have some fun! Luckily the park is really big and there wasn't anyone near us because we were both kicking the ball everywhere but straight!

After that, we decided that we would take the bus down to Racecourse Road and walk down the road to the nearest CityCat ferry terminal. Brisbane has a great public transit system (compared to Edmonton!). Not only do they have buses and an extensive train system, but they also have a high speed ferry/catamarans that travels up and down the river. Just like Edmonton, Brisbane is situated on a beautiful, large river. Unlike Edmonton, their river is much more developed than back home. They have a very shallow river valley that allows homes, businesses, etc to be built right along the river. So, it makes sense that they have a high speed ferry (City Cat) that takes you to one of the 16 docks along the river. They also have an inner-city ferry that can take you from one side of the river directly across to the other. The CityCats are fast! And the best part is that you can sit outside at the front or the back of the boat. We caught the ferry at the second last stop on the east side of the city. We decided that we would ride the CityCat all the way to the final stop at the University of Queensland. And what a ride it was! We had a first class view of some of the stunning homes along the river, the Story Bridge, the downtown skyscrapers and the beautiful parks that line the river. The journey from one end of the city to the other took just over an hour and cost each of us $2.50. Once we reached the University of Queensland, we took a walk around the campus and snapped a few pictures. The campus is absolutely beautiful!

Once we were done exploring the campus and got back on the ferry, it was getting dark out, and a little bit chilly...but don't tell the Aussies I said that. We're supposed to be tough Canadians! Going back in the dark was just as great as travelling in the Aussie sun! The city looked absolutely beautiful lit up and I was able to get a few, shaky pictures from the boat.

All in all, it was a lovely day!

Today was Sunday and despite the name, the sun seemed to be taking a day off. It was a bit cool so it was the perfect day to head to the Gallery of Modern Art. They have an exhibition there by Australian born sculptor Ron Mueck. I had never heard of him before, but after our excursion today, I will definitely be reading more about him. His bigger than life, but startling realistic human sculptures blew both of us away. We were in awe with the detail and accuracy of his sculptures. I didn't get any pictures, but here is his Wikipedia page where you can see some of his sculptures. I encourage you to read about his work and if you ever have the chance to see his work, make sure you go! You will be in awe!

After our day at the gallery, we headed home to make some supper and enjoy our Sunday evening.

Tomorrow...Uncle Errik is taking us on a walk in the hills surrounding Brisbane. Hopefully I can get some pictures and post them later!

Hope your weekend was just as lovely as ours!

To surf or not to surf

It really is funny here how people think a high of 19 and a low of 12 with a 27km/h wind is bone chilling. "The wind just blows right through you..." they exclaim. It's really quite funny.

I've been really lucky to keep watching the Stanley Cup finals at work this week, which obviously culminated in a Hawks win. I'm a bit sad that Hossa won the cup, since I took a bit of sick pleasure in his galloping from losing team to losing team, but he finally picked a winner and he has a cup. Philly really did play quite well and with a lot of heart but they lost to a much superior team. Great playoffs all the way through and I am very eagerly awaiting July 1.

This weekend is a long weekend down under as it's the Queen's birthday. Not Queen Elizabeth II, mind you, but some other queen. Probably Victoria. We were going to head up the coast and do a 4x4 camping tour on Fraser Island, the world's largest full sand island but we've decided against it. We might save it for when some of you fine people come down here and visit us. It would be mind blowing so we're not ashamed to wait for warmer weather.

Andrea continues searching for work, seemingly to no avail. I'm confident she'll find something awesome, though. There are a few jobs down here that would be great for me to apply to post internship, and that day is fast approaching, so I think I'll get on that pretty quick. Although there isn't much of a direct upside in it, there is a new kind of bar down here that just opened up that I can only describe as a 'video game bar', that I would love to work for. I think it's a great model for a bar/pub and could be directly ported back to Canada and could really take off. So I'd love to work there and find out how they started it up and how they plan to make it successful, but we'll see how that goes. I might have to work there for free, too. LOL. My life is turning into an Ayn Rand novel, just without the extreme financial success of the main characters.

My supervisor at work is Scottish and is really, really, really into the World Cup. Our whole office is going to follow the World Cup and cheer on the Socceroos in their quest for the cup! I encourage you to watch the tournament as well, since your alternatives are basketball and baseball...ugh.

Chris

Gourmet Friday!

When we first started thinking of our trip to Australia I truly thought that we would be moving to paradise. Now, I didn’t necessarily think that the city or the city life would be paradise itself, but in the back of my mind I always dreamed or hoped that we would find a contact or opportunity to start a pearl farm on a tropical atoll or start a niche, ecotourism resort on a tropical island, and that might yet happen. I’m not sure if that would be my dream job or my career destiny, but I think we could all agree that it wouldn’t be a bad way to spend a couple of years.

Today is a great Friday because it’s sunny, warm, and weekend looks to be more of the same. Uncle Errik has invited us over to dinner again tonight, it’s become sort of a weekly ritual (luck for us!) and I’m sure we’ll be treated to another gourmet meal. He’s starting to teach Andrea how to make bread, and last week they made baguettes. Very tasty, but I fear for my waistline.

I mention the sun because it’s been a bit cloudy here for the past week. It tends to be a bit wet here in the winter, and this winter is supposed to be abnormally wet. This isn’t too much of a problem for Queenslanders as they have been mired in a decade long drought and it looks like they’re finally getting out of it. They actually just completed a massive desalination plant to supply water to Southeast Queensland, but now they don’t need it because the reservoirs are full again. Go figure. There are actually kids here that are shocked to see the plains around them green and full of water because for their whole life they’ve only experienced the dusty and cracked red earth.

Just a little tidbit for you, if you ever wanted to move or visit Australia with your pet, you might want to reconsider. Because of the fragility of the country, your pet will have to sit in quarantine for 3 to 6 months before it’s allowed into the country. I’m not even sure if you get to visit it during that time, but surely that would be the most cruel thing you could do to your animal.

Everywhere we go we are somewhat of a novelty because of our accents. Apparently they think the way we speak is very funny here, and you always get a look when you talk to someone for the first time. Usually the first thing they ask you is ‘Where are you from?’ and they always seem relieved when you say 'Canada.' They even have some Canadian TV shows down here like Heartland and Being Erika, but I think they think they are American. That’s all for now. Enjoy your weekend!