Last weekend a friend who I’ve known for years tied the knot. Part of their honeymoon was a secluded getaway in a cottage style farm. In this case, secluded means you don’t have somebody to cook for you, so the cottage was equipped with a simple kitchen so you could prepare your own meals, self catering style.

If it was me, the last thing I’d want to be doing on the morning of my wedding would be getting the food ready that I needed to take. So queue the wedding gift with a difference…

I offered to do all their catering for the honeymoon, that way they didn’t have to worry about a thing. I had a couple of aims: 1. No cooking for them, at most, serving and reheating only. 2. It had to be able to be packed up and transportable, so it had to be simple and easy to plate up.

So here’s a selection of the delicacies in photo form!

A platter of roasted chicken, delicately roasted pork, tuna olive oil 3 bean salad, salad and seasonal fruit.

Salad platter

I’m actually not a big salad maker – in fact I’ve never made a pasta or tuna salad in my life, so purely for my benefit only, here’s the ingredients for both.
Tuna salad:
Tin of tuna in olive oil, mushrooms, green beans, three bean mix, corn, cucumber, spring onion, yellow capsicum and celery. Throw everything into the bowl and stir gently. (Next time I would only put in half the liquid from the tuna though).
Pasta salad:
Gently cooked pasta, grated carrots, celery, mushrooms and spring onion with a basil and herb pasta salad dressing (from Kraft). Same theory – put it all in and stir gently.

An old favourite – the chocolate ripple cake (made with chocolate peanut biscuits) was the desert one night – yeah, I know, that doesn’t transport that well, but it’s actually not too bad. It may have only just got a little squashed (the esky was pretty full), but at least it wasn’t going to roll off the plate.

Salad platter

Tuna salad

Pasta salad

Entree platter (kabana, cheese, crackers and cashew nuts)

Tuna and tomato flan topped with capsicum and mushrooms

Pumpkin pie (ready for transport)

Decadent chocolate ripple cake (served with seasonal berries and additional fresh whipped cream later on)

Tossed Salad

I couldn’t think of a nicer, more deserving couple than Margaret and Terry! Congratulations!

(Now if only they had some milk for their breakfast and coffee!)

So this post will wrap up the last Sunday I had in Uganda. I was due to preach at Barnabas’s church and Mike at the early service at Life Ark Church. Both were good services, the girls at Barnabas’s church gave a lovely rendition of an old hymn while the rain absolutely pelted down outside. Had a lot of fun preaching at Barnabas’s, so hopefully I’ll get back there one day. We went back to Barnabas’s house for lunch after church. They had prepared a traditional African meal and were so honoured that we would come and eat at their house.

After lunch I needed to stop by the market on the way home to pick up some goat for the Aussie night that I had with James and Solomon (read about it here). Ok, I know goat isn’t really Australian at all, but the only goat I’d had was in Kenya and it was mouth watering, so I was kinda wondering what Ugandan goat was like.

The next couple of days were spent in Jinja – rafting, quad biking and sight seeing around the Nile River (wrap up here).

My last ministry engagement this trip was back at Ben’s church later in the week, taking a small mid week group and just sharing something short. Of course, it had to get interesting, so not long after we’d started, the power (ie lights) went out. Never mind, the drums still make a noise, they don’t need power!

Life Ark

Rain drops

Water running

Girls singing

Barnabas

some kind of fruit on trees

Our African Lunch at Barnabas’s

Shirley, Mike, Barnabas’s family and me

African drumming

I left my Ugandan recap a couple of months ago back here, after I’d completed a week of ministry in Uganda.
The next Saturday, the last of my tour away, we headed off to Masaka, which included crossing the equator at Kayabwe as we went.
The road to Masaka is “under construction”. Apparently it’s been under construction for quite a while, so long, that some of the locals have moved because of the dust from the road. If you thought the dust was bad in other places, here it is ten times worse. Sadly, another problem with the road is the number of accidents. We passed a couple, a bus and a car had collided, I suspect the driver of the car may not have made it. Many of the drivers drive like cowboys and overtaking with all the dust makes it even more dangerous.

Passed a few cars driving along with fish on the front of the radiator, which was probably the coolest place! I guess that was their evening meal, might have been cool, but probably dust filled.

We reached the equator crossing and stopped there to take some photos. Took a look at buying some Ugandan flags, but even with James (our local Ugandan) negotiating for us, they still wanted too much so we left them there. You could also watch the water go down on either side of the equator, but we didn’t do that either. I’m sure it does. We spent a bit of time enjoying the novelty of standing in the northern, southern and both hemispheres. And proving that it is a small world, at one of the shops there I met somebody who lived about half an hour from me back here in Aus. Yep, definitely a small world!

After a while there, we continued to Masaka. Stopped at a school somewhere and checked out the view of the town from a hill in a local school ground, then had some lunch in one of the restaurants there. I wish I could remember which one it was, but I know it was one associated with helping the Ugandans socially and on the corner of George street, but that’s all I can remember.

We took a drive round the central part of Maska and drew some attention to ourselves by driving the wrong way down a one way street. But still, there were no signs at all if you came in the other way, really wide street, cars parked both ways – the only thing that alerted us to this little error was the Ugandans pointing and laughing at us and pointing at a sign that we had to turn around to see (because we were going the wrong way) that said you could only go one way. At the other end of the street there were also one way signs, but how does that help! Ah well, it was only a short street anyway.

Eventually we headed home, still fascinating driving through the Ugandan towns and seeing the butcher shops, with the meat hanging out in the heat and flies all day. Compared with our sanitry society where we’re meant to chuck the meat out if it rises above the recommended temperature for more than a couple of hours, it’s a bit of a difference. We followed the cattle truck (pictured below) on the way home for quite a while – the cattle were attended by two guys who rode on top of the truck in the dust (and nearly the rain) for the trip. I could think of a few better places to travel a 3 hour journey…

Anyway, here’s some pics of the equator and the Masaka area.

Butcher shop early in the day

Butcher shop late in the day

Banana plantation

Banana plantation

Dust covered plant at equator

Kayabwe equator crossing

Dusty Kayabwe

Kayabwe equator crossing – taxi

Kayabwe equator crossing

Fish anyone?

Masaka township

Flowers at a school in Masaka

Moss on tree

Flowers

Basketball court

Ugandan boy peeking out

Plants

In the restaurant

View from the balcony

The restaurant is on the corner of George St

Pedestrians crossing

Masaka Township

Masaka Township

Roadside Market

Cattle Truck

Kayabwe equator crossing

Accident

Just as we were due to play tennis one day (late November), it started pouring rain. We called it off and as I was driving up the road in Woodvale, I saw the turtle (some may call it a tortoise, take your pic) crossing the road. And no, it wasn’t moving that slowly, it was actually getting along at a pretty decent pace. Well that was until I jumped out and took a few pics and he started retreating into his shell. Someone asked me why I didn’t move it off the road. Ummm, take a look at those claws!

Look at those claws!

Only a small one

I haven’t really blogged much for a while, guess that’s because I’ve been busy. If we go back to November, I got into a bit of a cooking groove. Here’s some pictures of some of the food, I think the favourite would be lemon meringue pie!

Salmon Patties

Choc (milo) Coconut slice – uniced

Choc (milo) Coconut slice – iced

Coconut buttercake

Banana Crumble

Pavlova slice

Chewy choc oat biscuits ready for the oven

Chewy choc oat biscuits out of the oven

Chewy choc oat biscuits – close up

Lemon Meringue Pie

Assorted goodies – lemon slice, jelly slice, orange poppy seed muffins and carrot cake

Tuna tomato flan – Christmas eve lunch special

The cake (basic buttercake with added coconut) was made from scratch, with a recommended preparation time of 20 minutes. Took me much longer than that! The banana crumble was ok, but I don’t think I’d make it again unless I was trying to get rid of some bananas! The choc coconut slice is nice and easy, but I had no cocoa, so I substituted milo. Still tasted pretty good. Pavlova slice is always a winner and is really easy!

I somehow managed to read the recipe wrong with my chewy choc oat biscuits and put in extra coconut. Not sure that accounts for the way they expanded and joined together though. Even though they didn’t look so great, they still taste good and keep for ages! Even better.

In another recipe mixup, I put a whole can of condensed milk in the lemon slice instead of half a can. It turned out a bit sticky, but that’s it. That also keeps quite well and I’m still eating it. Had a slight mishap with the icing on that as well. Put in the juice of a WHOLE lemon. Ohhh… the icing was soooooo runny. Kept putting in icing sugar, then decided that was getting nowhere so I went with the corn flour. That actually started to thicken it up with no noticeable taste issues. (I’m putting that tip here for next time my icing turns out too runny.)

The salmon patties were mainly made as a trial. I wanted to see how they came up if I ate them cold or froze them. They seem to taste ok, but really, I didn’t love them. Reasonably easy except for making the actual patties which was a bit time consuming.

After all that baking effort in November and early December, I haven’t done much cooking at all til now. For Christmas eve lunch at work (well technically Christmas eve eve) I made a tuna and tomato flan. Such an easy dish that still tasted great reheated the next day. I think everyone at work loved it (and that’s hard to achieve).

So that’s about it for my cooking exploits recently. I’ll be getting back into it soon, so stay tuned.

We’ve just had Christmas 2011, so here’s a bit of a recap on the 4 day weekend. My brother was home from Europe, so it was good to see him Christmas day, although my sister was sick, so her and Gary didn’t come up. That meant we did Christmas on Christmas Day and a couple of days later on the official Christmas day public holiday. Saturday I spent with Dad finishing off Gary’s present – a super cool aeroplane letter box! Definitely well worth the time and effort spent on it, although when they didn’t come up on the Sunday, I nearly kept it for myself just because I think it’s so cool! On Monday Steve and I continued the boxing day squash tradition and we also managed to fit in a bit of kite flying on Tuesday (Christmas day take 2).

Anyway, here we go with the annual Christmas present list. I certainly did pretty well again this Christmas!

• BENQ 22 inch LED monitor
• Squash racquet
• 2 rolls of waxed lunch wrap
• Carving Fork
• 16Gb Lexar SD HC memory card
• Necklace from Lake Toba in Indonesia
• Key ring from Lake Toba in Indonesia with my name engraved on it
• Key ring from Singapore
• 320GB Seagate portable expansion drive
• A 450 piece jigsaw puzzle of the Cologne Cathedral from Europe (thanks to Steve)
• Biscuit slice pan (26cm x 16cm)
• Mozart miniature violin
• An enamel plate
• Shower Caddy
• A 2012 desk calendar that I made for everyone (and kept one for myself)
• Some cashew nuts and shortbread

To go with the aeroplane, I wrote a short story “The Adventures of Elley the Elephant – Elley and the Aeroplane”. Hilarious listening to Gary read it out after he’d got his aeroplane.
Here’s a couple of photos of the finished project.

Ready to receive letters!

The aeroplane letter box flying high.

After tennis on Saturday, I headed out to Notley’s Reserve in the Whipstick with my camera to take a few photos. Notley’s reserve is where we’d spend every picnic day holiday (for the younger ones, picnic day holiday is what it was before it was the Melbourne Cup holiday) at the church picnic. We’d have yabbing in the morning, then a lunch to share and then gather for the afternoon races – it was always a good day. Thanks to Neil and his bright idea (take some left over sandwiches from tennis arvo tea for tea), I was able to relive the Sunday School Picnic. Ok, I was minus about 100 other people and I didn’t do any running or yabbying, but hey, can’t have everything

I was mainly experimenting with the different lens and settings, but got some good shots. Was taking some photos of the magpie chicks near the car, and had zoomed in a fair way when one started running toward me. Thought he was going to attack me but life through a lens can be deceptive and he was really not that close at all! You can’t actually see it in the smaller shots, but in the magpie chick photos when he’s got his mouth open getting fed, you can see the detail of the tongue inside the mouth. I was surprised at how well the kangaroo shots turned out given that it was fairly dark – they still aren’t stunning, but they’re pretty reasonable given the lack of natural light. Just have to figure out how to turn off the noise the camera makes, because stalking a male kangaroo with this noise going off as you take some photos is a little annoying. Animals are pretty amazing I must say. Just take a look at how powerful the kangaroos are. You certainly wouldn’t want to get into a scrap with them.

Anyway, it was a nice evening and good to get out into the bush for a bit of time away.

The plant thingy -reeds

The dam

Trees Reflecting

Reeds

Reflection

Reflection

Gum tree seed pods

Young growth

Seed pods

The dam edge where we’d go yabbying

Leaves and stump

Leaf up close

Seed pods of the reed up close

Purple flowers

Everlasting

Vegetation

The dam

Mr magpie with his eyes closed!

Feeding time

Feeding time

Feeding time

Feeding time

Don’t mess with him!

Alert (thanks to the camera noise)

Kanga

Mum and Joey

Ok, just cooked the best fish I think I’ve done in a long time! The redfin was mouthwatering, tasted sooooo good, a bit of freshly squeezed lemon juice over it, with a serve of home made chips, battered pineapple and some snow peas. Soooo good!

Freshly caught red fin and home made chips

A special thanks to Phil who caught and filleted the fish!

And for the record – how I cooked it:
Chips – potatoes cut into strips, lightly tossed in some mixed herbs, cooked in the oven for a while
Fish – dusted in seasoned flour (basil, oregano and some curry), then pan fried for a few minutes each side (recipe from here)
Pineapple – dusted in the same flour then pan fried as well! (I overcooked that a bit on one piece, but never mind).

Great meal!

One of the things I wanted to do once I’d completed my course was buy myself a new camera and start to explore the area of photography a bit more. So here’s some quick shots with the Canon 600D.

Dessert for tonight – choc ripple cake

Red rose

Rose bush

Rose bush

Another rose

Closer still

New growth

Well, it’s that time of the year again. It’s Show Time! For longer than I can remember and longer than I’ve been alive, we’ve had a highland dancing competition at the show. In fact, Mum used to dance in the show comp when she was young, so it’s been a long time…

I remember when we were young, we’d have a public holiday for the show – so no school – and Mum, Nan and my sister and brother would go up to the show, help Mum and Nan set up their flowers in the flower comp, then take a look around the show.

Then on the Saturday, the day of the dancing comp, we’d have the comp, on the back of a truck, then we’d hang around to collect mum’s and nan’s flowers and have tea from the Gillies pie stand, then stay for the fireworks. And we’d always have to have some jam donuts. Well, as we got older, Mum and Nan stopped doing the flowers, Nan has passed on, and we no longer get a public holiday for the show – and no longer care enough about fireworks to stay and watch them!

But one thing hasn’t changed – when you go to the show, I gotta get jam donuts! So today, after the dancing comp and a quick look around the photography exhibit, I headed off to get some jam donuts. Sadly the jam donuts are just not as good as they used to be, they seem to be going a bit easy on the jam, but still, pretty good!