Poor little blog, how much neglection can it take? How many words can I make up?

I saw some Handel on the weekend (Alcina). It was long, so long that the opera started a full thirty minutes earlier than any opera I’ve ever been to. Of course, I hadn’t bothered looking at the ticket until I started packing my bag, so I had the fright of my life when I realised that it was about to start in 40 minutes and counting and I hadn’t even left the house. Fortunately, a taxi was found with no time to spare because if you miss the doors closing they make you wait outside until the intermission. They give you a telly to watch it on kindly.

I was a little crochety by the last act because of the length, but it was was lovely. The staging was wonderfully imaginative and gorgeously intricate. They had columns carved with beasts and men and the chorus (painted up like stone) would poke their heads out of removable panels. They had a mirror backdrop with separate scenes that would occasionally reflect what was happening on the main stage but with some detail changed (ie timing or the roles reversed in gender) so it was disconcerting.

Another thing about the opera, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen a fat opera singer. There was a time when most women were fat and the odd skinny person was a big star purely because they could do tele-movies with Placido Domingo. But I strain to think when was the last time I saw a fat person on stage. Unfortunately, I think that they now preference appearance over voice, because the voices are just not of the same standard as they used to be. As far as I remember anyway, for what that’s worth. I was also hoping for a counter-tenor or two but it was not to be. There were some definite giggles in the audience in some of the steamier scenes as the “hero” was getting it on with another woman.

The music was divine, the conductor was Richard Hickox so it was no surprise that it was executed superbly. I can understand how Beethoven named Handel as the greatest composer that ever lived, his music is just so exquisitely beautiful. It’s a pity that his music fell out of favour but great that we have started rediscovering him. I think this was the first time ever that the Australian Opera performed. Got me inspired to read all things Handel, though it is not the easiest task trying to find anything Handel in bookstores. I ended up going to the library and getting a large pile, though it will be quite a few weeks until I have time to delve into them.

Anyway, what has this got to do with potato salad? Not much except that I went to the Belgian Beer Cafe afterwards and ate tasty potato chips and cheesy balls, got a hankering for potatoes and then made this very easy potato salad with the stuff closest to me because I’m lazy. I don’t put quantities because it really is up to taste, how much you need and what you have.

Baby potatoes
Fresh sage
Good Extra Virgin Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
Garlic crushed (optional)

I got a new Panasonic microwave that I’m just in love with. It automatically cooked my potatoes perfectly by just pressing three buttons. Anyway, microwave them or boil them until cooked (ie you can poke a fork into them and not feel hard nasty raw bits) and then cut in halves or quarters if they are a big bit. Place in a bowl and tear up sage leaves over them. Drizzle with some tasty olive oil and salt/pepper to taste. You could also add a clove of crushed or chopped garlic but I didn’t feel like it strangely enough.

It’s not really much of a recipe, but it was very tasty, the sage cooks slightly with the heat of the potatoes.

Whip 250ml plain/whipping cream and 2/3 cup sugar until it starts to thicken and has the consistency of pumpkin soup (best way I could think of to describe it, sorry if it’s crap!).

Also if you have the misfortune of over-beating your cream and it starts to curdle, don’t throw it out! Rejoice at the opportunity you have been given, continue beating it and you’ll find that you start making butter. There will be a lot of liquid produced but once you drain it, you’ll have the wonderful satisfaction of having homemade butter. It tastes better too (a lot of salted commercial butter has water added which is why many recipes specifically ask for unsalted butter).

Chocolate “Electrical” Tiramisu

This is a little complicated in that you have to prepare the chocolate zabaglione, but it’s not very hard. Also if you are more a traditionalist then just leave out all mention of chocolate, it will still make a damn fine tiramisu.

First make up a batch of Chocolate Zabaglione with the following ingredients:
1/4 cup cream (the whipping variety rather than the whipped versions)
1/2 cup good quality dark chocolate chips
2/3 cup sugar
8 large egg yolks (freeze the whites to make a pavlova later!)
pinch of salt

Put the cream in a small saucepan (preferably a good quality one with a heavy bottom) and heat until it almost simmers on a medium heat. Take it off the heat and stir in the chocolate until it melts and there are no lumps. You can stick it back on a low heat very quickly (10 secs bursts) if needed or if it hardens before it’s needed next.

Bring an inch or two of water to simmer in a large saucepan.

Whisk the sugar, Marsala, egg yolks and salt until mixed in a metal bowl, preferably sized so it can sit on top of the saucepan without touching the water (ie an improvised bain-marie… if you have a proper bain-marie then this is irrelevant, just use that). Sit the bowl (I ended up using another smaller saucepan because no adequately sized metal bowl was on hand) on top of the larger vessel and whisk the eggy mix until it is “thick and creamy” (I found that a good deal of it became very frothy with the whipping… this ended up being a good thing because it gave the necessary air and lightness to what could be a very heavy dish).

The recipe says to mix until it reaches 160C but who uses a thermometer in the kitchen? (shhh… all you professional sweet makers!) I was happy with it when most of it was frothy and the underlying syrup felt heavy and thick. Once it’s done, take it off the heat and fold in the chocolate mixture with a spatula or similar flat instrument. The trick is not to beat it because then you’ll also beat the air you’ve lovingly whipped in, thereby destroying its ephemeral body.

It is in itself a worthy dessert. Giarda suggests keeping it in the fridge for at least 8 hours or serve it hot and straight away. Either way do it with lots of strawberries.

This isn’t its destiny today, however, we still have a (little) way to go. We’ll have to collect some more ingredients though:
1 normal container of mascarpone (will have to update this)
3/4 cup plain/whipping cream
1/3 cup sugar
Chocolate Zabaglione prepared earlier (supposed to be cold but I didn’t bother, it worked fine cooled for about 15 minutes)
2 cups of Hot Chocolate made up thickly (2x or 3x normal) and with water not milk (you can also use coffee here if you prefer, I don’t, if so remember to sweeten it. You can also try some varieties of cocoa, I’m tempted to try it unsweetened to emphasis the bitterness)
Cocoa powder (I just used the hot chocolate from above
1 packet Savoiardi biscuits (also known as lady fingers)

In a large bowl, stir the mascarpone two or three times until smooth (be careful not to mix too much, apparently it can make it hard… yuk!). Meanwhile, in another bowl, whip up the cream and the sugar to soft peak stage (ie it will hold its shape a bit but not so that you can tip the bowl upside down and it will stay in it… that’s hard peak stage). Fold this cream mix into the mascarpone and then fold in the chocolate zabaglione.*

Finally we are at the assembly stage (and I’m falling aslepp so ignore any ty3pos Sic!), get yourself a nice little dish and layer the goods as follows (if it’s smaller, you’ll have more layers, if it’s wider, you’ll have less):

Layer 1: Dip biscuits into hot chocolate/coffee and place, side by side, so that they fill up a layer of your chosen container.
Layer 2: Cover the biscuits with the cream/mascapone/zabaglione mix

Repeat until you get to the top of your container. It’s then best left overnight in the fridge so that the flavours soak into the biscuits, but you can serve it once it has been refrigerated for a few hours and it a bit more set.

*I thought that you could also serve the zabaglione as a separate layer to the mascapone/cream mix. I would probably go biscuits, zabaglione and then mascapone/cream mix. Also when I was folding in the chocolate zab, I thought (too late) that it would be nice to only very roughly and very slightly fold it in so that it kept a swirly marbled look. Two ideas for next time as I will definitely be making this one again.

These were particularly good:
Get What You Want - OPERATOR PLEASE (Virgin)
Love You - LITTLE BARRIE (Creative Vibes)
Girlshapedlovedrug - GOMEZ (Shock)

And I love the video for Ruby - KAISER CHIEFS (Universal), it has these little model scale people (like the kind you find on architects’ building models), so cute. I love model people.

Anesthesia
Antibiotics
Chlorpromazine [an anti-seizure drug, perhaps better known as Thorazine]
Computers
DNA
Evidence based medicine
Germ theory
Imaging
Immunology
Oral rehydration therapy
The Pill
[The discovery of the] Risks of smoking
Sanitation
Tissue culture
Vaccines

I’d say germ theory, anaesthesia, or antibiotics. Or even sanitation… though I was reading that unsanitary habits were becoming problematic in hospitals again. Staff just don’t wash their hands any more, apparently. Gross.

Anyway, this story was via Wired BodyHack which is a great little blog of interesting science-y things. Here’s a recent selection:
Hand Sanitizer Can Make You Drunk
Inbreeding: Bad for Kings, Good for Fish
Vaccines Don’t Cause Autism
Great Moments in Research: Psychologists Are Humble
Brits: Who Needs Orthodontic Braces?
Study: Treatment Possible for Mad Cow Disease

A commenter called nabinabita had this to say:
It is an idea in Japan.
Japan imported ” the T shirt ” from the Europe and America.
Japan exported ” an idea ” to the country in the foreign country.
I am glad.
Popularize ” the idea in Japan ” more.

Cool.