These times are a changing. As the years go by with reasonable health still following, caution gets thrown to the wind. They say carpe diem, don’t they? So, after the week before last having enjoyed a great rack of lamb, the temptation for a repeat has surfaced again. Out of nowhere too.
Lamb chops used to be cheap as chips. I remember the half cooked mutton chops at Scheyville migrant camp. The bluish stamp of the abattoir still visible on its skin, skirmishing neck on neck with keen maggots. It was during a very hot summer in 1956.
Actually, mutton is very nice in an Indian Raan dish and preferable to young sheep. You have to let the mutton age in a mixture of spices, yoghurt and lemon juice. It was my dish at Christmas time. The grandkids used to dip their bread in the mixture before it was even cooked. Look up Raan on Julie Sahni excellent recipe book about Classical Indian cooking.
Right now and it is only 3.30 pm I will start up the Webber. The Webber is a round US invented barbeque device that needs charcoal or coal briquettes to fire up. We had it since our own kids were still all around. And that is forty years ago. It is enamelled brown and as sturdy as an outside dunnee during a sand storm. The trick is not to put the rack of lamb on before the temperature is hot enough. Lamb mustn’t be overcooked. It is a matter of timing and getting experience.
During our morning’s walk I had picked up a handful of rosemary. The soft kind of rosemary. Our own has become very woody. Now we just steal it elsewhere. I more or less wrapped the lamb in it, together with lots of garlic and lemon juice.
We both sat outside watching the rosellas and pink galahs feasting on the special birdseed-mix that we leave out. Even that required a special way. The seeds just left in a terra cotta dish were discovered by a smart rat. He told his mates. The droppings left made us suspicious. Surely, the bird’s poop is not that big? We were told to put the dish with the seeds on top of an upside-down turned terra cotta bowl. The rats can’t overcome crawling on an upside down space like the gecko can. In Bali I noticed large geckos crawling upside down on smooth surfaces as well as bamboo or rattan type ceilings.
Scientists have for years wondered about the ability of creatures to move about upside down. It has to do with millions of tiny hairs able to cling to surfaces. A gecko can hang upside down and carry their full weight from just a single toe.
This really floored me.
This from Wiki; “Geckos use something called the Van der Waals force to cling to smooth surfaces. The Van der Waals force is a weak electrodynamic attraction that occurs over extremely small distances, but works with virtually any substance. The geckos’ toes carry millions of microscopic hairs at their tips; scientists call these hairs setae. These allow the creature to stick to a branch, rock or — as the researchers discovered — surfaces such as polished glass.” It would not surprise me that geckos know about fonts too. Perhaps they use the Dante type. Who knows?
It was around 5.15 when the coal in the Webber was deemed at maximum temperature for the rack of lamb to get done. It took about 20 minutes. It was lovely. One of the best. Helvi had made an even better side dish. Beetroot babies. They were cooked with garlic, some sour crème and our home grown herbs.
There is just nothing like sitting in the garden, knowing the birds safe from rats and H and I babbling away about nothing much, waiting for a simple glorious meal.
It is the only way.
Tags: Dante, Gecko, Scheyville, US, Van Der Waals, Webber
March 2, 2016 at 7:28 am |
That sounds idyllic. And, I wish I had access to Dante font for my comment.
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March 2, 2016 at 9:24 pm |
The Dante is not so popular. It is missed by many. Some take to drink with the unrequited yearnings for the good fonts of yesteryears.
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March 2, 2016 at 10:09 am |
Hung One On is preaching the virtues of lamb at another WordPress site.
Yes, those geckoes are bloody clever…who would have thought it was Van Der Waal’s force, thought by many to be like that san serif, good for nothing.
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March 2, 2016 at 9:29 pm |
Hung One On is too taken by the lamb. A lamb curry is so much better than an anti depression prescription. Even a warm milk and spoonful of honey works a charm during the manic dance of the mid-night demons.
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March 2, 2016 at 9:33 pm
Yes, Gez, a good meal and a couple of drinks is a mighty powerful nostrum. It was our own Viv’s curried prawn recipe that got me going with curries, now I tend to curry nearly everything!
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March 2, 2016 at 10:11 pm
Velly, velly good BigM 😉
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March 2, 2016 at 12:03 pm |
I think Helvi might need to share that beetroot recipe. It sound divine. I don’ t eat lamb often, but this sounds mouth wateringly delicious.
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March 2, 2016 at 9:30 pm |
Yes, I watched her at work cubing the beetroot babies. Sautéed with a bit of olive oil, plenty of garlic and sour cream. A work of art.
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March 2, 2016 at 11:24 pm
Sounds delicious. I imagine she cooked or steamed them first?
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March 3, 2016 at 1:02 am
The baby beetroots come cooked already. Helvi reheats them in the frying pan.
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March 2, 2016 at 9:39 pm |
This is how it is, Gerard, the only way, the way you like to live and therefore the best way. It is so rewarding, I feel, to hear that in our society it is still possible to be contended with the way we live.
I agree, Helvi’s beetroot recipe sounds divine. But I also like the numerous tips, suggestions and observations in your blog, Gerard. Again, very well written, indeed. Thank you!
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March 2, 2016 at 10:52 pm |
You are welcome, Uta.
The baby beetroot came as a preservative in glass jar. I am being urged to eat less meat and more vegetables. I’ll eat anything with herbs and garlic. Our small backyard a haven almost every afternoon.
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March 3, 2016 at 1:07 am |
On top of everything else we have this to cope with as well;
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March 3, 2016 at 1:31 am |
Sounds really nice, Gerard. Here in the Southern US, one has trouble finding lamb in a grocery store. It and duck just show up occasionally, and my husband and I both like them. Surely, some other Southerners do too.
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March 3, 2016 at 4:40 am |
Yes, Cathy.Lamb is very popular here but has become expensive. Old sheep (mutton) was a cheap meat dish in the thirties,forties and fifties, when Australia had millions of sheep.
The city streets on an afternoon used to be filled with the rank smell of mutton lard siphoned off the boiled sheep. It was used for kids’ sandwiches and for cooking.
Young lamb is very nice but some say; ‘those sweet and poor little lambs like little Bo-Peep had lost her sheep etc.
Duck is nice too.
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March 3, 2016 at 4:48 am
Well, veal is a popular dish here, and we both know what that is.
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March 3, 2016 at 7:02 am
Yes, and what about those poor little carrots? Scientists have discovered that carrots too have feelings.
And then the prawns, those scavengers of the bottom dwellers, ceaselessly cleaning up debris. We eat to survive and all we eat is alive at some stage.
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March 3, 2016 at 2:49 am |
Your garden sounds like a wonderful place to be. Nothing better than to be able to watch the birds as you eat in your very own garden.
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March 3, 2016 at 3:15 am |
Yes, that garden is heaven on earth, Ivonne.
You should see it. It nurtures as it protects. Balm to the soul. A place of healing and reconciliation. The place is overhung by protective tree branches. Leaves nodding in approval, almost hugging those seated. Of course, Milo too benefits although chasing little lizards is frowned upon. The birds are in accordance with it all but the large white cockatoes do make a racket.
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March 3, 2016 at 3:39 am |
This was my lovely bedtime story tonight! Your etching showed more place settings. I’m glad it was just you and Helvi. Much nicer that way.
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March 3, 2016 at 4:35 am |
That beetroot dish sounds scrumptious !
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March 4, 2016 at 3:40 am |
Yes, it is, especially when heated with some garlic and sour cream.
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March 4, 2016 at 4:26 am
Yum !
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March 3, 2016 at 12:17 pm |
Well I know that you like healthy fair, and the Greeks have one of the healthiest diets in the world (supposedly) and they indulge by celebrating special occasions with lamb so it can only be the right thing! 🙂
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March 4, 2016 at 3:41 am |
Long live the Greeks and their diets.
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March 4, 2016 at 12:54 am |
I feel rather silly. I had to resort to the dictionary to find out what a beetroot might be. Well, there you have it: beetroots are beets. I have three jars of pickled beets in the pantry. I dearly love those, especially in a salad, or mixed wtih cottage cheese. It’s fairly pedestrian, I suppose, but either can make a quick lunch.
Lamb? not so much, although there’s a good Greek restaurant down the street that knows how to cook it. I’ll have one of their gyros now and then.
Of course, we’re really in fish and seafood heaven, here: oysters, shrimp, trout, redfish, flounder. You know what our motto is, of course — Carpe Carp!
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March 4, 2016 at 3:44 am |
Yes, I forgot to mention the beets did come in a jar and were pickled.
Carpe Carp. 😉
A good Greek restaurant ‘down the street,’ should be obligatory.
Sydney has a really good fish market. It is right on the harbour.
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March 5, 2016 at 5:39 pm |
Sounds so good!!!
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March 8, 2016 at 9:42 pm |
Had a straight Pavlov reaction to this!
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