It's been some time ....

 Learning my way through life has been on the back-burner simmering away for a couple of years now. A lot has changed in our world and in my life as well. I have recently been given a forced transfer at work which will in effect reduce my income by 10 weeks a year. On the surface this is something that will make things difficult financially but that may turn out to be a blessing in disguise. I am hoping to use the onset of a drop in income to force me to create a side business blogging both here about anything that comes to mind and also on all matters food on my other blog which I have just renamed The Arcadia Glutton. The name is a little nudge toward the great Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall and his fantastic life change British television show River Cottage and all it's spin-offs. From memory Hugh's catering company brand is called The River Cottage Glutton. Arcadia is the name of the street that I have lived in or is that on for the last 20 years and the home base from which I create my food. Arcadia is a word with Greek origins which refers to a vision of pastoralism and harmony with nature. It's a nice street but the definition would have to be a little over the top. 

As well as blogging I am keen to have a crack at Vlogging about life and food. The first step in that process is to spend some time giving the home kitchen a deep, deep clean and then setting up my little kitchen to invite in the world. 

The final and most important part of the plan is to turn my home cooking into a profitable food stall and eventually food truck  business that I can take on the road and hopefully, when running successfully, give me more control of my time and life in general.

The other avenue of income is to create a website to sell my sauces, nut butters and other products. Of course the key to this is to create multiple income streams which when combined together bring enough money to fund an enjoyable life. 

So, how does it all work? How do I make time for all the components that make up the whole? For now I need to commit to sitting down and typing for at least a half hour every time I find myself with a day off from work. Starting is the most difficult part. I was listening to an audio-book the other day which spoke about the writing process. It mentioned that one accomplished writer has the approach of sitting down to write at least 1 page each day. Doesn't matter if it is absolute rubbish as long as they write that one page. Starting is the hardest part. So many areas of our lives can carry this message through in creating successful routines. Take the simple task of taking out the garbage. The task itself might take 2 minutes to complete but often firing up to do the job will take many times as long. Do you ever find yourself with a problem in your life which you push aside and think "I just need to relax on the lounge and watch some TV and then I'll get to it." The only problem is that when you are watching the TV you can't relax because your mind is still thinking about the problem. It's only when we take action that we can settle the mind and really relax. 

Another area I wouldn't mind having a go at is running a food podcast. This is in a really early phase of thought on the matter. I listen to a podcast called The Sporkful which has the catch phrase "it's not for foodies, it's for eaters" and covers aspects of American eating and deep dives in various areas of the culinary landscape. The guy who runs it, Dan Pashman said he started it in his home and now makes a living out of it. Amazing what can be achieved in our modern world. 

I believe there is a market here in Australia for more local content in the digital space and am hoping to cash in and by having an enormous amount of fun exploring the possibilities. 

Act as if... Act as if you already have the life you want. Free yourself from the 9 to 5 and do something awesome. If fact just do something that eases the financial grief enough to enjoy your time on the planet. And of course remember to do as the good people at Nike say "Just do it"

Have a great day talk to you another day.

What's for dinner? Pea and ham soup

A couple of evenings ago, I headed into Aldi search of some German sausages. I grabbed 3 packets. I was looking for the sausages to go with the Sauerkraut I had leftover from Sundays pork knuckle. I've had their sausages previously and again they did the job.
However, whilst I was in Aldi I saw a packet of green split peas. The first thing that came to mind was pea and ham soup. I headed straight for the refrigerator isle to find a ham hock. No joy. They did have a piece of smoked speck though. I thought it should do the trick.
So, this afternoon when I got home from work, nice and early for a change and with a slight Autumnal chill in the air, I thought today is the day.

Did my lazy google search and found a pea and ham soup recipe on Taste.com.au. Had a quick glance at the ingredient list. Had everything except carrots. Walked up to the local veggie shop and bought two carrots and whilst I was there got a cut watermelon and some yellow peaches.


Into the kitchen now. I gave the peas a good rinse as you do with rice to rinse off the excess starch. I think starch is the right word. Anyway, I turned on the pot to high heat, my stove-top doesn't reach to a massively high heat, especially with some of my thicker, better quality cooking equipment. I added a couple of tablespoons of olive oil. I only have extra virgin ( buy it when it's on special, use it for most non Asian dishes). Then I started through the ingredient list and chopped and added to the pot. Started with carrots, whilst I was cutting them the oil became fragrant and wafted in my direction, only the addition of a little garlic could make it better. I didn't add garlic, at least not yet.I popped in the carrot, celery, onion and then the garlic. All ruff chopped and into the pot. gave them a stir after each addition and then added the peas and smoked speck, seasoning followed by 6 cups of water. Bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer and then get on with your afternoon.

In my case getting on with my afternoon involved a little reading from Culinaria Germany to try to increase my knowledge of the food of my Mum's country of birth and a little of McGee on food and cooking. In Culinaria Germany they covered a little on potato dumplings which were said to be an essential part of Sunday roast in the region of Thuringia. In McGee I covered a couple of pages on Ice Cream. Just the kind of reading that makes you want to rush out an get an ice cream maker. I was good. I didn't.

The picture above left is about 1 and a half hours into cooking and you can see that the peas are starting to break apart and give the soup an earthy green colour. I think I am now getting close to the time to remove the smoked meat and then with a stick blender, which I haven't used in some time but came across whilst tidying up the kitchen draws last weekend, or was it the one before. The stick blender is great for this purpose and saves the transferring of the soup to a blender and of course saves on washing up.
I have now blended the soup, after removing the meat. The speck was so tender it was ready to fall apart. A gentle knife was run through it and returned to the blended soup. Thursday night dinner is done.

Bread

Spelt flour loaves -my first two loaves

A little over a month ago I made a sourdough starter following the instructions given on a you tube video. From that I have made bread each weekend and am enjoying the early stages of being a bread maker. It has been a lot of fun. After the initial week of building a starter from wholemeal spelt flour and water I have been able to make 2 loaves of bread each weekend with varying levels of success. Obviously, providing you care enough to try to get better, you will improve over time at least to some level of accomplishment.

One of the interesting things for me about bread making is the small number of ingredients that are used to make bread by this traditional method. In it's simplest form bread has only 3 ingredients, Flour, Water and salt. That is it. Four if you count time or naturally occurring yeast. I have a challenge for you. Go and pick up the loaf of bread you bought from the supermarket, or if you don't have one, grab one off the shelf next time you are shopping. Count the ingredients in the bread. I picked up a wholemeal loaf at work and had a look. It had 17 ingredients. I saw on a show on netflix the other week that the wonder bread that is sold in the USA has an amazing 25 ingredients. The commentator on the show made the statement that he thought that perhaps many of the people in our society with gluten intolerance are perhaps allergic to some of the 22 other ingredients in bread and not actually suffering from the gluten itself. This does not include the 1% of the population who are allergic to gluten. Whether or not this is true I have no idea and as little more than a bloke who cooks food for a living I can't say, but it does make you think.

A white loaf and a Multigrain loaf  

Kneading bread is such a homely old world thing to do. Bread is believed to have been made as far back as 14,600 years ago. So, when you make bread you are part of an ancient tradition, at least in your own way. 

So, what is my process? How do I manage my sourdough starter? It is quite simple really. In the first week of making the starter I added equal parts flour and water, day 1 50 grams flour and 50 grams of water. The starter was left out on the kitchen bench over night to begin it's activation. Day 2, another 50 grams of water and flour. The mixture stays at room temperature for all of this first week of the process. Day 3 the fun begins. Discard 100 grams of the starter and then add 100 grams flour and water each. Day 4 discard 150 grams of starter and top up with 100 grams of flour and 100 grams of water. Around day 3 or 4 you will start to see and smell the fermentation taking place in your starter. What causes this reaction? The naturally occurring yeast in the air. Day 5 discard 200 grams and top up with 150 grams of flour and water (300 grams in total). Day 6 discard 250 grams and top up with 200 and 200 again. Day 7, I have good news, we are ready to bake. I got this information from the I love cooking Ireland you tube page on their video on how to make sourdough. Make sure you check it out.

Sourdough starter

How do I look after the starter when I only bake once a week? As long as you don't use all of your starter you will not have to go through the starter making process ever again. Currently thinking of who I can trust to look after it when I go on holidays. So basically what I do is after I have used some of the starter to make bread, approximately 2/3 of the starter, I then stir together 200 grams of flour and 200 grams of water and mix this with the leftover starter. I rinse the jar that I use clean it out and then pour or spoon the starter back into the jar with the lid left loose to allow air to escape. An airtight jar may explode when the ferment is taking place. This mixture goes into the fridge until the night before baking, so in my case that is Friday afternoon when I finish work. I take it out, put it on the bench and it is ready to go Saturday morning.

Sourdough pizza , the recipe made 6 dinner plate sized pizzas

Over the last month I have made a basic white loaf, spelt loaf, a multi grain loaf, pizza bases and as I type this I am about to pop a rye bread loaf into the oven. I have taken a little time to get the oven temperatures correct, sometimes the loaves have ended up with a little too much sunshine. Having Said that all the breads have been edible and most cases well above edible. In fact I would say that they were yum. Even the loaves that were a little darker on the outside were great to eat.
If you like the idea of making your own real bread at home so that you can control what goes in your food then I highly recommend taking that week, probably only five minutes a day to get the starter going, jump on board and go for glory.

Sourdough Nutella pizza

multigrain loaves

Just start typing and see what comes

I heard the other day about a prolific author who was asked how he was able to produce so many books whilst others really struggle. His response was just write 200 words a day and the rest will follow. So that is what I am attempting to do here. Start and see what comes. When it comes to blogging starting is my, I want to say greatest challenge, but really, it is actually just the first challenge. Now that I have overcome that I can see what other challenges arise. Providing interesting content might well prove a greater hurdle.

So what should I write about. How about food. I am a chef. I cook food for a living. I work Monday to Friday, 6.30am to 2.30pm. At least those are the hours I am paid to work. The challenge, I think I may be over using that word is time management. I want to claim more of my life for me. That is not to say that I don't give my all to my food and care about what I put up for my customers each day. I am one chef cooking  baine marie held food for about 100 to 120 people a day. I work for a company which leases the premises of another company (our client) to provide a staff cafe for their employees. We have a manager who is a Catering Assistant, a barista and another Catering Assistant or CA for short.

So, what do we provide. The Barista provides what you would expect i.e. coffee. The CA's set up a sandwich bar and provide mostly made to order sandwiches and wraps. They also serve the hot baine. I provide 3 different meals a day, two containing meat and a vegetarian meal to serve aproximately 20. As well as this I make a salad for about another 20 visitors. The menu changes daily and it is my job to write a new menu each week. On top of this I also cook breakfast. The usual suspects are provided at breakfast, bacon, fried eggs, sausages, hash browns and grilled tomato or at least it would be if we had a grill. It is actually baked tomato. On top of that there is a weekly cycle of breakfast, not so special, specials. Monday French toast, Tuesday sausage roll, Wednesday eggs Benedict, Thursday ham, tomato and cheese melt, and Friday scrambled eggs on toast.

I think I am past those 200 words I spoke about at the start of this piece, now I have to find some interesting content.

What do I cook? Let me grab a typical menu. Thursday is roast day, roast beef one week, roast chicken the next, then lamb and finally pork with crackling. I roll through and after four weeks it is back to the beginning again. These days it is about 18 to 20 kilograms of meat. Many chefs would cook the meat the day before and slice and reheat on the day of service. Personally I like to cook and slice on the day. Hot meat is easier to slice and there is less of a food safety issue if you do it all on the same day. Food doesn't spend as long in the danger zone where harmful bacteria can do it's thing. What temperature makes up the danger zone? 5 to 60 degrees Celsius. The objective is to keep food out of that zone for as much of it's life as possible. That's the brief of it.

Friday is fish day. Hoki caught in New Zealand waters. What is Hoki? Hoki is a white fleshed fish found in the waters around New Zealand, southern Australia and off the coasts of South America. Why do we use it? Because it is both cheap and sustainable. By the time it gets to us in a frozen packet of I think, about 5 kilograms, it is also boneless. The fish rotation is smaller than the roast rotation. Battered fish one week, crumbed the next and a simple seafood basket in week three. If the client invests in a grill there will be a fourth item to the rotation being grilled fish, but that is yet to occur. They are not exactly in a hurry to spend money on us, which I do understand in that we are probably see as nothing more that an expense, but a little bit of cash thrown our way would be nice. Fish is the most popular item of the week, which is why the rotation isn't too big. We sell about 65 fish on a Friday against the normal allowance of about 40 of a regular meat dish.

Somewhere in the menu is a curry, usually on a Monday containing chicken as that allows me to get my meat order in on a Monday to ensure freshness for the remainder of the week. I get chicken on a Friday for Monday's menu and then as required for the rest of the week. What sort of dishes do I cook, Thai red and green chicken curries, various Indian curries although the norm is one curry a week. There is a pasta dish somewhere in the mix. I have tried to keep them a little lighter over the last year but do still like the occasional creamy bacon and mushroom boscaiola. A burger each week of some type. Good old fashioned beef burger is always a winner, as well as pulled pork rolls, chicken fillet burgers, I favour the thigh fillet sometimes marinated in Tandoori paste or a satay chicken burger can be good too.

My company like us to run a selection of healthy dishes, at least one each day which are recipes created by the head office food gurus to provide a push in the direction of healthy living. They are mainly based around, in my opinion, the idea of less meat and carbohydrates and more vegetables.  This of course is what current ideas of health food entail but customers often feel a little ripped off if they don't get as much meat in their fish as they usually get in a typical meal. I have found that if I run the healthy meat dish up against the fish then the lessoning of sales doesn't hurt the menu's balance.

Beef stroganoff, pork goulash, chicken cacciatore are but a few of the regulars to feature. Grabbing a few popular dishes from your local Chinese restaurant is an easy way to fill the spaces including Mongolian lamb and sweet and sour pork.

As they say and so much more. I will save the rest for next time. I try not to back dishes up too quickly for basically I need, there are some exceptions as mentioned above, about 120 different dishes to fill a 6 week cycle. That is quite a lot but it is important to not become too repetitive.

More thoughts from the kitchen to come in future weeks. I feel as though I have achieved something here by just getting the first words on the page (maybe page isn't the right word). Screen perhaps is more digitally appropriate.
 Hope you enjoy
Chef G  

Restaurant review - Eat GRK- Beverly Hills

We headed out to for a midweek celebration when my wife received her permanent residency after an almost 3 year wait. We were looking for something a little different to our usual Asian fare so this place jumped out. We had visited once before, leaving with over filled bellies and smiles of food joy on our faces. The problem, at least for me at Eat GRK is that there are more options on the menu than I can eat in one go. Not really a problem for a normal human, they just eat one option and try another next time. Not so for me. I have the tendency to attempt to eat everything I like in the one go and then then spend the rest of the evening asking myself why anyone would eat that much. Ahhh, we live and at least attempt to learn.

As I stated in the above intro the menu has a good number of options, and the outdoor style dining gives the place  a great atmosphere. In the winter it can get a little chilly but then, they have the portable fires going. This restaurant is situated right next door to the Beverly Hills hotel and would make for a good stopping point either on your way to the hotel or a after a couple of early beers. The cinema is maybe 50 metres away on the other side. Take your pick.

The menu has an array of options, most of the mains involve some form of charcoal cooked meat, Lamb, chicken or pork and there is usually a mixed tasting plate in each part of the menu if you are like me and can't pick just one. The entree options look good. Choices include grilled haloumi, feta fries, haloumi chips, as well as some dips and pita breads but these will have to wait. As I said earlier, I ate far too much on my first visit (all enjoyable) but I was going to make an effort not to make the same mistake again.

This time I went straight for the Mix Plate. It contains more than enough for a filling meal. The mix plate contains 100g of carved lamb or Pork, I chose Lamb. 1 souvlaki of your choice I went with the pork (meat on a skewer), 1 loukaniko (pork based wine soaked sausage), 1 Sheftalia (skinless pork sausage from Cyprus), 1 slice pita bread, Tzatziki for dipping, a generous side of chips and Greek Salad which was topped with a delicious slice of Feta cheese. Along with that they throw in a can of drink or a water. The sausages are rich and not afraid to be meaty, whilst the meats cooked over a charcoal grill were juicy and packed with flavour. The Greek salad was well dressed and generous and even the humble side of chips came topped with a tasty seasoning. All of that for only $32, I'm not sure you can do much better.

My wife had the Souvlaki plate. This contains 3 skewers, Chicken, lamb, and pork, all nicely grilled, with sliced pita, tzatziki, chips, Greek salad and the can of drink or water. As with my meal, this one was a success and we will return before too long.

Everything went down a treat and I am keen to get back there and try a wrap or two and maybe one day even make it to the coffee and dessert portions of the menu.

Shun Fujimoto , A courageous Olympian

Gymnastics is, to be completely honest not where I usually look for sporting inspiration, but this story is hard to resist.

The Japanese have a long and distinguished history in men's gymnastics having won 14 individual medals at the Olympics and 13 medals in team competition. Leading into the 1976 Olympics in Montreal, Canada they had won the team gold at the previous 4 games starting with their first in Rome in 1960. The 1960 Olympics was when a young boxer from the USA named Cassius Clay won gold in the Light Heavyweight division, but that story is for another time.

Heading into the 1976 Olympics the Japanese were the world champions as well as Olympic Champions but the USSR had won silver at the previous 4 games and felt that this might be their time to re-climb the mountain to Olympic Gold.

Shun Fujimoto, 26 years old, was a reserve for the team when they arrived in Canada. Shigeru Kasamatsu was a team leader and the world all around champion at the time. On the eve of the games Shigeru was forced to withdraw from the team due to an emergency appendectomy.  As a result Shun Fujimoto was called into the team to compete at his first and only Olympics. The courage he showed in his Olympic performance reverberated for many years to come. The injuries he sustained prevented him from competing at international level after Montreal.
In team gymnastics each team has 6 athletes and the top 5 scores count towards the teams final total. They compete in 6 separate disciplines and the totals from each discipline are added together for the final score. The 6 events are the Floor, Pommel Horse, Still rings, Vault, Parallel bars and horizontal bar.

During the 1st event of the optionals, the floor routine, Shun, whilst landing in his 4th rountine bent his knee the wrong way and the damage was done. He didn't say anything, but when he walked one step forward he couldn't feel his leg. He checked his leg's condition with each step as he headed to his chair. Shun was in agony but he didn't want to let anyone know as he thought it would effect his team's chances if he received treatment. I guess he figured that by heading for treatment it would add extra pressure to his team-mates and at the same time boost the confidence of their rivals. As a result he kept the pain hidden and amazingly carried on.

And so to the pommel horse. This had been Japan's weakest discipline in the last four Olympics. Knowing that, the team had focussed on this event to improve their standing. Shun was to go first. He knew it would be important to give the team a good start. Shun said later that he tried to forget the injury and concentrated on the task at hand. He did well and received a 9.5. He had survived.

Then to his greatest and final act of courage, the rings. Shun performed well, but must have known that the landing was going to take him to a world of pain. The moment he landed he felt a horrible squish from his leg. His leg bent completely the wrong way. He managed to correct it. If he leaned his leg would have bent forwards. Despite all of this he stuck the landing after an extended pause to keep his balance. He received the best score of his life, a 9.7.

His pain could no longer be hidden. His team doctors refused to give him pain killers and he retired from the competition. Shun was devastated. "I felt dead inside", he said. "We had lost our chance to medal and it was all my fault" He headed to the medical tent a broken man, physically and mentally. Shun had broken his knee in the floor routine. The dismount from 8 feet up on the rings dislocated his already broken kneecap and tore the ligaments just for good measure.

When he returned from the medical tent he was shocked to find his team celebrating. His team-mates thanked him for his courage and used him to inspire them to greater heights. This brought them all to tears. Shun thought he would miss the medal ceremony but his team would have none of it. He had inspired them and they wanted Shun with them on the podium. His team helped him halfway to the podium but he hobbled the rest of the way on his own because he felt that it would be embarrassing to be helped.

The very next day Shun's leg was in a full cast from hip to foot. This was his only appearance at an Olympic games but he certainly left a mark. The injury ended his gymnastics career and left him with lasting ligament damage.

In interviews Shun is an act of humility. He did a courageous thing but did it just so he wouldn't let his mates down. A wonderful lesson in what being part of a team is all about. Thanks for the inspiration Shun Fujimoto.

Chapter 1, Saturday is every day

The alarm sounds. He is already awake. Anxiety eating away at him. He arises from bed, heads to the bathroom. Whilst there he scrolls through facebook posts delaying the day ahead. In someway he is just distracting himself from thoughts about the day ahead. The 6 and a half hours of sleep was enough to get by but is never enough to be truly at peace. He moves on to the process of showering and getting dressed for the day ahead. Clothes are prepared from the day before because he knows that he can't trust himself in the haze of early morning to find everything he needs. In robotic mode he showers and gets ready for work. Then he puts on the kettle and grabs cereal for breakfast. He weighs the cereal and milk into the bowl, somehow convincing himself that he is still on the diet that had helped him lose 15 kilos a year ago. Once he had got his weight where he wanted it the bad habits had slowly crept back in. Now he was back where he started. He felt overweight, overwhelmed and in need of change.

The switch of careers had seemed a good idea at the time. Life is like that. You make changes to improve yourself. Chase your passions. You love cooking at home. You spend your train trip home from the office job thinking of nothing but what you will cook for dinner at night. Why not throw it in and become a chef? Open a cafe? Seemed like a good idea. Now ten years on work is hard and anxiety filled. Sure it's with food, but a job is a job. Maybe it's time to quit. Start out on his own. Open that cafe. Don't let fear hold him back. But, there is always a but. Does he really want to commit to a business? What about travelling and a more balanced life? Is it just a dream? Is a balanced peaceful life just an illusion? Is it really possible? He certainly hopes so.

    He is not alone in this Monday morning struggle. In this city of over 5 million people you can bet that half of them are facing an uphill battle on a Monday morning. He is most definitely not alone. I guess what separates him from the others is that he wants and believes that things can be different. Will the future prove him correct or a fool?

Bradley Pickering ducks back to bed to hug his wife of 3 years for 10 minutes that always turns into 15 minutes before he gives her a kiss and heads out the front door of their two bedroom unit in Southern Sydney. He regrets the feeling that his day has already had it's best moment. It won't get better.

He looks at his phone. The weather app says 11 degrees Celsius. A jumper, a jacket, a beanie, woollen gloves and thick socks will keep him warm until the heater in his 14 year old Toyota Camry starts to kick in. Probably take half of his 20 minute drive to work. At least he works in a kitchen. Once you turn everything on the room will heat up and the weather outside won't be relevant until it is time to go home. He wears headphones on his way to the car so he can listen to a pod-cast or an audio book on the way. He gets in the car switches to the Bluetooth speaker he got from his wife last Christmas. The radio can underachieve when you leave for work at 6am so a couple of years back Bradley switched to pod-casts for his driving listening. At times they can be motivational. Of late the advice is falling on deaf ears. Last month he listened to the four hour work week by Timothy Ferriss, a book on lifestyle design. How to get more time to do what you want to do and less with other members of the rat race. How he craves but as yet has not achieved.

The fog is thick for the drive in. It doesn't affect visibility but you'd much rather be in bed recovering from the weekend than out here heading to the nightmare that work has become. No winter trip to Thailand this year. Saving up for Europe in 12 months time. The goal is to get 12 weeks a year to do as he pleases. Maybe the 1st year the 12 weeks would all be travel. Over time he tells himself he would invest his time in other pursuits. Perhaps a month long meditation retreat to escape the rat race completely. Slow life down. Absorb every moment, live as Eckhart Tolle says "in the now". Think not of the future or the past. Be in the moment. Feel every movement and worry about nothing. Worry will not change anything. Bad will happen, good will happen. Just be. A month of quiet solitude seems right now to be a million miles away. Simplify my life he tells himself. One day.