Fresh Words Daily

It seems that cookbooks are now partly travel books and I guess that isn’t a bad thing when we consider that it is often said that the way to know a country is to understand its food.

Rick Stein takes us on another of his gastronomic journeys and very nice it is too.

The book was written to go alongside his TV programme about Spain and food – or food and Spain and he truely does love that country.  His first visit he tells us was in 1955 an his love for the country stems from that early visit.

It is a beautifully crafted book, with glorious pictures not  just of recipes but of people and produce and I like the way the chapters reflect the food from each particular area for example Chapter 1 is Galicia Chapter 2 Asturias and Cantabria etc. Stein is an engaging writer and evokes an atmosphere for place in his narrative

“Though it was very cold dark and gloomy at the time, I’m glad I arrived in Galicia in February.  You can tell what a place is really like out of season.  I drove over the Ria de Ribadeo with my son Jack and Debbie, who helps me with these books, on a blustery, rather melancholic afternoon and found a cheap hotel smelling strongly of tobacco smoke with a small radiator in the bedroom which heated it not at all. We walked around in our overcoats.”

Immediately there is the feeling of where we are and so we are anticipating  whatever food might be put in front of us to warm our chilled bones.

There are lots of fish dishes but I made the chicken and garlic and it was delicious.  I had thought that the garlic might overwhelm the chicken but it didn’t just a perfect sweetness from the garlic adding to the goodness of the chicken.

I also made an apple and cinnamon cake which has apple cider it it and very nicely it turned out.  The cider gave the cake a bit of a kick and it seemed even better the next day.  The recipes aren’t difficult and most of the ingredients are easily obtainable but I probably won’t bother with Shellfish Gatherers and Octopus Stew – not sure I can handle an octopus.

If you love Spain and if you are a bit bored with what you have been cooking this is a book which will transport you to another country and the invitation is in its pages to try something different.

Lovely book great recipes.

For many New Zealanders the land is important.  Away from home and the call of the land in this small country is as strong as a mother’s hold.  I was brought up on a farm.  I had animals as pets from when I was very young. Hetty my pet hen would hop in my bedroom window and lay an egg on my bed.  I had a calf in the calf club show at school.  I rode a horse as a young girl.  I knew how to cross the farm without standing in cow dung and I could open and sometimes shut a ‘taranaki gate’.  A fearful contraption of wire and wooden battens.  In my adult life I have lived always in the city so when I can go into the country it is almost as if my heart begins to beat a special rhythm.  Penrose Farm belongs to our friends Jo and Malcolm.  It is north of Auckland at Mangawhai and Jo and Malcolm have a special magic which they have imbued in their small holding.  All the animals are friendly.  The donkeys are tame and will come up close to be patted.  The sheep will walk over and nose your pockets to see if there are any sheep nuts for them.  The rooster will eat out of  your hand and the chooks don’t mind if you put your hand under their feathers to feel for an egg.  Our adult offspring love their visits there and they love Jo and Malcolm two of the world’s nicest people.  Their humour kindness and absolute goodness makes a visit seem like a retreat.  Recently we took our grandchildren to the farm.  Kane who is 7 and Ewan who is 10 months they live in the centre of Sydney and for Kane this was  heaven.  He rode a donkey. “Hold your head up straight Kane.”  Jo instructed. And he did looking very regal.  Then he fed the rooster with grain from his hand, but the best part was going up onto the hill amongst the sheep.  Although nervous of the sheep who were boisterous when they thought there might be some tidbits he was entranced with the place.  My enduring memory is a photo of Kane sitting in the grass on the side of the hill with the sheep now going about their own business.  Kane is in his childhood dreamworld.  The day is soft and the air is pure.  The view out across the estuary to the big dune shimmers.  His face is shining with enjoyment.  These are special days.

As a school girl I remember that many of our textbooks came from Whitcombe and Tombs a name I loved because it had alongside it the smell of new books, new beginnings, the start of a new year.  Then it was bought by Coulls Sommerville Wilkie and became Whitcoulls which seemed to me a ‘dog’ of a name.  It didn’t have the same solid ring to it that W&T had.  Never mind it did  publish New Zealand books.  In more recent times it has been taken over by the conglomerate Redgroup which picked up Borders and Angus and Robertson on the way.  There was still a publishing arm but it now only looked at books by rugby and cricket players, or cookbooks, or perhaps something with the title ‘My trip in a campervan’.  Literature had gone long ago. 

Why did the bookshop that had been in business for 125 years finally fall on its knees?  Easy.  It stopped being a bookshop.  Those who bought out those three bookshops didn’t care about books.  They didn’t care if their customers were looked after in their search for books. All that mattered was ‘the bottom line’. 

A couple of years ago I was in Borders in Queen Street Auckland and I asked a young assistant about a book on Ernest Rutherford.  She looked at me a bit puzzled and then said: “What has he written lately?”

I didn’t blame her for not knowing about a famous New Zealander but it underlined the fact that no one did any book training with the staff.  No one cared  about books enough to make sure that when books were sold they were done with love and knowledge.  So I stoppped shopping at those bookshops and went to independent book retailers who really do know their stuff. 

One year I was part of a group who before Christmas read stories at Whitcoulls and Borders in Queen Street.  We dressed up in Christmas attire and (for free) read stories while the parents shopped.  The idea was that it would be New Zealand authors we would read.  We were hard pressed to find New Zealand children’s authors in stock in those stores.

So the reason for the demise is that no one cared about the product.  It is a sad day to see a bookshop close and sadder for those who have lost their jobs but it was going to happen and the surprise is that it took as long as it did.  Thank goodness the book shops run by keen individuals are still, according to Booksellers statistics, doing well.

Four Flat Whites in Italy

At the end of the year 13th November to be exact this play will be on at Howick Little Theatre.  It is the second play I will have directed for HLT and already I am feeling excited.  Directing a play is like stepping off a bridge in the dark in an unknown city.  You have some people around you whom you have encountered but whom you still have to get to know. 

You have a range of problems/challenges with the arrangement of the set, the setting of the lights, the production of the sound, and how well the costumes look.  Colours of fabric can change dramatically under lights – after working on wardrobe and finally putting together a good looking outfit for the leading character in one play I worked on, the lights changed her soft pink top to a dirty brown.  So the director has to be aware of a range of things, and needs to be constantly looking and looking and looking as the play develops.  The first play I directed a year ago had four fantastic women who worked hard learned their lines and were ready to try out anything – I was very very lucky.  Will it be like that this time?  I don’t know but the excitement of the challenge makes my fingers tingle.  This is a play with 19 different locations – so the lighting plot will be complex.  The set designer and I have had a few brief conversations but I like a sparse set with just a few things to give the indication of time and place and then leave it to the actors.  Roger Hall writes plays for actors and there is plenty for them to explore it will be a terrific time from auditions on the 5 September until the play is opened on the 13th November.  I can hardly wait.

Being a car was a career first.  Jeremy Clarkson would be impressed.  My latest role at Howick Little Theatre – lines = “Vroom Vroom Vroom, and a squealing of brakes as I shot around the corner of the set.  Much laughter (silent) from those backstage and the audience  who were pretty puzzled by it all I think.  But lots of Fun.  Next appearance will be in 2010 – with I hope better lines.