Ho Ho Hot

Season’s Greetings in at least 27 degrees Celsius heat. La Nina, the Pacific weather system that throws up humid, tropical, stormy, sticky weather throughout the month of December, taunting us with one beautiful summer’s day in three. She, dances on the stage throwing hot flooded hissy fits in drought ravaged Queensland, Australia and heavy downpours rotting crops in New Zealand. (Without the snakes and cane toads).
The morning of New Year’s Eve, I enjoyed a coffee and catch up with a dear friend, mindful of the afternoon forecast promising thunderstorms. The flies were sticky and people desultorily dawdling on the foot paths. I battled with traffic headed towards Waihi beachside village, a mecca for sun seeking visitors wanting adventure on the Coromandel Peninsula.

Columns of cars snaked slowly towards the sand, toy laden with must have beach gadgetry: jet skies, kayaks, newly popular paddle surf boards, mountain bikes and zodiac rubber boats. The occupants of the cars converge on the village clad in ill fitting baggy beiges and sloppy tops crafted in some Chinese sweat shop. The whole beach fashion world has gone sloppy and troppo. Dozy folk wander aimlessly around the shops weighing up the virtues of purchase of one lot of imported Indonesian tat against another, ‘so not to wear’, to work clothing.

However, there is hope. A clever shop, brightly painted, filled to the brim with aforesaid tat, has pebbled a path and signed a sign declaring a secret garden. With anticipation, plodding pedestrians push through the authentic antique Indonesian doors. They come upon a glorious Balinese tableau of numerous, spaciously planted and situated wooden dais with squishy embroidered pillows (yogic stance preferred), wavy flags and colourful pennants paying homage to Buddha. Tired old grandparents vie with toddlers piling pillows and the man and his wife throng into the little sliver of an oasis more befitting another world. A world more suited to the gamelan orchestra, incense and candles than Kiwi fish and chips, a pie and a beer.

Le Crowd

I have now hit a new benchmark; I catered for 50 people.
It went well. A lady had her 80th birthday here and Holly, the chef daughter, was conveniently absent by leading a tour of AFS students around the South Island and throwing herself off bridges, paragliding and helicopter flying around glaciers. So Mum had to deal with it!

Menu 
• Oriental beef balls
• Thai chicken cakes
• Tomato tartlets
• Blinis
• Salmon sandwiches

For some reason preparing the food turned into a comic opera. My initial tartlet cases were way too large so I down scaled and used mini muffin tins for the pastry. The weather was humid so the icky, sticky French butter pastry would not behave and we ended up with what Italians might call rustic torta.
The chicken was gross to deal with as usual, but the punters pronounced it the dish of the day. I tried three different blini recipes until I found the Lord blini of all. It was organic and grew over night in the chiller fridge into a frothy, deliciously light concoction whipped into perfection by adding egg whites.

Thai Chicken Cakes – makes 25

3 eggs lightly beaten
1 1/2 T finely chopped coriander
1 T fish sauce
1 -2 T oil
3 breast equivalent chicken mince
2 stalks lemon grass white part only, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic crushed
3 spring onions, chopped
1/4 cup lime juice
coriander leaves, stems chopped
2 T sweet chilli sauce
1 tsp fish sauce
1/3 cup coconut milk

Preheat oven – 200 degrees C and lightly grease 3 -4 (12 hole) shallow patty tins or muffin tins.

Combine eggs, coriander and fish sauce. Heat the oil in a frying pan and pour in the egg mixture. Cook for about 2 minutes each side until golden. Roll up and shred finely. Set aside.

Mix the mince, lemon grass, garlic, spring onion, lime juice, extra coriander, sauces, egg and coconut milk in a food processor – fine but not smooth.

Spoon into patty tins and top with a large sprig of coriander. Bake 15 minutes or until cooked through but rotate trays so all are evenly cooked. Serve warm and garnished.

Dipping Sauce – 10

½ cup lime juice
¼ cup fish sauce
2 tsp sugar – dissolved
Kaffir lime finely chopped
Sweet chilli sauce to taste

Blinis – makes 100 baby sized using a teaspoon measure

520g full milk in a pot until lukewarm
20gm yeast
2 egg yolks
3 egg whites

Milk in a bowl then carefully tip the yeast into the centre. Add yolks. Whisk. Add 300gms flour. Wrap and rest at least 30 minutes. Add stiffly peaked egg whites. Drop a teaspoon sized portion into a hot buttered griddle or frying pan. Turn when the surface goes a little dry.

As for the salmon, shame on you lazy fish factory workers! They had shaved the salmon into slices and removed some of the pin bones but made waste of a good eighth of the entire packet. Even the cat could not finish the scraps.

At the end of service, I went outside to talk to the barman husband of mine and observe toddlers swaggering around with our beautiful wine glasses perilously in hand and children in gorgeous garb rolling down the grassy slope, the dog of ours being a prize attention seeking brat and to top it off white chocolate cake decorations smeared everywhere. So we did not charge enough AGAIN.