Down with cupcakes: Everlasting Feast with Lauraine Jacobs

How can sitting all day listening to other people talk be so tiring?  Two more sessions at the end of the day, and I was in need of something to perk me up a bit. The Lauraine Jacobs session entitled Everlasting Feast – the title of her new book, unfortunately didn’t quite do the trick.  Perhaps it was because her interviewer Graeme Beattie had suffered an accident and couldn’t be there, so everyone was thrown a bit, or maybe it’s because I was feeling a bit jaded about cooking,  endless hours of watching My Kitchen Rules had taken its toll! I only had myself to blame.

Lauraine’s interviewer Nicola Leggett was also her publisher and was reluctant for Lauraine to go into too many details about stories from the book, she thought that it would be much better if we went out and got a copy for ourselves – not surprisingly! I found this to be a shame, if I had heard more about the stories and recipes it would have probably enabled me to feel a bit more enthusiastic, what we did hear however assured me that it is jam-packed with wonderful tales of Lauraine’s life, the people she has met, Julia Child being one of them -  the characters, events and of course food that she has enjoyed.

I did pick up a few tips. There is butter and then there is BUTTER apparently and it should be kept in tin foil, and if not used at once then freeze it. Bakers and cooks don’t usually converge – you are generally one or the other, Lauraine always has smoked salmon, eggs and a great piece of cheese in her fridge, her favourite ingredients are lemons, butter, salt, and  herbs. Eclairs could well be the next big thing, cup cakes are definitely out!

• Lauraine Jacobs at the Festival
• Visit the Auckland Writers and Readers Festival website.
• Follow our Festival coverage on the blog.

 

A few of my favourite foodie things

New Zealand Book Month has given me cause to reflect on my fave New Zealand reads. While I’m at a loss to decide which fiction title is my number one, there are three non-fiction works that catapult to the top of my list. New Zealand fiction could be described as dark, raw and cynical but Kiwi cookbooks are some of the most accessible, easy-to-read and downright yummy cookbooks on the planet.

My first cookbook ever was given to me by my mother when I left home. It was The Best of Alison Holst now known fondly as “The Red Bible”.  I’ve used this book as many times as I’ve had hot dinners. My first copy became so splattered and manky after the first ten years it sat oozing oil and shedding breadcrumbs on the bookshelf. Although I knew I had to throw it out, I just couldn’t bear be without it. Fortunately, this best selling legend was reprinted a couple of years back and I grabbed another copy from the bookshop. My new copy is fast becoming as loved and battered (literally) as the first.

When I was going through my yuppy stage, I bought a slim volume called Smart Food for Busy People by Annabel Langbein and this book made a huge impact on me.  From the time I first opened the pages it started work its magic in my kitchen and I loved what it did for my culinary repertoire. The recipes had the new New Zealand vibe I was experiencing in restaurants at the time - crisp textures, emphasis on fresh produce, an influence from Asian cuisine, light and healthy food with flavour. I cooked recipe after recipe and wowed friends and family. Of course Annabel has gone on to host her own very successful television show and produce more quality, up-to-the-minute cookbooks but Smart Food is still my favourite.

Richard Till opened Espresso 124 on the Strip before it even became the Strip. It was the restaurant on Oxford Terrace around which all the others gathered as the food scene exploded into life in Christchurch in the late 80s. We loved Espresso 124. The food was brilliant, the atmosphere was charged and you could see Richard every Friday night hurling pans around the kitchen and dodging flames as he seared perfect steaks. The man’s a legend. His cookbooks capture his authentic Kiwi style and no-fuss approach to great food.

These are my favourites and there are plenty more – Al Brown, Ray McVinnie, Peter Gordon, Celia Hay, Julie Biuso, Fleur Sullivan … New Zealand has some of the best food writers on the planet. No doubt about it.

 

A home companion : my year of living like my grandmother – New Zealand e-book month

Wendyl Nissen is well-known as a straight talking journalist whose career has seen her edit top-selling magazines, produce ground-breaking television documentaries and take on talkback radio callers without batting a heavily made-up eyelid.

But what happened when she let three chickens called Marigold, Hillary and Yoko into her life on 24 October 2008?

A Home Companion details Wendyl’s year-long journey towards self sufficiency and life as a green goddess.

The book details each green goddess discovery as it happens – both the triumphs and the disasters – while Wendyl slowly sheds her corporate life and takes to wearing yards of muslin, leather sandals and forgets to straighten her hair.

A Home Companion is the book for any woman who finds herself yearning to get her hands covered in soil, rid her house of nasty chemicals, nurture her family and become a green goddess – even if it’s just at the weekends.

You can read A home companion as an e-book from our Overdrive collection.

A home companion is also available as a paper book.

 

Time to get the kids outside

Do you find your kids hang about inside even when the weather is fabulous?

Let’s get them inspired to play outdoors:

• get into some outdoor games
• learn a sport
• dig in their own garden
• try some outdoor crafts
• read a good story under a tree with a picnic.

Kid’s say they’re bored of their books? Try searching a reading list for other authors that write stories like their favourites and they can join the Summertime Reading Club where they may win a prize!

Teens can check out The Pulse for what’s new and happening. Garden City SummerTimes is here and the World Buskers Festival is just around the corner so there’s no excuse for not getting out this summer!

 

Trim down this Summer

Summer’s here. It’s time to get out and enjoy the good weather. Maybe you’re a little worried how you’ll look in your lighter clothes or still feel sluggish after winter.

Try eating better to lose weight and get fit.

Join a dance class.

Get stuck into the garden.

Whatever you do this Summer, get out in it. Every little bit of exercise helps even just playing with the kids or the dog, but most of all – enjoy!

 

Destination… Airport

Have you visited your airport recently?

Not for anything to do with travel, but just to hang out. Because the clever airport rebranding folk have come up with The Airport Visit as something to do. Just for fun. I kid you not. Actually, there’s quite a bit to be said for it. More interesting than a day in Sockburn and cheaper than a trip to Phuket, an airport is a bit like a mall with benefits.

But what’s it like to be at an airport with no travel purpose in mind? It certainly enhances the appeal of the book  100 Places You Will Never Visit. But, no matter what, I love airports. Alain de Botton beat me to what could have been my dream job when he landed the position of Writer in Residence at Heathrow for a week. But there’s nothing to stop me from blogging from Christchurch International Airport, so here goes.

You’ll be spoilt for choice insofar as cafés are concerned. I settled myself in with my cappuccino and got right down to my favourite airport activity – people watching: retired travellers endlessly checking boarding passes, harried mothers with overexcited children, cool businessmen praying they don’t get seated next to them on the flight. And weaving their superior way through this mêlée are the pilots, co-pilots and flight attendants. Perhaps not quite a glamorous as the Trolley Dollies in the latest TV series PanAm, but surely free of suspender belts at least!

Air travel is a peculiar beast – lacking the romance of train travel or the languor of a cruise, it has failed to generate a body of literature to commend it. My best find is the evocatively named Airports and Other Wasted Days. But sitting in a terminal, you have to marvel at how much air travel has changed. Time was when people dressed up to fly overseas, like the passenger in this old Christchurch Airport 1950 photo who is wearing furs and a hat and is surrounded by men in suits and uniforms. Now it’s baggy pants and Crocs all the way.

Now I know that a trip to the airport is not going to be an easy option to sell to the kiddies (some of whose friends have parents who are actually going to travel with their children) and I never said  an airport outing would be cheap. All I’m saying is: you too can get that travel buzz, buy chocolate coated “Sheep Dropping” raisins at a Duty Free, smell of three conflicting perfumes, wave to a pilot, misidentify jets to trusting youngsters and do it all on a spectacular caffeine high.

And what’s more, not once in the whole outing will a whining child say to you:

“Are we there yet?”

 

Psst! – hidden treasures #5

So far, while exploring, I’ve mainly talked about old stuff in our Aotearoa New Zealand Collection. This time around I want to let you in on a little secret:  whenever our library selectors buy New Zealand titles for the libraries, they buy a special copy for the Aotearoa New Zealand Collection. Just like its brothers and sisters out circulating in the community libraries, it gets processed and organised and added to the records, but after that it (most often) makes its way here to Tuam Street, where it is freely available to read, as long as you don’t leave the room!  Seriously, don’t make me chase you …

Remember that these books are reference only, and not to borrow, so unfortunately if you are number 72 on the list for a popular recent release, you can’t jump the queue; but if you truly are DESPERATE to get a head start on the latest must-read, Central Library Tuam and the ANZC are a great place to visit. Poking round the shelves this morning turned up these treasures:

• Julie Le Clerc’s Favourite Cakes (for when you need something yummy)
• Dennis Greville’s Easy on the Pocket Vegetable Growing (in case you spent all your money buying those cake ingredients)
• Witi Ihimaera’s The Parihaka Woman, and Paula Morris’ Rangatira, both recent novels by two of our most well-known writers
• Joanne Drayton’s The Search for Anne Perry (for those who saw, or didn’t see, Joanne at The Press Christchurch Writers’ Festival)
• and a series of large and hauntingly beautiful books featuring the photographic work of Doc Ross. I was particularly moved by the 2012 title Quietus: Observations of an Altered City, a large white-covered book recording the changing face of Christchurch, with a mixture of black and white, and colour photos, and script by Andrew Paul Wood. This is one of only 50 copies printed, and it is a real privilege to have a copy here on the shelf at Tuam Street to be read and admired by all.

 

Get spooky this Halloween

Halloween is great fun for adults and kids alike. It’s not far away so it’s time to make crafts and decorations and think about some spooky food and costumes for your celebration.

Other cool stuff:

• About Halloween for adults and kids
• Books on spooky stuff and spooky stories
• Horror tales and movies, horror genre authors

See if your local library has their decorations up.

 

Going South: Our selectors share cool new stuff

Once again it is time for a few choice titles from our selectors.

Mike Wilkinson Our far South
Mike, an outstanding photographer, was chosen to join the expedition organized by Gareth Morgan to New Zealand’s far South. He created a moving tribute to the Southern Ocean, the islands, its wildlife and Antarctica. It is a record of our time now, but one that is under threat by introduced pests, climate change  and overfishing.

Here are some other titles on the same subject that you also might find interesting.

• Gareth Morgan: A happy feat : voyage to the end of our far south
• Geoff Simmons : Ice, mice and men: the issues facing our far south
• John McCrystal : Shackleton Bear Goes South - one for the children.

Jason Anthony: Hoosh : Roast penguin, scurvy day, and other stories of Antarctic cuisine
Keeping with the Antarctic theme, seeing as it has just been Ice Fest, this is one of those intriguing books that is full of interesting titbits, including ,minted peas being created with the help of toothpaste and 101 things to do with penguin! Well not quite, but there are enough anecdotes alongside environmental effects of food waste and inefficient management to keep any Antarticaphile happy.

Some other new and interesting stuff:

James W. Hall : Hit Lit: Cracking the code.
The code being cracked here is what titles made the biggest bestsllers of the 20th century.  A very interesting book that looks at what the big smash hits of the last century had in common.  Some novels are still read today and as popular as ever for example To Kill a Mockingbird and Gone with the wind, where others are part of our social history such as Valley of the dolls and The Bridges of Madison county – a bit like 50 shades phenomenon which has everyone aquiver now but may puzzle people in 2022.

Stacy London  The Truth about style (as reviewed by this blog)
This book won’t give you a list of ten must-have items in your closet, or tell you how to hide your hips or tummy. It won’t tell you what color to wear if you’re a brunette or redhead, and it won’t inform you of what items should be purged from your closet. But it will help you realize how fellow women have learned to find personal style… and may help you find yours along the way.

Jason Miles : Pinterest Power: Market your business. sell your product, and build your brand on the world’s hottest social network
Here was me thinking that Pinterest was just like an online scrapbook or all your favourite pretty pictures of home decorating ideas, craft, weddings and such like.  Now it is being picked up by business and as the third largest social networking site in the world it obviously has uses far in excess of what my meagre attempts represent.

 

Dinner – not always all about happy families

As is frequently the case for me, I arrived at work one day last week to find a mystery book on my reserve shelf.  I still can’t figure out how many of these book titles get on my holds list, and am often startled by what I find.  Happily, most of my apparent choices turn out to be great, with only the occasional What Was I Thinking? moment.

This week’s arrival, I have to say, was one of the most winning-est yet.  On the face of it, it was already on a winning streak – what’s not to love about a book about food, posh food, in a posh restaurant, and featuring a giant lobster on the front cover?

I started reading late on Sunday afternoon.  I was still reading very late Sunday evening.  I got up early to read before work on Monday, carried the book around all day and spent ALL my breaks with the lobster.  Monday evening I was nearing the end, and by ignoring a) my family, b) the dishes, and c) all phone calls and text messages was able to turn the final pages around 11.15pm.

The premise (as all the reviewers point out) is simple.  Two brothers and their wives meet in a restaurant, to discuss a family problem.  This seems to be about the only point on which the reviewers agree, though.  This, and the fact that the cover quotes are astonishingly misleading: I certainly wouldn’t describe it as a heartstopping thriller, nor (as on another cover version) would I use the tagline: How far would you go to protect the ones you love?  Proper reviewers on important websites compare it to books like The Slap, and We Have to Talk About Kevin, but are divided on whether this is a GOOD or a BAD comparision.

I’m not going to talk about what transpires over the course of the dinner, as that would involve spoilers of the worst kind, and would also, I think, ruin the best thing about this book – not the storyline itself, although that is part of it; but instead, the creeping sense that as much as you guess about where the book is going, the actual truth of what is happening to these families is revealed to be worse with each turning of the page.  Character judgments are futile – who’s the hero, and who’s the villain; as are attempts to figure out a nice tidy plot resolution. Instead, and very much unlike my usual approach, I just had to let go and let the story take me with it.

What I will say is that, very unexpectedly, The Dinner turned out to be one of my Best Reads of 2012.  I don’t think it’s going to challenge my current lead, but it has certainly already led to some passionate and enthusiastic tea-break discussions.

Who else out there has read it? Loved or loathed it?  Do tell …