Friday 2 March 2012

Golden Nugggets

This week we received our rent - a large bag of freshly picked corn-on-the-cob straight from our land. Now I can see you are all imagining mouthwatering, bright golden husks of sweet delight....

LUNCH - Corn on the cob
Ingredients:
Freshly picked Corn cobs (2 or 3 per person depending on size of cob and person)
Water
Pinch of Sugar
1 knob of butter per cob
Salt/Pepper to taste

Special Utensils required:
A cooker/hob/gas burner
Large lidded pan

Method:
1) Fill pan with water and bring to boiling point with a pinch of sugar
2) Drop in pallid, rather hard cobs.
3) Replace lid and simmer for a couple of minutes until at least some of them turn golden
4) Remove from pan, insert corn holders (jab end with fork)
5) Serve on a plate.
Note: do not yet smother with the precious butter until tested if edible.
6) Return cobs to pan for a further hour in the hope they will become more tender.

DINNER - Corn & Chicken chowder
Ingredients:
Cooked Corn
Chicken
Jipang
Onions (some big ones & some shallots)
Garlic
Chili
Coconut milk
Seasoning

Special Utensils required:
A cooker/hob/gas burner
Lidded pan

Method:
1) Remove boiled corn kernels from the cob (You can use the ones you've got left over from lunch)
Note: If you use your thumb to do this wait until the cobs are cold or you will get a rather large blister burn.
2) Coarsely chop the onions, garlic, chili and gently sauté in a little oil/butter until golden.
3) Add corn, diced chicken and peeled chunks of jipang
4) Stir in a cupful of water and seasoning to taste (in this instance I used a spoon of Gulai paste but it could have been anything) before covering with a lid to steam the chicken & jipang mixture until tender.
7) Add a cupful of coconut cream, bring back up to heat before serving on a bed of rice
Note: If you are experiencing severe dental problems serve with noodles not rice to make picking out the corn easier or simply omit the corn altogether from recipe.

COFFEE TIME SNACK - POPCORN
Ingredients:
Raw Corn Kernels (you've probably still got a very large bag of cobs in the fridge)
Oil
For dressing Butter, sugar or salt as you prefer

Special Utensils Required:
A cooker/hob/gas burner
Wide, heavy-based lidded pan

Method:
1) Heat a small amount of oil in the pan until it's the right temperature. To test this, toss in a couple of corn kernels replace the lid and wait for the pop. Note: Lift lid carefully, away from you, so the hot corn splatters on the window behind the hob and not on you
2) Throw in the rest of the kernels just enough to make a single layer on the base of the pan.
3) Replace the lid and swirl the pan around so as to coat all the corn in oil before returning to the heat to listen for the pop, pop, splatter bang, pop.......
4) Once they've cooled down, throw away the tiny blackened nuggets, making sure you scrape all the ones off the lid before soaking the pan overnight.


BREAKFAST - CORN FLAKES
Ingredients:
Cooked corn kernels (you may have to make a fresh batch unless you've still got some left over from yesterday's lunch and dinner)

Special Utensils Required:
Rolling pin (yep I have)
Oven (mmmm - tricky) or Frying pan (OK I've got several of those)

Method:
1) Roll out the individual kernels.
2) Sweep the resulting crumbs from the chopping board, you and the floor into the frying pan to dry-toast until they're crispy
3) Offer the result to your husband on a small saucer just to see

Actually the result of this experiment did have some relation to a breakfast cereal, just not cornflakes as we know them. More research on this discover that Mr Kellogg uses a 40 ton rolling pin and 600 degrees C, malted-air blowing, drum oven.

Current experiment: Have plate of raw corn kernels on Sun regulo MK9 (in-between showers) drying out for further attempt at pop-corn.

I think we basically have the wrong corn for anything remotely edible by a human, but as sweet "Mr Smiley" Botak took the trouble to peel and de-beard the lot of them it seems a shame not to try.


OK, Wayan have you made that catapult yet...

Saturday 11 February 2012

It's not funny

So, our Saturday night pre-dinner lime-based drink was starting to take effect when there was a kind of splatty noise near our occasional table (two stacked upside down coca-cola crates).  The wife, who has already been having a bad day as squeezing the limes was extremely painful, hampered due to recently open (unintentional [so she says] self-inflicted) burn-based wound, bravely rattles the crates.  First pass yields nothing. A second, more aggressive thwack produced a further splat. Batty doesn't look too well.  How were we to know their sonar is not capable of detecting a simple ceiling fan.  Now, don't go all green, tree-hugger, save the snail on me, I know bats are protected in the UK but here they eat 'em and tonight is curry night - just need a few more. "Turn the fan up another notch darling, I've got the net ready..."

Sunday 5 February 2012

Techno Fail

My beautiful big sister has discovered a problem with the blog.  My incredibly clever use of some HTML codes don't work for everybody.  So if you nip back to the previous post, the bottom row of text should have had some dotted underlines to show there were some brilliant hidden messages. In fact, I've used this method quite a lot - some of the funniest bits I realise now have been wasted - oh well, never mind.

I promise to be a little less subtle from now on - Yes, yes I know subtle doesn't normally spring to mind about me but Amanda is still teaching me how to be more polite and say the right things and not to fly off the handle every time someone does something crassly stupid.

This is a test of my new method hover here I don't like it as much, maybe on a quiet day I'll look into it some more. Dammit - there I go again and I promised not to...

Wednesday 11 January 2012

Dungeons and Dragons

You are sitting under the shade of a coconut palm watching a snake eat a frog. A stunning blonde sits next to you and proceeds to breastfeed her baby. Believe it or not that's what happened even if it does sound like a 1970s computer game...
West lies a stepping stone path leading to a small hut, South lies an inviting garden path leading to a turtle hatchery, East is a fully equipped dive centre and North is a beautiful sandy beach and the sea. Your knapsack contains a) a stick of chewing gum. b) a book of poetry. What do you do?
[N] [E] [S] [W] [Kiss frog] [Kiss woman] [Kiss snake]