An early recipe: Carrot Cake

Vivid colours in Christchurch botanical gardens

Back (all the way back) in 2007, I sang in the choir at Christchurch Cathedral, NZ. It was a shock to see the cathedral spire in ruins in the recent earthquake, knowing I had sung in that beautiful building. Anyway, before my trip to NZ, I had occasionally baked with my mum on a spare Saturday afternoon, but that was it. April 2007 was the time I started baking for myself, in the tiny kitchen of another British bloke in the choir at that time, Robert Cross,with whom I stayed for my time in New Zealand.

Looking across some of the Port Hills to Christchurch

 I started with some simple muffins, but then a friend passed me a copy of the AWW magazine (I refuse to expand the acronym) dedicated to baking, and I delved into it, fascinated. One of the many things I tried was carrot cake, and this took up an entire evening, at the end of which I was exhausted. This was because it takes one and a half hours to cook. However, when I had put all of the batter into the loaf tin and put it in the oven, it immediately started to rise, at which point I went ".... ah." And removed half the batter from the tin. Unfortunately there was only one tin, so after the first cake had cooked, I had to empty the tin and wait another hour and a half for the second to cook! It was well worth the wait, though, and I have made it on many occasions since. By the way, Rob also plays and sings in his group (the genre of which will become clear) called This Country Needs More Country; check it out, there's good stuff on there!

Ooh... dirty dishes visible! Bad food blogger!

Carrot Cake

1 cup oil
 1 1/3 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
3 eggs
3 cups coarsely grated carrot
1 cup/120g chopped walnuts or pecans
1/2 a cup chopped raisins
2 1/2 cups self-raising flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp mixed spice

Cream cheese icing
30g butter
80g cream cheese, softened
1 tsp grated lemon rind
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1.5 cups icing sugar

Grease a large loaf tin, line the base with greaseproof paper, grease paper.
Beat the oil, sugar and eggs in a large bowl (with electric mixer) until thick and creamy. Stir in carrot, nuts and raisins, then sifted/whisked dry ingredients.
Pour mixture into prepared pan, bake at 180 degrees C  for 45 minutes. Loosely cover with foil, bake another 45 minutes.
Stand for a few minutes before removing from pan to cool on a wire rack.
Icing
Beat butter, cheese, rind and juice in a small bowl until light and fluffy, then gradually beat in the icing sugar. Spread onto fully cooled cake, or meltage may occur; this happened to me, and it wasn't pretty.

 

A day at the studio

Well, one of this week's trials is over! A few months ago I responded to a request on a poster in the Conservatoire for a performer to be recorded by Rebecca, a final-year Sound Engineering student. I offered my Schubert sonata in A minor (op. 143), and the Recital Hall was booked - a good thing, seeing as my end-of-year recital will take place there. It has been long in coming, and today I have played piano for four to five hours: at least one and a half practising beforehand, then about three and a half recording. I realise now we may have done things in the wrong order: least difficult (the second) movement first, most difficult (the third) last. I was having difficulty getting a proper run through at all, and was getting more and more frustrated. Still, Rebecca and the dude (sorry, dude, brainpower all gone) were good fun, and really helpful when I was getting angsty.

Rebecca and 'cool dude' allowed me to take a picture of them with my new camera

I spent quite a lot of hours yesterday, on the other hand, making bread for the first time in ages. I have found it quite challenging getting hold of active dried yeast, and I finally went to a big enough store where they had some Allinsons, which is good stuff. I got two cans. I was really pleased with the result: as a result of the dough not having risen properly for the first hour, I decided to deflate the dough and give it another hour. When I had gone through the curfuffle (I had to go and look that word up to check, and found it's actually Scottish!) of shaping my six rolls and two loaves and covering them in sesame seeds, and had FINALLY baked them, I found I had amazingly soft bread that sprang back when compressed. In other words, like supermarket bread, but so much better! I will make bread again soon, and maybe - *gasp* - try three risings to see what happens. I'm gonna have to work on my sizings though as my rolls had plenty of space whereas my loaves were cuddling up together. I'm going away now to take a picture of them.... be back in SECONDS What I actually did was go away, eat some bread, wash the dishes, then spend far too many hours on my computer.

Now it is way past my bedtime; tomorrow is essay-writing day! Oh joy.

Where Duncan Buys a New Camera, and Makes Some Lemon Curd

I bought a new camera on Saturday, a Digital SLR camera (a Canon EOS 500D) with which I hope to take many an artsy shot (especially of food). I have fancy wavy mirrors in my flat, and took a picture of myself, only slightly fearing that the camera would shatter upon attempting such a feat.

Yes Dad, I know my horizon is crooked

 I have been carrying it around in a cloth bag within my backpack, and every time I wish to take a picture I must hastily extricate it from the various zips and straps. About half of all attempts at shooting so far have been delayed by my inability to learn that taking the lens cap off, while a good start, does not automatically turn the camera on! I've had great fun playing with the various settings, and look forward to deleting many slight variations of shots I have because I've accidentally left 'continuous shooting' on.

Flowery Anthony Gormley

 When trying to take a closeup of the flower below, the normal 'White Balance' settings washed out the red, and it was only in 'tungsten' that it captured the colours somewhat correctly. The background is more bluish than reality had it, but that's generally what tungsten does.

 I made lemon curd! I used the recipe that I normally use, except that when attempting to double it (I had about 15 lemons) I only doubled the lemons and eggs, and neglected to do the same for the butter and sugar. Surprisingly, though, the curd still set, and I was rewarded with quite a tart, but still sweet, delightful lemony curd. I have to say, I did eat some with a spoon, as Joy suggests partway down her Tangerine Lemon Curd page - please note the photos, which are fantastic (even though she probably uses a macro lense!). I still have some lemons left, so I'll make the normal quantity (i.e. with correct proportions of everything) and compare the result with my current batch.

That be an odd-looking chutney, that be!

Lemon Curd 
(from the Sainsbury's Pressure Cooker book)
4 eggs
3 lemons
500g sugar
125g butter

Grating the rind off the lemons is probably easier before you mangle them.
Do so, and then get all the juice out of the lemons (jumping up and down on them: not recommended).
Whisk the eggs with the lemon juice and then strain through a sieve. Ours has a large hole in the middle. No-one wants to sell me a new one.
Melt the butter, sugar and zest in a pan, then add the egg and lemon juice mixture, combine over a medium heat. Keep heating, stirring regularly, until the mixture sets; you'll know when the stuff coats the back of the spoon you're stirring with.
Store in sterilised jars: boil them, or cook them at 100 degrees C, for five minutes, then fill jars and screw on lid tightly. Keep in the fridge.
Eat with the aforementioned spoon, or on toast (sorry, that's Tesco Value bread above) or in yoghurt, and definitely make sure to lick the bowl.

Kuala Lumpur, July 2010 - Part the First

Early last year, a tutor at Birmingham Conservatoire announced at the end of a rehearsal for the Conservatoire Camerata that the City of Birmingham Symphony Chorus was looking for extra tenors for two productions. One was a performance of Howard Goodall's 'Eternal Light - a Requiem', and the other was a trip to Kuala Lumpur for the last week of July, where we'd perform Berlioz's Damnation of Faust in the concert hall under the Petronas Towers.

The terminal at KL airport

The journey was pretty tiring, but went without mishap. The terminal at Dubai, our stopover, was mind-bogglingly massive; stepping out of the plane, one could feel the wave of heat wash past you: at first, I though it the exhaust from an engine, it was so hot. Inside they had a strange background music that grated on the nerves after the third playing. It played continually, many more than three times. I hadn't forgotten it on the way back. Once we had arrived in Kuala Lumpur, we were transported by coach to the hotel. Another tenor, and a fellow student at the conservatoire, kept pointing out the Petronas Towers, which consistently turned out NOT to be the Towers.

The view from my hotel room

The hotel we stayed in - PNB Darby Park - was not the  prettiest of buildings, but it had reasonable facilities, such as tennis courts and a swimming pool on the 8th floor. Both western-style and Malaysian breakfast was available. The first morning, I chose some of the western food, with small pieces of exotic fruit and umami jelly stuff (sorry for the technical jargon) in order to ease myself in. I only recently discovered that the fruit, which was very white with black seeds, was actually dragon fruit; I really enjoyed it. The second morning, I went for the proper thing: Nasi Lemak, having had it for lunch in Little Penang Cafe the previous day. I really enjoyed it, despite it being quite a bit hotter than before! Nasi Lemak is rice, with beef or fish, anchovies, and egg, and other additions. Another thing I enjoyed was Teh Tarik, literally 'pulled tea', which is sweetened with condensed milk then poured at a height from one container to another, frothing it up and cooling it down. I had several, of various degrees of sweetness, and one I had in a cafe one evening was just too sweet, it almost ached! The dessert I ordered in the Little Penang Cafe was Cendol, which consisted of shaved ice, red beans and green rice noodles, with coconut milk poured over the top. Unfortunately, owing to the tendency to blast the buildings' interiors heavily with air conditioning, I had by now cooled down, and I had to take my icy food slowly to avoid freezing my brain.

The stormclouds build up

On the third day, I suffered from 'stomach-can't-adjust-to-so-much-spicy-food-so-quickly' syndrome, and was unable to attend the rehearsal. On the upside, I finished my book, which I was planning to leave somewhere in KL as part of a venture called Book Crossing, where one goes to the website to generate a 'book-crossing I.D.', which one writes inside the book along with a message asking whoever finds it to register on the bookcrossing website. I left mine in the luggage compartment of the coach on the way to the airport for the return journey. My stomach didn't really recover, and I suffered from bouts of diarrhea for the rest of the trip, including during the first of the two performances where I was late entering with the choir after the interval, which was unfortunate. Thereafter I took certain remedies and was much more comfortable during the second performance on the Sunday.

The real Petronas Towers!


I do have a picture of the Petronas Philharmonic Hall in which we performed, but taken with the camera on my phone, so it is not of particularly high quality. I have other pictures, some taken with my phone, others with my camera, but I shall post them another time, as otherwise this post will become longer than reasonable.

In musical news, I will be accompanying a singer in the conservatoire's Lieder Prize prelims tomorrow, and am a little worried about the music: I'm still learning it! We'll perform Ravel's Trois Poeme de Mallarme, which are devilishly difficult, and two songs from Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn, which, although slightly less tricky, are awkwardly written for the piano.

I have just submitted my application to the WAM foundation to teach classical music - mostly piano - in a school in India for July and August! I will hear within about two weeks whether I will be jetting off at the beginning of July for two months of piano tutoring and group workshops. The blog of last year's participants makes for interesting reading, and gives me some ideas as to what I could do when if I get there.

Christmas Cometh!

Well, that was the last day of term! Although it felt suspiciously free, owing to not actually having any classes on Friday. I woke up to the blare of the block doorbell - someone trying to give me a package! I leapt out bed, donned a fleece in a panic and dashed to the door in case the 'someone' tried to take my package away... but the dude was waiting, so I eagerly gathered up my 'stocking' (Santa works in wonderful ways), and capered back to my bedroom, where I gloated over my prize. It was even labeled "From: S. Claus". I was considering putting up a picture, but then decided against it as most of the pic was taken up by MY ADDRESS IN BIG LETTERS which may not have been the best idea.

I've had the brilliant idea of actually sending a Christmas present to (among other people) my godparents and a grandpa in London, rather than just the thank-you letter that usually finds its way into a postbox around February. I've got some biscotti in the making which I shall package well, and send off to various lucky people. It is in fact cinnamon and sugar biscotti, and I am very grateful to Joy the Baker for posting this fabulous recipe in... umm... January? Oh well.

The uncut log

 The first time I made this recipe, it was for the Birmingham Conservatoire Camerata during our tea break, but I misjudged how much the recipe would make - i.e. I ate quite a few bits during the process - and was forced to cut the pieces in half to ensure everyone got a piece. They all enjoyed it, which was good. Can't for the life of me remember what we actually sang during the rehearsal though...

I made a biscotti tower... straaange person that I am

I am an ardent stumbler and have just happened upon the mathematical doodling videos of Vi Hart, incredible pieces of work and great fun to watch. But now I must leave all you (invisible, nonexistent) lovely people and go to bed, as tomorrow I am getting paid to sing carols in Nottingham - whoop, the moolah!

Wanted: Mr. Mo, and his Lasses

A serious crime has been perpetrated! A renegade baker, known only as 'Mo', raided a bank today, assisted by some well-known and also some less-known sidekicks. The old standby 'Mrs. Breadflour' was there, of course, only just having finished a conviction for creating counterfeit crusts. Her partner in crime, Friar Yeast, was also present. Unusually for Mo, he made use of the skills of 'Carroway and Fennel', a duo known for their use of carefully wafted odours to take out unsuspecting guards. Breadflour's daughter, Ryeflour, has no previous convictions, but has obviously been drawn into his family's tradition of nefarious deeds. A 'Ms Cocoa' is being questioned regarding reports that she instructed a co-defendant, Nikel, to use his shotgun on the people insided the bank, shouting "pump her, Nikel!"

Some of the stash of dangerous-smelling goods

About 30 people were knocked out with a new concoction created specifically for the event. What's more, when they came around, the ammunition had taken effect! Police are investigating possible use of narcotics designed to stimulate craving, as the victims of this merciless gang took to devouring them as fast as they could. In a statement made after recovering from burns to the inside of the mouth, one victim complained that "it lies rather heavily on the stomach."

One of the pieces of ammunition, rescued halfway through being devoured

A set of documents codenamed "bake it" is said to have been leaked from Murdoch Books, which supposedly contains plans for such an outrageous weapon. There are several possible authors, but any convictions are likely to be overturned as the content is widely available to the general public.

Annoyed about the ocean

More specifically, about what we're doing to it. In fact, I was getting really angry. Watching videos on TED.com is often 'inspiring' and 'jaw-dropping', to use the adjectives with which they rate their videos. But despite knowing about what bottom-trawling does to sea-floor life, having graphic representations of the results makes my blood boil. This video features over- and under-water photography by Brian Skerry, all of which is beautiful, some of which is horrible. A fisherman's hands holding about 8 shrimp, caught in an hour, and in the background, the rubbish, the 'bycatch'. What a waste.

I believe a goodly portion of my distaste for waste comes directly from my mum, whose nose wrinkles at the mere thought of throwing out the smallest scrap of material that could have some conceivable use.... AT ALL. But having a dislike for waste isn't bad, it can inspire you to think of novel uses for stuff you might otherwise just chuck. For example, I recently made a knife block (I bought some knives that didn't come with one) purely out of cardboard I had received as packaging, and sellotape. Of course, it's not very good, but it'll do for now, and was great fun to make! Other methods than throwing away of used stuff are important - compost and recycling - because otherwise it ends up in landfill, rotting and creating more CO2 (which we REALLY don't need) or in the sea, killing wildlife and creating massive rubbish patches the size of Texas (roughly) which swirl around in the Pacific, and maybe the Atlantic also.

So the lesson we must learn from this, is: buy British-produced goods, as this prevents the necessity of shipping them, creating air-pollution, and submarine noise-pollution (animals like whales sing over large distances); buy products with less packaging; buy fish from companies that fish sustainably, and of species that aren't nearly extinct. You can choose between being able to eat cod, or your grandchildren being able to do so. If you eat it, cod populations won't recover, if you don't (and actively persuade others not to), stocks MAY someday recover to the extent that we can cautiously begin to fish them again.... but in a way that respects the other sea-life, and isn't wasteful. My post barely touches the surface of what we're doing to the ocean. Read about it. Spread the word, if you ever want anyone to eat fish (well, particular species), you can't. Also, shark-fin soup? Just... just no.

To finish up, I give you a pic by Brian Skerry to prove that I'm not all doom and gloom. This Right whale was very inquisitive, and was unlikely to have come across humans before. This is why we sign pledges and make noise. This is why we care.

As the picture says, taken by Mr. Skerry, owned by Nat. Geo.