The reason for the long weekend was the massive disruption to Sydney while a bunch of politicians were in town. There were huge fences erected around the centre of the city, helicopters and planes constantly flew around the skies, hundreds of police were mobilised into the city along we old buses converted into holding cells for all the arrest expected (and after a description of the "cells" I cant see how they could not be a violation of basic human rights), these same buses were also going to be used as blockades if necessary, freedom of speech was withdrawn from the public within the centre of Sydney with protests banned by the courts.... all in all a great time to get out of the city or stay at home. My aunt and uncle chose the first option so I mainly chose the second.
The weekend started (on Wednesday) with cocktails in Newtown, followed by a slow pub crawl until we were kicked out of the last pub - it was closing. The following day I spent in the kitchen, I decided to finally use a cookbook I was given years ago and invited some friends to dinner, it was just going to be 3 course, but ended up as 5. I had to start to day before, so I already had the soup done, but there was still a lot to do and after burning the first lot of tomatos - I forgot the cookbook was American and that dont cook in Celsius.... The guys also arrived a little early, I didnt mind, they just had to have a few beers before dinner started.
First course was a cold Gazpacho soup and surprise, surprise, I had added extra Chili. Not bad at all.
The second course was a salad of french beans, tomato tartare and basil oil - was meant to use chive oil, but I couldn't be bother making both chive and basil oils and the basil was lovely with it. (At this point we started to take photos).
Ghost in the kitchen
This was followed by Tartare of Tuna and Salmon with beetroot oil, the roe added a delightfully contrasting texture, but the oil didn't look much like the picture...
The last of the savoury dishes was Pan-roasted snapper with Artichoke Ravioli. This course turned out to be rather difficult. As is often the case when you are not cooking in your own kitchen. I did have my pasta machine nor a ravioli cutter nor all the other equipment that helps with presentation. Plus something when wrong with the Barigoule vinaigrette, but it was still delicious.
Unfortunately the dessert - mini pavlovas with white chocolate cream covered in fresh strawberries and strawberry coulis was so delicious we forgot to take a photo.
Well ages wine? No... When I was at the vineyard last Xanthe discovered some wine had been bottled and caped but not corked int eh last vintage. The wines leaked and destroyed the labels of other wines. Terrible but as they cant be sold I volunteered to drink some of them.
When I went to Tassie to see Charile and Annie, Charlie brought out a bottle he had picked up on a recent trip to the Hunter. Annie was shocked when he bought two, but he assured her they weren't both for them. We consumed the first bottle that weekend and the second at the end of the evening.
Friday was a lazy day with friends arriving from Canberra at 8pm. The weather was awful, APEC was going to make getting into the city a nightmare and as I had never been to my local - which got rave reviews in the Sydney Morning Herald, we headed there. It was a lovely pub, so we stayed for a couple of bottles of sparkling before heading home with some takeaways.
On Saturday we headed to the movies to see the Bourne Ultimatum, most in the group enjoyed it, but were a little over the camera work. Then on to another pub to watch the rugby.
Sunday was again fairly lazy. A lovely long weekend.
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