Salted Caramel x 3

Salted caramel is a food trend that’s been with us for the last couple of years. And, readers, this trend, pardon the pun, is worth its salt.

If you haven’t done so already, take yourself down to your nearest hipster café or restaurant, and order the salted caramel option. Believe me, if your hipster venue is truly thus, it will be there.

What I love about salted caramel is that it’s deliciously contradictory. The sweet, creamy caramel, interspersed with (ideally) still-flaky shards of salt. It’s so wrong, yet so bizarrely right, the only fitting soundtrack is the best of Prince (you have to promise me that you’ll eat salted caramel while listening to Prince at least once, just to prove that, although my suggestion sounds a little whack, it’s gosh darn perfect).

I have to admit, salted caramel is not something I make frequently, because when it comes to salted caramel, I have absolutely no self control. If it’s in my fridge, I WILL eat it. Within the day (actually, if I’m honest, within the hour).

However, when people are coming over, or when I’m invited for a leisurely BBQ with some mates, I’m more than happy to contribute something deliciously tasty as well as deliciously on trend.

To make matters even better, salted caramel is surprisingly simple. Here I’ve provided the basic salted caramel recipe, salted caramel chocolate pots, and, grandest of all, salted caramel and chocolate tart (my recipe is loosely based on one that appeared in Delicious magazine a couple of years ago, but I’ve fiddled with it sufficiently to feel comfortable calling it my own).

It’s like a salted caramel pick-your-own adventure book, where every path you pick leads to a sticky, sweet, salty end. Enjoy!

Salted Caramel (makes approximately a cup and a half of sauce, keeps in the fridge for up to a week – but let’s admit, it’s not likely to stick around for that long).

I cup sugar
1/3 cup water
125g salted butter
1/3 cup pouring cream
Sea salt flakes

1. Place sugar and water in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Swirl saucepan to dissolve sugar. Simmer, without stirring, until starting to colour – about 15 minutes. (You will need to watch this carefully, because, guaranteed, the moment you turn your back to put a load of washing on, you’ll have taken the caramel too far, and will have a horrible burnt mess in your pan).
2. Lower the heat once the caramel has started to colour. Add the chopped butter, and stir over the heat for another 5 minutes or until golden. The mixture will look hideously split at this stage. Don’t panic.
3. Take saucepan off the heat. Stir in half of the cream. Watch your split mixture magically coalesce into a cohesive caramel. Stir in the remaining cream. Gloat at your cleverness.
4. Add a PINCH of salt flakes to the caramel. You need to salt slowly, carefully: you can always add more salt, but you can’t take it out once it’s in, and it’d be such a shame to ruin some beautiful caramel. Stir, taste. Add more salt, if you feel it needs it. Repeat until your caramel is salted to the perfect point of contradiction.
5. Store in the fridge, to serve over ice cream, or, my favourite, with fresh blueberries.

Salted Caramel Chocolate Pots (Makes 6, depending on ramekin size)

1 quantity salted caramel (above)
175 g dark chocolate
1 1/3 cups pouring cream
2 eggs, beaten
Cocoa powder, to serve

1. Preheat oven to 160 degrees.
2. Distribute your salted caramel evenly between your (oven safe) ramekins, filling each ramekin to no more than 1/3 full. Place in fridge to chill.
3. Meanwhile, break chocolate into a bowl. Heat cream in either a saucepan until almost boiling, or in a microwave safe jug (watch very carefully if you are microwaving the cream to avoid overheating).
4. Pour hot cream over chocolate, and whisk until chocolate is dissolved and smooth. Whisk in eggs.
5. If you want a nice, neat divide between your caramel layer and your chocolate layer, chill the caramel for a bit longer, maybe even overnight. If, like me, you prefer an intermingled confection, pour chocolate mixture into the ramekins over the only-just-chilled caramel.
6. Bake at 160 degrees for 30-40 minutes, until the chocolate layer is just firm to touch. There will be bubbly, oozy soft bits, but these will firm up as the pots cool.
7. Dust lightly with cocoa.
8. Serve, with fresh berries and cream.

Salted Caramel and Chocolate Tart

2 sheets store bought shortcrust pastry (yes, I’m a failure as a woman for not making my own pastry)
1 quantity salted caramel (above)
1 quantity chocolate mixture from the Salted Caramel Chocolate Pots recipe (also above).

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees.
2. Line a non-stick, 22cm diameter spring form cake pan with thawed pastry sheets. (Although you are making a tart, and would assume a tart or quiche pan would be best, I find a spring form pan the easiest, least messy way to make this). Be sure to line you pastry all the way to the top of the pan – store bought pastry will shrink considerably when cooked. Chill in freezer for ten minutes.
3. Meanwhile, assemble your salted caramel, and your chocolate mixture.
4. Remove pastry-lined tin from freezer. Blind bake for ten minutes, or until pastry is golden (Don’t know how to blind bake? It’s easy. Search for a demo video on YouTube).
5. Pour caramel into your blind baked tart case. Refrigerate (see above recipe for suggestions about separation/intermingling of layers). Top with the chocolate mixture.
6. Bake at 160 degrees for 45min-1 hour, or until the chocolate layer is just firm to touch. As with the salted caramel chocolate pots, there will be bubbly, oozy soft bits, but these will firm up as the tart cools.
7. Dust lightly with cocoa.
8. Serve with – you guessed it – berries and cream.

Llama.

Dear Brett and Jemaine, of Flight of the Concords fame,

In your song, Hurt Feelings, you ask the audience a number of questions about situations that may have, potentially, caused Hurt Feelings. Questions such as:

Have you ever been told your ass is too big?
Have you ever been asked if your hair is a wig?
Have you ever been told you’re mediocre in bed?
Have you ever been told you’ve got a weird shaped head?
Has your family ever forgotten you and drive away?
Were you ever called ‘homo’ ‘cos in school you took Drama?
Have you ever been told you look like a Llama?

I think you included this last lyric because, a) it rhymes with Drama, and, b) much of its humour derives from the fact that you wouldn’t anticipate many people would be told that they look like a Llama.

Well.

I’m writing to inform you that, actually, yes, I have been told I look like a Llama. And, yes, it did hurt my feelings.

Let me begin.

MamaK offered, generously, to cook me dinner last night. It’s nice to have someone cook you dinner at the end of the week, isn’t it? As we were eating our dinners, shooting the breeze and watching the telly, we started to play The Animal Game with reference to the people being interviewed on ABC’s ACT 7.30.

(Aside: The Animal Game is a great game. The basic gist is to look at someone, and work out what animal they most closely resemble, based on physical traits, psychological traits, or, if you’re really good at it, both. It’s spiffingly fun. You might like to consider playing it in the car next time you are on tour. For the record, MamaK is 52, I’m 25, and we were regressing after long and trying weeks)

After establishing that Interviewee A was most definitely a Rhino, and debating whether Interviewee B was a Basset Hound (my opinion), or a Doe (MamaK’s opinion), we began to list off various people in our family and what they would be. Owls, Donkeys, Wombats, Eagles, Emus, Bears and Monkeys were all mentioned.

Brett and Jemaine, I was carried away by the merriment of the situation, and did a really silly thing.

‘Go on’, I asked MamaK, ‘what animal am I?’

‘A Llama’ she replied, with no hesitation WHATSOEVER.

After I’d got over the initial shock of such an obscure and odd suggestion, I sought further clarification on the issue of my resemblance to a Llama. Because, as you suggest in your song, being told that you look like a Llama can, and indeed does, precipitate Hurt Feelings.

MamaK revealed that my resemblance to a Llama is based on the following mutual traits, physical and psychological:

• Intelligence;
• Long legs;
• Long neck;
• Protection of weaker animals;
• Smooth skin (under all that fur…point taken, I’ll book a wax this week); and
• Standing out from the crowd.

And when it’s put in those terms, it’s hard to have hurt feelings because you were told you looked like a Llama. In fact, it turns out MamaK was paying me a compliment.

So, Brett and Jemaine, maybe you should rethink the lyrics of Hurt Feelings, to reflect the fact that, after the initial shock, being told you look like a Llama is actually not that bad. They’re an obscure and hilarious animal, to be sure, but they’re also kind of rad.

Lots of love, platonic (Brett) and non platonic (Jermaine),

Peggy xoxoxox

Ps: I know that you want to know who you are in the animal game, so here it is: Brett, you’re clearly Guinea Pig. Jemaine, a Mountain Goat.

May the Force be with you

It’s been my great honour to watch a dear friend, and former student, finish her honours thesis this week. Those of you who have been there, done that, will know that an achievement this monumental deserves a Star Wars analogy: this week, a Padawan has become a Jedi.

(If the above references went over your head, your homework for this weekend is to watch Star Wars in its entirety. Use the Force to get you through the tedious prequels, and enjoy Harrison Ford circa the 70s).

Obi-Wan-Kenobi style, I’ve taken it upon myself to give my friend unsolicited advice through her honours year – for which I hope to be forgiven eventually. The most important piece of advice I have given her, though, is this: she needs to buy a significant piece of jewellery, for herself, to celebrate her achievements.

Bizzare, I know, that this advice takes precedence over all the other pieces of end-of-thesis advice I could give to a newly minted Jedi. Surely, I should advise her to sleep. To catch up with mates she hasn’t seen in an age. To symbolically burn a copy of her manuscript. To run. To go to the beach. To laugh until she can’t breathe anymore (although I have complete faith that she’s done this last one).

The reason behind my advice, though, is that something as big as finishing an honours thesis (or a Masters, or a PhD) is that it’s a long, hard journey, ultimately completed alone. While there are people beside you, people advising you, people without whom you couldn’t do it, it ultimately comes down to you, and your words (in Star Wars terms? You and the Force).

Which is why, in my view, you need to mark an achievement like finishing a thesis, and mark it well. Most importantly, you need to mark it for yourself.

It’s not enough to accept the congratulations of colleagues, friends and family. It’s not enough to know that you’ve done an amazing thing. You need to distil that amazing thing you’ve done into a symbol, something that will always and forevermore remind you that, yes, you did it.

And why jewellery, specifically? Well, let’s take a moment to think about what ‘big’ (expensive, thought-through, valuable) jewellery means in the course of a woman’s life. Typically, the ‘big’ pieces she has are given to her by others: by her parents on her 21st; by her partner to signify their engagement, and, again, on an important anniversary or birth of a child; by her children on a milestone birthday; or inherited from a family member.

What you notice, here, is that all of the ‘big’ pieces come from without – they are gifts. Whenever she wears them, she thinks of the people who gave them to her, which is what makes those ‘big’ pieces special and meaningful.

And, while it’s great to have pieces that make you think of your nearest and dearest, there’s a time and a place for jewellery that makes you think of you, and all you’ve achieved.

The first Sex and the City film explored this concept (mixing pop culture references: bear with). Samantha attends a charity auction to buy, for herself, a very expensive, very large, and, let's be honest, very ugly, ring. An anonymous bidder goes up against Samantha in the auction, driving the price higher than Samantha can afford. Miserably, she admits defeat. Later, Smith Jarrod, Samantha’s partner, presents her with the ring: Smith was the anonymous bidder, and bought the ring as a gift for Samantha.

Whenever Samantha looks at the ring, though, she sees only Smith, whereas she wanted to see herself – her achievements – whenever she looked down at it.

Now, I can appreciate why people may think that it’s selfish, or frivolous, to celebrate an achievement by spending money on something like jewellery rather than, for instance, an experience like travel, or something that benefits others. Perhaps it’s not for everyone, this whole bling thing.

All I know, though, is that whenever I put on my garnet ring, the ring I bought myself in the weeks after handing in my honours thesis, I am reminded that, yes, I did it. It’s made all the sweeter by the fact that it’s something I wear: there are patches where the soft gold has yielded to the movements of my hand; that it’s something I will, one day, be able to give to another young woman, in an ironic twist on the whole buying-jewellery-for-oneself exercise.

So, it’s with this in mind that I suggest a jewellery purchase to my dear friend, and to others who have, like her, become Jedis this week. Because not only did you have the potential (midochlorian readings off the charts), you used it and achieved something amazing, something that you should mark personally, enduringly, symbolically.

And that’s it, I’m through with my advice, and I’m hanging up my light sabre. Except for one final thing I can’t help but throw in:

May the force be with you.

Always.

On Election Day Sausage Sizzles

After several weeks of hard campaigning from all major parties, it’s finally here: today is election day in the ACT.

Now, this isn’t a post where I run my political colours up the flagpole, hoping for a salute. Nor is this a serious discussion about politics in Australia at the moment. I’m a sociologist, not a political scientist, although the two disciplines are kissing cousins.

What I am going to write about is how ardently I love election days. Tune out now if democracy soap-boxing isn’t your thing: I’ll forgive you. Today, of all days, I’m feeling magnanimous.

I love election days not because I want to see the least-worst team get up, or because I have a non-sexual crush the dude who does the ABC’s election analysis (What can I say? I’m both impressed and fascinated by someone who can work a graph)

What I really love about election day is the sausage sizzles.

Election day sausage sizzles are not like Bunnings sausage sizzles that happen every Saturday, or the church-fete ones that usually have an accompanying cake stall (fairy cakes on polyester trays! Oh my!). Election day sausage sizzles are special, because, unlike a normal sausage sizzle, you won’t see the following:
• Pushing;
• Shoving;
• Grizzling from the sweaty person behind the hotplate;
• Moaning about the queue; or
• Angst about spot-holders.

Instead, what you will see, at an election day sausage sizzle, is:
• Patient waiting in line;
• Stepping aside for old folks and people with small babies;
• Cheerful BBQ cooks;
• Pleases and Thankyous;
• No talk whatsoever of politics, but, rather, pleasant conversation about the weather; and
• Tasty, tasty sausages, with onion, if you like it, and self-administered lashings of all the sauce you could want.

So what makes election day sausage sizzles different from the normal slap-some-processed-meat-on-a-hotplate?

I think it’s this: we all know that, by voting, we’ve done a tiny something that, along with the tiny somethings of everybody else, will amount to a huge something - to our government.

Although our government isn’t perfect, every time I flick to the World section of the paper, and read about Syria, or Zimbabwe, I am so grateful that our huge something, our democracy, is made up of all of our tiny somethings.

Of course, no-one talks about this in the queue for sausages at the local primary school. But we all know what we’ve just done, and we all know why we’ve done it. And it’s knowing that which, I believe, makes us behave at our best, and our most civil.

Or, perhaps it’s too much of an effort to be rude on a day when the sun is glorious and our noses are full of the sweet, sweet smell of frying onions on a hot BBQ.

Happy democracy everyone.

Slip Ups

Way back in ’09, I wrote about my blasé attitude to panties. Three and a half years later, I stand by my minimalist approach to foundation garments: but with one significant caveat.

Slips – half and full – are the solid foundation on which the greatest of outfits are built.

I’ll admit, slips have a public relations problem. They’re what our nanas wear. They’re made from flesh coloured polyester. They’re perilously close to those awful spencers our parents forced us to wear under school blouses. In short, they’re not what you reach for when you want to feel pulled together, chic, and ready to kick ass and take names like a mo-fo.

But, I’m a style blogger, and therefore sartorially fearless. The above concerns? I laugh in their faces. I wear slips, in all their nana-ish, flesh coloured polyester, under-the-blouse glory. And, at least some days, kicking ass and taking names like a mo-fo is item one on the agenda.

(Other days, I consider it an achievement to not spill toothpaste on my shoes in the morning. But let’s not dwell)

The great thing about slips is that they perform radical wardrobe extensions. For instance, that woollen sweater you bought five years ago, wearing a little thin but oh so soft? A neutral slip, popped underneath, will allow you to wear that old favourite sweater to the office without giving your colleagues more information than they need about your bra. Or, a vintage dress, viscose rayon, with an unfortunate tendency to crotch creep like an overeager lover? A half slip will keep your dress where it’s supposed to be.

These uses are all fine and dandy, but my all time favourite application of a slip (half or full) is to facilitate floaty floral sundress and skirts on windy spring days. To live in the nation’s capital, in springtime, is to risk disgrace every time you step out in a light, full skirt – our breezes are, indeed, fresh. A slip, under your floaty florals, will mean that you can stroll about our blustery city free from fear of flashing unsuspecting passers-by. Should your skirt be blown completely up (this actually, no-joke, happened to me last month outside the Melbourne Building), all that will be revealed is your tasteful, modest slip.

Which comes in doubly-handy if you’ve had one of Those Mornings, and forgotten to put on your panties.

On Make Up and the OH-REALLY Face

This morning, I woke up to two things:

1) A thumping head cold; and
2) A text message from Clementine Kemp suggesting breakfast.

Lying in bed, texting Clem and making Chewbacca noises through my snotty sinuses, it occurred to me that I was in one of those dangerous, but potentially liberating, not-giving-a-shit moods that often accompany illness and burn out.

The upshot of this mood? I decided to face the world without my face.

You see, make up is a bit of a vexed issue. On one hand, I love playing with it, and the ritual of getting ready. While it is fun getting ready with a pack of girlfriends, as a true introvert, it’s my solo getting ready that I treasure. There is something potent, and, I think, powerful, about that little chunk of time contemplating the mirror. Whether it’s putting on a lick of lippie while listening to Let’s Dance by David Bowie (my old pre-lecture routine), checking for foundation tide marks before a job interview, or tidying up eye make up that’s gone awry between meetings, letting myself be absorbed in the simple acts of powdering, brushing, smoothing and tweaking fortifies me for the challenge ahead. On a more practical level, I love that all it takes is two minutes and three Clinique products (foundation; blush; mascara) to make me look like I’m well rested and fresh, when the reality is that I haven’t slept for longer than 3 hours at a stretch all week.

On the other hand, I resent make up. I resent that I don’t feel or look professional without something on my face. I resent that people, often meaning well, claim to prefer the ‘no make-up’ look, but then pass comment on women with dark under eye circles, or an unsightly spot, because we’ve been socialised to believe that women roll out of bed with an even skin tone, glowing cheeks, glossy lips, and full, dark eyelashes (FYI – they don’t). I resent that women are taught by the beauty industry to look for, and spend their money ‘correcting’, ‘faults’ in their appearance, least someone take offense at their pores.

So, yes, if I was to describe my relationship with make up in Facebook terms, It’s Complicated.

Which is why, this morning, I threw my make up into the too hard basket and went out for breakfast bare faced. I should contextualise this by saying that the circumstances of this morning meant ditching my make up wasn’t a monumental act of bravery. Clementine, like most of my old friends, has seen me without my make up on. We were going to a quiet suburban café, early on a long weekend Saturday, and were unlikely to be seen my many people. And, I didn’t have any major break outs or under eye circles this morning, so I felt like I looked better than normal when I woke up, despite the snot and Chewbacca sound effects. Had I been particularly spotty or dark under the eyes, meeting a less understanding friend, or having breakfast somewhere less low key, I probably would have put some make up on before leaving the house, in spite of not feeling particularly inspired to do so.

While at breakfast, it occurred to me that sometimes, wearing make up or not doesn’t really matter, because nobody, in the normal run of social life, is looking that closely at your face. A little theory that sociologists call civil inattention applies here: people are absorbed in their own business, and even if you did have a particularly amazing pair of bags under your eyes, they probably wouldn’t a) notice or b) say anything about it.

Unless, of course, you encounter a rude person, who decides that your appearance is their business to comment on. In those instances, given their ignorance of the rules of social interaction, you have every right to subtly reprimand them by employing what I like to call OH-REALLY face. (My OH-REALLY face involves raised eyebrows, slightly pursed lips, and flared nostrils. Yours is probably a little different. Isn't variety wonderful?) It’s not a bona-fide sociological theory just yet, but, nine times out of ten, I’ve found it pretty effective in reminding a rude person how to behave in social situations, regardless of whether said OH-REALLY face is made up or not.

You can add Chewbacca noises to your OH-REALLY face if you like. That, however, may push you into Garfinkelian Breaching Experiment territory (SOCY1004 shout out). I guess it all just depends on how many shits you feel like giving before you’ve had your eggs and coffee, really.

Go the Swannies…

Those of you who know me well know that I’m not what you’d call a Sport person.

This probably has something to do with having ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHY THOSE PEOPLE ARE RUNNING THAT WAY, THEN THIS WAY, AND THEN THE OTHER WAY AGAIN, AND WHERE’S THE BALL, AND WHAT’S ALL THE FUSS ABOUT ANYWAY AND I’M SO CONFUSED RIGHT NOW AND LET’S GO HOME AND EAT MACARONI CHEESE AND DRINK TEA.

Despite the efforts of many, I remain, staunchly, unenlightened when it comes to sport.

But, while I can’t read a game of sport, I can read an outfit like no-one else. If I were a gambling woman, I’d bet you ten dollars that I could tell you at least one thing about each and every stranger walking down the street, based purely on their clothes, and I’d be right at least 80% of the time (A tip for young players: shoes are the easiest place to start - avoid anyone wearing stripper platforms).

The problem with having savant-like abilities in reading clothing and its meanings is that, sometimes, I forget that not everyone inhabits the meaning system that I do. Some people inhabit completely different universes of sartorial meaning.

This was bought home to me yesterday, in the elevator at work.

I was wearing one of my favourite scarves. It’s from Friends of Couture in Melbourne (Degraves St on sale is a beautiful thing indeed). Comprised of large red stripes on a pale pink background, with a lurex fibre woven through a section at each end, it’s my customary it’s-a-bloody-awful-grey-day scarf, because I read the playful combination of pink, red, and sparkle as a whimsical and uplifting juxtaposition against the plain and sober geometric pattern.

Anyroadup, my scarf and I hopped in the elevator on Friday afternoon. The head of the organisation I work for was also in the lift.

Now, lifts are socially awkward at the best of times, but when it’s you, two other people, and (supposedly) the most important person in the building, it becomes excruciating. My tactic, as with all socially awkward situations, is to get down with my ethnographic self and start analysing people’s behaviour, while hiding in the corner hoping to avoid interaction.

One of the other women in the lift said ‘hi’ to the distinguished person. He said ‘hi’ back. She and her companion exited the lift at level five. I, and the big cheese, were exiting at level ten. Five whole levels of awkward silence. My rad ethnographic ninja skills? Failing, massively.

At about level seven, the head honcho turns to me and says:

‘I like your scarf. Getting ready for the weekend?’

My in my meaning system, I read this comment as meaning: Golly, I like your sparkly scarf. Sparkles just scream weekend, don’t they?

I replied:

‘Yes, I think it’s going to be a good one!’

He replied:

‘Well, it’s supposed to be cold and wet, I hope your team wins’

My in my meaning system, I read this comment as meaning: I completely GET that sparkle vs plain is one of The. Most. Significant. Sartorial. Debates. Of. Our. Time.

At this point, my newfound respect for what I understood to be a surprisingly complex individual, with considered aesthetic preferences, was growing. He continued:

‘Although it usually is on grand final weekend’

And then I realised. He was referring to the Swans vs Hawks football match this weekend. And had read my red scarf as team colours.

Semantic mismatch, much?

Luckily, the lift had bought us to where we needed to be, so further awkwardness was mitigated.

While we got out on the same floor, we were on completely different levels, sartorially.

And apparently, I’m a Sydney Swans fan now. Go the Swannies, I suppose…