Traveler's account of kitchen brilliance

Traveler has asked me to share the following 1st person account:

Enchiladas were on the menu and I had nowhere to turn. I have captured this dish before using ingredients common in the new world; Tortillas, Filling (chicken & cheese), and Sauce. The filling was no problem because as every one knows, ancestral chickens flew to New Zealand on the trade winds. Upon arriving they noticed that with no predators all birds preferred the more grounded flightless way of life. The chickens saw it was a better way and this deep spirituality spread throughout the world wide chicken population. So chickens are common. But the other ingredients are not. The Tortilla is a rare species here but can be obtained if stalked with cunning. The Sauce is no where to be found. At first I assumed all was lost; but then I discovered a miraculous fact! Enchilada Sauce is nothing more than beef gravy with a little cumin, a little onion, and lots of ground chili pepper! I must say I was still
quite shocked when making this combination the first time and discovering that it tasted like Enchilada Sauce. And just like that I had all the ingredients...

But then hardship struck. My ingredients were prepared; My oven was preheated; and much to my dismay I discovered an acute lack of square baking dishes. No 9x13 inch pans were in my kitchen. Neither were the 9x9 or perky 8x8 sizes. (And yes I'm talking about pyrex *and* metal ones). I was desperate and full of despair. But dear readers do not wail and tear out your hair; for in a flash of brilliant, non-linear, out-of-the-box thinking (indeed out-of-the-universe) I created a solution so cunning that all the world's greatest minds would slap their
foreheads in unison creating an enormous peal of thunder. As I stood there surveying my kitchen through a veil of tears my attention was caught by the stack of pie plates obviously unsuitable for efficient conveyance of the ever cylindrical enchilada. In that moment I created
the wedge shaped enchiladas. Yes you heard me correctly my shocked and awed reader; Wedge shaped.

I am a kitchen genius.

Traveler the genius

Well.. good think I posted that photo the other day. It is documentation that I did have my bus pass, at least at that moment. I managed to loss it within 10 minutes of posting it. Grrr, second month in a row that I've lost my pass before the month is over. I constantly check where it is now, and this last time I think I checked my pocket for it and then inadvertently pulled it out to fall to the street.

But there is good news in the Hauptman-Hennig household. Traveler was so frustrated with the lack of enchilada sauce – and my ridiculous attempt to substitute with taco sauce

(he muttered something about it being a fine condiment if you like mashed up over cooked salsa, but it is NOT for cooking) – that he has created his own enchilada sauce. It basically consists of chili gravy. Yes you take butter, and cook up flour in it then toss in some chili powder and I think the secret ingredient is beef broth. If you want the recipe, ask him now before he decides to make it a very top secret formula.

On top of this incredible feat, he 'invented' pie plate enchiladas with his 'genius' geometric solution:
 


All through this, he was baking me cookies. What a man eh?
I just sat in the corner smiling to myself at how lucky I am... until the next outburst along the lines of “this is f-ing brilliant.... its so amazing that it earns the expletive... are you documenting this, we need another action shot” was heard. Here is one of the requested “action shots”


Well enough documenting, I'm off to experience his creation

Okay, for all of those who've written wondering what my world would look like with at least a few pieces of furniture... here you go.

For those of you who need a bit more of an active role, see if you can spot the following:

• $3 / can black beans I was thrilled to finally find

• pay per bag garbage bags from the Wellington City Council
  

• the Internet cord I think of as the 'trip wire trap'
  

• the tarnished knob on the free set of drawers a guy threw in for practically free when I bought the bedside cabinet
  

• my bus pass that allows me unlimited rides for $95/month
  

• the really cool tea bag holder that Holly gave me for xmas
  

• and the safe key pass thing that generates random numbers that you use in conjunction with your user name and password when logging on to your online banking. Here you pay people online directly into their accounts and checks are considered absolute for the most part.
  

And there are still no limes to be found in my world. I was told that they aren't a very popular thing here, other than in drinks. I'm told that the bars buy up the available stock at wholesale auctions. You seem the in mojitos at bars all the time, but not at supermarkets or green grocers. I guess if I'm ever to make cerviche again I'll first have to go hit the bars in a serious manner. Maybe bring friends – but definitely bring a Tupperware to hold all the limes I steal off the drinks!

Napier - art deco weekend

Napier is a town that was more or less leveled during an earthquake about 75 years ago.

Because nearly all of the downtown area was rebuilt at the same time, it is a time capsule of art deco architecture. In the summer, they put on a huge festival to celebrate the 20's and 30's complete with live music, costumes, and classic cars.


We went up primarily for the dancing, which was really great. There were free concerts and dancing every night at the sound shell




and also live music in the pedestrian mall.


I particularly loved this image of this lady staking her claim for the car parade.. tapping her toes and waving her fingers along with the music until the cars drove by.


There were tons of acts on stage through the afternoons Between performances, music was often played and I loved watching the kids dance to the music. Here are some of my favorite shots.
 


There were classic cars everywhere.

Not only were they part of the very long parade on Saturday


but they also were the only cars allowed to park on the main road and on the beach.




All day long steam tractors pulled wagons of people around.



They also had a mini museum of working steam farm machines on display. They were running all day and late into the night.

More than half the people were in costume. I kept saying to myself “you'd never see this many men in America dressing up” but then again after the sevens I shouldn't be so surprised. Here are some photos from around town as well as the costume competition.











On top of all this there were many airplane displays. Each day there was a mini airshow or two over the town or water. On Sunday everyone gathered for picnics and watched the planes go over head.

My pot collection

I finally have a set of pots that I am really excited about. Years of cooking on random pots coupled with my lots of smart built in features makes my new collection of pots very exciting to me.

Here is my entire stockpile of pots.



First of the lovely steamer my friend Laura gave me. What is brillant about this is that she also commissioned pottery plates that fit neatly inside so that I can steam fish in it easy. Judi Z tuaght me this lovely trick of supporting fish while it steams and then serve that fish on the same deep sided plate



Then my new skillet. I never had a stainless steel one before and I am a new convert. It is supper easy to clean, and I have no worries about bits of teflon entering my diet.

And the most amazing of all is my new sauce pot because it has a built in strainer. The lid of the pot is extra deep with holes along the lip. This way you can just tilt the pot to pour out water. Its way easier to use and clean than a strainer! And the pot was exactly the price of buying a standard pot and a separate collender. Plus its a very nice heavy based pot with flutes to help with pouring. It doubles as our tea kettle at the moment.


Oh.. and here many fridges have a "conditioner" which is a mini heater to soften your butter!


That is all from the wacky land of Shannon – we're off to Napier to experience the Art Deco extravaganza there this weekend.

 

Valentine's Day..

Valentine's day this year will be remembered for several things...

1. sleeping on the floor next to my charming lover

2. winning bids on my first set of furniture that, although used, is not from the street.  I get to pick up most of it tomorrow.
 




3. a lovely dinner on our new table

4. being trapped in an elevator, alone, for an hour at work today ... sorry no picture, didn't really plan for this event. I did mentally redesign the elevator's emergency phone interface so that you don't have to push and HOLD the entire time you are trying to talk to the dispatcher. I kept accidentally hanging up on her by breathing and letting my thumb's firm pressure on the call button slip too much... grrr.  Oh well, got some situps and randomn push ups out of it.

 

Sevens

I have learned that the 'sevens' is not the name of a rugby team here, but a type of rugby played with 7 men a side. The world series of the sevens was played in Wellington last week. It is a time where adults can dress up – great since there is no real Halloween here I'm told. And unlike America where Halloween is about being have the most unique costume, dressing for the Sevens is a team-based competition where you try to get a many mates together to dress as crazily and as identically as possible:  flikr photos

This semi-disturbing example is for my brother and his friends enjoyment...
wellingtonista 

The sevens is also why I was entertained by live music and Rio dancer...

..as viewed from my office window.

Each team, country-by-country, was dropped off by a flat bed truck to 'parade' to the small civic square across the road from my work. I guess there was even an American team – I had no idea that anyone in America played Rugby let alone Sevens!

Then just after the festivities were wrapping up, there was a fire drill. My boss and I decided to walk over to check these out. We caught the tail end of this lively performance.


If you look closely you can spot the stock market sign in the background

 

Harbour stroll

There are often things to see and do down at the harbour. Here are some of the more permanent ones

Starting from Te Papa...

This is the national museum – and admission is free, well its give what you see fit, which is perfect because sometimes you just have 20 minutes and its nice to pop in and not feel like you have to get your full $20's worth of museum experiences.

Macs –

This is a popular a pub/restaurant with great out door seating. We think the food and drink are okay, but its really all about hanging out on the patio. In case you are curious, that is the NZ stock exchange next to it. Its a bit smaller than Wall Street and they don't seem to mind you have a beer at their front door.

A random water fountain sculpture


An interesting sculpture...


And this is something I call the wobble wand...

It is a metal pole that sprays wanter out holes along its length. While the water is squirting out, the pole sways, wobbles, spins, undulates and all sorts of other motions that don't have a clear verb attached to it. These kayakers were also rather intrigued by the wobble wand

Shipping...

For those of you who have eliminated frequent moving from your lifestyle, I have to say that you probably are wise - and you probably have a lot more stuff in your house and your bank account than us. We've been more or less 'moving' since last May in the sense that we've been packing, moving, or living out of boxes during that time. We are very close to be done with all that – at least for the rest of this year - and that makes me very happy.  I love many parts of moving, and unpacking/setting up is one of them.

A huge reason for my relief is that our stuff has arrived. I dropped off all our boxes at a warehouse in Portland, with some greatly appreciated help from Erin and David, and then have been waiting ever since to learn if I had been ever so clever or just another idiot for choosing to ship the way we did.

I don't really know what the journey was like for my stuff, but it was most likely on a boat like this.

It arrived in Auckland less than 3 weeks after leaving Los Angeles, which makes the Pacific seem a bit smaller to me. Then it took a train down to Wellington.

After some faxing, lots of phone calls, port fees, a stop at customs and a visit to MAF (ministry that deals with keeping bugs out of the country amoung other things), we were set to pick up our goods. I got to drive my first disel super van that was way too long for it ability to turn corners. The rental place pointed out the dents on each side where people had hit poles turning corners and then gave me the keys. They very much assume that everyone here can drive a stick shift – thank goodness I can now!

The men at the next warehouse were really lovely. They even loaded our stuff into the van for us. That saved a ton of work.




We then drove up to Porirua to pick up my first trademe purchase – our new table and 6 matching chairs. It was the strangest transaction... the woman emailed me her bank details. I deposited the money straight into that. She left the table in her shed and told me where the key was. I drove up, let myself in, and added the table to all my boxes. The top is banged up, but I really like how it fits in with our new flat.... and I certainly have never had matching chairs.  They even sort of match the color of our kitchen zone.



Hopefully by the end of the week we'll have more than just a table! For now I'm thrilled to have access to things that I packed last spring in Boston. Nothing was broken, and while I wish I had brought a tad more (like more than 1 towel to go with the 3 sets of sheets I brought - what was I thinking!, we have enough to make do.