GIIP photography outing to Ladner

A few weeks back a bunch of us from the photography club at church (GIIP) took a trip out to Ladner, about 30 minutes from downtown Vancouver. Charles had planned a pretty full day of shooting for us, with 4 different spots that we were to visit.

The first spot was some broken down jetty thing. It was a lovely little spot. The water was almost perfectly still and gave wonderful reflections, except for when someone came and launched their boat there. Apparently the lighting was better an hour before we got there, but I still found it pretty good anyway.



Next up there was a spot where we could see a bunch of boats. We didn't stay here for long because the light was perfect pumpkin light.




So off we went to the pumpkin patch. The week before the trip I bought a new toy for my camera, a polarizing filter. It did a splendid job of removing the glare from the pumpkins, and also made for some very blue skies.





Our final stop was at the Reifel Bird Sanctuary. There was a big potato field there that was just full of thousands of snow geese. We were lucky enough to see them all take off at once. Charles was pretty excited about this. He has been going there for years in the hope of seeing this site, and kept telling us how incredibly fortunate we were to see it on our first visit. Unfortunately I only have a little mini-lens for my camera, so couldn't get much detail of the geese taking off, but I guess you can get the idea of the scale of it from the photo.


It was very nice to get out of Vancouver for a change. It kind of made me miss having a car, but I think I am over it now, buses are so much cheaper.

Yes I'm still alive.

Hello everybody,

I thought I would dispel any rumours that may or may not have been going around. I can confirm that I am still very much alive, I just have not found the time or more to the point the motivation to update this blog in a while. So this will be a bit of an update on what has been going on in the last month and a bit.

First off I have moved apartments, just. When I say just it is because I only actually moved to the next building along, in the same complex. My old landlord needed the apartment back again so his daughter could use it while attending university. So the new apartment is kind of similar to the last one. The kitchen is almost identical, except there is slightly less room next to the sink, resulting in a more cluttered coffee area. Not ideal, but certainly workable. The layout of the apartment is a bit nicer, it is on a corner, with the bedroom having windows on 2 sides. Hmm, actually it may be easier if I just post a few photos of it here and you can all see for yourselves.




Hmm, so what else have I been up to? Good question. Not a great deal is my answer. I have been in the mood for roasts lately. In the last couple of weeks I have had both roast chicken and roast pork. The chicken was super simple and really tasty. I simply got a lemon that had been in with the potatoes as they were par-boiling, stabbed the lemon a few times and stuffed it inside the chicken along with a bunch of garlic cloves and some thyme. Par-boiling the potatoes and letting them get a bit fluffed up in the pot after draining made for wonderfully cripsy potatoes once they had been roasted in the juices that were coming out of the chicken. The roast pork was OK, but nothing special. I made a sauce to baste the pork with by combining about 1/4 cup of pomegranate molasses with some balsamic vinegar and sugar. That bit tasted really good, but the pork was a bit dry for my liking. Actually part of the pork was really good, but that was the part that I had for leftovers.

The french onion soup I made a week or so ago was fantastic, especially with the ciabatta bread and gruyerre cheese floated on top. Mmmm, yumm. I found it was even better the second or third day after making it, the flavours had developed more and it was oh so good. I think it would be my favourite soup.

Today I woke up and decided I would like some Saturday afternoon pancakes (yes I slept in this morning). I happened to have some apples in the fridge that I didn't use when I had my pork, so I decided to have apple pancakes. They were very nice indeed, especially with the maple syrup/honey mixture drizzled on top.

Autumn seems to be starting now, so with any luck I will find some nice autumn colours to photograph. Next week the GIIP photo club from church is planning on going on an outing to the Reifel Bird Sanctuary, and also some pumpkin patch somewhere on the way. It should be a good trip if the weather behaves.

Winter cooking has started again

So this last Sunday it was raining in Vancouver (actually something of a rarity over the last 2 months). And although not exactly cold, it was still cool enough to put me in the mood for some kind of stew type dish. I had spotted some lamb shanks in the local supermarket a few weeks ago so thought maybe I would try cooking them for a change.

So I found a nice looking recipe from my Bishop's cookbook and got together a shopping list. Then I fell asleep. I guess I was kind of tired after a late night of card playing on Friday night followed by an afternoon of kayaking fun on Saturday. Eventually I woke up and after a quick chat with Tiffany and putting together some bread dough to rise for my bread rolls, I finally made it out to the supermarket. Given the not so pleasant weather I decided against a trip to Granville Island so just had to make do with whatever the supermarket had. Unfortunately they were all out of turnips and there was no sign of parsnip (not that I was all that keen on using parsnip anyway). They also had no celery root so there were a few ingredients I had to make do without. But they did have the lamb shanks, they are the most important part of any lamb shank recipe.

When I arrived back at the apartment I shaped the bread rolls and let them start their second rise. I hadn't made bread since leaving PNG, it is just so much easier to go to the shop and buy some, but home made bread certainly does smell good and even tastes good sometimes. Once the bread was set to one side to rise I got started on the lamb. Lamb shanks are jolly easy to cook, just season them a bit then brown them nicely then whack them in a casserole dish with some stock and and a bunch of vegetables. Then go talk to your fiance for a couple of hours and dinner is ready.


And the really nice thing about lamb shanks is they taste just as good reheated the next day. So today I had leftover lamb shanks with garlic mashed potatoes. Yummy.

Surprise - We're engaged!

Yes that's right folks, the worst kept secret ever is now official, Tiffany and I are officially engaged. I had the great pleasure of having T come to visit me in Vancouver last week before we both flew down to Colorado for her family reunion.

Given that I am absolutely useless at keeping a secret and also needed to know T's ring size I didn't think trying to keep the ring a complete surprise was going to work. I did however surprise her with how and when she would get the ring. I had been dropping hints that maybe it would be at dinner on Saturday night as we celebrated her birthday. But I decided that proposing then would be far too predictable. I also wanted to make sure she had the ring before church on Sunday and didn't want to leave it until Sunday morning. So this left Saturday morning or Saturday afternoon. As I would be with her all day I figured that I wouldn't really be able to prepare much if I left it until afternoon, so decided to propose after breakfast.

I guessed she would be a bit tired after the long flight from PNG so planned breakfast for around 9:30. I got up extra early (for a Saturday at least) and mixed up some crepe batter and then went back to bed while it rested. Then I got up again, made the crepes and just as I was finishing them (a little later than anticipated) T knocked on the door (she was staying in the guest suite in my apartment). We sat down at the kitchen counter and hoed in to the crepes (very yummy crepes with ricotta, cream cheese and lemon filling with a blueberry sauce). This was followed by a coffee for me and a cup of tea for T. And accompanying the tea was a plate of dark chocolate truffles that I had made the day before. In the middle of the plate of truffles was the ring. I asked the big question and surprise surprise she said "Yes". What a relief.


We had a wonderful few days together, walking around Vancouver, taking a trip up to Grouse Mountain, going to Granville Island. I managed to reclaim the 2 player 500 title, with a rather convincing win, but I was at a bit of an advantage as T couldn't remember how to play.

On Wednesday we flew to Grand Junction, Colorado where I met my future in-laws for the first time. They were all very friendly and I liked them a lot (and no I'm not just saying that because they will likely be reading this). They are a bit louder than my family.

On Thursday we went on a trip to see Grand Mesa, a big flat topped mountain. It was a really pretty place. Then in the evening there was an extended family get together where I got to try and impress everyone with my culinary skills. I cooked a leg of lamb cooked in a blend of lime leaves, lemon grass, chili, cilantro (coriander leaves), lime, ginger, olive oil and salt. Once the lamb was cooked the leftover juices were made in to a bit of a sauce by adding some coconut milk. Thank you Jamie Oliver for the recipe. It seemed to work out OK, although I think it was ever so slightly overcooked. This was the second time I have made this recipe (the first time was for Lucas and Shannon) and both times I overcooked it, I really should adjust the cooking time next time.


The next day was white water rafting day. It was great fun. I hadn't done white water rafting since I was 14 and was looking forward to this a lot. Last time I managed to be the only person in the group to fall out, so I was keen to do better this time. It was a blast. We did the triple so got to do the rapids 3 times, each time taking a slightly different approach.


Saturday was the day of the big family reunion. The Burbridge family all had matching T-Shirts made up for the occasion, each with the person's name and an aka. Mine was Paul - aka Newest-son-in-law. I guess someone must have guessed the engagement was going to happen and had the t-shirt made up in advance.

For those of you who have keen eyes, you may have noticed in some of the photos that I am sporting a beard. This was a special request of T's and so I grew it over the last 4 weeks or so. On arriving home last night it was quickly removed so I am now back to the clean shaved look you may be more accustomed to seeing. And yep, I really do need a haircut, I will have to get on to that, 5 1/2 months between haircuts is probably a bit too long.

10 things about me

This is a somewhat different post to my usual. For 1 it is going to contain a numbered list and 2 it is not about food, well not mostly. Dan tagged me the other day, which apparently means now I am supposed to write 10 things about myself that most people don't know. This is somewhat tricky as a large number of my readers are close family members or people I grew up with, and most of the remainder know me in Vancouver. So this leaves 5 months of my life where my none of my readers were around except Tiffany and I already wrote about the interesting parts of those 5 months while I was in PNG. So odds are that most of you will already know a bunch of these things anyway.

1. I was a member of the winning team in the West Auckland badminton interclub competition when I was at high school. If forget which year though. I would have a photo to prove it but never got around to picking it up from the badminton club.
   
2. I don't like fresh figs. I only recently discovered this one myself, much to my disappointment after waiting months for fig season to arrive. Ah well at least I still like dried figs.
   
3. I was a founding member of the award winning boy band "Four"
4. I am getting married in February. OK so I guess most of you already knew that, but I kind of like telling people.
5. My favourite type of fish is tuna
6. I painted my first ever guitar purple.
7. The first music concert I paid to go to was Guardian in 1996. They sat down on chairs until the very last song. Not a great stage presence.
   
8. My first ever game of golf was played in Fiji at the Denarau Golf & Racuet Club with water on 15 of the 18 holes it is not an ideal course for a first round. It was part of a business conference I went to with Dad and Mum (I was a part time employee of theirs) and the tournament was an 9 hole Ambrose tournament. Between the 4 of us in my team we lost around 20 golf balls.
9. I was on TV in the Philippines.
10. The first CD I ever owned was a double CD of Joe Satriani - Surfing with the Alien and Not of This Earth. It was a Christmas present from Craig in 1994. Sadly it was stolen in 1996.

So there you have it. You all know me so much better now I'm sure.

GIIP meeting

A couple of weekends ago (yes I know I yet again have been very slow posting anything new) I went to the second meeting of GIIP (Get Involved In Photography) at my church. GIIP is a group of people who get together once a month or so to learn and share stuff about photography. At the first meeting we were given an assignment, we each had to take 3 photos on the theme of Spring and print them out so we can all look at them and give constructive feedback on the photos.


So for the few weeks before the meeting I was busy trying to come up with some interesting photos of Spring. It was already too late to catch the cherry blossoms and the tulips and daffodils were a little past their best. I took a few walks around Vancouver taking photos of ducklings and gosling but none of them were very good. Then one Sunday afternoon I took a long walk up to Queen Elizabeth Park where I found a bunch of flowers that were still looking pretty good. So I snapped a bunch of photos of them and a few of them turned out OK. Well, really I only liked one of them but was running a bit short on time so selected two of them as candidates for my photo assignment.


With time running out and inspiration still being somewhat elusive I decided to turn to the subject of a fair number of my photos, food. I thought about what food reminds me of Spring, and the first thing to come to mind was rhubarb. Excellent I can make something with rhubarb in it and take a photo of it. And for that added cheesy bit of creativity I thought maybe I could include the springform pan that Shannon and Lucas gave me at their farewell evening. So now I needed a recipe that would use rhubarb and a springform pan. I decided maybe a rhubarb cheesecake would work well, I had never heard of a rhubarb cheesecake but thought maybe it would work OK. So I did a bit of a google search and was surprised to find a bunch of recipes for rhubarb baked cheesecake. The next day I went off to the supermarket and bought the necessary ingredients and set to making the cheesecake. Actually before I started making it I thought I would try taking a few photos of just the rhubarb on my coffee table, just in case the cheesecake didn't look very good. I took a bunch of the rhubarb and the springform pan together too, trying to be all arty but they looked kind of stupid. Anyway, I baked the cheesecake only to find that it didn't really photograph all that well, just as well I took the photos of the rhubarb beforehand. The best photo of the rhubarb unfortunately was taken at a bit of an angle and the corner of the table made the photo look not so good. So I kind of cheated and rotated the image a bit and replaced the corner of the table with clone tool. Much better. So now I had my three photos and I was ready to get critiqued, well OK I wasn't really looking forward to the critiquing so much.


As part of the critiquing process the group had to choose their favourite of each person's 3 photos, and that photo is then going to be printed out real big, framed and hung on the wall in the foyer at church. And what photo did they choose of mine? The rhubarb. So maybe I do have an artistic bone in my body somewhere after all.

Next month the GIIP group is taking an early morning outing to Jericho Park to take photos together. The meeting time is 7am. Sadly I am going to have to miss it as I will be in Colorado that weekend with Tiffany where I will finally get to meet her family. OK I am not at all sad about that really, I would much rather be with Tiffany, and 7am that is just crazy.

What's going on in the kitchen?

Well my conscience has got the better of me and I have decided to update my blog once again. It has been far too long yet again and I'm sure you are all wondering what I have been eating these last weeks. Whilst I am not feeling inclined to give you a meal by meal commentary on what I have been eating I thought I would just mention a few, mainly ones that I managed to snap a photo or two of before devouring.

So as you are probably aware it is Spring here in Vancouver, and has been for some time now. With the onset of Spring comes some rather scrumptious vegetables including one of my new favourites asparagus. Yep that's right, I quite like asparagus nowadays. And during Spring asparagus becomes very affordable. One day I noticed there was a bunch of asparagus sitting in my fridge (there are 2 for $4 bargains all over the place and so I invariably end up with way too much asparagus in my fridge). So anyway I decided that I would try asparagus soup. I had a quick look through my recipe books (very quick look as there are only 2 of them at the moment) and found a lovely looking one, wait no that wasn't the one I used, I must have found the recipe on the internet somewhere. Anyway the soup tasted jolly good and I took a photo of it before I polished it off.


Another side effect of it being Spring is that I start making more salads. This week has been a prime example of this. Last weekend I was down at Granville Island grabbing some yummy stuff, and decided to start my evening meal with a fresh mozzarella, tomato and basil salad. I first tried this combination in New York 1 1/2 years ago and I just can't get enough of it. The 3 flavours work exceptionally well together and I just love the texture of a good fresh mozzarella ball.


Yesterday I decided to have salad again as I had already had bacon and eggs for brunch so didn't need anything too fatty for dinner. As I was wandering through the vege store I spied some mandarins and decided to use them in a kind of asian inspired salad. Well OK, it wasn't really particularly asian inspired except for the soy sauce I put in the vinaigrette but it was really good anyways. So good in fact that I decided to make the same salad again for lunch today.


While I was home in NZ I watched a wee bit of the food network, ok I watched way too much of the food network. One of the shows was all about salads and one of the salad dressings had pomegranate molasses in it. I had never heard of this ingredient, but they said it tasted really good so I thought I would just have to try it some day. Today was that day. It is an ingredient used a bit in Mediterranean cooking and is available in Mediterranean grocery stores. I don't know of any of those in NZ, but in Vancouver there are at least 3 that I know of, and my bus just happened to be going past 2 of them today. So I got off the bus and bought a bottle of pomegranate molasses, ingredients - pomegranate juice. If you want to try some and can't find it in any stores then you can just make your own by reducing pomegranate juice (widely available nowadays) until it is relatively thick, one website suggested reducing 2 cups down to 1/4 cup. Now armed with my pomegranate molasses I had to think of something to make with it. I already had a salad planned for lunch (see above) and had the dressing already made for that. I didn't really feel healthy enough to have salad twice in one day so had to find another use for the molasses. After a quick google search I settled on pomegranate chicken. Basically you just coat a chicken breast in crushed walnuts and flour and cook it in a fry-pan. Then you remove the chicken and add chicken stock and pomegranate molasses to make a bit of a sauce. So I did this and the result was not quite what I was hoping for. I think maybe the ratios in the recipe may have been a little off, or else maybe more likely is I should have measured the molasses instead of just pouring it in. It is quite a powerful ingredient and is rather tart. I think it would have tasted pretty good if I had used less molasses, I will have to try it again some time. I think it would work rather well on roast lamb so I may try that some day too. It is also very tasty mixed in with orange juice and sparkling water, very refreshing.

Well that about covers all of my recent memorable meals. I guess I haven't been putting so much effort in to my cooking these last few weeks. I haven't had anyone over for a meal for a while so I will have to get on to that too, it might help inspire me get cooking again.