In a rather startling turn of events I was called a MILF for the first time in my life the other day. My first reaction was to turn behind me and look for the MILF in question. Surely they were talking about someone else. After all they know me and I am missing the most important accessory for MILFdom, that is, a child. But then I realised that it was in some bizarre way a way of backhanded complimenting me while letting me know that I had progressed past the ingenue stage.

I found the comment a little disturbing as I grew up in the pre MILF days where mums were just…well mums. I’m not a teenage boy so I never had a crush on anyone’s mum and quite frankly everyone’s father was a little bit creepy. Watching one of my favourite shows “The Inbetweeners” has given me a slightly frightening but hilarious glimpse into their minds but it’s funny how this new acronym has become a marketer’s dream and where previously women who might have been ignored or disparaged are now the suddenly a desirable commodity. I felt sorry for the previous generation who had just gone forward without a snazzy marketing acronym.

Another item that has suddenly become a bit fashionable again is fat. For years pork belly and pork fat were shunned as they were …well too fatty but now they’re enjoying a revival. I even experienced the sensory pleasure of pork fat butter (and yes it was as good as you would imagine it to be). I first tried this pork fat fougasse at the restaurant Alain Ducasse. You know the part where you’re not supposed to eat a lot of bread but it’s just so good that you do? Well that was me. Fougasse is a French version of foccacia bread in a diamond shaped bread that can sometimes be slashed in the centre to resemble a leaf or an ear of wheat.

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In the culinary world’s equivalent of an excuse I knew I had a doozy. “I’m sorry I’m late but I was busy talking to Nigella Lawson” was kind of like proffering up the excuse of “My pet ate my home work”. It didn’t sound quite real and would probably be met with a disbelieving or suspicious look. So when I arrived at Melbourne’s Campari House fifteen minutes late to the hot salmon smoking workshop I just apologised for being late and joined the class already in progress. I was paired up with a partner and insofar as partnering goes for a smoked salmon workshop it was a good one. I was paired with Tom Cooper, the smoking aficionado who supplies smoked items to the top restaurants in Melbourne.

In the class instructor Danny was showing us how to hot smoke our own salmon as well as made quick French baguettes and our own garlic mayonnaise so that we would end up with a smoked salmon baguette with the fruits of our labour. Smoking the salmon was surprisingly easy. It simply involved heating a tray lined with a bed of uncooked rice, tea, brown sugar, herbs and cinnamon quills onto the gas until it started to smoke “aggressively” and then placing a side of salmon (or you could do fillets if they are easier to access) on top and covering it tightly with two blankets of foil and turning the heat down and smoking it for 20-30 minutes. Yep that is it as far as the hot smoking process goes!

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Merry Christmas my Dearest, Darlingest Readers! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas full of love and laughter and that you have had a chance to rest and recuperate from the crazy year that was 2010! In previous years I haven’t really written much about our Christmasses as we were often away without an internet connection  but this year I thought I’d throw the doors open and invite you into our Elliott family Christmas. We decided to theme it in a Finnish theme-as you may know Mr NQN is half Finnish and they are very proud Finns indeed. We merged my own family with Mr NQN’s and his aunt, uncle and cousin and before we knew it, we had over a dozen sitting at the table.

In the past we have gone away for a holiday and rented a house but this year, due to a multitude of reasons, we decided to stay put in Sydney. Unlike Halloween where I prepared all of the food, Christmas was a bring a plate affair with everyone bringing a plate for each person. The theme was red and white right down from everyone’s outfits to the red and white wax straws from Lovely Little Parties. Mr NQN and I made the red and white pompoms and hung little wooden Nordic birds from them.

This was the book that got me started on the whole Finnish theme for Christmas. I was lucky enough to receive a copy of the Moomins Cookbook from the lovely Catty from A Catty Life. She had reviewed it on her site and because I consider myself part Finn insofar as Mr NQN is half Finn and I’m Finnish by association, I got very excited about the book. Lo and behold Catty kindly sent me a copy of it in October which I considered an early Christmas present!

Sisko with Aura Lily

As a compulsive feeder, I couldn’t help myself and went a little overboard making a crispy roast goose stuffed with mashed potato,  braised sweet red cabbage, Danish Christmas caramelised potatoes and finishing it off with some slightly sweet soft buns heady in cardamom with slivered almonds on top and sugar pearls on top of stollen, Swiss roll cottages, cinnabread cookies and cranberry and oatmeal cookies. And when I woke up on Christmas morning I thought “Oh no! The vegetarians won’t have enough to eat!” and quickly made a caramelised onion pie. It’s a sickness I tell you

We were literally overflowing with food and despite the fact that we had over a dozen people at a table meant to seat eight, we pretended that we were in a Finnish cabin in the middle of Winter snowed in. Except that it was actually Summer and we were really hot

We had enormous, plump, sweet cherries sent from our friends at Harris Farm. It’s not Christmas without cherries and these ones had everyone in raptures. They were huge, sweet and meaty and the whole box pretty much disappeared instantly.

And Lindt sent over a lovely range of their Christmas goodies-Lindor balls…*drool* my favourite. I’d like to bathe in the liquid filling….I kept saying to myself “Share them with others, don’t hog all the milk Lindor balls”. And I’m quite proud of say that I did. Although psst don’t tell them but I have a stash of the peanut butter ones that I’m keeping

We had delicious Danish Caramelised Christmas potatoes-yep they’re as good as they sound! Although not strictly Finnish, what’s a border or two and a sea when it comes to good food?

One of my favourite side dishes is red cabbage. Plus it’s low fat and good for you! I know, I know, Christmas is not exactly the time to think of low fat but trust me, it’s good…

Karelian rice pies

Sisko, Mr NQN’s aunt made these Karelian Rice pies which are served with egg butter. I ate about half a dozen of these as they are among my favourite Finnish foods and she was kind enough to humour my pleas for these. The pastry outer is made of rye flour and she tells us the traditional Finnish food was often using a limited range of ingredients as there wasn’t a wide variety of food available in Winter. These rice pies are simply made of rye flour, water, rice, milk and salt and the egg butter is eggs and butter mixed together.

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