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Christmas Cake
Good news folks, I found lard to make pastry for my mince pies (and jars of Duerrs mincemeat in New World Supermarket). Discovered the lard hiding in the meat fridges - not in with the butter etc as in the UK. Had a christmas cake tasting last week - mine (made in September, with fortnighly additions of brandy) vs the famous (in New Zealand) Ruth Pretty Christmas Cake. Result was a tie - mine has the traditional almond paste and icing, which to me are the best bits, whereas the Ruth Pretty version is more what us Brits would call a Dundee cake as it has the fruit and nuts on the top, but flavour of cake wise, not much in it! However mine was much cheaper and bigger, mine cost all of $10 to make, vs the $45 dollar purchased one.
Gearing up for Christmas Day - will it be another picnic on the beach, hopefully not in the rain this time or may go alternative and have fish and chips. Its great having Christmas in the summer, you dont want to eat as much.
New immigrants tailed off this month as expected, but back to business as usual early in Feb when the next wave arrives.
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Beer and Mince Pies
Our team of 3 Brits and 2 Aussies managed a respectable 4th place in the Regional Wines Beer Options Competition. Not bad considering there were 18 teams and we didnt have a Kiwi amongst us! It was a good night, comprised of blind tasting of 8 beers and having to name the country of origin, strength, type of beer, name etc. great fun. Currently making our own ginger beer (as well as Mark's good old British Stout). The ginger beer is happily bubbling away in the sunny porch, just read that if we leave it to brew for more than 2 days some of the sugar turns to alcohol. This week's whinge is that I cant find any lard in the big supermarkets (necessary to make pastry for mince pies) - typical, having found a source of Atora suet (for suet puddings), now cant get lard, but i have found Duerrs jars of mince, so nearly have mince pies. We dont like the NZ made ones, they are too sweet.
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Beer in Wellington
Its really annoying when we reading in other blogs about how bad it is to find good beer in New Zealand. Where are all these people living - here in Wellington we can get hold of a wider selection of British, Belgian, German, Czech beers than we could in the UK and all from the same place - Regional Wines at the Basin Reserve, Wellington. Better still, once a month we go to a Beer Tasting evening there. There is a different "subject" each month ie, British, Belgian, etc., we get to try at least 7 beers over the evening and vote on our favourite at the end. Its a good laugh and great way to try new beers. So don't believe anyone who tells you that European beer styles are scarce - rubbish! Off to the Christmas tasting there tomorrow night (3 December 08) will report on that later. As well as these monthly tastings, there are loads of micro breweries brewing great products you just need to get out there and buy the stuff.