American Food : It's NOT what you think.

     Today my church held an International Food Fete. Many different types of food were there: Chinese, Malaysian, Italian, Burmese, more Italian...and American. Yes, American.  O.K., I'll wait for you to stop laughing and cracking wise.  Finished?  Good.
     I get this reaction often.  Those golden arch folks are so good at branding and marketing that the world over believes hamburgers and super-sized fries are the entirety of the American diet.  So when the idea was broached to hold a food fete [ pronounced in 'Strine as 'food fight' ] at my church I quickly raised my hand to make my contribution. After the laughter over such an absurd notion subsided, I officially started my campaign to educate the public on the real classic American menu. I was going to offer up complete meals, iconic holiday meals, that they may have only heard about in movies but now would get to try them in real life.  
    The menu:
          Thanksgiving Dinner - roasted turkey with gravy, bread stuffing, yams (sweetened with real maple syrup), green beans almondine (skip the canned mushroom soup casserole) and cranberry sauce.
          St Patrick's Day - corned beef, cabbage, potato, onion and carrot. Green beer is on their own.
          Comfort Food - meatloaf , mashed potatoes, green beans and apple crisp.  The very stuff Mom makes to say she loves you.
          Snack Time  - homemade jam and bread slices.  Well, this is a bit of bragging over my illustrious, award-winning jam career (ahem) and a way to clear out my pantry while offering an inexpensive snack option.

    Despite only preparing 15 servings of each category, this proved to be a behemoth task beyond roasting a stuffed 10-pound bird. The menu planning and costings weren't difficult but Kev refused to even mash a few potatoes so I was a one person culinary machine. It took several days to get it all prepared, measured, properly and appealingly arranged in carryout containers and frozen.   Hey, what could be more American than a frozen dinner? People could take it home or microwave it in the hall right away...it was the protocol for all vendors.
    Every good teacher goes into class prepared. I had menu sheets describing the offerings and their significance. Large signs saying, "American Food.  It's NOT what you think." An American flag to drape in front of the table as a come-on and a handmade sign of two yellow arches inside a red NO circle. For added effect, I wore my Betty Crocker apron.  And, as a nod to our good neighbors to the north, I had some Canadian maple leaf cookies to give away. Open the doors and let the hordes in!
    Sigh. Apparently my large signs weren't large enough. Too many people glanced at the flag, muttered 'ha ha, American food' and moved on to the curried rice dishes three tables over. Get serious, people.  Curries and laksa  can be found on every street corner in Perth, this is unique.  Well, there was some interest in the Thanksgiving meal.  People who had been to the U.S. or worked with Americans/Canadians had heard about this incredible meal and were eager to try it.  I had a couple of amused Irishmen willing to try what counts as Irish food on the other side of the Atlantic and  the old church dears selected the cheaper snack option (with the brandied marmalade, thank you.)  I sold half of what I brought.  Re-educating the masses simply was not going to be a one shot success story.
     We all had the first timers learning curve and are reassessing our p's [publicity, pricing, placement, protocols] and our q's [give me a minute, I'll think of something here.]  Some of us vendors started to swap leftovers.  After donating the required 20% [people 'paid' us with coupons and vendors redeemed them at the end of the day from the church purse] I managed to just come out in the black. I'll call that a success.

     I'll call it convenient that I won't have to cook supper for the next two weeks.  It's all  in the freezer.

April 15, 2013. Thoughts on an average day.

   I have gotten into such a predictable routine that I often wonder if I just stop noticing things along my way. Today afforded a few observations. Not necessarily brilliant, but I'll share them anyway.

    I approached  the red light across the street from my workplace and came even with the only other person on that corner. He said good morning and I could tell that he was a fairly recent arrival from Africa. I was a bit slow to respond-my being takes a little time to get up to speed in the morning-and he felt that he should explain himself.  It was his custom to talk to people he came across and he didn't mean to disturb anyone. I encouraged this happy practice while silently feeling a bit sorry for him.  This city, as so many others, is populated by people totally preoccupied by MP3 players, i-Pads, i-Phones, PDA's, readers and all sorts of electronic devices that isolate ourselves from others  while we delusionally think  we are staying connected. What an anti-social place this must be to this friendly young guy.

   The court I was working in today usually has a few slow moments  and I took advantage of that to fulfill an annual duty.  Yep, I finished my 1040 form during a criminal sentencing.  (Gee, what does that say about paying taxes?)  I usually get my return done on April 14. Why that date? Because it is the anniversary of my arrival in Australia. Yesterday, Sunday, was my fifth anniversary.  I never owe money (one has to make ridiculous amounts of dough before the IRS asks for a small percentage of the overage) but the US Treasury likes to hear from me.  And from all U.S. expats wherever they are.  I find that many American expats are not aware that they are obliged to file a return.  Hope they don't run into any surprises when they repatriate. I always have my envelope hand cancelled so that the postmark date can clearly be read by even the dimmest auditor eyes.

    I received my pink slip at lunch.  My company lost its contract after 25 years and most of us monitors are being "made redundant". We've known for awhile that we were getting the axe, so this was a mere formality.  I took a moment to share my company experience with the boss and silently hoped this wouldn't be too painful a day for him. Oddly enough, I am not sad or panicky.  I don't have new employment lined up for after May 17 yet but I must have greater confidence today than I did five years ago. Que sera, sera.

    After work, I went to the store to pick up some frozen apple juice concentrate. You know the stuff--just like orange juice it comes in a cardboard or plastic can which you mix with three or four cans of water in your own pitcher. Economical and ecological.  And nonexistent here in Australia. All juice is sold in cartons or jugs.  Kev said frozen concentrate had been trialled once upon a time but Aussies weren't sold on the concept. Just another thing OZ doesn't have but one learns to live without.

    And finally, this evening I made apple butter. Not quite as rich a brown as one expects but it tastes yummy.  I made a batch yesterday but absentmindedly added apple cider vinegar instead of apple cider. It's not ruined but I will put both up for my professional taste-testers to see which suits Australian sensibilities more.  No one seems to have heard of apple butter before so this will be an interesting session.  My taste-testers help me fine tune my recipes to Royal Show (state fair) winning standard. And since I lose my team in a month, I have to step up the R and D schedule.

   I am thinking this indeed was an average day.