Today I’m forty.  I don’t feel any different.  I look about ten years older than I did on my thirtieth birthday, but that’s about it.  Yet everyone wants to know how I’m going to celebrate.  How I plan on marking this mid-life milestone.  Last year, I had a clear vision of my fortieth celebration.  I’d be dressed like Phyllis Diller and surrounded by family  We would gather at the Niagara Falls Casino and stuff Canadian currency into Alex from the Thunder Down Under’s speedo.  But, like most complicated fantasies, the planning got away from me.

And despite being a recluse whose only contact with the outside world is trolling elderly Trump supporters on FaceBook, I have lovely friends taking me out for dinner.  It’s more than I expected, and frankly more than I deserve.

I’ll take it.

Crab Benedict Bake

• 2 cups cubed back-breaking bread
• 200g fresh white crab meat
• 7 eggs
• 3/4 cup coconut milk
• 1/2 cup double cream
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 3/4 tsp onion powder
• 1 1/4 tsp salt

1. Combine the bread and the crab at the bottom of a greased 9X13 inch pan.
2. Whisk together the eggs, coconut milk, cream, paprika, onion powder, and salt.  Pour mixture over the bread and crab, cover, and place in the fridge overnight.
3. Take the casserole out of the fridge a half an hour or so before you want to cook it.
4. Heat the oven to 375F/190C.
5. Bake uncovered for 30 minutes.
6. Drizzle with cheat’s hollandaise, below.
7. Remember, you’re fabulous and in your sexual prime.

Cheats Hollandaise

• 1/2 cup mayo
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 2 tsp dijon mustard
• 1/4 tsp paprika
• 1/2 tsp salt
• dash of hot sauce

Whisk all the ingredients together.

When I arrived in the UK  I was twenty-six years old, in a new country, and without a single friend in my new home…but only for an hour.  On the table in the flat I would share with NINE other people was a letter addressed to me.  The gist of it was, “Welcome. I think we will be great friends.”  It was signed by a girl named Naomi.  She became my first, and my best friend in London.

Naomi and I have had a series of adventures.  We have lived together, traveled together, and she has been there for me through many ups and downs.  Naomi helped me overcome a destructive, yet delicious phase where all I ate was Tescos custard, and my teeth wiggled loosely in my gums.  And she kept my spirits up the time a super keen woman from Harrogate forced us to make throw pillows into the early morning hours.  It is safe to say that Naomi has been protecting me from myself, and avid seamstresses for the past thirteen years.

And now she’s moving back to Australia.

I’d like to be able to say that I have had as large an impact on her as she had on me, but there is no way to match this lady.  I’m a creature of drama and crisis, while she is kind and patient.  She has been easy to love and befriend, and has always been there when I needed her.  I will be helplessly lost.

The only bright side today is this batch of waffles.  Hopefully, very soon, I’ll hear about a fatal shark attack.  Until then, I have waffles.

Waffles

• 3 large, room temperature eggs
• 3/4 cup coconut milk
• 2 TBS maple syrup
• 3 TBS melted and cooled coconut oil
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 cup raw cashew nuts
• 3 TBS coconut flour
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt

1. Preheat a waffle iron.
2. Place all the ingredients in the order listed into a high speed blender.
3. Blend on low for 30 seconds, then blend on high for 30 seconds.
4. This makes 9-10 waffles, so fill the waffle iron accordingly.
5. Close the lid and cook for 5 minutes.
6. Enjoy!

*Add extras like blueberries or chopped and cooked bacon.  Have it your way, baby!

*Take your pants off and make it happen.

Let me preface this by saying that I do like the UK.  English people are very polite, and they can be funny when they’re drunk.  And I love that when I go to the dentist, I get treated like I’m Cameron Diaz.  There is a darker side though.  They are sooo bad at customer service.  I could bore you with many tales where I received less than optimal customer care, but that is its own spectacular brand of douche.  Just take my word for it.

What I’m dealing with at the moment is the reaclimating process.  In Australia, the teenage boy bagging my groceries asked, “how are you today, miss?”  Baristas calmly accepted my decaf coffee orders without scoffing.  A sales person told me I was making the correct choice when I bought a kangaroo scrotum bottle opener.  There was eye contact.  Smiles.  I almost mounted a hotel concierge when he upgraded my room.  All around me light.  Things done properly.  Condiments on the side.  Gluten free menus.  Men successfully pulling off ponytails and seven inch beards whilst selling boomerangs.  I felt a part of it all.  I longed to be a part of it all.

Now, I’m back.  I won’t be going out for dinner very much, or leaving the house.  So, here’s a very nice Laksa recipe.

Chicken and Prawn Laksa

*I’ve made it before and I’ll make it again.  I just don’t have the picture ready.

• 2 shallots thinly sliced
• 1 red chilli finely sliced
• 5 cm piece of ginger finely sliced
• 1 tsp coconut oil
• 2 lemongrass stalks finely chopped
• 2 chicken breasts finely sliced
• 400 g raw prawns, chopped
• 600 ml chicken or vegetable stock
• 2 TBS fish sauce
• 1 TBS brown sugar
• a few handfuls washed spinach
• 250 ml coconut milk
• 2 limes, squeezed
• bean sprouts, butternut squash noodles, zucchini noodles, cooked rice noodles, or cooked rice

1. Gently fry the shallots, ginger, and red chilli in the coconut oil.
2. Add the lemongrass, chicken, and stock.  Simmer and stir in the fish sauce and brown sugar.  Cook for 6 or 7 minutes.
3. Add coconut milk, spinach, lime juice, prawns, and whatever noodle you choose to use and cook for 3 minutes.

I don’t consider myself a ridiculous person.  I have the same basic needs and wants as anyone else: family, friends, health, safety, shiny hair, and the occasional falconry course.  But, it’s getting weird for me to have people over for dinner.

“What do you like to eat?,” I’ll ask before I dish out an official invite.  See, I can make pretty much anything, and I aim to please.  The problem is when they say,  “Just make what you normally would.  I’m sure we’ll love it.”

Gosh.  What do I do?  Honestly, for the past few years I’ve treated myself as a science experiment.  I look like an average person, but I’ve seen and eaten things that would make you shudder.  I went through a phase where I put SAUERKRAUT in my smoothies.  So, I get that what may taste great to me, may taste like the cubed cheese at an old folks’ home to you.

But I’m always trying.  When I can, I ask a person with normally functioning taste and smell to sample my recipes.  For instance, my brother said the crab cakes from last week’s recipe were delicious.  And he wasn’t just being nice, as he’s not.

So, this week I’m being realistic.  This is the smoothie I’m drinking while there are nice blackberries around.  If you want it to dance on your tastebuds, up the apple content and remove the avocado.  Have it your way, baby!

Blackberry Smoothie

• 1 cup coconut water
• 7-8 blackberries
• 1/4 apple
• large handful of spinach
• 1/2 avocado
• 1/2 juiced lime
• pinch of pink himalayan sea salt

1. Put all ingredients into a high speed blender and make into a nice smooth drink.
2. Throw a handful of macadamia nuts and an inch and a half of chorizo into a Princess Diana memorial mug, and you’ve now experienced breakfast at my house.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcJjMnHoIBI

Several weeks ago an elderly Spanish man did something that now causes the power in my kitchen to go out several times a day.  I called him to fix a chandelier, but in doing so, he caused an imbalance in the cosmic force that governs the electricity in my kitchen.  Butterfly effect?  I have no idea as I never saw that Ashton Kutcher movie.

So, last night I was faced with a dilemma.  I had a four pound pork shoulder, some red Hawaiian sea salt, the unnerving desire to use my crock pot…and an unreliable power source.  I think all would agree that I had no choice but to plug the cooker in next to my bed.

It was a meaty, bubbly night.  I woke several times and fretted over the pork’s temperature and progress as if it were a sickly infant, and the blue glow from the display panel kept me on edge.  But, I believe, like any animal who eats its young, it was worth the effort.

`Okole maluna.

Hawaiian Pork Buddy

*This recipe is dedicated to Shawn Doherty

• 4-5 pounds boneless pork shoulder, skin on
• 5 slices thick-cut bacon
• 1 Tbs-1.5 Tbs coarse red Hawaiian salt
• 5 garlic cloves, peeled

1. Line the bottom of a slow cooker with bacon.
2. Rub the pork generously with the salt.
3. Cut slits into the port and push the garlic in.
4. Place the pork, skin side up into the slow cooker.
5. Cook on low for 16 hours.
6. Remove the pork from the liquid that has accumulated.
7. Take off the skin and fat and set aside.
8. Shred the pork into a clean bowl.
9. Taste and adjust seasoning by adding a small amount of the crock pot liquid.
10. If you’re a wild beast (like me) remove the fat from the skin and mix it through the pork.  The fat tastes sooooo good.

Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jc_ItEm5W54

*I want this sooo bad.

This is two straight weeks of pancakes, but I’m trying to get it right.  “Pancakes for all proclivities” is my motto.  Not really, but here’s another recipe anyway.

These are made with four ingredients: Coconut flour, eggs, salt, and gluten-free baking powder.  Super simple.  And it makes two big pancakes.  There’s no bullshit commitment to a huge batch.  You’re not left pondering where it’s all went wrong with a plate of twenty-seven pancakes, suddenly realising you’re completely alone in the universe.  Nope, this is a meal for one.  Possibly two; if you have a small child who will take one bite and then tell you “nope”, and to basically go stuff yourself.

I like them though.  They are nice with a little butter and maple syrup, but best as a savoury base.  I topped mine with cheddar cheese and a fried egg.  I have no groceries in my house, but this hit the spot.

Try it!  I hope you like them.  I you don’t, go stuff yourself.

Savoury Coconut Flour Pancakes

• 3 Eggs
• 2 Tbs coconut flour
• 2 pinches salt
• 1/8 tsp baking powder
• butter/ghee/coconut oil for cooking

1. Mix all ingredients to a smooth batter.
2. Heat a pan over medium heat and melt your fat of choice.
3. Pour in half the batter, and cook for two minutes.
4. Flip and cook for another minute.
5. Repeat with the remaining batter.

I’m not oblivious to the fact that this blog has devolved into a self-piteous testament to my homesickness.  But please cut me some slack.   It IS, after all, the 4th of July.  I am missing barbecues, my town’s 10K race, and some sort of red, white, and blue jello salad.

If I were in the grand old US of A, somebody somewhere would definitely have a pool, and they might even invite me over for a swim.  A dog or two would be dressed up (against his or her will) like Abraham Lincoln.  There’d be a small parade, with a high school marching band in suffocating polyester uniforms and elaborately adorned shakos.  At least one child from that marching band would pass out, mid-tuba-blow, from heatstroke.  There would be hot dogs, hamburgers, and hope that the one guy everyone loves to hate will toss a firecracker down his pants, or at least into his mouth.  All that is missing from my ultra-comforting vision is me…drawing a penis in the inky night sky with the trailing glow of a sparkler.

But, I’m in London. My only plans are taking some crappy English breakfast tea to the river and dumping it in.  If I’m alone I will surely shout, “NO TAXATION WITOUT REPRESENTATION!” and “WE HAVE IT IN OUR POWER TO BEGIN THE WORLD OVER AGAIN!  But really, that’s not what the 4th is about.

It’s about this:  Sitting under the stars with your big sister, getting nibbled by mosquitos as fireworks explode way up above.  A man in a cowboy hat screams “WHEEE!!” every single time a firework goes off.  It’s about your sister, waiting for the perfect, moment to say in her loud, clear, sweet, twelve-year-old voice, “He mister, you watch them, you don’t ride them.”

Or at least that’s what it’s about to me.

All is not lost though.  When the sun goes down, I have one sparkler left.

Happy belated 4th of July.

Smoked Haddock mini pies/frittatas

• 300 g/.65 lbs smoked haddock
• 50 ml/1/4 cup milk or cream
• 2 TBS coconut oil
• 2 leeks cleaned and thinly sliced
• 1 garlic clove crushed
• 2 tsp fresh horseradish grated or 1TBS horseradish sauce
• 1/4 cup parmesan cheese grated
• 1/4-1/2 tsp salt
• ground black pepper

1. Preheat oven to 180C/350F and grease 8 muffin holes.
2. Put the smoked haddock in a shallow dish and pout milk or cream over it.
3. Cover with foil and cook for 15 minutes.
4. Drain and set aside, allowing the fish to cool.  Once cool, remove skin and flake into pieces.
5. Heat the coconut oil and add the leeks and garlic.
6. Cover and salute for five minutes until the leek is softened, then remove the lid and cook off the liquid.
7. Beat the eggs with the salt and pepper.  Add 2 TBS parmesan cheese, horseradish, and flaked fish.
8. Pour into the eight holes of the muffin tin.
9. Sprinkle the remaining parmesan over the muffin/pies.
10. Bake for 20-25 minutes.
11. Allow to cool a few minutes  before removing from the muffin tin.
12. Top with a mini sparkler.
13. Delicious.

I can’t decide where I want to be, and it is something I’ve been struggling with for a while.  I think I’m coming to realise that wherever I am is not the place for me.  Which is awesome.  I think I might move, because 1 in 3 road accidents happen within a mile of home.

Years ago a friend of a friend asked me, “Where would you prefer to live, the US or the UK?”

“Well,” I told him, “I’d like spend my time between the two.”

“In the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, then?” He asked, with an expression only a  24 year old named Percy can pull off…self-satisfied, and with a mouth set like a butthole.

Really, what a dickhead, but so, so funny.

Now, I’m back in limbo.  I had a great time in Buffalo.   Mostly, I ate like the bulimic character in Meridith Baxter Birney’s Lifetime movie, “Kate’s Secret,” but without the purging. But, of course, there was more to it.

The US has my sisters, friends who accept chicken wing eating challenges,  parents, and the early summer scenery that keeps “Little Pink Houses” on a constant loop in my head.  The UK has my kitchen, …is London, and has a seven and a half mile park I can run around  in complete safety.  It’s awesome, but adds a touch of Cowslip’s Warren to my soul.  (Sorry, I can’t help but reference “Watership Down” when I’m blue.)

But, if you can’t be with the one you want, love the one you’re with.  Right?  At least geographically speaking.  So, I’m going to love London to the max.  Like, an all encompassing “make out for hours” and “sit on London’s face” kind of summer love.  Then, I’ll see how we are by September.

Avocado Pesto

This was the first meal I made when I arrived back to the idyllic London suburb I now call home.  I threw it over some rotisserie chicken and courgette/zucchini noodles.

Top with some parmesan.  It’s good and keeps surprisingly well in the fridge.

• 2 avocados
• 1 1/2 cups Basil leaves
• 3-4 cloves garlic
• 1/3 cup toasted pinenuts
• 2 TBS lemon juice
• 1 tsp salt, or to taste
• 1/4 cup olive oil

1. Pulse all the ingredients except the olive oil in a food processor until finely chopped.
2. Add the olive oil, with the motor still running, until incorporated and creamy.
3. Use as you would regular pesto.
4. Salt with homesick tears.