Month: December 2011

sometimes things can be simple and real

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Three reasons why I’m sharing this.   1. My friend Johnny Abegg made the film, which won Best Food Film with The Chef’s Directory. Johnny is widely regarded as one of the best surfers in Byron. Just as an FYI. And he’s cosy with my friend Lizzy at Spell. Again, background. 2. The film is … Read more

“poke life and something will always pop out the other side”

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Just this. From Steve Jobs in some random interview in 1995 (when he had hair, a beard and not-so-fat-wads-of-cash).

It cuts through to something we all need to know:

When you grow up you, tend to get told that the world is the way it is and your life is just to live your life inside the world, try not to bash into the walls too much, try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money. That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader, once you discover one simple fact, and that is that

 everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.

Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.

And then again, a little later in the same interview…and frankly my favourite insight in a long time:

The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will… pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing.

It’s to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it.

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some Christmas food gifts (and how to pickle daikon)

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I’ve been cooking a little lately. Experimenting. And I’ve found a few things that I reckon will make very nice Christmas gifts. I’ve got some friends coming around over the weekend to whip up some of the below to hand to Good People Who’ve Done Good Things By Me in 2011. And boy have there have been a few. Got some ideas yourself…share below!

05recipehealth articleLarge some Christmas food gifts (and how to pickle daikon)
photo via Andrew Scrivani

I love this idea, which I’m modifying from Martha Rose Shulman.

 marinated goat cheese

For a 1-cup jar:

  • 1 teaspoon mixed red, black and white peppercorns, lightly crushed
  • 2 garlic cloves, peeled
  • 2 bay leaves, broken into pieces
  • A 3 ounce log of goat cheese (I buy mine from the local markets here. Martha used a round log, but you could do squares from a block…I did)
  • 2 sprigs thyme
  • 2 sprigs rosemary
  • Extra virgin olive oil as needed

Whack peppercorns, garlic cloves and bay leaves in a clean, sterilized wide-mouthed jar. Pour in a film of olive oil.

Cut the goat cheese into rounds 1/2 inch thick (Martha uses unflavored dental floss to cut through the cheese!! Clever!!). Place one round in the jar and drizzle on some olive oil. Stack the remaining rounds, drizzling oil

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my Sunday Life column comes to an end…to make way for…

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…Well, a few things.

Straight up, I’ll be filing my final Sunday Life column this week.

Almost 130 experiments in how to make life better…you’d hope I’d have found an answer, hey?? I kinda have, but that’s for another time.

A publisher once said to me, “Never do a column for more than two years. The first year you find your feet, the second you find your voice and after that you repeat what you said in the first two years.” I tend to agree.

And as many of you who read this blog know, I’m not one to hang on to things. I like to move where my voice keeps fresh.

elizaveta porodina photos my Sunday Life column comes to an end...to make way for...
Photo by Elizaveta Porodina

So, from the New Year, I’ll be working on a bunch of new projects (TV and print), as well as ebooks.

Yes, ebooks.

I’ve been really rather thrilled with how rewarding ebook publishing is.

[For those new here, my ebook I Quit Sugar ebook went on sale about 8 weeks ago and has been hitting good spots around traps.]

Ebooks are a direct conversation. They help directly. They share authentically. They deliver what I want to share straight to where I want to connect.

Ebooks are new – according to Darren at Problogger, who is something of an international expert in this kind of thing, there are only about 20 or so bloggers making a living from ebooks here. So no one really knows where it will wind up. I’m the first “traditional” journalist to enter into it…I’ve been told.

Some general thoughts:

Media – and life in general – is moving faster than ever. Everything is speeding up. Flux is our permanent state now. I find this exciting.

They call my generation the bridging generation. We Gen Xers…we’ve had to bend and straddle and dance back and forth as we adjust from the ways of yore to, well, this new multifaceted, layered, messy, instant, constant, technology-based way.

I hand wrote my law essays at uni, but was the Tech Head in my office when the internet arrived while I was doing my newspaper cadetship at News Ltd.

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why the paleo diet works

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This week in Sunday Life I eat like a caveman

glycemic pasta woman why the paleo diet works

Of all the self-imposed guinea pig antics I’ve subjected myself to for this column, this week’s might be regarded as my bravest. For it entailed eating, oh-glory-be-yes, fat.

In a fat-fearful world, my no holds barred consumption of chicken skin, the crackling and the 3cm of subcutaneous tissue on my pork belly, several teaspoons of butter on my veggies, whole cups of full cream milk, chunks of ghee and avocado each day has freaked the innards out of most in my culinary orbit. And yet (boldly! fearlessly!) I’ve persevered with this particular experiment for three whole months.

Turn to the person to your left, and the one to your right. I’m betting one of you is making friends with your egg yolks right now, having picked up on what’s been dubbed the “paleo” or “caveman” diet. Images of loin clothes and bone gnawing aside, the diet boils down to something pretty innocuous: not eating anything fiddled with.

So, no grains, no additives, no sugar, no grain-fed meat, no mucked-around-with fat-reduced dairy.

And instead the unadulterated foods of our ice-age forebears. The subsequent claim is that doing so makes us healthier, thinner and live longer, a claim I had to test for myself.

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friday giveaway: a papillionaire bike worth $700

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Another generous Friday giveaway…and what a cracker it is this week. Yes, we’re giving away a Papillionaire old-school treadlie. Just in time for summer!   Not only is she very pretty, this Papillionaire bike is: a fully customised Sommer bicycle valued at almost $700  powered with a 3- speed internal hub (yes, gears!) an upgraded … Read more

a christmas gift guide #2 (plus some super reader offers)

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Since last week’s guide went down like brandy with Grandma after Christmas lunch, I thought I’d do another.

photo1 a christmas gift guide #2 (plus some super reader offers)
photo via Shannon Martin

Again, not a definitive list. Just some stuff I thought you’d like and that supports supporters of this blog and/or have a snappy, ethical slant. Enjoy!

merfins by Oceanika

MG 7456 a christmas gift guide #2 (plus some super reader offers)

For your mer-obsessed daughter, from $115. Kazzie’s a Byron chick who dreamt up this idea – eco mermaid fins for kids – a number of years ago. They’re made from recycled rubber, in a factory that uses environmentally sensitive practises and machines. I’ve seen kids swim in these things – they actually swim like dolphins. Check it out in this YouTube clip

The MerFin Package, which includes MerFins, swim tights and bikini, is priced from $174.00, or the MerFin alone starting from $115.00. Get em here.

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the art of actively doing less (+ a Women’s Weekly shoot)

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Shall I share some sweet irony with you? Or perhaps you’ll call it muddled, unfocused hypocrisy? Recently I flew to Sydney to appear in this Australian Women’s Weekly Christmas shoot below. Myself and a bunch of other (too?) oft-photographed ladies were asked “what’s the perfect gift that money can’t buy”. I said: “rest”.

ww1112 ww1211p058 the art of actively doing less (+ a Women's Weekly shoot)As usual, the trip was frenetic and involved air-conditioned hotel rooms and flights and running late and chemical-ly makeup (although the team decided to go with a “natural look” for me, which is always a bit of a narcissistic conundrum when you’re the oldest and biggest on the shoot!). By the time I got to the studios I was, well, very unrested. And unanchored.

That night I lay awake in my hotel room unable to sleep. I hadn’t slept for weeks (months?). And in that moment I realised I had to put my book project on hold, which I shared with you here.

I needed rest. I had to really commit to getting it. I had to get real.

Irony…hypocrisy…whatever…truth comes and finds you.

Since all this I’ve had to have a good think about rest.

Resting is not just putting our feet up on the couch when we collapse in a heap, exhausted. Resting is a responsible way of living.

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