This is why I cook

I’ve been reading Michael Pollan’s latest book: Cooked, A Natural History of Transformation. I’m transfixed. I love it. I’m sure you would too.

Photo by Hong Yi
Photo by Hong Yi

I’m learning all kinds of wonderful cookery thingerys. Like, salt any meat that’s to be braised or stewed for hours, if not days, before you cook it. Why? Salt obviously draws water out of things, so this advice can seem counter intuitive. But as the salt draws the water out it forms a salty liquid that then, after a bit, gets drawn back into the meat in a kind of osmotic vacuum effect. Thus making said meat super tender.

But reading the book has got me thinking about why I cook. Pollan points out it’s not an efficient thing to do. We can outsource cooking so much more cheaply and efficiently. So why bother? For me:

* Cooking is creative. I get into a flow of making and building and playing. I can test and try things and take risks. I build without a plan. I just start, then I add sauces and herbs and I feel my way toward the endpoint. It’s like that wisdom: like a car with its headlights on, we don’t need to be able to see our final destination at the end of the road. We just need to be able to shine our attention to the bit in front of us, and steer from there. This is the thrill of creativity…trusting that the road will lead us there…even if we can’t see it all in one.

* It’s manual. It’s hands-on. I roll my sleeves up and get out of my head. Out. Of. My. Head.

* It takes me beyond rules. I almost become recalcitrant. I refuse to check on The Google if I have the right temperature for baking almond meal cupcakes. I avoid using measuring cups and spoons. In fact, I only just bought a

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What if you could combine coconut and rice milk in one?

I know a stack of you ask me about non-dairy milks that don’t contain sugar, GMOs, phytic acid or other toxins. Which is no mean feat. I struggle to recommend many* and mostly suggest you make your own nut milks (there’s a recipe in my I Quit Sugar book). And, then, from another angle, some of you tell me you find coconut milk in cooking a little rich.

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Image via Smoothie Club

Now, to all of you I can say: Coco Quench.

Husband and wife Don and Ann from Pureharvest make this stuff. They also make the rice malt syrup I use in many of my I Quit Sugar recipes and are a bunch of authentic pioneers in this area and I met them during a recent Melbourne trip.

* As an FYI, their nut and rice milks are actually GMO and fructose free (the only Australian brands on the market that are).

And just so you know, this is a sponsored post, but opinions are all my own and I researched the topic and came to these conclusions myself. You’ll find my position on sponsored posts and advertising here.

Don and Ann have been experimenting and making organic, health foods since the early 1970s from their little place outside Melbourne. They walk their talk. They love what they do. And they were able to explain to me the deal with their latest invention: a milk substitute that combines coconut and rice milks in one. Here’s how it goes:

Use as a coconut milk substitute.

Some recipes can be vastly improved by using a little coconut milk. But perhaps they’re not quite a curry. Perhaps they’re a soup or a stew. But using a mere dash of coconut milk or cream is a bugger – you’re left with the rest of the can. Coco Quench is good

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so, a few things are going to change around here

I very much like change. I like growing. I like inventing stuff just to see if other people like it. And I love when things (finally) gel and flow and I can invite people onto my little canoe and we can paddle together. Because, while I’m a calcified lone ranger, I also do like sharing and being blown away by other humans and their skill and heart and uniqueness.

Zoe SW

Preamble over, let me share some friggen great news with you all. I Quit Sugar is about to unfurl in some dramatic new ways.

And first up, let me introduce you to our new General Manager, Zoe Eaton. If I could abide emoticons, I’d insert little clapping hands here. She has been on board a total of four days and has impressed us with her colourful outfits (I describe her sartorial personality as “licorice allsort” inspired), her lamb chop lunches and her geek speak. She’s been working in online and marketing for more than 10 years, previously at Turner International.

A little personal context: Zoe and I first met ten years ago when I was editing Cosmopolitan magazine. She was the senior marketing manager on the magazine and we worked together robustly (that would be a fair way to put it, hey Zoe?). We remained friends when we both left the magazine (around the same time) and get together to eat, drink red wine and share Big Ideas. We were doing this over some pulled pork only three weeks ago and she was fleshing out one of her Big Business Ideas. And it occurred to me: Zoe belongs at IQS. We both move fast. We both like change. Only 23 days later and here we are.

Please make her feel welcome!

Over the next few weeks you’ll notice a few changes around here.

* The iquitsugar.com site will be going live in a week or two. If you haven’t already, sign up to the newsletter to be

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a glamping roadtrip

When we were kids Dad would grab the youngest, blindfold them, spin them once and get them to stab at a map of New South Wales pinned to the wall. Wherever my little brother or sister pointed determined our summer holiday fun. “Rippa! Kids, we’re off camping in….Dubbo!”.

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This is the tent we stayed in. That’s a meteorite shot by Joanne Paquette the week before.

Oh, the places we visited. Up to eight of us in a four-man tent (my brothers slept in the trailer once it was unpacked).  One year it was drought-stricken goat paddock in Jindabyne. Another we wound up in Bendigo (we eventually branched out to the holiday non-spots of greater Victoria). We sat on milk crates. Mum always cooked Hungarian goulash in the big cast-iron pot. It invariably stormed. Flooded. Or there was a dust storm.

And you thought your jaunt to the Lake Macquarie Big 4 with the kidney pool was as good as it got.

I camped all my life. In snow. On the banks of crocodile-infested waters. In the middle of cities. In fact, I was 21 before I stayed in a hotel. I packed a towel and soap and made the bed in the morning, which made my new boyfriend at the time roll around laughing. So, it could be said I’ve earned my camping stripes.

And so, recently I allowed myself the comfort and joy of “glamping”. Glamorous camping. Last weekend I headed south of Sydney with my mate Zoe to try out the glamping deal at Paperbark Camp. I’d heard about this place almost ten years ago, when it first opened. I loved the idea. Turns out it’s now a MrandMrsSmith property.

Please note: I’m an ambassador with MrandMrsSmith and I am invited to try out their properties from time to time for review purposes. The opinions in this post are my own.

Paperbark is about 2-3 hours out of town, in Woolamia near Jervis Bay. It’s a bunch of elevated, luxury tents scattered throughout dense bushland close to the sea. You can hear the roar at night. Along with crackles of the night life going

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try this trick: buffering

When I was editor of Cosmopolitan my assistant Lucy used to book me out for 15 minutes either side of all my appointments. She did this off her own back. I asked her why one day. “So you have a buffer,” she said. By which she meant, so you have time to go to the loo, eat something, draw breathe and scratch my inner left elbow between what were often back-to-back meetings.

Photo by Brian Oldham
Photo by Brian Oldham

To this day I buffer. I actively set aside pauses in my day – 15-20 minutes at a time – to breathe and scratch my inner elbow. Lucy – thank you for instilling the idea!

I don’t like the feeling of being tugged all day, being a passive passenger to the capricious winds of others’ needs, emails, noises and distractions. I have a tendency to be the dry, fluttery leaf that follows the whirly-whirly of life’s demands. I’m easily caught up. But I want to be more solid. The original tree trunk in the equation. Not entirely unflappable, but with an immovable, safe home base to come back to.

I have often stressed the importance of creating space (not just time)  in your day, in your life, in your cells. Space allows us to expand, to get steady, like the roots of a tree. Space enables wellness, for it’s the constriction in our cells that causes disease and pain.

And I’ve made it one of my missions to emphasise with everyone I care about (you!) that we are the only ones who can take charge and do our own rooting. We don’t all have Lucys in our lives.

We have to book in our buffers ourselves.

We have to ensure we’re not the dry, fluttery leaf, day-in, day-out so we can be

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Slow cooked cinnamon beef cheeks with cauliflower cream

Gradually, gradually I hope I’m getting you all used to cooking with secondary cuts of meat…yes? The secondary cuts are the ones that can often be discarded because they’re not as fashionable. Which is a waste. The dumb thing is, these secondary cuts – chuck, shanks, cheeks, offal, shin, blade, brisket – taste infinity better than the primary cuts if they’re simply cooked a little differently.

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Slow cooked cinnamon beef cheeks, recipe below. Image from Eat Drink Paleo

Dumber still, these different cooking methods (slow and long) make the meat much better for you (the slow temperatures don’t destroy as many of the enzymes).Make a difference and vote with your dollar: buy secondary and learn to cook differently!

I’ve been playing with a few different cuts…gradually moving us all via this series of slow-cooked meals (you can check out my lamb shanks with lemon and cinnamon here and my beef with coconut curry here) to cooking with offal. We’re not there yet. But stay tuned.

Today, it’s beef cheeks. These are the facial cheeks of cows (not the bum cheeks!) and are very lean and tough if not cooked nice and slow and languidly.

Some quick pointers before we start…

* You can use a heavy-based casserole pot instead.

No need to buy a special electric slow cooker if you don’t want. You can use a Le Creuset casserole pot or dutch oven on the stove top or in the oven instead. You generally have to add liquid if you do (see below) and reduce cooking time from 8 hours (on low) or 4 hours (on high) to 1-2 hours.

* It doesn’t have to be a big one.

I use a 4.5L one. It’s big enough to make 6-8 portions.

* Halve the liquid if you’re using a slow cooker

If you’re converting a recipe from a standard (oven or stove-top) recipe, halve the amount of juicy stuff and do things

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My simple home: what I don’t own

I’m going to take a step or two back. And explain the “simple” in the My Simple Home experiment. I’d like to be clear.

Image by Maxwell Holyoke-Hirsch
Image by Maxwell Holyoke-Hirsch

You’ll notice the series is not called “My Minimalist Home”. Minimalism is a righteous aesthetic, but not always practical. All those ardent minimalists out there can be painful. And their all-in-one gadgets can cost a bomb. I really enjoyed reading this Slate article on how minimalism isn’t sustainable….and how the original minimalist zealots have backed off on their message to something…simpler. You might like this fresh perspective too.

I don’t call it “My Green Home” either. Sustainable timber and chemical-free options are great. But generally green home features and rants suggest more buying…More Stuff, albeit derived from new-growth shrubbery. It’s consumerism dressed up in hemp clothing.

You’ll also notice I don’t speak of “Decluttering”. Decluttering denotes chucking stuff out, and often perfectly good things that are then replaced by a less cluttery version of the original. And complemented by a visit to The Storage Shop to buy a whole heap of containers and filing solutions. Which is More Stuff.

Instead, I’ve gone the simple slant. Simple is minimalist, green, decluttered, low waste, practical, economical and all the rest of that good stuff rolled into one. Well it should be.

Simple has as its mantra one word: less.

Go to the shops less. Buy less. Consume less. Recycle less (recycling should be a last resort). Less furniture. Less gadgets. Use up what you have first. Improvise. Make do. Use the same thing for two purposes. Need less.

Recently Leo Babauta listed what he didn’t own over on mnmlist. I’ve decided to do the same, as prompted by his

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The I Quit Sugar Chocolate Cookbook has landed!

Drum rolls and fanfare be silent. The day has come. Yep, the I Quit Sugar Chocolate Cookbook is available today. And thank you for being so patient!

Screen Shot 2013-05-15 at 10.08.43 AMMy love of chocolate has seen me experiment madly with different densely nutritious and satiating recipe ideas for two years now. It’s not a bad experiment to sign up for, mind you. This cookbook, as with my previous books, evolved as an experiment as I explored sugar-free living for myself. I say this often: I’m not a scientist. I don’t pretend to be. I’m someone who gave this way of living a crack, found it did great things for my wellness, and now I love sharing what I’ve learned.

To grab the Chocolate Cookbook, click on the button below. If you’ve pre-ordered, your copy will be delivered to you today via email. Stay tuned!

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I’m hoping you’ll love it. Here’s what you’ll find inside:

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Minced meat and broccoli stir-fry (and 4 other mince-y tricks)

Blogger at The Stone Soup and food scientist Jules Clancy has been in my orbit for a while. She shared some nifty recipes using five ingredients or less here a while back. Recently we shared our love of meat. From a sustainability POV, it uses up perfectly good off-cuts. From a budget POV, it’s cheap. From a convenience POV, it’s radical. Jules also adds that from a cooking POV, it’s “forgiving”. Which is to say, it’s hard to fork it up!

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Beef & Broccoli Stir Fry, recipe below

Here she shares six ways to max your mince experience, beyond the spag bol usual.

1. Stir fry it.

Mince is brilliant in stir fries because it cooks quickly and has lots of surface area to absorb the flavours of your sauce and other ingredients. It also saves you from having to thinly slice your meat.

Next time you’re planning to cook your favourite stir fry, use minced meat instead of your normal chicken breast or thighs.

Beef & Broccoli Stir Fry

Serves 2- 3

  • 500g ground (minced) beef
  • 2 cloves garlic, finely sliced
  • 2 heads broccoli
  • 4 tablespoons oyster sauce (soy or Tamari, if you’re sugar free)
  • 1 bunch coriander, chopped

Preheat a large wok or frying pan on a very high heat. Add a few tablespoons neutral flavoured oil and stir fry the beef. While the beef is browning, finely slice the broccoli stems and chop the head into bight sized trees. Add garlic to the beef and continue to cook until well browned. Add broccoli and a few tablespoons water and cover the pan. Continue to cook on a high heat with the lid on, stirring every 2 minutes until the broccoli is bright green and tender but still a

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I’m an online dater and it changed me

There are a few things you learn when you do online dating. You learn about the different faces of humanity’s heaving, aching loneliness. You learn just how lonely you are. You learn about the opposite sex. You learn about how much your ego can take (from the incessant rejections; on most sites you’re alerted to who is checking you out…followed by a loud silence when they don’t make contact; on one site one works their way up the “most popular listing” by responding to all contacts, which results in a lot of automated rejection emails). But mostly you learn about yourself.

Photo by Tierney Gearon
Photo by Tierney Gearon

I first gave the phenomenon a go a few years back. And I approached it as just that: a phenomenon. With my journalist’s hat on, I used my need for a column topic as my excuse for entering the fray. But, really, my excuse was that I was lonely and the tactic, frankly, was cowardly.  In the resulting column I wrote about how online dating is a great way to learn to be thoroughly yourself. That is, the forms you fill out to join the various services are a great way to remind yourself of what you like doing, what your values are, and so on. I stand by my theory, even if the pretense was a cop-out.

But I learned more this time.  This time I signed on to two sites. I’ve been on them for two months.

About men, I learned this: they like to hold fish up high in the air, go to a lot of events on boats toting bottles of boutique beer, “hit the gym”, watch Two and Half Men and Shawshank Redemption and read the Sunday papers. They’re “laid back” and “easy going” and “down to earth” (what Australian man isn’t!?), but “don’t do the club scene any more”,  don’t have time to read (except for aforementioned Sunday papers and Bob Marley’s biography),  get into a bit of the Foo (as in, presumably, Fighters) like it’s 1997, and take “selfies” in bathroom mirrors.

I also learned that young men with tribal tatts wearing muscle tees living in outer suburbs with Mum and Dad (a detail I gather by the bathroom accoutrements I can see in the reflections of their selfie portraits) are overly represented in the single scene. Actually I didn’t just learn this. I already knew it. It’s just that on online dating I’m connected with them (they’re overwhelmingly my main pursuers on the sites). I’ve written about how educated, career-orientated women in their late 30s and early 40s are overly represented in the Western world today, while for men it’s this younger, blue-collar demographic. It’s the result of “hypergamy“. And it leaves a huge disconnect in the dating market. Although, frankly, I find this kind of bloke more authentic and open with their intentions and overall spirit than a lot of the polished men working in finance, divorced and in their late 40s and 50s.

I learned I don’t like internet dating, but I stick to it to see if it can surprise me. I find attending to “criteria” is not how I want romance to strike. And the point being, I want to be struck. I want to be pursued, courted. Knocked over. It’s going to take that…a real blow to the kneecaps from a guy who’s brave enough to come that close. Which leads me to…

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