Cooking Diary: Garlic Prawns

I cooked this today, for a quick meal! Here's my version of the recipe:

150g prawns, peeled and deveined
50g beans
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbsp vegetable oil

2 tbsp shaoxing wine
1 tbsp light soy sauce

1 tbsp water
1 tsp cornflour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp sugar

(1) Heat oil over medium heat. Add garlic and fry until it starts to brown. In the meantime, combine the water, cornflour, salt, and sugar.

(2) Turn up the heat and add prawns and beans. Cook for 2 mins or until prawns are just cooked through.

(3) Add the wine, soy sauce, and cornflour mixture, and stir-fry until sauce thickens.

Done!

The fundamental flaw in the first amendment

Hmmm... so much for not blogging before Monday.

Anyway, my blood boiled when I read this article tonight.

The Americans sure are proud of their Constitution, and most especially the first amendment to the Constitution, the one that protects the freedom of religion, of the press, of assembly, to petition, and of course, freedom of speech. There is much to appreciate, as surely much of these rights are fundamental human rights.

However, according to the article, the law also protects the freedom to discriminate, harrass, and incite hatred. Does this sound like the foundation to an advanced, civilized nation?

This has always been a flaw in classical liberalism / individualism, where the freedoms of one individual impinge on the freedoms of another. No, this form of liberalism is nearing the end of its useful life and I hope that soon the world's most influential nation will adopt to a more socially responsible form of liberalism.

Sue Bradford's resignation

Big news indeed. There's been a press release on this, and various blogposts with different opinions, and I'm not sure what there is to add except a personal perspective on the whole issue.

I'm personally very sad to see her go. A very effective politician, a very effective activist working within parliament to generate change from within. Certainly one of the best MPs in the last ten years.

I'm sad, but not disappointed. She's given ten years of service to New Zealand, which, even as a backbencher, is a fair chunk of time. Losing the leadership was, in her own words, "personally disappointing", and that is understandable. I don't think you can begrudge someone their right to resign given that she felt that she had lost the support of her own party's members. (The Greens democratically elect their co-leaders.)

On the other hand, this may not be a loss for the Green Party. Bradford polarised the nation over S59 - and public opinion was mostly against her, as demonstrated by the referendum. A comment on the Greens blog said that she "lives in the wrong century". I agree, she's a century ahead of our time, and in a few decades we will probably wonder why we as a nation fought so hard to defend our right to assault our children. But right here, right now, she's a political hindrance to a party that is trying to extend their influence beyond their traditional grassroot activist voter base.

The woman who beat her to the co-leadership is no slouch either. She's green left through and through, but Norman and Turei are so politically adept that they just might reach through to the centrist but environmentally-concerned vote. They are also more than capable of touching base with the younger professional vote, and indeed I envision that the Greens will become a mainstay of Left politics in the future, especially whilst Labour with Goff sinks into irrelevance.

In summary; it's a big loss to New Zealand, but a politically smart move for the Greens.

I'm still here!

But internet has been capped and I've been playing a bit of an old game, Warcraft 3: Frozen Throne. I'm not very good at it but it's fun enough.

Forgot to take photos of the cool red dust storm on Wednesday. :(

This weekend will be Magic: The Gathering prerelease which I'll go to, and then back to posting on Monday!

Gay Parade in Belgrade

A news item to watch tomorrow:

Whilst Sydney's Mardi Gras Parade is a popular annual event on the calendar for gay and straight Sydneysiders alike, Serbia are having their first gay parade in eight years in Belgrade tomorrow.

There are many in the Orthodox Christian nation who oppose the parade, including the Church and the Mayer of Belgrade, but neither condone the expected violence that is almost certain to descend upon the event.

This is surely homophobia at its worst, but that's not the whole story; the nationalists are also using it to pursue a different agenda. They see this parade as a positive step towards joining the European Union, and so disrupting it would be a significant setback for the pro-Western politicians.

Many eyes will be on the outcome of this parade. It will be a true test of a nation that has only recently embraced democracy and has recently been fractured by the declaration of independence by both Kosovo and Montenegro.

Edit:

I'd only just written this post up and it appears that the event has been cancelled within the last hour. How disappointing that freedom of expression clearly does not exist in a country that calls itself democratic.

Cooking Diary: Split Pea and Coconut Cream Pudding

I've been looking around the internet for some recipes for Chinese desserts. Unfortunately it seems that desserts aren't traditionally a course on the Chinese menu, and most of my memories of Chinese desserts come from my Hong Kong background. The concept of dessert was likely imported by foreigners, since Hong Kong has always been an important international trading port.

Anyway, I've been following a food blog, Christine's Recipes, which have some wonderful and easy Chinese dessert recipes, including this one:



Mmmmm yummy!

Greedy Company Knowingly Killed People

This particular news item from today disgusts me in so many ways.

It appears that a maritime waste dump off the coast of the Cote d'Ivoire was known to be highly toxic and dangerous, but for the sake of a quick buck, the company was still willing to dispose of it in the waters off a populated coast.

This is capitalism and greed at their worst. Since when does healthy competition include wilfully endangering the lives of innocent people? The company involved with the operation, of course, claim that they "intended no harm". Yeah right.

When will we bloody capitalist "civilized" Western nations learn to respect the lives of all people, and think about something other than our own pockets?

Cooking Diary: Simple Chinese Cooking

As usually happens on Tuesdays, a couple of my mates came round after work and I cooked dinner for us. I was missing a lot of sleep from the night before, so decided to go for something simple. Apparently simple is sometimes best, as they thought it was the best Tuesday meal so far!



The dish at the top left is steamed fish finished with soy sauce, spring onion, and ginger.
Bottom left is crispy fried egg topped with oyster sauce, spring onion, and chilli.
On the right is steamed tofu with garlic, sichuan pepper, and chilli oil.

link: Dumb Racist Americans!

Check this out!

http://lookatthisfuckingteabagger.tumblr.com/

The uneducated bigoted filth of America crawls out from the dirt and shows itself for the world to see!

Highlights:

"Abort Obamacare"
- Because universal healthcare is such a bad idea!

"'Cap' Congress and 'trade' Obama back to Kenya!"
- Somewhat witty but at the end of the day it's just more racist crap.

"Arrest our communist, racist, fascist, lying president now!"
- Hmmm please explain what a communist fascist is? And last I checked it was you white Americans being racist...

"Where's your birth certificate?"
- When you can't think of anything good to say, say something racist!

Cooking Diary: Simple Mushroom Curry

Today I had one of those days where I didn't feel like cooking anything too complicated, so I went for something simple:



Here's my recipe:

2 tbsp olive oil
2 finely chopped onions
3 crushed garlic cloves
1 tsp salt

about 15 medium-sized button mushrooms, quartered
1 cup vegetable stock
3 tbsp tomato paste

ground spices-
2 tsp coriander seeds
2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp turmeric
1/2 tsp cardamom
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1 tsp chilli (or to taste)

1) Heat oil on medium heat, add onions and garlic, then cook until onions are soft but not brown.

2) Add salt and coriander seeds and cook until the mixture thickens.

3) Add mushrooms and the remaining spices except chilli, and fry until spices are fragrant.

4) Stir in stock, tomato paste, and chilli, and cook until mushrooms soften and liquid has reduced and thickened.

Easy!

On Governments and Apologies

Every now and then a Government will come out and apologise for significant historic events, not least of which was Rudd's apology to the stolen generations right after his election in 2007. That event, in particular, was of national significance and was an emotional event for all Australians.

This week another such apology by another Government, albeit on a far lesser scale than the aforementioned, caught my eye.

Being a mathematician I am familiar with the name Alan Turing. His work in cryptanalysis was crucial to Allied efforts in breaking the German Enigma codes, and he also worked with some of the earliest computer, with concepts named after him such as the Turing test and Turing machines.

What I was unaware of was that he was also gay, and a few years after the War was one of many homosexual men who were treated abominably by the British. In this day and age it is inconceivable that a Western country could be publicly permitted to commit such atrocities.

And thus Gordon Brown apologised on behalf of his country's government for the treatment of this wartime hero. A small gesture, a token gesture, but nonetheless one that I can appreciate.

Cooking Diary: More Chinese food

I went shopping today for more new ingredients to try out - and found a "shrimp paste". Time to experiment!

I added it to a dish with silken tofu, dried mushrooms, dried tofu, ginger, spring onions, and.... oyster sauce. Sounds like a recipe for disaster? Well it turned out quite tasty but I'm not sure that I'd use the same combination again.

In the meantime, here's a better pic of my version of Sichuan chicken. I know, it's not the traditional way of cooking it, but it sure is tasty (even I ate a lot of it!)

Food for thought: Must we be paid to work?

A friend of mine made an interesting comment today:

"Ideally everyone would work to their capacity, and everyone would get appropriate/fair remuneration, but there’s really no point in championing one without the other."

This rather innocent statement hit me as an indication of how strongly capitalism has been drilled into our minds.

I'd like to ask: Is it truly necessary to be paid in order to do work? Is it not sufficient to work for the good of society?

I wonder if we had grown up in a different time, a different place, perhaps society would provide for everyone, and that in turn, everyone would work to provide the labour in order for society to function.

Cooking Diary: Sichuan Chicken and Lemon Fish

The food was surprisingly good, :D
but these photos are out of focus :(

Journey Through Faith: Religious and Social Beings

I came across an interesting article tonight:

Humans are hardwired to believe in God.

The point about religion as a social construct has been prevalent amongst my thoughts recently. I mean, organised religion is still so strong even in this age of scientific progress, which would suggest that there is more to it than simply believing that some mysterious being created the world in six days. It would make sense that there is some point in religion other than to hope for a better afterlife.

My opinion - and it is just opinion - is that religion provides a moral fabric which a group of people can use to build a society upon. It doesn't have to be logically sound, nor does it even have to be a positive set of rules; it just has to be present such that people can act in the same way. Perhaps it really is an evolutionary feature, whereby acting in groups simply provides a better survival strategy than flying solo.

Whilst I am an atheist, I remain superstitious in many ways, usually as a means to explain the inexplicable. It's strangely comforting and empowering, the positive side to belief and faith. Perhaps this is evolutionary bias towards religious participation coming into play. I don't know, but it's something I intend to think about.

I'll return to this topic at some point.

Cooking Diary: Sweet Potato Dessert Soup

I decided to try something weird and wonderful today, a dessert soup with a sweet potato base. "Dessert soup" in Chinese uses the words "sugar" and "water", and that is precisely what I used - sweet potato, ginger, sugar (brown and sliced, Chinese-style), and water. Easy!

It's quite filling though, I would share it around if possible.

Cooking Diary: Steamed Prawns, Fried Eggs with Chilli

Had a couple of mates over for dinner last night. I made three dishes, the first is a chilled tofu with a Chinese-style vinaigrette, the second is fried eggs with oyster sauce and chilli, and finally we have steamed prawns with ginger and spring onions.