Aug 23

Nubbins

"something (such as an ear of corn) that is small for its kind, stunted, undeveloped, or imperfect;

a small usually projecting part or bit" Merriam Webster Dictionary

"something small or undeveloped, especially a fruit or ear of corn" Collins Dictionary

"those small projecting parts, the hangers-on, the extra bits" Dawn Perry/Bon Appétit

In other words bits and pieces - leftover, unwanted bits and pieces.

It seems it's really an American/Canadian word - the British don't use it that much - they have 'gubbins' which I used long ago. It's derived from 'nub' with the 'bins' making it a diminutive.

It seemed to me as I looked for definitions that there are actually two different definitions - the one applied to corn - the kind of vegetable that I am wont to produce - deformed and tiny. No use. Then there's the offcuts, for want of a better word. Max Falkowitz on the Serious Eats website talks about butchers who sell off a mixture of bits that can't be used from various meats and deli products:

"This is the same charcuterie sold at premium prices, already cut up for you, and mixed with a bunch of other meats (mostly hams and bacons but also some sausage) for variety's sake. The butcher may not be able to get usable slices from them, and they may be a touch fatty compared to the rest of the cut, but that's their problem, not yours. Nubbins aren't just a good deal on end cuts—they're an improvement on the original product." Max Falkowitz/Serious Eats

I don't think they do that here, but they should. It's a bit like those bits of biscuits that you used to be able to buy.

But you can use the same principle at home yourself. If you have just a few scraps of meat, cooked or uncooked you can gather them together, freeze them and when you have enough turn them into something else - or just add to other things - like omelettes, quiches, soup, pies - that's where they would end up in my house. Max Falkowitz, made tartare:

"When dismantling a rib of beef into individual steaks, I found myself with plenty of odds and ends too small to cook. So they became tartare—a thrift-upon-thrift process of turning nubbins into even smaller nublets, then bulking them up with pickles and egg." Max Falkowitz/Serious Eats

An English lady called Laura on a website called Cookpad, seemed to think that the term nubbin applied to cheese:

"A cheese nubbin is a leftover chunk of dried-out cheese or rind ... Gubbins means bits and pieces or paraphernalia but it comes from an old French word ‘gobe’ a bite of food or a piece of something." Laura/Cookpad

And she provided a recipe for Nubbins and Gubbins fish pie which had those cheese bits in it plus other bits and pieces. So bits and pieces, leftovers, using up what others might think is rubbish.

Laksa icecream

Whilst 'researching' laksa for an upcoming post that I keep on putting off I came across Laksa icecream on the delicious. website, as served in Cold Rock Darwin in the Northern Territory:

"The fragrant new flavour is made from a curry flavoured ice-cream topped with crispy noodles, chilli flakes, and coriander leaves. “It’s more salty than sweet and tastes pretty much exactly like laksa, only frozen,” says Cold Rock Darwin owner, Susan Webb. “You could have it for dinner or dessert. It’s both really.”

Extreme perhaps, but maybe it works. Or in similar vein you could try Chilli oil parfait, orange sugar melon, lychee and lime leaf sorbet at Etta in Brunswick - which is nearer to home.

They do combine chilli with chocolate, so maybe it goes with icecream too.

Oh to be on the Mediterranean

A couple of days ago my daily painting from the Met was this by Henri Edmond Cross - a lesser known Impressionist whom I have come to love. It must have been a wet and miserable day, because looking at this painting - Mediterranean landscape with white house - I could almost hear the cicadas and smell the pines, feel the warmth. I will say no more.

Fridgescaping

This photograph was in the AFR The Buzz section last weekend. Apparently it's a thing. It's not enough to just arrange your fridge in a somewhat anal way by putting everything in matching plalstic containers, you also have to make it into a work of art. Not that I would say either of these are a work of art. It's a TikTok thing of course:

” fridgescaping is changing the appearance of your fridge by manipulating the things that are already there—let’s call them 'food and storage containers'—and adding non-native items—let’s call them "dumb stuff." Dumb stuff seems to include, but is not limited to: candles, tree stumps, mirrors, a handwritten note, decanted candy (decanted everything actually), glass or ceramic cat figurines, battery-powered fairy lights, and flowers in open glass vases. " Allie Chanthorn Reinmann/Lifehacker

Completely ridiculous. I mean who has time? - not even me and besides there are lots of bad things about it. Have a read of the Lifehacker article. It sums it up wonderfully well.

Cucumber Guy

Still on TikTok - this is a young Canadian man called Logan Moffit, who has become known as Cucumber Guy because of the multitude of ways he has for using a cucumber. I found this one on the Smitten Kitchen newsletter although it was link to a New York Times article by Erik Klim, where you can watch a couple of the TikTok videos. They've gone viral with millions of viewers, and recognised food writers approve his technique:

"a set template (the cucumber) and a formula that can be repeated, ad infinitum, with variance. In other words, one recipe, infinite possibilities."

Barbecue baskets

I think this was just an ad that I noticed out of the corner of my eye for a Temu product. I thought they were a very nifty way of barbecuing vegetables - well any small bits I suppose. They would get the barbecue flavour, but they wouldn't fall through the grid. Not that we barbecue a lot but yes - good idea.

Ballarat pie competition

I'm a bit late with this one as it's all over at the end of the month and the winner has been announced already: Wild orchard apple and Vansetter Vodka pie (shown below) from Itinerant Spirit. The best savoury pie and runner up was a Lamb shank and mustard mash potato pie from Learmonth Café.

I don't know whether the pies stay on the menu after the month of August, but if you find yourself with nothing to do one day, hop in the car and drive for a day out in Ballarat sampling pies You can find what's on offer on their website.

Three recipes to try

From here and there. Still on pies - Lamb shank and Guinness pie - from one of the recent Coles Magazines. When strawberries are back in season and the weather's warm, why not try Ottolenghi's Strawberry tiramisu cake which looks superb and not very difficult, and Herbed tomato and roasted garlic tart from Smitten Kitchen - one of those delicious tarts that can be thrown together in no time with the help of frozen puff pastry. A template.