This whole blog thing, especially now that I have two of them, is getting out of control. I’ve had a draft sitting in an open window for FIVE SIX DAYS, SIX! It was a response to this odious column in the age, published a full seven days ago, on why the global financial crisis might be good for us poor mislead consumerist women too uppity to get our asses into the kitchen and cook for our families or something like that. It’s the beginning of what I predict will be a mighty trend of finger-wagging ‘it wasn’t like this in our day’ moralising op-eds, along with the overly chirpy recessionista trend, or as I like to call it the gendering of the GFC, the former condemning silly women for their spendthrift ways, the second condescendingly advising that you can still have pretty things if only you’re careful with money.
I find Brigid Delaney’s piece particularly obnoxious for its implication that the GFC will be somehow solved on an individual level. The GFC is a disease, a sign that things are systematically horribly wrong with our economy, with the way this great Leviathan called ‘the market’ works to metabolize the world. Sure, you can brace yourself for impact by reducing your spending on food, but with food prices skyrocketing as part of the burgeoning global food security crisis there’s not much that can be done there.
Either way, these trends make me nervous.
You know what doesn’t make me nervous? This blueberry and nectarine cake I made for my mum as dessert after our postmodern eggplant parma. My segueway science is indeed tight.
Nectarine and blueberry cake
via Gourmet. Serves four to six.
- 1 1/2 cups plain flour, plus two tablespoons for the filling
- 1/2 cup sugar, give or take, plus another half cup for the filling
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 110 g cold unsalted butter, cut up into pieces
- An egg, beaten
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 tbsp cornflour
- 3-4 ripe nectarines, pitted and quartered
- A punnet of blueberries
- 1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
Combine half a cup of sugar, flour sans the two tablespoons, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Add the butter and rub in with your fingertips until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs, with a few pea-size butter lumps here and there. Add egg and vanilla and fork until dough becomes clumpy and ball-like.
Press dough into the bottom and sides of a springform tin with floured fingertips. Fridge until firm, about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Add nectarines and blueberries to your big bowl, followed by 2 tbsp sugar, 2 tbsp flour, cornflour and lemon juice. Gently fold together until coated. Tip into the springform tin and bake, loosely covered with foil, until it’s all bubbling and golden. This will take about 1 3/4 hours, but check midway through. Cool on a rack for at least 20 minutes before removing the sides of the tin, then cool for another 15 minutes before serving.
