Munchen und Oktoberfest 2010!!!

The excellent weather enjoyed in Paris continued as we continued onto Munich for Oktoberfest! Okay, I was really in Munich to visit a lab but the visit just happened to coincide with Oktoberfest. Seriously, it was an unplanned happy coincidence.

As neither of us had actually visited Munich prior to this, we also played the tourist around the city.

I also purchased a dirndl in preparations for joining in with the festivities!

We also met up with Pooey's friend Rita for dinner, who is a true-blue Munchener!

The restaurant, Frauenhofer

Pooey and Rita toast with their...spitzsi? Coke mixed with orange!

Check out my tired eyes!

Liver dumpling soup

Pooey's venison

I start attacking my pork knuckle!

Rita's comments on our decision to go to Oktoberfest included, "It's good that you've decided to come during the first week before the Italians and the Australians arrive!" Apparently these two nationalities party especially hard. Surprise surprise! We also decided to roll up early, just before lunchtime, to try and avoid the crowds of drunken people who would vomit on our shoes and clothes.

Pooey at various levels of excitement at the gates to the Theresienwieser (where they hold Oktoberfest)

Pooey tries on various hats. Rita nearly disowned her as a friend.

Liederhosen!

We planted ourselved in one of the Paulaner beer tents where we got some food, some beer, and sat back to enjoy the Bavarian dancing.

With Rita.

Pooey felt out of place without a dirndl so she tied her hair into pigtails to get into the mood.

Those steins are heavy! 1kg of beer + however much the glass weighs!

Various dances

This cameraman hottie was videoing the revelry.

Chugging with the dancing troupe

Starting...finishing...finishing...finished!

We decided that rather than get smashing drunk, we'd not be too Australia and instead take a walk around and take in the sights of Oktoberfest.

With the Paulaner beer barrels

The Paulaner draught horses moved just as I was taking this pic :D

Schatzi!

The Lowenbrau tent came complete with a lion that roared "Lowenbrau!" every minute!

Don't remember which tent this is...Augustiner?

Did you know there are amusement rides at Oktoberfest? I didn't!

The view from the ferris wheel. Despite the number of people you see, Rita said that this was apparently this is "not crowded."

Rita confessed that she had always been too scared to go on the ghost train. Cue us dragging her onto the ghost train :D

Eeeeeeeeekkkk!!!!

She survived!!!!

Friendly Freddie Kruger

Oktoberfest started as the wedding celebration between Crown Prince Ludwig (later Ludwig I) and Princess Theresa of Saxe-Hildburghausen. 2010 was the 200th anniversary of the original wedding party - it amuses me to think that the year after their marriage, some guy went "Hey! Remember that awesome party we had for your wedding? Let's do it again!" There was a special 200th anniversary dedicated area that had things from Oktoberfests of the past.

The special anniversary beer tent with a rendering of the happy couple.

They had animals at the original Oktoberfest! Some cool chickens, a horse, and patting a shetland pony! I want a pony!

Patting a cow on the antique merry-go-round

It was a long and tiring day so to end, here's this photo!

I sure did!

Paris 2010

These posts may have alerted regular readers to the fact that I recently took a vacation from M-town. Because I'm a bit of a party viking (go hard or go home!), I endured 20 hours flying to London, immediately attended a going away party for the Grand Empress, and had a quick dinner and nap before waking at 4:30am to catch the first Eurostar of the day to Paris. It was kinda tiring.

Pooey happy to be on her way to Paris!

The St. Pancras station - nice!

Pooey still happy to be on her way!

Our initial plans to sleep on the train were thwarted by some very loud-speaking fellow passengers and so after dumping our luggage in our hotel in Les Halles, Pooey and Smee went to Versailles while I went to meet up with Gnoudesavanes. Except he was an hour late. And then I got lost in the Gare de Lyon. For reals, I got lost in it. To refind myself, I pretended that I couldn't speak French and went up to a security guard with this wonderful exchange:
Me: "Excuse me, do you speak English?"
Guard: "A leetle"
"Could you please help me? I'm lost."
"Ov course! You are in zee Gare de Lyon!"
"Yes I know I'm in the Gare de Lyon...I'm lost in this station."
"(insert strange look)"
"(sheepish tone)....I need to get to Le Train Bleu."
"Eet's upstairs."
I did eventually make my way there so here are more pics!

The view over Les Halles from our hotel room. If we really poked ourselves out, we could see Sacre Coeur!

The inside of Le Train Bleu lives up to the unofficial Second Empire motto - If it's not gilt in gold, it's worth nothing!

Gnoudesavanes trying to pat the Train Bleu chat. Very fat, very cute, and very angry. It did not appreciate being stroked while trying to sleep.

Later we went to Le Centre Georges Pompidou. The view from one of the galleries.

Pooey booked L'Escargot on Rue Montogueil for dinner because she wanted to eat snails.

Posing with Smee outsie the restaurant. Gnoudesavanes looking perplexed.

Lots of snails! They came in different flavours. My favourite was foie gras (of course).

We also ate frogs' legs - they do taste like chicken! Gnoudesavanes noted that these were the biggest frog legs he'd ever seen. Cue cane toad leg jokes.

Despite being absolutely wrecked, I continued to go out with Gnoudesavanes for drinks because I'm a stellar chum and he wanted to redeem himself after I outdrank him a few times in Melbs. He failed because even he realised it was unfair to force someone who'd been in Australia less than 48 hours before to get smashed.

The next day we met up with Alix and Gnoudesavanes again for lunch in Chinatown. The day before, Gnoudesavanes had told me that a friend of his told him he needed to eat *Asian style baguettes*. Cue the purchase of poison pork rolls!

Excited to taste it!

HAHAHAHAHAHAAH
Alas, Pooey and I have decided that Melb poison pork is superior to Parisian ones.

We then went to the Champs Elysee and became *true tourists* by visiting the Arc deTriomphe.

The view towards La Defense.

Tigger and I are happy tourists!

We followed it up by visiting Laduree for desserts.

The guys waiting for their desserts.

Peeking into the other rooms.

As various people returned to their respective homes, Pooey and I were left alone for dinner. We settled on crepes.

Waiting for the topiary elephants in the Les Halles garden to come alive

I was posing with the nutella jars at the creperie when the crepe-maker gave me this HUGE NUTELLA JAR to pose with instead! It's bigger than my head!!!!

Happy with our crepes.

The next day I went to visit a lab while Pooey went on a free walking tour. When my visit was over, I joined up with her where I then became a nuisance to the guide by interrupting him to clarify various points about certain sights. Pooey said I should have just given the tour.

Also, we took pics while he was explaining stuff.

WE LOVE PARIS!!!

And here I am, writing about our adventures on the Eurostar back to London.

Sculpture of the week - Mannekin Pis by Jerome Duquesnoy

Jerome Duquesnoy, Mannekin Pis, 1618-19

Brussels, Belgium
(Source)

I'm tearing it up with Marene in Leuven/Brussels this weekend so this week's piece is Brussels' most famous sculpture...a bit to their disgust. Would you be proud if one of the major tourist attractions of your city was a fountain sculpture of a little boy urinating?

Often dressed in little costumes to reflect various visitors or events relating to the city, it's not known why Brussels has a sculpture of a urinating boy in the city are there are a number of legends about why it may be so. What is known is that the current Mannekin Pis by Duquesnoy is a 17th century replacement for an earlier fountain already called the 'Mannekin Pis' so

Painting of the week - Concert champetre by Titian

Titian, Le Concert Champêtre, c. 1510
Louvre, Paris

(Source)

If all goes to plan, I should be in Paris this weekend so here's a piece from the Louvre, Le Concert Champêtre by Titian...or Giorgione! Traditionally attributed to Giorgione, it is now considered an early major work by Titian, showing both the influence of his master (Giorgione) but also the things that would make his own name later; idealised beauty and excellent technique and style.

On my first visit to the Louvre in 2004, I remember being surprised that a major work (in my opinion) such was this was tucked away away from the Grand Galerie where most of the rest of the European works were. Turns out there was some minor renovations going on. It's now in the Salle de La Joconde - same room as the Mona Lisa. I wonder how many people look at her and not this piece?

Hai Pooey!

Some people near uni are getting into Oktoberfest the spirit!

Song of the week - F**k You! by Cee Lo Green

From the voice of Gnarls Barkley, comes the happiest sounding flipping the bird song in the world!

Had a bit of trouble finding a good quality track with the English lyric clip that didn't ask for my age so here they are in Spanish! Que te jodan!

Now, I don't want people to think I'm using this to signal to other people - this song has been stuck in my ear for ages but get blank looks when I name the song. So here's to infecting others with earworms!

*edit!* Now in ze German! Fick Dich!

Speedy croissants

Remember this entry where I decided to make croissants? To be honest, after that initial foray intro French baking with yeast, I attempted to make baguettes but they failed spectacularly and I got disheartened about modifying a recipe I knew worked. If it ain't broke, don't fix it and all that.

Well. I'm on a diet of sorts right now and decided to make croissants last night. Hehehehe. And I also decided to use my scientific knowledge to get the experiment down to a reasonable procedure time! After all, incubating your immuno in the fridge is just to decrease background - you could leave it on the bench for one hour at room temperature! (Christ, I'm such a nerd.)

So here it is! Incubation modifications are all approximate based on what I did in the intervening time. The Pom says TV scheduling is not a good enough key to time, you can decide for yourselves.

Ingredients (same as before)

• 260ml milk + 2 tablespoons for brushing over pastry
• 2 tsp dry yeast
• 250g plain flour + 3 tablespoons (kept separate)
• 2 tbs sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 180g unsalted butter (I used salted butter this time because I had the right amount in the fridge and was too lazy to get more. Whether you want to make this substitution is up to you as there wasn't an overly discernible alteration in flavour. Wikipedia says salt inhibits yeast activity but again, it seemed pretty much the same.)
  

Instructions

1. Heat 65ml of milk to lukewarm. Dissolve yeast in milk, stir in 6tbs of flour from the 250g, and whisk until lump-free. Cover with clingwrap and and let stand at room temp on top of a bowl of hot water until doubled in volume (about 20mins).
2. Mix sugar and salt into remaining flour.
3. Heat remaining 195ml of milk to lukewarm. Transfer raised dough to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with dough hooks. Add milk, and with mixer at high speed, add sugar, salt & flour mixture, a little at a time. Lower the speed to slow-medium until dough is sticky-soft.
   
4. Cover with clingwrap, and place bowl on top of another bowl filled with hot tap water for 1-1.25 hours (incubation time started at the end of The Simpsons...I stopped it during Bondi Vet).
5. Bring butter to room temp (I had the heater on so it was around 19C) and incorporate the 3 tbs of flour until smooth.
6. Flour the working surface, shape the cold dough into a 38 x 15cm rectangle (portrait, not landscape), and spread butter on the upper 2/3 of the rectangle. Leave a 1cm border between the sides and the butter.
7. Fold the dough into thirds like a letter, folding the bottom (butterless) third first. Turn the dough anticlockwise, roll out into a 38 x 15cm rectangle, and fold again. Repeat multiple times (I think I did it about 4 or 5 times).
   
8. Transfer the dough into a baking pan, cover with clingwrap, and keep at room temperature for 1.25 hours (I kept it by a heater outlet, went for a short swim and shower).
9. Roll and fold the dough multiple times again, wrap and keep at room temp for 45 min-1 hour (did my post-swim laundry and watched the second half of Rush/start of Burn Notice at this point).
10. Flour working surface, roll dough into a 40cm diameter circle. Cut into quarters, then cut each quarter into three triangles.
11. Roll the base of the triangle towards the remaining point. Do not curl the pastry into a croissant shape. Transfer to a baking sheet and brush with 2 tbs of milk. Let stand at room temp for about 30 mins.
    
12. Preheat oven to 200C. Brush croissants with glaze (egg yolk + 1 tbs milk), and bake for 15-20mins. If they brown too fast, cover loosely with foil.
13. Cool before serving. I got a bit impatient so I can't tell you how long I left them for but I ate a test one during the late news.

I divided the dough in half, one half of which is in the freezer (I'll let you know how defrosted croissant dough works), packed 4 in the fridge overnight, and test baked 2 that night. Here's how they came out.

Didn't get a pic of the inside before I ate it but it was pretty fluffy.

The overnight ones were taken to work - approximate time out of the fridge would be 1.5 hours? - before baking. This is how those ones came out!

Puffy and fluffy!

I think the extra standing time meant the second batch puffed up a bit more than the rushed ones but they were both fluffy which is more than I can say for my baguettes. So yes. From three days to about 4-5 hours - now it's much less ridiculous to bake your own croissants!

Random bitch session.

This is going to sound really petty and bitchy but....I know someone who hunches over as part of her 'normal' posture. It really annoys me. The slouching makes me want to slap her, grab her shoulders, pull them back and down, and push her into a proper posture.

Student food review - David & Camy's Shanghai Dumpling, Box Hill

I can't believe I've never reviewed either this place or it's dirtier sibling in the city! Because it's not the city version, I will not call it by the pseudonym *DD* and it wasn't quite as dirty as the original (and the best/worst) but the Boxy branch of this dumpling shop is just as fast and reliable (sorta) in its output of food.

We had a variety of standard dumplings as well as one dish I've actually never had before! If some of the food in the pictures look like dog food and kinda crappy, it's because we dug in before I remembered to take a photo.

Now...this was supposed to be the dandan mian...I think it was actually zhajiang mian with extra chilli thrown in to make it spicy. And it was really spicy! Cue hilarious moment when Clinty bites in a chilli on the expectation that the sauce wasn't hot. It was. Hehehehe. Not bad, just not what we ordered, or at least, what we were expecting.

Fried pork dumplings! Pretty much as expected *thumbs up*

Boiled chicken and prawn dumpling. Not as good (read - prawn chunky) as previous times we've had it here but definitely on par with the city branch.

Thai fried rice! I've never had this before but saw some people getting this dish as we walked in and I was *oooh! egg pancake over fried rice! I want it!* And it was pretty good! Nice light, thin egg, good fried rice with pieces of chicken, egg, lettuce...can't remember what else but a good addition to my eating repertoire.

The real disappoinment of the night - xiaolongbaos. As you can see, they had very thick skins and look more like dimsims. To be honest, I still happily ate them because the quality is probably on par with the city branch but Clinty was particularly devastated as he knows they can do better.

And the ability of the Boxy branch to do better is probably the main lesson of the story. Being in the 'burbs and less under the pump than the city branch, I can say from experience that the food has been better (esp. the xlb) on previous visits. But on a busy Friday night and having a queue of people in the restaurant, I'm guessing they took shortcuts resulting in the okay but not as good as expected meal.

Still, for $10/head, can't complain too much! Otherwise, perhaps go for lunch. And to finish, I'm just going to post a screencap of this googlesearch I attempted.

Kekeke

Compare against the guys singing on the post from 17/5/2010

I don't understand viet well enough to know exactly what's being said but awfulness crosses all language barriers.

Song of the week - Polovtsian dances by Borodin

Heard this on the radio as I was going into work earlier this week.
KHAN!!!! KHAN NASH!!!!

Crimes against fashion

It has occurred to me recently that I seem to write a lot about food and less about some of the random things that happen to me during la vie quotidienne. It has also occurred to me that it's a lot more difficult to do the Crimes against Fashion segment when I have to quickly pull out my camera and then chase someone to get an unobtrusive picture of their crime. I do however think this one is worth it, especially since examination of the photo on computer reveals two crimes!


Firstly, girl on the left (aka, redface). Skinny jeans...so many people in the world should not wear skinny jeans (myself included) but I respectfully concede that there are many people in the world who can and do successfully look pretty good in them. Wearing acid-wash skinny jeans precludes you from ever looking good in them.

But the real criminal!!! I don't rate wearing leggings as trousers, and I guess she's does have a tiny skirt over them but I was really really REALLY gobsmacked anyone considered wearing shimmery, multi-coloured leggings would be a good look. But the true horror that I don't think is conveyed in this photo is that in real life, those leggings had a plastic sheen! Do you all understand now why I had to chase her across campus? I HAD TO DO IT!!!!