Beautiful Things: Awesome ugly wine glasses

Are these are the most ugly or awesome wine glasses in existence? Could they be both? I think so! Think of a scale that ranges from ugly to awesome, try maybe this at one end and this at the other. Right at the centre point of this scale of attractiveness, where the two meet, you have these glasses. They are kind of amazing. And I have four of them!

Fun Places: Central Park, particularly the roller disco.

Sheep Meadow

Roller disco folks having fun in terry towelling.

Lovely stuff.

Central Park is a great place to go, pretty much any time of year, unless it's raining or you really, really need to go to loo. SO short on loos there. The leaves in Autumn are gorgeous, it's fun the see the snow and you're a bit sheltered from the wind due to trees in Winter. Summer and Spring are self-explanatory.


At any given time, there will be a lot of people there, and more than a few will be hurling flying objects around. It doesn't matter what anyone else is doing, though, because it's so enormous in Central Park that you'll have personal space, and everyone gives off an air of benevolent goodwill. Who could be unhappy in a giant, beautiful park?


A hot tip is that the guys rolling wheeled carts around and selling: 'Water, water, ice cold water!' are most usually also selling beer. Sometimes jello shots too. This is on the down low, because there are undercover cops booking people for public drinking. And they are undercover! The one I saw ticketing a man looked almost exactly like the guy I'd just bought a beer from. Great cover. Or deep cover? I know the lingo. What could be better than a round of tipsy Frisbee? Central Park is ace. 


My favourite day to go to Central Park is Sunday, because that's roller disco day. Anyone with the urge and roller dancing ability can join in, and the music is funky and fun (and available from a crazy looking guy for $4 a CD, or the bargain price of 5 for $20, um). 


These are some serious characters on skates, my favourite is Terry Towelling Mountain Man, an enormous, ripped dude in home-made pants, whose size belies his grace on wheels. Sometimes he'll even pop a water bottle or three on his head to show off. There's also an older woman who was clearly some kind of professional in an earlier life, she is beautiful to watch.


There's lots of active stuff you can do personally: bird watching, tours, punting. I haven't done any of this stuff, because the grass is soft and green, and you can lie straight on it with no picnic rug and take your shoes off too. I'd prefer to do that, because it's inadvisable to lie around shoeless in many places in NYC. It's really special to have places like this in a big city, soothes the soul and all that.

Yum Stuff: Apple Loaf

Thanks Donna Hay!

This is what I intend to do with the excess apples I have with tiny bite marks in them from last week's apple picking.


It's entirely borrowed from Donna Hay's website, here is the original recipe. I have a bit of a girl crush on Donna Hay. Whenever I make something of hers, it's yummy and easy, she even includes both f and c temperatures, so I don't have to Google it like other Aussie recipes I make here in the US. Then, the people who eat it are really nice to me, and say lots of lovely things about what a good cook I am. I'm not, especially. So, thanks Donna!


I change a couple of things (in brackets).


Ingredients:

• 2 cups (300g) plain (all-purpose) flour
•  ⅓ cup (75g) caster (superfine) sugar
•  2 teaspoons baking powder
•  ⅓ cup (55g) sultanas (I sometimes leave these out, or use chocolate chips instead)
•  ½ cup (125ml) milk
•  ½ cup (125ml) pouring (single) cream (I just use another 1/2 cup of milk, so one in total. It turns out just fine, and I never have cream).
•  1 egg, lightly beaten
•  2 tablespoons white sugar

apple filling

•  2 red apples, peeled and chopped
•  ⅓ cup (120g) brown sugar
•  ¼ teaspoon mixed spice (I use pumpkin pie spice and double it, spicy, spicy)

I do all of this stuff like she says:  

Preheat oven to 160ºC (320ºF). To make the filling, place the apple, sugar and mixed spice in a bowl and toss to coat. Set aside.

Place the flour, caster sugar, baking powder and sultanas in a large bowl, mix to combine and make a well in the centre. Gradually add the milk and cream and stir until a soft dough forms. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic. Roll the dough to a 20cm x 40cm rectangle and top with the apple mixture. Roll the dough to enclose mixture, brush with the egg and sprinkle with white sugar. Place in a 27cm x 7cm loaf tin and cook for 35–40 minutes or until cooked through when tested with a skewer. Serve with double cream or ice-cream. Serves 8.

YUMMO.