Alice Springs shuts down in January. Yesterday evening we wandered down to the fish and chip shop to find it closed, half the cafes are shut up too and riding to work you could be forgiven for thinking you’d accidentally gone on the weekend due to the lack of traffic. A lot of people extend their Christmas holiday and spend January on the coast, their motivation being to escape the extreme heat. Up until Friday (Jan. 18th) every day of 2013 had been over 40 degrees Celsius including an eight day consecutive run of over 42.
I still wanted to hold a brunch in January though and bravely planned it for Saturday the 19th hoping that people would still come, after all we can’t all stay inside in front of the air conditioner for ever (I liken January here to the hibernation that happens in January during the northern hemisphere, just with opposite weather extremes). The brunch would be at my friend’s house who I was housesitting (they are amongst the lucky ones who have escaped to the coast) under the natural shade of the trees in their front yard. My brilliant stroke of luck came by way of a storm of Friday night and some rain lowering the temperature – it was a pleasant 25 degrees when the guests arrived.
Many of the thirteen guests were repeat brunch-goers so I must be doing something right! (either that or they had no where else to go due to said shut cafes) Although I had been for a short run early that morning, such was the calibre of the guests that I was feeling a little lazy amongst them. There was someone who is training for a half ironman, another for a five-day mountain bike enduro and a runner who will compete in this year’s Paris marathon and many had been completing hard training sessions before brunch. Bec was back at my side in the kitchen and together we sent out a seasonal menu of white peach bellinis, spiced plum and Anzac biscuit parfaits and a puff pastry tart with green and black grapes, goats cheese, pancetta and crispy sage accompanied with a fennel salad. We joked that Anzac biscuits are in season too with Australia Day coming up and all. There were minor issues with the tarts taking longer in the oven than I had hoped and some ending up a little soggy (the grapes make for quite a wet filling) but I was happy overall. The most important thing is that the brunch raised another $260 for the Australian Cancer Research Foundation, whoop!
I really do enjoy these events the planning, the cooking and seeing everyone enjoy themselves it’s a nice offset to my social life which is starting to take the necessary decline to fit the training in. I was in bed by 9.30pm on Saturday night, the alarm going off at 4.30am this morning!
nooshlikesrunning 