Free chutney - Ornet Coleman style condiment cooking goes off!

HBO TV's Homeland would have you believe that Jazz is the preferred musical genre of the disordered mind.

This is likely true.

However, I would like to take this particular theory one step further and say Jazz is also the preferred soundtrack of the disordered cook, the pantry improviser. Muddy has often referred to me as the Miles Davis of the stove, but last Saturday, I confess I was more Free Jazz than Be-bop. Ornet Coleman if you will. Improvising ingredients and quantities as I made a batch of tomato chutney for the first time.

Last month, friend and work colleague Slim Wheels presented me with a jar of home-made tomato chutney which he'd made from his nanna's recipe. It was delicious, on cheese and toast, grilled snags and steaks, and in bacon and egg wraps. Needless to say, it did not last long in Chez Karpitz-Venetian, and I found myself scraping out the last dregs of sweet 'n' tangy goodness from the jar in less than a week.

Which is why I enlisted Slim for an afternoon of Nanna's chutney cooking (and much imbibing of Pimms 'n' Dry Ginger Ale and good French bubbles) last Saturday.

Here is the recipe - Classic version:

Ingredients

• 1kg tomatoes
• 2 large apples
• 3/4 cup of currants - same sultanas
• 1 tbsp whole cloves
• 1 tbsp salt
• 1 pinch of cayenne pepper
• 3 cups brown vinegar
• 3 large onions, sliced
• 1 cup water
• 3 cups white sugar

Method

1. Peel and chop onions, remove skin from tomatoes, chop coarsely; peel, core and dice apples.
2. Put all ingredients into pan and stir over low heat until sugar has dissolved. Bring to boil, then simmer uncovered for 1.5-2 hours, or until thick
3. Turn into hot, sterilised jars and seal.
　
Here is the recipe - Free-Jazz redux. Sort-of double quantity...
2 kg tomatoes (chopped but not peeled)
5 small pink lady apples
1 1/2 cups sultanas
1tbsp whole cloves
3 bay leaves
1 tbsp hot chilli flakes
6 cups brown vinegar
5 small onions, peeled and roughly chopped
2 cups water
5 heaped cups white sugarMethod - as per Nanna Wheels' classic recipe above. Cooked for three hours then poured directly into hot sterilised jars and sealed instantly. Made 6 jars of varying sizes.

Enjoy with meats, cheese, on bread and roast vegies and Jazz - on vinyl please.

Awesome.

Putting the 'i' back into Gandolfini OR are Margaret and David lazy, senile or just plain dumb?

Did anyone else catch ABC TV's Movie Show (actually At the Movies) last night? If so, did you writhe around in agony on the couch every time Margaret and David referred to James Gandolfini, star of Andrew Dominik's new film Killing Them Softly, as James Gandolfin-o?

Do these twats actually expect to be taken fucking seriously?

How can we trust anything these geriatric fucksticks say, when they get something so fundamental well wrong? And it's not like he's some unknown either. The Sopranos, which made James Gandolfini a household name, ran for a goodly number of seasons, garnering awards, the adulation of millions and the love of critics up the wazoo.

He has also appeared in a slew of films both indie and mainstream (Get Shorty, In the Loop, 8mm, The Mexican, Night Falls on Manhattan, Where the Wild Things Are among others).

If Margaret and David don't know who he is, surely the grip, the the make-up and hair dolly, the production assistant and ass. director would know, and should have had the courage to pull these rusted-on ABC barnacles aside and whisper the following sweet-corrections in their aged and clueless ears:

"It's Gandolfin-i you daft cunts".

Learning to ride - smooth and silky and a little bit muddy.

Sad really, at age 41, to have to confess to not knowing how to ride a bike, but there it is people, my secret shame. My only experience on a two wheeled vehicle is the bike my sisters Slim and Musty bought me when I was six. It had cool handlebars and daggy training wheels. I rode it up and down the driveway all afternoon, only to have it confiscated by my over-protective and controlling mother that very evening.

Gone. Never to be seen, heard or spoken of again.

Musty believes the bike was given away to a neighbour. My only proof of its existence - a grainy black and white photo of a pig-tailed me posed on it on the concrete slab that was our back yard.

For years I have had a love-hate relationship with cyclists. On one hand, I resent their carefree spirit and lithe bodies and on the other hand I respect their nerves of steel and uber-fitness. I am also fascinated by the infinite variety of bikes on the road and have been known to share in the "fixies" vs "non-fixies" debate with more learned bike riders...

I've always wondered what it would be like to ride. And no, a spinning bike at the gym doesn't count.

It wasn't until quite recently, when Silky Karpitz (an uber-jock-chick since childhood) proposed we do a triathlon that I had to confess I didn't know how to ride a proper bike.

Several kind (and very shocked) people offered advice - Berber Recliner, for one, offered me his road bike (with cleats, whatever the fuck they are) and a how-to tutorial; Red Karpitz offered me his mountain bike. But it was Patton Karpitz who struck gold with his suggestion that I should try learning on one of those blue rental bikes. His reason: they're heavy and slow, designed for both genders and all levels - essentially built for safety and comfort, NOT performance.

Perfect for a neurotic newbie like me.

Silky jumped on the suggestion. Before I knew it, I was locked into a lesson at Albert Park Lake - the blue bike station at the Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre (MSAC) to be precise - on a sunny Sunday afternoon. Silky as teacher. Muddy as documenter. Red's trusty grey helmet for protection.

Muddy took care of the bike hire, helped me and Silky extricate our bikes from the racks, and then walk them onto the grassy spot next to the car park. Silky handed me a pair of riding gloves in case "you tumble off and scrape the shit out of your palms trying to break your fall."

People, if I was a little bit frightened before, I was positively terrified now.

And yet, and yet...

Before Silky could tell me what to do, I somehow hoiked myself up onto the seat, chucked my feet on the pedals, gave them a push and took off. I wobbled for a few seconds and thought I would topple, but some latent instinct or obscure muscle memory kept me upright and in motion.

And boy was I in motion.

“Keep pedalling fast to keep yourself steady!” shouted Silky. But there was no need for instruction. I was off riding my middle-aged heart out. For the next ten minutes I dodged and wove through the big trees, hugged the edges of the grassy knoll and even rode the little hills before coming to a stop next to a stunned Silky and Muddy.

It felt GREAT.

Silky took me out on the paths adjoining MSAC for a short ride, to practice braking, using the gears and ringing the bell. Then, much to my surprise, Muddy decided to join us on our little jaunt (after much prompting – that is, bullying - from Silky). He rented a helmet and a bike and off we went, a cheery threesome, riding single file around Albert Park Lake. The experience was wonderful. Liberating. Sunny, with just a light wind and minimal traffic on Lakeside Drive to navigate.

20 minutes later, breathless from the experience (but not the workout – those bikes are EASY) we were back at the stand, planning a short ride to our coffee and cake reward at Carousel. But they were shut. Buggers.

Nevertheless, we bade our daggy blue bikes a fond farewell and went to Republic on St Kilda beach for a coffee and restorative carbs and some back-slapping and high-fiving. Awse.

Triathlons are fine, but there’s a whole world out there that can only be explored on two wheels and I cannot wait to discover them.

Red Karpitz makes the case for global optimism!

Folks, another guest appearance by my adopted son, baby bro and best friend, Red Karpitz below. This was Red's fourth speech in the Toastmasters' Competent Communicator Series - "C004 How to Say it". And he said it well. Here is the transcript. Enjoy.

The Case for Optimism

Mr Toastmaster, fellow toastmasters and esteemed guests, today, I would like to talk to you about the greatest moral challenge of our lifetime - perhaps the single most important thing that will determine the health and prosperity of this planet.

This moment right here might be the exact moment our children and our children's children, look back upon as the defining point in our history.

Now I know what you are all thinking...not another global warming speech....

Well, you are in luck, because we’ve heard more than enough about global warming at this club.

Today, fellow toastmasters, I will be discussing the need for optimism in a world of negativity.

Swine Flu, Bird Flu, Terrorism, Bioterrorism, SARS. Global Warming, Global Cooling, Climate Change, Deforestation, Genetic Engineering, Housing Bubbles, Multi-Speed economies, Job Losses, Overpopulation....

Australia’s poor performance at the Olympics...so much fear, so much negativity

Is there any wonder so many people struggle to get out of bed in the morning?

The reality is that negativity sells. We’ve been evolutionarily wired that way for survival. Our brains evolved in a hunter-gatherer environment where anything novel, dangerous or dramatic had to be dealt with immediately for survival.

So while we no longer have to spend time looking over our shoulders and guarding ourselves against sabre-toothed tigers, our brains have not yet caught up.

The media make full use of this - it keeps us glued to the news cycle, waiting patiently for our next hit of drama. Governments also exploit our fears as we gleefully give up our liberties for a little bit of supposed security.

But deadly and dire predictions are all too common. Running out of resources... We’ve heard it all before...Peak oil and peak coal were feared in the 1800s, while global cooling was a concern in the 1970s.

The Earth is 4.54 billion years old and it isn’t going to stop spinning anytime soon.

Without a doubt, negativity is an impediment to personal health and relationships. I am convinced that humans catch emotions - you become the people you most frequently associate with - so spending time with Negative Nancy is going to have an inevitable impact on your health and well-being. Choose your associations wisely - I note in my life I have needed to purge toxic relationships.

Beyond all the doom and gloom, I am in awe of the fact that nearly 7 billion people inhabit this earth.

We’re living longer, eating better, are more educated and wealthier than every generation before.

A third of children born this year in the developed world are expected live  to 100 years old.

Equally importantly, we are more connected than ever before - The prosperity we have enjoyed over the past few hundred years has moved the western world beyond scarcity for basic needs and provided the opportunity for individuals and groups to evaluate the sustainability of the lifestyles they lead. My only hope is that these new communities grow organically - that is, without force or coercion.

The reality is that I do not know what the future holds and I think you should be very wary of anyone who suggests that that they do.

However, if history is any guide, we are going to be okay. Sure, debts that can't be paid won't be paid, and that which is unsustainable will not be sustained.

There have been constant predictions of a bleak future throughout human history that haven’t come true. Our lives have improved dramatically—in terms of lifespan, nutrition, literacy and wealth, I expect this to trend to continue, in ways we can’t even begin to imagine.

Is the world perfect? No, far from it, but I suspect that is why we gather here each week, to develop our selves in order to become the change we want to see in the world.

I challenge you critically review the relationships you have made in your life and steer well clear of Debbie Downers - your health and wellbeing depend on it.

I also challenge you to throw away the newspaper and turn off the TV - Let’s rise above fear and negativity.

For the future belongs to the optimists - And I envision a future so bright....
we will all need sunglasses.

Thank you.

Feelgood Films for When You're Feeling Blue (or Red-faced with work-induced rage)

If like me, you occasionally suffer from a bad case of the homicidal work-related blues, there's nothing like coming home from a crap day at the coalface with a leaky bag of Pad Thai, a couple of curry puffs and a pack of beer (those 450ml bottles of Grolsch are fabulous as you can always wash out the bottle and use it to glass your co-workers the next day...), changing into your jimjams and working your arse-groove into the couch to watch a DVD. 

And you know what kind of DVD I'm talking about don't you? A goofy comedy, sparkly written, well-acted with plenty of colour, movement and texture that still makes you belly-laugh even after the thirteenth viewing. Everyone has a favourite or two. Here are mine. Enjoy.

Tropic Thunder: A pompous, out-of-his depth English movie director (Damian Cockburn, played by Steve Coogan) meets his untimely demise on the set of a Vietnam war epic, leaving a troupe of dingbat Hollywood actors to fend for themselves in a south-East Asian jungle, mistaken in their belief that they are participating in a gonzo movie experiment. They're so dumb, they continue to remain in character, swapping lines of inane improvised dialogue, thinking the trees have been rigged with cameras and mikes, even after circumstances prove otherwise. The group includes the monstrously insecure action film star Tugg Speedman (Ben Stiller) and pretentious Australian Method actor, Kirk "I don't read scripts, the script reads me" Lazarus (Robert Downey Jr - channelling a wonderfully compelling blend of Rusty Crowe and Peter O'Toole). 

Tropic Thunder is chock-full of sly movie in-jokes and references, superb one-liners plus some flat-out fabulous visual gags - like Robert Downey Jr playing an African-American character in the Vietnam war film-within-the-film in full blackface and afro. His extended cautionary riff about actors playing fringe or handicapped characters in the belief that will automatically win them an Oscar is worth the rental fee alone:

"Check it out. Dustin Hoffman, 'Rain Man,' look retarded, act retarded, not retarded. Counted toothpicks, cheated cards. Autistic, sho'. Not retarded. You know, Tom Hanks, 'Forrest Gump.' Slow, yes. Retarded, maybe. Braces on his legs. But he charmed the pants off Nixon and won a ping-pong competition. That ain't retarded. Plus he was a war hero. How many retarded war heroes do you know? Peter Sellers, 'Being There.' Infantile, yes. Retarded, no. You went full retard, man. Never go full retard. You don't buy that? Ask Sean Penn, 2001. 'I Am Sam.' Remember? Went full retard, went home empty handed."

Tom Cruise is the biggest surprise of all as the (unrecognisable) obnoxious, violent, chubby, bald studio executive Les Grossman (clearly modelled on Jeffrey Katzenberg) who is trying to leverage the on-set disaster for financial gain. 

Hold your sides nice and tight or they will split.

Bowfinger: Goofy, perenially optimistic C-grade Hollywood movie director Bobby Bowfinger (Steve Martin) commissions a SF-alien adventure movie script titled "Chubby Rain" from his bookkeeper and part-time cabbie. Although he has at his disposal a bunch of has-been and wannabe actors (Christine Baranski is peerless as an unemployed B-Grade Gloria Swansonesque diva and Heather Graham luminous as a midwestern nympho with movie-star aspirations), what he really needs is to cast a big-budget, box-office action star to secure the interest of a studio. Enter Kit Ramsay (Eddie Murphy), big budget box-office action star who also happens to be paranoid, narcissistic, anxiety-prone and sexually obsessed with the LA Laker cheerleaders. Ramsay is also in thrall to a cult called MindHead, led by a smooth conman played by the dapper Terence Stamp. 

Bowfinger's failed attempt to enlist the support of Ramsay in his movie venture leads to a cunning plan: covertly film Ramsay in his off-screen personal moments and then the splice the footage into his film. Only Bowfinger's gopher is aware of his plan. The other actors have been told Ramsey is method acting (his own unique style - "Cinema Nouveau") and will not engage with them outside of their scenes. So the actors walk up to Ramsay outside his home, in restaurants and in clothing stores and recite their lines, while his increasingly confused responses are secretly captured on film. Added to the crazy mix, is the casting of a Ramsay lookalike, who happens to be the star's lesser-known and sweet-natured twin brother Jiff (also played by Murphy). 

The film is another opportunity to poke fun at Hollywood egos, star religions and general moviemaking lunacy, but there's a sweetness to Bowfinger's Z-grade creative ambitions and his desire to keep his merry band of losers in what he believes is good work. This is the ultimate pick-me-up. 

And like Tropic Thunder, Bowfinger features one of my favourite actors - Robert Downey Jr.

Sprinkle some extra lemon on your Pad Thai and enjoy that second bottle of Grolsch.

Stalking George. The Australian's Megamind.

With the demise of Fairfax's print-based media, the opprobrium being heaped on Gina Rinehart for her tilt at its board and the general whiff of sleaze emanating from the inquiry into phone hacking by News Ltd's tabloids, you'd be forgiven for thinking journalism of the old-fashioned well-written, print-based, long-form kind is on the way out. Add to this the rise of social media, blogs, e-zines, RSS feeds and assorted other electronic-based communications, a great deal of the content of which is (with a few noticeable exceptions) shrill, unreliable, conspiracy-driven, poorly researched and written, it's easy to be left wondering - where have all the good (Aussie) journos gone?

Don't despair. We have some good ones in Australia. Big picture thinkers and analytical essayists like Laura Tingle, Lenore Taylor, Brian Toohey, and Shaun Carney to name but a few. But none hold a candle to the inestimable George Megalogenis, senior writer for News Ltd's The Australian, author and moderator of the news blog Meganomics, and author of three of the most lucid, clear-eyed and impartial books (plus one extended essay) ever written about the nexus between Australia's major economic reforms and the collective impact of these on Australian society and identity.

Billed as The Australian's resident nit-picker, George Megalogenis is my favourite journalist for the single fact that although I have been following his work religiously for five years, have stalked him at almost every public appearance he's ever made and hung on his every word when he's been on ABC TV's Insiders, I have absolutely no way of ideologically pigeon-holing him. He is a Richmond supporter - read “tragic” - a music and cricket buff, the forty-something son of Greek migrants and a very handsome, very tall man with a beautiful speaking voice. 

That's all I know for certain.

Unlike culture warriors Andrew Bolt, David Marr, Miranda Devine or Robert Manne, George Megalogenis is a truly impartial, non-partisan observer of Australia's economy and cultural identity. This makes him an enigma. It is a measure of how well-regarded he is by both political camps that upon its publication The Longest Decade was launched by both Paul Keating (then ex-PM) and John Howard (then current-PM), and its re-issue by Kevin Rudd (then and now - all-purpose fuckwit).

In his books and articles and blogs, he does not start with an ideological or moral assertion and then cherry-pick the facts to bolster his argument. Like a good economics graduate with a sturdy grasp of both the micro- and macro- and a thirst for facts, George Megalogenis is first and foremost a data miner. He digs and he sifts through the numbers, looking for meaning and the stories they contain. He looks carefully at decades’ worth of Census population data, polls, focus group responses, immigration data and all the hard core figures that come out of Treasury. As fellow journalist Annabel Crabb says about Megalogenis, ‘George, you have a beautiful mind.’

Faultlines, as the title suggests, looks at the source of our divisions and contradictions as a society. Our fissures are not based on the old divisions of Right vs Left, but rather, Old vs New Australia, City vs Bush, Inner City vs everyone else. He coins the term Generation W. "Women and wogs" a demographic largely unnoticed by others, but one which he identifies as a group deserving special attention – the people who have both driven and benefited from the reform era and who are best placed to enjoy the society it has created – unlike the other Generation W which deregulation has left behind – Whitebread and on Welfare. You know, Pauline Hanson's people.

In Faultlines, George surveys a cohort of Gen Xs who'd graduated from Ringwood High in the late eighties - gauging the attitudes of residents of Australia's most marginal electoral seat Deakin. The variety of experience, expectations, political opinion and lifestyle choice expressed in this group paints a far more interesting, complex and muddy picture of Australian society than politicians who love a bit of wedge politics and the shrill, lazy dolts and poltroons of the screeching media would want us to believe.

In The Longest Decade, a book I have foisted on various family and friends, he examines the deregulation era under Bob Hawke and Paul Keating and John Howard. Tampa, the children overboard affair, Hansonism, the GST, the baby-bonus, Victoria's Kennett era and Generation W all come under George's relentlessly clear-eyed scrutiny. He challenges our memories of that time because he has at his disposal the results, the facts and the figures of deregulation.

His Quarterly Essay - Trivial Pursuit - examines and skewers the 24 hour news spin cycle and the decline in the national conversation between politicians and voters. 

The Australian Moment is a broad-brush canvas of Australia's reforms, starting with Gough Whitlam's golden ascendancy and spectacular demise (mirrored in Kevin Rudd some thirty years later), Malcolm Fraser's inertia and the Hawke-Keating reform era which, as far as George is concerned more or less ended with John Howard.

In short, George Megalogenis is no culture warrior. Though he sees modern Australia through the prism of the Greek-Australian migrant experience, he is first and foremost a numbers cruncher, a recogniser of patterns, an analyst and story-teller beholden to no one opinion-shaper, even through Rupert Murdoch pays his wages. He treats the reader with respect. He leaves you to make your own judgements.

And whilst he looks like a handsome, olive-skinned Thunderbird, you can be sure there is no Gerry Anderson pulling his strings.

Do yourself a favour and read him.

Muddy K's excellent Scandventure.

Stay tuned for a series of posts from guest blogger Muddy Karpitz as he shares his excellent Swedish adventures with an unsuspecting and unprepared reading public.