RAVIOLI

THE JOY OF COOKING

Probably the first cookbook I ever read was the Joy of Cooking. Written by Irma S. Rombauer, with around eight editions, this cookbook has been in print since 1936. Our own 1985 edition interested me, with it's recipes for calf head soup and pictures of pineapples cut into fruit baskets. Later in life, I learnt to make pasta, and ravioli became a staple of my diet. Left alone some weekends at the house, I would make up a batch of ravioli, and sit down to watch a whole series of Sex and the City. 

Here is the ravioli recipe, as it appears in the Joy of Cooking:

Noodle dough:
On a large pastry board or marble tabletop make a well of:
2/3 cup all-purpose flour
Drop into it:
1 egg
barely combined with:
1 tablespoon water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon oil

Work the mixture with your hands, folding the flour over the egg until the dough can be rolled into a ball and comes clean from the hands. [add more flour if sticky]. Knead the dough as for bread for about 10 minutes. Let it stand for a while. Now roll the dough, stretching it a little more with each roll. Between each rolling and stretching, continue to sprinkle it with flour to stop it from sticking or developing holes. Repeat... until paper-thin and translucent. For ravioli: fill the dough immediately with filling and cook in rapidly boiling salted water for about 10 minutes.

ANIMAL CRACKERS

“Animal crackers and cocoa to drink,
That is the finest of suppers, I think;
When I am grown up and can have what I please
I think I shall always insist upon these.”

— Christopher Morley

SPRINKLES GALORE

In the days of hot-wheels, dragon ball-z and monkey-bars, we ate dunkaroos, goldfish crackers, and animal crackers. 

In actuality, animal-shaped biscuits have been around for a while - the earliest examples dating from the late 19th century. Over the years, several brands have produced any number of animals. From kangaroos to cats, mountain goats to rhinos, and donkeys to turtles, they have made a veritable Noah's ark of animals in a wide range of styles, colours, and packagings. The animal crackers that I remember, though, were pink and covered in sprinkles. 

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RECIPE

In a burst of nostalgia for pink sprinkled elephants, I created my own recipe for animal crackers, and while it is more of a biscuit, I am sure it will satisfy your own nostalgic impulses too. 

CRACKERS

350g PLAIN FLOUR
150g SELF RAISING FLOUR
125g WHITE SUGAR
125g BUTTER, DICED
125g GOLDEN SYRUP

ICING

A BIT OF WATER
A LOT OF ICING SUGAR
A SPLASH OF LEMON
A DROP OF RED FOOD COLOURING
MANY SPRINKLES

• Sift the flours into a bowl, and add the sugar.
• Rub in the butter with your fingertips.
• Make a well, then add the egg and syrup. Then mix the dough into a ball.
• Separate the dough into two halves, and roll each half with a rolling pin into sheets 5mm thick.
• Cut out your animal shapes - either by hand with a butter knife, or with cookie cutters.
• Bake at 170 C/ 350 F on a baking sheet for approx. 15 minutes, or till golden brown.
• Cool completely. 
• Mix the icing ingredients to make a stiff pink icing with a lemony flavour. 
• Outline the crackers with the icing, before adding a little more water to the mix and using this to fill the middle areas. Have patience, this way the cookies will look much neater. 
• Add sprinkles. 
• Demolish your animal crackers, and wash it all down with a tall glass of milk.

IRIDESCENT AURELIA

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- CURIOSITY -

Naturalists have collected, categorised and curated butterflies for over three hundred years. Stuffing boxes and cabinets with their curiosities, they ordered and classified their shining Aurelian specimens. This was, of course, at a time when evolutionary theory was hot off the press, and science was becoming exciting.

Yet, the Aurelians were not just a people of science; they were also a people of great feeling. It was their curiosity, their admiration of beauty, their passion and wonder that drove them to search in fields and in forest. And, oh, that moment of discovery - of sighting a rarity. Such a moment was often based on luck, and likened to an epiphany. Take, for example, the feeling of one Aurelian enthusiast, upon finding an Ornithoptera croesus:

“My heart began to beat violently... I felt much more like fainting than I have done when in apprehension of immediate death. I had a headache for the rest of the day.”

— Alfred Russel Wallace

Now, my curiosity is with the naturalists themselves: what made them tick, and how and why they created these beautiful, dusty monuments to Mother Nature. That is my study.