Loin chops with garlic & herb butter from Gordon Ramsay’s Fast Food

I haven’t been able to sit down to do any of my med work yet. I have a quiz coming up in less than a week and I have around 3 weeks worth of schoolwork to catch up on…so I decided to accomplish something in my life aka cook something from Gordon Ramsay’s Fast Food cookbook that I just recently bought from amazon.ca. So here it goes:

For the garlic and herb butter sauce you blend some softened butter with garlic, herbs (parsley and mint) and salt and pepper. The actual recipe tells you to chill while you prepare the chops but I basically did the sauce making while preparing the chops

Then I seasoned the pork chops with freshly ground pepper + salt and pan fried it in the skillet (the actual recipe told me to use thyme sprigs but I didn’t have any and so I used rosemary sprigs).

It also says there to spoon the juices over the chops as it cooks, except that my chops had no juice to pan with so I was a little confused.

Then place the garlic and herb butter sauce onto the pork chops and VOILA, you are done! I also boiled some sweet corn on the side. Delish!

This has got to be one of the easiest recipes from Gordon Ramsay!

Herb Crusted Rack of Lamb (served medium rare)- Gordon Ramsay F Word style

I’ve been wanting to savour rack of lamb for the longest time so I decided to make it myself. I totally forgot to buy bread crumbs or parmesan cheese- so i improvised. Well for the bread crumbs I toasted wholewheat bread and just mashed it and placed it in the blender and as for the parmesan cheese, I borrowed my roommates (Good thing she had some). Anyways, here’s how I did it:

Season lamb cutlets with salt and pepper – rub it in

Pan fry it for a few seconds until both sides brown

Preheat oven to 350F (around there) and bake it for 7-8 minutes

To make the herb crust, mix bread crumbs, parsley, thyme and rosemary, salt and pepper and parmesan cheese and a tinge of olive oil to make it all stick together and place it all into the blender (I didn’t use as much thyme because I ran out)

When lamb cutlet is done being baked, put on dijon mustard on it and then dip this into the herb crust

Bake in the oven for another 2-3 minutes

Voila you are done!

Reflection on my much-needed break back to Canada:

I had a really really good break because I had a chance to catch up with my close friends (spent some quality hangout time- got to cook a recipe together with a good friend and with another one I got to play some songs on the electric keyboard while she played around on her drum set- though we never got recording it was still a memorable moment- we also got to do our traditional Keg dinner and reminisce on old times) and though I didn’t get to spend much time with my sister (she studied a lot due to her crazy exam schedule and I never got down to studying after my philosophy exam), I did get to see her (so I cooked her a few dishes from Gordon Ramsay’s cookbook such as pork chop in piquant sauce and chicken breasts wrapped in prosciutto and stuffed with sage and ricotta cheese to help her de-stress/ lessen cooking time so she can study more). I was actually fairly pleased that she liked the dishes I made for her because she is very picky and has very high standards. I also got to go dancing at Rouge and at Lavish and got hammered both nights and both nights ended on very high notes (somehow I always do end up smoking a lot of cigarettes when I’m drunk and also shisha) I should really stop shortening my life haha! I also got a chance to shop for things- I was actually surprised at what an efficient shopper I was- I bought everything I had made a list for in 1/1/2 days. I think it’s also touching to know that some of my friends (that I’m not as close to) set aside a few hours to hang out especially when they were nowhere near ready for their 60% final exam that was on the next day & doing poorly would affect their entrance into professional school)- instead they are going to sacrifice a few hours of sleep. It was also super refreshing to be able to drive myself around. Also, I found an old childhood friend on facebook. Well I had her on msn all along but never really realized it. Turns out she is currently in Sydney and would love to show me around. She seems very spontaneous and adventurous so I’ve decided that in my 6 years in Australia, I will come down to Sydney and visit her. It’s funny because when I moved to Australia a few months ago I thought I didn’t know anyone there (except for a few cousins) but now I remembered that most of my classmates from middle school all went to Australia and that I would still have them on facebook. Tis the power of facebook! It’s funny how when you think one door closes (the path in Canada), another one opens (the new life in Australia). For example, in Australia I’m basically forced to be more active since I have to bike everywhere to get to places. I also find that in Australia, the more relaxed and laid back me is brought out more. (Though I’d say my parents would argue that I am too laid back for my own good sometimes. I disagree however!)

With all these things being said though, I think the most important thing was the realization of these things back home:

- My friendships with my close friends are strong enough to evolve into an adult friendship status- where you don’t have to see each other constantly to maintain the friendship (we can be apart for months on end without much contact and meet up and catch up like old times) I am very grateful to know this.

- Though we are all going in different directions, I know that we will all still keep in touch no matter the distance or circumstances

- I want a girl that makes me feel the same kind of euphoria I do when I sing and dance

- It’s these friendships and closeness to others that empowers me

- Learning new things/ being excited about things fires me up. I want to stay curious and keep on asking those questions, even though some may come across as being stupid!

Reading, oh how I've missed thee!

While waiting for my flight from Brisbane to LA, I had 3 hours to kill and I decided to browse through a bookstore. My love for reading actually died down many years ago. I think the last time I read a whole book outside of the required readings dictated in school was about 3-4 years ago and even then I never really sat down to read that much anyways. It’s one of those “I’m too busy for this” things that happened. However, after reading the book “Who Moved My Cheese” (Also as a sidenote, my sister was like “Who reads a book called who moved my cheese?!?!?!” umm apparently me haha!) and seeing other titles of books, I have decided to make time to read every day. Also, I think that reading about the opinions and ideas of others, you can improve yourself in many aspects of your life and I can’t wait to be a better person with these regards. I think doing medicine does not have a time limit to it (there is just so much to learn that even if you studied for 24/7 you wouldn’t possibly be able to know everything there is to it- which I think is a pretty humbling thing that there is just SO MUCH information out there), so you can choose to do it 24/7 or you can do it as a career and not let it take over your life. I think most of the time before getting into medical school I’ve been caught up with getting in that I’ve forgotten about / not cared as much about what goes on in the world around me. In this manner, I feel like I’ve lost touch with the real world.

A couple of book titles that caught my attention were

- Daniel Tammet’s Born on a Blue Day that chronicles his way through life being a savant

- Michael J Fox’s Always Looking Up that chronicles his very positive view though he was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease at the height of his career

- Mitch Albom’s the 5 people you meet in heaven

I also read a few food magazines and jotted down a few recommended restaurants in Melbourne and Sydney since I will be spending at least 2 weeks in Melbourne this coming June. I just actually started really getting into cooking only recently and I’m in awe with regards to how much there is to learn about cooking! It’s not as simple as I thought it would be. There is so much art involved in it and I believe that what attracts me the most to it is the fact that you could go on an adventure while cooking. Also, to watch Gordon Ramsay and the passion he always has when cooking (at least in his F word show videos) is very inspiring. I absolutely LOVE seeing people very passionate about what they do. It’s a very very very beautiful thing.

What happens in my brain (instead of the idea of sleep) when the in-flight entertainment doesn’t work for the first part of the flight…

So I was getting my meal for my Qantas flight from Brisbane to LA and don’t get me wrong, the food was pretty good by airplane food standards because it was edible and had some sort of a flavour (full cream milk and weet-a-bix and yoghurt), but what bothered me more though, was the fact that Qantas provided full cream milk instead of 2% milk, and butter instead of margarine. How many people actually drink full cream milk in the first place and who gets to decide what selection is provided? It is no wonder that obesity is very prevalent in Western countries. Also, the yoghurt we got at the airplane was definitely what I would NOT eat regularly because of the amount of sugar in that thing. 14.5 g of sugar in a serving of yoghurt, no matter how good it tastes, is a ridiculous amount! Plus, they also had a LOT of dairy for breakfast- yoghurt, full cream milk and very little whole grain- like the 6 pieces of weet-a-bix you were fed. My musings about serving healthy food on the plane was spurred on by recent discussion with my Aussie roommates Matt and Pranav the night before my departure from Townsville about which brand of yoghurt to go with- basically one with the least fat and sugar yet still somewhat tasty (this is a very late realization, but basically I realized that natural yoghurt tastes really sour and it is the sugar that makes it edible).
Also, what bothered me was how much plastic and packaging was involved with each serving of airplane food. For my tray I had those plastic utensils, then the aluminium foil that covered the food for dinner, or the cereal box that was a plastic bowl, the full cream milk carton…the more I count, the more guilty I feel. Considering how many people fly every single day (also with long haul flights, you usually get 2-3 meals plus snacks), I just wonder how much conserving we can do simply by starting change at the airline level (rather than just aimed at the household level). At the same time, I thought back to the amount of plastic packaging are involved with snacks, the blankets, the headphones…you get the point. Could I write a letter to them expressing my concern? Where can I get some statistics with how much waste is produced by the airline industry and more importantly, will they even care about my concern?

What I Learned from Who Moved My Cheese

So while waiting for my flight out from Townsville to Brisbane, I finally got down to read the book “Who Moved My Cheese”. The story is actually very simple that even a kindergarten kid would understand it. The power in the book’s message lies in the readers’ interpretation and these are the important lessons that I learned from this book:
- Always prepare yourself for change – things always change and you won’t be caught off-guard when this is so- in other words, be adaptable and flexible
o The way to do this is to have enthusiasm and carry around a fighting spirit (not the hostile kind, but the excited to take on the world kind and ready for anything kind of fighting spirit)
- Always be aware of your environment to scope out for signs of change to occur – pay attention and be knowledgeable enough to be able to do this
- Celebrate change- change doesn’t always have to be bad- It is bad only if you think it is bad
o If it is bad, then change your perspectives on it- see it as a challenge instead
o Some people can argue that changing your perspectives about something be a sign of weakness. Is it simply a defense mechanism so you won’t get hurt? Let’s say if your friend betrays your trust and you have the option of a) being miserable about it and sulking about it for days then perpetuate revenge b) feel hurt but move on and learn lesson from it. In this case (like in any other case), the situation stays the same- your friend no matter what, already betrayed your trust. Similarly, how others react to you telling them the news stays the same- they will feel bad for you and they will be concerned about your well-being and try to cheer you up. The only thing that doesn’t change is the fact that you are still hurt. You can choose to be miserable. Only you yourself can make you feel miserable. If you pick a, you will lose out because there is simply not enough time in the world to not be happy. You can choose action b and learn a lesson from it. In both cases, both actions do not give us the same results, especially FUTURE results. The way I see it is that by learning a lesson from each time that we feel that we’ve failed, we become better-skilled, more experienced and wiser.
- Don’t let the fear of failure hold you back- the way I see things now – there are certain fears that are helpful to survival and so one should have them to preserve one’s own life i.e. the fear of dying would prevent you from jumping in front of a bus, but there are other fears that I feel would be debilitating
o I think that the fear of failure can be overcome with a change of perspectives, like weighing out what the worst situation can happen and work with that
i.e. the worst that could happen is for me to lose 1000$ and I do have 1000$ to spare anyways and the best situation is for me to secure a business deal and move up higher in my job position so there is actually not that much to lose- so by employing such a technique, you would have more confidence and would be more likely to succeed and end up not losing that 1000$
- You shouldn’t expect to do the same thing over and over to only expect different results- that’s just not being realistic and foolish
o Change the way you are doing things, THEN expect a change in results

Pork chop with Piquant Sauce - Gordon Ramsay Style

So while I was in Canada I decided to start cooking from Gordon Ramsay's cook books (I bought 2 online off of amazon.ca). I chose pork chop with piquant sauce since my sister doesn't like steak/ lamb chops that much and I don't really like chicken, so pork is our common ground.
When I read recipes, I don't really read them carefully, so I did not pay attention to the fact thatI would need more tomatoes. So while making the piquant sauce, I had to cook it for longer and had to add more sugar than usual and had to keep on garnishing it. The sauce did turn out well (my sister said it was delicious) but for next time, read the recipe more carefully! Though my mom did say that real cooking doesn't involve recipes. (I do agree with that to some extent now...but when I first heard it I was like, come on mom, throw me a bone here...I just started cooking!) So here is the end product and at this point, I'm too lazy to write down how I made it: