Month: June 2010

A signature dish

Unlike Ben, I’m sticking with MasterChef through thick and thin. Yes, the plate dropping incident was shark jumpingly contrived. Yes, George reminds me of the type of sports fan who throws “Aussie, Aussie, Aussie” in to any pause in conversation, and yes, the product placement can be a little over the top, and yes, the contestants are all prima donnas who spout mangled sporting cliches about how this experience is life changing and elimination is but a small hurdle on the path to dream fulfillment… but it’s about food. So it’s compelling viewing.

Have you got a signature dish? What is it?

I like cooking curries. Some people have told me they like my Butter Chicken recipe, my wife has told me that the Beef Massaman I made this week is “my best curry ever”… so here’s my attempt to recreate the recipe for posterity’s sake… it’s designed to have leftovers – because curry is always better two days later.

Ingredients

  • Approx 400g of Rump Steak
  • A large onion
  • Crushed garlic (1 dessert spoon)
  • Two potatoes
  • One large tin of tomato soup, or a small tin of concentrate (plus an equal volume of water).
  • One standard sized tin of Coconut Cream
  • 100gm of butter
  • Curry Powder (to taste)
  • Turmeric (a pinch)
  • Cinnamon (a pinch)
  • Hungarian Sweet Paprika (two pinches)
  • Fish Oil (two teaspoons)
  • Brown sugar (a tablespoon)
  • Massaman curry paste (the type that comes in a jar)

Steps

  1. Slice the onion. Fry it on a low heat with the garlic, some olive oil and curry powder.
  2. Dice the potatoes, boil them till they’re soft.
  3. Mix the tomato soup, coconut cream, curry powder, paprika, cinnamon, and butter in a large pot. Keep it on a relatively high heat and stir until the ingredients are a nice smooth sauce.
  4. Add the onion and potato to the sauce.
  5. Add the brown sugar and fish oil.
  6. Mix the massaman paste in a frypan with a dash of olive oil. The jar probably says to fry it until you can smell it. Do that.
  7. Dice the steak. Add it to the frypan – coat the pieces liberally with the fried paste. Cook until the pieces are medium rare.
  8. Add the steak to the sauce.
  9. Simmer on low heat for 45 minutes.
  10. Serve with rice.

I’ll try following these steps again in a week or so to make sure I haven’t missed a step. But I think it’s all there. Tomato soup is a terrific base for cooking. I also use it in my Butter Chicken and Spaghetti Bolognese.

June 2, 2010

Bling for Jesus

Technically I should be writing this mammoth essay – but my friend Mika sent me this – and I can’t resist a rant.

Once upon a time I preached a sermon on Jesus sending the disciples out in pairs after his “harvest is plentiful, workers are few” sermon. He basically gave them authority to cast out demons and heal the sick in his name. I said that the instruction to evangelise was normative for Christians but that this gifting was specific to the apostles.

A dear sister from the congregation came up afterwards to correct me. On the basis of a bit of the Bible that pretty clearly is dubious. Mark 16:9ff. It’s a bit that comes with a note – in every version – that the earliest manuscripts don’t contain it, which should ring alarm bells. I’m ok with these passages being there – what I’m not ok with is people using them to create a point of difference with all other churches. Seriously, if you hold a minority position, at some point you’ve got to ask questions about the basis of that distinction. This well meaning lady pointed out that right there, in Mark 16:17, there’s what appears to be a promise that all who believe will have the ability to drive out demons, and in verse 18b there’s a promise that we’ll be able to heal the sick:

“17 And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues;”

What she didn’t mention, and what I was incredibly tempted to point out, was that in between driving out demons and healing people there’s the idea that we should also be playing with snakes and drinking poison:

“18 they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

If these verses are authentic then it’s much more likely they describe Paul at the end of Acts (he gets bitten by a snake, and he heals people). They’re not the sort of verses I’d be turning into theme verses for my life. There are actually snake handling churches out there (mostly, I think, in the US). The way I’d want to use them, if I was inclined, would be to argue with the anti-alcohol lobby that this is in fact an exhortation to drink poison, and that such drinking is a sign of faith…

Here’s a video (that I haven’t watched)…

Which, tangentially, very tangentially, leads to my actual point about this jewelery service “Bling for Jesus“…

Bling for Jesus have taken Deuteronomy 6:5-6 and 6:8 and turned them into some sort of business model.

“Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with
all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts…
Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads”

This clearly means turn bible verses into bracelets and tiaras. Right? Leaving the theological problems aside, these things are just ugly:



June 2, 2010

Written in stone

The essay I’m working on currently requires the use of “primary sources” from Rome. This means reading a bunch of inscriptions which were either sycophantic pandering to the emperor or imperial bragging.

But this is cool. Next time somebody you’re talking to about what possible explanation there might be for Jesus body not being in the tomb on Easter Sunday here’s a piece of relevant Roman legislation.

Imperial edict – Date disputed (either Augustus, Tiberius or Claudius)
White marble stele – possibly form Nazareth

Edict of Caesar. It pleases me, in regard to graves and tombs, whoever has made them for the cult of ancestors, or children, or kinsmen, that these things remain undisturbed forever; and if someone reports that anyone has either destroyed or in any other way removed the buried dead or has moved them to other locations with evil intentions to the injustice of the buried dead or if the tombstones or stones have been moved, against a person of this sort I order that a trial be started, just as in the case of gods, just so for the cults of mortals. There will be much greater need to honour the buried dead. In general, nobody will have permission to move them; otherwise such a person will be liable to capital punishment on a charge of violation of sepulchre. This is my wish.

June 2, 2010