Getting brekkie right

[Michele]  One of our family's traditions is Sunday morning blueberry sourdough pancakes.  Making this in Australia presented some challenges so last Sunday's breakfast didn't come out quite right.  No, the challenge wasn't the sourdough. I planned ahead for that and brought some with me from the US.  I actually spent a couple days trying to dry my sourdough out into a powder, thinking that this would be safer than a paste. Then I realized that an off-white powder might appear more contraband than a stinky paste.  In the end I brought a little of each and although both were inspected (notes next to them in my luggage confirmed this) they both made it through.

The other sourdough blueberry pancake ingredients were found on Aussie soil.  Blueberries and proper maple syrup (from trees and not from sugar cane) were procured.  Since sugar cane is a major crop around here, finding maple syrup is tricky but Woolies had some imported from Canada.  One of the things that went wrong last week when we made sourdough blueberry pancakes was a belated realization that the rental house did not include a fry pan.  Who offers pots and pans, colanders and the like, and doesn't offer a fry pan with their rental house?  Apparently the same people who decorate with brown walls and white couches (but that is a subject for another post.  But seriously, check out the white couch in the photo behind will.  White couches.  Outside too!   Right, right, more on that later...). So anyways, in an effort to save breakfast last week we bravely attempted to grill the pancakes outside.  Since we still hadn't figured out the grill, the pancakes worked out only moderately well.

Over the past week, we went to KMart and stocked up on lots of missing household good including.... a fry pan. Ah ha!  Now that our kitchen kit includes a fry pan (as well as measuring cup, plates that weight less than 5 pounds each and other items), today's blueberry pancakes came out very nicely and provided for us a familiar taste of home.  Note: in the photo above you can see some of the very nice art referred to in the earlier fancy house, empty pantry posting.  You can also see the cheerful KMart plastic plates that we bought to use in our uber-fancy house to substitute for the heavy black ones, such as the small rectangular bowls in the center of the table. Yes, heavy rectangular black plates and bowls are more artful and cosmopolitan... but I guess we ain't.  Polkadot plastic FTW!

After a first round of familiar sourdough blueberry pancakes, we did add some Aussie by topping them with passionfruit that Uncle  Larry bought Will at the Mareeba market yesterday.  Passionfruit on pancakes (in addition to maple syrup) got rave reviews all around (see photo at right).   BTW: We had a great time with the Aussies Andresens at the Mareeba market followed by a birthday picnic.  It is wonderful to be able to spend time with them.

PS. The house does have cutlery, Will was just being goofy for this photo.  You can see that Robin and Gavin are used to these sort of antics and are ignoring him.