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00:09 This podcast was recorded at State Library Victoria on Aboriginal land, the land of the Wurunjeri people of the Kulin Nations. We pay our respects to their elders past and present.
00:21 (piano music)
00:30 PENNY: Hello Christina.
CHRISTINA: Hi Penny.
PENNY: Welcome to In Those Days.
CHRISTINA: Thank you.
PENNY: Let's do some Trove Chat.
CHRISTINA: Trove Chat.
PENNY: I'm really sad to say that not everyone has time
CHRISTINA: Disappointing
PENNY: To scroll through Trove.
CHRISTINA: People need to get their priorities sorted.
PENNY: They do. And luckily the good people at Trove have helped those people out because they've got a section on the website that's called 'Spotlight' and they kind of highlight some of the most interesting materials in Trove.
CHRISTINA: That sounds like a very helpful package.
PENNY: It is. I think. And they have stuff like. If they've just digitised a whole lot of cookbooks they'll have some highlights from those.
CHRISTINA: Kind of like when you turn Netflix on and you can see, what's trending.
PENNY: You get little previews. That sort of thing. There was one good article that was like all theatre reviews of 'Don's Party' by David Williamson from when it first came out.
CHRISTINA: Oh, okay.
PENNY: Which I hope there, I didn't actually read the whole thing but I'd love it if there were some like reviews trashing it, because I love reading bad reviews of things.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, I love it.
PENNY: Then there's stuff like, there was an article on the first Australian Women's Cricket team.
CHRISTINA: No one expected that.
PENNY: And so look, it's it's better than scrolling social media. Much more wholesome.
CHRISTINA: Little bit judgmental Penny. I know I've got some issues scrolling social media at times.
PENNY: Yeah I'm judging myself as well actually to be honest. On social media what I tend to do is latch onto a controversy and then I want to follow it in all it's little directions.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, yeah, I'm not quite sure what my current trend is with that. I just spend too much time looking at silly stuff.
PENNY: Yep but if you look at Trove, you'll be a good person (hesitantly)
CHRISTINA: A better person than the social media trawler.
02:12 (piano music)

02:21 PENNY: We've got a returning guest today on In Those Days, my friend, who is a comedian and a TV writer and normal writer and a very funny person
VAYA: Thanks, well I was a comedian but I don't self-identify as one anymore but
PENNY: I'm so sorry
VAYA: But no, but like
PENNY: Neither do I. And cos this is, it's Vaya Pashos by the way.
VAYA: Thanks. Hi. But I'm happy to just take that title for life.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, just take it.
PENNY: Yep. I actually,
CHRISTINA: Yeah, if you ever made money from being funny, you're a comedian.
PENNY: Cos I really hate it when people introduce me as a comedian cos I like
CHRISTINA: High pressure
PENNY: I like to have very low expectations set and exceed them
CHRISTINA: You see people light up and think 'oh this is going to be good'.
PENNY: I prefer to surprise not disappoint.
VAYA: It tends to be a word that people throw in for context like, 'And she's funny because of previous reasons'. But I'm happy, I'd like to be one forever. Just without doing any work.
CHRISTINA: You are one.
PENNY: We're comedy adjacent.
VAYA: Yeah. Amusing.
PENNY: Comedy adjacent. It's not good. It doesn't sound good. 'She's more comedy adjacent'.
VAYA: It's more a think-piece.
CHRISTINA: Yeah. Spoken word comedy.
PENNY: So we're coming up for Easter. Exciting time of the year.
VAYA: I'd like to say which one, Penny, which one?
PENNY: That's exactly what I wanted to ask you about Vaya.
CHRISTINA: Controversial.
PENNY: Cos you, do you celebrate both Easters now, because you
VAYA: I go where the food is Penny. I go where the food is.
CHRISTINA: I support that.
VAYA: Yeah, so I traditionally have called it Greek Easter. Greester if we're feeling a bit cheeky. In recent years people prefer Orthodox Easter but look, I'm no religious.
PENNY: Right. So it's not Orthodox for you
CHRISTINA: Except for big celebrations.
VAYA: Yeah, if that.
PENNY: You don't have to believe that Jesus is really coming back.
VAYA: So calling it Orthodox Easter to me is just a step too far.
CHRISTINA: Easter 2.0.
VAYA: Cos the Russians, they want to be included, historically.
PENNY: I get it, right.
VAYA: And socially. And people always ask me when it is. And the answer to that is you Google it, the year of
CHRISTINA: Can we just have a set date for Easter. I know it's not like that but it's really inconvenient cos no-one knows when it's coming.
VAYA: And it's to do with the moon, isn't it Penny?
PENNY: It's the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Autumn equinox.
VAYA: Obviously.
CHRISTINA: After you've sacrificed a field of daisies. I don't know, it's all a bit weird.
PENNY: Greek Easter, just using your preferred term there Vaya.
VAYA: Thank you.
PENNY: It's based on a different calendar, isn't it? So one's the Gregorian calendar and
CHRISTINA: I knew we were going to say Gregorian today. I just knew it was going to come out.
VAYA: I don't know.
CHRISTINA: She's just there for the eggs.
VAYA: Because I don't, I just, I just thought it was, I don't know.
CHRISTINA: I just thought it was certain communities capitalising on the sales after Easter.
VAYA: Yeah, there is a bit of that but that's just an added perk and it's a real nuisance when it falls on the same day as, as I call it 'Skip Easter'.
CHRISTINA: Yeah.
PENNY: Oh, Skip Easter.
VAYA: Which is a term that evolved from the Australian Sitcom 'Acropolis Now'.
CHRISTINA: Where we take all of our cues on cultural appropriation.
PENNY: So did they call it Skip Easter, they just called everyone Skips?
VAYA: They called everyone Skip, which is derived from Skippy the bush kangaroo.
PENNY: Excellent. Well, I think we'll go with those terms Skip Easter and Greek Easter just for this episode, if everyone's comfortable with that.
VAYA: They probably aren't.
PENNY: Everyone in this room.
CHRISTINA: Everyone in the room is.
VAYA: You can say Aussie Easter.
PENNY: Christina, what's your experience with Easter? Are you celebrating?
CHRISTINA: In a minimal kind of way. Bit of a sad event really. I mean, not a sad event but it
VAYA: Well it is sad.
CHRISTINA: It just feels like the poor cousin of Christmas really. There's not the level of hype. And then I'm one of those people who doesn't demolish all my chocolate all at once. So, I'll still be eating that in August and it's not like I get a big haul of it either.
VAYA: Also, there'll be fresh chocolate on sale in August. So you can just go back and renew.
PENNY: My aim, as a child, was always to make my chocolate last until my birthday, which was in August.
CHRISTINA: Well, I think we're on a similar timeline.
PENNY: And I do, and I was pretty good with that. But it was actually, just became very stressful eating the chocolate. Because you'd have a little bit and then you'd go 'Oh, I've had too much. It's not gonna last!'
CHRISTINA: And I think.
PENNY: It's the first week of June.
CHRISTINA: And I always associate, it's a bit strange because I haven't done comedy festival stuff for years and years, but I always associate Easter with the Comedy Festival.
PENNY: Yes.
CHRISTINA: It always falls in there. And then, are you having a show on Good Friday? Are you not having, you know, there's a lot of, a lot of questions.
VAYA: Because comedy doesn't stop for Jesus.
CHRISTINA: No, no. Nor should it.
PENNY: When I was in the Raw Comedy Final, it was on Easter Sunday, and I remember that. And I remember finding that, at that time in my life, slightly weird and being like, 'Oh, I don't get to spend the day with my family'.
VAYA: Just get to do Show Business!
CHRISTINA: I prioritise comedy.
PENNY: I'm at the Town Hall with Yianni.
VAYA: Cos he doesn't have to worry, cos his celebrated a week later.
CHRISTINA: Exactly.
PENNY: Not bothered.
CHRISTINA: Not bothered at all.
07:39 PENNY: But anyway, I thought what we'd talk about today, is I looked up, because for our Christmas episode we talked about Christmas recipes. So I've looked up some Easter recipes.
CHRISTINA: Good I hope there's a bit more chocolate here.
PENNY: No.
VAYA: And I'll talk to you about the menu we enjoyed when I once spent a Greek Easter in my father's Greek village in Greece. Amazing.
PENNY: Oooh. Was it good?
VAYA: Amazing. Spoiler alert: 5 lambs.
08:09 PENNY: Wow. Okay. So this is from the Brisbane Sunday Mail and it was from the 10th of April 1927. It starts off with:
"The following interesting Easter recipes have been supplied by readers."
And I thought, I wasn't sure if, journalist actually meant interesting, or whether it was a sledge. And then I read the recipes and I think it's a sledge. Okay. So the first one is Easter eggs. Which sounds nice, Easter eggs, Easter. But don't get excited, it's not chocolate and I'm just gonna read the method okay?
CHRISTINA: Okay.
PENNY: "Soak the gelatine"
CHRISTINA: No.
VAYA: Trigger warning for your Christmas episode.
PENNY: "For an hour, then add it to the milk when it boils. Stir in the sugar and mix well. Divide the mixture into four parts; one part leave white and flavour with almonds;"
VAYA: Yum.
PENNY: Yeah. That's fine.
"into another pint stir the beaten yolks of 2 eggs, stir over the fire till the eggs are cooked, but do not let it boil and flavour with lemon"
So that one's basically gonna be lemon and yellow.
CHRISTINA: Egg lemon.
VAYA: But you've cracked the eggs to put them in.
PENNY: Yeah, the kind of yolks will make it
CHRISTINA: So it's custardy?
PENNY: Yeah.
VAYA: Okay.
CHRISTINA: Lemon custard.
VAYA: Yum.
PENNY: "into the third portion put the chocolate, which must be softened over boiling water, made into smooth paste, and flavour with vanilla"
So that's, yeah, so you do have one chocolate flavoured egg.
"colour the fourth portion with carmine, and flavour with rose water."
Now carmine is that red colouring made from insects.
CHRISTINA: Yep.
PENNY: "So rinse out"
Which we still use in things. Don't they?
CHRISTINA: Yep.
PENNY: "Rinse out 12 egg shells, which have been very carefully broken at the ends"
VAYA: That's not possible.
PENNY: "So as to leave the shape of the egg as perfect as possible.
VAYA: And I love it that they've not told you how. Just do it carefully! Yes, but how mate?
PENNY: In my family we had a bit of a tradition, this is when we were a bit older as well. Like, we we would decorate eggs and we'd blow them
CHRISTINA: Would you?
PENNY: Yeah. And you'd put the little hole in the bottom and the top. My older sister Georgina always wanted the eggs to be good and perfect. So she put tiny little holes. She'd be huffing and puffing on her egg.
CHRISTINA: It's an alarming visual.
PENNY: There was one time where my mum was just losing it. Like she was just laughing so hard. And it was so inappropriate.
VAYA: Just get an extra pinprick going there Georgina.
PENNY: Just crack it. What are you?
CHRISTINA: She got a lot out of that.
PENNY: How's it gonna affect your artistic vision?
VAYA: I love it.
PENNY: And then there'd always be someone at the end who'd be like 'We should make a omelet from the eggs.
CHRISTINA: No, just let it go.
VAYA: No, no.
PENNY: Everyone's been spitting into the eggs.
CHRISTINA: Just give it to the dog.
VAYA: Dog, that's good.
PENNY: But we did do some very artistic, like some people. And we had friends who were really good at art so they'd like. Someone made a nun once, like and she put a tissue over. It looked so good.
VAYA: So in the Greek Easter tradition we crack the dyed red eggs. I think it's symbolising the blood of Christ. I feel like everything symbolises the blood of Christ if you just don't know
CHRISTINA: Blood of Christ in there.
PENNY: Wine, eggs
VAYA: And you each take an egg, you and a partner at the table. You can put them nose to nose or bum to bum you tap them and say 'Christos Anesti' which is Christ has risen. The person who cracks, whose egg is cracked is out of that round and the key is to be the person with the last egg standing and then you're the winner of Greek Easter. Like some years there might be a cheeky uncle who's brought in a fake, like wooden egg that's
CHRISTINA: Oh crazy. Uncle Spiros.
VAYA: You're not invited. And then you open your eggs and you eat them with your lunch. It's lovely.
CHRISTINA: Great
VAYA: And then you keep eating them for weeks to come cos there's too many.
PENNY: Right, so they're boiled eggs?
VAYA: They're boiled forever. You just
PENNY: So there's no
VAYA: You boil, you put the eggs on to boil, you go clean the house for the rest of the day and then you come back to get them.
PENNY: Yum, Yum. So it continues
VAYA: Oh yeah, sorry
PENNY: "Fill the shells with the various mixtures and set upright in a shallow pan of flour"
VAYA: Again, how are you filling them? Any funnel tips? None.
PENNY: Yes, because what's gonna happen
CHRISTINA: No funnel tips.
VAYA: I'm picturing Georgina's tiny prick and nothing's going in there.
CHRISTINA: Well, that, you really need the context before you hear that statement.
PENNY: Because you have to tip. Yeah, because you've got a custard.
CHRISTINA: I hate putting something back in something that's been emptied. Like, do remember those shit orange jelly things that used to be a bit of a trend, maybe just when I was a child at my kinder so you've peeled the stuff out of the orange and then you just are randomly putting jelly in it.
VAYA: You put orange jelly back into the peel.
CHRISTINA: Also a bit like a cob loaf dip. I like the taste, but I don't like the fact that it's encased in a bread.
PENNY: And then the bread gets soggy.
CHRISTINA: No, I've got a lot of
VAYA: I wouldn't mind it. If I was eating it for myself. I don't like a shared cob loaf dip.
CHRISTINA: No. It's really too communal.
VAYA: But if I've got a personal cob, go for it.
CHRISTINA: Everyone needs there own personal cob.
PENNY: Okay, so you put these eggs:
"in a shallow pan of flour or bran to keep them steady, and leave till next day;"
CHRISTINA: Who's got bran lying around?
VAYA: The older generation.
PENNY: Regular.
"Then you break the shells very carefully and arrange the coloured eggs on a bed of clear wine jelly, that's been broken up into sparkling pieces"
CHRISTINA: Nah, I don't get it.
VAYA: I feel like that's just a bit of extra pizzazz that's just not necessary.
CHRISTINA: I'd need a lot of visuals.
PENNY: So it's like a jelly egg, on jelly. And look, to be honest, this is not the worst thing I've seen done with gelatin.
VAYA: It sounds fine.
PENNY: I mean, it's, there's no meat involved.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, apart from the gelatin cos it's hoofs and horns.
VAYA: Didn't sell as well that branding. We've gotta come back to the table with a new name.
CHRISTINA: Kind of like blood and bone.
PENNY: Exactly.
CHRISTINA: That's been more successful for the garden.
14:37 PENNY: So the next recipe is hot cross buns. Vaya, you are coeliac, so,
VAYA: Yeah, but the hot cross bun game has come to the party for coeliacs.
CHRISTINA: Good.
VAYA: Every major supermarket and upper-class bakery will give you a gluten-free hot cross bun option, including the very modern chocolate-chip, chocolate chocolate,
CHRISTINA: We don't want you to miss out.
VAYA: Apple cinnamon hot takes. It's just whatever you need, they've got you covered.
CHRISTINA: Have you been able to access the Vegemite ones that have been released at Coles recently?
VAYA: That sounds appalling. I'm still upset I can't get the Vegemite roast chook. I really want to taste that.
CHRISTINA: Is that a thing?
PENNY: Has that got, is that not gluten free?
VAYA: I may have dreamt that. Vegemite's not traditionally gluten-free unless you get the gluten-free Vegemite, which wasn't on the scene when I was diagnosed. I had, it took a few years for them to figure out how to get all that yeast out.
PENNY: Yeah.
VAYA: And then put it back in. The way they, it's a wheat.
CHRISTINA: Did you lobby for that Vegemite?
VAYA: I manifested it.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, good.
PENNY: Okay, so I want to read the ingredients for this hot cross bun recipe.
"Quarter pound of flour, 1 tablespoonful of yeast, 2 eggs, pinch of salt, 2oz sugar, 2oz butter, 1/2 pint of milk."
CHRISTINA: Is there no fruit?
PENNY: There's no fruit, there's no spices.
VAYA: Chocolate chips?
PENNY: There's no chocolate chips.
CHRISTINA: No Vegemite.
PENNY: This is a bread roll.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, yep.
PENNY: And then at the end she's like, tells you how to make it, just sort of a typical dough and then she says:
"Make a cross on each with the back of a knife, and bake in a moderate oven for 20 minutes"
So it's a bread roll she's done a cross, there's not even a piped cross.
CHRISTINA: It's a dinner roll.
VAYA: What do they typically make that piped cross out of.
PENNY: Flour and water.
CHRISTINA: I think it's like flour and water.
VAYA: It looks like a special ingredient.
PENNY: Yeah, cos Lincoln makes them at home. So this lady, imagine like what other
CHRISTINA: How disappointing.
PENNY: She's serving to her children and going 'It's lemonade' and they're like 'No, it's water in a yellow glass.'
CHRISTINA: It reminds me of a really crap party I went to when I was a small child and the parents were going through some health kick.
PENNY: Oh no.
CHRISTINA: It was like a fourth birthday or something and instead of a cake we had a roast pumpkin with candles.
VAYA: Oh that's upsetting.
PENNY: What is that? That is terrible.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, and I knew that was wrong and I made a few loud comments. And I had to pulled aside and quietly spoken to.
PENNY: But you were standing up for what's
CHRISTINA: And I was a kid who hated icing and cream and I was still outraged.
VAYA: One of the greatest deceptions I've participated in is my very early job as a children's party entertainer, a fairy. Fairy shop would bring out at half time a, we'd do sing happy birthday and she would bring out a fairy cake and it was that classic you know the dress was all decorated in icing and the Barbie doll was sticking out of the top. And that was a show cake and we'd blow out the candles on that cake and she'd put it back in the kitchen and then cut up a Woolworths mudcake. And that's what the kids would take. It wasn't, look, it wasn't advertised. She was transparent about that, what cake she was giving out but the kids thought they were eating the fairy dress and they were not.
CHRISTINA: No disappointing.
VAYA: I just, just still worry about the lies.
CHRISTINA: The long term impact.
PENNY: They didn't know. I think it's fine.
VAYA: Okay good.
PENNY: The thing about hot cross buns is people now these days like complain about them being in the shops earlier and earlier and now I think you can get them year round, almost pretty much.
CHRISTINA: Pretty much.
VAYA: I think 2029's hot cross buns are on the shelves now.
PENNY: Look, I don't care, I feel like if you only want to have them at Easter, don't buy them for the rest of the year.
CHRISTINA: Don't get outraged.
PENNY: Don't worry about what other people are doing.
VAYA: I mean the shelf-life's gonna sort itself out, don't worry about it.
18:26 PENNY: But in the olden days they really were only available on Good Friday but then there were problems because of course that was a public holiday and then with you know, well there was the bakers and there was the bread carters and there were holidays and there were unions and there was arbitration and it was a big deal. And so then they actually couldn't sell them, they couldn't deliver them on Fridays anymore because it was a holiday. So, people complained about that quite a lot and so I found this article, which was from the Newcastle Sun 25th of March 1929. And it's titled "LOST PRESTIGE: Hot Cross Buns SAME OLD PRICE"
VAYA: Love it.
PENNY: "Although day by day bread has been getting cheaper in Newcastle, no announcement of hot cross buns being cheaper this Good Friday has been made.
On the contrary, they are being advertised at 1s 3d a dozen, as in previous years. This is surprising, as hot cross buns have lost much or their old prestige."
CHRISTINA: Well, you've gotta pay for Jesus. You really do.
PENNY: "Gone are the days when the bakers baked though overnight, and school boys helped the bakers to pack them, and fell asleep in corners when they were tired."
CHRISTINA: Child labour.
PENNY: Yeah, so this guy's basically like if it's not made with child labour.
CHRISTINA: Come on Grade 2, we're off.
VAYA: We're going to do some helping.
PENNY: Where's the prestige in it if no-one collapses from exhaustion.
"When, too, breadcarters, with loud, pleasant voices, used to bring them round, and leave them on the doorstep at two, three and four o'clock on Good Friday morning. In those days nobody dreamed of missing his hot cross buns, and children used to sing songs about them."

CHRISTINA: Oh dear.
PENNY: Well there's still the song.
VAYA: One a penny. Two a penny. How's that price?
CHRISTINA: I think you're featuring in that song Penny.
PENNY: "The buns used to be delivered hot."
VAYA: I mean, imagine if they weren't?
CHRISTINA: Imagine if they were lukewarm.
PENNY: "Now breadcarters don't deliver them at all. Bakers bake them on Thursdays"
CHRISTINA: Outrageous.
PENNY: "those, bakers, that is, who can still be 'bothered with them,' as one baker said to-day.
And if people want them hot on Friday they must heat them them selves"
CHRISTINA: Oooh, that's really pushing it.
PENNY: "As the shops are closed."
And they didn't have microwaves, let me tell you.
CHRISTINA: No.
VAYA: Just an open flame.
PENNY: "What is worse, the bakers and the pastrycooks (who, by the way have captured nearly all the trade)"
I don't know if we're angry about that?
VAYA: I just feel like
CHRISTINA: No, well who else would capture the trade?
VAYA: If you want to specialise, you have to go to the pastry cook.
CHRISTINA: The blacksmith's not throwing them in to the mix.
VAYA: You could though.
CHRISTINA: Yeah, side-hustle.
PENNY: "The pastry cooks have become very careless about the crosses."
CHRISTINA: No-one wants a wonky cross.
PENNY: "Some stab a cross on the bun, and some don't. They just don't care! Yet the buns are selling at the same old price!"
VAYA: I'm sure Jesus at the time was thinking 'when this gets recreated in a"
PENNY: In a delicious bun-form.
VAYA: yeah, in bun-form. I hope that they really represent how accurately this device has been put together.
CHRISTINA: Absolutely.
PENNY: Do a little stick with a vinegar cloth on it down the bottom.
VAYA: I am very sympathetic towards the baker they. The hours they do and have done - they can't have a little sleep in on Good Friday?
CHRISTINA: Like, who's going into baking these days, honestly?
VAYA: I've got a friend whose husband is a baker.
CHRISTINA: Really?
VAYA: Who's signing up to Brumby's apprenticeship program? And it's very cute all their baby weighing photos they have on the bread scales.
CHRISTINA: Oh that's cute.
VAYA: It's very cute.
CHRISTINA: Bet there were lots of jokes about her having a bun in the oven.
PENNY: It is a hard job.
CHRISTINA: You don't even make much dough. Sorry.
PENNY: My dad's gonna love this ep.
CHRISTINA: I was doing it for you Peter.
PENNY: Good Friday is, from what I read, I read articles about it, like it was madness what they did. Because it was full on because like literally everyone would get these buns and they still had to make their normal bread.
VAYA: Good Friday in the village, in my father's village, near the foot of Mount Olympus. The best, it went off basically. Good Friday. Because you'd go and do Mass. You go to the church, you go to church, which the village church was so small we were mainly in the church yard, just hanging out, having chats while everyone was inside, listening to whatever goes on in there. And then you basically do a lap of the village with candles, everyone's got candles and you do a lap of the village and you're meant to go around and go back and end back at the church but we just stopped at my uncle's restaurant and went inside.
PENNY: Oh nice.
VAYA: And then they have the magiritsa, which is like the entrail soup, that is served.
PENNY: Is it nice though?
VAYA: Yeah, if you can just divorce what it is from your tastebuds. And then you just have a feast in the middle of the night.
PENNY: So that was Good Friday?
VAYA: Yeah.
PENNY: And then so is Easter Sunday also a big day?
VAYA: Yeah. There were a lot of lambs. And basically the recipe is you just put the lamb on the spit, a lot of salt, salads and you're done. That's it. But my partner was, had to basically, my uncle's a butcher and he had my partner put the slabs of lamb onto the skewer and onto the spit and
PENNY: And did he do well with that?
VAYA: They were all very impressed because my partner's Australian so they were like, 'Wow.'
CHRISTINA: He wasn't genetically leaning that way.
VAYA: He's essentially converted, he's Orthodox, or whatever. So it was very impressive. He's basically considered a Greek butcher now.
PENNY: Oh fantastic. So that's a little backup for you guys. If the TV writing doesn't
VAYA: Which it often wanes so
PENNY: Yeah, will you take, has Remy been?
VAYA: He hasn't been. My son was a COVID baby 2020. So he, I really desperately want to take him and I think I want to take him at Easter time.
CHRISTINA: That's a great idea.
VAYA: Spring time in Europe.
24:39 PENNY: That would be so lovely. That's something to look forward to. Okay I've got one last recipe. Okay, it's not quite, it's called "prawn gondolas".
CHRISTINA: Oh I mean everyone thinks of Easter and just thinks prawn gondolas.
VAYA: You know what, I am on board. I don't care what happens. I'm on that gondola.
PENNY: Okay, great.
CHRISTINA: With your prawn.
PENNY: "This can be made from pieces of left-over short pastry, as only a little is required. Roll the pastry out very thinly and line boat-shaped tins, which can be obtained at most kitchen-equipment stores, filling each with baking rice, so that the shape is carefully kept during cooking."
VAYA: They've got boat-shaped tins just handy at kitchen equipment stores?
PENNY: Well, they did used to have a lot of different shaped tins and stuff because, oh well, for all the gelatin recipes.
CHRISTINA: Well, you've gotta really think about your tins and your molds.
PENNY: They had like lobster shapes and, my grandmother had heaps of them.
CHRISTINA: Yeah.
PENNY: But anyway, this part of the recipe, they're just blind baking. Okay.
"Place, in a hot oven ; when cooked, remove the rice, and fill each boat with prepared prawns or shrimps."
VAYA: I love how they, the word prepared is doing a lot of heavy lifting there.
CHRISTINA: Yeah.
PENNY: Just prepare them.
"Coat them with thick mayonnaise sauce."
VAYA: Yum, yum.
PENNY: And this is the good bit.
"Place a prawn's head in the front of each boat, and serve"
VAYA: Like when you put a mermaid on is it like the hull.
CHRISTINA: Yes, I think so. I don't know why the prawn head has to, is anyone munching on that?
PENNY: It's for decoration.
"And serve on a bed of crisp lettuce, leaves arranged on a flat oval dish."
VAYA: It's keeping an eye out for iceberg lettuce.
PENNY: Oh, well done. I hope Dad enjoyed that too. And so I actually thought, look, I've never seen a prawn gondola but maybe it was a traditional thing.
VAYA: Is there a photo Penny?
PENNY: No, there's not photo. And I Googled prawn gondola and I looked up prawn gondola in Trove. It's not a thing.
VAYA: Did it take you to some distasteful places?
CHRISTINA: What you saw cannot be unseen.
PENNY: No, I've got a, what do you call it?
VAYA: A net nanny?
PENNY: Some kind of thing that filters that out.
CHRISTINA: So you were shielded from the worst.
PENNY: But I did realise it's not a thing. This is not something that anyone else is doing.
VAYA: You can lull yourself into a false sense of security with Trove because you think it's printed in the newspaper
PENNY: It's official.
VAYA: Which is a worry in the future when people are going to be like 'Well the Daily Mail' said this, this and this. Just because it's called a newspaper
PENNY: Yeah you have to go 'scroll back to the top of the article where the journalist said it was "interesting".' Never heard of it before. I don't know, does that provide some ideas for people?
CHRISTINA: I mean, nothing says decorative more than a head, does it?
PENNY: So we've got a little menu here. We've got jelly, we've got bread rolls.
VAYA: Stuffed eggs.
PENNY: Stuffed eggs. And like a
CHRISTINA: And a head in a boat.
PENNY: Prawn's head.
VAYA: Penny's just dismissively calling them bread rolls now. Just will not acknowledge them as a hot cross bun.
CHRISTINA: With absolute disdain. She's got a similar vibe to the weirdo that wrote the article.
PENNY: It was me.
VAYA: What is traditionally the Easter feast? Apart from the chocolate, and the buns.
PENNY: Well the buns do go back a fair way. And then I looked, because I thought 'Maybe the fruit and the spice is a new thing like the chocolate chips'. But it's not, like they've been doing it forever. People, apparently, used to keep a bit of the hot cross bun, like you'd keep it for the rest of the year. Like a crumb of it. It was like good luck or something.
VAYA: Yeah, that's the fanciful part, isn't it? In all this.
PENNY: But I think, Easter's a weird one. I don't think there is as many traditional foods.
CHRISTINA: I don't think it's as traditional is it? I think you know
PENNY: And even chocolate is relatively recent.
VAYA: Yep. Which blows my mind. Imagine doing it without chocolate?
CHRISTINA: We've all attached to that as an idea.
VAYA: Cos I look at the US and I think it's not as chocolate heavy a time of year. It's they, dye the eggs with food colouring. And they make Easter baskets for their kids where they just put a bunch of stocking stuffers in.
PENNY: And I didn't look up how the rabbit thing started.
CHRISTINA: No.
VAYA: Just probably a really cute little rabbit one day turned up with some eggs and people rolled with it.
CHRISTINA: And he had a waistcoat and it was all went from there.
PENNY: Makes sense. Aw, I'm so glad Jesus is nearly back. Like Harold from Neighbours. I actually really like, because I was brought up Catholic and Easter masses are pretty good, like if you're gonna go to any. They get the drama.
VAYA: Yeah, that's the thing with the Greek Orthodox tradition as well. It's a rocking time o' year.
CHRISTINA: The whole range of emotions comes out.
PENNY: Yeah, like if you want to you can get really sad about it. It's like theatre.
VAYA: But it's got a happy ending.
PENNY: Exactly. So, thanks so much for coming in and talking about Easter. I hope you both have a lovely day or days.
VAYA: Yeah and one week later I'll have, another, an additional good day.
PENNY: And Vaya, where can people find you?
VAYA: I also a podcast called Neighbuzz about Neighbours the Aussie soap, which has risen again. Will rise again.
PENNY: And not reincarnation, but coming back to life is a big part of Neighbours, traditionally.
VAYA: Especially if you're married to Toadfish Rebecchi.
PENNY: Yes. And the big one, Harold was one of the first.
VAYA: Came back, playing the tuba in the Salvos band. Which is probably what Jesus would have liked to have done.
CHRISTINA: How all reincarnations should be.
PENNY: Nah, I think Jesus'd hate the Salvos. Okay fantastic. Thank you.
VAYA: Thanks Penny, thanks Christina.
CHRISTINA: Thank you.
PENNY: Bye
CHRISTINA: Bye
30:24 (Piano music)

PENNY: Trove chat (silly voice)
CHRISTINA: Trove chat (silly voice)
PENNY: It's time for Trove chat.
CHRISTINA: Coming back at you for Trove Chat.