***This is a sponsored post. As always all opinions are my own and all succulent, spicy exotic dishes were devoured by your truly as well***
It’s no secret. The come down from a holiday (a bloody, FANTASTIC one at that !!!) can crash like a ton of bricks.
And for me, it’s a mix of post holiday blues and a bout of homesickness funk.
I particularly miss the spicy, exotic food.
I remember when every meal was ordered at a restaurant or as room service, I thought, “How AWESOME is it that I don’t have to cook!!???
Then immediately afterwards was the extra joy of discovering that I didn’t have to wash dishes either!!! Yee to the HA!
I don’t know how many times I ate Beef Rendang for no other reason than for my taste buds to do a little tango.
And because it’s a dish that takes up a full day and every pot and pan in the kitchen to cook it, I rarely do.
There’s a LOT of scrubbing after making a pot of authentic Indonesian Beef Rendang.
Washing dishes is the chore I most abhor. I dread a broken dishwasher. It would be my biggest domestic fear.
The unspoken house rule is that I cook and Mr Surfer cleans up after me. Luckily, I’m a pretty good cook because I’m sure there are numerous times he wishes we can bend things a little.
I also think beyond having a great appliance, reliable dishwashing tablets are even more important. Nothing worse than doing a load then pulling out plates that still have residue and gunk. You know?
What better way to celebrate (or commiserate my return) than to host a giveaway???
One lucky reader will kiss dishwashing nightmares away with a packet of Finish Quantum with Power Gel.
These babies have become a mandatory cleaning item in our home. No matter how much I slave in the kitchen, it’s now easy just to load a dishwasher. Well, for Mr Surfer. Heh.
I guess reality isn’t so bad after all.
To win, all you have to do is leave a comment on this post and tell Mama G:
“What’s the one dish you love to make but also makes the biggest mess?”
Terms and conditions:
- This giveaway is only open to Australian residents
- Closing date for entries is 10pm AEST Tuesday, 3rd of December.
- The winner will be contacted via email on the following Wednesday.
- If the winner does not reply to my email within 24 hours, another winner will be chosen.
- Entries will be judged on merit and decision of the winner will be final.
Getting back on the IBOT boat with Essentially Jess
Update (04/12):
The Winner of the Finish Quantum Giveaway is…Cher Haining!
It is a real kick in the gut coming home from an awesome holiday. 🙁 The last couple of holidays we’ve been on, I’ve booked a quick weekend away a few weeks after we get home so that I have something to look forward to and the crash back to earth isn’t quite as hard 😉 It’s like weaning yourself off something. lol.
Aroha @ Colours of Sunset recently posted..Born To Do It
Welcome back dear!!! It was great seeing all your fun family pix during your holiday and no doubt you had such a good time. Post-holiday blues sucks but at least there’s Christmas to look forward to 🙂
Ai Sakura recently posted..Bub & Me: Canon Pixma Craft Workshop @ Suntec City
I always get post holiday blues at the thought of cooking and washing up. To be honest I think that I would cry if our dishwasher broke down, I love it that much. I love a good roast but I hate washing up all the pots and pans afterwards!
Eleise recently posted..How to cope with the shitty times in a blended family!
Welcome back – I’m on holidays now, a few dishes still required, but not every night. No dishwasher!
I would love to enter this giveaway but I don’t cook! Well, very rarely anyway. I think the most messy meal I do cook though is a leg of lamb on a bed of potatos. With out shitty oven there is often quite a few baked on potatos on the edges and they are a bitch to get off. I’ve chucked away at least one roasting pan because I just could not be bothered! Would be interesting to see if these babies were up to the baked-black-in-lamb-juices challenge!
Kylez @ A Study in Contradictions recently posted..Twenty Four Months – Punky
I hate the post holiday come down. But I don’t mind getting back to home cooking and not having to eat rich food every night. But hey, that’s what holidays are for!!!
Hello from #teamIBOT
I love baking cakes but i make such a mess, especially when it involves flour and electric mixers!
I love to make my chocolate mousse but I have to use a bowl to whip the cream, a bowl to mix the eggs and sugar on high, another microwave bowl to melt the chocolate and finally I mix it together in my mixmaster to create a deliciously dense chocolate mousse. The great thing about making the mousse though is being able to lick the beaters and the microwave bowl with the chocolate. After all that licking all utensils and bowls need to go in the dishwasher to become hygienically clean!! I hope you settle back into your normal routine of life with ease. x
Bec @ The Plumbette recently posted..How to convert a skew pan toilet waste
I have great tablets but think our dishwasher is the problem, it’s like me, getting long in the tooth.
Best dish, umm I have to say I haven’t made a big messy meal images 🙁 xx
Emily @ Have A Laugh On Me recently posted..Ten things that drive me up the wall – are you one of them? My best rant ever!
I love to make Shepherds Pie on occassion; but it is a hand-dishwasher’s nightmare!
A saucepan to boil the potatoes for the top of the pie, chopping board and knives to cut up all the vegies, frypans to saute in, measuring cups and spoons, and on and on and on!!!!
PS. I can tell you are still in holiday mode, you know how?
Your closing date for this comp says 3rd of November when I think you mean December. 🙂
Gah! You got me, Michelle!!! Just amended it! Thanks for pointing it out! 🙂
The food looks divine. Hope you’re homesickness eases and it is not too long before you get back into routine. Yep I am with Karina baking a cake creates a tornado in the kitchen and a broken dishwasher I had a few months ago and my life sucked!! First world problem I know!
Sarah@SnippetsandSpirits recently posted..My Blog and Me
Man, that rendang looks amazing!! I love making a huge lasagna, but hate all the dishes and baked on sauce in the lasagna dish. It takes a QUANTUM effort to FINISH all the washing up!
Welcome back Grace! I love making Tiramisu but the kitchen is a mess when I finish! It seem s that I also use all the dishes and bowls to be able in the kitchen to make this cake!
Rita @ The Crafty Expat recently posted..Five tips to overcome the writer’s block and find back inspiration
*It seems that I also use all the dishes and bowls in the kitchen to be able to make this cake!
Rita @ The Crafty Expat recently posted..Five tips to overcome the writer’s block and find back inspiration
I’m not a very good cook, so all my meals seem to make a mess. They also seem messy to eat too. The worst, however, was dropping the 100s & 1000s on the floor – weeks later I was still finding them!
Lydia C. Lee recently posted..How do you decide where you are going?
As much as I love a good pork roast with the lovely crackling, I despise having to clean and scrub the roasting tray. There left over fats (yuk) and bits that stick…not my cup of tea.
Eva @ The Multitasking Mummy recently posted..Becoming a child again at Christmas time
I love making scrambled eggs in the microwave (because I am lazy), but the egg sticks to the container every time!
There is not just one if my husband is cooking! He has a knack for turning the kitchen into a bomb shelter even if it is just a steak. How he does it, I do not know, but would be thankful for any help I got in cleaning up after his destruction 🙂
Becc recently posted..Healthy Kids
The old lasagne tends to make quite the mess of my baking dishes. As a vegetarian kindly cooking a meat meal for the carnivores in my family, I feel it’s totally above and beyond the call of duty to have to scrape the leftover meaty bits from the dish. In the dishwasher it goes!
Renee at Mummy, Wife, Me recently posted..What I wish I knew about pregnancy – Giveaway
Welcome back and a great little giveaway Grace! Oh on most nights I dislike cooking and cleaning – where does that leave me?!
Josefa @always Josefa recently posted..Conversations with Death
I’m pretty anal, I clean as I go so no dish no matter how simple or complex ever really gets on top of me and makes a mess (sorry!).
Home made spring rolls, filling and rolling them makes a mess all over the bench. Then deep frying them, they splatter oil all over the stove, sometimes even the floor. And when you eat them, and are a clumsy bum like me and drop one, the soy sauce splashes all over me and the table! For something so delicious, I can never win with this one.
We so miss not having a dishwasher, we are going to have Christmas Day at our older sons house and he has a dishwasher!! I love making Roast Dinners with every Pan/Pot used because we have so many yummy baked vegetables but it takes so long to wash up after wards!! You are so lucky to have the rule in your house, normally I have to wash up when I cook dinner, and wash up when David cooks 🙂
Lisa Wood recently posted..What Does Adventure Mean
I have never had the joy of owning a dishwasher ever in my life!
I keep telling myself this is a good thing, cause I am teaching my kids valuable life skills, but given half the chance, I would have one!
EssentiallyJess recently posted..Little Boy in a Doctor’s Office
I have always dreamed of attempting to make the famous Zumbo’s crockenbush. But just the thought of the aftermath will always wake me up into reality 😉
My family loves my lasagne, but the mess makes me think twice before preparing it. The slow long cooking of the Bolagnaise sauce, happily bubbling and spitting red spots all over the stove and surrounds, the sticky saucepan form the white sauce, grated cheeses flys everywhere, bits of chopped herbs stick to every surface, then as it cooks in the oven it usually bubbles over as I alway try to add ‘just one last layer’. Of course cleaning the baked on bits off the lasagne dish is the last straw! At this stage I always threaten That was the last every lasagne.
I have a great gluten free chocolate cake recipe – but the chocolate has to be melted over a saucepan in one bowl, the eggs separated and whisked separately with different ingredients and then the dry ingredients mixed in yet another. Putting it all together always seems to lead to spills and there are bowls everywhere by the end of it.
Mmmmm… SLOW ROASTED SHOULDER OF PORK! Delicious, but four hours of roasting bakes a solid mess onto my baking dish. Endless soaking and scrubbing.
Or one cycle with Quantum Finish!…
I love making messy lasagne, the tomato splashes everywhere, the cheese sauce sticks to the saucepan, then when I dish it up the kids spread it everywhere. Then I go to wash the plates and they are stained with red tomato and sticky cheese sauce. Totally worth it the degree of mess is totally worth the massive enjoyment of the meal.
I love making homemade pizza but making the base means there’s plenty of flour everywhere. And once the kids get around to doing the toppings…look out! The kitchen is a bomb site once we’re finished…but nothing tastes as good as homemade pizza!
Sunday Roast: just so many dishes what with all the veggies, gravy, roasting pan and Yorkshire pudding tray it gets totally out of hand!
LASGNE sticks to the pan when it is baked in the oven and takes me almost the same time to scrub it then it does to cook it.
Lasagna…because I make too much it is reheated at least twice more in the oven…making the caked on top part harder and harder to clean. But I LOVE Lasagna
Roast dinners i love them but theres so many dishes (pots, pans, roasting trays ect) that by time im finished cleaning the kitchen im hungry again on the up side lucky theres always leftovers.