Sarah Cooks

Australia Day Party

2012-01-27T00:00:00.000+11:00

Hey hey! A picture-heavy post today, on the fab Australia Day party we had today! Even though there was heaps of food, somehow it wasn't stressful, and all fell together pretty easily. In addition to the menu below, lots of our friends generously contributed salads and extra desserts. Yay! I plan to blog the individual dishes in more detail in due course, but for today let's look at some pretty pictures!

An Australia Day Feast for 11

Roast Pork Belly

Frikadellen

Thai Chicken Burgers

Sweetcorn Fritters

Parker House Rolls

Lettuce, Tomatoes, Avocado, Cucumber, Red Onion

Pavlova

The Table

The Burgers: Beef Frikadellen, Thai Chicken Burgers, Sweetcorn Fritters

The condiments: Guacamole (made by my cousin Catherine), Red Onion, Cucumber, Avocado Slices, Tomato

The Salads: Watermelon & Feta (brought by Alaina)

Cupcakes (they count as salads, yes?) and Asian Salad (brought by Adrian)

Mixed Veggie Salad (brought by Kristine)

Parker House Rolls

PORK BELLY!

The pork belly was incredibly crackly - amazing! It's the recipe from The Ottolenghi Cookbook if you want to try it out.

Cute burger!

And because I know you guys love it... more CRACKLING!

The Desserts:

Pavlova

Lamingtons (brought by Alae)

Cupcakes by Paolo (brought by Adrian)

I used a Donna Hay recipe for the pavlova and was so pleased with the result. I know I've bagged Donna's super-stylised style before, but her recipes for the basics are really great!

Aftermath

Phew! That was a lot of food! Happy Australia Day!!!

Gold Bar Banana Bread

2012-01-22T21:32:00.001+11:00

Happy Chinese New Year eve everybody! I'm so looking forward to the Year of the Dragon. It's supposed to be a lucky one, especially for rats like me! Judging from Twitter and Facebook, lots of my friends are busy eating today! As for me, we'll be having Reunion Dinner at my parents' house later tonight, and today was a huuge day of cleaning and sweeping and wiping and washing to get my flat in tiptop shape for the big day tomorrow. Of course, I made some time for a little baking too! Phew, I am exhausted! And so glad to have a little sneaky time to sit down and blog.

Clearing out the freezer and cupboards today, I found a whole lotta frozen bananas, and lots of other little goodies, and decided to make a special, super-lucky Chinese New Year version of my favourite choc chip banana bread. I trust you'll indulge me in my superstitious Chinese symbolism!

Firstly, I made them in a mini loaf tin, to resemble gold bars. Yeah, money! (Or "prosperity" if we're going for the whole Chinese cliché!)

I also added heaps of add-ins to the batter, representing abundance.

I chose the macadamias for their luxuriousness, and the fact that they kinda look like little coins. Ditto the white chocolate buttons. (I used the milk chocolate chips because I wanted to finish off the packet I had in the cupboard. And they taste awesome). I added the chia for extra healthy goodness. Also, the word "chia" means "eat" in Hokkien - representing a wish for lots of good things to eat this year!

They smelled so good in the oven! It's been total torture not eating them, but I want to continue the lucky theme and take all eight (lucky 8!) of them to the Reunion Dinner tonight. Cannot wait!

Gold Bar Banana Bread
Adapted from Bill Granger's Chocolate Chip Banana Bread
Makes 8 mini loaves

250g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
125g unsalted butter, softened
200g caster sugar
4 ripe mashed bananas
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips (milk, white, dark or a combination)
1 cup macadamia nuts, roughly chopped
3 tbs chia seeds

Preheat the oven to 180C. Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl.

Mix the butter, sugar, banana, eggs, vanilla extract, chocolate and nuts in a separate bowl. Add the chia seeds, flour and baking powder, and stir gently to combine. Do not overmix.

Pour the batter into a lightly greased miniature loaf tray. Bake for 45 minutes, or until the loaves are cooked when tested with a skewer. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Happy New Year!

Canberra 2011: Urban Pantry

2012-01-19T17:07:00.000+11:00

Urban Pantry

5 Bougainneville St

Griffith, ACT 2603

(02) 6162 3556

Website

And now we come to the final post in my series on Canberra! As you may have gathered, all our previous eating destinations were chosen by our gracious host An. Urban Pantry, on the other hand, was one that I really wanted to visit, having read about it both here and here before our trip. It was super crowded when we arrived at 2pm on a Sunday afternoon, and we had to wait around 20 minutes for a table, which gave us some time to check out the surrounding shops. The whole Manuka area seems to have changed a lot since our last visit in 2009, with many more trendy cafes and bars popping up in the meantime.

Mango Magic - mango, pineapple & nectar blended w/ ice topped w/ coconut cream - $8.80

Yes, you read that right - $8.80 for a smoothie! They have a 10% Sunday surcharge, but that didn't seem to deter the crowds.

I was still full from my massive breakfast, and couldn't even contemplate eating a full meal. Instead, I chose a little almond and honey slice from the cake cabinet.

Honey & Almond Slice - $6.05

The slice itself was tasty and had a good level of sweetness, but the berry sauce seemed unnecessary, so I scraped it off. I felt a bit like Joey in Friends when he ordered the cheesecake: "Excuse me sir, there seems to be some sort of red crap on my cheesecake", hehe!

Wagyu beef burger w/ spiced tomato relish, cheddar,onion rings & salad greens served w/ fries - $20.90

The wagyu burger (ordered without salad) was really fabulous. (Yes, I snuck a taste!) The patty was super tender and juicy - I wish I'd had a big enough appetite to order one of my own!

Thyme scented mushroom bruschetta topped w/ Persian fetta - $20.90

The mushroom bruschetta was also delicious (although quite expensive, especially considering the Wagyu beef burger is the same price). It had a pungent but not-overpowering garlicky taste, and the gorgeous little pieces of creamy Persian fetta complimented and lifted the savoury mushrooms.

I liked Urban Pantry, but I would have been better off coming with a bigger appetite - poor planning on my part! I'd love to visit for dinner and also try some of their desserts! I must say that it is very expensive though, even without the Sunday surcharge (see the Breakfast/Lunch and Dinner menus here), so it isn't one that I'd visit more than occasionally.

And that's my last post about my trip to Canberra! Thank-you Canberra, it's been grand!

Canberra 2011: Poachers Pantry

2012-01-17T16:01:00.000+11:00

Poachers Pantry

431 Nanima Rd

Hall ACT 2618

(02) 6230 2487

Website

For our second breakfast in Canberra, An chose Poacher's Pantry, a "traditional country smoke house, café, farm shop and cellar door". I'm told that locals don't tend to visit, but rather think of it as a place to bring out-of-towners. (Can any Canberrans confirm or deny that?)

Poacher's Pantry is set amongst pretty gardens, and has both outdoor and indoor seating, as well as a retail area selling pantry items and their house-smoked smallgoods. But we were here for breakfast!

Cappuccino - $4; Latte - $4

Toast with Lynwood jam and butter - $6

The toast, bizarrely, came pre-spread with butter. Although I suppose "spread" isn't the right word - melted butter was slathered over the middle of the toast, which meant the butter dripped right through onto the plate. This also meant the centre of the toast was soggy whilst the edges were dry - very unappetizing! I really don't know why they did that. It seemed to be an attempt at a garnish, which did absolutely nothing for presentation or flavour.

An fared better with his sweet corn and potato pancakes.

Sweet corn and potato pancakes with bacon, oven roast tomato and avocado - $18

The dish didn't look that good to me - the pancake looked pallid and undercooked, and I'm not a fan of gigantic portions (half an avocado for one person, really!) - but An enjoyed it, and even managed to polish off most of it!

I was totally craving pancakes, and was glad to see buttermilk hotcakes on the menu.

Buttermilk hotcakes with a baked rhubarb strawberry compote and honeycomb butter - $16

The hotcakes themselves were delicious: light and fluffy, with a wonderful light crust on the outside. However, they were drowned in butter. Seriously, drowned! There wasn't just that splodge of honeycomb butter on the top (which I moved to the side of the plate pretty quickly anyway), but there was also heaps of butter on the plate. You can see the threads of rhubarb suspended in the melted butter, below. Now, I have a pretty high tolerance for butter - some of my friends refer to me as Butter Queen! - but even this was too much for me.

I can't say we were wildly impressed by Poacher's Pantry. The food was hit and miss, and the service, whilst polite, was rather patchy. It took ages to catch someone's attention to replace a dirty cup, for example. We'd initially planned to purchase some of their prosciutto to take home, but after the breakfast we decided to give it a miss. On sunny days, I can imagine it would be pleasant enough to enjoy a coffee at one of the outdoor tables, but I certainly wouldn't recommend it on the quality of its food.

Canberra 2011: Aubergine

2012-01-15T17:17:00.000+11:00

Aubergine

18 Barker Street

Griffith ACT 2603

(02) 6260 8666

Website

Whenever we catch up with An, we have to do at least one all-out, treat of a dinner. (See these posts for previous examples: Rockpool Sydney, Artespresso, Spice Temple Sydney, Vue De Monde, Embrasse). For this particular trip to Canberra, we chose Aubergine, a two-hatted restaurant in Griffith.

Aubergine is located near a very quiet suburban shopping strip, and has floor-to-ceiling windows, which allow in lots of natural light. The decor felt slightly eighties to me, reminding me a lot of the now-closed San Giorgio in Carlton. (I'm showing my age here - does anybody remember that restaurant?)

Housemade sourdough bread, served with soft butter

2010 Verget Syrah - $10; 2006 Clover Hill Sparkling - $14

I really enjoyed these meaty, spicy little olives. My fellow diners aren't really into olives, so I got to have these to myself! Muahaha!

Diners can choose from either a 2-course ($62) or 3-course ($75) fixed price menu, and unlike our previous meals in Canberra, we all went for the 3 courses! The dishes were all very cheffy in their presentation, reminding me of Vue De Monde (dish composition), Embrasse (the use of flowers and micro herbs), and even The Point under Scott Pickett (the swirls of sauce on the plates).

Let's have a look at the entrées. I'm not going to describe the individual dishes in detail, as they were all fantastic, and I'm sure you'd get bored of me saying: "This was delicious!", hehe.

Duck breast, confit leg and sausage, spiced carrot purée, braised endive

Zucchini flower filled with goat's cheese, potato gnocchi, sweet corn, basil

Fillet of mackerel, butter poached lobster, shellfish cream, radish, puffed rice

Butter-poached lobster, you say? Don't mind if I do!

And now, the mains:

Mustard crust pork loin, pork croquette, black pudding, roast pumpkin, sage

Two of us went for a vegetarian option for our main: a pithivier of portobello mushroom, with shimeji mushrooms, roast Jerusalem artichokes and blobs of mushroom sauce.

Portobello mushroom pithivier, shimeji mushrooms, roast Jerusalem artichokes

This was definitely the highlight of the evening - such wonderful buttery pastry!

Green beans with eschalots - $9

These beans were also fabulous - cooked to be soft rather than squeaky, and absolutely drowned in butter. Gorgeous!

We decided to share our desserts, having a cheese platter first (for an $8 supplement), and then two sweet desserts between us.

Cheese selection - Délice de Bourgogne (triple cream), Pont-l'Évêque (washed rind), Roquefort (blue), Morbier (semi-soft), Murcia al Vino (semi-hard) - additional $8

Chocolate truffles

With the cheese platter came these adorable chocolate truffles. They were very dark, very rich, very intense.

Coconut and mango panna cotta, financier, mango sorbet

I love how the panna cotta looked like a fried egg! I also loved the smooth, fresh mango sorbet and little chunks of mango, but my favourite element of this dessert was the almondy pieces of financier.

Chocolate fondant, coffee délice, salted caramel ice-cream

With its salted caramel ice-cream, this was a very current dessert (I would say "on trend" but I hate that phrase!). The chocolate fondant was just perfect - slightly crunchy on the outside and meltingly soft within. We were very full by this stage but just had to finish up every last crumb on the plate!

I loved Aubergine, and it is easily the best restaurant in Canberra that I have visited so far. It was extremely well priced, service was great, and the food was absolutely delicious!

Canberra 2011: Grazing at Gundaroo

2012-01-13T20:43:00.000+11:00

Grazing

Cnr Cook And Harp St

Gundaroo, NSW 2620

Ph: (02) 6236 8777

Website

For lunch on the Saturday of our Canberra trip, we drove out to Gundaroo, a small historical village about half an hour out of the city. The restaurant, Grazing, came highly recommended by a friend of a friend, and is a popular lunch spot for daytrippers from Canberra.

Grazing is connected to Capital Wines, with a cellar door out the back. Capital Wines are also available quite cheaply in the restaurant by the glass, and they fill up the glasses quite generously. Wahey!

Bread - $2 per person; Capital Wines ‘The Whip’ Riesling 2011 - $8

The white, fluffy bread rolls came out warm, and tasted just like home made.

Capital Wines ‘The Abstainer’ Rosé 2010 - $8

I thought the rose was absolutely gorgeous, a perfect drop for a sunny day. I didn't realise until after we left that they only sell it at the cellar door - I'll have to remember to go and buy some next time I'm in Canberra!

The meals are all simply priced too: entrées are $17, mains are $33 and desserts are $16. (Vegetarian mains are $28).

After having had rather substantial breakfasts, two of us decided to order entrées as our mains. I picked up this tip whilst in the Barossa - apart from being cheaper, entrées can often be a bit more interesting then mains, and importantly, allows you to try a greater variety of foods before you get too full. Huzzah!

An chose a fish dish. From memory, kingfish wasn't available that day, and it was replaced with snapper. I wasn't sure if fish would be a good choice, considering how far we were from the ocean, but it was by all accounts very fresh.

KINGFISH - Barbecued yellowtail kingfish with five spice salt, Asian style gremolata,spicy prawn dumpling and soy mirin jelly - $17

Oh dear, I only just realised the, er, awkward angle of the above photo. Hehe!

KANGAROO - Kangaroo tail and beetroot tortellini. Garden beetroot, goat’s cheese and wattleseed burnt butter - $17

I loved my main, in all its beautiful shades of mauve. Accompanying the tortellini were an astringently-dressed grated beetroot salad, creamy goat's cheese and nutty wattleseed burnt butter. It was a lovely combination of flavours and textures.

RISOTTO - Risotto with garden herb roast butternut squash and its puree, toasted pinenuts, sage and Italian parmesan - $28

Sandra's main, the risotto, was rather bland and not particularly noteworthy, which we felt didn't really justify the $28 price tag.

Much better however, was the dessert!

PEACH TARTE TATIN - Almond infused house made puff pastry and peach tart with honey and vanilla syrup, vanilla ice cream and pistachio - $16

The peach tarte tatins are made to order, all crunchy pastry with sticky-soft peaches, and vanilla bean ice-cream. My only criticism of the tart is that it was very sweet - I think the honey and vanilla syrup were a bit OTT.

Now, I must admit that before the lunch, I was a little apprehensive about visiting Grazing. In my pre-trip internet research, the menu seemed quite expensive, and being a touristy spot, I wasn't sure if the food and service would match the prices. However, the service was lovely, the food was well-made and (excluding the risotto) was good value for money. Definitely worth the trip!

Canberra 2011: Lonsdale Street Roasters

2012-01-12T17:22:00.000+11:00

Lonsdale Street Roasters

3/7 Lonsdale St

Braddon ACT 2612

Ph: (02) 6156 0975

Website

Next up on our three-day eat-a-thon in Canberra was Lonsdale Street Roasters, a funky, Melbourne-style coffee house in Braddon. (It's just a couple of doors down from Italian and Sons!) It was very busy on the Saturday morning we were there, with customers spreading out onto the pavement and a constant queue for takeaway.

Apart from some pastries and other sweet treats in the cabinet, the menu includes a range of toasted panini, and breakfast items, like toast, banana bread, waffles and muesli.

For a cafe that roasts its own beans in-house, the coffee was as good as you'd expect - strong but not bitter, with the milk heated to a pleasing temperature. And I thought the teapots were very cute too!

Pretty pot

Raspberry Danish

Homemade muesli with seasonal fruit - $7

I ordered the muesli, which I had assumed would be bircher style, but was actually toasted muesli. I normally don't eat toasted muesli as it's super-fattening for something that seems so healthy, but it was a tasty brekky nonetheless. Our waitress suggested I add some sugar syrup which was sitting on the table in a glass bottle - I didn't bother though, as the muesli was sweet enough, and the bottle looked pretty grotty, with loads of white sugar syrup encrusted on the outside. Before she'd explained what it was, I actually thought it was an old dirty candle holder, oops!

While munching through the muesli, I was wondering if I would have been better off, calorie-wise, if I'd just ordered a serve of banana bread. (I remember seeing toasted mueslis that were 25% fat!) Nutritionally-minded people, any insights into which might have been the better option?

I'm sure that we can all agree, however, that An's selection of a massive bacon, egg, tomato and spinach panini was the least healthy of the lot! Mmm... bacon.

Toasted Panini - scrambled egg, Kevin bacon, tomato - $11

Canberra 2011: Italian and Sons

2012-01-09T10:53:00.000+11:00

The week before Christmas, I made a sneaky weekend getaway... to Canberra! Our nation's capital is a quiet little city, and I sure did get some funny looks from my friends and coworkers when I mentioned I'd be going there for a holiday. But I actually love visiting Canberra, not least of all because my good friend An lives there! We filled the weekend with visits to restaurants and cafes. Good food, good friends. What more do you need?

First stop was Italian and Sons.

Italian and Sons

7 Lonsdale St
Braddon ACT 2612
Ph: (02) 6162-4888
Website

Italian and Sons reminded me a bit of D.O.C. Pizza Bar in Melbourne: an Italian restaurant with a strong emphasis on the provenance of ingredients. Of course, being Canberra, there weren't any crowds and we were able to book in advance - yay!

We started off with a plate of affettati - a selection of cured meats. From the menu we chose San Daniele prosciutto, capocollo and cacciatore salami. Apart from the San Daniele prosciutto, all the meats are cured in-house.

Affettati - cured meats served with fennel taralli - $25 for 3

The cacciatore was very chewy and spicy, in great contrast to the soft and mild prosciutto. We also ordered some foccaccia to go with, baked in their wood-fired oven. It was well made, crusty and hot, but I found it a little heavy-handed with the salt, especially when served with the salty cured meats.

Wood baked focaccia - $8

And now, the mains. The menu offers a range of pizzas (both with tomato and in bianco), pastas and specials. None of us were in the mood for pizza that night, so I suppose we'll have to save that for next time!

Gnocchi di patate with veal and marjoram ragu, shaved reggiano - $27

I snuck a little taste of the potato gnocchi, and loved the light texture against the rich, tender veal ragu.

Orecchiette with suckling pig ragu in bianco, broccoletti & pecorino - $27

For my main, I chose the orecchiette with suckling pig. How could I go past "suckling pig"? Whilst I enjoyed this dish, I found it a little sweet, and it needed quite a bit of salt to balance it out.

Friday Piatto - Fish of the day with peperonata - $33

The fish here was fresh and cooked well - with crispy skin and tender flesh that flaked apart easily - the real star of the show was the peperonata. It had a great balance of sweet and sour, complementing the gentle flavour of the fish.

We also got a side of farro, baby beetroot and house smoked ricotta.

Farro, baby beetroot & house smoked ricotta - $15

I love me a good grain salad, and this one was fabulous! I daresay it was even better than my pasta dish - I could have easily eaten this as my main in its entirety and been very happy. I must try and recreate this at home.

In our younger days, we would have easily had a dessert each, but on this occasion, we just ordered one panna cotta to share. (On a side note, I would totally have ordered their biscotti selection, but they only do it in a 2-person serve, and no-one wanted to share with me. Boo!)

Ligurian honey panna cotta & poached red wine pear - $12

The panna cotta was smooth and creamy, and quite firmly set. I'm not a huge fan of red wine in desserts, so didn't like the pear too much, but the panna cotta itself was lovely.

The service at Italian and Sons was excellent too. The staff were friendly and welcoming, and were very helpful when it came to navigating the menu (especially when we were deciding which affettatti to order). I'd definitely like to visit again the next time I go to Canberra!

Gippsland Getaway

2012-01-06T19:23:00.001+11:00

As I mentioned in my previous post, we spent a quiet-yet-fun New Years in the Gippsland region, near Lakes Entrance. We were staying in a little cabin in middle-of-nowhere, that had a lake on the property and kangaroos! Actually, it was just 15 minutes out of Bairnsdale, but for someone who rarely ventures out of Zone 1 it felt very remote! It was a wonderful spot for relaxation. However, whilst the location was great, the accommodation itself wasn't that great - there wasn't anything wrong with it, but it wasn't so special that I'd recommend it especially.

Let's have a look at the weekend's eats!

Bairnsdale is about a four hour drive from Melbourne, so we started with a hearty breakfast at Depot de Pain in Hawthorn, one of the few local cafes that was open over the Christmas/New Year break.

Clockwise from top left: Sausage roll, chevre omelette, croque madame with avocado, smoked salmon omelette

We were pretty impressed by the food at Depot de Pain, and I'd definitely like to visit again.

By the time we got to the accommodation, it was late in the afternoon and we hadn't had lunch, so we lit up the barbecue straight away.

On the left we have a selection of sausages and burgers from Andrew's Choice (cheese kransky, spicy Italian pork, lamb kofte, Thai burgers), and on the right Adrian's amazing marinated pork ribs.

Mmm... meat!

Ribs in Adrian's secret Filipino marinade

There were heaps of kangaroos around, including a mamma kangaroo with a joey in her pouch! So cute!

Aah... and the view from the side of the pier. Gorgeous!

With our afternoon tea of barbecued meats, we weren't super hungry by dinner time, so we dug into a quadruple chocolate loaf cake that I'd brought for the weekend.

And with some festive New Year sparklers!

For breakfast the next morning, (first brekky of 2012!), I made Nigella's doughnut French toast, with an old loaf of brioche that I had baked earlier in the week. We served them with coffee, blueberries and sautéed peaches. I love the way that the simple addition of vanilla extract and cinnamon turns simple French toast into a really indulgent treat!

While we were up there, the lakes in the area were affected by blue-green algae so we couldn't swim in them. Instead, we took a little drive down to Lakes Entrance beach after breakfast. Look how gorgeous the day was!

Have you ever noticed how swimming in the ocean builds up a huge appetite? It must be all the energy expended swimming against the waves. (Don't forget, always swim between the flags!)

There are quite a few fish and chipperies in the area, and we ended up at Awesome Fish and Chips on the Esplanade, which was well priced and wonderfully fresh. (Thanks to April for the recommendation!)

Scallops, flake, chips, tartare sauce, sweet chilli sauce

And later that night... yup, more barbecue! This time it was Adrian's marinated pork belly and pork shoulder. I love how the marinade made the meat all tender and caramelized. Yum yum!

Sandra also made some Frikadellen to add to the meat feast. We ate this all with bread and chilli sauce and curry ketchup.

For dessert - a couple of hours later! - we made some little trifles in wine glasses. We layered leftover slices of brioche with fresh custard, blueberries, whipped cream and blackberries. (And a little rum!)

Hehe, endless cooking of Nigella recipes means I can now create trifles without a recipe, using leftover bits and pieces. An important skill, surely!!

The next day we had to check out by midday, so we had a late breakfast / brunch, frying up all the remaining eggs and barbecuing all the remaining meat.

So yes, we did eat pork belly for breakfast whilst on holiday. Eep! I mentioned above how ocean swimming seems to build up a huge appetite; I'm not sure why, but lazing around a holiday house, watching DVDs and drinking seems to build up an appetite too! Between the four of us, we totally smashed through that brekky!

And finally... on the way home we stopped off at gorgeous Golden Beach for more swimming and boogie boarding. It's such a beautiful beach, and a lot less crowded than Lakes Entrance beach. This does have some downsides though: the beach is not patrolled, and there are hardly any shops around. (And in one of the two shops near this beach we encountered a really surly shop owner - grrr!) However, the beach is truly gorgeous, and absolutely perfect for swimming and sunbathing.

Sarah Cooks 2011 Roundup

2012-01-04T16:01:00.002+11:00

Happy new year everybody! How was everyone's New Year's Eve? I spent a lovely weekend in the Gippsland region, enjoying the fresh air, the cool breezes, the pristine beaches and a rather alarming amount of barbecued meats. Speaking of cool breezes, how crazy hot has it been in Melbourne? I can't believe it was hotter at home than it was on my beach holiday! I'm relieved that it's a bit cooler today.

2011 has been a busy year here at Sarah Cooks! Let's take a look back at the year that was.

Last year's New Year's Eve, I had a quiet night in with friends - drinking champagne, watching cheesy horror movies and eating a cheesecake I baked.

Mmm... creamy

I spent much of the start of the year working my way through posts from my epic 2010 double-Christmas Parties - including Venetian carrot cake, maple-apple cakelets with calvados-mascarpone cream, home cured salmon, and a super-crispy roast pork belly.

In February I was lucky enough to win the Barossa's Table Competition, where contestants had to submit a blog post with a recipe or serving suggestion using Barossa produce, and match it with a Barossa wine. For my winning entry, "A Barossa Inspired Meal", Sandra and I drew on the Barossa's German heritage and created a German-style meal of rolled Barossa chook and Black Pig prosciutto, and paired it with a Henschke Keyneton Euphonium 2007.

The prize was an amazing week-long trip to the Barossa for two people, packed full of foodie adventures and experiences. The highlights of the week were meeting Maggie Beer, enjoying a fabulous lunch cooked by Gill Radford of Radford Wines, visits to TeAro Estate and the Hill of Grace vineyard (squee!!!), and a stunning Wine Flight degustation dinner at Appellation.

As per usual I visited a lot of Restaurants this year, ranging from the sublime (the 10-course degustation with matching wines at Vue De Monde) to the kitschily fabulous (Captain America's Hamburger Heaven). Other great eats included PM24, Provenance Food and Wine, Spice Temple, The Atlantic, Muttis, Cafe Vue at 401 and Embrasse. I must say my favourite restaurant in Melbourne at the moment is Spice Temple - I've visited five times already and especially love their hot sweet sour numbing pork!

Hot, Sweet, Sour, Numbing Pork at Spice Temple

Cafes weren't quite as well represented on my blog this year, even though I sure have been drinking a lot of coffee! This was mainly because I stuck to my new favourite - Axil Coffee Roasters in Hawthorn. The coffee and food have consistently been delicious, and I always buy my coffee beans from them. (I also really enjoyed Duchess of Spotswood, but being on the other end of town from me, I only visited twice in 2011).

We did a lot of entertaining this year too!

Devilling eggs

The biggest party we hosted was my Mad Men birthday party. There were heaps of retro canapes (devilled eggs, mini-beef wellingtons, prawn cocktail), there were fabulous costumes, there were vintage advertisements on the wall, actual vintage cigarettes, and there were lots of cocktails! I was so pleased my friends got in the spirit and dressed up too - lots of big beehive hairdos in the room that night!

Smaller, but no less pride-inducing was my second annual PORKTOBERFEST lunch, which included homemade pretzels, a roast rack of pork, bread dumplings, red cabbage, Rüdesheimer Kaffee and a Black Forest Cake!

Speaking of German things, in August I went to Germany for a month, where I indulged in all my favourites - wunderbar cakes, ice-creams, amazing sausages, bread, and berries. Cheap cheap berries!

Whilst in Europe I also went to Paris for 5 days, visiting a good friend of mine. In Paris we cooked a lot, and giggled at the odd French translations for Asian food and Orangina's bizzare sexy anthropomorphic animals. I also fell in love with Sadaharu Aoki's green tea croissants, Berthillon's mandarin ice-cream and Pierre Hermé's Ispahan. So much deliciousness!

In other travel related news we also went to Daylesford in November and Canberra in December. I haven't blogged Canberra yet, but I will be soon - lots of great restaurants and cafes there!

Now of course, the title of my blog is "Sarah Cooks", and I have been cooking and baking a lot this year. (Although it seems that it's mainly the fun sweet stuff that makes its way onto the blog!)

As y'all know, I love my German cakes, and enjoyed baking a Rotweinkuchen and an Apfelkuchen.

My love affair with Nigella recipes continued unabated, with garlic and parsley hearthbreads, grasshopper pie, danishes, devil's food cake, Irish oaten rolls, and her buttermilk scones.

I don't think these strictly count as baking, but some of my favourite sweet treats are pancakes and waffles. This year I made oatmeal waffles with burnt butter vanilla apples, Bill Granger's pancakes with fresh blueberries, and some health-giving chia seed pancakes.

Oatmeal Waffles with burnt butter vanilla apples

I also had some fun with chocolate-chip banana bread, Valentine's Day double-chocolate chunk cookies, my shoe-shaped cake, snickers cookies and some deeply fabulous rainbow cookies!

My favourite cookbook this year was, without a doubt, the Ottolenghi cookbook - their salads and tarts are amazing! I was lucky enough to get Plenty for Christmas, so I plan to cook a lot from that in 2012.

Ottolenghi's sweet potato galette

I totally loved the 5-in-1 Multicooker that Kitchenware Direct sent me to test. It has well and truly become part of my kitchen, and we've cooked heaps of risottos, stews and braises in it.

Christmas this year involved a lot of culinary treats too. For Christmas Eve we had homemade lobster rolls, Dom Perignon, glazed Andrew's Choice leg ham and Poires Belle Hélène, and on the big day itself we had Gordon Ramsay's turkey, stuffing and gravy, followed by Nigella's ultimate Christmas pudding - gorgeous!

And finally, as I bring the post to a close, let me pour you a (symbolic) glass of champagne...

... and say thankyou to everyone who's been following my little blog, leaving comments and chatting to me via my Facebook page and Twitter. All the best for a safe and successful 2012! I hope your year is filled with lots of fun and delicious moments!

Christmas 2011: Leftovers

2011-12-30T17:41:00.000+11:00

Hello hello! When there is Christmas feasting, there are also leftovers! We've finally finished all the leftovers, and I think we're all a bit sick of turkey and ham around here! Having watched endless episodes of Nigella, Jamie and Gordon's Christmas programs over the break, I was tempted to try my hand at all sorts of big fancy pies to use up the leftover meat, but I thought that would defeat the purpose by creating even more leftovers. (And don't forget you can't reheat leftover food more than once).

Whilst I did make one batch of pasties, and one sandwich, this year I found that the best way to use up the leftover ham and turkey was to serve it in thin slices to add protein and bulk to a fresh, healthy salad. Much more suitable for our warm weather, don't you think?

Ham & Leek Welsh Pasties

I made Nigella's ham and leek Welsh pasties again (Kitchen), to use up leftover ham and petits pois. These have ham, leeks and white sauce on the inside and are encased in a shortcrust pastry. Lovely with a nice cold cider as an accompaniment.

Turkey and Ham Sandwich

This monster of a sandwich consisted of thick slices of white bread, lettuce, tomatoes, ham, turkey, and a thick smear of crème fraîche mixed with chives. The crème fraîche mixture, apart from providing a tasty chive flavour, prevents the sandwich from getting dry (especially as turkey can dry out in the fridge).

Fried Ham and Eggs; Broad Bean and Radish Salad with Green Tahini

This lunch was inspired by a recipe from Jamie's Family Christmas. Did anyone else watch it over Christmas? (It's actually from 2009, but I hadn't seen it until this year). I absolutely loved the program, especially the segment where he made fried gammon with his nan - she was so cute! In the original recipe he uses raw slices of ham (i.e. gammon, which needs to be cooked before eating) but I made a quick version with leftover slices of smoked ham. All you need to do is dredge slices of ham in mustard powder, and fry them in a pan. The mustard powder lightly caramelizes on the ham and is just so fabulous!

Even though we can't get gammon here in Australia, the idea of the mustard-powder coating would work well with ham steaks (it sounds so 70's and I don't care who knows it) or Kassler, especially as an indulgent weekend breakfast. I had it with a poached egg and the incredibly delicious broad bean and radish salad from the Ottolenghi cookbook, and it was a great light lunch, after all the heavy, carb-based meals of the preceding few days!

Marinated Mushrooms with Walnut and Tahini Yogurt

I received a copy of Yotam Ottolenghi's book Plenty for Christmas, and these marinated mushrooms were the first recipe I made. I found some cheap shimeji mushrooms at an Asian grocer on Victoria street, and off I went! You marinate the shimeji mushrooms with sliced chestnut mushrooms (I used "baby bella" brown-capped mushrooms from my local supermarket) in lemon juice and olive oil, and toss them with broad beans and toasted walnuts. It's served with a punchy garlic/yoghurt/tahini sauce, and I served it with thin slices of turkey and ham. The full recipe is here, in Yotam's column in The Guardian. Enjoy!

Mini Christmas Puddini Bonbons

I love these intensely flavoured little truffles! I also got holly-shaped sprinkles this year, so I didn't need to bother chopping up gummi bears like I did last year. I served them as a little sweatmeet with coffee to finish a post-Christmas dinner party. They turned out very soft this year, so I'm keeping them in the freezer. Theoretically, this means I won't be tempted to eat them all at once - hah!

THE SWANSON

I couldn't help it. In the fridge we had a turkey leg, and we had slices of bacon. How could I not make one? In honour of my favourite TV character, Ron Swanson from the hiii-larious Parks and Recreation, I made "The Swanson" - quite simply, a turkey leg wrapped in bacon.

"The Swanson"

Ron Swanson - what a legend.
Photo source: Eater.com

And on that note I conclude my Christmas posts for the year! Hope you all have enjoyed the festive season as much as I did this year!

Christmas 2011: Christmas Dinner

2011-12-27T01:15:00.002+11:00

And now we come to the main Christmas event - the turkey dinner!

Christmas Dinner for 4

Roast Turkey with Lemon, Parsley and Garlic

Gravy with Beer and Walnuts

Pork, Apricot and Pistachio Stuffing

Char grilled Broccolini with Chilli and Garlic

Roast Potatoes

Red Cabbage

Bread Dumplings

Nigella's Ultimate Christmas Pudding

Iced Rum Sauce

Can you believe that we had a white Christmas in some parts of Melbourne? There were storms, rain, and lots of hail! (See here for some photos of the incredible weather and its effects.) We were very lucky to avoid the worst of the weather in our area, and just got a lot of rain.

Judging by the Tweets and Facebook messages in my feed yesterday, it was a big day of eating, and our house was no exception.

This year I changed up our usual Christmas meal a bit, having been inspired by a Gordon Ramsay Christmas Special I saw on TV the week before Christmas - he looked incredibly tense and joyless, but his meal looked fabulous! The turkey, gravy, and stuffing recipe were all Gordon's. As accompaniments, we served the usual roast potatoes, red cabbage and bread dumplings, with Ottolenghi's chargrilled broccoli as a vibrant green addition.

Gordon's turkey is smothered in a herby, lemony butter; stuffed with garlic, onions and lemon halves; and draped with slices of bacon to keep the breast juicy and moist (heh).

I must say I wasn't too impressed with the pallid "standard" bacon I got at the Vic Market; I must look for a better brand and supplier!

Prior to watching the program, I hadn't planned on making stuffing, but the sage-covered roll of stuffing that Gordon made looked totally delicious. (And I'm obsessed with sage right now!)

The pork mince is mixed with grated apples, lemon zest and parsley, and studded with dried apricots and pistachios. A spicy sausage is laid in the centre (the recipe asks for merguez or chorizo; I could only find chorizo), and rolled up tightly before being baked.

Here is the roasted turkey - it's not the most attractive, but hot-damn it smelled amazing!

The bacon blanket is removed from the turkey and cooked up with the pan juices for gravy. All that bacon, the herbed butter drippings and the onion/lemon/garlic from the turkey cavity, make the most amazing pan juices!

Look at all that tasty goodness!

Gordon's recipe asks for cider in the gravy; I used beer (which I also used to baste the turkey). There weren't a lot of pan juices, but they were very intense, and could take quite a bit of stock/beer to make it up to a decent amount. This was easily the best gravy I have ever made - so tasty and deeply savoury. Lovely stuff!

The roast potatoes were based on Nigella's perfect roast potatoes, but made with olive oil as I'd run out of goosefat (oops!). I also took a tip from Jamie Oliver's Family Christmas program (do we see a theme here...?) and squished down the potatoes with a potato masher halfway through cooking to increase the crispy surface area. I also added garlic cloves and rosemary leaves for extra aromatic deliciousness.

Because of the herbs stuffed under the skin and the bacon-blanket, this turkey wasn't as golden or crispy as my previous efforts. (I love how my niece described last year's turkey as being "covered in turkey crackling"!) I wonder if this could be improved by removing the bacon for the last 20 minutes of cooking and / or using a maple syrup glaze? Either way, the turkey was fabulous - it wasn't dry at all!

Here are the sides: roast potatoes, chargrilled broccolini and red cabbage.

Ottolenghi's way of cooking broccoli is great - you blanch the broccoli briefly (I used broccolini), then cook them on a hot griddle until they get some nice char marks. They're finished off with some fried garlic cloves and finely sliced chilli. I loved the fresh, punchy colours and flavours against the otherwise brown and slightly heavy dishes.

Carved pieces of turkey

Stuffing with gravy

Below is my plate. You can (just) see a lone bread dumpling on the top-left side of the plate. As there were only four of us eating we didn't make the bread dumplings from scratch, but just boiled up some individual dumplings from a packet. (Labelled as Semmelknödel in delis or continental stores).

Haha, I love how the broccolini is at the bottom of the plate, trying to separate me from all the unhealthy food behind it!!

Phew - I was sooo full! We took a little break after all that food to open presents. Yay!! (I got some great foodie gifts this year, and have posted pics on my Facebook page.)

Dessert was Christmas pudding, of course. This year I tried my hand at Nigella's Ultimate Christmas Pudding, full of lusciously moist prunes and redolent with Pedro Ximénez sherry. I made up the batter and did the first steaming a month ago, and simply steamed it again for 3 hours before we ate it. (I actually doubled the recipe, and have 2 extra puddings at home. One has been frozen for next year, and I'm excited to be having the other one this week when we have friends over for a casual dinner. Yay for pudding!)

I served it with Nigella's iced rum sauce (from How to Eat), replacing the rum with more Pedro Ximénez. I love this stuff, more so than brandy butter! It tastes like a kind of smooth, rich sherry ice-cream. Gorgeous.

The pudding was so wonderful! It was definitely an improvement on both the Roux Brothers' very traditional pudding I made in 2008, and the gluten-free, vegetarian Christmas pudding I made at "Christmas in July" at The Langham last year. Nigella's pudding was smooth and rich, with an appealingly moist puddingy texture. The sherry was an inspired choice, matching and enhancing the sultanas contained within the pudding.

Best Christmas meal ever!

Christmas 2011: A Luxurious Pre-Christmas Dinner

2011-12-24T12:50:00.001+11:00

A Luxe Pre-Christmas Dinner for 5

Lobster Rolls on Homemade Brioche

Gingerbread Spice Glazed Ham with Cherry Relish

Petits Pois à La Française

Scalloped Potatoes with Leeks

Poires Belle Hélène

Merry pre-Christmas everybody! Is everyone ready for the big day tomorrow? I still have a couple of gifts to wrap, but other than that everything is sorted and ready for Turkey Day! I'm taking Christmas a little easier than usual - I've only made Christmas puddings and one batch of Vanillekipferl this year; no Christmas cake or mince pies - but we did have a super-duper deluxe blowout meal at my parents' house two nights ago.

You may remember I previously said I wanted to make my own version of the uninspiring New England Lobster Rolls I tried at Golden Fields earlier this year, and the menu was built up from that idea. (Granted, I've only tried a canapé version of their famous rolls, not their standard version which has so caught the interest of Melbourne's dining public). I based my lobster rolls on this recipe from Gourmet Traveller, and baked my own brioche buns for it. I'll be making them again next week for another dinner for friends, and will devote a whole blogpost to them soon! Lest you think I've got money to burn on lobster, let me tell you about a sweet deal I've made with lots of my friends: if they agree to supply fresh lobster, I'll make us lobster rolls. Pretty cool, huh!

The rest of the menu continued the "luxury" theme with a beautiful leg ham from Andrew's Choice Butcher in Yarraville, which I glazed in gingerbread spices and served with a cherry relish (a recipe from Snowflakes and Schnapps). The accompaniments were my favourite peas (a Nigella recipe), and Martha Stewart's scalloped potatoes with leeks, which we thought would make a good change from my usual ham-accompaniment of mac & cheese.

For dessert, I wanted to try my hand at making a dessert I tried at Il Fornaio last year: Phillipa Sibley's Poires Belle Hélène, from her new book PS Desserts. I actually received a review copy of PS Desserts from the publishers, and I intended to post the recipe for Poires Belle Hélène here on my blog. However, I encountered a few little kinks with the recipe, and don't think it's the most user friendly recipe to try at home. Once I've worked my way through the book a little more I'll find a better recipe to share with y'all!

Phew! I'm getting tired again just writing about the menu! It was a lot of work - a two-person job spread over two days (thank-you Sandra for all the help!) - but worth it for such delicious results.

Let's start with the dessert, as this was the first thing we had to prepare - most of it was done the day before. It was definitely the most difficult thing on the menu - there were pears to poach, vanilla ice-cream to churn, chocolate sauce to pipe and chocolate sponge to make! If you've tried this dessert before, you'll know that the ice-cream is piped into the poached pears, and the chocolate sauce is frozen in logs, then baked inside the chocolate sponge, for two sweet surprises at the table.

Peeled and cored pears, ready for poaching

Vanilla scented custard, the base for the ice-cream

Scooping the chocolate sauce into a piping bag

Piping lines of chocolate sauce - don't laugh, I know what it looks like!

Various mixtures that go into the chocolate sponge. I whisked the egg whites by hand!

As I mentioned above, I had some issues with the recipe - the most important of which was that it made way too much chocolate sauce. With the quantities given, I got about 15 logs of chocolate sauce - and I only ended up needing two of them! There's no mention anywhere in the recipe that it makes more sauce than you'll need, and looking at the quantities, they could easily be scaled down.

It did taste delicious though (especially straight out of the freezer!), so I'm keeping them for future snacking or for melting over ice-cream.

The other issue I had (which was my fault) was that the recipe asks you to bake the sponges 4.5cm in diameter, and I only had 8cm moulds, so I was only able to get four flat sponges out of the mixture rather than the six tall ones that the recipe says it will make. (And there were five of us eating that night - d'oh!) I know that baking is an exact science and that the recipe would have worked better if I'd used moulds in the correct dimensions. However, I must admit I found it a little frustrating that the chocolate sponge recipe was so precise, when the chocolate sauce recipe made so much more than required. The puddings are quite rich though, so we were happy to share.

Half-filled sponges with chocolate sauce inside

So, the sponges went in the freezer, and the custard and pears went in the fridge, ready to be finished off just before eating.

The other thing I did in advance was to bake the brioche rolls, using this incredibly easy recipe.

Brioche rolls

Everything else we prepared in the afternoon before the dinner!

raw ham

And then finally... everything was done and we could crack open the champagne and eat! Cheers!

Champagne supplied by my dad

Lobster roll with champagne

Mmm... so much lobster.

One tail made more than enough filling for us, which I suppose makes it an economical way to enjoy lobster?? Hehe.

And now the main course...

Ham, cherry relish, petits pois

The ham was gorgeous - and I'd expect nothing less from Andrew's Choice! We've got quite a bit of ham left... yay leftovers! I daresay I like the spicy, sticky cherry relish even better than Nigella's spiced peaches, which used to be my usual accompaniment for ham.

Scalloped potatoes with leeks - potatoes sliced by hand (thank-you Sandra!)

The scalloped potatoes were amazing! Somehow they tasted light, with no feeling of stodginess or heaviness. A great recipe from Martha Stewart! I must confess that scalloped potatoes are one of my favourite foods ever. When I was a kid, whenever we'd go to buffets, I'd always make a beeline for the scalloped potatoes, while everyone else was getting stuck into the more expensive oysters and prawns. I even liked them made with the MSG and salt-laden flavour packets you can get at the supermarket!

Haha, check out my potato-to-ham ratio:

As I mentioned above, there was still a little work to do for the dessert: about 20 minutes before we wanted to eat (and after all that food, we definitely needed a little break in between courses!), we churned the ice-cream, popped the puddings in the oven, then piped the ice-cream into the pears.

Ta-dah!

My puddings didn't look quite like Philippa's perfect towering version, but I was proud of them nonetheless! It was so nice to hear my mum exclaim: "Oh wow, there's something inside the pear!" I totally understand it when Philippa writes "I love surprising people".

Mmm... melty ice-cream...

You'll see that I created a much bigger cavity in my pears than in the ones at Il Fornaio - more room for ice-cream!

Mmm... melty chocolate sauce...

Oozy chocolate pudding

Yum yum yum! My favourite part of this dessert was the pear - perhaps for an easier version in future I'll make the ice-cream-stuffed pears and just drizzle them with the chocolate sauce.

Merry Christmas everybody!!

Christmas 2011: Adrian's Pre-Christmas Dinner

2011-12-19T23:13:00.002+11:00

Hi everyone! Can you believe it's less than a week until Christmas? I hope everyone's enjoying the festive season, and I'm super-excited to see what everyone's got planned for the big day! I've got a few big Christmas meals coming up (well, three actually!) for family and friends over the next week or so, which I'll be blogging just as soon as I can. But for today, I'd like to share with you the most epic pre-Christmas meal I enjoyed at my friend Adrian's house last week. Adrian, (different from Food-Rehab Adrian, but just as nice), has previously worked as a chef in London and Paris, and last weekend cooked an amazing Christmas meal for 14 lucky guests. There were two geese, a ham, two gravies, stuffing, four separate side dishes and an insane amount of brandy butter. Woah! Let's take a look:

The Table

Geese - 2 roast geese with Cumberland sausage / prune / armagnac stuffing

Cherry Gravy - I loved the sweet cherries against the dark goose meat

Glazed ham served with pineapple gravy

Potato salad - whole boiled unpeeled potatoes with mayonnaise, grated hard boiled eggs, crisp bacon pieces, chives, onions

Greens - asparagus, peas and broad beans cooked in stock

Red cabbage

Roast vegetables - Goose-fat roasted carrots and parsnips with chestnuts

My gift from the Christmas cracker - cute measuring spoons!

There was so much delicious food, and I was so full! But of course I was powerless in the face of dessert...

Flambéed Christmas Cake

Brandy Butter. Ahem.

Vanillekipferl - My contribution to the evening

Vanillekipferl and brandy butter - a surprisingly good combination

Thanks to Adrian for an absolutely incredible meal! What a treat!

What are y'all cooking and eating for Christmas?

Giant Steps / Innocent Bystander

2011-12-14T21:33:00.001+11:00

A few weeks ago, we took a little road trip to the Yarra Valley with my lovely cousin Catherine. We visited Healesville and a few wineries, and drove down the beautiful Black Spur, but the highlight of the day for me was lunch at the Giant Steps / Innocent Bystander Winery.

Giant Steps / Innocent Bystander Winery

336 Maroondah Hwy

Healesville VIC 3777

Ph: (03) 5962-6111

Website

Prior to our visit, my awareness of Innocent Bystander largely centred around their ubiquitous (and delicious!) moscato, however, the winery has been blogged pretty heavily - it seems to be a very popular destination for daytrippers!

We secured ourselves a table outside on the deck, and then took it in turns to explore...

There's quite a bit going on in the large space, and I started with a tasting of the wines (luckily I wasn't driving that day!) We picked up a couple of bottles of the moscato to take home as well.

I had a sticky beak around the cheese counter... (there's a cheese room as well!)

I also found myself drawn to the variety of lovely-looking breads and pastries, baked in-house. In addition to the breads, there were Polish donuts, croissants, chocolate tarts, lemon tarts and much more. (You can't see the label in the below picture, but on the bottom right hand side, there's a cake simply labelled "Chef's Whim" - cute idea!)

Look at all those pastries! I really must come back for breakfast one day.

Innocent Bystander is famous for their pizzas and they're all made to order on organic sourdough bases.

The pizzas are priced between $19-$24, and have a range of simple, classico toppings. They have other meals as well - things like duck and mushroom pie, and red duck curry - but these were all rather expensive. There were many items close to the $40 mark: a bit more than what I'd want to spend on a casual lunch. We all ended up ordering pizza, and I'm glad we did, as they were generally very good!

I loved the burnished, bubbled-up dough (which I believe comes from the colomba method of folding and kneading the dough). Apart from the gorgeous crunchy/chewy texture, it means you get little craters and pockets of flavour and filling - yum yum. (Although sometimes this means you also get pockets of oil - not so pleasant).

Calabrese salami, san marzano tomato, oregano & buffalo mozzarella pizza - $24

Roast mushroom, asiago, black truffle oil, roasted garlic & parsley pizza - $23

The mushroom pizza was the least tasty of the three we tried - whilst it had a great texture, it was very bland and really needed a lot of salt.

I paired my spicy pork sausage pizza with a glass of the moscato - (treat yo'self 2011!) - and the light sweet bubbles matched well with the spicy pizza.

Spicy pork sausage, buffalo mozzarella, san marzano tomato & chilli pizza - $23

Aah.. what a lovely way to spend a weekend afternoon!

Chia Seed Pancakes

2011-12-11T23:14:00.005+11:00

I love a good pancake stack! This was my breakfast on Saturday morning: fluffy chia seed pancakes, topped with organic vanilla yoghurt, fresh blueberries and drizzled with honey.

It was reading Michael's review of Cafe Lua that got the idea of chia seed pancakes in my head. The ones he ate there were savoury pumpkin and chia seed pancakes, served with a lentil and spinach salad - sounds delicious, right? Cafe Lua is now on my (ever-expanding) list of places to visit, and on my next trip to the supermarket, I picked up a packet of chia seeds for the pantry, which I used in the sweet pancakes you see above.

You see, I've been attempting to eat healthily and exercise more in the lead-up to Christmas, and by the time the weekend rolled around, I really felt like a little treat. I wanted something substantial, but not something that would ruin all my hard work. I thought that a small stack of pancakes, enriched with health-giving chia seeds would do the trick.

I based the recipe on Nigella's American breakfast pancakes (How to be a Domestic Goddess), adding chia seeds and making them very small, like pikelets. I initially considered making the batter in the blender, but I didn't want the crunch of the chia seeds getting lost. I don't like the idea of sneaking healthy ingredients into normal food - (sorry Jessica Seinfeld!) - and much prefer the approach of finding healthy food that actually tastes good. (Prime example: antioxidant-rich blueberries!)

Here is a pancake in the pan, just as it's ready to flip. Can you see the little grey specks from the chia seeds?

Bird's eye view of the stack

Nude stack

Adding the yoghurt

Adding the blueberries

With some honey

I really liked these! The seeds gave the pancakes a nice crunch, without making them heavy or dense, and the blueberries were a very tasty (and healthy!) accompaniment. Fabulous.

Chia Seed Pancakes
Adapted from Nigella Lawson's American Breakfast Pancakes
Makes 8-10 small pancakes, serves 2

Ingredients
115g plain flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 1/2 tsp sugar
15g chia seeds (black or white)
1 large egg, beaten
15g butter, melted and cooled
150ml milk
Extra butter for frying
To serve: vanilla yoghurt, fresh blueberries, honey

Method
Sieve the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into a mixing bowl, and stir in the chia seeds. Make a well in the centre, and gradually add in the beaten egg, melted butter and milk, whisking all the while. Set aside for 30 minutes. (Enough time to prepare the fruits, set the table and put a pot of coffee on!)
Heat a non-stick pan over a medium heat, and melt a teaspoon or so of butter in the pan. Drop 30ml of batter at a time into the pan, (I use a quarter cup measure and get two pancakes out of each one), and cook until the top of each is bubbling and the base is sealed. Flip over and cook for another minute or two until browned to your liking. Keep the cooked pancakes warm as you cook your way through the remaining batter.

Serve with vanilla yoghurt, fresh blueberries and honey.

So, now I have a packet of chia seeds in the pantry - any suggestions on what I can do with them?

Snickers Cookies

2011-12-07T07:32:00.000+11:00

"Hey Sarah, why don't we try these Snickers cookies from Safeway? They could be nice!"

Now that sounds like a challenge. Fret not, dear readers, I'm not blogging about some dodgy cookies from Safeway. Well, not just blogging about some dodgy cookies from Safeway. When those homebrand Safeway Snickers cookies mysteriously found their way into our shopping basket, I knew I just had try and make a better version at home. What's with the huge list of ingredients? I don't even know what half of those things are: emulsifiers (322 from soy!), compound dark chocolate, shortening blend... blergh.

And here is my version. Just good quality unsalted butter, brown and caster sugars, vanilla extract, an egg, flour, some bicarb, some salt, toasted peanuts and milk chocolate. And of course, some chopped up Snickers bars. Aaah...

I based these cookies on Nigella Lawson's chocolate chip cookies (from Kitchen), but you can use your favourite chocolate-chip cookie recipe. I chopped up a couple of 65g Snickers bars and added them to the dough with the chocolate chips and the peanuts. (I reduced the volume of chocolate chips and peanuts accordingly so that the total volume of add-ins remained the same).

Here are the Snickers bars... yum yum. Don't forget to taste test!

All the add-ins. I used unsalted roasted peanuts, but I think that salted peanuts might work well too. (Although if that were the case, I'd avoid putting any salt in the dough itself).

Mixing the dough...

And with the nuts and chocolate...

Nigella says to use a quarter cup measure to portion out the dough. This resulted in evenly-sized cookies, but they were huge! (Insert gratuitous joke about how Nigella has big cookies, har har). I think somewhere between quarter-cup and one-tablespoon would be perfect - I should stay on the lookout for a 30 ml mini ice-cream scoop.

And here's one of mine, next to one of Woolworth's. In all fairness, the Woolies' ones weren't completely terrible, they were just very average. I don't get why anyone would buy something that calorific, when you could easily bake something. (Or, you know, just buy a Snickers bar!)

They were unpleasantly tough and chewy, with all the add-ins cut up so small that the texture was uniformly soft - you could barely detect the presence of peanuts, chocolate chips or Snickers pieces! (Although the inability to detect it is a good thing when it comes to compound chocolate.) Nope, definitely sticking to home made!!

Mmm... melty...

The Ottolenghi Cookbook

2011-12-04T23:53:00.004+11:00

Sweet potato galette

Mmm... here's a delicious sweet potato galette, from my new favourite cookbook: the Ottolenghi Cookbook. You may remember my friend Clarice introduced me to this fabulous book in Paris, and after cooking some fantastic recipes together, I just had to buy it for myself.

N.B. This is a photo we took of the book cover itself

Ottolenghi, for those of you who don't know, is a famous cafe / restaurant / bistro with four locations in London (plus a restaurant, Nopi). The book is written by business partners Sami Tamimi and Yotam Ottolenghi, who both hail from Jerusalem, and their passion for fresh, delicious food is evident on the pages.

Before I even got stuck into cooking the recipes, I knew it was my type of book. Firstly, they use the soaked-bread-in-water trick that I love for meatballs; they acknowledge that their macarons are imperfect-looking-yet-tasty, and even recommend Ladurée for perfect ones; and finally, their cupcakes are the serious kind - lusciously thick ganaches and mascarpone based icings, none of that nasty crusty hard pink buttercream stuff! Love!

Clarice described the book as having a similar style to Bill Granger, in that there's a balance between fresh, vibrant healthy savouries, and very decadent desserts. Of course, they're also both based on well-renowned cafes! However, I would say Ottolenghi definitely has the edge on Bill. Even though I'm a fan of Bill, with Ottolenghi there is a level of technical skill and knowledge on the page that just doesn't come through with Bill's books. Not to imply that Bill himself lacks technical skill, far from it, but just that his recipes seem too simplified to sustain my prolonged interest.

A clear theme I've noticed through the book is unexpected but well thought out flavour combinations and techniques - a sweet potato galette is perked up with raw garlic and chilli; blanched brocolli is given extra smoky depth by being cooked on a char grill, and so on.

I've been cooking heaps from the book, and I haven't come across a single dud recipe yet. If I were ever to do another Sarah Discovers How to Eat-type project, it would be with this book. In fact, I'm putting off buying the Yotam's next book (Plenty), because I'm afraid I won't ever leave the kitchen! Let's have a look at what I've been cooking so far...

Sweet Potato Galettes

I'll start with the sweet potato galettes, as this is my absolute favourite recipe in the book! Since we've come home from Europe, I've made it at least four times - perfect for relaxed dinners with friends, or an easy yet treaty meal at home. These days I don't need the recipe anymore, but can simply wing it - yay! It's just puff pastry, layered up with sour cream, roast slices of sweet potato, goat's cheese, pepitas and chillies. I always use Carême puff pastry, for super flaky-buttery goodness!

After baking, you brush the tart with a punchy mixture of olive oil, raw garlic and parsley, really lifting what would otherwise be a uniformly sweet-ish tart into something memorable and delicious.

Turkey and Sweetcorn Meatballs with Roasted Pepper Sauce

I must admit I wasn't convinced by the name "turkey meatballs", turkey mince always reminding me of dry, uninspiring diet-foods. But these were really good! See the squished bread roll in the mixture? That's what makes the finished meatballs balls (heh) soft and bouncy! As you can see, there are heaps of herbs and other ingredients to add interest. The corn kernels are also roasted in a pan before being added to the mixture, giving a nice smoky flavour and tortilla-like aroma.

Ta-dah!

It's a bit of a pain to fry the meatballs and then bake them, but the results are worth it! The accompanying red pepper sauce (not pictured) is pretty intensely sour, so I like to tone down the vinegar and add a pinch of sugar. I like these served as a starter, or as a full meal with some rice.

Mixed Mushrooms with Cinnamon and Lemon

The cinnamon and lemon in this dish differentiates it from your standard garlic-butter mushrooms, and I served these as an accompaniment to barbecued chicken and polenta. You'll see I just used plain old button mushrooms - if I were to use the suggested mix of button, chestnut, shiitake, oyster and enoki mushrooms, it would have cost me about $25 for the mushies alone! It still tasted good though.

Brown Rice and Quinoa with Orange and Pistachios

with spicy tomato sauce (from the Kosheri recipe)

This healthy and substantial recipe contains rice and quinoa (obviously), brightened up with a sparkly mixture of dried apricot, spring onions, rocket, pistachios, lemon juice and orange juice. I think it's meant to be served as a room-temperature salad, but I served it hot for dinner. The fried egg was my addition - very Asian of me, I know.

The original recipe specifies camargue red rice and quinoa, but I couldn't find red rice, so I substituted brown basmati. I also made the spicy tomato sauce to go with it as I was worried it might be a little dry - it certainly wasn't dry, but I did love the warming, spicy tomato sauce with the rice and egg.

Marinated Rack of Lamb with Coriander and Honey

This was a very simple recipe for lamb (I clearly used chops instead of a rack), and I thought the pungent herby marinade took the lamb above a standard grilled lamb. Very nice!

Butternut, Carrot and Goat's Cheese Tartlet

This tart recipe is a bit more involved than the galette above - you start by making a poppyseed shortcrust pastry, and fit it into individual little tins.

There is also a jammy-type relish from grated carrots...

... as well as goat's cheese, a creamy-eggy filling and roasted cubes of butternut pumpkin. Phew! Interestingly, the recipe says it will fill six 2x10cm tartlets, which I used, but I had enough mixture to fill those, plus an extra 20cm tart!

I brought these sturdy little babies to a picnic, along with the cucumber and poppyseed salad (another recipe from the book!) I've made the cucumber salad almost as often as the sweet potato galette - it's definitely a staple in my house now.

They were very tasty, but quite a bit of work - I'd definitely like to make them again, but probably not as frequently as the sweet potato galette. Perhaps for a future dinner party!

Blueberry Crumble Muffins

These are a simple muffin recipe, topped with a generous spoonful of crumble and studded with fresh blueberries. I added walnuts for extra crunch. The muffins were great - very tender crumbed and moist. However, being based purely on white flour and with the crumble topping, they were a little sweet and soft; I think of them as more of an afternoon tea treat than a breakfast item.

Chocolate Fudge Cake

And finally I present the chocolate fudge cake! It's one of those sunken flourless chocolate cakes: rich with melted chocolate and lightened with whipped egg whites. It's slightly different though, in that you bake two thirds of the mixture first, let it cool, add the remaining mixture and bake it again. This is to give different textures in the cake (although you can bake it all at once if you want!)

When I made it, I was too impatiently greedy to let it cool in between baking and after it was completely cooked, so it was very, very dense and fudgy, almost falling apart when we ate it. Oops! It still tasted amaaazing though. Next time I'll be more patient and let it firm up completely before digging in. Maybe.

Check out the following for more Ottolenghi goodness: both Laura from Hungry and Frozen and Cindy & Michael from Where's the Beef have been cooking heaps from Plenty; Keiko from Nordljus has visited Ottolenghi twice to talk to Yotam in '08 and '10; and Yotam himself has a column in The Guardian. Enjoy!

A Rather Delicious Asparagus Salad

2011-11-29T23:55:00.000+11:00

Here it is! A rather delicious asparagus salad, and my new favourite brunch dish. I made this up over the weekend, based on a classic Italian combination and a starter my ex-chef friend made for a recent lunch party. It has green, white and purple asparagus - some raw and sliced into fine shavings, some lightly cooked in chunks - with a soft-poached egg, parmesan cheese and mostarda di fruitta. Of course, I finished it with some lovely extra virgin olive oil, a squeeze of lemon juice, and plenty of freshly cracked salt and pepper - gorgeous with a thick slice of grainy sourdough toast to catch all the lovely juices.

I must admit, I made this dish primarily because I had heaps of asparagus that needed to be used and I thought it would look pretty; I wasn't prepared for how wonderful it would taste!

I'd bought a lot of asparagus the day before - a total impulse buy - at the Vic Market. I'm usually a stickler for recipes, and will only buy what's on my list. But when I saw the below display I couldn't resist! And without a final recipe in mind, I bought one bunch of each colour: white, purple and green. I'm glad to say this salad was the result of my impulsiveness.

I was actually at the market on a guided tour, having been invited along to join in a Foodies Tour. Whenever I'm travelling I love to wander through markets - some of my faves have been: Port Vila Market in Vanuatu, the Nishiki Food Market in Kyoto, Vienna's Naschmarkt, Barcelona's world-famous La Bouqueria and, of course, London's amazing Borough Market. I do shop at the Vic Market reasonably regularly, but usually I'm in too much of a hurry and am too busy elbowing my way through the crowds to stop and look around. It was really nice to take a different view of our very own Queen Vic Market, and I took heaps of photos just like a tourist! I've put the pics up on my Facebook page, so do check them out if you are interested.

Now, back to the asparagus salad! I've put the recipe in full at the bottom of this post, and have some pictures here of the steps involved. There's a bit of fiddly assembly involved, but it's not too difficult - and so worth the effort!

Shaved asparagus

Let's check out my new slate-coloured pebble bowl from Mud - and big thanks to my friends Soph, Alae and Kristine for giving me a Mud voucher for my birthday this year! I absolutely love it! Yay!

Cooked asparagus lengths - the purple colour seems to fade when it's cooked

Poached egg

Arranging the raw asparagus shavings on top

With thin slices of mostarda di frutta

A Rather Delicious Asparagus Salad
An original recipe by Sarah Cooks, inspired by a classic Italian combination
Serves 1

Ingredients
2 stalks each white, purple and green asparagus
1 egg, preferably free range and/or organic
1 tbs extra virgin olive oil
A generous squeeze of lemon juice
Sea salt and black pepper
To taste: mostarda di frutta, Parmesan cheese

Method
Wash the asparagus stalks and snap off the woody ends. Take one stalk of each colour and use a vegetable peeler to slice them into thin shavings. Set aside.
Slice the remaining asparagus stalks into 3cm lengths. Blanch in boiling salted water until tender but still crisp, about 2 minutes. Drain the asparagus pieces, cool under cold running water and drain again.
Poach an egg in simmering water until cooked to your liking.
Meanwhile, to make the dressing, stir the olive oil and lemon juice in a small bowl, and season to taste with salt and pepper. Swirl the cooked asparagus pieces in the dressing to coat, and place on a serving plate. Place the drained, poached egg on top.
Swirl the asparagus shavings in the dressing to coat, and pile on top of the egg. Add shavings of Parmesan cheese and thin slices of mostarda di frutta. Drizzle generously with more olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
Serve with thick slices of sourdough or multigrain toast.

Danishes

2011-11-26T19:10:00.001+11:00

Ever since I bought Nigella's How to be a Domestic Goddess, I've wanted to make her Danish pastry recipe. However, it always seemed too time consuming, despite being a sped-up version. You need to let it rest and rise twice, then there's the rolling and the shaping and the ensuing mess. And what on earth would I do with 6 danishes? (That's a rhetorical question).

But buoyed by my experience with croissants, puff pastry and Tartine's flaky pastry (which is essentially an un-laminated rough-puff pastry), and with a free weekend ahead of me, I thought it wouldn't hurt to give them a go.

Danish pastry is the same as croissant dough - that is, a yeasted laminated dough. Nigella's recipe is a quick processor version. Rather than wrapping the dough around a flat square of butter before starting to roll, in this version the butter is distributed throughout the dough in small, pebble-like pieces.

Additionally, Nigella's version gets you to do all the rolling at once, rather than letting it rest for 30 minutes in between each turn. (If you don't put yeast in the original dough, what you've got is a rough puff pastry!)

With each turn, the dough gets smoother and smoother...

... and you can see the layers building up.

And ta-dah! Here is the finished dough. I love how smooth it gets, compared to the rough and shaggy ball of dough you start with.

I used a pizza cutter to slice the dough. This way you get minimal tear-and-drag along the edge of the dough, so the layers rise more evenly.

So, the recipe makes enough for two batches Nigella has two versions in her book: cheese danish, and an almond danish. I made cheese and cherry danishes with the first batch, and stashed the remainder in the freezer for a later batch of almond danishes.

As you can see above, the pieces weren't particularly even. Oops! But still, I managed to bring them together into rough Danish pastry shapes.

Glazed with egg...

...and then baked! The recipe calls for you to brush the baked danishes with a clear sugar glaze, and then drizzle a white sugar glaze over the top. I'm not a fan of my sweets being too sweet, so I skipped the second glaze.

You can see in the above photo the comparison with and without the clear glaze. It's quite pretty, but I'm not sure it's completely necessary. Do you think it makes a big difference?

You'll also notice that some of the pastries came unstuck while being baked - a combination of too much wet filling, and my not sealing the edges tightly enough. I think next time I'll avoid ricotta for a firmer German / Eastern-European cheese, like twaróg, or those hefty blocks of Tempo's continental cottage cheese. That's probably about as close as I can get to Topfenstrudel in Australia!

Oh yes, and the taste? These danishes were incredible. I loved the soft flaky pastry and its total butteriness (I've decided that's a word). They're actually super easy to make, and I found that Nigella's recipe worked very, very well.

I told you I also made almond Danishes, yes? I did these a few days later (with the dough frozen in the meantime), to take to my parents' house for dessert. The dough puffed up heaps because it proved in a much warmer spot!

And here they are, all baked. I didn't bother with the sugar glaze this time as I was in a hurry.

I'm so glad I finally got around to making these - yum yum and so much fun! Such a lovely breakfast or afternoon indulgence with a cup of coffee. I'll definitely be making these again, perhaps even making croissants out of the dough. (So much faster and easier than the full croissant/danish dough I've made previously). I'll want to play around with the fillings too - what are your favourite danish fillings?

Nigella Lawson's Garlic and Parsley Hearthbreads

2011-11-23T19:34:00.002+11:00

I wanted a hearty accompaniment for a simple spaghetti bolognese, but wanted something a little more special than a squidgy frozen loaf from the supermarket. So I rolled up my sleeves and whipped up Nigella's garlic and parsley hearthbreads. The more eagle-eyed among you will notice that I have made this before, seven years and a day ago, in fact! After all that time, I think it's due for a repeat, don't you?

The recipe comes from Nigella's lovely book, How to be a Domestic Goddess, which I adore for its delicious recipes, understated photography and its deadpan humour. (This was years before the bright colours and silly names from Nigella Express: "Go Get 'Em Smoothie", "No Worries Chocolate Mousse" etc.)

The dough is a standard white-flour yeast dough, with a bit of olive oil and salt added. It's topped with a mixture of roasted garlic, parsley and olive oil. I added fresh oregano as well, because I had some and because I love it!

I didn't think we'd get through 8 hearthbreads with dinner, so I made half the dough into little football bread roll shapes to eat later!

With the garlic paste spread on top...

And fresh out of the oven...

Cute!

The next day, I defrosted some feta-stuffed Frikadellen for dinner, but instead of eating it with potatoes and gravy, I made myself a mini burger. I halved and toasted one of the bread rolls, spread it with some of the leftover garlic paste, and topped it with the Frikadelle and some curry ketchup.

Mini-burger! Super cute!

The Lake House

2011-11-21T21:07:00.002+11:00

For a special occasion dinner in Daylesford, it had to be The Lake House.

Lake House

King Street

Daylesford 3460

Ph: (03) 5348 3329

Website

So, you may have seen that Alla Wolf-Tasker herself commented on my post about Wombat Hill House. Cool, huh? I think it's pretty great that someone so long-standing in the industry is still interested in and keeps up with what's being said about her work - so assuming that she does read this post: HI ALLA!

I was delighted to be seated right next to a window, with a nice view of the trees. Not only was it a lovely spot, but it was great for taking pictures of the food! I never use flash photography for food pictures in restaurants - I think that taking one or two flash photos of the people you're with is acceptable, repeated flash photographs of all the dishes throughout the evening is not - so I always think of it s a bonus when there's a lot of natural light. We were there for a few hours, and you'll also see that my pictures get darker as the night went on.

The staff were also very nice - it seems that Lake House and Wombat Hill House share some staff, and two of them recognised us from our visit to Wombat Hill House and said hi!

I started with a refreshing bitters lime and soda, and I loved the attention to detail - how cute is the 3-citrus garnish?

Bitters Lime and Soda

We also had local mineral water throughout the evening. (As I was driving, I just had one glass of champagne to start with, even though the "matching wines" option was very tempting!)

Sparkling mineral water

We were told that you could have a full degustation menu (a vegetarian option was also available), or the option of three courses from their fixed price menu ($105), with an optional cheese course for an $18 supplement. The vegetarian degustation menu actually looked amazing, and was well priced (approximately $130 from memory), but being big meat eaters, we weren't sure if it would be filling enough, so went for the fixed price menu. Between us we ordered one three-course, and one four-course option, and shared the cheese course.

First, we were brought a little amuse bouche of nori crisps with bonito aioli. The crisps were airy and well, crispy, rather like a prawn cracker, and the aioli was creamy with a pleasantly fishy taste. Sandra, however, doesn't like seafood, so I got to have this all to myself - muahaha!

Nori crisps with bonito aioli

We also got bread, which tasted just as good as it looked and, importantly, came with soft butter. Apart from the white bread that you can see in the picture, there was a brown bread which I thought was wholemeal, but turned out to be mushroom bread!

Bread and butter

Now, first courses. Sandra had the white asparagus dish, a beautiful composition of different shades of white. I always think of white asparagus as such a treat!

White asparagus, 64^oC egg, potato remoulade, Parmigiano Reggino, white asparagus veloute, parmesan foam

The egg was cooked perfectly: soft and oozy.

It also came with a delicious white asparagus veloute. It was so delicious, in fact, that Sandra said she'd have been happy with a big bowl of this veloute as her meal in its entirety. Big praise coming from a girl who hails from the asparagus capital of Germany!

White asparagus veloute, parmesan foam

For my starter, I had a wonderful mackerel sashimi with tender pieces of octopus and a smoky paprika tuile.

Sashimi mackerel, slow cooked octopus, orange & fennel seed vinaigrette, fennel aioli, smoky paprika tuile

I loved this dish! It had such delicate, fresh flavours and a nice contrast in textures - a real pleasure to eat.

And now we move on to the mains...

Sandra had wanted to order the "Pastured beef - seared Black Angus Yearling, slow braised shin, sweetbreads, white polenta, parsley, capers", and asked if the meat could be cooked "very well done". Our waitress explained to us that that particular cut of meat would shrink quite a bit, and suggested that we order something from their "Simpler Fare" menu, which would suit being cooked all the way through - fillet steak with asparagus, red wine jus and tarragon potatoes (see below), which Sandra was happy with.

From the "Simpler Fare" menu: Fillet steak with asparagus and red wine jus

I chose the spring poussin: I just couldn't say no to the combination of "white asparagus, morels, foie gras".

Spring Poussin - breast, ballotine, pancetta, garlic custard, white asparagus, morels, foie gras

The meals came with a gorgeous mixed-leaf salad and buttery tarragon potatoes.

Green salad, Tarragon potatoes

I mentioned above that Sandra requested her steak to be cooked "very well done" - unfortunately it came out closer to medium rare, and was still very pink and juicy in the middle. (It would have been great for me, but, of course, it wasn't my steak). It was so rare that she couldn't eat it, so we actually sent it back. The waitstaff were very nice about it, and offered to take my meal and the sides back as well, so that we could both eat together. Really considerate!

We were happy to wait, and fifteen minutes later our meals were brought out again. However, the steak was still not cooked well done! As you can see below, even after being sent back once, it was still pink in the middle.

By this stage, the asparagus and jus had gone a bit cold (my meal, luckily, was still warm), and we didn't want to kick up a fuss, so we didn't send it back again. It was just cooked enough that Sandra could eat it, but she didn't really enjoy it. We didn't quite understand why it wouldn't be cooked through, especially when our waitress had explained the menu and offered a meal that would suit being cooked this way, and that they'd taken the trouble to take both of our meals back when we'd first told them it wasn't cooked enough for her liking.

I don't mean to go on about the steak when there were so many positive aspects to the meal, but steak, like coffee or poached eggs, really is a dealbreaker: if it's not prepared exactly the way you like it, it's a real disappointment. And if you're paying those prices for your dinner, you expect your steak cooked the way you request!

On a more positive note, I greatly enjoyed my main course. I loved the poussin itself, with its tender and juicy meat and crisp skin, as well as the little morsels of morels and tender-crisp asparagus. (I see now it was a rather asparagus-heavy meal, but I think that's a Very Good Thing.)

And check out this awesome block of foie gras that came with my meal! What decadence! Even I, eater-extraordinaire, could only manage half of the foie gras.

Come to Mamma...

A short break, and then it was time for our cheese course.

Cheese platter - goats cheese, cheddar

You get 50 grams of cheese in total, and can choose one or two cheeses from a selection of four. We got a lovely goats cheese, and a rather mild cheddar. (Unfortunately I can't remember the names of either cheese - I believe the goats cheese was called "Bridget's Well", but have been unable to confirm this through extensive internet searches. Does this name sound familiar to anyone? And more importantly, can you tell me where I can buy it?) The cheese came with some muscatel grapes, lavosh, and some lightly toasted slices of fruit bread. I love dried fruit and rich spices with cheese, and this bread was a fantastic accompaniment! We were both quite full by this time, so I'm glad we'd decided to share the cheese course.

Our pre-dessert was an apple panna cotta with apple and vanilla jelly.

Pre-Dessert: Apple panna cotta with apple and vanilla jelly

Apples? Vanilla? Panna Cotta? All of Sandra's dessert favourites in one little glass! I felt bad that she hadn't liked her steak, so I only had a tiny taste and let her have the rest. I was impressed with the purity of the apple flavour that came through, and the smooth and creamy texture. Interestingly, both panna cottas actually tasted quite different. One had a very strong apple flavour, whilst the other had a more pronounced vanilla taste. Both were delicious, but it was interesting to note the difference - clearly they must be made by hand in individual batches!

And if there's a "pre-dessert", that means there must be a dessert! I had the "Assorted chocolate textures, early violets". This included a quenelle of chocolate sorbet, squares of chocolate bread and butter pudding, white chocolate jelly, chocolate mousse, shatteringly crisp shards of chocolate tuille, and a violet granita.

Assorted chocolate textures, early violets

I enjoyed all the chocolate elements in this dish, especially the luscious chocolate sorbet and the unexpected white chocolate jelly. I'm not the hugest fan of violets (or floral flavours in general), so I didn't love the fact that the granita melted across the plate and combined with the other flavours - but if you do like violets and chocolate, then this dish is for you!

Sandra went for the selection of ice-creams and sorbets.

Seasonal ice-creams, sorbets, embellishments

Our waitress had told us the flavour selection would be peach, mango and raspberry, but what actually came out was coconut, mango and raspberry. Sandra does like coconut though, so it was all good! Like the panna cotta above, the sorbets were impressive in their smoothness and purity of flavour.

We finished up the meal with some coffee and "Sweet Indulgences".

Cafe latte

Sweet Indulgences hand made at Lake House

The sweet indulgences consisted of Austrian shortbread, fudge, a little jelly, a pistachio cakelet and (the standout, for me) spicy caramel popcorn. Luckily there was only a small amount of the popcorn on the plate - in other circumstances I could have easily scoffed huge quantities of it! I believe it was cayenne pepper on the popcorn, which gave it an addictive spicy kick.

The meal cost approximately $250 for two, which I think was quite well priced considering the level of service and the quality of the produce used. Our only gripe was with the steak, and if not for that, it would have been an ideal dining experience. I would definitely like to visit again one day.

Buffalo Wings with Blue Cheese Dressing

2011-11-16T22:32:00.001+11:00

I said I'd make Buffalo wings, and here they are! They're super easy, and very tasty, crispy and spicy - a nice change from the usual sticky-glazed wings we seem to eat in Australia. For some reason, any time I eat something uninspiring or unsatisfactory at a restaurant, I leave absolutely determined to cook a better version myself. I made these, a week after our trip to Captain America's, to share at a cocktail party my friends were having. (The same cocktail party to which we brought the rainbow cookies, incidentally. It was a good party!)

You have to coat the wings in flour, bake them, and then drizzle them in a spicy sauce to serve. They are always served with celery sticks and blue cheese sauce. Here they are after baking, but before the hot sauce:

Looks like KFC, yes yes?

I prepared the sauces and dusted the wingettes in flour at home, and baked them and assembled the dish at my friends' place. Easy, easy! I've put the recipe down below and they are super-delicious, so give them a go!

The sauce smelled incredibly hot and acidic, so I only coated half the wings in the sauce in case it was too powerful. (I later realised that I forgot to add the 6 tbs of butter that the recipe asks for - whoops!). But it actually tasted great: spicy, yes, but not overpoweringly so. They were super-addictive, and we totally smashed them! Even better than the wings, though, was the blue cheese dressing - so delicious. Even people who don't like blue cheese seem to like this: the sour cream seem to mellow out the intensity of the blue cheese, to make it a very accessible taste. I ate the leftover dip with crackers, with celery sticks, drizzled over steak... and I'm sure it would be great as a dressing for a chunky cos lettuce salad!

I'm actually not too sure on the reasoning for having celery sticks with the wings - is it to maintain a pretence of healthiness? Or simply for a crunchy contrast? - but either way, the combo was fabulous. I actually detest raw celery, but when it's dipped into the sharp blue cheese dressing, well, I realised that raw celery actually has a purpose.

Authentic Anchor Bar Buffalo Chicken Wings
Recipe from About.com

Ingredients
36 chicken wingettes
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tsp salt
1 cup plain flour
1 1/2 tablespoons white vinegar
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons Frank's Louisiana hot sauce
6 tablespoons unsalted butter

Method
Toss the wingettes in a bowl with the oil and salt. Place into a large plastic zip-lock bag, and add the flour. Shake to coat evenly. Remove wings from the bag, shaking off excess flour, and spread out in a single layer on foil-lined baking trays. Bake for about 20 minutes, turn the wings over, and cook another 20 minutes, or until the wings are cooked through and browned.

While the wings are cooking, mix all the remaining ingredients in a pan, and over low heat bring to a simmer, stirring occasionally, and then turn off. After the wings are cooked, transfer to a large mixing bowl. Pour the sauce over the hot wings and toss with a spoon or spatula to completely coat.

Serve with celery sticks and blue cheese dressing.

Blue Cheese Dressing
Recipe (with slight adaptations) from Kottke.org

Ingredients
1/2 small onion, roughly chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tbsp fresh parsley leaves
2 tbsp fresh chives
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 tbsp fresh-squeezed lemon juice
1 tbsp white vinegar
1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese
Salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper to taste

Method
Combine all ingredients in a food processor or blender, and whizz until smooth. That's it! Tastes fabulous with the Buffalo wings, as a salad dressing, as a dip, to accompany steak or a baked potato...

Wombat Hill House

2011-11-14T19:38:00.002+11:00

Wombat Hill House
Wombat Botanic Gardens
Daylesford Vic
(03) 4373-0099
Website

On our first full day in Daylesford, we stopped in at Alla Wolf-Tasker's new cafe, Wombat Hill House, for a spot of breakfast. It's set in a cute little house in the Wombat Botanic Gardens, a very short drive out of town.

First impressions: I loved the cosy atmosphere and the bright and airy space...

Interior

... and most importantly - THEY HAVE FREE WI-FI! Yay!! Totally fantastic. It seems that nowhere in Daylesford has Vodaphone reception, and it was so good to be able to check my emails and let my family know I'd arrived safely.

I was very tempted by the baked goods at the counter - think comforting options like cookies, brownies, mini carrot cakes and so on - but they were extremely expensive. For example, a mini carrot cake with cream cheese icing, baked in something about the size of a standard muffin tin, cost $7. Seven!! Eek! I really did want something sweet, so I ordered a little chocolate brownie square for $4.50. (You can see a picture of it below).

They also have salads in the cabinet, as well as items like their house made fritters and ricotta hotcakes.

Cute! I love wombats!

Cappuccino, Cafe Latte, Brownie - $4.50

Mmm... gorgeous coffees! The brownie, whilst small, was very rich and well made. It was a nice little treat to go along with our breakfasts and coffees.

Ricotta hotcakes & fruit - $14

The ricotta hotcakes seemed small when we first saw them, but perhaps this is because we've become accustomed to the gargantuan portions that many breakfast cafes in Melbourne seem to serve. They were quite filling, and there was definitely enough there for a decent breakfast. However, we thought the accompanying fruit might be tinned - they certainly looked and tasted tinned, and I don't think stonefruits were really in season at the time. A bit disappointing for a $14 breakfast! (And even more so considering that Wombat Hill House comes from Alla Wolf-Tasker, whose passion for local, seasonal, fresh produce is legendary).

***EDIT: 15/11/2011 I got a twitter message from Alla - "often use our own bottled fruit.esp late winter & spring.Peaches were done by an Italian lady."***

A much better choice, however, was the lovely vegetarian scrambled eggs. These came with a toasted bagel, spinach, mushrooms, cherry tomatoes and goats curd.

Scrambled eggs, spinach, roasted tomatoes, mushrooms, goats curd

Despite the food being a bit overpriced and underwhelming, I did enjoy the morning at Wombat Hill House. The atmosphere was nice, staff were very warm and friendly, and the coffee was great. I certainly wouldn't agree with Nina Rosseau's statement that it's "nothing short of amazing", but it's still a pleasant enough spot for a relaxed holiday breakfast.

Monk and Me, again

2011-11-12T23:42:00.002+11:00

The new Chef's Specials menu at Monk and Me

Monk and Me
9 Evans Place
Hawthorn East VIC 3123
(03) 9813-1151
Website

Earlier this month, Clement, manager of Monk and Me invited me to try out their new specials, and of course I accepted! Full disclosure: as you may have read in my previous post about Monk and Me, Clement is a friend of my brother, who worked there many years ago. However, I really like the food and often visit as a paying customer. (Sandra, in particular, is obsessed - obsessed, I tell you! - with their super crispy, amazing curry puffs).

Knowing that three dishes would be way too much food for just two people, we enlisted the Food Rehab crew to help out with the eating - thanks for the awesome company and sharing tummy space! Between the four of us, we were Tweeting, Foursquaring and Facebook-ing like crazy throughout the night - cameras and iPhones at the ready! (But no flash photography of course, wouldn't want to distract the other customers!)

We started off with some entrees: curry puffs (of course), and a new item, Jade's Trio. These were juicy little steamed prawn dumplings, with a dipping sauce of soy, chilli and vinegar.

Jade’s Trio – steamed prawn dumplings - $9.00 for a serve of 3.
Curry Puffs – $6.00 for a serve of 2.

For our mains, we shared the three specials, with two serves of coconut rice - a good amount for four people.

Beef Kelantan - Tender gravy beef cubes in an aromatic spicy sauce with coconut shavings. $22.

The Beef Kelantan looked similar to a rendang, but was quite different. With less gravy than a traditional curry, this dish was full of large, tender chunks of beef held together with a deeply flavoured, almost smoky sauce.

Hoi-sin Quartet - Steamed scallops, rockling fillets, calamari and king prawns served in a fish soup with onion, lemongrass, ginger, celery, pepper, dry chilli topped with steamed choy sum and green beans. $26.

Malaysian food can tend to be a little oily, and the light, clean tastes of the Hoi-sin Quartet were a welcome contrast.

Duck Massam - Boneless braised duck in a hot and sour sauce with okra, zucchini, capsicum, ginger flowers and kaffir lime leaves. $25.

Finally, we have my favourite dish of the night: the Duck Massam. It contained a generous amount of boneless duck pieces, and I absolutely loved the sauce. It had a nice chilli heat to it, and an addictive sour taste: similar to assam laksa or fish head curry. Lovely!

There had been quite a bit of food, but we somehow found room for dessert...

Raspberry and Passionfruit Sorbet - $7.50

Refreshing, fruity sorbets are always nice after a rich and spicy meal!

Sago pudding served with brown sugar & coconut milk - $7.50

I love traditional Malaysian desserts, and this comforting sago pudding topped with rich coconut milk (mmm... santan... lemak!) reminded me of the bubor cha cha and pulut hitam that my mum used to make when I was a kid.

Banana fritter topped with maple syrup and served with vanilla ice-cream - $9.50

And of course, we had to order the classic Asian-restaurant dessert: banana fritters. Who doesn't love them? They just go to prove my theory that "deep fried" makes everything better, hehe. I was impressed by the generous size of the bananas (har har), but wasn't convinced about the need for the drizzle of chocolate sauce. However, overall it was a satisfying dessert: freshly fried, crispy and tasty.

It was a super fun evening - fantastic company and lots of delicious food. It was also good to try some new dishes, as I tend to stick to my old favourites whenever I visit. Thanks to Clement and the team at Monk for a great night!

Sarah and friends dined as guests of Monk and Me.

The All-Clad Frypan

2011-11-09T22:58:00.001+11:00

For my latest product review for the good folks at Kitchenware Direct, I chose an All-Clad 20cm stainless steel frypan. Perhaps a rather boring choice, but I really needed a small metal frypan (i.e. not a non-stick one), and I've always wanted an All-Clad pan! You see, many years ago, I used to work at a cookware store, and I would always drool over the All-Clad range. I loved how shiny they were and I loved their obsessive focus on quality. Each piece comes with a little card with the name of the individual who inspected it - cool, huh? Prior to this one, I didn't actually have a frypan that could go from stovetop to oven, (apart from my carbon steel pan), so I've been testing it out with some tasty stove-to-oven recipes!

Tarte Tartin

I got this recipe from The Roux Brothers on Patisserie, my go-to source for all matters pâtisserie-related. You need a lot of butter...

... then a lot of sugar...

... and some apples!

You top it with a sheet of puff pastry, and cook it on a high heat for about 20 minutes until the sugar is caramelised, then finish it off in the oven.

But about 5 minutes into the cooking time, the sugar and butter underneath started bubbling over and spilling out of the sides - eek!

Because of the spillage, I got a bit timid and took the pan off the heat after only 10 minutes, and the apples turned out a bit pale in the end. (It still tasted good though!) I've since read other recipes where you caramelise the apples before adding the pastry lid; I think I'll try this next time.

Love those buttery layers!

Once it was baked, I managed to flip it over in one piece - phew!

So yes, the tart turned out a little pale, but it was still very tasty, especially with some crème fraîche on the side! (And in the background you can just see some little palmiers I made with the pastry offcuts).

Roasted Duck Leg and Potatoes

This one is a very easy Nigella recipe (from Kitchen, but also available online here). You simply brown a duck maryland...

... then finish it off in the oven with some potatoes and thyme.

It's almost too easy for such a decadent, delicious dinner! (Don't worry, I had this with a refreshing green salad).

Pea and Potato Frittata

Another Nigella recipe, this time a light supper from Forever Summer.

One negative thing I've noticed about this pan is that it can be very difficult to clean, especially if there's cooked-on bits of food. When I made the frittata, it stuck terribly, even though I greased the pan generously.

The instructions that come with the pan say that you're not meant to use a metal scourer to clean it, but this was actually the only way I could get it to come clean - soaking, sponges and soft scourers just didn't work. (Although I felt terribly guilty about it - I'm the type of person who always follows the instructions for my cookware, hehe).

Crustless Pizza

However, I've found that this pan is absolutely perfect for cooking hot batters - things like Yorkshire pudding, sweet Yorkshire pudding, my puffed apple pancake, or Nigella's Crustless Pizza. It works way better than the ceramic dish I usually use, as the stainless steel pan conducts the heats more efficiently, which in turn helps the batter rise and get crispy.

Mmm... doughy crispy batter goodness. You'll also see that I used trashy tinned champignons like I suggested last time - so tasty.

Even though the pan is a bit difficult to clean, it's great for searing meat and cooking my beloved Yorkshire pudding batters - it conducts heat evenly and has a very sturdy construction.

What is your favourite brand of frypan? Can you recommend any other recipes that would work well in this pan?

Sarah received the All-Clad 20cm stainless steel frypan courtesy of Kitchenware Direct.

Daylesford Weekend

2011-11-05T23:02:00.002+11:00

Hey hey y'all! How was everyone's Cup Weekend? I love a Tuesday public holiday! I spent the weekend in lovely Daylesford, where I got some much needed relaxation and enjoyed more than a few yummy bites!

We stayed in Ablac Studio, a teeny-tiny but very comfortable cabin about 15 minutes out of town. It was so peaceful and relaxing! And it was very isolated - probably not the best idea to watch the scary Halloween episodes of all my favourite shows there, in the middle of the woods!

Well, I say it was isolated - but there were some visitors...

Yup, I totally squealed when I saw them! Kangaroos!!!

You can see this guy was quite relaxed in our presence.

And speaking of relaxing, the apartment had an outdoor bathtub! YAY!! I think outdoor showers and baths are the height of luxury - private ones, of course - love them! (Remember the fabulous Breakas resort in Port Vila, Vanuatu?) I had a secret fear that the kangaroos would scare me out of the tub to use it for themselves, hehe, but luckily nothing of the sort happened.

For today's post, I'd like to share with you some pictures and impressions of the different cafes and restaurants we visited on our trip.

Farmers Arms Hotel

1 East Street

Daylesford VIC 3460

(03) 5348-2091

Website

Prior to the trip, I sent out a twitter message asking for people's fave places to eat in Daylesford, and at least five different people responded very enthusiastically - Farmers Arms! It is a low-key and friendly pub with a wide range of meals in very generous portions. It didn't end up being quite as good as the recommendations had led me to expect, but still, it was a pleasant spot for a casual dinner.

Beef Cheek and Eggplant Red Curry with Rice - $26

The beef cheek was very tender and the curry had a lovely flavour, but the dish overall was very fatty and rich - you can see a slick of oil on top in the above photo. This richness was exacerbated by the huge portion size - there was easily enough for three people in that bowl!

My Tunisian goat stew, on the other hand, was a much better choice - I enjoyed the freshness of the fattoush salad against the sweet, rich stew.

Tunisian Goat Curry with Mograbieh and Fattoush Salad - $28

Chips - $7

The chips we ordered weren't great, unfortunately: they'd clearly been sitting around for a while and fried again. I'd heard good things about their desserts, but we were extremely full so we didn't try any.

Hepburn Bathhouse
136 Main Road
Hepburn Springs VIC 3461
(03) 5321-6000
Website

Being a total spa-junkie, I was really looking forward to trying out some of the region's famous bath houses. After much internet-research, we booked a "Sanctuary and Tea" package at the Hepburn Bathhouse, for $80 each. For this, we got two hours of bathing, plus Devonshire tea at the Pavillion Cafe.

However, it was incredibly overpriced and a disappointing experience. The baths were uniformly cool at 36C, and the floors were rough and painful - ouch! Even the special features of the Sanctuary area weren't great: the "Spa Couches" were itchy and uncomfortable, the "Monsoon Shower" was more like a Trickle Shower, the "Aroma Steam Room" had no discernible aroma at all.

Yes, it was relaxing, but nothing that you couldn't get in a spa at your local pool, and definitely not worth the price! I think we would have actually been much better off saving the $160 and putting it towards a nice meal instead. Oh well.

In fact, the best thing about the bathing experience was the afternoon tea! We each got two warm and fluffy scones, with double cream and local berry jam. I got one plain and one fruit scone, and Sandra got two plain.

Plain scone, date scone

Here are the insides of the plain scones. Mmm... fluffy.

The scones were really good, but for bathing I definitely prefer the Mornington Peninsula Hot Springs.

Cliffy's Emporium
30 Raglan Street
Daylesford VIC 3460
Ph: (03) 5348-3279
Website

To fuel up for the long drive home, we stopped in at Cliffy's Emporium. It's a cosy little cafe and food store, with an eclectic mix of decor.

Lentil and Vegetable Soup with Bread - $8.50

The soup contained cute mini-lentils, but had a rather odd taste - it was quite sweet, and had an overpowering spice flavour (I think it was fennel seeds).

Lamb pie with peas and mint chutney - $11

I loved the lamb pie! Tasty filling, flaky pastry, and a sharp mint relish. Gorgeous. They sell these pies frozen to take away, and if we weren't facing a 2-hour drive, I would have bought some to bring home.

In addition to the above, we also visited Wombat Hill House Cafe and The Lake House (yay!), which will each get their own blog post, coming soon.

Overall it was a lovely relaxing weekend - I loved the fresh air and scenery, and all the locals we met were super nice! However, as you can see, we had a bit of a mixed bag of experiences when it came to the food and spas. Nothing was particularly bad or unsatisfactory, it was all just a bit "meh", especially for an area that's well known as a food and spa destination!

I generally find it quite tricky picking good places to visit when planning a weekend away. I use a mix of Google, Twitter and personal recommendations, but of course there is no fool proof system. There also seem to be at least three Daylesford tourism websites (here, here and here) - a bit confusing!

What are your favourite spots in regional Victoria? How do you plan and chose things to see, do and eat on weekends away?

Rainbow Cookies!!!!!!!

2011-11-01T18:49:00.001+11:00

Hehe, how cute are these babies? These rainbow cookies were inspired by some food blog I saw whilst randomly surfing the web late at night. Although it was so long ago that I can't remember exactly where I first saw it - it must have been somewhere in between Wikipedia articles about celebrities and You Tube clips of 90's hip hop songs! I normally don't like artificially coloured foods, preferring my food to look how it tastes, but these were too adorable to resist. You can use any plain biscuit dough; we used Nigella's cut-out biscuit recipe.

The dough was made in one big batch, then we split them into six pieces, and coloured them all individually. (A messy, lengthy process, which resulted in me having to wash the mixing bowl six times!)

We refrigerated them well, and then rolled them out into even(ish) pieces. You layer them up, spreading egg white in between the layers to help them stick.

Then, back into the fridge it went, to firm up properly before slicing. It's really, really important to get the dough well-chilled - as we discovered, once the dough gets warm the layers all melt into each other as you slice them.

The pieces were quite narrow, but thanks to the baking powder they expanded when baking, to form perfectly pretty little rainbow cookies!

So cute! I frikkin love rainbows!

Despite the bright colours, they just tasted like plain cinnamon butter cookies. We took them over to our friends' place for a cocktail party, and they went down a treat.

Embrasse

2011-10-27T21:37:00.002+11:00

You my remember that a few months ago, Sandra and I were treated to a magnificent birthday dinner at Vue De Monde by our good friend An. Well, when his birthday rolled around we also wanted to take him to a fabulous restaurant, preferably with a degustation menu. And after much deliberation, we chose...

Embrasse
312 Drummond St
Carlton VIC 3053
Ph: (03) 9347 3312
Website

I had read many good reviews of Embrasse in blogs and newspapers, and was very excited to visit. It is a small, unassuming restaurant, located on a quiet street in Carlton. I was also aware of the protests (and apparent threats of violence) that surrounded their decision to serve horse meat for a very brief period. I didn't quite understand the fuss, or why horses deserve special attention over say, cows, chickens or sheep. Horse meat is often served in other countries - in Germany, for example, Pferdemetzgereis, or horse butchers, are not uncommon.

However, back to the topic at hand:

In addition to an a la carte menu, Embrasse have both 5-course ($95) and an 8-course ($125) degustation options. Being a special occassion, we splashed out on the 8-course option. And because I didn't have to drive (yay!) I also splashed out on matching wines for an extra $95. Sandra and An aren't big drinkers so just ordered a glass of wine each for the meal.

And speaking of splashing out...

Kir Royale - $26 each

We started with a round of kir royales. These are one of my favourite pre-dinner drinks, and were a lovely start to the meal. At $26 a pop they were pretty pricey - I assume they were made with real champagne - so I've since 'invested' in a bottle of crème de cassis so I can make kir royales at home. (You can safely assume there's always champagne in my house, hehe!)

Before the procession of courses commenced, we were brought some little amuses bouche served on individual spoons.

I was amazed by the intensity and the purity of flavour of those little mouthfuls; a theme that would be repeated throughout the night.

Beetroot, black sesame seeds, apple

Cauliflower

The breads on offer were olive, and smoked wheat - both warm, crusty and delicious. These were replenished throughout the night.

The butter was perfectly soft and spreadable - a small detail but so important! I loved the cute block for butter and the wooden butter knife too.

Now, let's look at the procession of courses. I'm not going to say too much about each course individually - suffice it to say they were all fabulous and the wine matches were great too! I love how beautifully composed each plate was.

First Course

Souvenir of Laguiole….our way

Meli Melo of vegetables, emulsions and purees, home grown and foraged herbs and flowers

Suze Cocktail – Gentiane, Cassis and tonic

Second Course

Dory, smoked olives, stinging nettle juices, old way pickles, malt bread

2010 Polperro Pinot Gris – Mornington, VIC

Third Course

Squid cooked in red wine, zucchini and family, fromage blanc froth, meyer lemon and bergamot

2010 Wittmann Riesling – Rheinhessen, Germany

Palate Cleanser

Rhubarb and Rose Tea

This was a rather interesting little palate cleanser, with a unique sour taste that we all thought tasted absolutely distinctly of McDonald's cheeseburgers. (You know, the sour pickle/onion tang?) I'm sure it wasn't intentional, but it was so unexpected and really cool!

Fourth Course

Pork fillet- roasted and glazed with an anise syrup, mushrooms, Jerusalem artichokes, flame grilled potato, chicory, Dijon mustard

2008 Bella Ridge Chenin Blanc – Swan Valley, WA

Can you see the little mushrooms on the left hand side of the plate? How adorable! I thought this plate was like a composed woodland scene - gorgeous.

Fifth Course

Wagyu beef, smoked rice vinegar, asparagus, ink, caramelised butter, pomme croquette, plantons, wild garlic

2008 Domaine du Vieux Chene Côte du Rhône – Rhône, France

Mmm... rare beef and a crunchy, creamy potato croquette: bliss.

With our final savoury course, I thought that now would be a good time to mention that all the little leaves and flowers on courses weren't just for decoration, but were actual edible components of each dish, adding texture and flavour.

Sixth Course

Cheeses from here and over there

2009 Mas Amiel – South-West France

Pre-Dessert

The pre-dessert was an adventurous flavour combination: dark chocolate, and a red capsicum sauce. Our waiter informed us it was a love-it-or-leave-it combo - I loved it, Sandra and An weren't quite as enamoured.

Seventh Course

Banana, nougatine, desiree potato, olive oil, sheep’s milk yogurt

2009 Pichot ‘Le Marigny’ Vouvray Moëlleux – Loire, France

Potatoes in a dessert? A thousand times, yes! The little potato noodles were appealingly mealy (y'all know I love dough), and combined with a lovely smooth yoghurt, crunchy nougatine and little sweet bursts of banana. Just wonderful.

And rounding up the meal was Embrasse's famous forest floor dessert. I've seen and read about it on innumerable blogs, and I was ecstatic when it was brought out!

Eighth Course

Chocolate & hazelnut parfait, forest floor, sorrel mint granita

1982 Toro Albala gran Riserva Pedro Ximenez – Xerez, Spain

I know it's a 'forest floor', but I think it also looks a little 'under-the-sea', don't you? My favourite part of this dessert was the 'mushroom' with its meringue stem and chocolate parfait cap. Wow!

And as it was a birthday, our lucky An got a little salted caramel and chocolate petit four.

I'm so glad we chose Embrasse for this special occasion! The food (as you can see) was amazing, the atmosphere was lovely, and the service was fantastic - warm, professional, efficient and well-informed. Our dietary requirements were easily accommodated (we'd informed them when we made the booking that one of us didn't eat seafood and only liked meat well done; I felt that it was only fair), and all our other needs were taken care of without us even having to ask. No problems, no worries - it was such a perfect, enjoyable night!

Happy birthday An!

Rotweinkuchen - Red Wine Chocolate Cake

2011-10-23T19:49:00.004+11:00

Check it out! My Rotweinkuchen, or red wine cake, that I baked last night Who doesn't love a bit of Saturday night baking? I bake this cake reasonably often, and hadn't thought to blog it before now, as I tend to think of it as a bit of a plain, homestyle cake. However, when I tweeted about it, I got lots responses from people interested in this unusual-sounding cake, so here's the post!

I actually have heaps of blog posts in draft, all in various states of completion - homemade almond danishes, rainbow cookies (rainbows!!!), a breathtaking 8-course degustation dinner at Embrasse, buffalo wings and more - which I'll be posting just as soon as I am able. But for now, please enjoy this post about Rotweinkuchen!

I got this recipe from Sandra's mum - it's a light and fluffy chocolate cake with red wine in the batter, covered in a red wine icing-glaze. As for the type of red wine, I don't think it really matters, as long as it's a dry one that you don't mind drinking - you only need about 180mls of wine in the cake, so you'll wanna be able to drink the rest. Bonus!

The original recipe for the cake simply instructs you to "mix everything together and bake", but as you'll see from the recipe I included below, I split up the steps when I bake it myself.

There's no melted chocolate in the batter, just a little cocoa, which gives a lovely buff-coloured batter.

One of the key ingredients is Schokoraspeln, or those little chocolate sprinkles that you'd normally find on an ice-cream sundae. Most supermarkets here sell them in the baking aisle. I think of these little sprinkles as being sweet rather than chocolatey, but that fits in well with the light taste and texture of the cake.

I love bundt tins (I have two 16cm tins and a mini-bundt tray in addition to the 22cm one below), and have previously made this cake in a loaf tin, and as cupcakes.

Ta-dah! Here is the baked product.

If you don't feel like glazing, I think the cake would be just lovely with a dusting of icing sugar. Having said that, the glaze isn't difficult, and I'm required to stick to tradition when I make it!

The original recipe only asks for red wine and icing sugar in the glaze, but I'm not a fan of the insipid lilac coloured glaze this makes. I add a little cocoa powder to mine to get a nice matte brown.

Please excuse the mess in the background! I like to call it my "creative chaos", hehe.

And here it is, all glazed - a lovely, tender-crumbed cake with a hint of both chocolate and red wine.

Rotweinkuchen - Red Wine Cake
A traditional German recipe, with slight adaptations by me

Cake
300gms plain flour
1 packet baking powder
2 tbs unsweetened cocoa powder
250gms softened butter
250gms sugar
1 packet vanilla sugar
5 eggs
125ml red wine
100gms Schokoraspeln

Glaze
1 tbs unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4c red wine
Enough icing sugar to make a drippable glaze

Preheat the oven to 175C, and grease a 22cm bundt tin.

Sift together the flour, baking powder and cocoa powder, and set aside. Using an electric mixer, cream the butter, sugar and vanilla sugar together until the sugars are dissolved and the mixture is pale and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Now, using a spatula or a wooden spoon, fold in the dry ingredients a third at a time, alternately with the red wine. Finally, fold in the Schokoraspeln. Pour the mixture into the prepared bundt tin, and bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, until a cake tester comes out clean. Cover with foil if it is browning too quickly.

Let it cool for 15 minutes in the tin before turning it out on a wire rack to cool further. Glaze the cake while it is still warm, but no longer piping-hot.

To make the glaze, whisk together the cocoa powder and red wine, and gradually whisk in enough sieved icing sugar to make a smooth, drippable glaze. (Alternatively, do this in the processor if you CBF sieving the icing sugar). Spoon the glaze over the cake - you can either let it run in little rivulets down the lines of the cake, or spread it around the cake to make a thin, all-encompassing covering. Let the icing set for 20 minutes or so before eating.

James Halliday's Wine Companion Magazine Launch at Golden Fields

2011-10-21T20:54:00.002+11:00

I recently attended the launch of the new magazine, James Halliday's Wine Companion, at Golden Fields. I must admit that when I received the invitation, I was just as interested in the venue as I was in the magazine itself. Prior to the evening, I'd heard great things about Golden Fields, but never actually been myself. You see, I tend to avoid hyped-up new venues, especially if they have a no-bookings policy. I am the type of person who likes to plan my social life weeks in advance, and the possibility of being stuck for two hours without a table is just too much for my fragile constitution to bear! I've also, generally, been quite disappointed with the food at these types of hyped-up venues (e.g. Mamasita, Hu Tong), and can never justify the long wait. I thought that this event would be a good opportunity to sample some of Golden Fields' famed dishes, without the added stress of trying to secure a table!

There were loads of people there, and it was great to catch up with some bloggers who I hadn't seen in a while. Unsurprisingly, there were quite a few wines being served, including the delicious Pewsey Vale Eden Valley Riesling and the 10 Minutes by Tractor Pinot Noir.

And some of the nibbles that were on offer:

Clockwise from top left:
Squid-skewer
House-made cold rice noodles with sesame paste and chilli oil
Twice-cooked duck, steamed bread, vinegar and plum sauce
Pressed pork terrine with ginger jam

I wasn't particularly wowed by the dishes - the cold rice noodles had a lovely texture and a nice garnish of fresh herbs, but overall it was extremely bland. I would have liked a lot more of the sesame paste and chilli oil! The duck was my favourite - I love soft mantou dough!

And of course, there were plates and plates of Golden Fields' famous lobster roll.

I believe it was Ed who said he wanted to secure a large plate of these lobster rolls, and scoff the lot!

New England lobster roll, hot buttered bun, cold poached crayfish, watercress & Kewpie

I liked the rolls, but didn't love them - another danger of trying things that have received a lot of favourable press: naturally expectations are high. I definitely liked the soft, lightly toasted buns, but felt that there wasn't enough lobster for the bread. (Although having said that, these were canapé versions; looking at other blog posts, the full-sized version is a lot more generous with the lobster).

I've already agreed with my dad that, inspired by the Golden Fields roll, we're going to make our own lobster rolls for Christmas this year, and we're going to make sure they're chock full of lobster!

We were all given a proof copy of the magazine to take home with us. I don't tend to read a lot of wine writing, and I was actually surprised by how much I loved it! It seems to be targeted towards people like me: young-ish, enthusiastic wine drinkers, who want to increase their wine knowledge but aren't interested in traditional, old-world stuffy wine writing.

Hehe, I love James Halliday's distinctive 'hawk' eyebrows

There was only one article by James Halliday himself: a very useful guide to cellaring wines. Having never read his writing before, I greatly enjoyed his clear, unfussy style. There were also features on rose and sparkling red (yum yum), and some great food and travel features, including - gasp! - recipes for a 3 course meal to accompany champagne. Could that be more me??

Do you recognise Seppeltsfield Road in the above picture? Yay, Barossa!

The first issue of James Halliday's Wine Companion Magazine will be on sale at the end of the month, and I'm really looking forward to reading future issues.

Sarah attended the magazine launch at Golden Fields as a guest.

Pretzels

2011-10-13T22:06:00.001+11:00

Check it out! I baked my own pretzels! Yay! (Hehe, and I just realised that I have three posts in a row with a pretzel as the first picture!)

The week before PORKTOBERFEST II, I was undecided as to whether I'd bake pretzels. I really, really wanted some freshly baked Bavarian deliciousness, but I just wasn't sure if I'd have time on the day. But then I saw a recipe for them in Gourmet Traveller, and that made up my mind for me. (The recipe is here, on the Gourmet Traveller website).

I know you can buy pretzels here, but they're never really impressive. I'd say Lueneburger or Brezel Biz are the best you can buy in Melbourne, but I'm still not super-keen on them. Whilst I think they're made reasonably well, pretzels are only really good when they're fresh out of the oven. After they've been sitting around for a few hours, you may as well not bother. And this is where home-made pretzels will always have the edge over store-bought ones, no matter how rough and ramshackle they are. (Oh, how I miss Grimminger bakery, and their constant stream of hot pretzels, baked throughout the day!)

I made and kneaded the dough the night before and let it have a slow rise in the fridge overnight.

Early on the morning of the party, I got rolling! (You may remember the last time I made pretzels, with Duncan and Thanh, I struggled to roll the dough out into long sausage shapes, but this time I had no such trouble - woo!)

You'll see from the first picture in this post that my pretzels were quite thick - I didn't think they'd expand so much; next time I'd definitely roll them thinner.

Traditionally the pretzels are poached in a solution of lye (AKA caustic soda) before being baked, to give them their characteristic colour and taste. Gourmet Traveller's recipe, however, has a much simpler poaching liquid: water and baking soda. Much easier for home cooks!

Raw on the left, poached on the right

Brushed with egg-yolk glaze

And the final touch before baking: a sprinkling of coarse sea salt. The recipe suggests using sea salt flakes (like Maldon or Murray River), but that's just a bit wrong. You need big chunks of salt, the type that you might put in a salt grinder.

And before you worry about excess salt consumption, remember that in Germany, people just rub off the excess salt with their fingers before eating.

Ooh look - they split just like real pretzels do!

I also loved the pretty patterns they left on the baking paper.

Don't you just love this pretzel bread-bag? I got it at Tchibo in Germany, and thought it was sooo super-cute! Love!

The pretzels were really easy (all the kneading was done in a mixer), and so lovely fresh out of the oven. I think I'll be baking these a lot from now on!

PORKTOBERFEST, II

2011-10-08T19:26:00.002+11:00

Guten Tag und Grüß Gott! I am most certainly back in Australia now, and have been for about a month, but have only just finished all my Europe posts. Phew! I've been cooking and baking heaps since I got back, and am really excited to share lots of Melbourne-based deliciousness with you! Funnily enough though, my first post back in Australia happens to be a German-themed one: our second annual PORKTOBERFEST party.

I think I improved greatly on the first PORKTOBERFEST, and not just thanks to the cute decorations! We bought these super-cute paper napkins and cups online, and they arrived just in time for the party. (We'd also ordered a blue and white tablecloth, which, unfortunately, didn't make it in time - boo). When I was in Germany, Dirndls and Dirndl-style dresses were available in the stores, and I desperately wanted to buy one. Perfect for PORKTOBERFEST, Halloween, and other beer-drinking occasions! However, I was told in no uncertain terms: "Das ist verboten! Only drunk tourists and Bavarians wear those!" Hehehe. Perhaps next year I'll have better luck.

Of course, PORKTOBERFEST is all about the food, and when I say I improved on the first on greatly, I really mean it! This year I went all out and baked my own pretzels, I made a Black Forest Cake from scratch (and it didn't fall apart this time - yay!), and splashed out on a lovely rack of free-range Berkshire pork.

PORKTOBERFEST II for 6 People

Selbstgebackene Bretzel / Freshly-baked Pretzels

Schweinebraten / Roast rack of Berkshire Pork

Semmelknödel / Bread Dumplings

Rotkohl / Red Cabbage

Apfelmus / Apple Sauce

Soße / Gravy

Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte / Black Forest Cake
Rüdesheimer Kaffee / Rüdesheim Coffee

The whole meal was actually quite easy to put together - I made the pretzel dough and cake layers the night before, I baked the pretzels in the morning (blogpost to come!), and prepared and assembled everything else while the pork was having its slow roast in the oven.

Let's have a look at that beauty...

I bought the pork at Prahran market - they didn't have any racks on display, but the butcher there kindly got a slab of pork from out back, and deftly cut off a neat rack, trimming away the excess fat and scoring the rind. Lovely! I'd never had Berkshire pork before, and was really keen to try it. Now, I didn't follow a specific recipe, but just sprinkled the meat with salt, fennel and caraway seeds before roasting it. Easy! Although I must say I was a bit confused about actual times and temperatures for cooking. I have lots of recipes for roast pork rack, but they all seemed very different - most were variations of: high blast, then a long, slow cook, then a high blast again; one simply said to cook at 200C for 90 minutes (for a 2.6kg piece) - but I couldn't find any guides that gave a specific time-to-weight ratio. In the end, I kinda winged it, cooking my 2kg piece at 220C for 30 minutes, then at 200C for about an hour, followed by a 20 minute blast at 230C. Luckily, it came out perfect. Tender and juicy meat, encased in a crisp, shattery layer of crackling. Woo-hoo!

While that was cooking, Sandra made the bread dumplings (Oma Resel's recipe) and red cabbage, while I assembled the Black Forest cake. I had much better luck with the cake this time, (no more flat pancakes for me!)

I did most things the same as last time, except I made it 23cm instead of 28cm, and used this recipe for the cake layers. Because the cake itself was smaller, I had more cherries to go around, and put them in the 2nd layer as well.

Since my first Black Forest Cake attempt, I've learned that it's much easier and neater to pipe cream onto layer cakes, rather than spreading it on with a spatula! Ta-dah!

You'll notice that I didn't put any chocolate flakes around the side - the kitchen was already very messy by that stage and I didn't want to be flinging chocolate flakes everywhere!

And with that, lunch was ready.

Mmm... crackly.

Pork rack is easy to carve - you just slice it into individual chops along the bones.

Check out the crackle: when the rind gets all light and bubbly and aerated, and no longer looks like a solid slab, you know you've hit the jackpot.

With gravy...

And a whole plate! Here is one of my pretzels - yay!

I totally loved the pork! Very juicy and flavoursome. It was pretty pricey, at $32/kg, but I thought it was worth it for a special lunch. The cut also had the perfect crackling-to-meat ratio - I think pork rack is the new pork belly, hehe.

We had a nice, long, lazy lunch; laughing and chatting while we picked at the remains of the meal. And then, for reasons I don't understand but for which I will be eternally grateful, my friends jumped up and started doing the dishes! Everything got cleaned while I stood in the corner drinking my wine. For a girl without a dishwasher, I thought that was pretty amazing. Love!

And here is dessert. I just want to state explicitly: even though we had a can of cool-whip for the coffees, the cake was covered and filled with 100% fresh cream!

We even made Rüdesheimer Kaffee, setting brandy alight in the coffee cups, and adding strong coffee and cream. I'm glad to say it worked!

I finally got my cross-section photo of a Black Forest Cake! I was really happy it maintained its structural integrity and didn't collapse.

Can't wait for next year's PORKTOBERFEST!

Germany 2011: Wrap-Up

2011-10-04T21:48:00.002+11:00

Just like I wrapped up my Paris posts, I wanted to wrap up my series of Germany 2011 posts with a selection of German deliciousness. Let's roll.

I sure ate my fair share of pretzels while in Germany! And my favourite pretzels were from Grimminger bakery. They're a chain of bakeries, and do The Best Pretzels, ever. Only 1,50€ and so tasty. (Their Brötchen were amazing too!)

Some breakfast pancakes I made one morning: some plain, others with blackberries, blueberries and raspberries. Yay for cheap and delicious berries!

Next thing I wanted to show you was some halbes Hänchen (or 'half chicken'). We got some Halbe Hänchen and chips for a quick dinner one night, and I was surprised by how much I liked it!

Knusprige = crispy

The skin was gut scharf (very spicy) and crispy, and the meat itself was tender and juicy. So good! I have to admit, though, that a halbes chicken is waay too much for me; a quarter is about the right amount. But Viertel Hänchen doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does it?

Check out the luridly yellow chips. Love it.

In August, Zwetschgen (damson plums) were everywhere! All the bakeries were selling plum cake, plum crumble buns, and all sorts of plum goodies. We can't get damsons in Australia (those of you who remember my How to Eat project will remember my lack-of-damson depression), so I was really excited to see them everywhere. Here's a yummy Zwetschgenkuchen from a local bakery: fresh plums on a yeasted base.

More BBQ goodness! You can (just) see the braided bratwurst sausage plaits on the right hand side of the grill. Cute!

Straight after the BBQ, I introduced the Germans to the wonders of the Aussie pavlova, generously topped with raspberries.

They all seemed to like it, especially Sandra's little cousin, who'd just done a project on Australia and wanted to learn more about our cuisine.

Next up, some typical German dishes we enjoyed at a small restaurant around the corner from home. Huge portions, big glasses of beer, what more could you want?

Zigeunerschnitzel und Bratkartoffeln - pork schnitzel with capsicum sauce and fried potatoes

Hackbraten mit Zwiebelsosse - Meatloaf with onion sauce

Wurstsalat mit Bratkartoffeln - Sausage salad with fried potatoes

Schnitzel mit Zwiebelsosse und Bratkartoffeln - Pork schnitzel with onion sauce and fried potatoes

Berries from the garden. Look how perfect the raspberries are!

And here are some strawberries we bought from the market, which we made into my favourite cake: Erdbeerkuchen.

I love how red and juicy the strawberries were. And how pretty is the cardboard tray?

And just to prove to y'all it was a selbstgebackener Kuchen...

We covered it in Tortenguss glaze and ate it out in the garden with whipped cream. What a great summer treat!

And that, my friends, completes my final post on my Germany trip!

Germany 2011: Oma Resel's Kartoffelsoße

2011-09-30T22:39:00.001+10:00

Kartoffelsoße is Oma Resel's speciality, and Sandra's favourite dish of all time. Literally "potato sauce", this dish of bread dumplings topped with potato sauce is something that frugal housewives would make their families in leaner times, when food was scarce and meat was expensive. In these carefree, crazy-wheeling consumerist days, little pieces of Fleischwurst sausage are added, but back in the olden days, the double carb hit of bread and potatoes would be the meal in its entirety.

And speaking of frugal, I find it very cute that, as a child growing up in the 60's, Sandra's dad would look longingly in butchers' windows and say: "When I'm grown up, I'll be able to buy a whole loop of Fleischwurst!" (If you've seen my previous meals in Germany, you'll see he's fulfilled that goal many times over).

Kartoffelsoße was the first dish that Sandra requested when we got to Germany, and a few short days after we landed, we went over to her Grandma Resel's place to learn the secrets of her famous dish. Initially, I wasn't sure if I was going to blog it, thinking it might be just too plain to interest you guys. But when I live-tweeted the dish - "Onions! Lard! Paprika! Potatoes!" - I got a flurry of excited responses, and I knew y'all would love it as much as I do.

As with the Gulaschsuppe, no standard recipe included here: like all grandmas, Oma Resel doesn't use recipes, cooking by heart.

She starts by making the bread dumplings. They're the same dumplings I make for Christmas, just made with a lot more skill! She takes some day-old bread rolls and slice them into little cubes, then add eggs, butter, salt, pepper and flour.

Then she pours hot milk over the mixture, stirs it all up into a dough, and forms it into balls.

The balls (hehe) need to be cooked in boiling water until they float, fifteen to twenty minutes. But before cooking them, the Kartoffelsoße needs to get started!

And this is how she does it: she heats up a generous (or alarming) amount of lard in a pan, and fries chopped onions in it until softened and fragrant. Many different types of lard were readily available in German supermarkets (including the fabulously titled "party lard" - that's my kinda party!) I'm sure that you could substitute goosefat or ordinary vegetable oil.

The next step is to add loads of sliced potatoes, douse them in heaps of paprika, and pour over beef stock.

She cooks it until the potatoes have softened in the tasty broth.

Then, to turn the potatoes and broth into Kartoffelsoße, she uses a food mill, or a "Flotte-Lotte", as they're also known.

Potatoes go through first, then the broth.

The result is a smooth, thick, ochre-coloured sauce.

This is when you'd tip in the little pieces of Fleischwurst to heat through. (Hot tip for Melbournians: the best Fleischwurst in Melbourne is sold at the Wursthütte on Glenferrie Road in Malvern!)

As soon as the Fleischwurst is heated through and the dumplings are cooked, you are ready to eat!

Mmm... fluffy dumplings...

And that is it! It's a super labour-intensive dish, so appropriate for a meal made with love to feed your family. I loved how comforting it was, and given the crazy rain and wind we've been having for the past few days, I could totally go for a bowl of this right now.

Danke schoen, Oma Resel!