The Gourmet Challenge

Peanut butter Chocolate Fondants

2011-03-08T10:22:00.004+11:00

Who doesn't love chocolate? Everybody loves chocolate!! Do you know whats better than chocolate? Chocolate with peanut butter! Since we've been having some cold weather of late, oh summer how I wish that you hadn't stood me up, I had a craving for something sweet, hot and rich. So naturally I turned to the good old chocolate fondant. But the plain old chocolate fondant just wasn't doing it for me anymore, so I decided to make it a little more interesting by adding a little peanut butter to the centers so when you dig in a volcano of peanut butter spurts out of the middle. My grand visions certainly didn't turn out that way, but it was pretty satisfying nonetheless.

To make the peanut butter center, I keep aside a little of the chocolate mixture and then add a generous amount of peanut butter to that. Then I put the peanut butter/chocolate mixture into the middle of the 2/3 filled ramekins. The peanut butter changes the consistency of the chocolate batter, instead of ending up with a very fluid lava like center the peanut butter makes it all a bit thick. So the centers stay soft and gooey, but not as runny as I would like. I think it needs a bit of tweaking. Anyway here is the recipe and a video to tease you with.

Peanut butter Chocolate Fondants

INGREDIENTS

Makes 4

100g good quailty dark chocolate

100g unsalted butter

2 eggs

2 egg yolks

50g castor sugar

30g plain flour

2 tbsp crunchy peanut butter

extra butter and cocoa powder

METHOD

Preheat oven to 180C

In a double boiler, melt together the chocolate and butter, set aside and allow to cool slightly. In a separate bowl whisk together the eggs, yolks and castor sugar until light and fluffly roughly 2-3 minutes on medium speed.

Combine the chocolate into the eggs, then fold through the flour. Using 1 cup capacity ramekins, grease the outside with a little butter, then dust the grease with some cocoa powder, this will prevent the batter from sticking. Spoon the mixture into the ramekins, about 2/3 of the way full. Add the peanut butter to the remaining chocolate mixture, mix until just combined. Divide this evenly into the 4 ramekins, making sure to get the peanut butter mixture as close to the center of the ramekin as possible.

Bake for 12 minutes at 180C

The mixture can be made ahead of time and kept in the fridge in the ramekins, when baking adjust the cooking time by 2-3 minutes to compensate for the cold mixture.

Duchess of Spotswood

2011-02-27T20:22:00.002+11:00

Duchess Of Spotswood
87 Hudsons Road
Spotswood, Victoria
03 9391 6016

Pork and I have a love/hate relationship. I love it to bits, but for some reason it hates being in me. Despite the tummy aches and some common sense I still order pork at every opportunity possible, so visiting the Duchess of Spotswood is a bit of a no brainer. The Duchess has been on my radar for a little while, especially since it received a fair bit of attention from printed media and the blogging world late last year. As an extra treat for Daz's birthday last month we went to the Duchess for breakfast before spending the day at Scienceworks. Before you judge me for going to Scienceworks, its actually a whole heap of fun. You get to act like a kid again discovering that hand/eye coordination is severely impeded when one sense is taken away from you. My particular favorite was a sperm race, before you freak out - it was all computer simulated. Two sperms are pitted against each other, in a race to see who gets to the ovum first. It was literally Pacman replaced with a sperm, we had three attempts and Daz won every round, lets face it sperm racing is not my forté. Ah hem...back to the Duchess.

Before I go on, I have to tell you I loved it!! My only regret is not ordering myself two sets of breakfast! The place is usually packed on a weekend, but service still remains prompt and courteous. So many other places just fold under the pressure, but they seem to take it in their stride. I ordered the Duchess of Pork - Crispy pig's jowl with fried egg, rich truffle sauce and sourdough toast. I was in pork heaven. It was just gorgeous, what was promised on the menu was well delivered. The outside of the pork was so crispy it was beyond sexy, but that crispy outer layer gave way to some seriously rich and juicy flavorsome meat. The jus and truffle just brought one more layer of flavour complexity. Not to mention the soft yolks of the egg that drench the whole lot in an egg gravy. I'm in love with this breakfast!

Daz ordered the Prince of Wales - House smoked salmon fillet with potato pancake, poached egg, and sourdough toast. Again another winner. You have to admire a busy cafe that takes the time to smoke their own salmon fillets, the care and attention definitely translated to the plate.

As a breakfast destination, this may well become one of my regular haunts. If you haven't already tried the Duchess get yourself down there. I know its on the other side of the West Gate, but with some fine weather you can make a day of it by visiting Williamstown beach and even grabbing yourself an ice cream on Nelson Place for and afternoon refresher.

Ezard

2011-02-22T14:58:00.005+11:00

Dining Date: October 2010
Rating: 36th, 2 Stars
Chef: Teage Ezard & Sharn Greiner
Location: 187 Flinders La, Melbourne, VIC, (03) 9639 6811
Website: www.ezard.com.au

I’ve been putting off writing this post for a very long time, since October last year to be precise. The exact reasons why I’ve been putting it off are varied, mainly because I didn’t have a great experience at Ezard, but I know that loads of people love the place and that generally it’s an establishment with pretty high standards. For some reason I thought I was being unfair giving it a bad slant considering I’ve only been there once. But then again we have to all understand that a majority of restaurants have once only customers, and an unhappy experience tends to stick in the brain.

We decided to go along to Ezard in October to experience the signature eight course tasting menu. A menu comprising some of Ezard’s most popular and distinctive dishes, crafted over 11 years of business, some of which have even made it to immortalisation in Ezard’s cookbook…Ezard. Daz and I were pretty excited, in our mind there was no better way to experience a restaurant than a selection of their very best. We had already made up our minds - we were going the full hog and prepared our stomachs for the onslaught…but that wasn’t to be.

As soon as we were handed the menu we were talked out of having the eight course degustation, it seems that we had an early booking and that 8 courses would take too long, so we were steered towards our choice of 5 from the eight on offer. To say I was a little disappointed would be an understatement…but in the end it was probably a blessing. I’ll probably get shot for this, but the food wasn’t that great and the service was bordering on rude. We were ignored for a good part of the night, and the only smile we got from the waiter was at the very last course, probably because we were about to vacate the table.

Bread is one of those things that is a hit or miss. In some places you get wonderfully warm and fresh bread with possibly some good quality olive oil, in others it might be day old leftovers with cold hard butter. Ezard stepped their game up, beautiful soft bread, good quality olive oil and some flavoured dust to accompany your bread consumption. This was seriously good, there was a rosemary and Parmesan, a red pepper and I don’t remember what the last one was, but nonetheless….I could have eaten an entire loaf of bread covered in these “dusts”, the best thing about them was that they were replaced quite often.

Also to start we had a small shot filled with foam to kick start the meal, I missed the description of this but thought that I should add it for posterity sake, I think it was cucumber and prawn. Sadly the foam quickly collapsed so the photo looks a little sad. But it was quite pleasant and was getting us in the right mood.

Asparagus, Persian fetta and witlof salad with poached quail egg, soft herbs and hazelnut dressing. This was nice, light and tasty. The veggies were still crunchy so it was a real sense of eating spring, the soft quail egg acted as its own little self saucing device.

Oxtail wonton dumpling in sweet and sour tamarind broth, lime, chilli and shaved coconut. Unfortunately this dish was more on the sour side than sweet. The tamarind and lime both attacked your palate, it was a little bit of a killer but the flavours were all there. The oxtail dumpling was pretty delicious – the soft gelatinous meat inside the thin skinned dumpling was really well done, I just wish the broth wasn’t so sour. I actually have a copy of this recipe, so I’ll give it a go myself.

Crispy skin barramundi with Chinese broccoli, yellow curry dressing and baby cress salad, give me a massive bowl of that curry and plain rice and I’ll be in heaven. Like the oxtail dumpling, there were elements that stood out clearly above the rest and the yellow curry was the winner for me. There was nothing wrong with the barramundi, its just that the curry distracted you, in a good way, from everything else on the plate.

Five spiced bangalow sweet pork belly with shredded apple and coriander salad, ginger wine glaze. When something is placed in front of you that has a perfectly positioned piece of crackling, you know what you’ll put in your mouth first….bye bye crackling. The pork was soft and juicy and you cant go wrong with the combination of pork and apple, but the glaze once again was a little on the sour side. I completely understand the pairing of ginger/sourness with this dish, but by this stage I was totally over the whole sour element in every dish – sourness from the dumpling broth, sourness from the yellow curry, and now the sourness in the glaze…it was becoming a little repetitive. If I had any of the dishes on their own they would have been great, but as a combination and one after the other – my stomach and tongue were taking a beating.

Open Wagyu beef burger with brioche bread and soft centred quail egg. Daz loved this one, and any wonder really, he’s a man and a burger was place in front of him - he was bound to love it. For me, it was good but not great.

Banana parfait, cinnamon tuille and passionfruit syrup, the flavours were all there….a winning combination……except, the parfait had massive ice crystals in it. Sigh. But how can I be mad with a dessert which comes out with a banana and basil hat?…..how cute is that!

Overall, it was a bit of a fizzer. To be honest sometimes service plays a big part in your experience, the food was bad per say, but it could definitely be made better with a smile and some finesse from the wait staff. I’ll be back at Ezard, I really don’t think it fair to judge the whole affair on one off night - there were some elements there that really sparked my interest, so they do deserve a second chance.

On a completely different note….Daz has started a whole NEW blog. This time it’s about interesting stuff, sorry babes but only a select number of people are into android development. This time he’s started a blog covering his thirty before 30 challenge. As a 29th birthday present I’ve given him 30 challenges to complete before the big three O smacks him in the face and he’s going to chronicle them in blog form. The challenge will last 12 months and he is duty bound to complete them all, the catch is that he’ll find out what the challenge is only a week before he completes it. So head on over to the Thirty before 30 blog to check out what he’s up to.

Rabbit tortellini, Jerusalem artichoke Puree and Rabbit Broth

2011-02-11T11:21:00.000+11:00

To be honest, I made this recipe a little while ago. After eating at Sarti I was inspired by the flavours in their rabbit tortellini with Jerusalem artichoke puree, so of course me being me I decided to recreate the dish. I actually made the dish back when Jerusalem artichokes were in season. They grow in my garden and at the moment the plant is well above my head ready to burst out into its floral prettiness. Anyway back to the dish, since its Chinese new year and it’s the year of the rabbit, I thought what better time to post this recipe than now.

Jerusalem Artichoke plant

I love all the flavours in this dish, the nuttiness from the hazelnuts, the richness from the broth and the subtle gamy flavour from the rabbit all work so fantastically together. I’m actually very proud of my effort, and without tooting my horn too loudly I actually think my dish turned out better than the one I had at Sarti.

The whole recipe is pretty straight forward, the only difficult part is folding the pasta so it looks pretty, I’m getting better but by no means am I perfect yet. As a kid, my mum never had the patience to fold all her tortellini properly, they were usually plain half moon shaped so I’ve had to learn the art of tortellini making as an adult. The other piece of advice I would offer is to really invest some time and effort into producing a good quality rabbit stock, it’s really the star of the dish and any hard work put in the preparing stage will pay off when it comes to the eating. So without any further delay, here is the recipe.

Rabbit Tortellini Filling
INGREDIENTS

1 medium sized rabbit
2 egg whites
2 small golden shallots, peeled cut in half
2 cloves garlic, peeled cut in half
2 tablespoons of double cream
Salt and pepper

METHOD

1. Debone the rabbit, make sure to remove as much meat from the rabbit as possible. Set the bones aside, you will need these to prepare the rabbit stock.

2. Roughly cut the rabbit meat into small pieces and place in a food processor. Pulse the meat until it has been roughly chopped by the food processor, this step helps to get the whole process underway.

3. Add the shallots and garlic and processor further. Then add the eggwhites and cream, not forgetting to season well with salt and pepper, process the mixture until you get the consistency of sausage meat. Once this is achieve place in the fridge until needed.

Rabbit Broth
This can be flavoured any way you want. If you like it plain it can be just the rabbit bones and some simple white wine, if you like it herb infused you can go mad with plenty of different herbs. I’ll give you the ingredients that I used which resulted in a subtle but rich flavour.

INGREIDENTS

1 rabbit carcass (left over from rabbit tortellini filling)
4 golden shallots
4-5 garlic cloves
100mL dry white wine
2 bay leaves
4-5 large sage leaves
10 whole black peppercorns
1 tablespoon butter
Olive oil

METHOD

1. In a large stock pot add a splash of oil olive and heat over medium heat. Add the rabbit bones and sear until the rabbit bones and any meat left on them turn a deep golden colour. This is a very key step, a big portion of your flavour will come from the browning of the bones, so take your time here. Don’t do it too fast because you’ll just burn your bones and add a bitter flavour, however a nice golden colour will add a caramelised flavour.

2. Add the shallot and garlic to the pan and cook until fragrant, 1-2 minutes. Add the white wine to deglaze the pan. Cook until the alcohol in the wine has evaporated, 2-3 minutes. Add the bay leaves, sage leaves, pepper corns and enough cold water to cover the bones, and a little salt to season. Allow the water to come to a simmer and leave it to gently simmer for at least 45 minutes. The longer the better.

3. Allow the broth to reduce down to a ¼. Once at this stage strain the bones and transfer the broth to a small clean saucepan. Add the butter, check the seasoning – adjust if necessary and set aside until needed. Before serving, reheat the broth.

Jerusalem Artichoke Purée
INGREIDENTS
500g Jerusalem artichokes, peeled
500ml whole milk
30g butter
One small potato, peeled
1-2 tbsp double cream

METHOD
1. Cut the Jerusalem artichokes into pieces along with the potato, ensure that all the pieces are roughly the same size so that they cooked evenly. Place in a pan with the milk. Bring the milk to a simmer and cook the artichokes for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally, until they are very soft.
2. Remove the artichokes and potato from the milk, do not discard the milk as it may be required later. Place the artichokes and potato in a food processor bowl.
3. Add the butter and process until a puree is achieved, you may need to add some of the reserved milk to achieve the right consistency. At this point you may be left with a few lumps in you puree, to remove the lumps pass the puree through a fine sieve. Transfer the puree to a pan and add the cream and season well with salt and pepper. Set aside for later, before serving re-heat puree.

Spinach Pasta with Semolina Flour

INGREDIENTS

1/4 cup very finely ground semolina flour
3/4 cup plain flour
2 egg yolks (room temperature)
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 cups of spinach leaves

METHOD
1. Remove stems from spinach leaves and blanch in boiling water for 2 minutes. Remove from water and rinse in cold water to quickly cool the spinach. Squeeze as much water out of the spinach leaves as possible. In a blender or food processor, blitz spinach to get a smooth puree.

2. In a food processor, combine the egg yolks and spinach puree and mix until combined, this will only take a few seconds

3. Add the remaining ingredients and pulse until a firm dough is formed. If the mixture seems a little dry then add a few drops of lukewarm water until the mixture comes together.

4. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead the dough for a few minutes, just to make sure that everything is incorporated evenly. Wrap the dough in some glad wrap and Put aside to rest for 10-20minutes.

5. After resting, roll the pasta out thinly and put together the rabbit tortellini. Since I always have trouble with my tortellini (sometimes they get a little soggy before I get them into the boiling water) I give my self a little insurance. As I make the tortellini, I place them on a freezer tray and snap freeze them. That way they stay exactly as I made them and are easier to handle come cooking time. This also means I can make my pasta well in advance. Just make sure to adjust your cooking time according to the state of your tortellini.

6. Cook tortellini in boiling salted water until the pasta is al dente. I won’t give a cooking time because it depends on too many factors, thickness of your pasta, the temperature of your tortellini, the quantity of tortellini that go into the pan and so on. The best way to judge is to taste test, always an excuse for a sneaky nibble right?
Plating
To garnish -

A few spinach leaves
A few roasted hazelnuts
Place a big tablespoon of puree on the plate. Add a few of the tortellini and sprinkle the spinach and hazelnuts on top. Spoon a few tablespoons of the broth over the entire dish and enjoy.

Josie Bones. Meat + Beer = Full

2011-02-01T16:21:00.004+11:00

Josie Bones
98 Smith Street
Collingwood
03 9417 1878

Look! Its a naked rabbit *giggles*

When Conor from Hold the beef was in town recently to watch a furry little yellow ball getting smashed across a tennis court, Agnes from Off the Spork suggested Josie Bones for a catch up, I was more than willing to join in on the meat and beer fest. If you’re not familiar with Josie bones, thats ok – neither was I. It was only on the morning of the planned dinner that I realised that Josie Bones is actually run and owned by the guy who came third on the first season of masterchef, that's Chris Badenoch and Julia Jenkins from the same show. Josie Bones open in the last quarter of 2010 and it looks like they are doing a roaring trade. That aside, I was totally intrigued by the notion of a speciality beer place that serves small plates of mostly meat inspired dishes, sounds like its completely up my alley. To all my vegetarian friends, I love spinach but I’m sorry meat is what makes me tick.

At the time, the weather in Melbourne was a little on the fresh side. Now that the temperature has really ramped up, it would be a great spot to get some friends together – have some crackling of the day and slowly make your way through the long list of local and imported beers. And when I say long, I mean LONG. But back to the crackling of the day, that was GOOD! We ended up with chicken crackling and pork crackling. My preference was the chicken crackling. Slightly on the salty side and really packed a crunch. The pork crackling was almost teeth shattering. A great way to get the stomach juices flowing. Although by the end of it, I wondered where they got all the chicken skin from. There was a distinct lack of chicken on the menu. I envisioned a flock of naked chickens roaming the country side getting seriously sunburnt.

We ordered a variety of dishes to share amongst us. We’ll start with the trotter fritters and romesco sauce. They were really crunchy on the outside with a soft juicy pork center. They were darn good until I got to the other end of my trotter square. One side had loads of soft meat and chopped up skin, while the other end was a big chunk of pork skin. Slightly disappointing, but sometimes these things happen. I was the unfortunate one to cop it.

Next we had the lamb tartare, radish and mint and wheat beer brioche. This was a first for me, I had never eaten raw lamb before, so wasn’t exactly sure what to expect. I imagined a fatty mutton tasting hunk of meat that would be really chewy, luckily this wasn’t the case. The lamb was really lean and tender. The cute quail egg sitting ontop added an element of lusciousness, just like a good traditional tartare. I threw a good smothering of mustard on my portion, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Hmmm, this is a blogger fail so bear with me. We order a special which was rabbit terrine with prunes soaked in some alcohol (which I cant remember) along with...I think...onion jam. I’m sure someone will correct me. I really liked this dish, the rabbit was really moist and the whole terrine was light on gelatine. Daz hates gelatinous dishes, so this was a hit for him too.

So far have you noticed the distinct lack of vegetable matter? Well to counter act the protein overload we ordered Baby Nicola potato salad. It was creamy and a pretty decent potato salad. It served its purpose to introduce some fibre into our meal, well the small amount of fibre that resided in the skin of the potatoes.

Next we had octopus and bone marrow cigar with green mango salad. I’m not going to lie, I’ll give it to you straight. This was HORRIBLE! I wanted to love it...I really did. I love bone marrow and the whole notion of it being paired with octopus sent me into imagination overdrive, but sadly the reality of the taste bought me crashing back down. It was just a fishy oily mess, I think that is enough said.

Thankfully the second special we ordered saved the day. Pork belly with pickled peach and a creamy puree of some description (Help anyone??). This was good. If I see pork belly on a menu, I more than likely to order it. The skin was crispy and the pork had just enough of fat to make it juicy and moist. I enjoyed the pickled peach with the pork and I’m definitely going to steal that idea for myself.

Last we had Grain feed beef meat, thrice cooked chips and horseradish hollandaise. When I saw this on the menu I had flash back to the thrice cooked chips I had at the botanical. Sadly, to me, these didn’t stack up. They were nowhere near crispy enough for chips that have been cooked three times. You can tell from their pale appearance that they weren’t going to be quite right. Dont get me wrong I still enjoyed them, but it was a little bit of a let down. What was the most interesting moment was that Conor actually had some of the beef....shocking huh?

What I will say about Josie bones is that it has exceptional service. The staff are all so friendly and extremely willing to help on food, wine or beer selection. It was a great way to put you in a seriously good mood, so some how the beer tasted that much better. After we gorged ourselves on meat from a variety of animals, we braved the walked to Cutler and Co in an attempt to score a spot for some dessert. We failed. We ended up at the crepe place across the road, which seems to be fast becoming my backup dessert destination. Everyone has one right? Check out the uber cuteness of our bill patron....bahhh

Results - Crispy Orange Tuile, Chocolate Mousse and Szechuan Pepper Ice-Cream

2011-01-19T16:07:00.003+11:00

“Forgive me father for I have sinned, it has been over 4 weeks since my last blog post”. Can you believe that it’s been 4 weeks since I posted this recipe and I still haven’t managed to post the results!?! Well I am now here with the long awaited results. I had this all ready to go before the Christmas break, but then a trip interstate, coupled with a few trips to hospital kind of put a dampener on my plans. Everything is ok now, and I can get stuck into filling cyber space with more pictures of food.

This dessert was a little peculiar, but still packed a punch with taste. The Szechuan ice cream was slightly peppery with a lovely fragrant taste which went really well with the tart but sweet candied tomatoes. And before making this dessert, I could never have imagined that tomato and chocolate are a really great combo. I don’t know if I’ll be replacing butter for chocolate in my tomato sandwiches though. I enjoyed the crunch of the zesty tuile too, all in all it was a pretty impressive dessert, at least flavour wise. But the recipe wasn’t exactly my smoothest experience in the kitchen.

I’ve cooked a fair few top 100 recipes since starting this blog, but by far this was the most disastrous of them all. It started with the actual recipe, the mousse called for a sheet of gelatin….of what strength? Who knows. I kinda guessed it and got it wrong, of course, so my mousse turned out a little more rubbery than I had expected, there was no whipping it once it had set, it was set to stay baby!

Then there was the orange almond tuiles. I moulded them into the perfect length and width before going into the oven, but every time the tuile came out of the over a little fatter and wonkier than it had gone in, so all my moulds turned out to be 15ft higher than I was hoping (ok that’s an exaggeration, but you get the point)

Onto the ice cream…“Make sabayon by heating sugar and water to 118C”….errrrrrrr……what water? Did I miss something? In the ingredients list there was no mention of water and how much of it I was supposed to use, so I decided for my sanity’s sake to ditch the recipe and just make ice cream my way, and it turned out pretty good if I don't say so myself.

Another issue with the recipe, in the candied tomatoes section, it didn’t specify whether to drizzle the sugar syrup over the top or toss the tomatoes in it, I went with tossing and thankfully I got it right….sometimes tossing is the right thing to do. I normally don’t have a problem with trying to figure stuff out for myself, but on this particular day it was hot, I was running out of time and using my brain was the last thing I wanted to do, which leads me to the very last problem.

By the end of the whole saga I was over it, I wanted to just eat the darn thing. Spooning the mousse into the freakishly tall tuile moulds seemed all too hard, I broke a fair few before finally getting it in without damaging the shell. Then when it can to making the ice cream quenelles I didn’t care anymore, so I just dumped it on top. I regret it now, but at the time it was the easiest thing to do. A few happy snaps later it was all over, dessert was eaten and the turmoil of slaving in the kitchen was well and truly behind.

Crispy Orange Tuile, Chocolate Mousse and Szechuan Pepper Ice-Cream

2010-12-17T22:38:00.003+11:00

And now for the very last course in the Great 3 Course Jacques Reymond Challenge. Dessert is my favorite course of all time, so this one is going to be a doozie. So far we've had balls, balls and duck, hope you've been keeping track or that just sounds like I have a bit of a fetish....ok no guarantees I "DON'T" have a fetish. So strap your self in people, for this is the course to end all courses.....Chocolate, pepper and orange on one plate. As always, here's the recipe with results and photos to follow.

Crispy Orange Tuile, Chocolate Mousse and Szechuan Pepper Ice-Cream

Serves 4-6

The Candied Tomatoes will be the subject of some lively discussion among your guests, as well as the spicy chili pepper flavour of the Szechuan pepper Ice-cream, which perfectly compliments the chocolate and orange

Orange Tuile

100g sugar

50g butter, melted

25g flour

zest 1 orange

75g almond flakes, extra finely chopped

50ml orange juice

Chocolate Mousse

3 egg yolks

20g sugar

150mL milk

75mL cream

1 gelatin sheet, soaked in cold water

100g milk chocolate

30g dark chocolate (70%)

Candied Tomatoes

50mL sugar syrup

1 vanilla bean

1 punnet Roma cherry tomatoes, halved

Szechuan Pepper Ice cream

200g sugar

8 egg yolks

300mL milk

400mL cream

1 1/2 tbs Szechuan pepper

METHOD

Orange Tuile

Preheat oven to 140C. In a bowl, whisk together sugar and melted butter. Add flour, orange zest, almond flakes and orange juice, mix well. Spread thinly onto plastic baking sheet in a 8cmx4cm rectangle shape and bake until golden. Remove and while still hot, mould into a cylinder shape, using a small rolling pin or small bottle

Chocolate Mousse

In a bowl, whisk egg yolks with sugar to make a thick sabayon. In a saucepan, bring milk and cream to the boil and pour into the sabayon. Place back in saucepan on low heat and continue to cook slowly until it thickens, do not boil.

Remove gelatin from cold water and squeeze out excess water. Whisk gelatin into custard mix. Cool to room temperature. In a double boiler or microwave, melt chocolate, and allow to cool to room temperature. When the two mixtures are the same temperature, fold them together. Allow to set in the fridge. Once set, whisk mouse and spoon into piping bag. Set aside.

Szechuan Pepper Ice cream

Make sabayon by heating sugar and water to 118C - use a sugar thermometer to get an accurate temperature. Pour the egg yolks over the mixture and whisk until cool.

Bring milk and cream to the boil and infuse with pepper. Strain after 10 minutes and mix with sabayon. Once cool, churn in an ice cream machine.

Candide tomatoes

sugar syrup is one part sugar to one part water. Add water to a small saucepan and bring to the boil. Once boiling add sugar, stirring until sugar dissolves completely. Remove from heat and allow to cool completely.

Preheat oven to 50C-60C. In a small saucepan, place the sugar syrup and vanilla bean and warm slightly for 5 minutes to infuse. Strain.

Place tomatoes, cut side up on a tray lined with baking paper and bake in the oven on very low heat until dry and chewy but not hard.

Serving

On serving plate, place orange tuile upright and slightly off center. Fill 1/3 of the tuile with the chocolate mousse. Place 3 pieces of candied tomato on top and fill another 1/3 of the tuile, balancing a quenelle of Szechuan pepper on top.

Ginger Bread Almond Ice Cream Sandwiches

2010-12-07T21:19:00.002+11:00

Its December and that means two things, hot weather and Christmas!!!! Its been a funny start to December in Melbourne, hot weather coupled with torrential downpours converting our once mild little town into a tropical oasis. There’s not much you can do to get away from the sticky-ness, apart from jumping in a swimming pool, or if you’re in the city - the Yarra river. Note – I do not advocate the practice of jumping into the Yarra river, do that at your own peril. Another way to get away from the heat is to eat ice cream.

I’ll find any excuse to eat ice cream, I’ve been known to eat ice cream in the middle of winter, and I don’t mean sitting at home on my couch….I mean going out and hunting down some gelato! So considering that Christmas is just around the corner (oh gosh…already!), I decided to make ginger bread almond ice cream sandwiches.

The ginger bread cookies are chewy, so when you bite into the sandwich you get the soft spicy goodness of the cookie, coupled with a cool creamy ice cream middle. I wanted to make the ice cream really creamy, similar to commercial ice cream sandwiches so you’ll notice that my recipe calls for 2 types of cream to boost the fat content of the ice cream…hmmmm fat. If your health conscious, you can skip that and just use more of one type, but lets face it, how many people who are making their own ice cream are truly health conscious? I’ve also devised an easy way to make ice cream without owning an ice cream machine. It involves a KitchenAid and funnily enough, a freezer. Check out the recipe for more info.

While I was making the ginger bread cookies, Daz asked me to make him ginger bread men. I wasn’t going to deny him, I really didn’t have an excuse not to make them, dough was ready to go and I already had a ginger bread man cookie cutter. And they were so cute in the end anyway, especially with their green t-shirt. Everyone had a lot of fun, until someone got their head bitten off!

Chewy Gingerbread Cookies

Ingredients:

Makes roughly 30 cookies.

3/4 cup malt extract or tracel or golden syrup
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/8 cup castor sugar
1/3 cup water
80 gram butter, softened
3 1/4 cups plain flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground cloves
1teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Method

1. Combine together the tracel, brown sugar, sugar, water and butter in a medium sized bowl until smooth. Sift together the flour, baking soda, nutmeg, allspice, ginger, cloves and cinnamon. Gently stir the dry ingredients into the wet mixture until all of the ingredients are properly combined. Make a large ball and wrap the dough in gladwrap and place in the fridge for least 4 hours or overnight.

2. Preheat oven to 175 degrees C. On a lightly floured surface, roll the dough out to achieve roughly a 5mm thickness. Using a round cookie dough cutter, cut dough then transfer cookies to an ungreased baking paper lined baking tray. Make sure to leave a small distance between each cookie, they wont get much bigger, but you don’t want to run the risk of them sticking together.

3. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes. Remove from oven and place on wire racks to cool. At this stage the cookies can be placed in an airtight container and will keep at room temperature for 1 week. If constructing ice cream sandwiches, once cooled place cookies in the freezer ready to have ice cream filling added.

Almond Ice cream

INGREDIENTS

100ml almond milk
3 egg yolks
100g caster sugar
50ml pouring cream
80 mL double cream
1 vanilla bean, split and scraped or 1 teaspoon of vanilla bean paste

METHOD

1. Bring almond milk to the boil in a small saucepan, once boiled add vanilla bean, and set aside.

2. In a medium sized stainless steel bowl whisk egg yolks and sugar together by hand, then pour almond milk onto the egg yolk mixture while whisking. Cook mixture over a bain-marie while whisking continuously for about 10 minutes or until it begin to thicken thickened. A good way of testing it is if it still smells like raw egg than its not cooked enough, or if it coats the back of a spoon and keeps a straight line when you wipe some away with your finger.

3. Once thickened cool sabayon over ice while still whisking. Once completely cooled whisk both types of cream into the sabayon. Place the mixture into an ice cream machine and follow manufacturers instruction. Or use my method: A couple of hours before starting place your KitchenAid stainless steel bowl in the freezer. Once you get to the cooled sabayon/cream mixture, transfer to the frozen mixer bowl and whisk with your KitchenAid for 2 minutes. Transfer to the freezer for 15-20minutes then whisk again for 2 minutes, making sure to scrap down the sides. Repeat this again 4 or 5 times until the ice cream becomes the consistency of a thick soft serve. No need to buy a ice cream machine, and you’ll get perfect, icicle free ice cream every time!

4. To make the ice cream fillers for the sandwiches, place ice cream in a glad wrap lined rectangular plastic container. For thick ice cream sandwiches, make sure that that ice cream is roughly 2 cm thick. Cover the top of the ice cream with more glad wrap and place in the freezer for 2-3 hours to fully set. Once set, use the same sized cookie cutter you used for making the gingerbread cookies and cut round ice cream sandwich fillers. Place back in the freezer for 10 minutes or so and then assemble your sandwiches. Cookie, ice cream filler, cookie……enjoy!!

While we’re on the subject of Christmas, on the weekend Daz and I went along to the Scandinavian Christmas Bazaar. It was a last minute decision, so I wasn’t exactly sure what was going to be instore, I was imagine fire breathing donkey’s, three legged men and loads of Swedish meatballs. Sadly, of the three only the last one was on offer. We had a quick bite to eat, devouring Räksmörgås, Æbleskiver's and Frikadeller's . It seemed like fun, so I’ll definitely be adding it to my calendar for next year.

Æbleskiver

Frikadeller

Results - Roasted Duck Breast, Braised Turnips, and a Mango and Lemon Sauce

2010-11-30T19:33:00.004+11:00

Sometimes I wonder how chef's come up with flavour combinations. Do they have the Issac Newton moment when an apple falls out of a tree smacking them plainly in the face?, or do they purposefully set out to challenge our traditional take on flavour unions? I'm not exactly sure how Jacques Reymond thought of putting mango and turnip together, but let me tell you it was a stroke of genius! I really didn't think that my favourite part of this dish would be the combination of the sweet juicy mango with the soft but tender turnip. And to be brutally honest, that is the only aspect of this entire dish that I will probably be making again. Before yesterday I had no idea that there was more than one use for a turnip, the first being a implement to throw at your partner when they eat the last piece of chocolate in the pantry.

I totally failed with the pickeled wombok (aka a Chinese cabbage that sounds strangely like a small furry animal). I don't know if I read the recipe wrong, or I totally missed the point, but I followed every step and at the end of it I was left with slightly damp crisp cabbage. I stared at it for a little while, kinda hoping it would magically turn into the right thing, but 20 minutes later and nothing. So I got frustrated and just wilted the whole lot in a hot pan, I may have committed a culinary sin, but in the end I wasn't exactly overcome with a taste sensation, so I'm not too upset that I got it wrong.

The other thing that I really liked about this dish was the orange and lemon sauce. I really enjoyed the fragrant star anise and szechuan pepper in the sauce, and I thought that the whole thing came together really well, who would have thought that orange and duck were a match made in heaven!!! The French may be onto something here. Once again though, the big spoiler was the limp, drab tasting cabbage. I strongly recommend making the rest of the dish and leave out the accompanying pickled cabbage. Maybe just steam some crunchy string beans, or better yet just save your stomach for a huge serving of dessert. Speaking of dessert, onto my last challenge in the Jacques Reymond 3 course dinner. Stay tuned for the sugar high!

Roasted Duck Breast, Braised Turnips, and a Mango and Lemon Sauce

2010-11-28T15:39:00.006+11:00

And now for the main course to the Jacques Reymond 3 course delight! So far the appetizer and the starter have gone well. I'm not so sure about the main course though. While flipping through the Cuisine du Temps book I had a real hard time settling on something. Nothing really caught my eye, other than the suckling pig. But that seemed a little indulgent considering normally you have to buy a whole suckling pig, a challenge even to the well seasoned gluttons that Daz and I are. So instead I'm going to attempt the roasted duck breast. I'm a fan of duck, so hopefully this will turn out well, however the mango and lemon sauce screams a little "sweet and sour" to me which apparently is the whole point to this dish, hopefully it will be a good combination.

After reading through the recipe, it also suggests to serve the dish with a side of pickled wombok. Now, if your a little ignorant like me....no its not a small hairy Australian marsupial, its actually Chinese cabbage. So in fact this recipe includes a bonus side recipe, helping with the all important veggie count.

As always, here is the recipe and stay tuned for the happy ending.

Roasted Duck Breast, Braised Turnips, and a Mango and Lemon Sauce, Serves 4

This Dish is all about the four tastes, saltiness (duck), acidity (lemon), sourness (turnip) and sweetness (mango)

4 duck breasts, skin on

1/2 teaspoon flaked sea salt

Lemon Sauce

2 tablespoons palm sugar, grated

1/4 teaspoon Szechuan pepper

1/4 cinnamon stick

1/2 star-anise

3 cardamon pods

zest 1/2 lemon

1 teaspoon julienned ginger

25 mL sherry vinegar

250mL orange juice

1 teaspoon custard powder

juice of 1 lemon

1/2 teaspoon ginger juice

Braised Turnips

2 small turnips, peeled and sliced

1 tablespoon sugar

30g butter

100 mL chicken stock

salt and pepper to taste

1 mango sliced

Clean the duck breast of excess sinew, score the skin and rub with salt. Place the duck skin side down in a heavy frying pan on low heat to render out the fat layer between the skin and the meat. It is not necessary to preheat the pan. Do not turn the breast until it has cooked three-quarters of the way through - approximately 15 minutes. Cook the other side for 30 seconds to a minute. Remove from pan and rest for approximately 5 minutes

Lemon Sauce

Caramelise the palm sugar in a small saucepan. Add the spices, lemon zest and ginger and cook until fragrant. Deglaze with sherry vinegar and orange juice and reduce by half to 125 mL. To finish the sauce add the lemon juice and ginger juice to taste. Adjust consistency with custard powder.

Braised turnips

Caramelise sugar in a frying pan until golden. Add a couple of small knobs of butter and the turnips. Once glazed lightly, add a little chicken stock and simmer gently until tender. You need just enough chicken stock so that by the time the liquid has evaporated, the turnips are cooked. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

To Serve

Put sliced mango in the center of the plate and place braised turnips on top, then duck breast, skin side up. Pour over lemon sauce. Pickled wombok is also and excellent accompaniment to this dish

Pickled Wombok

A fresher, more textured alternative to traditional sauerkraut.

1/2 wombok

1 salad onion, sliced

1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns, lightly crushed

1 tablespoon clarified butter

125 mL white vinegar

125mL white wine

1 bay leaf

2 stalks thyme

3 juniper berries

2 garlic cloves, crushed

75mL chicken stock

pinch of salt

Separate the leaves and stalks of the wombok. Slice the stalks thinly on an angle.

In a medium sized saucepan, sweat onion and pepper in a little clarified butter until soft. Add vinegar and reduce until almost evaporated. Add white wine, bay leaf, thyme, juniper berries and garlic and reduce by half. Add chicken stock to taste, season with a pinch of salt.

To cook wombok, bring pickling liquid to the boil and pour over the wombok. Remove from liquid to serve.

Sarti

2010-11-22T12:06:00.003+11:00

Sarti6 Russell PlMelbourne, 3000(03) 9639 7822

Daz and I often perve on people…..of both sexes, I know its a little weird and slightly strange, but I'm not like most girls. I love checking out shoes and dresses and I often try to get Daz involved, but he’s just not that into females shoes. I must admit though, I'm the one who actively points candidates out to him. While we were dining at Sarti on a particular warm evening we spotted an attractive lady who had a stunning black dress on. As I was admiring her dress another woman walked in with the exact same black dress on. We all stared and were eager to find out what would happen when they both discovered they weren't the most original pair in the room. About a minute later our curiosity was satisfied when the original lady returned to her seat and noticed the other lady sitting at the next table. A few nervous laughs later and it was all sorted. It was such a fascinating incident, we all know how competitive women can get, especially when out on the town wearing your favourite little black dress. I don’t know what we were expecting, maybe some mid meal entertainment, nothing like a scrag fight!

Enough about the scenery, onto the food. We decided to share some of the stuzzichini to start. If you don’t already know stuzzichini are small share plates similar to tapas. So we had Tartare of wagyu beef, porcini acid, smoked tomato, pine nut oil. Big pieces of fleshy juicy wagyu, crunchy pieces of pine nut all topped with very smoky tiny tomatoes. The oil was quite smoky giving the meat a distinct bbq taste. I really enjoyed this dish, although I couldn’t help but want some nice pickled gherkins.

Next we had Zucchini flowers stuffed with ricotta and herbs, the zucchini was tender but still crunchy. The outer batter was really crispy and the filling was fluffy and pundgent from the mixed herbs and spices added to the mix.

There was no way that we weren’t going to order the ‘Neo Nati fritti’, soft shell crab, ‘peperoni’ and ‘n’ duja crumble’. If you didn’t already know, Daz is a soft shell crab enthusiast, in that he will chose that over any other dish available. So we were really pleased when it arrived and lived up to its name. Thick pieces of juicy crab, with a spicy pepper "stir fry" underneath. Once again the outer shell was slightly crunchy with the soft flesh inside still very juicy. The crab was extremely fresh which was a nice little bonus.

The stuzzichini were really good, sadly the rest of the meal was a little bit downhill. I’ll just warn you now.

I ordered the Spinach ‘tortelli’, filled with rabbit, jerusalem artichoke puree, roasted hazelnuts, and rabbit broth. The pasta was a little undercooked, it wasn’t al dente it was “al raw-o”. It was even more evident considering the rabbit filling was very delicate and moist. The puree was fantastic along with the addition of hazelnut and rabbit broth. I really enjoyed it, however the undercooked pasta was a bit of a let down for me.

Miss Coco LV ordered the pasta of the day, Pasta with duck ragout. It was good to see big pieces of duck scattered throughout the pasta, but once again the same issue as above, the pasta was slightly undercooked, so that totally ruined it for me.

Daz being the big red blooded man that he is ordered the Chargrilled 1824 ribeye ‘con la vera caponata siciliana’. The opposite to above happened here. Daz asked for a medium rare steak an instead he got a medium almost medium/well steak. It was such a shame considering it would have been a beautiful piece of meat. The other draw back was that the caponata was really oily, not just a little bit, there was a puddle of oil left over on Daz's plate after he finished. The other weird thing was that the steak was served on such a small narrow plate, making it almost impossible for Daz to eat. At one point the steak almost ended up in his lap.

After the main meals we were really disappointed, not to mention the service was lacking. The were very few of the wait staff that actually smiled, and none of the dishes were explained to us. So as soon as the dish arrived it was plonkt on the table and then not a word was said. I’m one for detail, especially with food, so found it really impersonal. Hopefully the desserts would pick up our mood.

Daz ordered the Lemon tart. Poor Daz, he has such a bad record when desserts are concerned. He was expecting a nice slice of lemon tart, or an small individual lemon tart, instead he got three tiny cubes of lemon tart with a lovely display of fruit and crumble and cream. It was a little strange considering the rest of the meal was served in a very traditional sense, but his dessert had a very modern appearance. The tart was pretty good though, nice and tangy with a crispy caramelized top. However Daz’s disappointment was not overcome by flavour, I guess great expectations are easily shattered

I had the Pistachio ‘panna cotta’, caramel salted popcorn. Fail!!!! The pistachio panna cotta didnt taste like pistachio, it was a little stodgy and the caramel salted popcorn was neither caramel nor salted....but it did have popcorn in it though. I'm not exactly sure what happened here, but the whole thing was a massive failure.

Miss Coco LV had the Chocolate semi freddo, traces of pumpkin. Thankfully this saved the day as far as desserts are concerned. The ice cream was really chocolaty and the semi freddo itself was really nice. I didn’t get a chance to try the pumpkin puree though. Nice idea though, matching pumpkin and chocolate together. There were no complaints coming from Miss Coco LV and she managed to finish the whole thing.

From my perspective Sarti was a pretty big let down. The surroundings are modern and really well done, but the service and some of the food weren’t quite up to scratch. I do recommend to go for the stuzzichini, maybe order a couple of cocktails and sit in their court yard and enjoy a few share plates with a bunch of friends, and then go somewhere else for dinner.

*It looks like Sarti is no longer in the top 100 restaurants of Australia. They were ranked 84 when the guide was released earlier this year, but the Gourmet Traveller website only have 98 entrants in the top 100. So at the moment it looks like Sarti and Lucio's are off the list. Stay tuned for more information....if I get any.

Results - Fresh tomato Broth with Saffron, Ricotta Fritter

2010-11-13T18:27:00.004+11:00

Has anyone else noticed that I seem to be cooking alot of "balls"? For some reason I seem to be attracted to spherical shaped food items, and you know what?.....I'm not complaining. How can you not love ball shaped food, they're easy to handle, are oh so cute and fit nicely in your mouth.....wait, am I still talking about food? Maybe I should get back on track.

First lets talk about the taste. I made the broth and decided to serve it at room temperature, not warmed or chilled like the recipe suggested. It was a pretty warm day when I made it so the soup temperature was just right. All of the flavors blended together reminded me of warm summer day, fresh coriander, tomato, a hint of chili and the freshness of lemongrass . My only problem is that for some reason tomato soups/broths always cling to the back of my throat and give me an unpleasant sharp feeling. I enjoyed the first 5 or 6 mouth fulls, but then I was over it. I did however love the ricotta balls, so cute and tasty. I will definitely be making the fritters again, but as small finger food to kick start a party.

Onto the actual recipe, it could not have been easier. Put everything in a pot and let it reduce, you don't need any skill for that. I was a little concerned at the end of the cooking time when I noticed that the whole process only made about a cup full of broth. I only made a half serve, but that wasn't enough for one person let alone two. So I decided to deviate away from the recipe and crushed the veggies while they were still sitting in my strainer and that seemed to extract some extra juice. I managed to squeeze out more than a few extra serves, so that fixed my problem. I ended up with a lot more tomato pulp but the second straining took care of any extra tomato bits.

Before cooking

After cooking

The ricotta balls were even easier. The only difficult part was waiting for the batter to be ready, and that was only difficult because I've always had a issue with patience. At the end of all the frying I was left with a fair bit of batter, so I decided to whack in a heap of cracked pepper, a little extra slat and make little salt and pepper beignet...oh they were so yummy! Might throw in some cheese next time and make cheese and black pepper balls. I've decided that Jacques Reymond is the batter king, so far anything that I've cooked involving flour and liquid has turned out to be awesome. At the end of this, I might turn into a batter ball myself!

ABOVE PLUS BELOW

EQUALS =

So, we've eaten the appetizers and now we've consumed the consommé, I guess next is the main attraction. And guess what? I haven't even worked out what its going to be!! I think I will have look through the book again........maybe after dinner though.

Fresh tomato Broth with Saffron, Ricotta Fritter

2010-11-10T08:43:00.006+11:00

My attempt at making the appetizers for my Jacques Reymond 3 course dinner went really well, and now for the starter course. I decided to choose something light and and refreshing, something that reminds me of summer - considering we have some nice warm weather coming our way. So here is the recipe for Fresh tomato Broth with Saffron and Ricotta Fritters. Of course photos and the full wrap up is on its way shortly.

Fresh tomato Broth with Saffron, Ricotta Fritter

Serves 4

TOMATO BROTH

1.5kg tomatoes, each cut into 6

1 celery stick, sliced

1 leek

3 shallots

2 garlic cloves, halved

2 red birdseye chillies, halved and deseeded

2 fresh kaffir lime leaves

1 knob of ginger, peeled and sliced

1 stick of lemon grass, crushed

400 ml of water

1 teaspoon sea salt flakes

1 teaspoon of sugar (or to taste)

1/4 bunch of coriander

1/4 bunch basil

1/4 teaspoon saffron threads

RICOTTA MIXTURE

100g ricotta

1 teaspoon basil, chopped

1 1/2 teaspoons coriander, chopped

2 teaspoon of semi dried tomatoes, cut into small cubes

salt and pepper

BEIGNET BATTER

50g plain/all purpose flour

1/3 teaspoon baking powder

pinch of salt

1 egg

35 mL soda water

10g melted butter

Note: The Beignet batter needs to be made an hour before being used

BROTH

In a large saucepan, combine all ingredients except for herbs and saffron. Cook gently at a low simmer for 20 minutes. Remove from the heat, add basil and coriander and let herbs infuse for 5 minutes. Pass through a fine sieve and collect broth. Add saffron threads and let infuse for 5 minutes. Strain again and set aside until ready to serve.

RICOTTA MIX

In a medium bowl, mix ricotta, herbs and semi dried tomatoes and season. Roll into balls and set aside

BEIGNET BATTER

In a bowl, mix flour, baking powder and salt. Make a well in the centre, add the egg and mix lightly. Add the soda water and gently whisk. Add the melted butter and mix

TO SERVE

In a saucepan, heat the broth, but don't boil.

Heat a frying pan with enough oil to deep fry. Dip ricotta balls in the batter and coat well with a fork. Add to the pan and deep fry. Remove and place on a paper towel to absorb oil.

Pour broth in the bowl and place the ricotta fritter in the center.

NOTE: the broth is also delicious served cold as a very refreshing chilled summer soup

Results - Gougères

2010-11-02T14:22:00.004+11:00

Gougères are French for yum!* I thought I would do the smart thing and only make a half serve of the recipe. You know, there’s only Daz and I and I don’t want to be tempted with too many cheesy puffs lying around the house. I know that’s a common problem people could face, so I don’t want to subject myself to it. With these delicious puffy, cheesy clouds of joy Daz and I set a new record. They were all eaten before I even finished taking photos of them. Thats really impressive!! And then came the wave of sadness...no more cheese puffs to snack on.

This has got to be the easiest top 100 recipe I’ve tried so far. It seriously couldn’t be similar, prepare your ingredients, add them together in the assigned order, bake and eat. And yet I still managed to stuff it up!!

The recipe calls for diced gruyere, so that’s what I did. But when I added it to the hot flour/butter/egg mixture the cubes of cheese weren’t melting like I had expected them to. Did I cut them too big? Did I fiddle and fumble too long and my mixture was now too cold for the cheese to melt? The recipe said nothing about chunky pieces of cheese in it. So I thought I would stir the mixture a little more. Still no difference. Ok, I’ll just spoon them onto the tray, cross my fingers and hope they’ll rise.....and thats what they did. But even better than that, the chunky pieces of cheese melted and then went all crispy and caramelised so in every gougère you would have a lovely big pieces of chruncy cheese...oh I’m in heaven. I totally understand now why Jacques said “Don't use other types of cheese or you won't get the right result”, its well worth the result. But I think my over mixing prevented my puffs from “cracking” like Jacques. A small price to pay, but I wont be making that mistake again!

My other issue was that the puffs took alot longer than 25 minutes to cook. More like 35 minutes, in the end I took them out because I was frustrated by the wafting smell of cheese throughout my house making me extremely hungry, so they weren’t quite as dark as I would have liked. But that had absolutely no impact on the deliciousness of them!

What I really love about this recipe is....no piping bag!!!! Usually with choux pastry you have to pull out the old bag and leave half of the mixture stuck to the side of your implement. Not in this case, all you need is a trusty spoon......oh oh....which means there are much more finger licking opportunities! Bonus score!

Now I’m really looking forward to the next challenge of my three course Jacques Reymond meal. By the way I’m glad I’m having other meals in between the courses, that way there’s no chance of me starving, considering I’m only cooking one course every couple of days.

I’m definitely going to be making these again, although next time I’m going to fill them with crab!!!

*Not actually French for yum.....that's petit miam!

Gougères

2010-10-29T15:40:00.002+11:00

Restaurant: Jacques Reymond (Vic)

Recipe from Cuisine du Temps, Jacques Reymond

2011 Rating: Number 15, 2 Stars

I'm setting myself a challenge within a challenge. I recently purchased a copy of Jacques Reymond's book, Cuisine du Temps, for two reasons really 1) He's a hot, older French guy and 2) I'm a sucker for fine dining cook books. I was sitting on the couch flipping through my new purchase deciding on which recipes I wanted to try, so I thought wouldn't it be great if I could cook a three course meal using the recipes in this book. So that's exactly what I'm going to do. I'm going to bring you a three course meal!! Lets start with something easy and most likely extremely yummy....the Gougères. Gougères are savory choux pastry puffs and can be often filled with a multitude of ingredients. In this case they will be serve filling-less. The gougères themselves have been on the Jacques Reymond menu for over 25 years, they gotta be good if they've been on the menu for that long.

So here's the recipe and a picture of what they're supposed to look like. Fingers crossed mine will turn out similar.

INGREDIENTS

250ml water

150g butter, cut into small knobs

pinch of nutmeg

pinch of salt

freshly ground pepper

200g plain/all purpose flour

5 eggs at room temperature

120g Gruyere or comte cheese, dices in 1/2cm cubes. Don't use other types of cheese or you won't get the right result. Australian Gruyere is perfectly suitable for this recipe

extra egg, beaten, for egg wash

METHOD

In a large saucepan put water, butter and seasoning and bring to the boil, stirring constantly. It is very important to keep stirring so the butter mixes in with the water; that way when you add the flour the dough forms immediately and it doesn't split.

Once boiling, turn off the heat and add the flour. Combine well and keep stirring for one minutes until dough is compact and well combined. Add eggs one by one using a small mixer at a low speed, or if you do it by hand, keep the dough in the saucepan it has been cooked in. It is very important to have the dough still hot while you incorporate the eggs. Once all the eggs are incorporated, fold through the diced cheese.

Using a tablespoon, spoon onto a baking tray lined with baking paper, with a pastry brush, egg wash the tops - ensure not to let the wash drip down the sides as it will prevent them rising evenly.

Bake in a preheated fan-forced over for approximately 25 minutes at 200C or 180C convection oven.

Take out of the oven as soon as they are cooked so they will stay crispy. Gougères can be eaten straight out of the oven or reheated as required.

This recipe is for 15-18 large gougères because once you put them on the table they will disappear in no time. You can make them any size you wish, but bigger is better.

NOTE: You can also freeze raw gougères. When ready to eat, put them straight into the hot oven, do not defrost them, and allow a few more minutes of cooking time.

Tea Rooms of Yarck

2010-10-25T09:49:00.007+11:00

Tea Rooms at Yarck6585 Maroondah HwyYarck, 3719(03) 5773 4233

Do you remember when you were a kid and doing silly stuff for a laugh was the best thing that could happen to you during the day? A favorite of mine while growing up were the giant spinning cups in playgrounds, where all your mates piled into the contraption and span it until someone starting crying out for their mum or someone vomited and then everyone would have to go home. Always such fun, I tell you what isn't fun.....riding one of these when your a little older, with freakish childhood balance control gone, and with a belly full of food. That's exactly what Daz and I did after a recent meal at the Tea Rooms of Yarck.

Yarck is a 'blink and you'll miss it' town north east of Melbourne. In our case we made the trip out to Yarck specially for lunch. I'm not sure how many people randomly stop by for lunch. Judging by the amount of people that day, a fair few made the trip out especially from Melbourne. The space is bright, clean and really welcoming. We were lucky to snag a seat right next to the window in the back area of the restaurant. So to one side we had a view across the garden, to the other we had a view of the entire restaurant, which is always pleasing for me because I get to see other people enjoying their meals and I get a chance to have a look at the dishes I don't get to try myself.

The Tea Rooms don't have a menu, instead the chef comes up with a list of dishes based on the season. The dishes are then written on a massive blackboard in the middle of the dining area. The Kitchen staff are well versed and can answer any question at the drop of a hat. Considering the menu changes frequently, the wait staff are a well oiled machine. As a diner you can opt for a chef's menu, which consists of a taste of almost everything on offer that day, or choose al la carte. Daz and I opted for the al la carte, purely due to portion control. We had plans to go out to dinner that night and didn't want to end up too full to eat again. What we weren't planning on were the serving sizes, truly value for money I say!!

On arrival we were given a big bowl of flat bread, lightly drizzled with fruity olive oil. Seriously a perfect way to kick start the appetite. The bread was really crispy and towards the end Daz and I were fighting over the last remaining pieces.

We ordered an antipastini to share as a starter, which included three individual components!!

First we had the frittata, fluffy egg filled with broad beans, carrots and onions, served with radicchio leaves and Parma ham. So delicious!

Octopus ragout, served with seared veal and tuna mayonnaise. The octopus was so tender, before it even hit your tongue the flesh was already falling apart. It was so saucy and not even a hint of fishy-ness. The veal was such a delight, matching it to the tuna mayo was just a stroke of genius. I wish I could have had a man sized portion of this dish.

As soon as we walked into the room there were plates of terrine laid out waiting to be carved and served. So I was extremely pleased to see that a slice was incorporated into the antipastini. It was pork terrine, with pieces of pistachios speckled throughout, served with some simple veggies and a beetroot salad. It was all delicious. I wish I could make a terrine that good.

We also receive a bowl of warm fluffy bread, with another smaller bowl of fruity olive oil. Just perfect to soak up all that ragout!

We also ordered another dish as a starter. Crudo di pesce, served with Kingfish and fennel tartare, watercress salad, yarra valley salmon roe. I can't remember which fish it was exactly, I'm assuming it was tuna, I should have written it down. The kingfish tarte was fantastic, tiny cubes of kingfish and fennel with a huge dollop of salmon roe on top. Surprisingly the salmon roe wasn't as salty as I had expected, so it added a nice balance to the entire dish.

For mains I decided to have the spaghettini granchio e bottarga, spaghetti with huge chunks of blue swimmer crab, chili, orange zest and sun dried mullet roe. This was delicious!!!!! Most times when you order a crab pasta there's very little crab meat to be seen. But not in this case, there was almost more crab than pasta. Both the pasta and crab were perfectly cooked, the sun dried mullet roe added a nice hint of salt and the chili just brought the whole thing together. Nothing better than a good old hit of heat.

Daz ordered the Rollo de maiale. There was no way in hell Daz wasn't going to order this when the waiter described it as "suckling pig de-boned and stuffed with more suckling pig". It was the saddle stuffed with the leg from the pig, along with herbs, breadcrumbs and nuts. It also came with some roasted potatoes. The pig itself was so fantastic, still so juicy and tender, with the outer skin crispy and delicious. The potatoes had begun to soak up some of the juices which made them impossible to avoid. My only issue was that the potatoes were inconsistent, some were cooked well, while others were still undercooked. Not a massive deal.

By this stage of the meal we were chockers. I contemplated not having dessert, but what was the point coming all the way out here without sampling the sweets. This is where Daz and I had a disagreement, I wanted to order the bomolini - small Italian doughnuts, while he wanted the gratinata - apple blackcurrant crumble. In the end Daz won, I think the promise of home made vanilla ice cream won me over. I'm glad I was swayed to the dark size, the crumble had luscious fruit topped with nuts, oats and huge pieces of crumb, not your average breadcrumb size crumbled, so when you took a bite your mouth was filled with generous amounts of each component. The ice cream was fantastic too, loads of egg yolk and vanilla bean. It was fantastic.

I loved the Tea Rooms of Yarck. To be honest I didnt expect 'comfort food style' from them. There are only two things that I didn't like about it, firstly that I didn't pick the chefs menu and got a chance to sample more dishes, and secondly its so far away meaning a random pop by would be rare. I guess if I want a quick fix I could always pop by Da Noi in South Yarra, their sister restaurant.

Results - Passionfruit Tart

2010-10-13T17:37:00.007+11:00

I've had a terrible day, not the worst in my life, but definitely in the top ten. It kicked off with mega awful traffic, something that I've sadly become accustomed to, it just means theres more time for Daz and I to talk rubbish and perv at passers by.....my fav was when we spotted a short skirted very high heeled gorgeous babe who suddenly tripped over her heels and came very close to falling over. Sorry, I'll get back on track.

I took the day off today to take care of a few things for my mum, I decided that I desperately needed a coffee. But with no cash in my wallet I needed to go to the ATM. So in the pouring rain I found the ATM, or where the ATM once existed. You see it seems that the ATM had caught fired....either through foul play or spontaneous combustion and was not in any kind of working order. So my morning coffee ended up costing me an extra $2!! Stupid ATM fees. I decided to buy a berry/coconut muffin to perk my spirits and the muffin had almost no coconut in it!! More of an annoyance rather than bad luck. Then my car battery decided it had enough and died. I was stranded....the clincher is that we had recently bought a new battery and it was sitting at home in our garage. So what is a girl to do?, there was no one around to offer a jump start, I don't want to call the RACV for two reason really, I'm not a member and I had a perfectly working battery sitting in my garage. So I caught a taxi, retrieved the battery and changed it. Did I mention that it was pouring rain??

So back on track to do my errands. By this stage I was in a cranky mood and when I was faced with an arrogant sales assistant, I think I kinda cracked. He pretty much only spoke in grunts and was the most unhelpful person I have ever met. So I shoved his paper work back and told him I wasn't interested. I got back in my car and bango, one of my windscreen wiper blades decided to join the battery and ATM, all gone to hopefully better places.

I had a gladwrap accident where the gladwrap stuck to the top of the tart, hence the big gaping hole. Otherwise it was a very good looking tart...hehehe

So at the end of the day, I'm slightly damp, I have grease under my fingernails, cranky and lucky that I haven't been in a car accident due to limited visibility. So of course the perfect thing would be something to sweeten my day. What better way than with a sweet little tart. The tart turned out perfectly, well as perfectly as Neil Perry intended. I made it exactly as the recipe stated, and the result was a very soft wobbly custard, creamy with a perfect crumbly pastry. The passionfruit really came through and to my surprise the overnight resting did wonders!! The sugar in the mix slowly cooks the egg, so when you pour it into the tart shell it is almost custard like in texture.

I have two issues with this tart, firstly the custard was way too sweet for my liking. I'm not a massive fan of overly sugary desserts, so I would curb the quantity of sugar. Secondly, the recipe makes no mention as to what temperature the custard should be before it goes into the tart shell. Is it supposed to be straight out of the fridge? at room temperature? or what? So my cooking time was well off. I ended up cooking it for double the recommended time, and I had taken the custard out of the fridge an hour earlier. It wasn't quite fridge cold, but it was still relatively cool. In future, I will actually warm the mixture up over a double boiler so the cooking time will be quite short. I'm already planing to make a mango tart......just waiting for the mangoes to catch up with my craving.

Passionfruit Tart

2010-10-10T21:39:00.003+11:00

Restaurant: Rockpool (NSW)

Recipe from Neil Perry (Originaly seen in Rockpool by Neil Perry)

2011 Rating: Number 2, 3 Stars

Sometimes a girl just feels like a tart. A little while ago I stumbled across a recipe for Passionfruit Tart by Neil Perry in my local paper, originally seen in Neil Perry's book - Rockpool. I thought I would give it a go, the fact that the filling needs to be made 24 hours in advance intrigued me. I noticed that the recipe that appeared in the paper didnt include the recipe for the shortcrust pastry, so I turned to the internet, hoping that I would stumble across the very Neil Perry recipe I was looking for. Luckily I found it at epicurious, and then quickly discovered that the recipe for the actual Passionfruit tart is all over the net. So here is my contributions to spreading it some more.

Will I still feel like a tart? Will the filling be eaten before it can be baked into a tart? Photos and results to follow soon!

Sweet Shortcrust Pastry (found at epicurious)

INGREDIENTS

250 g (1 1/2 cups) all-purpose flour

75 g (2 1/2 tablespoons) unsalted butter, cubed

a pinch of sea salt

90 g (1 cup ) confectioner's sugar, sifted

55 ml (1/4 cup) milk

2 egg yolks

METHOD

Place the flour, butter, salt, and confectioner's sugar in a food processor and process for 20 seconds. Add the milk and egg yolks and process for a further 30 seconds until a mass forms.

Turn out to a lightly floured surface and knead lightly for a few moments. Flatten and form a disk. Wrap in plastic and place in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

Roll out the dough with a rolling pin according to the recipe. Refrigerate until needed.

Passionfruit tart

Serves 8

Ingredients

9 x 55g eggs

350g castor sugar

300ml double cream (45 per cent butterfat)

350ml passionfruit juice, strained

plain flour for rolling

500g sweet shortcrust pastry

a little egg wash for glazing

icing sugar for serving

Method

Put the passionfruit mix together the day before you wish to bake the tart (resting it in the refrigerator helps avoid splitting).

Break the eggs into a bowl and whisk.

Add the sugar and continue to whisk until well incorporated.

While stirring gently, pour in the cream. Add the passionfruit juice and continue to stir until well blended. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Spray a 26cm tart tin with Pure and Simple.

Lightly flour a bench and roll out the pastry until it is 2 cm wider than the tart case.

Roll the pastry over your rolling pin and gently ease into the tart case , pushing the sides in gently so that it takes the fluting. Rest in the refrigerator for 20 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350F).

Line the tart case with foil, place rice in the foil and bake blind for 20 minutes.

Remove the rice and foil, brush the tart shell with egg wash and cook for a further 10 minutes.

Remove from the oven and lower the temperature to 140°C (290F). Return the tart case to the oven.

With the case sitting in the oven, carefully pour in the passionfruit custard.

Fill the tart right to the top with a cup or small dariole mould. Bake for 40 minutes.

Check the tart, it should be halfway set but still quite wobbly in the middle. If you take it out too soon it will not set and run when you cut it; if you leave it in too long it will set too firmly ad lose its elegance. Through experience you'll find the optimum set for the tart in your oven.

Remove the tart from the oven, balance on a cup and remove the sides. Put on a cake rack and, with a palette knife, slide the base off the tart tin.

This will allow the tart to cool and the pastry to crisp up rather than sweat.

Invert the pastry ring back onto the tart to help hold the sides in as it cools and sets. Allow to cool for 1 hour.

Carefully cut with a serrated knife and place in the middle of large white plates.

Dust with icing sugar and serve.

Birdman Eating

2010-10-02T18:26:00.005+10:00

Trendy and me usually don't go together. I always get in on something really late and usually miss the whole period when something is cool. Case in point, I'm not on facebook and I still love my hypercolour t-shirt, hopefully the two points are not related. Birdman eating has been the hot place for eating breakfast/brunch for quite a while now, so when Noels and I were deciding on where to eat, Birdman eating crossed my mind. Considering I never do things the traditional way, we actually had dinner at Birdman and not the trendy hit breakfast thing that everyone is doing these days.

I was a littler surprised with Birdman Eating, it was a Friday night, the perfect dinner time buzz hour 7-8pm and yet there weren't that many people out for dinner. There is an incredible amount of places to choose from on the Smith/Gertrude street junction, so I can understand that they weren't batting people away.

The menu consists of small dishes to share. We chose a combination form the menu and the specials board. We started with Seared scallops with quince butter and crispy panchetta. The scallops with nicely seared leaving the inside still juicy and succulent, the quince butter added a little silkiness. What was a massive surprise to me was the addition of vanilla, the whole thing was accented buy this very strong sweet flavouring coming from the vanilla, it was actually quite pleasant.

Zucchini & fetta Fritters. These were yummy massive balls of zucchini goodness. Once they came out I was expecting them to be slightly overcooked, considering their dark golden colour. But once cutting them open you could clearly see they were moist and fluffy on the inside. The fetta gave the fritters a nice salty creamy flavour, and the labne on the side gave a sharp flavour bringing the whole thing together.

Spiced lamb skewers with smokey eggplant. The lamb skewers were such a yawn, but the smoky eggplant! YUM!!!! It was fantastic, smoky, creamy and just perfect. I wish we had order a massive bowl of it, we asked for some bread which arrived warm on the inside and crunchy on the outside. Just perfect to mop up all the eggplant and olive oil yumminess.

Confit pork belly, pickled raddish, horseraddish yoghurt, apple cidar and vanilla syrup. I was really looking forward to this dish, however the confit pork didn't excite me. The pork was soft with a crisp skin, but nothing special. What stood out was the pickled radish, they were tangy and crunchy. I was expecting the horseradish yoghurt to be a little hot like good fresh horseradish, but sadly it was very mild. I was also disappointed with the vanilla syrup, I completely missed it. It might not have made it to the plate at all.

After our meal we were still a little hungry so looked at the dessert menu for some inspiration. Only pannacotta's were on offer. I like me a good pannacotta, but I had one for dessert the night before so was looking for something a little more inspiring. I some how convinced Noels that we needed to go to Cutler and Co for dessert. Its only down the road and the desserts are good. Bad mistake, did I mention it was a Friday night and the perfect dinner service buzz time 7-8pm? We made it to Cutler and Co, asked if it was possible to have dessert. That was not a problem, but we would have to eat it standing up at the bar. Maybe we should have done it, we could have started a whole new craze, dessert standing at the bar........the quintessential melbournian thing to do. Our better judgement kicked in a we walked out and down Gurtrude street. I stopped in my tracks when I saw this:

Perfect! French Crepes for dessert it is!! We managed to come across Breizoz French Crêperies.

Noels had the Almond praline crepe which came filled with plenty of almond and praline bits.

I went for something a little more dangerous, whats life if its not filled with a little fire. I opted for the flambée Chestnut & rhum crepe. I was surprised how good it was. Filled with a generous serving of chestnut puree and absolutely doused in rum. At one point I had genuine concerns for my eyebrows.

To be honest the crepes were a real highlight. I probably wont go back to Birdman Eating for dinner, but I might attempt to become a coffee hipster and go along for a double shot machiato with a dash of soy milk foam one day.

On a side note......

2010-09-27T14:57:00.003+10:00

For the past week I've been sick! I'm a terrible sick person, every 2 minutes I must announce in my most annoying croaky voice...."I'm sick". Poor Daz has to put up with it and I have to admit that after about 2 hours, I annoy even myself. For the past 3 years I've been the picture of health, I had a run in with some glass in my foot (which you might hear about in my next post) and a small case of sinusitis, but other than that not even a sniffle of a snuffy nose......until my cute and adorable 18 month old niece came along. She sneezed on me and it was all over. Kids are cute until they share their kiddie germs with you, and who says they have sharing issues!!

This is one of those rare occasion when a post appearing on this site will have nothing to do with food. There are plenty of things that we do in life, most have something to do with food, love or money. And this particular thing covers point one and two.......somethings are better than money. I talk about Daz alot in my posts, mostly about him eating something or other....or even an embarrassing story about him waiting in line overnight to purchase an ipad. So he's taking a fair whack of torture from me, and now its time for me to repay it.

Some of you may know that my Dazzie is a techno-gadget-geek of the highest order......it comes in handy believe me. A while ago he started his own blog about developing applications for the Android operating system for smart-phones, called The Andriod Workshop. He recently came across a new Google App inventor that allows the has-no-idea-about-technology-and-what-does-this-button-do average Joe to create their own applications, a bit like drag and drop programming. And guess who's going to be the guinea pig....ME!!!!

I have to come up with my own idea, then I have to go through the long and intellectually challenging training process and hopefully create my own app and become the most glorious smart-phone application creator of all time!!! Think angry birds crossed with that aeroplane traffic controller thingy. Yes....I'm completely up to speed with things. To be honest I envisage tears, screaming, lots of stress and possibly even a stomach ulcer......and those all coming from Daz.

If you want to know more about the "experiment" head on over to Daz's blog. In the mean time, I'm hungry....I might make a toasted cheese sandwich.....I'll start training later.

Leek and Cheese Scrolls

2010-09-19T10:01:00.003+10:00

This is how naive I am, a little while ago I bought a savory cheese scroll, I was hungry and in desperate need of carbs. I chomped into my scroll and was surprised by how much vegemite was in it. It seemed a little offensive to me, how come they upped the amount of vegemite in savory scrolls and why wasn't I consulted? While I was feeling sorry for my self and dreading the soon to hit heart burn (vegemite gives me heart burn....you would think that I would just stop eating it huh?), I contemplated creating a whole new savory scroll, one that would delight and be full of cheese. So hence the birth of the leek and cheese scroll.

There are two ways to make Daz happy, give him any type of gadget or cook him anything with leek in it. In fact that is how I've gotten him to start enjoying broccoli by making a leek and broccoli soup, I thought I would never see the day when he was actually ask me to cook something with broccoli in it. And now every time we go shopping we must come home with leeks. I have an issue with paying more than $2 for a leek, but I've seen him pile in $3.50 leeks into our shopping trolley. One day we'll be poor because we've spent all our money on leeks! You've hear of the credit crunch, we'll be in the leek deficit!

So when I told him my idea for these scrolls he got pretty excited, and insisted that I make them straight away so I did. My recipe makes roughly 18 small scrolls. They were so tasty, I struggled to keep Daz away long enough for me to take the photos! By the end of the day there were 2 lonely scrolls left, and then came the all too familiar over eating guilt.

These scrolls are pretty easy to make, in fact I don't think I'll buy another scroll again. The flavors are endless and you can have them hot and fresh from your oven. What more could you ask for?, other than if someone else could make them for you.

Leek and Cheese Scrolls

Make 18 small scrolls

INGREDIENTS

1 large leek

2 cups of plain flour

7 grams of dry yeast

40 mL milk, warm to blood temperature

100 grams of grated cheese, eg. tasty, Parmesan, Gruyère

pinch of sugar

pinch of salt

butter

1 egg, beaten

METHOD

1. In a small bowl add the dry yeast and half a cup of warm water, roughly at blood temperature. Add a pinch of sugar and allow the yeast mixture to become frothy. The sugar helps to kick start the yeast. In a large bowl add the flour and make a small well in the middle. Add the milk and then the yeast mixture. using your hands start to work the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, once a little of the flour has been incorporated into the yeast mixture you can now add the salt. Adding the salt directly to your yeast mixture will kill the live mixture preventing the dough from rising. Continue to mix all the ingredients together, adding more warm water when needed, until you have a dough, similar to a pizza dough consistency. Cover the bowl with glad wrap and place in a warm place to prove, the dough will become roughly double in original size, this will take around 45minutes.

2. Slice the leek thinly. Sautee in a medium size pan with a knob of butter. Do not allow it to caramelise, you only want the leek to be soft. This will take 3-5 minutes.

3. Once the dough is ready, flour a clean working surface and roll the dough to roughly 3-4 mm in thickness. Sprinkle the leek and cheese over the entire surface of the dough. Then gently roll the dough into a long sausage. Taking a sharp knife cut the dough into 1-2 cm pieces, then transfer to a baking lined tray, making sure to leave a little space between each scroll as they will continue to grow.

before

after second proving

4. Cover the scrolls with baking paper and place them in a warm place, this is the second proving. Allow them to roughly double in size again, this will take about 45 minutes. In the meantime preheat the over to 180C.

5. Once they are ready brush them with the beaten egg wash, and place in the oven. Cook for 12-15 minutes or until golden ontop.

Beer Doughnuts

2010-09-08T16:45:00.005+10:00

Donuts or doughnuts? Who cares!! These ones have beer in them!! As a treat recently Daz and I trekked out to Healesville to visit the White Rabbit Brewery. There are two things that I really like about White rabbit beer. Firstly the White ale is one of my favs, very subtle, low on the bitterness and sweetend with honey....isnt everything better sweetened with honey? Secondly they have a very cute white rabbit on the logo, I base my drinking habbits on very important aspects.

These are some rabbits that I dont mind running over with my car.

After purchasing way too much beer for two people to consume, I contemplated using the beer to prepare a recipe. But what recipe? Beer Chicken....too cliché, beer battered fish....I’ll let the fish swim for another day. Then I channelled Homer Simpson and realised that Beer Doughnuts were the only way to go. As soon as I mentioned the idea to Daz, his eyes lit up...... “beer and doughnuts? But its not my birthday”. I did a quick Google search (where were we before the “don’t be evil” Google?) and came across this recipe.

Oh look, they've multiplied!!

Quick cross the road now while I distract this drive with my bare leg

What really appealed to me about this recipe is that the doughnuts are actually baked rather than deep fried, so in fact they are a healthier choice when doughnuts are concerned. So of course I made a couple of changes to the recipe, I can’t help it, I must always tinker with things. Once I made the batter it quickly became fluffy. I’ve never smelt the combination of nutmeg and beer before, and oddly I found it very appetizing, it instantly made me hungry! I half filled my pan and shove it in the oven. I followed the recipe and took them out before they began to colour.

They tasted pretty darn good, a tiny hint of yeasty beer and loads of nutmeg. They were really fluffy, with massive air pockets in the dough, in fact they were more cake like rather than doughnutty. I thought they really lacked the deep golden outer crust and I’m sad to admit I missed the greasy after taste you get from eating a regular doughnut.

I had some batter left over, so I made the decision to throw away my initial intentions to make a healthier doughnut and committed to deep frying the rest of the batter, I’ve always been the fickle type. First doughnut, disaster!! The batter was way too runny, it managed to turn into a fat pancake sucking up loads of the oil! Solution....I added a whole heap of flour to the rest of the batter. Heck, I didn’t have enough to make another oven baked doughnut so I might as well be a big kid and play with goop. Surprisingly, they turned out really well. They fluffed up exactly the same way as the oven baked doughnuts - resulting in crater sized air pockets. However, they still managed to soak up a lot of the oil. I would much prefer the oven baked version. Next time I’ll just let them cook for a lot longer and actually become golden brown. Screw you recipe, I will not listen to you!!

Beer Doughnuts (My tinkered version)
Prep time : 30 minutes
Makes 9 Doughnuts

Ingredients:

1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup castor sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg (fresh ground is best)
1/4 teaspoon salt
60 mL buttermilk (at room temperature)
2 large eggs (at room temperature)
90 mL amber ale
4 tablespoons melted butter, cooled

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 170C. Grease a doughnut pan with a generous amount of butter.

2. Melt butter and let cool. Sift all dry ingredients together into large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together eggs, melted butter and beer until well-blended. Pour the liquid blend into the dry ingredients all at once, and mix just until blended (do not overmix, or the doughnuts will be tough).

3. Fill each doughnut form half full. Bake in the preheated oven in the middle rack for 9-12 minutes. The doughnuts should not be browned on top. Remove pan from oven, let cool for a minute, remove from pan and roll in castor sugar.

Royal Mail Hotel

2010-09-03T11:29:00.005+10:00

Dining Date: June 2010
Rating: 10th, 2 Stars
Chef: Dan Hunter
Location: 98 Parker Street, (Glenelg Hwy), Dunkeld Victoria 03 5577 2241
Website: www.royalmail.com.au

Recently, both the Gourmet Traveller Awards and The Age Good Food Guide have been announced. I always find it intriguing that two reputed guides can have such different views on the same restaurants, proving that taste is truly objective. The Gourmet Traveller awards has put Cutler and Co at the top of their list, whereas the Good Food Guide had The Royal Mail hotel as their winner. I’ve now eaten at both establishments, and if you were to ask me my opinion, I would put the Royal Mail ahead of Cutler and Co.

The transformation of the Royal Mail Hotel

Daz and I celebrated out 7th anniversary not long ago, and as a treat we went away for a short trip to the Grampians. We had very little planned for our time away, mainly eating, bush walking and sitting in front of the open fire. The bush walking was good to counteract all the eating, and the open fireplace was a great way to warm up after some scary bushwalking. Lets just say that I’m scared of heights and I suffer from vertigo, we managed to test both of those elements in one walk. Anyone for tight tracks along cliff faces that go directly up?

Yes, we actually walked across that and yes there is a cliff face directly to the right. I'm glad I wore extra absorbent underwear that day.

I have wanted to go to the Royal Mail Hotel for some time now. I constantly hear of the exciting new dishes that Dan Hunter has been producing and all I wanted to do was sample them for myself. The Hotel is split into two parts, a fine dining section and a bistro. Since it was a special occasion, we went for the fine dining option...why else would you come all the way to Dunkeld if not to get your socks blown off.

All of the ingredients for our meal are locally sourced, some as close as their very own kitchen garden. Our ten course tasting menu started with Sardine on toast, Pork sandwich, Heirloom tomatoes. First of all...great presentation! And even a bonus point scored.....I’m a lazy person so presenting me an already forked tomato is just perfect. From plate to mouth in one swift move. The sardines on toast were crunchy, with a soft jelly on top. I love the addition of the baby radishes. The heirloom tomatoes was jammed packed with flavour and you cant go wrong with tomatoes and basil as a combination. Next was the pork sandwich. Soft juicy pieces of pork which had been slow cooked in between slices of toasted buttery brioche. I wish I could have a regular size portion of this with some seriously crunchy chips. YUM!

Next was the Pacific oysters, snow pea, grapefruit, marine essence. This was an intriguing dish. Before the dish arrived Daz and I were discussing exactly what marine essence is. I thought it might be a fancy fish stock. Once the dish arrived, my curiosity was too overwhelming so I asked exactly what it was. Turns out it was the liquor from the muscles, which gave a intense marine flavour....exactly like drinking sea water. In fact the entire dish was designed to resemble the sea with mashed seaweed and crunchy snow pea to mimic the sea vegetation. It was just a joy to eat, once it arrived at the table to aroma of the sea was unmistakable, and then the soft perfectly cooked muscles made my taste buds rejoice with glee.

Egg yolk, toasted rye, legumes, yeast. Oh my god. This was the best dish I have ever eaten in my entire life! Every element on that plate was just perfection. The egg yolk had been slightly warmed, so when you burst the outer skin the crunchy bed beneath was flooded with a sliky sticky yolk sauce. It was the best. I cant tell you what any of the individual elements were, this dish was just so completely out there for me. That might be why I loved it so much. I would love to recreate it one day, but I’ll definitely need a recipe.

And then there was Wild mushrooms, calamari, hints of autumn. So visually appealing and still so delicious once you ate it. The mushrooms were paper thin, so once you put it in your mouth you got all the earthy mushroom flavour with very little of the meaty mushroom texture. The calamari had be grilled or blow torched so there was a smoky element, leaving the calamari perfectly cooked. Not even a hint of rubbery-ness here. It was all sitting on a celeriac or parsnip puree which gave a sweet element.

Coral trout, brassicas, chicken broth and skin. Are you thinking what I’m thinking? What the hell is a brassicas?? The wait staff at the Royal Mail are so well versed that they answer the question before its been uttered. Brassica is the the genus of plants which broccoli and cabbages belong to. This was another stand out dish. The chicken broth was thick, so it covered your palate with richness. The trout was once again perfectly cooked. But who in their right mind would add chicken skin as a garnish? Dan Hunter is who. It was seriously good, crispy salty and just downright bad for you. I contemplated hitting Daz over the head with my plate just so I could steal his chicken skin....little did I know he was contemplating the exact same move. We called a truce and put our knives down before someone got hurt.

Eel, beef tendon, kohl rabi, potato. There are a few things that make Daz uncomfortable, goats cheese, bone marrow, tendon, offal of any sort and spiders. Before this dish came out I watched as he squirmed and became increasingly agitated. Up until this point everything had been perfect and he didn’t want to miss out on a possible great dish just because he didn’t appreciated one element. When the dish arrived, he practically closed his eyes and just ate. I think that experience might have changed him. The tendon had been slowly cooked leaving it very gelatinous. In the end it didn’t add much flavour but a bucket load of texture. The eel was smoky sitting in an almost BBQ like sauce, the potatoes were really cute to...tiny poato balls. hehehe

Next there was Lamb, eggplant in white miso, pine nut, chlorophyll. This was an interesting dish. I totally respect the fact that the kitchen has gone to the effort of producing chlorophyll, essentially a thick spinach paste, but in the end I would have much preferred some un-adulterer spinach. The eggplant was spectacular, it had been coated in the white miso paste and then char grilled, it was the definition of yum. The lamb was un-faultable, perfectly cooked.

Rhubarb, licorice, almond, citrus. This dish made me rethink the way I have eaten rhubarb my entire life. Ordinarily I’ve eaten rhubarb as a soft stewed/bake sweet. But in this case it was still crunchy! So shocking to me. I actually thought it was a mistake, because on Daz’s dish half of his rhubarb was soft, after asking the waiter we were informed that it was supposed to be crunchy. The rhubarb is steamed in its own juices giving it its intense red colour. There were great chunks of lemon rind throughout the dish giving it an intense citrus flavour. The almonds were fresh, reminding me of my childhood when we used to eat almonds straight off the tree. But the best thing was the licorice sauce which tied the whole dish together. A perfect way to start the dessert section of our meal.

Fresh and dried berries, beetroot, black olive, rose. When strawberries taste like fairy floss life is being kind to you. This was awesome. The were so many things happening on this plate. On one corner you have dehydrated berries, dehydrated rose petals scattered all over the place, adding floral sweetness and then fresh strawberries covered in a berry thick gel. Not to mention the black olive and rhubarb dust. Just fantastic.

Last, yes we actually made it to the end, we had Pistachio, hazelnut, honeycomb, chocolate. Pistachio cake that tasted like fudge, chocolate and hazelnut ice cream that tasted like nutella and then honey comb scatted all over the place. This dish was a textural dream, creamy richness and crunch.

All I had to say at the end of the meal was, can I have the whole thing all over again? Their website states that “Dining at the Royal Mail Restaurant requires time; time to experience a range of ingredients, temperatures and textures; to leave behind preconceived ideas; to experience a gastronomic journey highlighting the perfection of each ingredient.” Even with all the words in the world available to me, I simply could not put it better. It was an experience, one that I will never forget and most likely hold as my measuring stick for all great meals to come.

2011 Australian Restaurant Guide

2010-08-25T13:07:00.002+10:00

This is both my favourite part of the year and my most hated. The 2011 Gourmet Traveller Restaurant awards have just been announced. I get to see the list that I will hungrily chase for the next year, see just how many restaurants I can cross off the and can cry over how many I’ve already eaten at that didn’t make the cut. Last year I started my count at 14. Despite all the excessive eating I’ve been doing, I can only manage to cross off 17. That’s a measly addition of 3 more top 100 restaurants!! Sadly, quite a few have dropped off the scale. I guess I will just have to do a lot more eating over the next 12 months. Or concentrate on the top 20, surely they’re less likely to be toppled in next years awards? At least this year I can say I’ve eaten at the nations’ best restaurant....a big woo hoo for Cutler and Co.!

On the recipe side of the equation I’ve managed to knock off 15 top 100 recipes, not a bad feat...however I need to pull out my A game if I’m ever going to manage to cross off all 100.

So at the moment I’m only at 17% of my goal. I’ve updated the top 100 list on the left bar.

How many have you eaten at and are there any that have been left out that you really love?

Results - White bean velouté with salsa verde and candied pancetta

2010-08-20T07:48:00.004+10:00

I like beans in dip, I like beans on toast and now I've discovered I like beans in soup. Who would have ever thought! Overall I was pretty pleased with my attempt at the Comme Kitchen recipe. The leek soup was sweet and extremely filling with all the extra fiber coming from the beans. Overall it was extremely healthy too, if you chose to ignore the fact that there was about a bucket load of cream added to the finished product.

I really enjoyed the crispy pancetta ontop, giving the otherwise vegetarian soup of bit of flavour twist. Although I've had sweetened pancetta before, it was still a little strange for my taste buds. You would take a mouthful of the soup, taste the minty freshness from the salsa, creamy buttery-ness from the soup and then the sweet candy element from the pancetta. All a little strange, but oddly pleasing. It was a wintry cold when we had this, so curling up with a hot bowl of soup, some crusty bread and a warm heater was the order of the day.

I do have a couple of bones to pick though. Whenever I chose a recipe to tackle, I'm usually lured in by the pretty pictures. I had grand fantasies of my dish turning out as spectacular as the original. In this case I was hoping for a pristine white soup accented with the vivid green salsa. Somehow my soup ended up yellow with splodges of green glop.

I know what happened to the salsa verde. I had a pretty hopeless food processor. The minimum amount of liquid require to get a good result is about 1L, so my chopping and emulsifying didnt quite turn out the way I had imagines, in fact it turned out more like a pesto than an actual sauce. The salsa was also slightly bitter, which I attribute to the whole making process, rather than cleanly chopping alot of the herbs ended up bruised. It tasted quite nice when mixed into the soup, but was a little unpleasant when eaten in a large blob.

My next issue was with the candied pancetta, well more an issue with me really. I dusted the pancetta shoved it in the oven and waited a little while. I tested the pancetta and it was still overly soft, not to the crispy result I had desired. So I shoved it back in and waited a little while longer, by the time I thought it was time to pull it out, it was too late. The sugar had began to caramelise and turned the pancetta into a dark mess. And after all that the pancetta was still not as crispy as I had expected. oh well.

This recipe is pretty easy, it can be put together in under 45 minutes, especially if you use canned beans which have already been soften. Although, the next time I make this I might pay a little more attention to my pancetta. If you would like to see the recipe again, go here.

White bean velouté with salsa verde and candied pancetta

2010-08-17T09:43:00.004+10:00

Restaurant: Comme Kitchen (VIC)
Recipe from Chef Daniel Southern (recipe from Gourmet Traveller website)
2010 Rating: Number 93, 1 Star

Its funny how sometimes you come across recipes. On this occasion the thinking process went a little something like this;

I have a leek and a can of beans, I wonder what I can make with them? Google my old friend, bingo....leek and bean soup.

So simple, and the recipe looks pretty darn simple too. So heres the recipe with the results to follow soon.

White bean velouté with salsa verde and candied pancetta
Serves 4

Cooking Time Prep time 20 mins, cook 1 hr 25 mins(plus resting, proving)

100 gm unsalted butter, coarsely chopped
2 leeks, white part only, finely chopped
1 celery stalk, finely chopped
4 garlic cloves, finely chopped
4 thyme sprigs
1 fresh bay leaf
2.2 litres chicken stock
110 gm dried cannellini beans, soaked overnight in cold water, drained
200 ml thickened cream
120 gm round mild pancetta, thinly sliced (about 8 slices)
For dusting: pure icing sugar
Salsa verde
1 cup (loosely packed) flat-leaf parsley
½ cup (loosely packed) mint
¼ cup (loosely packed) basil
3 anchovy fillets, coarsely chopped
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 tbsp small capers in salt, rinsed
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
175 ml extra-virgin olive oil

1 Melt butter in a large saucepan over low heat, add vegetables, garlic, thyme and bay leaf and stir occasionally until tender (7-10 minutes). Add stock and beans, bring to a gentle simmer and cook until beans are very soft (1-1¼ hours). Discard herbs, process mixture in a blender until smooth, pass through a fine sieve, stir through cream, season to taste and keep warm.

2 Meanwhile, preheat oven to 160C. Place pancetta on a baking-paper-lined oven tray, sift icing sugar over in a thin, even layer, top with baking paper and weight with another oven tray. Bake until crisp (10-12 minutes), set aside.

3 Meanwhile, for salsa verde, process herbs, anchovies, garlic, capers and mustard in a food processor until finely chopped. With motor running, add oil in a continuous stream until emulsified and set aside. Makes 270ml.

4 To serve, divide white bean velouté between bowls, drizzle with salsa verde and crumble over candied pancetta.

Campari House

2010-08-12T12:17:00.004+10:00

I am so behind with my blogging!! I wont even tell you when we went to Campari House for their Toast to the Campari house Roast as part of the put Victoria on Your table by Melbourne Food and Wine. Lets just say it was in the first half of the year, and now we’re in the second half. That should do. We went along with the ever delightful Agnes from Off the Spork and her hilarious hubby and brother, Alastair and Pat.

To say we had a good night would be an understatement. Imagine this....and entire restaurant to yourself with seemingly bottomless glasses of wine. Thankfully the restaurant was a little light on people, because we have a habit of being a little too loud and sometimes obnoxious. Ok, I’ll confess it’s usually me who is obnoxious. We were greeted at our tables with all the glasses laid out and told that all the wine on offer for the night would be served at the first course. That way you could match your own wine to the dish. Considering I’m pretty ignorant about wine, my choices were well off the mark, I thought that the bubbles went really well with EVERYTHING. I’m not exactly sure anyone else got a winner on the night, but it was very fun trying to be a sommelier for the night.

So onto the food. And to be honest I had no expectations about Campari House, but by the end of the night I was very impressed. We started with Braised black travelly on wild mushroom rissoni, pistachio dust. I’m pretty sure this was a big hit with everyone at the table. The fish had such a crispy skin, exactly how I like it, with a sharp and refreshing lemon hit. The pasta was creamy with meaty mushrooms throughout. I did however miss the pistachio dust. I was pretty hungry so I may have wolfed it down before I noticed anything. Daz was really taken with it, but somehow my mum can't get him to eat her rissoni with broccoli, I suspect the broccoli has something to do with it.

Next we had Rabbit ballontine, caramelised pearl onion, game jus. The Rabbit loin was wrapped in bacon, topped with crispy sage, thyme and barely cooked pearl onions. The bacon gave a smoky quality, and the pearl onions were nice and crunchy but with caramelised edges. The jus was lovely, silky, gamy and perfect to tie all the elements on the dish together. We had a mini debate about what was actually in the game jus, and of course I just had to know. I guessed that there would be rabbit in it, but was well off on the quail....I thought it was venison. How many glasses of wine had I had?

Next we had Cauliflower gratin, truffled white polenta. Another winner! At first I was thinking, this isn’t that good.....it's just cauliflower in cheesy glop. It wasn’t until you dug a little further and unveiled the fluffy and creamy polenta that you understood why this dish was good. I could have eaten a massive serve of this. If you ignore the amount of butter, cream and cheese in this, it could be extremely healthy. It does have cauliflower in it! There was only one real disappointment....I wanted MORE TRUFFLE. But isn’t that always the way?

Next was the Slow roasted mustard beef, sticky winter mushrooms. Sadly my beef was a little cold, which made it a little had to chew when it was this rare. Otherwise I thought it was great. Nice and filling with beautiful meaty mushrooms. Once again being the strange and curious types we are we wanted to know how the mushrooms were made sticky. And I guess when you ask a stupid question, you get a stupid answer. The sticky jus was made from wine and honey. BIG SURPRISE!!

To finish we had Chilled strawberry soup, basil foam, shortbread straw. Daz was taking the photos for the night, so by this stage he had enough to drink to transform him into a teenage Japanese girl...hence the angled photo with bunny ears in the back. Hey wait....didnt we already eat the rabbit? Anyway back to the food, as soon as I read the menu I was excited. By now you know that I have a very unhealthy obsession with basil. FYI I’ve already planted my basil for the season....I know its too early but I’m hoping for an unusually warm late winter allowing my basil to shoot up so I can indulge in my true love....sorry Daz....basil always wins over you. Back to the dessert....hmmmm basil foam, it was all I could think about the entire night. The soup was the true essence of strawberries, and the basil foam did not disappoint. The only disappointment was the shortbread straw that didn’t even work as a straw. False advertising!!! Pat and I both tried to suck through the straw before we discovered that it was a lie!! It was like finding out the tooth fairy was just your parents leaving money in exchange for teeth. It was horrible!! We had a cry and then moved on.

Overall the food was well thought out and exceptionally put together. Not one dish was a knockout compared to the others, but together the whole meal was pretty memorable. I’ll definitely go back and see what else Campari House has to offer.

For Agnes' version of events, go here

Results - Guava and Custard Apple Snow Egg

2010-08-02T21:21:00.006+10:00

And now for some very very sweet results.....literally!! After reading possibly the longest recipe I've ever seen, and been challenged by my un-believing brother, I gave the almighty Snow egg from Masterchef a try. I'm happy to say that I succeeded and my brother ate his words! HA! I finally got you back for making me eat dirt when I was a kid......revenge is sweet.......just like dessert.

I'm glad that I wasnt on Masterchef with only a limited time to complete this recipe. It took me nearly 4 hours to finish it. Most of it was waiting around, trying to get custards to set, ice creams to cream and water to freeze. When I first read the recipe I thought it was going to be a breeze, and to be honest there wasnt any particular part which was difficult. The only problem was that it was 8 separate desserts crammed into one almighty uber dessert. So by the end of it I was well and truly over the snow egg. So much so that I didnt really like it. I thought it was way to sweet and a little un-impressive. Daz, my borther, sister-in law and my 1 and a half year old niece disagreed, saying that the dessert was VERY delicious. I guess I'll just have to agree to disagree.

What I absolutely loved about the recipe was the custard apple ice cream and the custard cream. These were so fantastic. I'm glad I had plenty of left overs, I've been making left over bonus desserts with the custard cream, I truly recommend trying it with some fresh strawberries. A thousand times better than ordinary strawberries and cream. Yes, simple strawberries and cream are now ordinary to me.

I did come across a couple of tricky issues when attempting this dessert. Firstly, I couldnt find strawberry guavas. Guava season in Australia ended in June, so I was hoping for a miracle to find strawberry guavas. On my hunt I actually come across ordinary guavas but decided not to buy them because I thought I'd hold out. Big mistake. I searched high and low, I even went to Coles where apparently Masterchef's shop....but still no luck. In the end I opted for rhubarb as a replacement. It was a great substitute, rhubarb and strawberry as a combination is a favourite of mine. I later found out that at Quay they often have the dessert as white peach instead of guava, so my artist licence has not been revoked.

Next was finding liquid maltose. After a chance discovery, I was in an asian grocery looking for beef jerky - as one does, I found the maltose staring at me begging me to buy it. So that was alot easier than I thought.

My next issue was finding a silicone dome tray for the meringues. I remember seeing one during my quest to find the perfect tart pan for my French party, but considering that an 101 year old Alzheimer suffer has a better memory than me, I couldnt remember where I saw it. So instead I used the tiny little glass bowls I use to put sauces in. Worked a treat. I even put baking paper inside them, just in case the meringues got stuck, but there was no need.....they slid out like a weekend at wet-n-wild.

Even though this recipe was pretty straight forward I did make one fatal error. My maltose tuiles were a little under done. They produced the perfect crack (see the below video), but unfortunately I didnt quite caramelize the sugar enough, giving the snow eggs a very pale appearance. I also had difficulty with the tuile melting onto the eggs. I'm not quite sure if that was due to a thickness issue, the sugar being too pale hence under done or the fact that I was trying to melt them with possibly the most pathetic torch imaginable. I've never had a size issue before, but yesterday I just wished for something bigger and hotter. *giggles*

The most important question, would I make these again? Probably not. The effort clearly outweighs the rewards. I'm all for complicated dishes, in fact I love a challenge....but even this was too much for me. I will certainly be making parts of this dish again, but will be paring them with less diabetic inducing elements. Still, I have admire Peter Gilmore for even contemplating a dessert o this caliber.

Guava and Custard Apple Snow Egg

2010-07-31T19:33:00.005+10:00

Restaurant: Quay (NSW)

Recipe from Chef Peter Gilmore (recipe from Masterchef website)

2010 Rating: Number 1, 3 Stars

Yep, you read right, I'm going to attempt to make the snow egg dish from the finale of Masterchef. It will be my first attempt at any of the recipes featured on the show. I'm attempting this recipe for two reasons really. Firstly, the recipe comes from Peter Gilmore from the famed Quay restaurant (which means I can tick off Quay from my list) and secondly, my brother said I couldn't do it. If that isn't incentive enough, I dont know what ever will!!

I'm not going to be crazy enough to put a time limit on the whole exercise, I get enough of an adrenaline rush from washing all the dishes. So here is the recipe, and stay tuned for the results and hopefully some impressive word eating from my brother.

Guava and Custard Apple Snow Egg

INGREDIENTS

Custard apple ice cream

100ml milk

3 egg yolks

100g caster sugar

3 soft ripe custard apples

50ml pouring cream

Vanilla custard base

400ml pouring cream

2 vanilla beans, split and seeds scraped

1 whole egg

3 egg yolks

80g caster sugar

Guava granita

100g caster sugar

500ml water

400g strawberry guavas, peeled and diced

100g fresh strawberries, hulled and halved

Poached meringue

Canola oil spray

150g egg white

150g caster sugar

Guava puree

175g caster sugar

250ml water

½ vanilla bean

375g strawberry guavas, peeled and roughly diced

Maltose tuiles

200g liquid maltose

100g caster sugar

20g flaked almonds

Vanilla cream

100g vanilla custard base

100g double cream

Guava fool

100g of guava puree

200g vanilla cream

1 cup icing sugar, to serve

METHOD

1. Preheat oven to 150ºC and turn on ice cream machine to chill.

2. For the custard apple ice cream, bring milk to the boil in a small saucepan. Whisk egg yolks and sugar together by hand, then pour boiling milk onto the egg yolk mixture while whisking. Pour into a stainless steel bowl and cook while whisking over a pot of simmering water for about 10 minutes or until it is thickened. Whisk sabayon until cool over ice. Set aside. Scoop the flesh of one custard apple at a time into a double muslin lined chinois sitting over a measuring jug. Gather the muslin cloth at the top and squeeze tightly to obtain a clear juice. When you have 150ml, whisk it into the sabayon with the cream. Place the mixture into an ice cream machine and churn for about 40 minutes. Place in the freezer until set.

3. For the vanilla custard base, heat cream and vanilla seeds together in a small saucepan until it just begins to boil, and then remove from the heat. Whisk by hand the eggs, egg yolks and sugar together in a stainless steel bowl until combined. While whisking the eggs, slowly pour on the hot vanilla cream. Mix well and remove the vanilla pods. Pour this mixture into 4 dariole moulds to a depth of 5 cm, place the dariole moulds into a small baking dish with boiling water around the dariole moulds up to halfway to form a water bath. Place the water bath into a 150ºC oven and cook the custard 25 minutes or until the custard is just set. If the centre is still runny place in the freezer until set then place in refrigerator until needed.

4. For the granita, combine sugar and water in a large saucepan; bring to the boil then lower heat. Add diced fruit and gently simmer for 10 minutes. Take off the heat and infuse at room temperature for 30 minutes. Pass the liquid through a muslin cloth and discard the solids. Pour the syrup into a lamington or slice tin to a depth of 5cm. Place in the freezer until solid. Scrape with a fork into crystals and then transfer to the freezer until required.

5. For the poached meringue, whisk the egg whites in an electric mixer until they form soft peaks and then slowly add the sugar bit by bit. Keep whisking until the meringue forms firm peaks and the sugar has dissolved. Spray hemisphere moulds lightly with canola oil spray. Spoon mixture into a piping bag fitted with a 1cm nozzle. Pipe mixture into moulds so it sits above the surface. Place the filled moulds into a large baking dish and pour boiling water into the baking dish to a depth of about 3cm. Bake at 150ºC for 15 minutes until just. Allow to cool for 2 minutes, then trim off tops so they are perfect hemispheres. Gently un-mould and place cut side up on a baking paper lined tray in the fridge until needed. Increase oven temperature to 180ºC.

6. For the guava puree, combine sugar, water and scraped vanilla bean in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Lower heat to a gentle simmer, add guava and simmer 10 minutes. Take off the heat, remove the vanilla pods, drain the flesh from the liquid, place the flesh in a blender and add just enough of the cooking liquid to process into a thick guava puree. Pass the puree through a fine sieve and set aside, covered, in the fridge until needed.

7. To make the maltose tuiles, stir maltose and sugar together in a small saucepan then bring to the boil until it reaches hard crack stage (until it caramelises). Take care to brush down the sides with a pastry brush dipped in water so it doesn't crystallise. Once golden add the flaked almonds and immediately pour the mixture onto a silicon mat, allow to cool completely. Process the cooled praline in the bowl of a hand blender to form a fine powder. Next sift a fine layer of the praline mixture through a drum sieve, over an acetate stencil with 11cm circles cut out of it onto a silicon mat on a baking sheet. Melt this mixture in a 180ºC oven for a few minutes until it forms a clear liquid paste. Cool tuiles slightly and peel off silicon sheet while still flexible. Store flat between sheets of baking paper until ready to use.

8. For the vanilla cream, whisk the cream and custard together to form soft peaks. Store in the fridge until ready to use.

9. For the guava fool, place the guava puree in a small bowl and fold through the vanilla cream gently to form a rippled effect. Do this just before you are ready to assemble the dessert.

10. To assemble, take 8 of the half hemisphere poached meringues. Using a teaspoon or half teaspoon measure remove a small scoop from the centre of each half hemisphere being careful not to break through the outer edge. Then place a teaspoon or half teaspoon measure scoop of custard apple ice cream in four of the hemispheres. Invert the other four hemispheres over the ice cream filled meringues to form a complete sphere. Use wet fingers to stick the two halves together. Place a tuile on top of each sphere and using a blow torch and an even motion, melt it over the sphere, patting it down if necessary. Dust spheres liberally with icing sugar. Next add a generous spoonful of the guava fool in the bottom of each serving glass. Top the fool with the guava granita. Use two teaspoons to place the snow egg on top of the granita and serve.

Bastille Day 2010

2010-07-25T17:24:00.015+10:00

Every year I host a French Party in celebration of Bastille Day, and this year was no different. Loads of French inspired food, and a few corny French accents to boot. It usually involves alot of preparation, followed by even more drinking, which usually ends in a massive hangover. I’m proud to report that 2010 was no different to any other year....except this year I let Daz help with the dishing process. He did an awesome job at handing out the plates to everyone, but when I asked him to help with the actual food to plate process he didn’t quite listen to me as closely as I had hoped, so some of the dishes looked a bit wonky. Not to worry, they tasted pretty darn fine in the end.

Since this may possibly be the longest post I’ve ever written, I’ll keep my intro short. I prepared a 4 course meal with petite fours to end. I’ll explain the dish with the recipe to follow straight afterwards.

First we had Coquilles Saint-Jacques saisies et purée de petit pois (Pan seared scallops, pea puree, beetroot slices and crispy pancetta). I had a little issue with presentation on this one. I trial the dish 2 times before hand and each time the presentation was different. In the end I went with simply stacked together. In this photo you can’t quite see the pea puree in the background and the crispy pancetta.

PAN SEARED SCALLOPS WITH PEA PUREE

INGREDIENTS

Serves 8 entree size portions
16 scallops
200 gram baby peas
2 cloves garlic, finely diced
3 shallots, finely diced
1 tbsp cream
1 tsp butter
4 thick slices of pancetta
1 beetroot
1 Star anise
1 cinnamon quill
2 tbsp white vinegar
2 tbsp white sugar
Olive oil

METHOD

1. Start by poaching the beetroot. In a small pot place the beetroot, star anise, cinnamon quill, sugar and vinegar and fill with enough cold water to just cover the beetroot. Place over medium heat and simmer until the beetroot is tender. Cool under running water. Gently peel the beetroot and thinly slice it.

2. To make the pea puree, boil the peas in some salted water until the peas are just cooked. Drain and keep to a side. In a frying pan melt butter and sauté garlic and shallots. Add peas and then transfer to a food processor. Add the cream and process until a smooth puree forms. You may need to add a little more cream to achieve the right consistency. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

3. For crispy pancetta, preheat oven to 180C. Slice pancetta into small triangles and place on a baking paper lined tray. Cook in the oven until the pancetta is crispy. 10-15 minutes. Remove form tray and drain on a paper towel.

4. For scallops, season the scallops with salt and pepper, drizzle a little olive oil over the scallops – just enough to coat the scallops. Heat a frying pan until very hot, then add the scallops. A very hot pan is important to get nice caramelisation on the surface of the scallop without overcooking it. Cook for 1 minutes or so on each side, depending on the size of the scallop.

To assemble dish, on a small plate place a quenelle of pea puree, then in front place one scallop followed by a slice of beetroot and then another scallop. Place a piece of pancetta to the side of the scallop.

Next we had Tarte de poireau et Gruyere, Salade de fenouil à l’orange (Leek and Gruyere tart, with a fennel, walnut, curly endive and orange salad). To make my life alot easier I served this course cold. Except I think it would have tasted a little better slightly warmed, just so the cheese was a little softer. Despite my criticism, this was one of my favourite dishes or the night. My pastry was so crumbly and short I was really impressed with myself. There were 3 portions of this tart left over. Daz made short work of them and polished them off while I was preparing for the next course. At least he helped with the shortage on bench space!

LEEK AND GRUYERE TART, FENNEL AND WALNUT SALAD

INGREDIENTS

For Shortcrust pastry (From Gourmet Traveller)

250 gm (2/3 cups) plain flour
190 gm unsalted butter, coarsely chopped, chilled
1 egg yolk

For Tart

3 medium sized leeks
50 grams Gruyere, grated
50 grams Parmesan, grated
20 grams butter
2 shortcrust lined tart tins, blind baked

For Fennel and Walnut salad

1 fennel bulb, thinly shaved
50 gram walnuts, shelled roasted and roughly chopped
Juice of 1 orange
Yellow leaves of 1 bunch of curly endive
Oliver oil
Salt and pepper

METHOD

For Short crust Pastry
Cooking Time Prep time 10 mins, cook 25 mins (plus chilling, resting)
Makes 2 x 12 cm rectangular tarts

1. Process flour, butter and a pinch of salt in a food processor until fine crumbs form.

2. Add egg yolk and enough chilled water (about 3-4 tsp) and process until mixture just forms a dough (2-4 seconds).

3. Turn pastry onto a floured surface and lightly knead with the heel of your hand until the pastry comes together.

4. Form pastry into a disc, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until chilled (2-3 hours).

5. Roll pastry, using a rolling pin, on a lightly floured surface to 3mm thick.

6. Brush excess flour from pastry with a pastry brush, then use pastry cutters to cut lining for individual cases or roll pastry backwards over rolling pin to lift pastry and line large tart case. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to rest.

7. Preheat oven to 200C. Blind bake pastry until golden (15-25 minutes), then cool on a wire rack.

For Tart

1. Preheat oven to 170C.

2. Slice leeks into long batons, making sure to only use the white flesh of the leek. In a small frying pan, melt butter over medium heat. Add the leeks and cook until leeks have completely softened. Approximately 10 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

3. Sprinkle the parmesan over the base of the two blind baked tart shells. Layer the leeks over the cheese. Sprinkle the Gruyere cheese over the leeks. Place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes, or until the cheese has become golden.

4. Remove from the oven and leave in the tin for 5 minutes. Then remove from the tin and allow to cool on a cooling rack. This will ensure that the pastry will not sweat and that it will be very crisp and crumbly.

For Fennel and Walnut Salad

1. In a large bowl add, walnuts, fennel, endive. In a separate small bowl add orange juice, olive oil and salt and pepper. Add enough olive oil/orange juice to get a nice vinaigrette. Add to the fennel/ endive and toast until all components are covered in the dressing.

To assemble the dish, slice the tart into individual portions. Add to the plate with a little Salad to accompany.

For main we had Rôtir du porc et Puy lentilles a la françaises (Roast pork belly, Puy lentils with a rich red wine and beef sauce, cavolo nero (black kale)). This dish tastes almost a life time to prepare, but I swear every last moment of it is worth the result. The pork becomes so tender with the long cooking time, especially decadent with the really crispy crackling. And the rich puy lentils are a thing to be marveled over. I actually tried to recreate the puy lentils I had a Bistro Vue, I got close – but I don’t care, my version is different but just as nice. I do have one bone to pick though. Everyone at the table got such crispy crackling, mine wasn’t quite as crispy throughout the whole piece. I didn’t need praise at the end of the meal, all I need to do is remember the lack of talking and crunching sounds coming from everyone’s smiling faces.

SLOW ROASTED PORK BELLY

Will make 8 serves
This recipe needs to be started 24 hours in advance

INGREDIENTS

2 kg pork belly
1 tbsp fennel seed
1 tbsp chilli flakes
2 tbsp rock slat
2 carrots, roughly chopped
1 garlic head cut in half
2 celery stalks, roughly chopped
2 brown onions, quartered
300 mL white wine
150 mL water

METHOD

1. Wash and thoroughly dry the pork belly. With a sharp knife cut diamond shape cuts roughly 2mm into the pork skin. In a mortar and pestle, add salt, fennel seeds and chili flakes, crush until a coarse powder is formed. Rub this mixture into the skin of the pork belly, making sure to get into the cuts on the skin. Place in the fridge over night uncovered. This process will both flavour and dry out the skin, so it will result in a super crisp pork crackling.

2. Pre-heat the oven to the highest temperature it can go. Season the flesh part of the pork with freshly ground pepper and salt. Transfer to the very hot oven and sear for roughly 1 hr. In this time, you should notice that the pork will take on a very golden colour and the crackling will begin to form.

3. Remove pork from the oven and decrease the temperature to 160C. Transfer pork to a plate and add vegetables to the roasting pan. Add the water and white wine, this will work as a humidifier for the meat while it cooks in the oven, keeping the meat moist. Return the pork to the roasting pan, placing it on top of the chopped vegetables. Wrap the outside of the pork with aluminium foil, leaving the crackling exposed.

4. Cook for 3 hours at this very low heat. At the very end, if the crackling is still not to your liking, turn the grill portion of your oven on for 5 minutes, this will crisp up the remaining moist parts of the skin. The pork will now be very tender, moist with the crackling super crispy.

CAVOLO NERO (BLACK KALE)

Serves 8 small sized portions

INGREDIENTS

2 bunches of black kale
2 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper

METHOD

1. Rinse kale, remove the end 3 cm of the stalk. The stalk can be pretty tough and horrible to eat. Chop into 5 cm long pieces.

2. Heat a shallow frying pan and add olive oil. Throw in kale and sauté for 1-2 minutes. Add small splashed of water at a time while flipping the leaves. This will act as a steamer and slowly cook the kale. Since kale is a tougher green vegetable compared to normal cabbage, it may take a little while for it to cook. Continue to cook in this way until the steam part of the leaf has begun soften, about 5 minutes or so. Season with salt and pepper.

PUY LENTILS WITH RICH RED WIN SAUCE

Serves 8 small sized portions

INGREDIENTS

For Beef /Pork Stock, makes roughly 2 litres – this can be prepared well in advance and frozen if necessary

1 kilo beef bones
1 kilo pork bones
2 brown onions, quarters
1 garlic head, halved
2 carrots, roughly chopped
half a cup of dried mushrooms
half a bunch of fresh thyme
half a bunch of sage
2 leeks, cut into 3 pieces each
3-4 sprigs of rosemary
5-6 bay leaves
5 white pepper corns
5 black pepper corns
Olive oil

For Puy lentils

200 gram puy lentils, rinsed under cold water
1 carrot, finely diced
1 celery stalk, finely diced
1 clove of garlic, finely diced
2 shallots, finely diced
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp bi-carb soda
300 mL red wine
400 mL beef/pork stock

METHOD

For Beef/Pork Stock

1. Pre-heat the over to 230C.

2. Rinse bones under cold running water. Alot of butchers cut their bones with blade saws, so it is very important to remove as much of the bone dust as possible. Place on a baking tray with onions, garlic and carrots. Add a little olive oil and mix bones and vegetables together until they are lightly covered in the oil. Place in the oven and bake until the bones have taken a deep golden colour, roughly an hour.

3. Transfer bones/vegetables to a large pot. Add a little boiling water to the roasting tray and remove as much of the baked on particles on the baking tray. The caramelized flavours of the stock will come from this process. Add the liquid to the stock pot. Add the herbs, peppercorns, leek, and mushrooms to the pot. Cover with plenty of cold water.

4. Place pot over low-medium heat, gently simmer for 6-7 hours. During the cooking process remove as much of the scum that comes to the surface as possible. Continually top the pot up with fresh cold water.

5. Once all the vegetables have almost disintegrated, and the bones have all fallen apart, strain thorough a fine sieve and place in a container. Transfer to the fridge and allow to completely cool. Roughly 2 hours. Once all the fat has settled on the top, remove and discard. The stock can now be used.

For Puy Lentils

1. Bring a large pot of water to the boil. Add the lentils and the bi-carb soda. The bi-carb soda will lock in the green and speckled colour of the lentils. Make sure not to add any salt during this cooking process, as the salt will make the lentil skin tough and unpleasant to eat. Cook the lentils until they are tender. Puy lentils remain firm after cooking, they do not become soft like other varieties of lentils. Once they are cooked, drain and keep in an bowl covered with cling wrap. This process can be done well in advance.

2. In a large frying pan over medium heat add olive oil, garlic and shallots. Saute for 2-3 minutes until the garlic/shallots have become soft. Add the carrots and celery and sauté for 2-3 minutes until they begin to soften. Add the wine and reduce by half. Add the beef/pork stock and reduce to a 1/3 of the original volume.

3. Add the lentils and lightly season with a little salt and pepper. Continue to cook until the sauce become very thick and sticky. You can wish to stop the coking process earlier and have a much thinner sauce. At the very end season to taste with salt and pepper.

To assemble dish, place a slice of pork, a little lentils and some cavolo nero on a plate

For dessert we had Crème caramel et poires deux voies (Crème caramel and Pear two ways – poached pear and pear sorbet on a burnt butter shortbread crumb). Apologies for the half eaten dessert, by this stage the wine had taken over and I forgot that I was taking photos. I had quite a bit of trouble coming up with something for dessert. I wanted something that I could prepare in advance, but still looked lovely. In the end I went we a dessert that can almost be called two desserts on one plate. The shortbread crumbs and sorbet was inspired by the awesome pear dessert we had a Cummulus Inc.

CREME CARAMEL RECIPE from Taste.com.au

Preparation Time

30 minutes
Cooking Time

60 minutes

INGREDIENTS (serves 8)

270g (1 1/4 cups) caster sugar
80ml (1/3 cup) water
375ml (1 1/2 cups) milk
250ml (1 cup) thickened cream
4 eggs
2 egg yolks
55g (1/4 cup, firmly packed) brown sugar
2 tbs golden syrup

METHOD

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Place the caster sugar and water in a saucepan over low heat. Cook, stirring, for 2 minutes or until sugar dissolves. Increase heat to high and bring to the boil. Boil, without stirring, occasionally brushing down side of pan with a pastry brush dipped in water, for 3-4 minutes or until golden. Pour sugar mixture evenly among eight 125ml (1/2-cup) capacity ovenproof ramekins. Set aside for 5 minutes or until set.

2. Combine the milk and cream in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Bring to a simmer (do not boil). Remove from heat.

3. Place the eggs, egg yolks, brown sugar and golden syrup in a large heatproof bowl. Use a fork to whisk until well combined. Gradually whisk the milk mixture into the egg mixture. Transfer the mixture to a large jug, then carefully pour over the caramel in the ramekins.

4. Line the base of a large roasting pan with a tea towel and fold to fit. Place the ramekins on the tea towel in the roasting pan. Pour enough boiling water into the pan to reach halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Cover the roasting pan with foil. Bake in preheated oven for 40-45 minutes or until custards are just set. Remove from oven.

5. Transfer the ramekins to a baking tray and set aside for 2 hours to cool. Cover the ramekins with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 6 hours or overnight to chill.

6. To serve, run a flat-bladed knife around the inside edge of the ramekins and carefully turn onto serving plates.

CARAMEL AND BURNT BUTTER CRUMBS

INGREDIENTS

60 grams castor sugar
100 grams butter, cut into small cubes
170 grams plain flour

METHOD

1. Make a caramel first. Add castor sugar to a small pan and add a few tablespoon of water, just enough to wet the sugar. Heat sugar over medium heat until a dark caramel develops. Make sure not to stir the sugar as it will crystallize. Brush down the sides of the pan during the cooking process with a pastry brush dipped in water, this will stop any sugar stuck to the sides from burning.

2. Add the butter and stir until the butter and caramel form something similar to a butterscotch sauce. Continue to cook until the butter and caramel take on a dark golden colour. This wont take very long at all because the sugar is already extremely hot. Remove from the heat and allow to cool slightly.

3. Add flour to the pan and stir with a wooden spoon until all ingredients are combined. Turn out onto a clean surface and gently work the dough and form a flat disc. If the butter begins to bleed out too much you can add a little extra flour to soak it up. Wrap tightly with cling film and refrigerate for an hour. Preheat oven to 170C.

4. Crumble the dough into crumbs. Chunky pieces are fine, as they will add texture. Scatter on a lined baking tray and bake for 10-15 minutes until the crumbs take on a very golden colour. Make sure to mix the crumbs once or twice during the cooking process as the crumbs on the outer edge will cook quicker.

5. Allow to cool complete and store in an airtight container. Will last about a week. These can also be frozen.

PEAR SORBET AND POACHED PEAR CUBES

Makes roughly 500mL of sorbet and 24 cubes (depending on size)

INGREDIENTS

100 g castor sugar
1 vanilla pod - cut lenthways with beans scrapped or 1 tsp vanilla paste
4 medium sized pears, peeled and cored
1/4 cup honey
150 mL water
1 cinnamon quill

METHOD

1. Place water, sugar, honey, vanilla bean and cinnamon quill into a medium sized pan. Place over low heat and slowly begin to heat.

2. Place a small ceramic bowl or plate in the freezer. This plate will be used to place the poached pear on, the coldness of the plate will quickly cool the pear after the cooking process, prevent it from cooking any longer.

3. In the mean time, cut as many equally sized cubes from the pear as possible. It doesnt matter if you get alot of thin or oddly shaped pieces of pear left over, as these will all be put in the pot to create the sorbet.

4. Poach the pear cubes in the sugar and honey mixture. The cooking time will depend on the ripeness of the pear. The pear should be soft but still firm in the center. Usually 3-5 minutes should be enough. Sample cubes during the cooking time to achieve the perfect texture. Once the cubes are cooked, place on frozen dish and place in the fridge.

5. Roughly chop the remaining pear and place in the sugar and honey mixture. Cook on low to medium heat until the mixture is reduce by half and the pears are soft but not falling apart. Place on a small baking tray and place in the freezer for 1 hr

6. Once the pears have cooled in the freezer for an hour and the syrup is very thick but not frozen, place the whole lot in a food process and process until a very pale and fluffy mixture forms. This will instantly give you a sorbet mixture. Place the sorbet in an airtight container and return to the freezer until it is required.

To assemble dish. Turn out the crème caramel onto a plate. Directly next to the crème caramel, place a long line of burnt butter crumbs. Place three poached pear cubes next to the crumbs and finally top the crumbs with a quenelle of pear sorbet. Serve immediately.

And to end the meal we had Truffes de champagne et chocolat blanches (White chocolate Champagne truffles, with a crushed pistachio coating). I made so many of these, over 30. I was certain that I would have some left over. I remember only eating one on the night. The next morning in my groggy state I went in search for a sweet fix, the truffles would be perfect. I stumbled into the kitchen to find that one mere truffle was left. I sobbed gently before shoving in my mouth and quickly forgetting my troubles.

WHITE CHOCOLATE CHAMPAGNE TRUFFLES WITH PISTACHIOS CRUMBS

Makes roughly 30 truffles

INGREDIENTS

200 grams white chocolate
3 tbsp of cream (45% fat)
1 tbsp butter
50mL champagne
150 grams white chocolate to coat
80 grams pistachios, toasted and crushed

METHOD

1. In a duble boiler, melt 200 gram of white chocolate, cream and butter. Once the chocolate had completely melted, add the champagne and stir until thoroughly combined. Place cling wrap over the surface of the melted mixture and place in the fridge for 1 hr

2. Roll the chocolate ganache into small 2 cm balls and place on a baking paper lined tray. Place in the fridge to harden.

3. Melt remaining white chocolate, then individually roll the ganache balls in the melted chocolate followed by rolling them in the crushed pistachios. Store in an airtight contain and keep in the fridge. Allow to come to room temperature before eating. Will last for 1 week.

There’s only one thing I truly hate about having dinner parties. And that's dirty glasses. I hate not just washing them, but having to put them away. There’s no wonder I don’t own a complete set of matching glasses, I’m more likely to break them before washing them and putting them away safely.

Jumbo Couscous with Moroccan Lamb

2010-07-13T17:30:00.005+10:00

Last year, I had a my first attempt at recreating a dish I had eaten at a restaurant purely and utterly from taste bud memory. The results were actually quite surprising, surprising in that it actually tasted quite good and didn't end up as a pile of mashed flavours. The snazzy dessert from Cafe Vue did wonders to boost my confidence, and thought me a valuable lesson on portion control, a full bowl of white chocolate mousse does not equal one serve. Recently, I tempted fate and had another go at recreating a dish I had tried at Bar Lourinha. And interestingly, the results were even better than my Cafe Vue attempt!

I really enjoyed the jumbo couscous with Moroccan lamb on the night. The flavours were intense, the dish was satisfying and definitely left me wanting more. Since I’m currently trying to avoid my McConnel curse, going back to Bar Lourinha just to have a bowl of this couscous is not ideal. Surely it can’t be that hard right, I’ll just try to make it myself at home.
I’m glad to report that the results were fantastic. No, the flavours weren’t quite the same, but the backbones were all there. It’s extremely hard to recreate the exact same spices as the original dish, to be honest I think mine is a little too simple. But in the end, the home version won a lot of fans - Daz and I!! It was warm and comforting. So creamy with the addition of sour cream, those little morsels of Moroccan flavoured lamb just popped in your mouth and my favourite of all was the texture component from the crushed pistachios, just down right delicious. Once again I failed to learn my lesson regarding portion control, I cooked enough to serve 4, between Daz and I the whole lot was gone before 10pm. Sigh.

One thing that certainly caught my eye when the jumbo couscous came to our table was the sheer size of the couscous. I know the menu said jumbo, but I wasn’t quite expecting it to be that big! And sadly that is the first point of difference between my couscous and Bar Lourinha’s. Mine isn’t quite as big, and on this occasion - to me size really does matter! I cooked the couscous al dente, perhaps if I had cooked the couscous a little longer it would have fluffed up more, but it definitely wouldn’t have become jumbo, extra large maybe.....certainly not jumbo.

The original Bar Lourinha dish

To me, the key step in this entire dish is the chicken stock. It must be full of flavour, and properly reduced to get all that gelatinous texture from the bird into the soup. Its so crucial as the stock is what gives the couscous its flavour and some of its creamy buttery texture. I know this make the recipe extremely long and lets face it troublesome, but there are places that sell good quality chicken stock already made. Well worth the time and effort.

By the way, you're probably wondering where I got my jumbo couscous from. There are plenty of pearl couscous products in the supermarkets at the moment, but this recipe calls for something grander! On a lazy afternoon while chomping on a South Melbourne Market dim sum, I stumbled across a packet of giant Couscous in front of the nut shop, so naturally I bought it. Later while at the other nut, I think it was Rita's, I noticed they sold the same Couscous by the kilo. Giant Couscous everywhere!

There’s a couple of things I would have done differently, I would cook the lamb slower and for longer. I found the lamb in my dish a little chewy compared to the original. I think it needs to completely melt in your mouth without the need to chew, chewing is over rated! I also think I need to tweak the spices, I suspect Bar Lourinha probably uses a multitude of other spices I haven’t considered. And I would cook the couscous for a lot longer. I was growing extremely impatient with the whole dish, ok I lie....I was hungry so as soon as the couscous was cooked I plated up. Once again, I really think it needs to be very soft and fluffy.

I’ve included the recipe the way I made it on the day, without my recommended changes. So in the end, the dish doesn’t taste exactly like the original although it does come pretty close. Regardless, I will be making it again and again and probably again.

Jumbo Couscous with Moroccan Lamb
Serves 4

INGREDIENTS

Chicken Stock (this can be prepared in advance and frozen)

1 medium sized boiler hen, rinsed and cut into quarters
2 onions, cut into quarters
2 celery stalk, coarsely chopped
2 carrot, coarsely chopped
1 leek, white part only, coarsely chopped
1 garlic head, broken into individual cloves
half a bunch of thyme
a few sprigs of rosemary
10-15 sage leaves
5 or 6 bay leaves
1 tsp white peppercorns
1 tsp black peppercorns

Moroccan Spiced Lamb

Small leg of lamb (under 1kg)
2 tsp Salt
2 tsp black Pepper
1 tsp Ginger powder
1 tsp ground Turmeric
1 tsp Paprika
1 tsp ground Cumin
1 tsp chili powder
3 cloves of garlic, mashed into a paste
4 tbs olive oil

Jumbo Couscous

2 cups of giant couscous
3 shallots, diced very finely
3 cloves of garlic, diced very thinly
2 tbsp olive oil
1-1.5liters of chicken stock
Diced Moroccan spiced lamb
100g of sour cream
a few springs of flat leaf parsley
2-3 tsp paprika
50 grams of toasted and crushed pistachios

METHOD

For Chicken Stock

1. Place all ingredients in a large pot. Cover with plenty of cold water. 4-5 liters. Place over medium high heat and bring to the boil, once boiling reduce heat and allow it to gently simmer. Simmer for 3-4 hours. During the cooking time, skim as much as the sum and impurities from the stock. Allow to cook until the stock becomes well flavoured with the chicken and vegetables and reduced by half. Remove the chicken carcass and as much of the vegetables and herbs as possible, then strain to remove any small portions. Place in a suitably sized container and allow to cool with the lid off. Once the stock has cooled, place in the fridge and allow the fat that has settled on the top to solidify, this step my take a couple of hours. Once the fat has solidified, skim it off and your stock is ready to be used, this recipe makes 2-3 liters, depending on how much the stock is reduced. I divide my stock into small portions and place in the freezer. That way I will only defrost as much as I really require.

For Moroccan Spiced Lamb

1. Pre-heat oven to the highest temperature it will go. The oven needs to be really hot so the meat will quickly sear when its placed in the oven, this will lock in the juices and forming a spice crust.

2. Place all herbs and spices in a bowl, I use a mortar and pestle because I tend to buy whole spices, but mixing the ground spices together is just as effective. Add the garlic paste and olive oil and combine to make a spice paste. Cover the entire lamb leg with the spice rub and place on a baking tray.

3. Place lamb into hot over for 15-20 minutes, make sure to keep an eye on it as it can quickly begin to brown. We want it to brown, but not burn. Reduce temperature to 180-190C and cook for a further 45 min-1hr, cook until the meat is still pink in the middle. As I mentioned earlier, next time I would reduce the temperature to 150-160C and cook for much longer.

4. Allow the meat to rest for 15-20 minutes and then cut into small bite size chunks. The lamb can be prepared well in advance as it will be re-warm when the couscous is cooked.

For Couscous

1. Place chicken stock in a sauce pan and bring to the boil, reduce heat and allow to stay hot.

2. In the large frying pan, over medium heat add olive oil add garlic and shallots and saute until tender and fragrant. Add the couscous and lightly toast for until all the couscous has become covered in the oil, similar to risotto.

3. Add half the hot chicken stock and cook, while occasionally stirring, until all the liquid has been absorbed. Add a few ladle's worth of stock to the pan and allow the stock to be absorbed, repeat until the couscous is cooked and fluffy. Add salt and pepper to taste. Add lamb and cook until all ingredients have warmed.

4. To serve, place couscous on a dish, add a dollop of sour cream, sprinkle with a little paprika and pistachios and garnish with parsley.

I dare you to only eat one serve!!

Cumulus Inc.

2010-07-05T21:05:00.015+10:00

Dining Date: May 2010 2010

Rating: 57th, 1 Star

Chef: Andrew McConnell and Josh Murphy

Location: 45 Flinders La, Melbourne, VIC (03) 9650 1445

Website: www.cumulusinc.com.au

It seems that every time we go to a McConnell restaurant we’re doomed to showing up late. When we ventured along to Bar Lourinha we showed up more than 45 minutes late due to traffic. Meeting up for dinner at Cumulus Inc with Agnes, Alastair and Pat from Off the Spork was a little better with us showing up about 30 minutes late. I’m starting to think I have some sort of McConnell curse. Luckily, while patiently waiting for us to show up the guys had decided on what to order. So the food arrived shortly afterwards.

Just a word of warning, actually a big word of warning. I was rushed, flustered and my camera lens was on a very quick trip to dying, so my photos are INCREDIBLY bad. I seriously contemplated not posting about Cumulus, but the meal was so good that I hope my description will over shadow the very blurry photos. By the way, my lens finally packed it in while on holiday not long ago.

We ordered a couple of dishes to share, Slow cooked octopus with aioli, dehydrated olive. The octopus was so tender, it simply dissolved away in your mouth. I particularly remember the pungent olive oil. Wish we had ordered 2 serves of this dish.

Crispy school prawns sautéed with chilli and garlic. I promise you that the prawns did not look so blurry in real life. They were crispy and full of prawn flavour. The chilli offered no heat, only a subtle flavour and the whole lot had an underlying lemon flavour which refreshed the dish and lifted it to another dimension. I could imagine eating a massive serve of these and washing them down with ice cold beer. Once again, I wish we had ordered 2 serves of this. On a side note, one great thing about misdirected focal points, check out Alastair’s t-shirt! I didn’t notice it on the night, but he has one awesome milk t-shirt!

Foie gras parfait with toasted brioche. The parfait was fluffy, silky and slightly salty. It was just perfect matched with the sweet raisins. A bit of a failure for me was the brioche, firstly the brioche was not buttery enough for me. If I’m going to eat it, I want to at least feel the arteries in my heart hardening, instead it tasted like regular toast. Secondly, there wasn’t enough bread to parfait ratio. I’m so sick of this happening, there always seems to be a miscalculation when bread/crackers/crisps are concerned. I think I’m going to write to our new prime minister and see if she can address the problem, she looks like she enjoys her crackers and cheese.

Grass fed steak tartare. This was just awesome! The ingredient list was like any other steak tartare - capers, gherkins, onions, chives and an egg yolk, but some how it was completely different. The meat was low on fat, a real bonus when eating it raw, and it was served with traditional sauces and anchovy oil (see Agnes’ post for a photo). I felt a bit like Doctor Zoidberg for minute, totally imagining sucking the entire bottle down in a split second, until I realised the tartare tasted better without the oil. It added a salty dimension without the fishy aftertaste, but the original dish, with no condiments was best.

For the main we decided to order the Whole slow roast lamb shoulder to share. The lamb was so tender and juicy, I still have dreams about it to this day. Most people dream about winning lotto or running away with Fabio, not me.....unless Fabio is holding a massive tray of this slow cooked lamb. The outer fat was crispy, the whole shoulder was covered in a generous helping of salt, when you got a mouthful of that salt it was just delicious. The lamb came with a red onion salad and some lemon. I strongly recommend ordering the lamb and squeezing a generous amount of lemon on top....just perfection!!

As a side we ordered Cracked wheat & freekeh salad, preserved lemon, blueberries. This salad was perfect to go with the meaty and rich lamb. I enjoyed the dried blueberries throughout the salad, but especially loved the generous amount of sour cream on top.

For dessert I ordered the Pear sorbet, burnt butter shortbread & almond milk. I sadly forgot to take a photo of it. But once again, Agnes was on the ball and has a great photo of the stunning dessert. This has to be one of the better desserts I’ve had in a long time. The pear sorbet was so fluffy, not an icicle in sight! Perfectly cut pear pieces. Who would have thought that the combination of burnt butter shortbread biscuits and almond milk custard or panacotta or whatever it was would go together so well. Everyone always talks about texture in dishes, and this totally delivered on texture. The crunchy biscuit, the soft and melting sorbet, the slightly crunchy pear cubes and the pudding like almond milk. I would love to make this very dish at home!

Pat ordered the Steamed chocolate pudding with hazelnut toffee & crème fraiche ice cream. I managed to sneak a tiny bit of this one, so chocolaty and totally sexy with its oozing centre. Pat seemed to really enjoy it!

Daz ordered a selection of petit fours, Rose Jelly, Chocolate caramel truffle and Chocolate fudge. Sadly they weren’t that impressive, just you’re regular everyday petit fours. I tried to convince Daz not to order them, but he has a habit of being bitterly disappointed at the end of a meal, case in point - ordering a cheese platter at Cutler and Co expecting a cheese cake to arrive instead.

To finish the meal we ordered Madeleine filled with lemon curd each. How does an entire meal get wiped from your memory? Ordering one of these. By far my favourite thing on the night, but I’ve always had a sweet tooth. These are specially cooked to order, they arrive at the table piping hot. Since the cake is fresh out of the oven the lemon curd quickly warms up, so your mouth is bombarded with zesty warm goodness. My fantasy, order a dozen of these and suck the warm curd out of them. Creepy huh?

Cumulus was a real highlight. I really enjoyed all the dishes. I had little to no expectations of the place, and I think that helped. When we went to Cutler and Co I had high expectations and sadly the experience just did not live up to them. I’ll definitely be returning to Cumulus Inc.

Leek and Broccoli Soup

2010-07-01T10:42:00.002+10:00

Recently Bakers Delight sent me a couple of complimentary samples of their new sourdough. They have two varieties, fruit and olive. So once I received the bread I thought I might make something to go with it. Considering the recent cold snap we’ve experienced, I thought there’s no better way to warm up then by eating a big hot bowl of steaming soup. Not to mention soup is a great way to up your veggie consumption.

I often make a broccoli soup with crisp chorizo sausage on top. But I thought I might try something a little different and added leek to the mix. The leek adds a sweetness to the finished soup. I usually blend my soup up and make a thick puree, but because I felt especially lazy that night I decided to skip that step and kept the soup chunky. Eating the chunky soup actually makes you feel fuller, and not feel like a baby eating soft mushy food. I had my tonsils out a couple of year ago and for two weeks I survived on mashed peas, chicken soup (just the liquid) and KFC mash potatoes and gravy. I lost quite a bit of weight, but gained an unusual anxiety about mushy food.

I cut a couple of thick slices of olive bread and dunked it into the soup. The saltiness of the sourdough went really well with the smoky oily sausage. Daz and I went a little bread mad that night and managed to polish off the entire loaf. Well bread is best at its freshes, so we had no choice but to eat the entire thing.

This is a really easy and quick recipe. In fact its all cooked and served within 30min, great for a work night.

Leek and Broccoli Soup

Makes 3 big serves

INGREDIENTS

1 leek, sliced
2 heads of broccoli, stalk chopped into small pieces and florets chopped roughly
3 cloves of garlic, sliced thinly
1.5 litres of chicken stock or vegetable stock
2 chorizo sausages, sliced

METHOD

1. In a large saucepan add a little olive oil over medium heat, add the leek and sauté. Allow it to soften, but not colour. This will take around 5 minutes. Add the garlic and allow to soften.

2. Add the stalk of the broccoli and cook until slightly softened. Add the stock and the remaining broccoli. Cook on medium-high until all veggies are soft and the liquid has reduced slightly. You can add other veggies to the mix if you wish, potatoes are a really good addition – making the soup very thick and hearty. Season with salt and pepper to taste. You can leave the soup chunky or blitz it in a food processor to get a smooth soup.

3. Just before serving fry the chorizo sausage in a fry pan with a little extra olive oil. Allow the fat from the sausage to slightly render out.

4. Serve the soup with a few pieces of sausage on top and a teaspoon or two of the oil from the fry pan. This will add a real smoky flavour to the soup.

Persimmon Cupcakes

2010-06-21T16:41:00.004+10:00

Persimmons and I aren't friends. We've never really liked each other, their delicate flavor and baby food consistency have never really grown on me, and I'm sure they're not happy with me giggling loudly when I throw one towards a hard surface. Seriously, you should try it, they make one almighty big mess, especially good in food fights.

There's a couple of perks to living in a house previously owned by migrant Italians. Dodgy home electrical work and massive fruit trees. You might think that the first point is not a perk, but it always a laugh when you call in a trades person and tell them there is a real possibility they may die while working in our house. Back to perk 2, one of the massive fruit trees in our backyard happens to be a persimmon tree.

Despite my attempts to neglect it, the tree seems to revel and produces tonnes fruit. My brother loves persimmons, but there are only so many he can eat. I tried giving them away to my mum, she has two small trees of her own, she ended up passing my persimmon onto some friends of hers. I’ve tried giving them away to friends, but yet I still remain in a glut of squishy soft flesh! I had a bright idea one day and filled an enormous box, plonked it outside my front gate with a sign reading “free persimmons – please take”. I even put out plastic bags so passerby's could happily put their free fruit in a carry bag. 20 minutes later I checked on my experiment, the persimmons were gone, along with the box! I was left with a sign and all of the original plastic bags. I’m still left with loads of fruit, but now my box is gone, I have no means of transporting fruit from the backyard to the doorstep. I thought about putting them in buckets, but I’m afraid the buckets will disappear too. I’m not running the risk of having nowhere to wash my small and delicates.

So I’m left with only one option, eat them. Sigh. I didn’t want it to come to this, but the time has come. I was perusing the internet, as one does from time to time and noticed that Rianna from Cherry Blossom Cupcakes had made Precious Persimmon Cupcakes. I was instantly curious. They sounded divine, even though they contained persimmon. So I shot off and email and asked if she would kindly share her recipe with me. And luckily she said yes!!

I made Rianna’s original recipe, with orange zest buttercream frosting. They tasted exactly like gingerbread, but in cupcake form. The flavour of persimmon is very subtle, the cake is moist and fluffy with loads of brown sugar flavour to boot.

The first batch of cupcakes

I like my cupcakes low on sugar, that way I can eat more of them and not feel so guilty, that reasoning works for me! So after Daz asked me to make them again, I decided to tweak the recipe a bit - I cut the amount of brown sugar in half and decreased the castor sugar by 15 grams. The result is a cupcake with more persimmon flavour, which was what I was hoping for. I topped them with orange zest cream cheese frosting and a sprinkle of pistachios. The second batch disappeared just as fast as the first, and now I’m planning my third batch. I never thought I would actually enjoy persimmons in something. Now I worry about not having a big enough supply of persimmon.

Thanks Rianna for the great recipe!

Persimmon Spice Cupcakes
Should make 18 standard sized cupcakes

Ingredients

260g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
pinch of ground cloves
225 g unsalted butter
165 g caster sugar
165 g brown sugar
1 egg
1 cup pureed persimmon pulp
2 tbsp orange juice

1. Preheat oven to 175 celcius

2. Sift together flour and spices and set aside

3. Cream softened butter and sugars together until light and fluffy.

4. Add egg and beat well.

5. Add 1/3 of flour mixture and mix in lightly, then 1/2 of persimmon pulp and orange juice mixing lightly. Add another 1/3 flour mixture and mix, remaining 1/2 of persimmon pulp and mix and then remaining flour and mix through lightly.

6. Spoon batter into cupcake cases to around 2/3 full (I use an ice cream scoop to measure)

7. Bake for 25 minutes or until the tops spring back to touch.

8. Cool 5 minutes in the trays and then on a wire rack.

Cupcake Fun!

2010-06-17T14:35:00.006+10:00

The traditional thing to stalk - is a famous person or an ex partner, but I'm not traditional at all.....I love to stalk cupcakes and cupcake paraphernalia. To be honest, I don't know who is seeking out whom anymore. I think cupcake "stuff" finds me. I constantly find myself squealing......"oh! cupcake" which is usually followed by Daz quickly disappearing. I once had a conscious and didn't want people noticing me taking happy snaps of the item on my mobile phone, nowadays I just take pictures sometimes with sales assistants standing right next to the item. So in this installment, I bring you the biggest, most cupcake packed Cupcake Fun! there has been to date. Strap your seat belts on and grab yourself a cupcake for sustenance...you'll need it!

First we have a selection of cupcake aprons. Cupcake aprons have become very popular of late. A decade ago the fake boobs on aprons was extremely popular, now its the humble cupcake.

This is the matching apron to my cupcake mitten sent to me by Arwen from Hoglet K

This one has cute little frills at the bottom, so you can feel girly in your cupcake apron and mittens

Next we have cupcake clothing. I'm a true believe in starting things at a young age, and why not start your child's addiction to the sweet frosted ones straight after birth. I think that if I had a child and bought this outfit, every time I changed their nappy it would be followed by some cupcake gorging. I wouldn't be a hot mamma, I'd be a cupcake saddle bags mamma!

Imagine - You're trying to have a romantic night, the mood is right, the wine is flowing. You decided you want to get the lighting just right, so you light your cupcake candles. That's perfect, now the dozen cookies and cream cupcakes and I can have a real intimate time together.

A friend of mine recently sent me this trolley coin. Its absolutely awesome! Instead of using a $2 coin for your trolley you can use this cute little coin. I'm often searching around in my handbag for a coin, now I can simply unhook the cupcake from my keys and insert away....that sounded weird.

Agnes from Off the Spork sent me a happy snap of cupcake lip balm! Then I was surprised with my very own little tub of the stuff. As soon as I got over the wonderment of cupcake lip balm I focused my attention on the red velvet flavouring. Would the cupcake taste like the batter, or the cream cheese frosting? I couldn't stand the curiosity any longer, so the second I got it home I ripped it opened and discovered that the lip balm tasted like the batter. In a way I was actually please, I'm not exactly sure how they would have created an artificial cream cheese flavoring.

Still on the topic of lip balm, next we have Shut your cake hole lip balm in strawberry flavour. Hmmmm.....shut it with cupcakes.

Ever wondered where a good place to store or hide your cupcake is? we'll I have the solution, inside a ceramic dish, shaped like a cupcake! I guarantee that no one will suspect they'll be hiding in there!

Cupcakes have become so in vogue that cookies are even trying to be them! I recently found these cupcake cookie cutters in matchbox. What next, bread in the shape of a cupcake?

You can wash all those cupcake cookies down by enjoying a cup of tea in your cupcake mug. Do they make cupcake flavoured tea?

Once you've made all those cupcake cookies, you can store them in your cupcake clad cookie tin. I'm so glad I refrain from buying any of this stuff.....you've hear of cat ladies, well I'd be the cupcake lady!

Its winter time, and its so easy to catch a case of the sniffles. Well don't worry, you can wipe away your worries with cupcake tissues!! I have a confession, I actually bought these! I was curious to see if they smelt like cupcakes. They were $3.50 for 10 tissues, ripe off! And the answer is no, they don't smell like cupcakes. I want to cry now, where are those tissues!

Behold, the knitted cupcake! They are so darn cute! We recently went to the Grampians for some rest and relaxation. We decided to walk into the visitor center to waste some time and have a look at some of the local offerings. As soon as I walked through the door I was confronted with these fluffy goodies. It seems that even on holiday cupcakes seem to find me! There was a little old lady sitting behind the desk knitting away. I'm assuming that she would be the creator of these works of art. I was going to tell her that she had done a really good job, but thought it would be weird if I said that without buying one. It took a lot of will power to walk out without buying any.

Next we have cupcakes in the movies! Arguably, sex and the city started the cupcake craze back when Carrie was munching on a Magnolia Bakery cupcake. In the new movie, cupcakes make another appearance. I've not seen the movie yet, but found the trailer for the film to be intriguing. Here are a couple of screen grabs from Charlotte in the kitchen with her children.

There's even cupcake stuff stuck on the pin up board!

You can watch the full trailer here

Katy Perry is one crazy girl. Her recent video for California Gurls was a gold mine for cupcake related hilarity. Here are a couple of screen shots...

First we have Snoop Dogg wearing the best suit ever invented, the cupcake suit. I wonder where I can buy one for Daz.

Then we have Katy herself wearing the most supportive cupcake I've ever seen.

You can watch the full music video here. I strongly recommend you watch it, if only to see the gummie bear/ whip cream incident!

Well that's all for this installment of Cupcake Fun! Remember if you happen to be followed by any cupcake related stuff please take a photo and send it to me in an email. thegourmetchallenge {AT} gmail {DOT} com

You can read about other installments here, here, here or even here

Old Town Kopitiam Mamak

2010-06-13T16:18:00.003+10:00

The wonderful Conor from Hold the Beef recently made a flying visit to Melbourne before her world-wind tour of the northern hemisphere. So a bunch of Melbourne food bloggers got together and headed down to Old Town Kopitiam Mamak at QV on Penny's recommendation. You can always count on Penny for a good recommendation!

The location is nice and easy, located on the second floor of QV, even though I don't work in the city I often find myself in and around the CBD so a quick visit is never a big ask. I enjoyed the atmosphere, nice and noisy with plenty of over hanging lights, something I've become very pleased at seeing. The food was also good, although I really regret not getting an Ice Kacang for dessert!

So Daz and I shared a Roti to start. Perfect way to get the stomach juices flowing and get yourself seriously hungry.

I like a menu that is part appetizing, part chose your own adventure. I'd never had a Nasi Kandar before so opted for that, the adventure part required a couple of selection choices. This always causes a bit of nervousness, will I choice the best thing? will someone else get something better?? So I closed my eyes and dove in - Briyani Rice with 2 selections - chicken curry and sambal eggs. The eggs were a little over cooked for my liking, but everything else was great. Packed with flavour and topped with a crispy papadum. Can't go wrong with a little more texture in your dish. I wish I had asked for chili, everything tastes better with chilli.

Daz chose the same Briyani Rice with 2 selections, he also chose chicken curry, but with fried calamari. Since his dish was so similar to mine, I chose not to sample it. He polished off the whole dish, so I'm sure it tasted great.

I think I found a new favourite. The meals are really tasty, pretty great value for money and all the dishes came pretty quickly after being ordered. I strongly recommend getting yourself down there to give this place a go, let me know how the Ice Kacang is!

My fellow food bloggers on the night were;

Conor from Hold the Beef

April from My food Trail

Agnes from Off the Spork

Penny from Addictive and Consuming

Cutler and Co.

2010-06-08T21:28:00.005+10:00

Dining Date: May 2010

2010 Rating: 14th

2010 Star rating: 2

Chef: Andrew McConnell

Location: 55-57 Gertrude St, Fitzroy, Victoria

Website: www.cutlerandco.com.au

Way back in May we headed off in search of a well priced lunch with Agnes, Alastair and Pat from Off the Spork. Cutler and Co has a fixed Sunday lunch for $65, definitely a winner on the wallet. The lunch was filled with loads of laughter and plenty of food related puns to keep us going for hours. There were some real corkers, and sadly some really lame puns, mostly coming from me, if you want to check out all the good ones, head on over to Agnes' post.

So lets get straight into the food. The lunch was three courses, where the first course was a selection of dishes designed to be shared by the entire table. Then there was a choice for mains and a choice for dessert. To start we had Cured ocean trout toast. The trout was soft and juicy sitting on a very crunchy crisp croûton. I wish I had eaten this a little slower or at least had the brains to hide the plate from everyone else.

Next we have the French Breakfast Radish.Those crazy francophiles, eating radishes for breakfast, what will they think of next? Macarons as door stops? I wasn't exactly sold on eating a radish on its own, but surprisingly I enjoyed it. They were fairly crunchy, to be expected and slightly appetizing.

Next we have the Claire de lune oysters. These seem to have become the popular kid in school, appearing at every party and usually being awesome to hang out with. I'm a fan of good quality fresh oysters, and these are as good as they get at the moment.

Beetroot salad, goats curd and apple. The beetroot was fantastic, the earthy flavour of the beetroot combined with the gamy flavour from the goats curd was spectacular. I made sure to fill my mouth with a small portion of every element on the dish, and the apple jelly still managed to make it to the party and offer its sweet contrast to the competing flavours. The waiter informed us that the dish had dill oil in it, somehow I managed to miss that flavour all together.

Pearl barley, radicchio and ricotta salata. I had my reservations about this dish. My mum often makes salted ricotta when she gets a bit greedy and orders a few kilos of ricotta when all she really needs is a small wedge. We often have it shaved on top of fresh pasta. I enjoyed the pearl barely, it was chewy with a slight firm center, but I felt like the dish was missing something. I think if the ricotta was a bit more salty and a bit more pungent it would have lifted the dish a little. So this was a bit of a miss for me.

Garlic sausage, potato and ravigot. Yum! This one got me interested again. The thick generous sausages were fantastic, I piled a whole heap of this on the warm crusty bread they served and chewed away happily.

Fried green tomatoes. They were served with a crunchy outter shell and a creamy mayo. My notes literally say "They were fried, green and tomatoes". Sometimes I make myself laugh!

Sweet peppers, migas and tuna mayo. Stop everything! This one was the stand out of the day. Peppers with pickled garlic, spanish fried crutons, parprika and tuna mayo. I usually walk away from a meal with at least one dish I would like to recreate at home, and on this occasion it was one element of a dish - the tuna mayo! I'm sure its just tuna and mayo mixed together but it was a taste sensation. At one point I tried to scoop some on my bread and eat it like that, but Daz baulked at me and said it wasnt allowed - something to do with manners, I dont have any and he would like me to grow some. Everyone at the table was impressed by that mayo and as soon as the dish was finished, the attentive staff whisked it away. Leaving us all wondering way we didnt dive in and lick the plate clean.....oh yeah we're supposed to have manners.

Onto the mains. Alastair had the Local line caught snapper, tomato, prawn & chorizo

Agnes and I had the Braised lamb, buckwheat polenta and gremolata. The weather is getting a little cooler, so ordering anything with polenta is a good way to warm up your belly. The lamb was very tender but was slightly too fatty and was a little too intense in lamb flavour, it tasted a bit more like mutton. I ate the whole lot though.

Pat and Daz ordered the Roast Quail, smoked sausage and sauerkraut. It was quiet funny to see the two boys getting the smallest dish on the menu. I looked at Daz' face when the dish came out, I know him pretty well and I'm sure I can read his mind and it said "IS THAT ALL?" Luckily for him the portion size was made up for with plenty of flavour.

Onto dessert. Alastair ordered Earl Grey tea ice cream, chocolate ganache and macerated prune. I didn't get to taste this one, but I must give ten points on presentation, it was a truly beautiful dessert.

Poor Daz. Sometimes, very rarely, I feel sorry for him. He ordered his dessert at the start of the meal, opting for the Gruyère d'Alpage and shiraz jelly. Daz is a little like me and completely cheese obsessed, so when he saw Gruyère he had to order it. Sadly it wasn't what he expected. He thought he would get some sort of cheesecake with wine jelly, when his cheese plate was placed in front of him, his dreams of eating a cake were completely shattered. Of course he can't keep his emotions off his face and showed his disappointment, we all laughed and laughed...he almost cried. The really hurtful part came when he had eaten all of his three paper thin crackers, and finished his teaspoon of jelly and was left with more than half of the original cheese - with nothing to eat it with. Then we laughed and laughed at him again.

Agnes and I ordered the Quince baba, sheep's milk yoghurt and cherry. The baba was very dry, it needed to be soaked in a lot more rum (I feel the pirate in me coming out). The cherry puree was just perfect with the delicate yoghurt and Quince jelly. I think if the baba had been removed all together it would have been an much more appealing dish.

I wasnt exactly blown away by the food at Cutler and Co, but there were enough intriguing elements that has made me conclude that a return visit is necessary. At the very least to order a massive bowl of tuna mayo.

After eating lunch, Daz and I decided to take a walk down to Brunswick street for a bit of shopping. Two doors down from Cutler and Co we discovered an oddly dressed tree. I know winter is upon us, but I didn't know that trees suffer from the cold as well! The tree had been lovingly and painstakingly wrapped in dozens of doilies. I often see doilies at charity shops and wonder who would buy them, now I know....cold trees! Check out the freezing pole to the right.

Results - Toasted flour fettuccine carbonara

2010-06-01T22:14:00.004+10:00

And now for what you've ll been waiting for, the long awaited results!! For the full recipe go here.

I originally wanted to try this recipe because I wanted to a pasta dish with a twist. I've often had pasta made with semolina flour before, I am Italian after all. But I had never tried a recipe that called for toasted semolina, so my curiosity got the better of me and I was soon in the kitchen standing over a hot smoking pan.

The toasted Semolina adds a natural nutty flavour to the pasta. During the toasting the whole house smelt like roasting chestnuts, and I'm happy to report that some of that flavour is carried over the cooking process. I admit I should have not been so afraid and toasted the flour for a little longer. Its hard to see in my photos, but you can actually see the speckled effect of the toasted semolina grains. If I had gotten them a little more golden the effect would have been mre pronounced, and most likely the flavour would have been more intense.

Semolina: Toasted on left, Untoasted on right

Making the pasta was a real breeze. Using my KitchenAid to mix the dough and then using my neat Christmas present (from Daz) to roll and cut the pasta. At over $300 a set for the KitchenAid pasta maker the price is a little steep, but long gone are my days of wearing my arm muscles out manually cranking a tiny pasta machine. I remember the first time I told my mum about my cool new gadget, she quickly informed me she would be over to make some pasta!

If you leave out the truffle this whole dish is extremely cheap. I made half the recipe and ended up with 3 very generous serves. I imagine that the truffle would add a very earthy flavour and which was distinctly lacking. I would substitute truffles with some mushrooms to try to replicate that flavour, or just go the full hog and get some truffles!

This recipe is definitely going on the "make again" pile. Its quick, easy, cheap and has runny gooey egg and melted cheese in it, its a winner all round!