The Occasional Epicure

Welcome, Courier-Mail readers!

2006-04-18T07:22:00.000+10:00

The Occasional Epicure received a small mention in today's Courier-Mail "GoodLife" liftout! Welcome to my cosy - though occasionally neglected - Brisbane-based food blog.

For those who don't have access to the newspaper, here's the online version of the article, albeit without the "Essential reading" sidebar which included yours truly!

Stay tuned for a thrilling expose about Ginger Nut biscuits :) , but in the meantime, please stick around and check out some past highlights...

-- An adventure making Portuguese custard tarts

-- Brisbane Lions cupcakes - I might need to make these again this season if things don't start to improve soon!

-- Some yummy self-frosting cupcakes

-- An interesting sandwich combination for a French groom in Singapore

-- Dining at my favourite Sunnybank restaurant

Thanks again for visiting, and I hope you enjoy discovering the tasty world of food blogs!

food and drink cupcakes restaurants Brisbane

Four things meme

2006-03-11T08:22:00.000+10:00

My blog's name has been very accurate lately, but a tag from Helen has motivated me extract the digit and post! Thanks Helen!

Four Jobs I've Had in My Life:
1. Bakery sales assistant - early mornings + nice smells
2. Recruitment coordinator
3. Marketing assistant for a lithotriptor manufacturer
4. Events officer

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over:
1. Amelie
2. The Castle
3. Love Actually
4. Pulp Fiction

Four Places I've Lived:
1. Sunshine Coast, Australia
2. Singapore
3+4. Nine different houses in Brisbane, Australia (I'm happy that my share housing days are finally over!)

Four TV Shows I Watch:
1. The Bill
2. Desperate Housewives
3. Neighbours - sad but true
4. The Biggest Loser (Australian edition) - I can't help it, this show is always on!

Four Places I Have Been on Vacation:
1. Tasmania
2. Hong Kong
3. Thailand
4. Malaysia

Four Websites I Visit Daily:
1. "The BoM" Bureau of Meteorology - Brisbane rainfall radar page - this was a godsend in my old windowless office! :)
2. News.com.au - so trashy
3. Ben Lee's blog - my very favourite musician writes about his travels and spiritual discoveries
4. Cute Overload - I can't help it!

Four of My Favourite Foods:
1. Cakes - all kinds
2. Steak sandwiches
3. Singapore chilli crab
4. Anything containing ginger (after all I did grow up on the Sunshine Coast - the world's largest and best ginger-producing region)

Four Places I Would Rather Be Right Now:
1. New York (news flash: we've booked our flights - eight months to go!)
2. Macau, eating
3. Galapagos Islands
4. Wheelhouse Apartments, Strahan, Tasmania

food and drink meme

Queensland Multicultural Festival

2005-10-26T21:22:00.000+10:00

A few weeks ago RJ and I went along to the Queensland Multicultural Festival. It was one of the first really hot days of the summer, and we arrived at about 12.30, hungry and stinking hot!

The first thing we did was head straight for the food. I had the very best intentions of wandering around checking out all of the fantastic multicultural offerings and snapping heaps of fantastic photos, Grab Your Fork-style. (No-one documents an outdoor food event quite like our friend Augustus Gloop!) However when I saw the absolutely enormous crowds I quickly realised that it would be pretty much impossible to meander around the stalls calmly snapping photos and making a well-considered decision about what to eat for lunch. I had to pick a stall and get into a queue - stat! - if I wanted to get something to eat.

I headed for the satay tent - not that adventurous, I admit! RJ took off saying he'd spotted something-or-other that he had to have. Being packed in with all those other satay lovers was kind of stifling, made even more uncomfortable every time the wind blew a big gust of hot air over everyone!

However! It was worth the wait! The satays were cooked over hot coals, and when they were done they were whacked into a big batch of sauce where they waited until they were fished out and served with rice and a spring roll.

The best chicken satays - ever

By the time I'd secured our satays RJ was halfway through a favourite food of his that he has never thought to tell me about before! It is this delicious Hungarian snap fried bread. It was crisp and delicious! And next time I see it for sale somewhere I'll be jumping in that queue!

Cute pink shirt RJ!

My favourite part of the day's entertainment was the lion dancing

We survived the heat and had a good day. And hopefully my next festival photo-taking attempts will be just a little bit more fruitful! :)

food and drink festival Brisbane

Oaty date slice

2005-10-14T22:22:00.000+10:00

Winter in Queensland is long gone. I love eating porridge for breakfast every day when the weather is cold, but once there's a hint of warmth in the air it's straight back to cereal and cold milk. This year I miscalculated when the porridge days would end, and finished up with an oversupply of rolled oats.

I needed help! Who could suggest a use for these lovely and healthy grains? (Are oats classified as a grain? Somebody, please advise!) Anyway, the lovely AugustusGloop came to my rescue with an old favourite recipe of hers, from her grade seven home economics text book no less.

I also had a bag of dates in the pantry that I'd bought to make some scroggin which didn't quite eventuate. Wouldn't you know it - AG's recipe included dates too! Everything was just falling into place!

Following AG's hot tip, I left this in the oven for a bit longer than the prescribed 15-20 minutes - about 35 minutes all up - and the slice turned out beautifully.

It's sweet and chewy and oaty and a bit datey. Mmm!

It looks like Weet Bix but tastes a million times better!

food and drink baking oats recipes

The Occasional Gardener - sunflowers

2005-10-10T19:22:00.000+10:00

My current herb garden has passed its prime, but my sunflowers have finally bloomed! They're so pretty I just had to share these photos.

The bees love them!

sunflowers garden gardening

Choc chip cookies

2005-10-08T11:22:00.000+10:00

My friend Matty B is famous for making these delicious choc chip cookies. He has been baking them for years and is always a Most Welcome Visitor!

Several years ago he gave me the recipe. This is the exact wording he used. I love how it's such a "boy" way to describe baking instructions :)

It makes about 36 cookies if you don't eat too much raw cookie dough!

Niki's choc chip cookie research project got me thinking about CCCs again, so I decided to whip up a batch the other day. If I'd taken them out of the oven when the timer rang at 12 minutes they would have been just right, but I thought they looked a bit pale and left them in a couple of minutes longer. They were still fine, just a little bit crunchier than ideal.

The finished product - yum!

Cookie close up

The cookie bounty - they didn't last long...

Niki, please feel free to add these to your "to be baked" list! I'm happy to be doing my bit by contributing to this important research! :)

food and drink baking chocolate cookies recipes

Singapore - Laksa

2005-10-05T21:22:00.000+10:00

In August 2004 RJ and I visited Singapore for my friends' wedding. It was way before I had ever even set eyes upon a food blog. But because food is one of my favourite things about Singapore, I ended up taking some photos of things we ate.

One of Singapore's most famous hawker centres is Lau Pa Sat. Situated right in the heart of the financial district it's a bit of a tourist trap, but still seems popular enough with the local office workers too. Lau Pa Sat is open 24 hours and features over 100 food stalls, so you can pretty much eat whatever you want whenever you feel like it.

This day, I only had eyes for one dish...laksa. Laksa is a firm favourite of mine from back in my working-in-Singapore days. My colleagues used to laugh at me because I wouldn't eat the bits that they thought were the most delicious - the fish cake, fish balls and cockles. They used to say "Ask the uncle to leave it out - he'll be very happy with his bigger profit margin!" My favourite ingredient is the fried spongy tofu that absorbs the delicious coconut milk-based curry soup, closely followed by the prawns, hard boiled egg, beansprouts and noodles.

It's really hearty comfort food. Eating a hot spicy soup for lunch in a country famous for its year-round heat and humidity probably doesn't seem like a great idea, but it really is!

In my five-year away-from-Singapore gap I had, of course, tried the laksa on offer at Australian restaurants. It's almost never as good, because it costs four to five times more and it never seems to capture the right flavour and mix of ingredients. That's why I just had to have it at least once on my trip back last year!

A trip down memory lane at Lau Pa Sat

The other fantastic thing about Singaporean hawker centres is the freshly squeezed juice. It's made on the spot and sets you back less than $2!

Oh, and the other thing in this photo is the ubiquitous "small packet tissues". There are so many uses for these in Singapore that you'll wonder how you ever got by at home without carrying them everywhere!

food and drink Singapore laksa travel

Freddo Frogs

2005-10-01T11:22:00.000+10:00

When I posted about eating frog porridge in Singapore my friend McHills was somewhat disgusted. Her husband, the hilarious and talented Jimmy Trinket, offered me a prize if I could guess which movie this line came from:

Nothing's more suspicious than frog's breath!

Of course I recognised the line instantly (wink, wink) as coming from Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas.

I had kind of forgotten about it all until one day McHills arrived at my office and presented me with my prize - a supply of the more palatable variety of edible frogs.

Thanks Mr and Mrs Trinket!

Found!
Also, hello to my colleague, Ms L, who casually mentioned the other day "I found your blog last night"! I think it would be weird to suddenly find a blog about the exact baked goods that you had actually eaten, but Ms L took it very well! I'm looking forward to reading her blog one day soon!

food and drink frogs chocolate Cadbury

Malaya Corner 4

2005-09-29T22:22:00.000+10:00

In which your intrepid correspondents visit - yet again - Sunnybank's finest, Malaya Corner.

My mum was visiting for the weekend so we decided to introduce her to Malaya Corner. Oh, and she saw my blog for the first time, too! (This was handy because she actually reminded me to take a photo of her dinner before she ate it!)

Good old Malaya Corner was bustling as usual, but we still got a table immediately and set about deciding what to eat. We had to have the kari puffs again - just so my mum could try them! We also ordered tahu goreng (fried tofu) for entree. It was big chunks of tofu deep fried and served with crushed peanuts, bean sprouts and some kind of hoisin-like sauce. I forgot to take a photo! Oops - we'll just have to order it again another time!

Because RJ's sambal chilli prawns had been so delicious on a previous visit, I decided to try the sambal chilli chicken. It had just the right amount of chilli flavour and heat. I think I still prefer the prawns that RJ had, but this chicken was pretty tasty!

Sambal chilli chicken

My mum went for the nasi goreng. It was full of all kinds of goodies. I tried a bit of the chopped tofu, but it was a bit dry and chewy. Mum said that the rest of the dish was nice. It was a huge serving too!

That's my mum in the background! She unintentionally teamed with the theme by wearing an Oriental print shirt!

RJ has long been dying to try the Malaya Corner char kway teow. We both love ho fun - flat rice noodles - and this delicious dish combines them with prawns, dark soy sauce, and a fantastic smoky flavour. Once again, the serving was pretty huge. RJ gave it the thumbs up but said it could have been a bit more spicy.

Char kway teow

It goes without saying that we'll be back!

Other Malaya Corner visits:
Malaya Corner, Sunnybank
Malaya Corner 2
Malaya Corner 3

food and drink Sunnybank chilli Brisbane

The 23rd Post/5th Line Meme

2005-09-26T20:22:00.000+10:00

Barbara from Winos and Foodies tagged me for this meme.

The instructions are...
1. Delve into your blog archive.
2. Find your 23rd post (or closest to).
3. Find the fifth sentence (or closest to).
4. Post the text of the sentence in your blog along with these instructions. Ponder it for meaning, subtext or hidden agendas...
5. Tag five people to do the same.

I was pleasantly surprised to realise that I even had 23 posts! Here's the fifth sentence from that post, Choc Hazelnut Friands:
"I took these on a recent visit to my mum's place, and I only ate one!"

This photo and sentence out of context makes it seem like there were only two friands in total. There were twelve! And I only ate one! I wish I'd eaten more.

I learned a very important lesson from this friand experience. If you're going to bake delicious goodies to give away as gifts, make sure you keep some for yourself at home too!

It seems like everyone in the blogosphere has already completed this meme, so I won't tag five more people. But if you haven't already and you do feel like delving into your archives, consider yourself tagged!

food and drink meme friands

Self-frosting cupcakes

2005-09-25T10:22:00.000+10:00

I first saw these cupcakes on Niki's blog, Esurientes, where they looked delicious! She had found them on Nic's Bakingsheet. Then they kept cropping up everywhere else:

ChichaJo at 80 Breakfasts has made them twice

Lushlife at Not Just Desserts

Barbara at Winos and Foodies

So I thought, "why not see what all the fuss is about?" And I'm pleased to report that these humble cupcakes lived up to the hype!

Like Niki, I used Kraft Nuts About Chocolate instead of peanut paste or Nutella. When I'd first seen it at the supermarket I wasn't that interested, since chocolate and peanut spread could - of course - never be as good as everyone's favourite chocolate and hazelnut spread Nutella. Could it?

Before I whacked this stuff on my cupcakes I thought it would be a good idea to eat a spoonful first. Wow! It tastes just like a liquid Snickers bar! I could probably eat a whole jar if I wasn't careful!

Yum!

The cupcakes turned out really well. The cake itself was nice and vanilla-y and the Nuts About Chocolate frosting was fantastic. They look really cute and taste great. They were pretty quick to whip up too. Please visit Esurientes for the recipe.

If you end up baking these cupcakes or know of anyone else who's blogged about them, please let me know and I'll update my little list! I think it's cool that this same recipe has been baked around the world.

More happy self-frosting cupcake bakers:

Violet at and the dish ran away with the spoon

Factobrunt at Too Young to be Grumpy

food and drink cupcakes baking chocolate

Sugar High Friday #12 - Custard

2005-09-16T06:22:00.000+10:00

I have to admit, I'm not the biggest fan of custard. Besides the egg tarts at yum cha, I usually only eat custard once per year - and that's the ready-made kind poured straight from the carton onto my plum pudding on Christmas day.

Which is why the Sugar High Friday theme chosen by Elise at Simply Recipes was good. It gave me the motivation to try out a recipe for Portuguese Custard Tarts, which is something that I wouldn't usually get around to making.

The whole tart making experience was fun, even though it seemed to take forever and mess up my whole kitchen. I'll tell the story using photos and the recipe (from Sweet Food, published by Murdoch Books)...

Ingredients
155g (1 1/4 cups) plain flour
25g copha (white vegetable shortening), chopped and softened

Hold on! What on earth is copha? Well, non-antipodeans, I am pleased to reveal that this strange Australian ingredient is vegetable shortening made of solidified coconut oil. Mmm, sounds delicious doesn't it?

Actually, I was really annoyed when I saw copha on the ingredient list! I only needed 25g, but it only comes in a 250g packet. And the only other recipe that calls for copha is
chocolate crackles! What a shame! I will have to whip up a batch of these top Aussie treats to use up the rest of my copha block.

Also, how authentically "Portuguese" can this recipe be? I get the feeling that copha is not stocked by the shopkeepers of Portugal/Macau/other famous custard tart destinations...

30g unsalted butter, chopped and softened
250g (1 cup) sugar
500ml (2 cups) milk
3 tablespoons cornflour
1 tablespoon custard powder

What a gourmet rebel I am - using a recipe with custard powder!

4 egg yolks

Apparently you can freeze the whites, so I did that and I'll use them in my next batch of friands.

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

Method
Sift the flour into a bowl.

Goody! This is the easy bit.

Add 185ml (3/4 cup) water, or enough to form a soft dough. Gather into a ball, then roll out on baking paper to form a 24cm x 30cm rectangle.

This is when I started to realise that these custard tarts could turn into quite an interesting part of my baking self-education. The dough was not really all that dough-like, but I rolled it out anyway.

Rolling the dough

Spread copha over the surface.

Hmm. The copha didn't want to melt in the microwave! I thought it would melt like butter but even after a full 60 seconds it was still hard. I nuked it a bit longer and finally spread it over the "dough". There were some significant copha lumps.

Melt, damn copha!

Roll up from the short edge to form a log.

Right-o. I sprinkled a bit of flour around so I could get a grip of the edge. The quick'n'easy rolling that the book seemed to describe did not occur. It was more like squishing the dough back into a big lump.

Roll the dough out into a rectangle again, and spread with the butter.

At least the butter melted in the microwave!

Roll into a log and slice into 12 pieces.

My 12 pieces weren't very uniform in size! Oops!

Working from the centre outwards, use your fingertips to press each round out to a circle large enough to cover the base and sides of twelve 80ml (1/3 cup) muffin holes. Press into the tin and refrigerate.

I just whacked each lump of dough into the muffin tin and pressed it onto the base and up the sides.

Pastry shells

Put the sugar and 80ml (1/3 cup) water into a pan, and stir over low heat until the sugar dissolves. Mix a little milk with the cornflour and custard powder to form a smooth paste, and add to the pan with the remaining milk, egg yolks and vanilla. Stir over low heat until thickened. Put in a bowl, cover and cool.

It seemed to take forever for this custard mixture to thicken. Just when I started to think I'd done something terribly wrong, it finally thickened up!

Preheat oven to 220C (425F). Divide the filling among the pastry bases.

Custard-filled shells ready for baking

Bake for 30 minutes, or until the custard is set and the tops have browned. Cool in the tins, then transfer to a wire rack.

Fresh from the oven!

The finished product

Makes 12.

Overall these were pretty tasty. The pastry was hard and crunchy and I don't think that's how it's supposed to turn out. The custard filling was sweet and delicious. If I could just improve my pastry-making skills, I'll be onto a winner!

Check out the round-up of all the custardy recipes from around the world now up at Simply Recipes.

food and drink SHF Sugar High Friday custard baking recipes

Childhood food memories - meme

2005-09-07T13:22:00.000+10:00

How exciting! I have been tagged for my first meme and now I feel like a certified, real blogger! And even more exciting, I was tagged by AugustusGloop from Grab Your Fork who was tagged by the Adam the Amateur Gourmet who was tagged by Clotilde of Chocolate and Zucchini (probably the most famous food blogger of all - she was even included in TIME Magazine's 50 coolest blogs!)!

Anyway, enough of the "!" and on with the meme. Growing up on Queensland's Sunshine Coast hinterland meant that I was surrounded by plantations of sugar cane, Macadamia nuts, avocados and pineapples (including really big ones).

Funnily enough, none of these local agricultural goings-on really had much impact on my childhood food consumption.

Instead, let me tell you about my most significant memories surrounding food.

1. Cheezels

OK, I'm starting out with a story that I hardly remember myself, but I've heard it so many times from my mother that I can picture it in my mind anyway.

When I was born in the late 70s my parents were kind of hippy idealists. I'm not quite sure how to describe them, but they didn't want my brother and I watching "American garbage" on TV...so we didn't have a TV. They didn't want us drinking soft drink and eating junk food...so I tasted McDonald's only once before I was 17.

At my cousin's birthday party when I was two or three there was the usual junk food selection spread across a table. Apparently I stood there, dumbstruck, looking at a bowl of Cheezels. I asked my mum, "What's that?" to which she replied, "Some people say it's food." So I picked one up and popped it in my mouth. I obviously liked what I tasted, because after all the other kids helped themselves to some snacks and ran off to play in the garden I stood there putting a Cheezel on each finger and then eating them one by one, totally mesmerised by the colour, the texture, and (most likely) the salt!

I still love them!

2. The lettuce leaf

My mum was big into feeding my brother and I a healthy diet. She seemed to have a "no negotiation" policy when it came to finishing our veges at dinner time. We had to eat everything on our plate before we were allowed to leave the dinner table.

I always hated lettuce. Even now I'm not a fan. On one particular occasion I had finished everything else on my plate except one lettuce leaf. I really didn't want to eat it! It was a horrible brown mignonette lettuce! I couldn't bear the thought! I didn't like the flavour, the colour or the texture!

So I sat there and looked at it. My mum sat there and looked at me. I thought I could get away with it. But there were no exemptions from the "finish your veges before you leave the table" rule. This lasted for half an hour. I couldn't win. I ate the lettuce and I was finally allowed to go.

3. Eating sugar

Back when I was little, I used to eat sugar straight from the sugarbowl, which was kept on the shelf next to the teabags and the tin of instant coffee. It was raw sugar - nice and crunchy!

The year was 1986. I was eight. Don't ask me why now, but my mum and I were really keen to go and see Elton John in concert in Brisbane. We had been putting our spare coins aside in a jar to save up for our tickets. Then one day I was in the kitchen helping myself to another serving of sugar and got busted by my mum who really hit the roof! She said, "That's it! I've warned you before and now we're not going to see Elton John!" And she took the jar and all my hard-earned coins away. I was devastated!

In the end we did end up going to see Elton John. It was my first concert and I remember having a fantastic time. I don't eat sugar like that anymore.

4. Mum and the sweetened condensed milk

By now you might be thinking that my mum was very strict and tough. Of course, she just had our best interests at heart and was doing what mums need to do to keep their vege-hating, sugar-scoffing kids in line. Now we're the best of friends.

One day, I realised that - in addition to being my mother - my mum was a normal person too. Innocently wandering towards the fridge one day I saw that my mum was standing there with the door open. Not that unusual, as the was the only cook in the household. What was unusual and made my eyes light up was the fact that in one hand she was holding a tin of Sweetened Condensed Milk and in the other hand was a teaspoon. I couldn't believe my eyes! My mum was eating Sweetened Condensed Milk straight out of the tin! When she saw me, her face took on the same super guilty look that I probably sported when I got busted eating sugar.

5. Hog's Breath Steak

This event took place after I had technically left my "childhood", although my culinary appreciation was still in its infancy. I was 18 when I first visited the Hog's Breath Cafe in Airlie Beach. I ate the Hickory Smoked Prime Rib.

I was amazed. Until that day, "steak" had just been the meat in the "meat and three veg", less than 1cm thick and often coated with pepper. Hog's Breath was responsible for making me understand just how tender and delicious steak can be. I've never looked back!

Who's next?
I'd like to hear about the childhood food memories of:
Fanny from foodbeam - I'm sure she's got plenty of yummy French food memories to share
Barbara from winosandfoodies - an Aussie wine-lover in New Zealand
Pseudo Chef from Cook & Eat - a food and cat fan from Perth

food and drink meme family memories

Singapore - sabo-ing the groom

2005-08-31T21:22:00.000+10:00

Last August RJ and I visited Singapore for my friends' wedding. It was way before I had ever even set eyes upon a food blog. But because food is one of my favourite things about Singapore, I ended up taking some photos of things we ate.

At our friends' wedding the happy couple visited each of the 30 tables of guests to take a photo and receive all of our good wishes. Tradition dictates that some guests (young hooligan friends, prankster colleagues etc.) can attempt to sabo the couple. Sabo (pronounced "sar-bo") is an abbreviation of sabotage used in Singlish.

Of course our table wanted to get into the spirit! We came up with the brilliant idea of making a chocolate and chilli sandwich for the groom to eat. During his speech he had said that he would always take good care of his new wife. So we asked him to prove that he'd do anything for her and eat our sandwich...

Chilli choc treat for the groom

The sandwich was washed down with a glass of red wine and a Coke. He was a very good sport about it, especially considering such a thing would never happen at a wedding in his native France!

food and drink Singapore travel chilli wedding

Fresh Tassie Strawberries

2005-08-29T19:22:00.000+10:00

Here are some more fun food photos from our terrific Tasmanian honeymoon! While on the road to Port Arthur we found a strawberry farm. You could pick your own or buy some ready-picked.

Strawberry sales office

We opted for the ready picked version as we were in a bit of a hurry. We wanted to leave plenty of time for seeing the historic site at Port Arthur. We were welcomed by two very cute dogs - you can just make out one of them in this picture.

Fresh strawberries

This tray of strawberries was about $5 if memory serves me correctly. (It was only a few months ago! My memory is starting to pack up already!)

Yummy berry

Back in the car we enjoyed these berries all the way down to Port Arthur.

If you're going to Tassie, I really urge you to spend a day at Port Arthur. It's fascinating, moving and melancholy and an important reminder of Australia's convict heritage and the people who eventually helped to build our country.

food and drink strawberries Tasmania Port Arthur travel

Singapore - Kickapoo

2005-08-28T17:22:00.000+10:00

Last August RJ and I visited Singapore for my friends' wedding. It was way before I had ever even set eyes upon a food blog. But because food is one of my favourite things about Singapore, I ended up taking some photos of things we ate.

I was introduced to Kickapoo by my Singaporean boss back in 2000. She went to great pains to teach me the correct pronunciation: kick-a-poe, not kick-a-poo!

When I set eyes on Kickapoo again during our 2004 trip, I had to buy some and get RJ to try it. It's fruity and refreshing!

And the name is so damn funny.

Joy Juice!

food and drink soft drinks Singapore travel

Yuen's Supermarket, Sunnybank

2005-08-27T10:22:00.000+10:00

After our dinner at Malaya Corner, RJ and I made our now-customary postprandial trip to Yuen's Asian Supermarket. It's so cool that it is open at night and just a few doors down from our favourite restaurant!

Yuen's - doorway to Asian foodlovers' heaven

I didn't take too many photos there; I don't want the owners to think I'm up to anything untoward. But I just had to snap the Great Wall of Tea.

Never go thirsty again!

Later on I also found a giant bag of this tea. It is my favourite accompaniment to yum cha. I didn't buy it, but I had to take a photo anyway...

Pu-erh tea

Important note! I have no idea why the English spelling of this tea's name is so bizarre. It is not pronounced poo-err (although some people might say that after they drink it; it tastes a bit like dirt to me, but that's part of its charm) rather, it is pronounced poe-lay.

food and drink supermarket tea Brisbane

Malaya Corner 3

2005-08-24T07:22:00.000+10:00

The third installment of the Malaya Corner adventures in which Kelly and super-cute sidekick/husband RJ attempt to eat their way through the wildly extensive menu at Malaya Corner, Sunnybank, Brisbane.

So off RJ and I trotted to Malaya Corner filled with hope and hunger for what was sure to be another gastronomic good time.

Dodgy photo of Malaya Corner

Once again we were bamboozled by the array of options on the menu. Luckily it is logically divided into rice dishes, fried noodles, noodle soup and rice porridge (in my language the latter category translates into "avoid"). So once you have decided what kind of carbs you're after you can just pursue that section and make you selection. Very good system, I say.

So many options!

I wanted to try the tahu goreng (fried tofu) for entree but RJ convinced me that since I hadn't taken a proper photo of the kari puffs last time, we should order it again. Hmm. As you can see from this photo I was convinced! Next time we will be eating the tahu goreng - I will not be tricked again by Mr Ambivalent-About-Tofu!

Kari puffs

I'm a big fan of the giant glasses of lemon Coke served here, but with a visit to the dentist just around the corner I thought I'd better steer clear. He can always tell when I've been drinking Coke! Horrible man. Anyway, we decided to go for the free self-service tea which is in big plastic jugs on the counter, next to the self-service water.

Free tea - yippee!

Having been doing some serious Singapore reminiscing lately, I decided to order the Hainanese Chicken Rice. Hainanese chicken rice is the staple standby of any newly arrived and/or culinarily unadventurous foreigner in Singapore. It's also a firm favourite of locals and other adventurous eaters. What I'm trying to say is that it's not just for scaredy-cat foreigners, but it does happen to be their food of choice.

Its simple appearance - chicken and rice - hides the delicious truth: this is no ordinary chicken and rice.

The chicken is poached and served with fragrant rice cooked in chicken broth. A yummy soy sauce is poured over the top and the meal is accompanied by a special kind of chilli sauce, grated ginger and chicken broth. When my meal arrived it smelled exactly like the many, many chicken rice dishes I had enjoyed when I lived in Singapore.

Unfortunately, the chicken was served cold, which was a bit of a shock. And I also remembered that back in the S'pore days I had enjoyed the chicken rice served with roasted chicken a bit more than the poached version, but this was only a small problem.

Hainanese chicken rice

The flavours of the rice and chicken were spot-on, but I probably wouldn't order this dish again. The cold chicken - although pretty tasty - was a bit hard to get my head around! And if I'm eating chicken with the skin on I do prefer it to be crispy and brown, rather than soft and white.

RJ ordered the Malaysian Curry Chicken with Rice. His succinct review was "I've had better." I tried a bit of the curry sauce mixed with rice and it was nice, but not very spicy.

Malaysian chicken curry with steamed rice

All in all, it was not our best visit to Malaya Corner, but we will not be deterred! We will return! The char kway teow beckons!

After dinner we made our now-traditional pilgrimage to Yuen's Supermarket, but that's another post...

Other visits to Malaya Corner:
Malaya Corner, Sunnybank
Malaya Corner 2

And because Google Maps is so much fun, I've located Malaya Corner - it's in the shopping centre on the south east of the intersection.

food and drink chicken rice curry Brisbane

Singapore - Breakfast

2005-08-21T11:22:00.000+10:00

Last August RJ and I visited Singapore for my friends' wedding. It was way before I had ever even set eyes upon a food blog. But because food is one of my favourite things about Singapore, I ended up taking some photos of things we ate.

Just down the street from our hotel was a Kopitiam food court. The word "kopitiam" means "coffee shop" but this particular capital "K" Kopitiam is part of a chain of modernised hawker centres. Not exactly the most authentic Singapore dining experience, but it was air conditioned and just around the corner, so it was the logical place for us to eat breakfast.

Having lived in Singapore for 12 months I always felt like I'd really missed out on something special because I'd never eaten the famous breakfast dish kaya toast. I'd eaten kaya on bread before - it's a delicious coconut, egg and pandan flavoured jam - but I'd never tried the toast. It was time to rectify this terrible inadequacy in my Singapore food repertoire!

Now this isn't just any ordinary spread on toast! The bread is toasted on a little grill and then each slice is cut in half (not the normal way you'd cut a piece of toast in half but through the bread to make two very thin slices), spread with butter and kaya and put back together again.

Kaya toast and lime drink

The sweetness of the kaya and the saltiness of the butter made the toast delicious. I could have eaten a big pile!

To drink I ordered an old Singapore favourite - the sweet, cordial-like lime drink. I love the picture of the quintessential Kopitiam uncle on the cup. So cute!

I believe the really "right" way to eat kaya toast is with soft boiled eggs and a cup of coffee, but i didn't really feel like eating eggs that day. I also need to leave some things on my Singapore Food To Eat list so that I've got an excuse to go back in the future!

By the way, in the background of this photo you can see RJ's breakfast - noodles with char siu and a bowl of soup. Yum!

food and drink Singapore kopitiam breakfast travel

Choc Hazelnut Friands

2005-08-18T21:22:00.000+10:00

It's friand time again! Instead of the almond meal that is used in standard recipe I added hazelnut meal. And, as all Nutella-lovers know, nothing goes better with hazelnuts than chocolate, so I whacked in a bit of cocoa and broke up some chocolate buttons and stuck them on top. I thought the chocolate was going to melt a bit more than it did, but the friands still looked (and tasted) pretty good!

Choc hazelnut friands

I took these on a recent visit to my mum's place, and I only ate one! I'm still feeling a peculiar friand craving, so I will have to make another batch soon!

food and drink friand cakes baking small cakes

Singapore - Frog Porridge

2005-08-16T11:22:00.000+10:00

Last August RJ and I visited Singapore for my friends' wedding. It was way before I had ever even set eyes upon a food blog. But because food is one of my favourite things about Singapore, I ended up taking some photos of things we ate.

We spent this particular day with my Singaporean friend D, who I had met during my exchange student days in 1999 at Nanyang Technological University. After a long day spent eating our way around the island, D took us for dinner in Geylang, Singapore's notorious red light district. It's also known for its fantastic food.

D wanted us to try one of his favourites, frog porridge. Last time D had talked about eating frogs (way back when I was an exchange student) I'd tried not to rule out the idea. That was until we reached the hawker centre and saw huge fish tanks full of frogs hopping around, croaking happily, unaware that they were about to, well, croak! At the hands of a hawker armed only with a grotty old pair of scissors, no less. So D's frog porridge plan was vetoed. And - it appears - he had waited five years to try to convince me again.

This time, he knew better than to let us see the frogs! He ordered us to sit down at the table out on the footpath and said he would go and place the order. We could hear a bit of croaking, but as our table was next to the road there was enough other noise to disguise it. RJ was keen - he is very brave - but I told Derek that he had better order me some chicken satay sticks, or else!

I was happily munching away at my satays when the frog porridge was delivered in two clay pots: one containing the rice porridge and the other holding the frog pieces. These were to be mixed together in each person's bowl. It smelled delicious! D had neglected to tell me that the frogs would be cooked in ginger and shallot sauce, one of my very favourites!

I still couldn't quite get my head around eating frog, but in the end I psyched myself up and tried a bit! I felt super adventurous! It had the texture of chicken, I guess, and the strong ginger and shallot flavour seemed to overpower any flavour that the frog might actually have had.

Frog porridge

So with that scary adventure over, D suggested that we could go across the road after dinner and eat some "Taiwanese snakes"! I began to protest strenuously until I realised a couple of moments later the my Australian-accented ears had misheard... We were, in fact, about to enjoy some Taiwanese snacks! Phew!

food and drink Singapore frogs ginger travel

Malaya Corner 2

2005-08-13T15:22:00.000+10:00

A couple of weeks ago I had had a pretty bad and exhausting day, and RJ had the smashing idea of going to Malaya Corner for dinner. Out of interest I timed how long it took to drive to Sunnybank from our place - 25 minutes, which I think is not too bad. It's definitely not too far to go for such an extensive menu, delicious meals and reasonable prices! (And there was a special bonus, which I'll mention later.)

The restaurant was pleasantly crowded and noisy. We didn't have to wait for a table and there were plenty of other diners whose dinners we could look at! The menu is so extensive that we both found it difficult to select our meals. This lead us to making a new resolution: we will visit Malaya Corner once a fortnight and eat our way through the menu! Yum! (In fact, we are going back there tonight. We'll have to wait and see we actually keep this up though...)

I was in the mood for something really delicious. Just reading the menu made me forget my dud of a day! Exactly one year ago RJ and I were visiting Singapore to attend my friends' wedding (happy anniversary T & Y!). One of the best meals we had there (excluding the wedding banquet, of course) was chilli crab at No Signboard Seafood (Stadium branch, for those of you who know Singapore).

Anyway, before I get all Singapore-memory-lane on you, I'd better get back to Malaya Corner and the story at hand. I chose the Singapore chilli prawns and when I took my first mouthful I was absolutely delighted! The sauce tasted very similar to how I remembered the "real" thing - spicy and a bit coriander-y. It was so good I ended up finishing off the sauce with a spoon once all my rice and prawns were gone. (At No Signboard the chilli crab comes with little squares of white bread (crusts removed!) to soak up the sauce.)

Singapore chilli prawns

RJ also liked the sound of chilli prawns, so - not wanting to order the same thing as me - chose the sambal chilli prawns. I tried these too - for research purposes - and found them to be super tasty as well! The sambal was spicy enough without being overpowering.

Sambal chilli prawns

For our entree (which came out after we'd started eating our mains - but who cares?) we had kari (curry) puffs. The pastry was so light and crispy and the filling so flavoursome that we had already started eating the last of the four puffs before we remembered to take a photo!

Kari puff

By the time we finished our meals we were feeling full and happy. Altogether the kari puffs, two prawn dishes and two giant lemon Cokes came to less than $40 - what a happy ending! (And we'd remembered to bring cash this time. So there was no awkward wait for me under the watchful gaze of the cash register auntie while Ray traipsed around Sunnybank looking for an ATM.)

Special Sunnybank bonus!
When we emerged from the restaurant we noticed that the Yuen's Supermarket was still open! On a Sunday night in Brisbane, that is pretty amazing. Anyway we spent an enjoyable half an hour wandering around in there stocking up on all out favourites like Pokky, a big carton of Indo Mie, fried tofu puffs (for laksa - yum), 2 litres of fresh soy milk... Everything our little hearts desired that can't be procured at our local suburban Woolies!

food and drink prawns seafood Brisbane

Sugar High Friday #11 - Coffee

2005-08-12T00:22:00.000+10:00

How exciting! This is the first time I have participated in Sugar High Friday! I've been reading the entries on other people's blogs for months, but have only just got around to baking something of my own on time! The theme for SHF #11 was "coffee" so I scoured my recipe book collection and found these Espresso Cakes in Modern Classics 2 by Donna Hay.

The recipe said that it made ten small cakes, but the mixture rose so much when I baked it that it would have worked if I'd made 12 slightly smaller cakes instead.

Espresso cakes

Instead of using chocolate glaze as suggested by the recipe I made my own coffee icing with instant coffee, boiling water and icing sugar. As you can see in this photo, my cakes turned out a bit differently to the illustration!

Viva la difference!

Although I was a bit disappointed at first that the tops of my cakes had risen and then spread out so much (and consequently looking nothing like the neat little packages in the photo) when tasting time arrived, I was pleasantly surprised! The whole cake was delicious but the top was a delightfully chewy highlight. It reminded me of the muffin tops episode of Seinfeld where Elaine comes up with the great idea of starting a business that only sells the top of muffins.

Anyway, before I get distracted thinking about old TV shows, it's time get back to the task at hand - the espresso cakes. Here's the recipe!

Espresso Cakes
from Modern Classics Book 2 by Donna Hay

100g butter, very well softened
1 cup caster sugar
3 eggs
1 1/4 cups plain flour, sifted
2 teaspoons baking powder, sifted
1/4 cup hazelnut meal
1 1/2 tablespoons instant coffee granules or powder, dissolved in 1 tablespoon boiling water

Preheat the oven to 160C. Place the butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder, hazelnut meal and coffee mixture in a bowl. Combine using electric beaters on low speed, then increase to high speed and mix until just smooth.

Grease 10 x 1/2 cup capacity muffin tins. Spoon in the mixture and bake for 25 minutes or until cooked when tested with a skewer. Cool in the tins for 10 minutes then remove and cool on a rack.

Ice with the icing or glaze of your choice!

Check out the roundup of all the SHF entries kindly hosted by Ronald at loveSicily.

Technorati Tags: food and drink SHF coffee baking recipes

Wine Blogging Wednesday #12 - Drink Local. Real Local.

2005-08-10T23:22:00.000+10:00

This is the NV Rosé Pinot Noir Chardonnay Sparkling from Sirromet, a winery on Brisbane's eastern outskirts.

It's pretty to look at and refreshing to drink. It's perfect for a celebration, even if you're just celebrating the end of another working day! It retails for about $16 a bottle.

You can visit the cellar door at Sirromet and taste ten wines for $5. The day we did this I didn't learn very much about wine. This was not through any lack of knowledge on the part of our tasting expert, rather it was because we were there for a friend's hens party and we're really paying much attention.

In summary, I don't know very many technical things to say about wine, but I do know that I like this Rosé!

Cheers!

Check out the Wine Blogging Wednesday roundup at Lenndevours.

food and drink Wine Blogging Wednesday Sirromet Queensland wine wine

Herb garden update

2005-08-05T09:22:00.000+10:00

Here's a quick update on my herbs, which were so little when I first planted them.

Now they're much bigger! Surprisingly, the coriander (third from the front) has been the best grower. The basil (second from the front) did well too, but now we've eaten most of it, so it looks a little bit on the skinny side in this photo.

Herb patch

Between the herbs and the fence are six sunflowers that are growing bigger daily! I can't wait until they get really huge and start flowering!

I didn't get around to planting any chillies yet - I just keep forgetting! Stay tuned...

garden herbs coriander basil sunflowers

Ball and Chain Grill, Hobart and Jailhouse Grill, Launceston

2005-08-04T21:22:00.000+10:00

More tales from Tasmania... The same colleague of RJ's who told us to go to Kelleys had also highly recommended the Ball and Chain Grill in Hobart as a fine place to have a piece of steak. After a big day touring the Cadbury Factory and the Cascade Brewery we headed straight down to Salamanca Place. Things were looking good as we found a parking spot right outside the restaurant just as it was opening (6pm, I think it was).

Unfortunately, we found the whole experience just OK. The waitress sat us at a table in a glass-roofed conservatory area, which I thought felt colder than the enclosed room we'd walked through to get there. So I asked her if we could move back to the "indoor" area. She told me "It's the same temperature everywhere" and walked away. She made me feel like for some reason we weren't good enough to sit in the inside section. Maybe it had to do with my outfit consisting largely of Kathmandu and New Balance! But as a born and bred Queenslander on holidays way down south, staying warm was much more important than looking smart! The food was OK - basically your standard big steak and a salad bar (which did feature some enormous and tasty olives).

Later that week we found ourselves in Launceston. The host of the very nice Old Bakery Inn where we stayed recommended a place called the Jailhouse Grill. (There's a bit of a convict theme running through Tassie...) After we'd gotten ourselves in and seated we realised it was almost exactly the same as the Ball and Chain. The service here was a bit better. I ordered scallops and bacon skewers which didn't turn out the be the best idea. The bacon didn't seem to be cooked all the way through!

Bacon and scallop skewers

Neither of these convict-themed restaurants blew my hair back, which was a real shame because I love a great steak! I'm sure the food was much nicer than what the real convicts ate in the old days though!

Ball and Chain Grill
Salamanca Place
Hobart
Phone 03 6223 2655

Jailhouse Grill
32 Wellington Street (corner York Street)
Launceston
Phone (03) 6331 0466

food and drink Tasmania Hobart Launceston steak

Fish Frenzy, Hobart

2005-07-30T18:22:00.000+10:00

While RJ and I were honeymooning in Tasmania in May we were fortunate enough to stumble across Hobart's best fish and chip shop, Fish Frenzy.

Fish Frenzy interior

It's official!

The menu was extensive, but we couldn't go past the "Fish Frenzy" which comprised two pieces of crumbed fish, scallops, calamari and chips - all for the bargain price of $13.50! The food arrived promptly and tasted delicious. I remember that the two pieces of fish weren't the same, but now I can't recall what either of them was at all! And the calamari, chips and scallops were all just right.

I dislike stinginess, so I was delighted at the generous quantities of lemon. There was plenty to squeeze into my glass of water! And...after we'd started eating I decided that I'd like to try some chilli and lime mayo, which was 50 cents for a little tub. The nice Fish Frenzy man refused to let me pay for it! Top marks for generosity!

Our lunches

So if you find yourself in Hobart, make sure you visit Fish Frenzy. The service, food and atmosphere were all fantastic!

Fish Frenzy
Elizabeth Street Pier
Sullivans Cove
Hobart
Phone 03 6231 2134

fish and chips food and drink Hobart Tasmania

A blogger by any other name would smell as sweet

2005-07-24T10:22:00.000+10:00

Well, it didn't take me long to get sick of my dumb name BrisKJJ and wish that I'd spent a bit more time thinking up a cooler moniker. Something more like Blazing_Star_Racer (that's my cute husband, formerly known as RJ on this blog) or Jimmy Trinket (that's my friend's husband who samples my baking sometimes) would be cool.

Anyway, in the interests of keeping things simple I've decided to revert to a name I like much more. It's simple to spell, it's easy to pronounce, and it's what people have already been calling me for the past 27 years: Kelly.

Pleased to meet you!

Strawberry Friands

2005-07-21T20:22:00.000+10:00

I'm having a bit of a friand frenzy at the moment - two batches in as many weeks... These delicious small cakes are very easy to make and really, really tasty!

I was telling a friend that I'd started baking friands, and she said "Aren't they just like muffins squished into a different shape?" It was then that I realised I would need to bake another batch as soon as possible and bring her a sample.

I gave her two friands in a little takeaway container so that her husband could try one too. (He'd been v. upset about not sampling my brownies!) I'm pleased to report that they were a big hit, and deemed to be entirely unlike misshapen muffins after all!

Friands
from Modern Classics Book 2 by Donna Hay
125g butter
1 cup almond meal
1 2/3 cups icing sugar, sifted
3/4 cup plain flour, sifted <--- aarrgh! Edited to add this vital ingredient that I missed in my original post
1/2 teaspoon baking powder 5 egg whites [I couldn't be bothered working out what to do with 5 egg yolks, so I just used frozen egg whites]
1/3 cup fresh or frozen raspberries, blueberries or sliced strawberries [I saw $1 punnets of strawberries while I was queuing at the express lane - it was meant to be!]

Preheat the oven to 180C. Place the butter in a saucepan over low heat and cook until melted and a very light golden colour. Set aside. [I did this the first time I made friands; this time I just melted the butter in the microwave.]

Place the almond meal, icing sugar, flour and baking powder in a bowl and stir to combine. Add the egg whites and stir to combine. Add the butter and stir to combine.

Grease 10 x 1/2 cup capacity muffin tins [of course, if you have friand tins, you might as well use them]. Spoon 2 tablespoons of the mixture into each tin and sprinkle the berries over the top. Bake for 15-20 minutes or until golden and springy to touch but moist in the centre. [Mine took longer. I think my oven is a bit inconsistent.]

Enjoy!

Technorati Tags:
friand cakes food & drink small cakes baking recipes

Pita Things

2005-07-18T12:22:00.000+10:00

These pita "things" are always a huge hit. When I try to explain them to people, they look a bit sceptical and say "Sounds a bit weird! Do I need to serve them with dip?" But once they try them, they're hooked...

So, without further ado, I present you with the recipe for...

Pita Things

Fresh basil (Greek basil is best)
Crushed garlic
Grated Parmesan cheese
Butter
Pita or flat bread

Mix chopped basil, garlic and softened butter. Spread onto pitas. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese then cut into triangles. (A pizza cutter is really handy for this.) Bake on a tray at 180C for 8 to 10 minutes.

Lemon pepper may be substituted for the basil. This is tasty too!

And no, you don't need to serve them with dip. They're tasty enough on their own!

They're delicious!

Brisbane Lions cupcakes

2005-07-16T16:22:00.000+10:00

My favourite Australian Rules football team, the Brisbane Lions, are playing the top-of-the-ladder West Coast Eagles tonight in Perth.

Unfortunately, here in Brisbane, we are 3600 kilometres away so we're having a few friends around to watch the game on TV. In honour of the occasion, and in the vain hope that my baking can influence the outcome of a football game, I whipped up some maroon, blue and gold mini-cupcakes.

Superstition plays a big part in sport, and last time I made these mini-cupcakes was for a "maroon, blue and gold" themed morning tea the day before the 2002 grand final...which the Lions went on to win.

Aussie Rules fans also love quirky statistics. How's this for a piece of trivia? The Lions have won their past five games, and each win has arrived with an increased margin. If they keep this pattern up, they should win tonight by more than 78 points...

Go Lions!

food and drink Brisbane Lions cupcakes cakes baking

Sad postscript: Unfortunately - and despite my best baking efforts - the Eagles proved too good for the Lions on the night :( The Eagles played a fantastic game where the final score was 17.9.(111) to 13.10.(88).

Desperate Brownies

2005-07-12T09:22:00.000+10:00

It was with bitter disappointment that I received the news that Channel 7 would be screening 24 instead of the terrific Desperate Housewives last night. What would the girls at work and I talk about on Tuesday morning? Our regular DH debrief would have to be postponed until next week! Quelle disaster!

But disappointment turned to determination, and, Bree Van Der Kamp-like, I decided to make the best of a bad situation and use my newfound spare hour to whip up a batch of the delicious looking brownies featured on Niki's blog a couple of weeks ago. They looked so fantastic in her photos that I haven't been able to stop thinking about them since I first read her post.

I don't think I've ever made a recipe that called for melted butter and cocoa to be mixed together. I was so impressed by the resulting mixture that I had to take a photo!

Butter and cocoa mixture

When the prescribed 20-25 minutes in the oven had elapsed, my tin of brownie mixture still wobbled ominously when I attempted to remove it from the oven. Mindful of the recipes instruction "Do not overcook" - but at the same time wary of my oven's sometime problem with holding the correct temperature - I left the tin in for another few minutes. After this, the brownie slab seemed a bit more solid, so I took it out.

After it had cooled down a little, I mixed up the icing, thinking "Two cups of icing sugar for one 18x28cm slab of brownie?! Sounds rather ample!" There did end up being plenty of icing to splash around...

Bowl of icing

This morning the finished product looks absolutely delicious. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm sure the girls at work will like it! Hopefully it can fill the gaping hole in our Tuesday morning routine that would normally be occupied by unnecessarily in-depth DH debriefing and analysis!

The finished product
This photo is my entry in the food community's monthlyDoes My Blog Look Good In This photo competition, this month kindly hosted by Andy at Spittoon.

Thanks Niki for sharing your recipe!

Malaya Corner, Sunnybank

2005-07-02T16:22:00.000+10:00

The closest thing I've found to real Malaysian and Singaporean hawker food in Brisbane is at Malaya Corner in Sunnybank. Just reading the menu is a treat and deciding what to eat can be very challenging!

We've been to Malaya Corner a few times now, but on this occasion RJ chose the curry and roti, which looks pretty small but is actually quite substantial. I sampled some, for research purposes, and found that it was extremely delicious!

Roti and curry on funny plastic banana leaf plate.

I had the ho fun noodles (my favourite kind) with beef (my favourite meat) and ginger and shallots (one of my top ten flavour combinations). It tasted fantastic and the portion was huge! As an added bonus, the carrots were cut out into cute little shapes. My mouth is watering now just thinking about it again.

Ho fun noodles with beef and ginger and shallots

To accompany our meal we had the not-very-authentic but huge and refreshing nonetheless lemon Cokes. My other favourite thing about Malaya Corner is that the tables are made from my very favourite Laminex colour, Maize Tela! The very same that I have in my laundry! (I know that is a pretty stupid thing to get excited about, but I can't help it.)

Lemon Cokes and the Maize Tela Laminex table.

All in all, there is nothing not to love about Malaya Corner. There's plenty of delicious things to eat, the service is fine, and the prices are very reasonable. Oh! There is one small thing not to love - the accept cash only! There are no EFTPOS or credit card facilities. (Thankfully there's an ATM nearby, otherwise we might have ended up doing the dishes...)

We'll definitely be going back, so stay tuned for more updates.

Malaya Corner
Shop 38 Market Square
Corner McCullough Street and Mains Road
Sunnybank
Phone: (07) 3344 3838

The Occasional Gardener!

2005-06-30T23:22:00.000+10:00

I've decided to establish a herb patch in my back yard. I hate paying $2.50 for a bunch of herbs at Woolies, only to have most of them wilt within a couple of days.

So far I have (from the front of this photo) flat-leaf parsley, sweet basil, coriander, Greek basil, chives and Thai basil. Guess what my favourite herb is? Basil!

After I planted these herbs, it rained in Brisbane for a week so I am a very happy little gardener.

The next thing going in will be chillies. I'm going to try growing those from seed, so there won't be any hot photo opportunities for a little while yet...

Kuranda Candy Kitchen

2005-06-30T21:22:00.000+10:00

Recently I was lucky enough to find myself in quaint Kuranda, north Queensland for a day. The town is most famous for its markets, but my favourite place was the Kuranda Candy Kitchen. I smelled a sweet and delicious aroma and followed my nose to a little tiny shop where I found Ross and Judy making some wedding candy for a couple who were evidently called Jack and Shae...

Watching the candy being made was pretty amazing. Ross and Judy turned a big pile of sugary stuff into tiny candies that said Jack ♥ Shae in the middle!

Here's how it happened...

Mixing up the red and yellow sugary gooey stuff.

Stretching the mixture over big hooks - this made the finished product more shiny.

Forming the words - the letters of the happy couple's names were made out of red strips of candy, and yellow strips were used as spacers around and between the letters. That's one of the names on the left-hand side of this photo.

The names and the heart were assembled into this big log and another layer of yellow candy was rolled around the outside. The brown workbench appeared to be made of leather and had a gas barbecue underneath that kept the candy warm and pliable.

A layer of red candy was rolled around the outside of the big candy log and then Ross and Judy pulled the candy at one end to make it smaller. It was amazing! I had expected that some kind of machine did this part of the process.

Here's the candy getting really thin!

This is how it ended up. Judy whacked the candy "rope" with a metal spatula every so often to cut it into these lengths, which she then chopped into pieces about 1cm long to finish off the process.

Alas! I didn't take a photo of the finished product, but I did buy some Fruit Rock, which is made in the same way...

It's so cute! My favourites are the passionfruit and kiwifruit.

If you're lucky enough to be visiting Kuranda, I'd highly recommend dropping in to the Candy Kitchen. And to Jack and Shae, best wishes - I hope your wedding went/goes well and that you have a lifetime of happiness together! :)

Desperately Seeking Saucepan...advice

2005-06-03T08:30:00.000+10:00

With the mid-year sales having started this week, and a couple of generous gift vouchers burning a hole in my pocket, I've decided it's time to invest in some proper saucepans. But the range availabe in your average deparment store is a bit mind boggling! If I'm going to spend lots of money, I want to make sure I'm buying the right thing.

So I thought I'd put the question out there - I'll gratefully accept anyone and everyone's advice about which saucepans (and frying pans, etc) to buy or avoid...

Thanks in anticipation! :)

Kelleys Seafood Restaurant, Hobart

2005-05-26T23:30:00.000+10:00

A colleague had told RJ about this famous Hobart seafood restaurant where you have to knock on the door to be let in. Because it sounded fun and came highly recommended we made a reservation to have dinner there on our first night in Hobart. It's in a funny little backstreet up behind Salamanca Place. The walk there from where we were staying was a bit longer than we'd expected, so by the time we arrived at the mysterious door, we'd developed two very healthy appetites.

I knocked on the door using the big brass knocker and we were promptly shown inside to a cozy little table in the corner. Embracing the Tasmanian food (and beverage) scene, I got stuck into a Boags and RJ had a Cascade.

We decided to skip entrees and go straight to the main course. RJ decided to have the seafood platter and I ordered the ocean trout wrapped in prosciutto and served with polenta (although I was tempted to have the Deep Fried Selection).

My ocean trout came with a delicious salad of rocket, pear and walnuts dressed with a very "bitey" vinaigrette. Since rocket is my favourite green, I was thrilled! The rest of the dish was delicious too!

The waitress had told RJ that his seafood platter would serve "two people or one really hungry person". In the end, we were glad we didn't order it to share. All the morsels were very tasty, but there definitely wasn't enough for two main courses. The platter featured prawns, sushi, sashimi, calamari, pickled octopus, mussels, and whatever is on that skewer in the photo (I can't remember anymore!).

We'd enjoyed our mains (oh! and the beautiful complimentary homemade bread rolls) but we still weren't full, so we ordered a chocolate pudding to share. It was served with vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce. For a seafood restaurant, they do a pretty mean dessert!

The service at Kelleys was excellent, the atmosphere was cozy and the food was worth the walk!And there was just something special about knocking on the door. It felt almost like you were visiting a friend's house.

Kelleys Seafood Restaurant
5 Knopwood Street
Battery Point
Phone (03) 6224 7225

Cadbury Factory Tour, Hobart

2005-05-22T16:30:00.000+10:00

The Cadbury Factory tour is one of the big must-sees for visitors to Tasmania. So we faithfully made our booking and drove to Claremont (about 20 minutes from the Hobart CBD). Upon arriving there we were amazed to see the carpark choc-a-block! It's a very popular place!

I could barely contain my excitement! Everything there is delicious Cadbury purple, even the visitor information sign...

We went inside and paid our $12.50 each (a real bargain, I think!), took a seat, and waited for our tour guide to arrive. When she did, she told us all about how we were entering a real food production facility and that we couldn't take any jewellery, bags, cameras, phones or anything on the tour. Fair enough. I wouldn't want to find someone's yucky earring inside my Turkish Delight! Then she handed out a very fetching hair net to each person, and a "beard net" to the one gentleman who needed it.

Because of the camera (et al) ban, I don't have any photos from inside the factory. But I have the memories! At Claremont, Cadbury make their family blocks and their small chocolates (including Roses, Favourites and Freddos). Their other products (including Easter eggs) are made at other locations.

On the tour we walked around various areas of the factory and got right up close to the chocolates whizzing around.

We learned, and saw, how chocolate is made. Apparently the secret behind really delicious smooth chocolate is a process called conching. This is where the hot liquid chocolate is mixed in huge vat type vessels for extended periods to make it nice and smooth. We also saw some of the small chocolates being made. The first were Turkish Delights. The centre jelly is poured into moulds, cools, and is tipped out onto a conveyor belt. It moves along onto a grid section where melted chocolate is splashed onto the bottom of the jelly and more melted chocolate is poured over the top to cover the jelly centre. We also saw vanilla fudge (one of the Roses collection) being coated in the same manner.

We learned lots of interesting Cadbury facts along the way:

The company was started by Quakers and has been practising job rotation for over 100 years. (Apparently Quakers were early adopters of staff welfare principals.) Staff doing routine work like packing chocolates into cartons will only work at each station for 30 minutes before moving onto another task.
The factory's waste ratio is only 2%. This is largely because if plain chocolate products (eg: Dairy Milk family blocks) are produced out of specification (eg: underweight or broken) they are melted down and re-moulded.
Roses are wrapped at a mind-boggling rate of 500 per minute.

After the tour finished, we got our belongings back and were let loose in the chocolate shop! Our best purchase was a 5kg box of seconds for $35. At $7/kg, I think this represents excellent value - cheaper than many fruits and vegetables, even! We also bought lots of goodies at the souvenir shop (where everything is purple!), include a Cadbury stubbie cooler for my mum, a Caramello Koala and Freddo Frog bib for our neighbours' new baby, and a groovy purple "green bag" for me!

Here's the 5kg of chocolates:

Here's me and my new best friend:

(Note the Cadbury-purple bench!)

The Cadbury tour was terrific fun. It was informative, interesting, delicious and really exciting. I'd highly recommend it!

PS. I had to stop and take this photo just down the road from the factory for my mum. Yes, it's a retirement village on Cadbury Road. The perfect spot for a lifelong chocoholic like my mum to retire!

Fresh Tassie Apples

2005-05-21T13:30:00.000+10:00

My significant other - RJ - and I just returned from our honeymoon in Tasmania. So I've got plenty of material for this poor neglected blog! Stay tuned, because it'll probably take me ages to get everything written and posted...

On our first day in Tassie we went for an afternoon drive from Hobart to the Tahune Airwalk. Driving down the Huon Highway we noticed lots of little stands outside people's front gates selling fresh apples, potatoes and other produce using the good old honesty box system.

So we pulled up and bought a bag of apples from this stand:

When I hopped out of the car I was surrounded by the beautiful smell of fresh apples. It was delicious! I chose the tastiest looking bag of apples, put my $2 in the honesty box, and jumped back in the car. RJ and I each ate an apple straight away, and we agreed that they were the crunchiest and most delicious apples we've ever sunk our teeth into!

There were 12 apples in the bag, and they were all delicious!

Corn on the cob

2005-04-16T09:55:00.000+10:00

I was going to make a corny joke, but thought I'd better not... :)

Seriously though, what better snack is there than a couple of cobs of sweet corn with lots of butter and salt?

Edmonds and the Banana Loaf

2005-04-09T11:11:00.000+10:00

I'd enthusiastically bought a bunch of bananas for smoothies that never got made, so I decided to try my hand at making some banana bread. I consulted all my recipe books to find a recipe that fulfilled my two main requirements: using up lots of over-ripe bananas and baking in a loaf tin (because I don't own any round cake tins right now!).

I settled on the Banana Loaf recipe from the delightfully retro Edmonds Cookery Book. This book is a New Zealand icon and - even though I'm not a Kiwi - I love it! I grew up using my mum's old copy that she'd bought way back in the old days when she'd lived in NZ for a while. They she brought me back my very own 37th edition copy when she went across the ditch for a holiday in 1996.

Edmonds has all the basics, including Boiled Eggs (page 81). This saves me phoning my mum the one time each year that I decide to boil an egg to ask her how long to cook it for! It's also got a groovy chapter of International Dishes, with things like Beef Stroganoff (Russia), Nachos (Mexico) and Pizza (Italy), which is good for a laugh given that these dishes are hardly considered "international" or exotic anymore.

Anyway, back to the Banana Loaf... It was fairly quick and easy to whip up, and it tasted fantastic!

Just out of the oven!

Up close and personal

About to tuck in!

It was delicious! My beloved rated it so highly that since then he has developed a habit of letting our bananas get over-ripe every week, so I can to make this banana loaf again...

Entrée - some cool food words

2005-03-12T10:30:00.000+10:00

To launch my new blog, I thought I'd share these five food-related words that I learned recently from the A.Word.A.Day newsletter.

ebrious (EE-bree-uhs) adjective
1. Inclined to excessive drinking.
2. Tipsy.

[From Latin ebrius (drunk). Two cousins of this word are inebriated and sobriety.]

sitophobia

(sy-tuh-FO-bee-uh) noun
Morbid aversion to food.

[From Greek sito- (food) + -phobia (fear, aversion).]

The word is also spelled as sitiophobia. Two related words are sitomania (abnormal craving for food), and sitology (the study of nutrition).

polyphagia (pol-ee-FAY-jee-uh) noun
1. Excessive appetite or eating.
2. The habit of feeding on many kinds of food.

[From Modern Latin, from Greek polyphagia, from polyphagos,from poly- (much, many) + phagy (eating).]

bibacious (by-BAY-shuhs) adjective
Overly fond of drinking.

[From Latin bibere (to drink).]

postprandial (post-PRAN-dee-uhl) adjective
After a meal, especially dinner.

[From Latin post- (after) + prandium (meal). Ultimately from Indo-European root ed- (to eat or to bite) that has given otherwords such as edible, comestible, obese, etch, and fret.]

Two siblings of this word are preprandial (before a meal) and prandial (relating to a meal).