Gourmet Inspired Food Blog

A very spa-ducken Christmas - the result

2011-12-28T13:42:00.003+11:00

The final verdict, spa-ducken is tasty.

It was a good feat, even though the final glaze turned out a little bit burnt but the rest was 100% fine. Definitely a great experience, but probably not something we'll try again - even though my boyfriend's brother, who is in charge of hosting Christmas next year suggested I bring the main. Yeah, right.

So happy holidays all and see you in the new year. Here's to a delightful and delicious 2012.

Spa-ducken

Spatchcock, deboned completely
Medium sized chicken, deboned completely
Medium sized duck, deboned with wings and legs in place
Sticky rice and chinese sausage stuffing
1/2 bunch thyme
Few sprigs of oregano
Salt/pepper
Rice wine and stock for roasting

Pre-heat oven to 160 degrees.

Start with the duck laid out flat skin down. Spoon a liberal amount of stuffing on meat and spread evenly.

Place chicken on top skin side down and repeat with stuffing. For the final spatchcock layer, I put in thyme and oregano.

Carefully wrap the birds around each other, trimming the meat that doesn't fit. (who knew chicken breasts were si large???) Secure the final wrapped birds with twine and toothpicks to close the opening.

Lay in roasting tray skin side up. Garnish with vegetables. Pour rice wine and stock over the top. Cover and place in oven.

Roast for 3.5 hours, removing the foul for the last 30 minutes and bringing the. Temperature up to 200 degrees. You can glaze with soy, oyster sauce and honey if you wish. Rest for 20 minutes before serving.

Before glazing bit blurry

It is a very spa-ducken Christmas - pt 2

2011-12-24T17:08:00.007+11:00

Ah Christmas Eve. Where shoppers leap for the last sprig of rosemary and fret with traditional pre-Christmas spirit over the misplaced shopping list left forgotten in a supermarket aisle.

Meanwhile, in our little flat, the very spa-ducken Christmas is well on its way.

But first, to get into the spirit of the season, some festive decorations.

And in preparation for the cooking of the great feast the birds are deboned.

And the stuffing prepared.

As you can see I'm taking a bit of an Asian twist using my favourite staple, sticky rice and Chinese sausage.

Tomorrow the cooking and feasting.

Merry Christmas everyone! We'll be posting the final spa-ducken results after the holidays. In the meantime to all a good night.

A very spa-ducken Christmas - pt 1

2011-11-21T20:20:00.005+11:00

It's going to be a spa-ducken Christmas! That's right, spa-ducken!

Let me explain. We're hosting Christmas this year for 7. While I love cooking our house doesn't really have room for big dinner parties, but since it's family, they can deal with the tight squeeze.

I've always wanted to try to make a turducken, ever since I first read about it in Jeffrey Steingarten's book. If you haven't read It Must've Been Something I Ate, it's a must read fir any adventurous foodie.

Only problem with the infamous turducken (for the uninitiated, it's the chicken stuffed in a duck stuffed in. A turkey) is that it feeds 16-18! Even with my partner's brother and brother-in-law who could eat for 3 each, we'd still have way too much meat.

So jnstead we're trying the spa-ducken, that is a spatchcock stuffed in a chicken stuffed in a duck. Should be a much more manageable size.

So...we're going to need some practice runs especially with the deboning of things. So 34 days until Christmas....

First up deboning the spatchcock. This was surprisingly okay with a sharp paring knife and some good YouTube instructions - I even managed to get some of the wing meat out.

Since it was a trial, it turned into dinner with some herbs, olive oil and some thyme.

Have you any Christmas dinner tips? Especially in the poultry department?

Salt baked crusted spatchcock

2011-10-23T09:24:00.006+11:00

Yum - great salty goodness. I've never actually made a spatchcock before but it didn't really seem like it would be that different to chicken. Make the crust as below and ensure to completely enclose the poultry with no gaps or holes. I left it in 200 degree celsius oven for about 45 minutes and let it rest for about 5 more.

The sides are steamed sticky rice with chinese sausage and shitake mushrooms with some steamed chinese broccoli.

Crust:

1 1/4 cup rock salt crushed with mortar and pestle
2 cups flour
1/2 cup chopped fresh thyme
Couple of sprigs rosemary leaves stripped from stalks
2 egg whites
200 ml of water

PS oh yeah - In case it's not obvious, DON'T EAT THE CRUST!!! :D

Bourke st bakery Flourless chocolate cake

2011-08-21T21:26:00.003+10:00

260 g dark chocolate
135 ml milk
40 g yoghurt
4 eggs
105 g caster sugar for eggs
4 egg whites
160 g caster sugar for egg whites
135 ml pouring cream
55 g unsweetened cocoa powder, sifted

Preheat oven to 150 degrees. Grease 20 cm spring form pan and line base with baking paper. Paper should protrude 2.5 cm over edge of tin

Put the chocolate in a large stainless steel bowl and set over saucepan of simmering water to melt. Boil water for 2 minutes and stir chocolate to melt.
Put milk and yoghurt in saucepan over medium high heat and bring to boil. Turn off the heat, mixture should be curdled milk.
In a separate bowl, Whisk eggs and caster sugar for about 10 minutes. Mixture should be light and nearly double in volume.

Whisk egg whites in very clean bowl to soft peaks. Add sugar for the whites and whisk into shiny meringue. Don't over whisk. Place in fridge.

Whisk cream into soft peaks and place in fridge.

Next, you will need all of the components ready to fold together, the melted chocolate, curdled milk, eggs, meringue, whipped cream and cocoa powder. Pour curdled milk into chocolate and fold and then add cocoa - whisk well until fully incorporated. Fold in whipped eggs in 3 batches, making sure first batch is fully incorporated before adding more. Lightly fold meringue into whipped cream. Fold this mixture into the chocolate mix in 3 batches making sure you fully incorporate the first batch before adding more.

Using spatula, scoop batter into prepared tin and tap on bench to even out the mix. Bake for 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 30 minutes. Do not disturb the cake cooking for the first 45 minutes. After that, rotate to ensure even cooking. You can cover top of cake with baking paper and lower temperature if the top is starting to brown. Check if cooked by placing hand and on top to feel if it mix is set through. Let cool 30 minutes before serving. Serve with sharp knife that had been warmed in hot water and clean blade completely between cuts.

Image credit

Masterchef - Gary's Blackforest Cake & why do you cook?

2011-02-15T09:11:00.000+11:00

I've been meaning to try this out for some time now - and with quite a bit of stress over the past couple of weeks, I figured the best thing to do to de-stress over the weekend was to make a cake. :)

For me, cooking and baking is a way to deal with stress. Because it's so unlike anything else I do in my day to day - and it requires the utmost concentration, it really helps to reboot my brain and relieve stress. Back in 2001, when 9/11 happened, I wasn't in New York at the time as I was in college. The whole thing was so mind numbing and impossible to take in, I ended up making pasta alfredo for everyone to give me something to mentally cope. (Mind you, it tasted absolutely horrendous.)

Gary's Blackforest cake

http://www.masterchef.com.au/black-forest-cake.htm

While the recipe is quite complex and involves quite a number of techniques and creations, the whole thing wasn't actually that bad. As you can tell, I didn't end up with the 5 tier cake like the one on the show simply because it was too late to try and make a second sponge cake (I only had 1 springform pan) and I hadn't bought enough marscapone cheese. Plus, when we served it up, most people had already eaten dessert anyway, so it was probably a good thing that it was a little smaller in size.

Yummo.

Why do you cook? What hobbies help you destress?

Five Spice Bacon Salad

2011-02-11T18:47:00.001+11:00

Five spice pork is a lovely traditional chinese dish - the sweet and savoury taste of the five spice seasoning goes lovely with natural richness and juiciness of pork chops...

And bacon. :)

With summer well and truly here, salads have been the most appetising and easiest simple dinner option to enjoy - but it's been important to keep salads interesting, and filling. This salad is exceptionally light, but the addition of the bacon (and even the little bit of bacon grease!) makes it a hearty dinner option. Serve with a little bit of rice for an even more filling option.

Five Spice Bacon Salad

Ingredients:

6 slices of middle bacon
2 tbs chinese five spice
30 g snow pea sprouts
150 gram mixed lettuce
1 ya pear cut into thin slices

Cut bacon into sizable chunks (but not small bits for now) - I usually stack the slices on top of each other and cut through. Coat the "chunks" liberally with five spice seasoning.

In a heated pan, bring the coated bacon to a sizzle. Let cook for about 6 minutes, just until the bacon cooks through without becoming too crispy. Save the grease to drizzle lightly over the salad, if desired.

Remove from pan and cut into bite size pieces. Toss together lettuce, snow pea sprouts and pear slices with the bacon pieces. Drizzle remaining bacon grease into salad (definitely tasty but not the heart healthy option - I also realise that I'm watching the Biggest Loser while I write this, so maybe NOT the most responsible recommendation I can make). Otherwise, you can dress with a light soy and some sesame oil.

Serve over rice for a nice hearty dinner option. (that still counts as "salad").

Avocado Pesto

2011-02-06T18:24:00.002+11:00

Mmmm - avocado, what an amazing and versatile fruit. Great on toast with a sprinkle of S&P and an absolute must have for any sushi lover.

With the incredible heat in Sydney this past week, it's been a real challenge to whip up dinner after work - the last thing you want to do in the 40 degree heat in a non-airconditioned apartment is turn on the stove!

This lovely pesto went perfectly with a simple salad of spinach leaves, roma tomatoes, barbecue chook and spanish onion - and no cooking required!

Finally, the cool change is here. Personally, I'm pretty done with summer!

--

Avocado Pesto

Ingredients:

1 bunch basil
2 small garlic cloves
1 avocado
salt and pepper to taste
1/3 cup olive oil

Pick just the leaves from the bunch of basil. In a food processor, pulse basil leaves with garlic. Use a stick mixer to puree avocado and basil, garlic mix while slowly adding the oil in a steady stream until the mixture is smooth. Salt and pepper to taste.

Great for leafy summer salads - and works well with cold pasta salads as well.

A delectably delicious new year - chocolate crusted lemon tart

2011-01-02T17:45:00.000+11:00

My friend went to New Zealand and the Cadbury factory last month and came back with the Green and Black's chocolate cookbook - lotsa awesome recipes including this one for a divine lemon tart. Definitely a holiday hit.

This year, I hope I'll be able to include more about the foodie community. There are so many great food bloggers out there, especially here in Sydney and I would love to become more involved with it. Hopefully that also means I get myself off my lazy butt and blog more!

Have a very happy new year everyone and here's to a delectably delicious 2011!

http://www.greenandblacks.com/ca/recipes/online-recipes/green-and-blacks-chocolate-crusted-lemon-tart.html

What's your comfort food? (and Har Gow Recipe)

2010-10-18T18:11:00.007+11:00

Mac and cheese, lasagne, chicken noodle soup, casserole - we all have our comfort foods. Most of them will probably stem from our childhood and our fondest memories - when mum tucked us in with a blanket in front of the TV and served up a piping hot bowl of tomato soup with our fav cartoons.

Being asian, a lot of my comfort food is chinese - although when I was sick, my mum usually gave me a bowl of some sticky black bitter herbal concoction that was supposed to make me better. Much worse than cherry cough syrup. Anyway, my point is that a lot of my "comfort" foods come from comforting routines my family had established. Because my dad worked in a restaurant I didn't get to spend weekends with him when I was in school - but during school holidays we always went out for lunch, usually to some chinese noodle place where I would always order roast pork and wonton noodle soup. Or we would go to yum cha and I always had the har gow. So those are at the top of my list for "comfort food".

What's on yours?

Har gow recipe

Taken from http://www.anyrecipe.net/asian/recipes/hagow.html

Filling

300 g prawns
150 g water chestnuts minced
2 1/2 tbs corn flour
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp black bean sauce
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp sesame oil
1/4 tsp grated ginger

Wrapper
1 1/4 cup wheaten corn flour
1/2 cup tapioca flour
1 cup boiling chicken broth
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp oil

Peel and devein prawns and cut into 1 cm pieces. Mix with filling ingredients and set aside.

Mix wheaten cornflour and tapioca flour with broth and oil. Knead into dough - if it's too sticky, add more wheaten cornflour.

Break off about 1/4 of the dough and cover the rest to keep moist. Roll into a 1.5 cm thick tube then divide into eight pieces.

Roll each piece out as a flat dumpling wrapper - using a flat bottom of a pan to press down on the dough really works! Your wrapper should be round and no more than a couple of mm in thickness.

Pleat the edges of about 1/2 the circumference of the wrapper so you have a small little 1/2 cup. Traditionally, 8 pleats iis a lucky number in chinese culture. Place filling into the "cup" and fold over to form a half moon shape. Fold the corners in a little and flatten the bottom on a piece of grease paper to form the rest of your dumpling shape. Repeat with the rest of the dough.

Steam in a bamboo steamer lined with grease paper for about 7 minutes. Let sit for 3 minutes before serving.

Crab, ricotta and chive parcels

2010-09-27T21:05:00.004+10:00

So we're finally back on track with the cooking/blogging. Over the past month I've done little else except make failed batches of macarons - although I did revisit some of the old favourites including Portuguese coffee tarts and roast pork with my mum visiting for a few weeks. I did finally conquer the macarons - well, sorta. I ended up with some great tasting macarons that stayed up (instead of being flat as a coin) using a recipe from Tartelette. (Shout to to Julie Mak for the heads up - she has an awesome food blog btw that you should all check out - http://idreaminchocolate.wordpress.com)

The only thing was - that my macarons still didn't have the little feet. :(

Anyone with any more suggestions??

Meanwhile, I of course, a long with the many MasterChef fans out there - have been eagerly following the launch of the pint-sized version, Junior MasterChef. I really have to say I am amazed at how mature and inspiring these kids are when it comes to cooking. You can really see the depth of their passion - and how disciplined and process driven one has to be to achieve.

I do hope that these kids remember that every now and then - it's just as important to get into a mud pie!!

One of the little darlings had a great idea for making ravioli in wonton wrappers. "I use the wonton wrappers so the skin gets crispy," she says. (I'm paraphrasing here - sorry). But it is a great idea - and really easy! I served these with some rice noodles, coriander and sprouts with a dressing of fish sauce, lime juice and rice wine vinegar

Crab, ricotta and chive parcels (in wonton wrappers)

Ingredients:

1 cup shredded crab meat (in a pinch I used tinned crab meat)

150 grams ricotta

1/4 cup chives, finely chopped

wonton wrappers

Method:

Preheat over to 180 degrees Celsius. Mix crab meat, ricotta and chives in a bowl. Put about a heaping teaspoon of filling in the centre of a wonton wrapper and gather up the corners, using a bit of water to seal.

Line the parcels up on a greased baking tray. Bake for about 20 minutes or until edges are just about crispy.

Flat Macarons again

2010-08-07T13:51:00.006+10:00

Foodies - I'm at a loss. I tried to make the macarons again for the 2nd time. I got a new little egg beater thing to make sure I beat the eggs to peaks. And again everything seemed to be going well - in fact the little macarons were definitely rising in the oven! I have a picture to prove it!!

See? Rising macarons!!

But low and behold - when I took them out of the oven - collapse! They went back to being flat as coins (again I have a picture to prove it!)

See - FLAT macarons. :(

Any help? Advice? Suggestions? Has this happened to you? If you know anything about meringue and how it's supposed to crust over and not collapse - help would really be appreciated.

Slow cooked salmon

2010-07-27T18:43:00.001+10:00

A co-worker pointed me to this exciting concept, slow cooked salmon. The idea is to brush and bed a beautiful piece of salmon and then cook it in an oven at just around 100 degrees for 30 minutes. The result - beautiful tender and juicy salmon that is moist and flavoursome - delicious!

http://steamykitchen.com/96-tropical-island-salmon.html

We started with a brush of olive oil, salt, pepper and ground coriander. We then threw the salmon skin side down in skillet to crisp it up a bit.

For the bed, we used caramelised onions quickly sauted in a fry pan with some fine white wine and a few chunks of navel oranges. Lay the salmon, skin up, on the bed and top each fish with a slice of orange. Cook in oven at 100 degrees for 30 minutes.

Ground some macadamia nuts and chillis and roast in pan to release flavour. Mix nut mixture with some finely chopped mint. Remove salmon from oven and top with nut and mint. Serve.

Too easy!

When life gives you flat macarons - make cookies!

2010-07-20T19:11:00.000+10:00

Inspired by Adriano Zumbo's macaron tower, I really wanted to try making macarons myself. I checked a number of recipes including from Poh's kitchen. I sieved almond meal and icing sugar to grainy fineness, whipped egg whites to peaked perfection, and folded everything together to that magma like consistency that all the experts harp on about - well, given my first hand familiarity with magma.

The macarons flat as a pancake - literallly the size and thickness of a 20 cent piece.

I'm not sure what I did wrong - maybe my egg whites weren't separated early enough (I left them for the day instead of overnight) maybe my 15 year old oven can't cope with pre-heating to 200 and then turning it bakc DOWN to 160. Macarons, I'm sure, are just temperamental things that take awhile to master...

The challenge for me was what to do with the 2 cups of sensational blueberry ganache I had made for the macaron filling...

Make sugar cookies. :)

Sugar cookies with blueberry white chocolate ganache

Ingredients:

Cookies:

2.5 cups flour
1 cup butter
1.5 cups white sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tbs baking powder.

Ganache:

300 mL thick cream
1 can blueberry pie filling or 1 cup fresh blueberries
1 bar (280 g) white chocolate, chopped roughly

Method:

Start with the ganache. In a saucepan, bring cream and blueberry puree to gentle boil. Remove from heat. Stir in white chocolate and mix gently until smooth.

Spoon out mixture into large tray and let set at room temperature for one hour.

For the cookies, preheat oven to 190 degrees. Mix butter and sugar until creamy. Add egg, flour, vanilla and baking powder and work the mixture into a soft dough.

Spoon out the dough in round circles about the size of a 20 cent piece and bake for 8-10 minutes until just brown along the edges. Allow to cool.

Sandwich ganache between two cookies to finish it off!

Which potatoes should you use to make chips?

2010-07-16T12:41:00.002+10:00

So MasterChef favourite Aaron failed to make the cut for the final 6 – his downfall – the wrong potatoes.

I’m gonna be honest and say that I have no idea about different types of potatoes – I always generally assume a potato is a potato and there isn’t that much different between the different types. I’ve also never tried to make chips...

So a quick rundown on potatoes:

Russet potatoes – these are starchy potatoes with low moisture content, making them perfect for chips (sorry Aaron), baked and jacket potatoes. They produce a beautiful fluffy texture when cooked, so they’re perfect for mash. Look for them by their brw

Chat potatoes – these little cocktail potatoes are small and waxy in their texture. This makes them ideal for boiling, steaming and serving in salads as they hold their moisture and have a lovely potato flavour that is not too dry.

Larger sized white potatoes can also be used for boiling and have a similar high moisture content.

Desiree potatoes - these medium starch potatoes have a pale pink skin and are great for roasting and mashing.

The problem is that it seems if you go to Coles or Woolie’s in Australia, you seem to be limited in your potato selection with your choice of tubers being “brushed” “washed” or cocktails. The cocktail potatoes are the chat potatoes above, while potatoes generally tend to be Nadine potatoes, which like the chats, are of a higher moisture content. If you can find them, desiree potatoes will probably be your most likely candidate for higher starch content.

The Perfect Man spruiks the perfect cheese - Parmesan!

2010-07-05T19:05:00.008+10:00

If you live in Australia, you've probably seen the Perfect Italiano advertisements featuring the Perfect Man - he's sensitive, athletic and a great cook to boot. I especially love the part where he looks into the camera and says "And when there is no woman to listen to, I practice my listening face."

Pretty hilarious!

Anyway, the Perfect Man has got the right idea about what I have come to think is one of the world's most perfect cheeses: parmesan!

I had two good experiments with parmesan recently. The first was parmesan carrots. A fairly simple dish, made with Dutch carrots and fresh breadcrumbs. I usually don't like carrots but parmesan and breadcrumbs really makes everything delicious.

The second was a really simple idea - parmesan crisps! All you need is parmesan - and you're in cheese heaven!

Here are the two ideas below!

Parmesan Carrots

Ingredients
1 bunch dutch carrots - stalks trimmed (approx 500 g)
2 cups fresh bread crumbs
2 tbs seasoning - I used middle eastern
1/3 cup freshly chopped parsley
1/2 tsp chili flakes
2 tbs freshly grated parmesan
zest of 1 lemon
Flour for dusting (approx 6 tbs)
2 eggs beaten
Oil for frying

Method

Wash carrots thoroughly and allow to dry.

In a large bowl, mix together bread crumbs, seasoning, parsley, parmesan, chili flakes and zest. Lay out the flour and the eggs in separate bowls.

Dip the carrots first in the flour to coat, then in the egg and finally in the breadcrumbs - ensure they are well coated.

Use about 2 cups of oil in a fry pan, enough to create a shallow layer of oil. Heat to frying temperatures and lay out the carrots. Shallow fry on both sides until golden brown. Serve with aioli mayonnaise.

Aioli tip: You should try and make mayo from scratch but if you're short on time, mix 1 tsp minced garlic with 3 tbs store bought mayo. Mix well.

Parmesan Chips

This is way too delicious and too simple not to try! They are perfect accompaniment to a light cream soup.

Ingredients:

2/3 cup grated parmesan cheese (or as much as you want to make!)

Method

Preheat oven to 190 - 200 degrees Celsius. Lay out a couple of sheets of baking paper on a tray.

Place egg rings on to the paper and layer grated parmesan in each, spreading evenly. Each ring should have about a thick (1 - 2 mm) layer of cheese. If you space your circles out, you can remove the rings for a more "lacy" look.

Place the parmesan rings into the oven and bake for about 5-8 minutes or until a crisp golden brown. Remove from oven, let cool and remove your beautiful, delicious parmesan crisps!

What delicious recipes do you know with cheese?

MasterChef, Jamie Oliver and Dressing the board

2010-06-26T14:03:00.002+10:00

As many of you are probably aware, I live in Australia and am a big big fan of Australian reality show, MasterChef. Amateur cooks compete in these amazing challenges recreating siganture dishes from some of the world's biggest culinary icons - Matt Moran, Kylie Kwong, Neil Perry - and at the end one is left standing to be named the MasterChef and gets a publishing deal, money and prestige. Anyway if you haven't seen it - you should - the eps are here - http://www.masterchef.com.au

Anyhow, this week, the show's being filmed in London, home to some of the biggest cooking names around - including of course, Jamie Oliver. I've seen his shows, read about his philanthropic work - he was showcased in a cover story I had worked on at my old job. To see this guy doing his thing on ANOTHER show though I one he's not the producer of - was actually quite phenomenal. You can see Jamie is the real deal, passionate - bursting with energy - completely eccentric and running at 50 million miles a minute!

One of the interesting concepts he presented was a new way to cook steak - he called it "dressing the board" - quite a simple concept but really brought out some fresh new flavours. Here's what we tried:

Ingredients:

1 thick juicy 200 g sirloin steak
3 tbs mint, finely chopped
2 small chilis finely chopped
1 tsp mince garlic
2 tbs olive oil
1 tbs balsamic vinegar

Large wood chopping board

Method:

Cook the steak in a pan as desired. While the steak is cooking prepare your dressing ingredients and mix the mint and chili well on the board. Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic and stir through. When the steak is cooked take it straight out the pan, place it on the board with your dressing and coat liberally. As the steak starts to cool and seal off, it'll take on the flavours of the board - so you have a well flavoured piece of gorgeous and juicy steak - without the typical burning of the marinade! Genius!

Lobster ravioli

2010-06-15T17:03:00.000+10:00

After watching so much MasterChef I've come to realise that I am missing a lot of the basics when it comes to my cooking arsenal. I can make rice - and I know how to make pastry - but these guys are doing things like making pasta from scratch, or knowing exactly which herbs and spices are missing in a korma (I don't even think I can name 3 spices that go in a korma - let alone identify the taste of 5 missing ones.) In order to be a good cook, its important to know about the basics - like making pasta or rice.

So here we go - making pasta from scratch. I got some frozen lobster tail from the fish markets for the filling - you can't seem to find fresh live lobster like I can in ny. One of my clearesy early cooking memories is watching my dad chop up live lobster - he's chinese so he doesn't bother with the boiling it alive first. He just hacks it up to pieces and the grey matter inside the bits of shell twitch for awhile long after the thing's dead. Quite fascinating really - but probably not something I could stomach to do on my own - I'll get the frozen bits thank you.

Ingredients:

Pasta:
2 cups flour
3 eggs

Filling:
200 g cooked lobster meat shredded
200 g fresh ricotta
1 cup diced shallots
1 tbs sesame oil
Salt and pepper to taste

Sauce:
150 g tomato paste
1/2 onion diced
100 mL cream
1 tbs dried basil
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

Put flour and eggs in a food processor and pulse until combined. Scoop out dough and knead on the bench until it forms a tight smooth ball. Cover with glad wrap and let rest for 30 minutes. You can prepare the filling ingredients during this time.

Combine lobster, ricotta, shallots and oil in a large bowl and mix well. Set aside for stuffing the ravioli.

Roll out about 1/2 of your pasta dough to a 1.5 cm thick rectangle. Normally, to get the right thickness and consistency, you would pass this through a pasta maker a few times to flatten the dough. I, of course, do not own a pasta maker to I did my best with a rolling pin. Fold the ends up into the middle, turn 90 degrees and roll flat. Repeat about 6 times.

In the case for ravioli, the rolling pin can work because you can cut the dough into smaller pieces and rollit quite thin, essentially each raviolo piece out one at a time. You would definitely need a proper pasta maker for anything long, such as fettucine, linguine or lasagna sheets. Hang your pasta out to dry over the back of a chair or an aluminium covered clothes drying rack.

Extract the white of 1 egg to close your ravioli. Cut circles out of each piece of pasta and pile lobster filling in the middle. Brush the edges of each ravioli with egg wash and seal with fingers.

Boil a large saucepan of water to cook pasta. While you're waiting you can start making your sauce. Brown onion in a fry pan, add basil, tomato sauce and cream and about 100 mL of water. Let simmer to reduce sauce.

Cook your pasta in salted boiling water for about 5 minutes. Serve imnmediately with sauce.

Rainy days and prawn soup

2010-05-30T13:28:00.005+10:00

It's been raining quite a bit in Sydney - and unfortunately Sydney, or maybe Australia in general isn't really well equipped for rain. There aren't pubs with warm fires to cosy up to or warm grog to drink. NY, Japan - these other places seem to lend themselves to some sort of winter entertainment - here girls are still hitting the cross in mini skirts.

We were at the fish shops thinking about making mussels but they were all out. I caught sight of some fresh green king prawns with heads still attached. I remember my dad has always said that when it comes to seafood, the heads are the sweetest part of a crustacean. Being cold and rainy, I thought it would be the perfect time to try and make a warming seafood soup.

--
Ingredients:
500 g green prawns, unpeeled with heads attached
1 large ling fillet, cut into pieces
250 mL fish stock
1 cup white wine
water, as needed
1 tin diced tomatoes
4 cloves garlic - peeled crushed
2 small garlic shoots
1 red onion chopped
1 tbs grated ginger
1/2 red capsicum chopped
150 g enoki mushrooms
1 tomato diced
1 bay leaf
1 small tin sardines in olive oil - DO NOT STRAIN
salt to taste
coriander to taste

Method:

In a large pot, add the fish stock and garlic and bring to boil.

Separate the prawn heads from the bodies. Leave the bodies to shell and devein later, add the prawn heads to your stock and bring to boil. Add onions, tin tomaties, garlic shoots, bay leaf, ginger, white wine and oil from the tin of sardines. (I served the sardines as finger food with some red capsicum dip and water thins). Allow to simmer for 30 minutes, adding water and liquid as needed. You can shell and devein your prawns and prepare your other ingredients during this time.

Remove the soup stock from the heat and strain. Return liquid to stove over a medium flame and add diced fresh tomatoes, capsicum and enoki mushrooms. Let simmer for 5 minutes or until capsicum is soft. Add ling pieces and prawns and continue to simmer until fish and prawn meat are cooked through (2-3 minutes). Serve with coriander and salt to taste.

For an extra bit of kick - add a few slices of fresh ginger to the strained soup. I would also consider sauteeing the prawns separately in garlic and serving over the soup instead of cooking it in the stock.

Homemade gnocchi with garganzola spinach sauce

2010-05-17T20:41:00.002+10:00

Garganzola is an amazing cheese - succulent and packed with taste. We had some great homemade gnocchi at il baretto last week - again a great italian joint in Surry Hills. It came with a delightful garganzola sauce. In this version, I've spruced up the sauce with a bit of spinach for colour.

Ingredients:

1 kg potatoes, washed but not peeled
1 egg
250 mL flour plus more to flour surface
2 tbs grated parmesan
Pinch of salt

Sauce:
125 g garganzola cheese
1/2 cup milk
20 g butter
100 mL cream
100 g spinach, chopped
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

To make the gnocchi:
Place the potatoes in a saucepan with cold water and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 30 minutes until the potatoes are cooked. Insert a skewer to test.

Peel the potatoes and mash well - I used a stick blender. Combine with flour, egg and cheese and mix well.

Flour surface and lay out small amount of potato dough. Carefully roll in flour to create a 1.5 cm roll. Cut into 1 cm pieces and lay out on a baking sheet. Continue with the rest of the potato dough, then set aside. Put a saucepan with water on the range to boil while you make the sauce.

To make the sauce:
In a large frying pan, combine garganzola, milk and butter until creamy. Reduce heat and add cream and spinach and simmer for 5 minutes.

While the sauce is simmering and once the water boiling, you're ready to cook the gnocchi. I cooked it in small batches, adding about 10 pieces at a time. Scoop them out as soon as they start floating - think of it as rescuing survivors from a ship wreck (ok - maybe that's just me. =P)

Stir the gnocchi through the garganzola sauce and serve immediately.

Curry Mussels

2010-05-16T15:31:00.003+10:00

This particular dish is inspired by Luke Nguyen from Red Lantern in Surry Hills. I have always loved mussels - the meat is so sweet, juicy and succulent and the local mussels in Sydney are always plump and beautiful. You could - and probably should - make your own curry paste with chilli and shrimp paste etc. But in a pinch, the red thai curry paste from coles (get the paste not the sauce form) will do well. This is a superb winter dish.

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Ingredients:

1 kg fresh mussels
1/2 stick lemon grass - cut in 3
250 mL coconut milk
155 mL coconut cream
2 tbs thai red curry paste (add more to taste)
2 bunch baby bok choy chopped
1 chilli - chopped
2 cloves garlic - minced
Fresh parsley to taste
1/2 cup chicken stock
2 cups cooked rice for serving

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Method:

In a large wok or sauce pan, fry the garlic to release the aroma. Add stock and bring to a simmer.

Add curry paste, baby bok choy, chilli and lemon grass and let simmer 3-4 minutes. Add coconut milk and cream and bring to boil. Reduce heat.

Add mussels and cover. Cook for about 10 minutes. Mussels should just be starting to open. Add sprouts and let cook for additional 3 minutes until all of the mussels have opened. Remove from heat.

Dress with fresh parsley and stir through. Serve in bowls over fluffy cooked rice.

Master Chef Inspired Pavlova

2010-05-15T12:31:00.003+10:00

Marshmallowy Goodness.

For Anzac Day - I decided to try and make a Pavlova, having seen Donna Hay's recipe on Masterchef. I mean what better way to celebrate a great Australian public holiday than with a great Australian dessert?

The only problem - small tiny problem - was that I didn't own a beater. And when I saw those dreaded instructions: "whip egg whites to glossy, satiny peaks" I knew I was in trouble.

About 30 minutes of hard core whipping later - I had my glossy peaks and my pavlova in the oven. Feeling quite proud of myself, I went on to read about the topping.

"300 mL cream, well whipped"

Crap.

(turned out okay, but definitely investing the $30 in a mixer!)

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Ingredients:

4 egg whites
300 g caster sugar
1 tsp vinegar
3 tbs corn flour
1 tsp vanilla
-- and if you don't have a mixer - a fork and some strong forearms!

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Lay out a piece of baking paper on a baking tray and draw a 20 cm circle, if desired.

Whip egg whites until soft peaks form. Slowly sift in sugar and continue beating until the peaks are stiff and satiny. Mix in corn flour. Fold vanilla and vinegar into the mixture.

Mound your mixture into the centre of your baking paper and bake for 25 minutes. Turn off the oven and allow pavolova to cool in the oven.

For the topping, use about 300 ml of well whipped cream and seasonal berries, kiwis, passionfruit etc.

Croquembouche!

2010-04-26T09:11:00.009+10:00

Over Easter long weekend, I finally managed to tackle it - the elusive croquembouche. I started at about 1 pm (this time without a dinner party or non-cooks trying to tell me what to do going on in the background). Four hours, eight eggs and a burnt sauce pan later (which I managed to scrub out - whew) - I had it - a 2 foot tall croquembouche!

A croquembouche is essentially puff pastries (or choux pastries in the book), filled with custard then stacked into a tall cone shape held together by rich thick caramel. Event croquembouches use about 100 puffs and are about 3-4 ft tall. You can rent or buy a croquembouche cone from a catering shop to get the cone shape. Or you can do what I did - rolled up some newspaper into a cone and line it with baking paper.

It took about 40 choux patries (many of which were quite flat and not very well puffed, but they were okay once I turned them on their sides). Though on the small side - the results were certainly delicious!

One word of warning though, choux pastry and caramel do NOT keep in the fridge. We put 1/2 our croquembouche in the fridge thinking we could save it for later (there were only three of us that night as I was afraid of another eminent disaster). Unfortunately, I discovered the next day a gooey sticky pile of pastry with runny caramel on top. Very not cool.

(will post ingredients and methods soon!)
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Squid and Baby Bok Choy

2010-03-19T12:37:00.002+11:00

This brings back memories – the perfect home cooked dish. When I was growing up, my dad worked in a Chinese restaurant as a chef and like most Chinese restaurant workers he worked six days a week. Wednesdays were his usual days off, and because my mother wasn’t really the best of cooks – my dad would still cook us dinner on his day off. He’d dish up steamed fish, blanched veggies – and then an extra something, sometimes barbecue pork, sometimes a stir fry – whatever it was, it was always delicious.

This was a classic Dad dish. He’d do this really cool thing and gently slice a cross hatch pattern into the larger squid pieces. This helped them cook and let them naturally curl into themselves, plus they looked really cool.

Ingredients:

1 large squid – in Australia, squids seem to be extra large, while in the states I only saw small ones. Either ways you want about 400 grams

3 small baby bok choy – cleaned and roughly chopped

Oyster sauce to taste

1 tbs sugar

Salt to taste

3 cloves of garlic – finely minced

Oil to stir fry

4 small slices of ginger

Method:

Clean the squide. You’ll want to remove head with the tentacles attached, but while you’ll want to cut off the tentacles and cook those as well. (Be sure you remove the hard mouth!) Empty and clean the insides, being sure to remove the cartilage that acts as the spine of the animal. Peel back the purplish skin so you’re left with the white meat.

Cut into chunks and sizable slices. Cross hatch each slice but cutting first across and then up and down, but don’t slice all the way through.

Heat about 2 tbs of oil in a wok. Add the garlic and fry in the oil for about a minute to release the flavours. Add squid pieces and ginger and fry for about 2 minutes. Cover and let cook for about 5 minutes.

Add the baby bok choy and stir through. Add about 3 tbs of oyster sauce (depending on taste) and sugar and salt. Mix thoroughly, cover and cook for an addition 2 minutes.

Squid Ink Pasta with Oyster Mushrooms

2010-02-07T07:54:00.009+11:00

One of the beauties of making pasta is that you really don't need to worry too much about proportions and measurements. By having a general understanding of cooking (ie knowing things like a pinch of garlic goes a long way) you can really just throw everything together however much you have!

I came across a book the other day, called "Relaxed Eating" - food from a bowl. Pasta is definitely one of those foods where you can feel good about indulging in a hearty serving straight from the bowl.

Here's our recipe for a delicious squid ink pasta dish (note the lack of measurements. Just throw it altogether):
Ingredients

Pre made Squid Ink Pasta (you can make your own if you're feeling daring!)
Semi dried tomatoes
Oyster mushrooms (cut into hearty chunks)
Anchovies (anchovies are strong so we just added about 1 small jar)
Minced Garlic
Chilli (Our first chilli harvested from our chilli plant!)
Olive oil (plenty of it)
Oregano - finely chopped
Method

Boil the pasta to cook and drain. In a medium sauce pan add the oil and garlic and chili and saute to release the flavours. Add mushrooms and semi dried tomatoes and saute for about 1-2 minutes to soften

Add pasta and stir through to combine well. Stir through the anchovies and oregano so that they break completely apart and the pasta is evenly coated. Serve in large bowls for a relaxed meal.

Eataholics - what's your food phobia?

2010-02-03T22:50:00.005+11:00

Been watching the ABC documentary about Eataholics - guys who have eaten nothing but chips for 20 years. Or a guy who has lived on a diet entirely of chips and beans, and doesn't even chew his food.

We all have our food phobias - and weaknesses. I'm Asian and absolutely love noodles - especially the instant kind. When I was younger, my parents wouldn't let me eat them because of their MSG...sometimes, my dad would let me have ONE single noodle out of his bowl. So to date, even though I know it's bad for me, and they actually taste pretty awful at times, I still find myself craving them. I guess it's like a comfort food - like mac and cheese.

Meanwhile, I'm not really a huge fan of chips and fried foods. Nor chocolate for that matter. Which I guess makes me pretty odd -especially the chocolate part.

Anyways, I'd love to hear what other comfort foods and food phobias people have. Leave a note - let me know! (Let me know if I can create something out of it...)

Chocolate AND cheese cake

2010-01-20T22:54:00.003+11:00

Seriously, two of my favourite desserts - in ONE! I saw these lil chocolate cheesecake cupcakes at this patisserie near work and thought, wow! What a concept! I figured I'd give them a go for my boyfriend's birthday.

The tricky part was trying to figure out how to bake the cake for long enough but then be able to add the cheesecake in the middle...my flatmate suggested baking paper, which totally did the trick. I tried to put some rice in the middle to weigh it down, but it just ended up rising with the cake.

However, in the end (little bit of Physics here...) because the cheesecake is denser than the chocolate, it held its own so the cake just rose around it. And I have to say...it was indulgently good!
Gourmet Inspired Tip: I was short on time so I cheated and bought cake mix. I'm sure your favourite choc cake recipe will work just as well. Or you can try and mix up the flavours? Do an orange cake with chocolate cheese filling? Hmmm...combinations are pretty much endless!

Ingredients:

Chocolate cake batter: here's a good one from Nigella that should work. I would just make enough batter for one 8 in cake tin and skip the frosting. Or if you're lazy, buy a mix!

For cheesecake filling:

250 g cream cheese
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 tbs lemon juice
1 tbs vanilla
20ish Blueberries

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Make the batter per instructions and pour into a round, greased 8 in cake pan.

Lay a sheet of baking paper across the surface, gently pushing down in the centre so that the paper sticks to the batter, but don't push the paper all the way to the edges of the pan. You want the edges of the cake to rise and a crust to form while the paper keeps the middle gooey.

Bake pan for 15-20 minutes.

While the cake is baking, gently fold the cream cheese into the sugar and the egg until smooth. Add lemon juice, vanilla and most of the blueberries and whip quickly until well mixed and the blue berries are just starting to break apart.

Remove the cake (but leave the oven on!) and gently remove the baking paper from the centre of the cake. The sides of the cake should just beginning to set while middle should still gooey without a crust. Carefully spoon your cheesecake mix into the middle of the cake, using the back of a wooden spoon to evenly distribute it into a general roundish shape. Don't worry if batter spills over the sides of the developing crust. Top cheesecake centre with remaining blueberries.

Put the cake back into the oven and bake for another 25 minutes until the cake part is cooked all the way through and toothpick comes out clean. The cheesecake part should be firm and not runny and little brown peaks should just be starting to form. Turn off the oven and cool the cake in the oven with the door ajar for about 2-3 minutes. Remove, let cool completely and serve.

No fresh ingredients challenge - Tins and frozen veg can make a meal

2010-01-14T23:36:00.006+11:00

So over the holidays, I ran into a strange Boxing Day dilemma. After a Christmas of ham and pastry, I was hankering for some homemade veggie soup. Specifically, I was looking to make a potato and leek soup, Only problem was, it being Boxing Day, every single fresh fruit and veg shop in Newtown was closed. Instead of succumbing to the easy Take Away option - Addison's on Erskineville Rd was still open - we hit the local "supermarket", aka glorified convenience store, to check our options.

Here's what we came back with:

1 tin whole champignon mushrooms
1 tin Mini taters with a hint of mint
1 pack frozen spinach
1 small carton of pure cream
1 stick salted butter
Approx. 300 ml chicken stock

And from this, with a bit of spices and herbs, we proceeded to make a very green but surprisingly tasty, cream of potato and spinach soup! :D How's that for a Boxing Day Feast?

Gourmet Inspired Tip: Nutmeg! Seriously - discovery of 2009. The flavour of the spinach was a bit to powerful and it wasn't quite complementing the cream the way I was hoping. Thanks Anthony Bourdain's potato and leek recipe, I added a bit of nutmeg to really tie everything together.

Ingredients:

To the above list I added:

1 tbs chilli flakes
1 tbs nutmeg

Method:

Heat the chicken stock until boiling. Add potatoes and spinach and simmer on low for approximately 20 minutes. Add the butter and mushrooms and simmer for another 25-30 minutes. Remove from heat.

Scoop out the mushrooms from soup, they get lost if they get blended up with everything else. Blend the remaining soup until smooth. Return to pot, return the mushrooms and return to heat.

Add approximately 100 ml of cream and combine until smooth. Season with chilli flakes and nutmeg. Salt and pepper to taste.

Happy New Year - and Croquembouche 2009 was a #FAIL

2010-01-05T20:44:00.003+11:00

Happy New Year folks! Had a lovely holiday as my friend came to visit. I even got to cook her my signature paella which she whole heartedly enjoyed.

Ahh – the Croquembouche test...I tried and I failed...miserably.

The main issue that happened was my first batch of choux pastry were way too big...so they puffed up way too huge, which alarmed some of the people in the kitchen (non cooks of course!) who then suggested that I take them out of the oven. They then quickly deflated, became completely useless and I had to start again. This was about 6pm and I had run out of ingredients. :(

So the next batch was much too runny, they didn’t puff at all so I ended up with tiny little choux mounds instead of balls. They were impossible to fill with custard and I was utterly disheartened by then so I messed up the caramel part as well and it didn’t get hard enough.

I piled my little disheartened mound into something resembling a little runny volcano. Nothing like the glorious croquembouche it was meant to be. :(

Well that was my failed test for 2009. I’ll give it another go in 2010...hopefully with better results.

Easy Lemon Chicken

2009-12-21T23:19:00.004+11:00

Mmm Lemon Chicken - it's like quintessential country NSW Chinese take away.

Gourmet Inspired Tip: I actually think the preserved lemons work better than fresh lemon with this dish as it gives it a very nice musky flavour. The preserved lemons I had included peppercorns, cinnamon, cloves and bay leaves in the preserves.

Ingredients:

300 g chicken, sliced in the "fingers"
1 cup flour
1 egg beaten
5 wedges of preserved or fresh lemon
1/3 cup lemon juice (or use some of the preserve juice!)
2 cups frying oil

Method:

Dip the chicken pieces in the egg and coat with flour. Sprinkle lemon juice liberally on top.

Heat the oil in fry pan and shallow fry the chicken pieces for 10-15 minutes until golden brown and the chicken is cooked in the middle.

Squeeze the preserved lemon wedges on top and serve with wedges on the side. Garnish with parsley if desired.

Duck Ragu

2009-12-17T11:31:00.003+11:00

More duck delight!

I love being able to buy duck at most gourmet shops now and even Coles! I had to get Confit Duck legs from Premium Quality Meats in North Sydney, but I think the salt curing just gave the ragu and the duck more flavour. I heart duck no matter what, so I think any duck would have done.

This is another il barretto inspired dish – yum!

Ingredients:

2 duck legs

1 can whole peeled tomatoes

200 g porcini mushrooms (surprisingly I couldn’t find any, so I used oyster mushrooms instead)

½ cup chicken stock

½ cup red wine

1 onion, diced

1/3 cup cream

400 g fresh paperdelle pasta (enough for 2 people)

Method

Heat olive oil in a deep fry pan and sauté onions until flavours are released. Add duck and quickly brown the sides.

Add canned tomatoes, red wine, chicken stock and mushrooms. Let simmer uncovered for about 45 minutes to reduce the liquid.

Add cream and stir through. Let cook for an additional 15-20 minutes, during which you can prepare the pasta.

Stir through pasta in the sauce, coating well. Serve, garnished with parsley.

Japanese Dinner Awesomeness (pictures to come!)

2009-11-30T12:26:00.003+11:00

Great success with Japanese dinner on Sunday. Made Agedashi Tofu and Chirashi-zushi.

Gourmet Inspired Tip: For best results, you want soft silken tofu, but it can be a little difficult to manage. Do what you can to leech the water out of the pieces before cooking. As I was short on oil, I used about 1/2 cup of peanut oil in a small pan and shallow fried the pieces on both sides.

Agedashi Tofu

Ingredients

500 g silken tofu

2 cups Corn flour, enough to coat your tofu pieces

1 /4 cup dashi soup stock
1 tbs rice wine vinegar
1 tbs Japanese rice seasoning (I had Tamago Nori – egg and seaweed)
1 green onion, finely chopped
Sesame oil to taste
Soy sauce to taste
Frying oil (ie peanut or canola)

Method

caCarefully slice your tofu into pieces about 1 cm x 2 cm thick. Wrap them in a paper towel or tea towel to leech out the moisture. Leave them for about 20 minutes and change the wrap at least once.

- Coat your tofu pieces liberally in corn flour.

- Heat oil in a frying pan to about 170 degrees. When the pan is hot enough, gently lower your tofu pieces into the hot oil and deep fry for about 3-4 minutes until the sides are just starting to brown. Remove and let cool on plate.

- Mix dashi soup stock and pour over fried tofu. Top with rice seasoning and green onions and finish with sesame oil and soy sauce. Serve immediately to enjoy that hot silken goodness.

Blog Plug

2009-11-18T17:03:00.003+11:00

This will probably be one of the few opportunities where I can relate work and food. I haven’t eaten here yet, but I have been working on a blog for Quality Hotel Cambridge and their chef has a pretty cheeky sense of humour. I have yet to try the food, but I do hear it’s great.

The blog will have stories and recipes, including this yummy sounding Coriander and Walnut Pesto. YuM!

Spicy Corn Fritters

2009-11-17T12:00:00.004+11:00

Gourmet Inspired Tip: Homage to the awesome food, atmosphere and music from the now shut Hopetoun Hotel, these are corn fritters with a bit of a kick. The key is to get your batter and corn mixture right. I prefer lots of fresh corn in mine so it’s nice and crunchy and not too oily.

Ingredients:

2 cobs fresh corn, kernels removed

½ red capsicum, diced

Plenty of fresh parsley, finely chopped

1 cup flour

1 egg

½ cup water

1 tsp cumin

1 tbs paprika

Salt to taste

Canola or other non smoking oil to fry

Tabasco sauce to serve

Method:

Mix the flour, egg and water to create a batter. It should be very soft and doughy without being runny (add water slowly for best results).

Mix in the corn, parsley, capsicum, cumin and paprika and stir until well coated.

Turn your stove on high and in a non stick pan and add a thick layer of oil, sufficient to shallow fry. Let the pan heat up until the oil is very hot, but not smoking.

Spoon in corn batter and flatten. Let fry for 2-3 minutes on each side, being aware of spatter (I used a loosely covered lid to help limit the popping effect). Cool on paper towel. Serve with fresh salsa and plenty of tabasco.

Halloween Hi jinx

2009-11-09T19:30:00.008+11:00

For Halloween, I hosted a dinner party...Dinner for the Dead with the following menu:
Slaughter of the Sea
- consisted of water crackers with Wattle Valleys Chunky Red Capsicum, cashew and parmesan dip, topped with headless sardines. They are a taste sensation!

Severed Limbs of Poultry
- chicken wings and drumsticks made with garlic, spring onions, oyster sauce, soy sauce and Chinese Brown Candy sugar. Bloody Mashed Potatoes
- This was a revelation. Make mash per usual then add one tin of pureed beetroot. It gives it a very bright magenta colouring but the beetroot actually really enhances the taste of the mash and gives it a "refreshing" taste.

Bunnicula Strikes Again
- Just a salad with a dressing made from sweet chili sauce, lemon juice, vinegar and some sugar.
And of course Bloody Marys!

But best of all, my friend went to Coles to "construct" a dessert - Cake Cannibalism!

The eyes and eyebrows are jelly candies, the teeth are bananas lollies and there's bits of jelly to simulate blood. What an absolutely amazing idea!

Fail - Mongolian Lamb :(

2009-11-02T15:05:00.003+11:00

Had delicious Mongolian Lamb Hot Pot at Golden Century two weeks ago and I thought I could do something similar. I looked up a Mongolian Beef Recipe and figured I could do something similar in the hot pot.

I ended up with some nicely cooked lamb and leek stew...nothing that tasted like Mongolian sauce though. Oh well. Lamb is still always delicious.

I’ll let you know when I get it right! In the meantime, head to Golden Century for unbeatable hot pot lamb! Yummo!

My quest for the perfect cuppa - and Portuguese Cafe Tarts

2009-10-26T23:00:00.004+11:00

Since I've started this new job, I've been on the hunt for the perfect cuppa. But right now, I'm stuck in the faceless masses of average joe's amidst Town Hall, where eveyrone uses Grinders or Lavazza or heaven forbid - Vittoria - beans. Coffee in the CBD doesn't seem to have any real personality or distinction...much like the people caught in the morning rush...

Sigh...give me Surry Hills...where you could tell the creatives from the journos from the designers...and you didn't have a problem picking that one good cafe in the mix...it was the one with the longest line!

If anyone knows good coffee in the Town Hall area of Sydney CBD, please let me know! In the meantime, enjoy this Portuguese Cafe Tart recipe.

Portugues Cafe Tarts (Coffee Tarts)

Gourmet Inspired Tip: Who doesn't love a good coffee dessert and who doesn't absolutely adore Portuguese tarts? I thought I would marry these two passions of mine and create some Portuguese Coffee Tarts.

I didn't have a muffin tin, so I used the oven safe tea cups again, but they turned out amazingly well with the puff pastry - if you like that extra bit of puff.

Ingredients:

4 x 10 cm rounds of puff pastry
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup milk
2 egg yolks
1 shot of espresso or strong coffee
2 tbs corn flour
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbs brown sugar

Method:

Grease a muffin tin (or in my case, tea cup) and cover with puff pastry sheets to form 4 good bowls. Refrigerate.

Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius. While the oven is heating, combine sugar and water in a saucepan and stir slowly over low heat until sugar dissolves and becomes syrupy. Remove from heat.

In a bowl, combine your corn flour, milk and egg yolks and whisk until well combined. Add sugar mixture and vanilla extract and mix thoroughly. Return mixture to stove and heat slowly until mixture thickens to a good custard consistency. Add espresso and stir until well combined.

Remove pastry cups and pour custard mixture into bases. Bake for 20-25 minutes until the pastry just starts to brown. Remove from oven and let the custard settle back into the bases.

Spread brown sugar on a piece of aluminium foil and dry in oven for 1-2 minutes to remove moisture. Gently tap the tarts out of their containers and then sprinkle the tops with brown sugar. Place under hot grill or broiler, or use a blow torch, to quickly caramelise the tops. Serve.

My version of Duck a l'Orange

2009-10-19T20:20:00.005+11:00

Kylie Kwong eat your heart out. :)

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Gourmet Inspired Tip: I was super excited last month to discover that Coles now carries duck. I know most butchers have always had duck, but I think it's a pretty significant sign where home cooking's headed when you can buy delicious duck at Coles. Maybe it's MasterChef or the economic downturn having people becoming more adventurous with their domestic cuisine, but duck is no longer just for the gourmet professionals.

Sure they cost $15 for two fillets but I was pretty keen to try to it out - it didn't turn out to be crispy skin duck like Kylie's but I was still pretty excited to have made a decent duck dish at home.

Duck a l'Orange

Ingredients:

The Duck

2 duck breast fillets
1 tbs rosemary
1 tbs tarragon
1/2 tsp pepper flakes
1 tsp sesame oil

The Sauce

1 1/2 cup orange juice
1 navel orange, rind removed
3 star anise
1 tbs cinnamon
1 tsp sugar

Method

Rub rosemary, tarragon, pepper and oil into the skin of the duck fillets. Place duck pieces into steamer and steam for 12-15 minutes. until duck is just undercooked.

While the duck is steaming, preheat your broiler or oven to 250 degrees Celsius or higher. You can start making your sauce. Pour orange juice, cinnamon and sugar in saucepan and bring to a boil. Turn down the flame and simmer slowly, stirring occassionally to reduce the juice. When it starts to become syrupy, add the orange pieces and the star anise and simmer for an additional few minutes.

While your sauce is reducing and once the duck is done steaming, put it in an oven dish with any leftover juices and broil for about 5 minutes until the spices and skin are just starting to crisp. Remember to leave the oven door ajar. (I forgot and spent a good amount of time under the smoke detector with a magazine fanning smoke!)

Remove the duck from the broiler and let cool. Serve over rice and pour your orange sauce over the duck and rice for maximum flavour. :)

100 hits!

2009-10-16T10:23:00.002+11:00

Haha, a small but significant milestone. The thing with blogging is that in some way, it’s like running your own online business. To get your message out there in the plethora of musings and ego trips you have to actively work on generating a buzz through the right networks. Forums, other blogs, directories...you have to spend time promoting yourself (or get a budget so someone else can do it for you!)

Anyway, to my 100 readers so far, thanks! Leave comments, love and feedback.

Sushi Stack - cause nothing looks as impressive as stacked food

2009-10-15T21:22:00.009+11:00

Gourmet Inspired Tip: I adapted this recipe from a picture my flatmate showed me of a sushi stack, I think it came from Women's Weekly Magazine. And my theory has always been that there's nothing as impressive as stacked food.

Taste wise, it's not really much...just a big sushi patty without some of the elegance and daintiness of more mini sized sushi (although my friend who never ever eats sushi actually tried it and thought it was pretty good...he loved the texture of the flying fish roe which he had never tried before). I guess this is just a general lesson that looks can be deceiving. That's the thing with cooking - there's the art part to it, but it ultimately comes down to taste. That's what they say on MasterChef, "it all comes down to the dish you cooked." Meanwhile, how many times have you been deceived by food that looks amazing but tastes like nothing much?

But I still think that there's nothing that looks more impressive than stacked food.

Sushi Stack

Ingredients

1 cup sushi rice
1/2 cup water
2 1/2 tbs rice vinegar
2 tsp sugar
Pinch salt
1 tsp sesame oil
4 tbs flying fish roe (you can get this at an Asian supermarket)
1/2 cucumber, peeled into strips with a peeler
1/4 avocado, thinly sliced
2 piece of Nori (seaweed) trimmed to the size of a small ramekin
Sprinkle of sesame seeds

Method

To make the sushi rice, wash and drain the rice until the water runs clear. Cook the rice, by bringing the water and rice to a boil and then covering and letting simmer for 12 minutes. Remove from heat and let stand for 5 minutes. You can prepare your other ingredients while the rice is cooking.

Mix vinegar, sugar, sesame oil and salt into a dressing. Pour over rice and mix thoroughly with a wooden spoon.

Let the rice mixture cool to a lukewarm temperature. (I stuck the rice in a bowl and put it in a cool fan forced oven.)

In a small ramekin, or other appropriately shaped mould, layer your ingredients, first with a base of rice, then a layer of flying fish roe, a layer of shaved cucumber and a layer of avocado. Top with a sheet of nori and finish with another layer of rice on top.

Flip your stack over onto a plate. Lift up the ramekin mould to reveal your stack. Top with sesame seeds and a couple of slivers of cucumber. Serve

Important: Contrary to instinct, serve your stack with fork and knife, not chopsticks! The layer of seaweed and cucumbers are difficult to cut through without a knife to help.

Garlic Prawns and Butterflies

2009-10-11T23:16:00.007+11:00

Tomorrow is the first day at my new job and I have serious serious butterflies. I'm excited and nervous..and well actually really petrified. It's not the work part that's daunting...it's the first impression bit...and I'll have to live with it for the rest of my time at this job. It's things like what if I accidentally use someone's personal cup?, what if I make an inappropriate joke? or just fall flat on my face...although that might not be so bad cause then at least people take pity and try to be nice.

When I was in Uni, my first day working as Assistant Technical Director for a production, I cut 15 pieces of wood 6 inches too short. Fortunately, no one, not even the Technical Director looking after me wanted to do the job, so I wasn't fired on the spot.

At least this time I won't be working with a table saw. Now how to cure the butterflies...

Gourmet Inspired Tip: So speaking of butterflies, last week to celebrate my new found employment, we went to dinner in Surry Hills to this amazing Japanese restaurant called Toko. And we ordered the Garlic Prawns. These weren't the sizzling kind you get at the pub, but they were beautifully "butterflied" and split down the middle, head, tail, shell and all. The meat was sweet, juicy and succulent and it wasn't overladen with oil. After a bit of deliberation, I tried to recreate this dish at home. My butterflying and splitting of the prawn wasn't quite as delicately done, but it was still pretty tasty. So these were the good butterflies.

Enjoy!

Garlic "Butterfly" Prawns

Ingredients:

10 Large uncooked prawns, heads, tails and shells on
2 tbs finely minced garlic (or garlic paste will be fine)
1/4 cup olive oil
Parsley, finely chopped to taste

Method:

Very carefully, using a fine and sharp knife, butterfly your prawns with the heads, tails and shells on. To do this, bend your prawn against its curve to "break" the shell a bit and help flatten it out. Then holding it belly side up, starting from the base of the tail, split your prawn lengthwise, between the swimmers, sawing the head in two. Make sure you cut all the way through the meat, but not the shell. Open your prawn and flatten it out, leaving it belly side up.

Lay your prawns out on a baking tray covered in baking paper. Mix oil and garlic paste together then evenly spoon the mixture out over the exposed meat of the prawns. Cover loosely and refrigerate for about 1 hour to let marinate.

Preheat your oven to 200 degrees Celsius. Place your marinated prawns in the oven for 5-6 minutes. They should just be cooked.

Remove, sprinkle with parsley and serve. This is going to be a bit of a messy dish (even though it presents quite well) so make sure you've got some moist towellettes on hand!

Beef Stew

2009-10-08T09:46:00.005+11:00

It's like 2 degrees outside...and supposed to be Spring. Seeing that this is my last week of "freedom", I figured I'd make a beef stew since it takes a long time. I'm also running pretty low on $$, even for budget gourmet, since this $200 I was expecting didn't come through. (I write this as an act of spite, of course). So with time and no money and freezing weather, the only logical conclusion is beef stew!

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Gourmet Inspired Tip: I'm sure everyone knows this - you can't hurry stew. The longer the better. Seriously, if a recipe says 1 1/2 hours undisturbed, leave it for 2. Since I'm not married and have lived in 6 different places over the past 5 years (I've finally stayed in one spot for over 12 months last year) - I do not own something like a casserole dish - so I had to use a large metal saucepan instead. The trick I discovered, is to line your metal saucepan with baking paper on the bottom and another layer of paper over your cooking ingredients. The paper acts as a barrier against the intense heat of the metal to prevent scorching - and makes clean up a lot lot easier!

Hearty Beef Stew

Ingredients:

500 g beef - cubed
1/2 cup flour
1 tbs paprika
1 parsnip, cubed
1 carrot, chopped
3 small onions, chopped roughly
4 potatoes, cut
250 ml red wine
Salt and pepper to taste

NB: We had some tops of some leek in the fridge, which worked really really nicely in the mix as well

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees. In a mixing bowl, combine flour and paprika and lightly coat each piece of beef.

In a casserole dish (or large pot with lid - lined with baking paper), layer your beef pieces on the bottom spacing evenly. Put vegetables on top and stir gently to mix, making sure all of your pieces stay within the confines of the baking paper walls if you've got it on the botoom. Pour in wine and water. Cover entire mixture with another piece of baking paper and put on lid.

Cook in oven for at least 2 hours. The longer the better. The extra 45 mins will do wonders to tenderise the meat.

Season to taste and serve.

Potage Parmentier "un-french" - (Julia Child rolls in her grave)

2009-10-06T09:52:00.002+11:00

So upon watching the movie, Julie & Julia I decided I had to start reading the book. It's alright...a bit melodramatic for my tastes, but I guess that's what blog adaptations are meant to be, an overindulgence in metaphorical and lyrical description that you firmly believe to be witty and relatable, chock full of stream of consciousness and the favourite ellipsis...because everyone if given the chance will write like that. Otherwise you would just be writing "today I made potato soup." :)

Anyway, today I did make potato soup. I also read the opening chapter about Julie's first Julia Child recipe, "Potage Parmentier" and her description of making potato and leek soup. All you needed was potato, leek, butter, water, salt and pepper. That sounded easy enough.

There I was, using my fork to mash my soup, since I don't have a potato ricer and using anything electronic, according to the author was simply "un-french". So, I, unlike Julie, was not too above mashing soup with a fork in a desire to be as authentically French as possible.

We sit down to eat and it's good. Nice texture, aroma, some good flavour. Then my flatmate says, "you know what would be great with this, some chili. Maybe a little bit of garlic."

And she was absolutely right, the soup was missing that extra little kick. The thing with French food, is...it sounds super sexy. Potage, escargot, bouf...it's all gourmet sounding and superb. But "authentic", fork mashing and all, tastes...well maybe a little bland for the modern palette. True foodies would probably kill me for saying it, but in an age where the best Thai take away is around the corner and the scent of curries wafts from every neighbour's home (and it's the good kind, not the kind that just hangs stale in the air)...our modern way of eating isn't really thrilled by the "authentic" delights of butter, mashed potato and leeks.

I'm probably not doing potage parmentier the right way. Julia Child, I'm sure is rolling over in her grave...Julie Powell probably is rolling her eyes too, (I didn't soak my potatoes in water to keep them from turning pink for starters). I'm sure her soup was excellent and full of flavour - with real kick. But since I don't hold sacred the ancient pages of Mastering the Art of French Cooking nor is there Julia Child in my kitchen brandishing an imaginary wooden spoon, I look what was left over of the the soup, minced some garlic and threw in some chili flakes, added water and cooked for another 20 mins. And I got my kicks.

Potage Parmentier petit epice - Little spice potato soup...still mashed with a fork. Just a little bit "unfrench".

Potage Parmentier "petit epice" - Little spice potato soup

Ingredients:

5 potatoes, sliced
1 leek, sliced and washed
50 g butter
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1 tsp red pepper flakes or chili flakes
Salt and pepper to taste

Method:

Add potatoes and leek to about 1 litre of boiling water. Let simmer for about 30 minutes until soft. Stir gently, then add garlic, chili, salt and pepper and let simmer for another 15 minutes. Remove from heat. Using a fork, food mill, potato ricer or other non-electronic mashing aid, mash the soup until texture is quite smooth. (You still want to have some "bits" for that home cooked texture. Unless you're serving soup to my boyfriend...who doesn't believe in soup bits.). Stir in butter until creamy and well blended. Serve with cheese toast.

Hint: Okay, I admit it...I didn't really mash the whole thing with the fork. If you have a stick whizz, use that for a few seconds to do most of the mixing, but leave some untouched parts so you can finish it off with a fork for texture.

Please also note: Until further notice...like when it gets out of hand...I am making this blog a DoFollow blog but have the verification and moderation on. So leave thoughtful comments and you'll get backlinks. :)

Chinese Style Roast Pork, plus Julie & Julia

2009-10-05T12:59:00.001+11:00

I watched the movie Julie & Julia yesterday, and it got me thinking...why do people set up blogs? Is it to "give yourself something to do" or is it a narcissistic indulgence, where everything can really be "me me me"? Julie Powell was one of the pioneers in everyday blogging culture, when there were maybe just 1000 of serious blogs in the world...not the millions out there now. Hard to imagine that was really just 7 years ago.

For me, I started this when I quit my job...I think it was to give me something to do. I quit rather suddenly, and as other people have pointed out, my job had really come to consume my life. Leaving left a rather large void in my day to day existence...especially when it came to writing. Cooking and blogging helped fill up "units of time"...and gave me some semblance of routine.

Next week, I start a new job. It's really only been 5 weeks and I don't feel like I've done much over that time. Certainly, I haven't really done that many recipes. I mean...Julie Powell did maybe 50 of her recipes in 5 weeks. It gave her readers something to go back to on a daily basis.

So...I'm going to try and give you something more. I THINK about food and cooking everyday. I talk about it a lot...but not to you. I sit there writing down notes and reading things about cooking to try and come up with my next concoction. I have no idea if it's much of a good read, but it should at least keep me more focused on this work, especially if I'm going to start working full time again. So, feel free to kick my metaphorical blogging a-- if you don't hear from me for a week (like last week).

Chinese style Roast Pork

Gourmet Inspired Tip: I made this last week to serve with Stephanie Alexander's French Onion Soup. A bit of an odd combination, but the pork and baby bak choy themselves are a great combination and work as a light entree. Alternatively, serve with rice for a good and simple main. Char siu (roast pork) sauce can usually be found in your local supermarket in the Asian section.

Ingredients:

300 g pork fillet
1 packet red char siu sauce (about 100 g)
2 tbs honey
sesame oil to taste
1-2 tsp sesame seeds
2 baby bok choy
2 sprigs parsley, finely chopped
oyster sauce to taste

Method:

Cut pork into 4 pieces. Cover the pieces thoroughly with char siu sauce and marinate for at least 4 hours or overnight. Hint: if you wrap the pieces in foil, you can use the same piece of foil to grill the pork and keep more of the flavour.

Pre-heat grill to medium/high. Brush pork pieces with 1/2 the honey and sesame oil before grilling. Sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Grill each side for 10 minutes. Turn grill temperature up to high and brush pork pieces with remainder of oil and honey and grill for another 15 minutes or until pork is cooked through.

To cook the baby bok choy, boil approximately 1 litre of water. Separate the leaves and scald quickly in boiling water for 1-2 minutes. Remove immediately.

Layer a bed of baby bok choy on plate and drizzle with oyster sauce. Place grilled pork on top and sprinkle with parsley to taste.

Smackin' ze chops - braised lamb chops with a rich zesty kick

2009-09-28T10:51:00.001+10:00

Gourmet Inspired Tip: My boyfriend's mother offers her children (in a joking manner) a smack in the chops; "Can I get you anything else? A smack in the chops?" Consequently, we've picked it up in our usual banter. But I always wanted to create an enticing "smack in the chops" that you just couldn't say no to!

I've made a similar grape jelly and chili sauce with meatballs before but had never tried it with lamb. The flavour of chili with lamb in the rich thick sauce was sensational and I served it up with some "fancy chips" (I'll put that recipe up later) and wilted spinach. The only thing I think is that sauce was a little too thick this time around, but the extra 1/2 cups of stock should help that.

Can I get you anything else? How about some "smackin' ze chops"?

Ingredients:

2 lamb forequarter chops
1 tbs chili powder
1 tbs rosemary
1 tsp harissa or other Middle Eastern spices
1 cup grape jelly (about 250 ml) Australia has no grape jelly, so blackcurrant jam worked instead.
1 cup hot chili sauce (250 ml)
1 1/2 cups beef or chicken stock

Method:

Spread chili powder, rosemary and harissa evenly over chops. Refrigerate and marinate for at least 4 hours.

Preheat oven to 160 degrees Celsius. In a saucepan, heat the hot chili sauce, grape jelly and stock until well combined. Allow mixture to gently bubble on low heat while you prepare the chops.

Heat oil in frying pan. Sear chops on all sides to seal, about 1-2 minutes on each side.

In a baking dish, arrange your chops. Pour hot jelly mixture all over chops. You should have about 1-2 cm of liquid coming up the sides of the meat.

Cook in oven for 2-3 hours, until meat is falling off the bone. Add more stock if the sauce starts to look too thick.

Sausage and Mushroom Stack

2009-09-17T18:46:00.001+10:00

Thank you Briyah for being my guinea pig!

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Gourmet Inspired Tip: Who doesn't love a good sausage link, but it may not scream elegance on the plate. Buying a single link of your favourite sausage for this recipe is an easy way to make a good gourmet impression. After all, there is nothing that looks quite as impressive as "stacked" food - if it's stacked well.

My first attempt at this didn't work as well as I hoped as the "pattie" formation didn't stay together. Throwing an egg into the meat mixture, as indicated below, will help avoid the semi-lopsided contraption pictured.

Mushroom and Sausage stack

Serves 2

Ingredients

2 large portobella mushrooms, destemmed
2 tbs butter
200 g spinach leaves, washed
100 g zucchini, thinly sliced
100 g leek, sliced
200 g mushroom, chopped
1 sausage link, any flavour
50 g tinned water chestnuts
1 egg
Balsamic vinegar to taste
Coriander to dress

Method

Preheat grill to high. Pat butter on the bottoms of the mushrooms and place under grill, tops down, butter side up. Let cook for 10-12 minutes.

While the mushrooms are cooking, in a food processor, combine the leek, chopped mushrooms and water chestnuts until well processed. Move to mixing bowl.

Using a knife, cut a hole in the sausage link and extract meat from the skin and add to mushroom leek mixture. Add egg, and use your hands to combine the meat and mixture until it is thoroughly mixed through. Shape into patties about the size of your portobella mushrooms. Fry in hot pan until meat is cooked, about 3-4 minutes.

In a colander, wilt the spinach leaves by slowly pouring about 2 cups of boiling over the leaves. Do the same for the zucchini slices to cook them slightly.

Remove mushrooms from grill and place on plate. Add a layer of wilted spinach leaves on top, then a layer of the zucchini slices. Pour balsamic vinegar over these layers to taste. Top off the veggie stack with your mushroom and sausage patties and add a sprig of coriander on top.

Hint: If you're still having issues making the patties stick, add some breadcrumbs or flour to the mixture.

Seafood Paella & Spanish Chicken Rice

2009-09-13T19:25:00.002+10:00

This is a two part entry, enjoy!

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Gourmet Inspired Tip: A few months back, my boyfriend gave me a fantastic paella recipe that I tweaked for some outstanding results. Really, when it comes to paella, it's all about the bottom crusty part of the rice, called socarrat. Really, the key to getting a really good caramelised crust is a good quality non-stick pan (I have a Scanpan) and a lid that's big enough to cover it.

Below are two recipes. The first is my original paella recipe featuring paprika dusted blue cod. I took out a lot of the non seafood elements of the original dish (chicken and chorizo) and replaced the green beans with peas for plating purposes.

The second recipe is what I call, "poor man's paella", which is basically chicken rice with vegetables. Again, the rice is done in the same style of the first paella to give it that great crusty bottom that is sure delight. Enjoy!

Seafood Paella

Ingredients:

- 2 cups Spanish or Risotto rice
- 500 g Blue Cod fish, cut into cubes
- 1 tbs paprika
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 red capsicum, cut into cubes
- 200 g prawns
- 16 mussels, approx
- 5 1/2 cups chicken stock, heated
- 1 tsp saffron, for best results
- 1 tbs cayenne pepper, to taste
- 200 g peas or green beans
- 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 cup white wine, if desired

Method:

- Dust fish pieces in paprika and saute lightly in high quality non-stick pan until sealed. Remove from heat.
- Lightly saute prawns until sealed and remove
- In the non-stick pan, lightly fry onion, chili and garlic to release the flavours. Add dry rice and mix until rice is coated thoroughly.
- Spread rice evenly so it coats the bottom of the pan and layer fish pieces evenly on top, followed by the capsicum and peas. Add most of hot stock (save a little in case you need to add more liquid later) and follow with wine, if desired. Top with sealed prawns and let simmer on low for 10 minutes. DO NOT STIR.
- Add mussels one by one on top and simmer for an additional 15 minutes. Mussels should begin to open and you'll notice the caramelised crust forming along the edges.
- Try to see if the rice is cooked. If it is still crunchy and there is no more liquid, add the leftover stock and cook for an additional 5 minutes. If you can, cover the entire pan with a lid or a bit of aluminium foil to help the rice cook.

Hint: Once you have the crust you're more than halfway there. It's better to start with too little liquid than too much and to add more at the end. Once you have the crust, it's just a matter of cooking the rice through.

Spanish Chicken Rice

Similiar to paella, but with cheaper ingredients. Again, if you can get the crust, the results will be desirable and impressive. Basically replace the cod pieces with chicken.

Ingredients

- 500 g chicken thigh fllet, diced
- 1 tbs paprika
- 1 red capsicum, cut into cubes
- 200 g green beans
- 5 1/2 cups stock, heated
- 1 tbs cayenne pepper, to taste
- 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 1/2 cup white wine, if desired
- 1 onion, minced

Method

- Dust chicken pieces in paprika and saute lightly in high quality non-stick pan until sealed. Remove from heat.
- In the non-stick pan, lightly fry onion, chili and garlic to release the flavours. Add dry rice and mix until rice is coated thoroughly.
- Spread rice evenly so it coats the bottom of the pan and layer chicken pieces evenly on top, followed by the capsicum and green beans. Add most of hot stock (save a little in case you need to add more liquid later) and follow with wine, if desired. DO NOT STIR.
-Simmer for an additional 15 minutes. You'll notice the caramelised crust forming along the edges.
- Try to see if the rice is cooked. If it is still crunchy and there is no more liquid, add the leftover stock and cook for an additional 5 minutes. If you can, cover the entire pan with a lid or a bit of aluminium foil to help the rice cook.

The Aussie Creme Brulee

2009-09-09T16:44:00.002+10:00

It actually worked! Hurrah!

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Gourmet Inspired Tip: I love creme brulee, and have always wanted to try making it. But after a bit of thinking and reading, I decided to give it an Aussie twist.

Aussie creme brulee is basically creme brulee with an Anzac bikkie base. It gives the dessert a little bit more substance, and I think the crumbly texture and sweetness of the bikkie really takes the custard and caramelised sugar flavour to a new level.

I've been super stoked to try this idea and it actually worked the first time around, well almost...my base was a little soggy as I was overly excited and didn't think to "bake it blind" first. The method below rectifies my error, but even with the sogginess the flavours were definitely there.

Enjoy!

Aussie Creme Brulee

Ingredients:

- 400 ml pure cream
- 6 egg yolks
- 1/2 cup sugar (raw or white)
- 1/4 cup brown sugar
- 1 1/2 cups Anzac biscuits, crumbed (about 6 biscuits)
- 3-4 tbs butter
- 1 tsp vanilla
- pinch of salt

Method:

- Preheat oven to 180⁰C.
- In a mixing bowl, using your hands, mix the Anzac biscuit crumbs and the butter until the crumbs stick together.
- Layer the mixture evenly across the base of four small (5 oz) ramekins. I didn't have any, so I used short flat tea cups (pictured). Just make sure whatever you use is small and shorter than it is wide, as you will have to fill it to the brim with your custard. Cover the entire base and flatten it as much as you can, should be about 2 mm thick.
- Bake in oven for approximately 10 minutes, until the bases are set. Remove and let cool.
- In a pan or pot, heat the cream until it is hot but not boiling.
- In another mixing bowl, gently combine egg yolks and sugar, but do not whisk. Slowly add hot cream, stirring constantly until sugar and eggs are completely dissolved. Add vanilla and salt and mix thoroughly. Strain out any remaining solid bits.
- Pour custard into bases, filling the cups all the way to the top. (If you don't, it will be very difficult to caramelise the sugar on top at the end).
- Place cups in a deep baking dish and fill the dish with hot water so that it comes about halfway up the cups. Bake in oven (still at 180⁰C) for about 30-40 minutes until the custard is set.
- Remove from oven and let cool to room temperature. Refrigerate until chilled.
- Sprinkle brown sugar on tray lined with baking paper and dry in oven for a few minutes. Remove and break up the clumps of sugar using a rollin pin or the base of a cup. Set aside.
- When ready to serve, sprinkle brown sugar generously on top of custards. Place under hot broiler for 3-4 minutes to caramelise the sugar. Alternatively, use a torch. Remove and serve. :)

Quick creamy salad dressing

2009-09-06T23:36:00.001+10:00

Mission tomorrow - make Aussie Creme Brulee!

In the meantime, here's a quick recipe for a simple creamy salad dressing.

Gourmet Inspired Tip: Old dry bread (obviously not mouldy) can get a second life as croutons in a simple "Caesar" Salad. Mine was cos lettuce, egg, parmesan, bacon bits and week old sourdough as "croutons"

Ingredients:

- 1/3 lemon, juiced
- 3 tbs mayonnaise
- 1 tbs brown vinegar
- 1 tbs olive oil
- 1/2 tsp garlic

Method:

Mix all ingredients together and drizzle over "Caesar" type salad

Honey glazed grilled turkey sandwich

2009-09-03T20:38:00.001+10:00

$6 turkey steaks at Bi-Lo got me thinking…

A Gourmet Inspired Tip: Sandwiches are the classic lunch staple, from Subway to the gourmet gargantuans you can get at the deli. It is also one of the most popular bag lunch options but you might be uninspired by the dry lunch meat options. Not to mention the “soggy” sandwich dilemma when you finally arrive at work. Try this simple, delicious – and hopefully drier option.

This method works with chicken or turkey. If using chicken breast fillets, slice thin fillets about 1 cm thick.

Ingredients

- 200 grams chicken or turkey fillet, approximately 1 cm thick
- 3 tbs honey to taste
- At least 2 leaves of cos lettuce
- 1 tbs mayonnaise
- 2 slices crusted bread, sourdough works well since it is more resistant to sogginess

NB: By avoiding tomatoes, you’re decreasing the soggy factor

Method

- Glaze the turkey or chicken fillets liberally with honey.
- Place under hot grill and grill each side for 2-3 minutes. Don’t overcook.
- Butter the bread. Make sure the cos lettuce is dry and place on both slices of bread. Spread mayonnaise on top of lettuce. The lettuce acts as a barrier to keep the mayonnaise from seeping through to the bread.
- Put chicken in between the pieces of lettuce. Hopefully, if packaged properly you’ll have a delicious gourmet sandwich, as if it had been freshly made.

Seafood Spaghetti with clam sauce - and how it all started

2009-09-03T19:28:00.001+10:00

My boyfriend had recently taken me to a Surry Hills restaurant favourite, Il Baretto on Bourke Street where we were served an excellent dish of spaghetti and clams that was to die for (apparently called Spaghetti al vongole - thanks George!)

The next week, with $10 in my pocket, I trudged up to the local Coles thinking of how to scrounge up some decent ingredients for dinner – but all I could think about was that spectacular Il Baretto pasta. Clams of course, were not at Coles and would have cost too much if they were even there. But I did happen upon a tin of baby clams for $3.68. After some more considered thinking and smart buying, I went home and threw together a “gourmet inspired” seafood spaghetti with clam sauce.

And unlike at the restaurant, my boyfriend could help himself to seconds.

Seafood Spaghetti with clam sauce (inspired by Il Baretto’s that started it all)

Note: final ingredients and proportions are still being tried, but I would love your comments and feedback! Thanks

A Gourmet Inspired Tip: The clams in the original dish tasted amazing and fresh, but the perfectly cooked pasta stirred through what was a very simple sauce with the strong flavour of clams was what won me over.

The tin clams obviously don’t compare to the taste of fresh clams but they do manage to give the pasta that delicious clam flavour. To give the dish some substance and a “seafood feel”, basa fillets are cheap but they taste like nothing. A little bit of paprika married with the basa fish texture helps flush out the essence of the dish. Top with a couple of prawns if you feel like splurging. :)

Ingredients

- 250grams spaghetti
- 1/2 brown onion, finely sliced
- 1/2 red capsicum, finely sliced
- 1 basa fillets, cut into chunks
- 2 tbs paprika
- 1 tin baby clams
- Parsley to taste, finely chopped
- 3 tbs olive oil
- ½ cup white wine (cheap chardonnay works fine)
- 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 5 cooked peeled Tiger prawns (optional)

Method

- Follow instructions to cook pasta. Try and get it as “al dente” as possible, do not overcook.\
- Add the paprika and basa chunks into a small baggie and shake to lightly dust fish with paprika
- In a non stick pan, lightly fry the pieces of fish until they are slightly charred on the outside and almost cooked through. Remove from heat.
- In a sauce pan over medium heat, add the olive oil garlic and fry until garlic brown on the edges. Add onions and capsicum, cook until onions become translucent. Add baby clams and white wine. Turn down heat, cover and let simmer for 5-10 minutes. Use the clam tin to add water if the liquid level gets low.
- Add cooked pasta and parsley and stir through, cooking it for another 1-2 minutes to ensure eveness of temperature. Remove from heat. Add the cooked basa chunks and tiger prawns if desired, cover and let sit for 1-2 minutes before serving.

HINT: Oil and salt in the water before it boils will help keep your pasta from sticking. (Thanks Kez!)

Thoughts? Comments? Am I completely insane? All feedback much appreciated thanks! x

Gourmet Inspired - leave the professional tricks to the professionals, let the professionals inspire us.

2009-09-03T19:10:00.000+10:00

Introducing Gourmet Inspired

The professionals all agree, when it comes to gourmet restaurant quality meals, you have to get your ingredients right. This means, the freshest herbs, picked from your backyard, the best cuts of meat and of course, organic in-season produce from your local farmers’ market.

Garden? Farmers’ Market? HELLOOO???

I’m sorry, but the professional chefs may have the time to trawl through the markets and drop by the wharf to pick up the fresh catch of the day. But for the rest of us, “fresh” means the mad dash to the supermarket aisles in a suit straight after work, desperately trying to scrounge together the ingredients for tonight’s meal - if you manage to remember exactly when you bought that last carton of eggs. Organic means picking up the saran wrapped package with the green seal instead of none. Not to mention with today’s economy, exquisite cuts of meat may not be particularly wallet friendly.

But does that mean we can’t enjoy our favourite seafood pasta and tartine tarts at home?

Gourmet Inspired is a new way of looking at home cooking. We all know about home style roasts, spaghetti bolognaise and stir fry out of a packet. This collection of recipes has been developed to be simple and budget friendly, “inspired” by the tastes of your restaurant favourites, perfect for the amateur chefs in all of us.

Leave the professional tips and tricks to the professionals, but let the professionals inspire the rest of us.

Coming up: Seafood Spaghetti with clam sauce