Category Archives: Food porn

Food glorious food; since Wednesday; this has included dining out and home cooked happiness

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On Wednesday I spent the day in Sydney for a meeting. I flew back to Canberra on Virgin Australia. I was able to enjoy an afternoon snack of cheese and ice cream plus some quince paste.

A snack on a Virgin Australia flight. Cheese, quince paste and an ice cream sandwich.

On Thursday morning inspired by the Ranting Chef and a post on 09 August I made baked beans on toast. I added a little Holbrooks Worcestershire sauce and some chili flakes plus Tabasco sauce for spice. I would have added an egg but it was already going to be enough.

Baked beans on toast with coffee

On Thursday evening we went to celebrate the birthday of a friend. We went to Sanur’s Balinese Restaurant in Belconnen. We’ve been there a few times before and I’ve blogged about the experience. Bron and I shared an entrée (Sanur’s Deluxe Platter for Two $18.9 A platter of mixed spring roll, chicken or beef satay, sweet corn patties and battered prawns) and I asked for fried chicken (“Chicken” Char Grilled or Fried ½ Chicken $18.9 Sanur Style Chicken marinated in house special ingredients and served with sambal bajak). I was a little disappointed it was dry and not that flavoursome. Bron had the Crispy Ayam ($18.9 Battered marinated chicken thigh tossed with garlic and aromatic salt) which was delicious. The chicken was moist, tender and tasty. For dessert we both enjoyed the Coconut Delusion ($8.90 Coconut pancake filled with unti (shredded coconut) with pandan anglaise, ice cream & toasted almonds).

Entrée platter

Entrée platter

Fried chicken

Bron’s chicken

Coconut dessert

The evening was punctuated with hilarious stories of menstrual period iPhone apps and videos of a bloke called Merv who is good at sucking. The flow of the conversation had periods of tension and hilarity. There was lots of talk about the ladies cycling together. I didn’t know they all had bicycles. :-)

This is Merv

On Friday morning Bron and I enjoyed our regular Mavi Breakfast wrap.

Mavi breakfast wrap

For lunch on Friday I felt like some hot chips from Urban Bean in my work building. These chips are delicious. A small container costs $4 which sounds expensive (and it is) but the container is quite large. It also comes with some aioli.

Great hot chips

On Friday night Bron made a light dinner. We had a baked egg in a creamy Italian style risotto. It was delicious. This is a split photograph edited before and after the egg was cracked.

Baked egg and risotto

For breakfast on Saturday we had poached eggs and ham. I wanted a little cranberry sauce too.

Poached egg with ham and cranberry

After doing some washing  and house work we went out to Ricardo’s café in Jamison for afternoon tea. Bron had a golden mousse and I ate a swan.

Golden mousse

Swan

For dinner on Saturday we celebrated another friend’s birthday and went to Chairman and Yip after drinks at Benchmark wine bar. I was a little disappointed by the Benchmark wine bar. The drinks were really expensive and I got the feeling they were trying to get us out yet the restaurant was only about a third full. There was a huge hens party going on and we had wait staff asking us if we wanted more drinks every five minutes. My greatest disappointment as someone who cannot drink alcohol though is the absence of pineapple juice. That’s what I wanted. In the end I settled for a lemon lime and bitters. To be fair it was our waiter’s first shift. A friend asked for a Chardonnay and he received Chandon sparkling wine. Our waiter was very apologetic and smiled a lot.

At Chairman and Yip it was very different. The wait staff were efficient yet unobtrusive and allowed us to enjoy our meal. This was one of the nicest meals I’ve eaten in Canberra. For en entrée I asked for duck pancakes and ended up sharing with Bron who had pan fried Kurobuta Rich River (Victoria) pork cake with red wine vinaigrette. Both entrées come for $16.50. Both were delicious although the pork cakes were more filling.

Duck pancakes

char-grilled fillet of beef with shallot and spring onion sauce

For a main course I asked for a char-grilled fillet of beef with shallot and spring onion sauce. Bron asked for beef and scallop ground pepper hot pot, M asked for chairman’s red curry chicken and L asked for pumpkin and cucumber with caramelised chili and kaffir lime.

pumpkin and cucumber with caramelised chili and kaffir lime

My first plate, in the end we shared everything amongst each other.

For dessert I asked for a panna cotta with a passionfruit sauce. Bron asked for Pyramid of chocolate mousse over white chocolate mousse that sounded like chocolate fellatio which created uproar at our table. :-)

Panna cotta with passionfruit sauce

This morning we had breakfast at Ellacure in Bruce. We’ve been meaning to do this for a long time. It didn’t disappoint. I asked for poached eggs on toast with a side of hollandaise and avocado while Bron asked for Eggs Benedict with bacon (this is Bron’s instagram image). Breakfast at Ellacure is very worthwhile. The service is very good and the food is delicious. The service verged on trying to get us out, but really, it was 0900 in the morning and they would be very busy after 0930. They were very efficient. I would rank this a great place in Canberra for breakfast or brunch.

Look I got pineapple juice :-)

The best thing was I got pineapple juice :-)

Poached eggs, hollandaise and avocado. This is one of the best photographs I’ve taken.

Don’t forget coffee :-)

Tonight I was inspired by another blogger I follow, viz., Live2EatEat2Live aka The Mouse. He recently posted a picture that I have fond memories of as a boy. This is my version.

Rice with egg, lup chong and soy plus some spring onions

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A quiet weekend in food and halfway through the London Olympic Games 2012

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I had hoped this Olympics I’d take more time and watch more of the coverage and enjoy the sport. So far that hasn’t happened. Other things have got in the way like just being too tired to bother. Instead, I’ve been listening to the coverage on the radio while in bed (yeah I know, that’s not going to help my tiredness). The television coverage from Channel Nine has been as expected, i.e., parochial, disjointed and riddled with advertising. The radio coverage has been good but mainly because of the sporting experts accompanying the sports broadcasters who have been boorish.

One day I hope to watch an Olympic games live. I’d like to watch the swimming and women’s artistic gymnastics mostly. If I could I’d like to watch the weightlifting too.

Yesterday morning I had a simple breakfast with avocado on toast and coffee.

Avocado on toast, with coffee (Nikon D90)

I love a nice firm Hass avocado on toast. Unfortunately when I did the grocery shopping yesterday, the local Coles had run out of the Hass variety and only had Reed avocados. I found a site at http://www.avocado.org.au/foodservice/australianGrown/common_australian_grown_varieties.aspx which describes the difference. I’m hoping the Reed variety are okay. I’m waiting for them to ripen before I try them.

I spent most of the day washing, cleaning and vacuuming and also did some exercising by going for a walk. The weather was pretty good yesterday. While it was overcast it wasn’t as cold as it could have been.

Lunch was a simple omelet with spinach (inside) on toast.

Spinach omelet on toast (Nikon D90)

Bron invited me to dinner. She had whetted my appetite with images on Facebook during the afternoon. The images were amazing.

The main course was lamb on a skewer with haloumi cheese, and capsicum served on flat bread with aioli and asparagus. It was delicious especially when the eating it like a big sandwich. The bread soaked up the extra aioli and was like having two meals in one.

Lamb on a skewer with capsicum and haloumi cheese

For dessert Bron made two different meringue creations. The first was banana and caramel and the other was cherry chocolate. These were very rich. They tasted wonderful. I am seriously spoilt by Bron.

Banana caramel and Cherry chocolate meringues

For breakfast this morning Bron made an amazing baked egg in risotto with pancetta. The image doesn’t do it justice. It was amazing with sourdough toast dipped into the runny egg yolk. I am very spoilt.

Baked egg on risotto with pancetta and spinach

I spent most of today at work. Not the ideal way to spend a Sunday but necessary to keep on top of things. Along with some fruit that I brought along with me I needed a sugar and caffeine hit late in the morning.

Morning snack. Top Deck and Diet Coke.

For dinner I made salmon again and put together some left over mince and cauliflower to make a I don’t know what to call it. It tasted okay. In fact it tasted pretty good.

Salmon with broccoli and the cauliflower thing

I hope you have a great week. Take care.

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The London Olympic Games 2012 opening ceremony, dinner with friends and pondering one’s mortality.

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Yesterday morning I woke and watched the opening ceremony of the London Olympic Games (LOG2012) on television. Channel 9 in Australia has the broadcasting rights. In my personal opinion, Channel 9 doesn’t listen to viewer feedback. They won the rights to other programs like Top Gear from SBS and as a result that program has lost popularity and the sales of DVDs of the Top Gear series I imagine have gone up. Channel 9 was warned by loyal viewers and a strong fan base. Did they listen? No, they twitched too early when the ratings were not to their liking. Any fool could have told them it would not rate as well as they had hoped. It’s a program about cars hosted by three blokes who separately are not as funny as when they are together.

I thought the opening ceremony was fantastic and certainly better than anything we’ve seen in recent decades. As proud as I am to be Australian, the opening ceremony of the Sydney Olympic Games (SOG2000) was a forerunner for the movie Australia. A ghastly waste of Australian tax payers’ hard earned money. The volunteers were fantastic, don’t get me wrong. I just don’t think the person in charge had any idea.

The highlights for me were the tribute to the National Health Service, the anthem sung by a choir and the lighting of the Olympic cauldron. There were many other fantastic elements, not least the segment of Rowan Atkinson playing the character Mr Bean and the orchestra playing Chariots of Fire. The clip below is not from the LOG2012. It looks like many youtube users are rightly concerned with copyright.

[Please note I do not endorse and detest absolutely cigarette smoking. ]

I think it’s a wonderful thing that the British are so proud of their health service that they would integrate it into their opening ceremony and to focus on the Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) for Children. Having a nation and their government dedicated to ensuring every citizen has a right to a high standard of health care is a wonderful thing. It made me think of fabulous hospitals in Australia like the Royal Children’s Hospital in Brisbane (not the one in Victoria), the Princess Alexandra Hospital and the Royal Darwin Hospital.

I’ve ranted on social media plenty of times about the singing of national anthems. At important footy matches and other sporting events, all too often the organiser didn’t use his or her brain and selected a “talented” rising star or well known celebrity to mangle and screech or scream or simply add their stupid and ridiculous take on our anthem. In my opinion, the best way to respect with dignity the importance of our anthem and the anthem of other countries is to use a choir. At a footy match is could be a school choir from a local school, for something bigger it could be a professional children’s choir, and for the LOG2012 it was great to see and hear the voices of a group of singers. It was respectful. It was good.

There was a lot of speculation on who would light the Olympic cauldron. It was great seeing Sir Steve Redgrave take a prominent role towards the end, but what was better was seeing a group of young developing athletes each nominated by a former great of British sport light the thing. It was a nice touch seeing Muhammad Ali there given his role in 1980 in Atlanta. It made me think back to SOG2000. I thought it should have been Susie O’Neil but I’m in a minority there.

After a fairly quiet day Bron and I went to dinner with friends P and L. We’ve enjoyed many fine dinners with them before and their meals have featured in this blog.

Alaskan king crab with aioli

Last night we brought Alaskan King crab that we’d purchased from Costco and Bron made some aioli. For the main meal we had steamboat (hotpot) plus a tray of roasted pork belly. I was fortunate to have the tray of porcine heaven in front of me. There is little better than bite sized pieces of perfectly cooked belly pork along with an amazing dipping sauce.

The steamboat was really good. We had noodles, pork, chicken, beef, fish and prawns plus heaps of vegetables and mushrooms plus some great dipping sauces. L and I like a really hot chilli sauce while P is a big fan of plum sauce. There was also tofu. Bron and L tried to explain how good tofu is. How tofu absorbs flavours and can taste really great in a laksa. If I have a table of real meat and vegetables in front of me, I’m not deliberately going to choose tofu.

Mmm…roast pork belly. I love roasted pork belly.

The table laid out ready for dinner.

You can see in the net some lovely mushrooms.

Towards the end as all the meat and vegetables and yes tofu was coming to an end, we tipped everything into the now developing broth. P and L had laid the table with sipping cups like the ones we have hot chocolate in at Max Brenner. You know, the ones that look like toilet bowls. These are a fantastic idea for steamboat. At the end, when everything was cooked in the broth, we spooned out the final bits and pieces and from the sipping cup drank then best tasting oriental soup you’ll ever taste.

Doesn’t it look good.

This was amazing soup.

P has been continuing his exploration of the world of desserts. His journey is continuing (P understands why I wrote journey…private joke) and discovering new delights. Last night he made a baked cheesecake with coconut cream and topped with slices of pineapple. This was served with Zabaglione. This is the first time P has made it and the first time I’ve tried it. It was fantastic. P, L and Bron enjoyed it with a sticky dessert wine that had a 20 per cent alcohol content. Everyone was pretty happy when the coffee and walnut rocky road plus chocolate covered blueberries came out at the end.

Coconut cream cheesecake topped with pineapple and Zabaglione

Cheesecake and Zabaglione get in my belly now.

Bron also developed a canine crush on Bundy. Bundy belongs to P and L and is a pretty happy pooch.

Bron and Bundy on her lap.

Coffee and walnut rocky road and chocolate covered blueberries

I’m not sure if it was the amount of food and a late night or the week I’ve had at work, but I had some freaky dreams last night. There was lots of thinking about death and mortality. I watched someone die in my dreams and was asked to verify death. It made me think of late night ward call when I was a resident and being called to verify a patient’s death. I went for a walk with Bron this morning and started thinking again about how good it would be to plug my brain into a robot. I’m now at an age when I’m thinking about life and death more often. I’m witnessing my body go through the changes you hear about and learn about when you’re younger. Wouldn’t it be nice to simply plug your brain into a mechanical body and go and skip and jump and see things just like when you were a kid?

This afternoon instead of lunch we had an early afternoon tea and I had a lovely vanilla slice from Ricardo’s at Jamison.

Vanilla slice

Alaskan King Crab, macarons and a chocolate meringue and orange chocolate ganache layered cake

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Wow what a dinner we had this evening. Bron out did herself. This morning we went to Costco with the aim of getting some King crab. During the Summer, Costco has a pavilion set up for seafood. It looks like in the Winter this is not the case. We ended up finding some Alaskan King crab in the frozen food section of Costco.

King crab at Costco (iPhone)

When I got to Bron’s place this afternoon she was in the midst of macaron manufacture.

Ready for the oven (iPhone)

These are a jaffa flavour.

Piping macarons (iPhone)

Macarons with orange chocolate ganache (iPhone)

There is also some cointreau in the ganache.

King crab waiting to be eaten (iPhone)

You can find the twitpic link at https://twitter.com/bron99/status/226597992789065728/photo/1

The aioli was amazing (iPhone)

It took a while but we finished four legs and two claws (iPhone)

For dessert Bron made a chocolate meringue layered with orange chocolate ganache topped with cream and raspberries.

Chocolate meringue with chocolate orange ganache topped with cream and raspberries (iPhone)

Chocolate meringue with chocolate orange ganache topped with cream and raspberries (iPhone)

Chocolate meringue with chocolate orange ganache topped with cream and raspberries (iPhone)

After dessert I was still feeling peckish so had the last of the salted caramel chocolate Bron had made plus a macaron.

Salted caramel chocolate and macaron (iPhone)

I now feel full and have strong garlic breath from the aioli.

 

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Four strikes Lemon Grass, four strikes…

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It’s been a little while since our last outing to Lemon Grass at Woden. We love the food, especially number 39 on the menu GANG PANANG (Creamy red curry (chicken or beef) with crushed peanuts and kaffir leaves topped with crispy egg noodles). We wanted to give them another go. We were patient and as clear as possible when speaking. Yet we waited and waited and at the end when we wanted to ask for dessert, the wait staff cleared empty tables rather than tables with customers. They main problem with this restaurant is the ratio of wait staff to customers. On a large floor with seating for more than a hundred or so customers there are three wait staff. They’re friendly enough but I’m not sure what food service training they’ve received.

We started with entrée and around us we had fish cakes, curry puffs and pork patties. These were not that good, they were tasty but not really anything special.

Pork patties (iPhone)

I then had the beef red curry (Number 39).

Beef red curry (iPhone)

One of our party noticed you couldn’t get a 69 at this restaurant. Mind you, you can’t get a 63 or a 64 either :-)

We all wanted something sweet and were prepared to stay and order dessert here. Lots of other tables had been vacated and dirty plates were stacked on each. We had dirty plates on our table and were clearly wanting to stay. The wait staff avoided our attention seeking behaviour and proceeded to clear the other tables. In the end, we went to the front desk, obtained the bill, sorted out the money and left.

We had dessert at Max Brenner.

I had ice cream, whipped cream and toffee topping plus a hot white chocolate.

Ice cream, whipped cream and toffee topping (iPhone)

White hot chocolate (iPhone)

Will we return? Yeah probably. We had the idea we’d order number 39 for takeaway and then go somewhere else to eat. That may be the solution.

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My weekend in food

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Okay it’s a bit more than the weekend. On returning to Canberra I caught up with Bron and we had dinner at the Canberra Southern Cross Club (Jamison) on Wednesday night. I had my usual scotch fillet steak with calamari and prawns. You’ll notice a jug of pepper sauce as well as a jug of Béarnaise (because that’s how I roll).

Scotch rib fillet reef and beef from the Canberra Southern Cross Club (Jamison) (iPhone)

On Thursday morning Bron made Cinnabon for her work mates. I got to have two for breakfast (lucky me).

A tray of Cinnabon on cooling racks (iPad)

This tasted amazingly good (iPhone)

On Thursday evening Bron made an aubergine curry. It was delicious.

Aubergine curry (iPhone)

On Friday morning we had a Mavi breakfast wrap. I love these. They are bacon, egg, hash brown, mushrooms and barbecue sauce rolled up in a flat bread and served with a medium coffee. Two of these cost $19 at Mavi in Phillip.

Mavi breakfast wrap (iPhone)

That evening we went to Kingsleys Steak and Crabhouse in Civic. I had a steak with WA marron which was delicious. The steak was extraordinarily tender even if it was a little medium rare rather than rare. The potato bake and beetroot salad were nice accompaniments.

Steak and WA Marron (iPhone)

Potato bake (iPhone)

Beetroot salad (iPhone)

Nothing left. It was good (iPhone).

For dessert we had caramel cheese cake with peanut brittle.

Caramel cheesecake with peanut brittle (iPhone)

After dinner we went to Koko Black and I had hot chocolate.It was the nicest hot chocolate I’ve ever had.

Hot chocolate from Koko Black (iPhone)

Saturday morning came and I felt full from Friday night. I’m so grateful Bron was happy with making me a poached egg and avocado.

Poached egg and avocado (iPhone)

That afternoon we went to a birthday high tea at Adore Tea for a dear friend, viz., Nat.

Cucumber sandwich Adore High Tea (iPhone)

Adore High Tea (iPhone)

Adore High Tea (iPhone)

Adore High Tea (iPhone)

Adore High Tea (iPhone)

Adore High Tea (iPhone)

But I adore coffee (iPhone)

Last night Bron made a beef stew on mash with cabbage.

Beef stew on mash with cabbage (iPhone)

This morning we went to Urban Pantry for Brunch. I had the big breakfast which was nice but the poached eggs weren’t very good. The yolks were firm and not runny. This is a deal breaker. We won’t return.

Big breakfast with a side of Hollandaise (iPhone)

Finally tonight I made myself some chicken with avocado, cabbage and onion.

Chicken dinner (iPhone)

So that’s my extended weekend in food. Good night. I’ll catch you all through the week.

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Footy food and the Decider #origin #QUEENSLANDER Queensland defeats NSW 21:20

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Tonight it was the decider. Last year Queensland won its sixth State of Origin series. This year Queensland won the first game and NSW won the second game. I’ve previously written that I really hope for a good close game and truth be told, as much as I wanted Queensland to win, NSW winning would mean that Rugby League is the winner. We need to have two strong origin sides not a lopsided competition. We need to have a game that kids can remain excited about, after all, rugby league is the greatest winter sport of all. Much more enjoyable than soccer and Aussie rules and for a spectator superior than Rugby Union. I write these things not wanting to upset readers. I just find so much satisfaction in watching a good game of rugby league.

In the end the result was right and the game was one of the most exciting nail biting games of rugby league we’ve seen. Queensland defeated NSW 21 to 20 in a very tight match.

For dinner tonight I was partially inspired by recent MasterChefAU episodes featuring dude food. I knew I needed some vegetation so there is some avocado. Otherwise it was all chicken. Chicken wings coated in oil, honey and spike.

Eight chicken wings in my fry pan. Ready for roasting. (Nikon D90)

So I put the wings into a fry pan and then put them into a hot oven (200 °C) for 30 minutes.

Nicely cooked chicken wings. (Nikon D90)

I could have just eaten the chicken but my conscious got the better of me so I added some avocado as an after thought. It’s also green :-)

Spiked chicken and avocado. (Nikon D90)

During the game it was great watching my Twitter timeline. It was fantastic seeing Lisa Curry tweeting for Queensland. I recall watching her swim when she was a school girl and I was swimming at school. She is a fantastic Queenslander.

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Chocolate overload…Never and Facebook likes

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I have great friends. This morning Bron brought me in one of your chocolate balls from her birthday cake.

White chocolate covered cake ball (iPhone)

Then work mates who were having a section meeting brought in the morning tea they had prepared.

This looks like a chocolate flying spaghetti monster (iPhone) Thanks Amy

Then there were dates, more FSMs, rocky road and Lindt passion fruit chocolate (iPhone) Thank you HECM section friends.

It was a great chocolatey day.

And for those who liked my Facebook page this is what “insights” gives me now I have 30 likes.

What 30 likes gets you on a Facebook page

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I’m a Spike convert | Shout out to the Salmon Fishing Queen

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In Late May Barb from Life in the Foothills blogged that she spiked a chicken. I wrote a comment that I’d not heard of Spike and I’d have to go looking for it. Very kindly Barb sent me a bottle from the US to Australia. The website describes Spike as 39 different herbs, spices and vegetables all lovingly blended with just the right amount of salt! The original version contains salt crystals (earth and sea), nutritional yeast, hydrolysed soy protein (NO ADDED MSG), mellow toasted onion, onion powder, orange powder, soy granules, celery leaf powder, celery root powder, garlic powder, dill, kelp, Indian curry, horseradish, ripe white pepper, orange and lemon peel, summer savoury, mustard flour, sweet green and red bell peppers, parsley flakes, tarragon, rose hips, safflower, mushroom powder, parsley powder, spinach powder, tomato powder, sweet paprika, celery seed ground, cayenne pepper, plus a delightful herbal bouquet of the best oregano, sweet basil, marjoram, rosemary and thyme.

I’m very grateful to Barb for sending me this bottle (Nikon D90)

On Sunday afternoon I prepared a slow cooked pork belly dish for lunches this week at work. I Spiked it.

This was my lunch container today at work (iPhone) Also on Instagram http://instagram.com/p/Mj8YQYxNLh/

On Sunday evening I prepared pumpkin soup. I Spiked it.

I love pumpkin soup. (Nikon D90)

This evening I roasted a Chicken Maryland. I Spiked it.

This is the way Barb explained to use Spike. Rub in oil then rub in Spike. (Nikon D90)

This is the way Barb explained to use Spike. Rub in oil then rub in Spike. (Nikon D90)

Again, thanks Barb. I have more chicken this week and Spike will be used.

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