Tag Archives: Pavlova

A sour end to a wonderful break

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I left Brisbane today after a little over a week of joy and happiness. I’ve had a fantastic time visiting my parents and my daughters.

This morning Dad made us breakfast sausages and bacon.

Breakfast snags and bacon.

Looks odd but it was tasty.

For morning tea we had pavlova

Leftover pavlova for morning tea is the best :-)

It’s always better the day after when the cream goes a little more stiff.

My parents had to attend a matinee session of South Pacific this afternoon and I had to deliver the girls home. I had a couple of hours to kill so I got to the airport a couple of hours early. I checked in my bag using a QANTAS QTAG. A simple and convenient method to avoid paper based luggage tags. The process seemed to work okay.

I went to the Qantas Club and spent time reading. They had iced vivo biscuits which are a real treat http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iced_VoVo

Thank you @qantasairways for the upgrade and the iced vovos 😃

I boarded my flight after getting an upgrade thanks to Qantas. For an afternoon snack, I had a cheese plate.

I was going to say nice cheese plate @qantasairways but my bag is still lost. Still tracing according to website.

It was delicious.

Then on arriving in Canberra I discovered my bag was not put on flight QF961. This is the second time in two months that this has happened with Qantas.

I caught a cab home after being told my bag would be delivered when it’s found. The cab driver of TX73 was not the driver on the dashboard card which was for A2278. He didn’t indicate to change lanes or turn corners and he was speaking on his mobile telephone throughout the drive from the airport to my place (this is now illegal in the ACT unless he has a proper handsfree set up which he didn’t). He didn’t know the directions to my place so I had to direct him. When I asked about his authority card it was in his pocket. I called the taxi company and they didn’t want to do anything. I would have to put the complaint in writing.

At 2055 AEDT I called QANTAS but they had closed their baggage service area despite their brochure saying it is open until 2100 AEST (which is 2200 AEDT). I called the Canberra baggage claim area and was told I should avoid using the Qantas QTAG system in future and there was still no trace of my bag. I am so annoyed. This has made me feel quite upset after what has been a wonderful break from work seeing my parents and daughters. I have stuff in that bag that I need to use not least of all the value of the contents.

I try not to rant too much on this blog but tonight I’ve ranted all over twitter and I felt the need to ventilate here.

I hope my bag shows up soon. Word to the wise, avoid the use of the QANTAS QTAG system.

Gaz

Pacific Fair

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Today is 2013/01/01 (YYYY/MM/DD this is the way I shorthand dates), the first day of 2013. It was also the last day we spent on the Gold Coast. I promised Miss11 and Miss15 a shopping trip in the tourist shopping centre, viz., Pacific Fair.

Pacific Fair Website http://www.pacificfair.com.au/

Google maps http://goo.gl/maps/wafZ4


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To start though we needed breakfast. We walked across the road to Bistro Blanc on Surf Parade on Broadbeach.

Bistro Blanc Website http://www.bistroblanc.com.au/

Google maps http://goo.gl/maps/2YeKg


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First things first.

I really need this.

Coffee

———-

Miss11 and Miss15 both had bacon and egg on a muffin with a hash brown.

Miss11 and Miss15 each had a bacon and egg muffin. They were happy.

It was served “gourmet” style with barbecue sauce.

———-

I couldn’t go past the Eggs Benedict with bacon.

It's hard to not have Eggs Benedict.

This was done on a Turkish bread which was very nice.

———-

Having spent more than a week away from home, I planned my 3G data usage to perfection.

Perfect planning

———-

Okay Pacific Fair with Miss11 and Miss15 meant lots and lots and lots of dress and shoe shops. It also meant looking at some novelties.

For fans of plants v zombies

I never knew you could buy Plants v Zombies plush toys :-)

———-

I haven’t posted pictures of everything they looked at. I am fortunate that my daughters like looking and are careful when choosing to spend money, even my money. In the end everyone came away happy.

For morning tea, you guessed it, it had to be another vanilla slice.

Vanilla slice at Pacific Fair

This one I shared with Miss15 who reminded me that when we lived in Darwin every Saturday or Sunday morning I’d walk to the local pastry shop and buy them caramel tartlets and buy myself a vanilla slice or bee sting.

———-

After more than half a day of shopping we needed some food before the drive back to Brisbane. We opted for a mall Chinese takeaway. This was a $10 plate of self service. It was awful. Truly disgusting. The worst I’ve ever had. The place is called Cathay Oriental at Pacific Fair shopping centre. Don’t do it is my advice. McDonald’s or KFC would be better.

Shopping is hard work. We all shared this. Worst mall Chinese food ever.

It looks nasty. Tasted worse.

———-

Miss15 and Miss17 needed new wrist watches. I bought them some very nice looking watches.

ICE watches for Miss15 and Miss17

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As we were driving home Mum and Dad were cooking dinner. Basically it was wonton soup without the wonton wrappers. Instead it was served with noodles.

Chinese style pork and prawn meat balls. Basically wonton soup without the wonton wrapper. Fantastic meal. Thanks Mum and Dad.

Check it out. This was beyond awesome.

For previous entries on wonton take a look at this search query http://garydavidlum.com/?s=wonton&submit=Search

———-

For my last night in Brisbane with my parents and two of my daughters, Mum made her “world famous” pavlova. One of the greatest Australian inventions ever (I write this to deliberately stir up my friends and family from New Zealand*).

Mum's homemade pavlova. A true Australian classic. Mum makes the best pav.

This one had passion fruit, pitted cherries, banana and mango topping.

———-

Okay, tomorrow, I return to Canberra. I have had a great little break in Brisbane and the Gold Coast.

*For all I care, New Zealand can keep Russel Crowe and Richard Wilkins as their own. Pavlova is ALL AUSTRALIAN.

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Best meal ever and #StateofOrigin Game 2

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Last night Bron and I visited some close friends who we often have dinner with. Mostly it’s us going to their place to eat wonderful food. Last night was no different. In the words of Bron (and I agree), “Best meal in my life“.

A few weeks ago we set up the date and started talking about a menu. We suggested we’d go to Costco and get King crab legs for an entrée and Bron said she’d make a lemon tart for dessert. P and LP came back and said they would happily prepare an Asian degustation for our main course.

Bron and I ventured out to Costco yesterday morning to learn that the seafood arrangement only came out every fortnight. We’ve been to Costco so many times on alternating weeks that we had not noticed this. This was disappointing because Bron was also going to make her gorgeous aioli and and another dipping sauce. Bron sent P a text message and explained. No worries, “We have prawns” came the reply.

The lemon tart was an experiment. Bron had not made this recipe before. She need not have worried. It was perfect.

So we started with a few prawns and homemade dressing. These had only been frozen once and were a delicious and certainly acted as an entrée or appetiser for us. I was so hungry.

What followed can only be described as awesome. I use that word advisedly. Like a good many words used on social media and on television and movies, “awesome” is over used. This meal was awesome.

We started with LP’s dumplings. Mouth sized and full of flavour. The spicy dipping sauce was just right. P then followed with some of his signature pieces, namely, a crunchy Chinese cabbage salad and seafood cakes. I could have eaten the salad all night. This was followed with LP’s tamarind prawns. Oh my the flavour was fantastic. This was a first time for LP. The Pièce de résistance was P’s twice cooked belly pork. The reduction could be smelled when we entered the house. The star anise and cinnamon wafting in our nostrils tempting us to pick up the jug and drink the sauce was an ever present danger.

With the ‘mains’ over, we entered the dangerous world of dessert. I say dangerous because no one gets between some of us and their dessert.

LP was preparing the chocolate soufflé as we arrived. She was so delicate in folding in the cream. It was certainly worth the effort. I have never had a soufflé so light and fluffy. Bron was concerned that I had left crusty bits of chocolate on the edge of my ramekin. I quickly fixed the problem without burning my tongue :-)

Bron’s lemon tart was also a triumph. Earlier in the day Bron had received a gift from a dear tweep who shared from her bounty of lemons. The quickly prepared candied lemon rind was also delicious along with the cognac whipped cream that LP had provided with her soufflé.

To finish the evening we all enjoyed a half of a small pavlova that P has now perfected. It was a perfect evening with fantastic conversation, lots of laughs and dare I say, for me at least, belt loosening.

I apologise for the quality of my iPhone photography. I was trembling with multiple foodgasms that I had trouble focusing.

Prawns with homemade seafood sauce (iPhone)

Pork dumplings (iPhone)

Crunchy Chinese cabbage salad and seafood cakes (iPhone)

Tamarind prawns (iPhone)

Twice cooked pork belly (iPhone)

Twice cooked pork belly (iPhone)

Chocolate soufflé served with cognac cream (iPhone)

Cognac cream (iPhone)

Lemon tart with Cognac cream (iPhone)

Pavlova served with Chinese gooseberry, passion fruit and strawberries (iPhone)

More as a post script than anything else, I have not blogged for a few days and I should comment on the second game in this year’s State of Origin series. NSW defeated Queensland. As much as I wanted the Queensland XXXX Maroons to win, it wasn’t to be. The game was fierce, it was tight, it was superbly played. Queensland played well and NSW played better. NSW were the best team on the night and deserved to win. This now means a decider in two and a bit weeks. This is not a bad thing. If Queensland had won, this would have made game three a fizzer and given Queensland has won the series in the last six years it would severely damage the State of Origin concept. Dare I say it, NSW winning the series in 2012 would not be a tragedy. The important thing is ensuring the greatest game on the planet, i.e., Rugby League is maintained for everyone to enjoy.

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When @Nigella_Lawson meets @donnahay_tweets, well sort of…

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Tonight Bron prepared a lovely crispy skin duck breast with a cranberry and citrus sauce. It was served with a really nice stiff mash of potato and sweet potato along with some greens.

Crispy skin duck breast with a cranberry and citrus sauce

For dessert Bron combined a Nigella Lawson pavlova recipe with a Donna Hay idea for layering the chocolate filling between pavlova slices.

The complete cake. Sorry the lighting wasn't right for the image.

My first piece, yes I had more :-)

I won't say how much more I ate...

It was delicious.

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My weekend in food and ‘health’

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This week at work has been fairly full on. I’ve come back from a week away in Washington and there is a lot on in the branch. We also had senate estimates this week which just adds to the longer hours. We were there to give evidence at 2250 AEDT on Wednesday night. We finished after 2300 AEDT.

The weekend has been a much sought after break. I’ve been looking forward to dinner with friends this weekend. We had dinner parties planned on both Friday and Saturday evenings. Catching up with friends is always so good. Coincidentally we were repeating a weekend from earlier in the year http://wp.me/p16Zhd-jV

On Friday evening the menu was prawns, roast beef and pavlova.

The prawns were as fresh as they could be. Only frozen once and cooked as soon as they were thawed. The main course had a number of highlights. Freshly baked bread being one thing but the star was a slow cooked standing rib roast. The prime rib was cooked for about twelve hours at 50 °C and then pan seared to give it a lovely crust. Dessert was an amazing pavlova. The picture of the pavlova speaks for itself. It was served with home made vanilla bean ice cream. It was so rich and creamy.

Fresh prawns with a seafood sauce.

Yep, it's a salad. The olives are local.

Creamy potato bake.

Fresh bread made on the day. With real butter, what can be better?

Standing rib roast. Doesn't it look amazing.

Plated up. This dinner was so well balanced.

A heart shaped pavlova. Lovely fresh fruits including blackberries picked locally.

Pavlova served with home made vanilla ice cream.

It was a great night finished with dark chocolate and more good conversation.

On Saturday night we caught up with friends for a shared dinner party. Regular readers will know that Bron has become a star with Yorkshire puddings and a request came for roast lamb and yorkies plus Bron’s sticky date pudding. The main course was all about the lamb shoulder. The lamb shoulders (about 10 kilograms of lamb) had been prepared by a butcher and split to ensure an even cooking. The lamb pieces were placed over cloves of garlic and rosemary stems. Over the lamb more garlic and rosemary were added. Aluminium foil covered the meat and then the roasting tray was placed in the oven at 230 °C for 30 minutes after which is was turned down low to between 150 and 170 ⁠°C for seven hours. The low slow cooking ensures a succulent product with meat that pulls away easily from the bones.The secret to this meal was putting the lamb in the barbecue for about half an hour. The result was a beautiful caramelisation of the meat leaving us with some crackling too. It was accompanied by smash potatoes and roasted carrot, sweet potato and parsnips.

After the main we had Bron’s sticky date pudding with butterscotch sauce, custard and vanilla ice cream.

10 kilograms of lamb shoulder in three oven trays.

This is me sampling some of the lamb. Look at that growing mountain of meat.

Smash potatoes and roasted sweet potato and parsnip.

Can you believe how much meat we went through?

Bron made enough yorkies for everyone to have two or three.

Ready to serve.

My first helping of lamb and vegetables.

My second helping of lamb.

My first helping of Bron's sticky date oudding with butterscotch sauce, custard and vanilla ice cream.

My second helping of pudding.

After dinner we had to have fruit.

Terry's chocolate orange ball.

This morning I woke up feeling awful. I had a headache, muscle pain and some joint pain. Even though room temperature was about 22 °C, I was shivering. A hot shower and a cup of tea didn’t help so I spent most of today in bed drinking water every hour and passing really concentrated urine. From time to time I could feel myself being viræmic. I still have a pounding headache but felt like I need to blog so I can say I did something today.

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A weekend in food

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I know a lot of fellow bloggers have started 2012 with posts about resolutions and reviews of 2011. I thought my first post for 2012 should be about a weekend of food enjoyment.

On Friday night we caught up with friends and enjoyed steam boat and pavlova at their place. We’ve enjoyed steam boat with them before and it has always been a fantastic meal. Steam boat is also known as hot pot. I remember steam boat as a kid, Mum had an electric boat and we had many happy meals putting meat, vegetables and noodles into the simmering water. On Friday night we enjoyed marinaded pork, beef, chicken and prawns. We had three types of noodles and heaps of Chinese vegetables. At the end, three egg yolks were beaten in and we had the best soup to finish.

Steam boat preparation. Everything ready.

Steam boat preparation. Everything ready.

A bowl of awesome goodness.

For dessert we had a pavlova lovingly made by our friends. This pav was amazing. The cream was whipped coconut cream and pouring cream. It had a lovely coconut flavour and a smooth texture. The fruit included banana, passion fruit, mango, pineapple, Chinese gooseberry (kiwifruit), blueberries and strawberries.

The platter was about 60 cm in diameter. Four adults polished it off in one hit. It was awesome.

A huge pavlova

We accompanied the pavlova with one of the all time best ice creams. Weis‘ mango cream with Queensland nut (Macadamia) chunks.

My favourite ice cream Weis' mango cream and macadamia chunks

My first (of three) helping.

My first of three helpings of awesome pavlova

The empty platter, all gone in one go

We finished the evening with chocolate and port. Well I didn’t have port, but it was a great evening. Lots of laughs. We really treausre these times with our friends. Especially the work and social related conversations. I’m glad I don’t drink otherwise I’d forget how much I laugh when we’re all together.

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A really great tweet up

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Prologue

About a month ago Meredith @macjam1 asked a bunch of us to her place for a Christmas barbecue.

Canberra has a really good and very active group of tweeps. There are circles within circles. I’ve found myself spending a lot of my twitter and facebook time with a small group of friends based in Canberra. We’ve met a few times already and have become firm friends. Some of us know each other through listening to @markparton on @2CC and others have work connections. Mostly though it’s through twitter and facebook. In addition to this group we also have some close twitter buddies in Queensland and Victoria who one day we will visit.

The barbecue

Each of us had in mind something to bring along while @macjam1 and her husband provided an excellent venue and more meat that we could throw a stick at. The weather ended up being great after forecasts of rain and cold. The afternoon and evening air was fresh but not cold. The sound of mosquitoes was held at bay with Aeroguard and Citronella candles.

The food was heavily influenced by most of us recently taking to various weight loss programs. Some are doing variations on low carbohydrate systems, others are exercising like crazy (cycling and Zumba are popular) and there are those on combinations. We started with combinations of spicy sausage and mushrooms cooked on the barbecue along with a cheese ball and Turkish bread and dips. Then @NatMcNazz brought along these awesome Parmesan cheese biscuits flavoured with chilli and fennel.

Fred the tooth pick holder was popular

This image reveals @tinythecabbie ‘s hand

Turkish bread and dips

Here is a close up of Fred and his partner Cork

Fred and his mate

The tooth picks later became popular with the kids who lit them in the candles and then played with fire (all under close adult supervision of course).

There was so much great food. By the time it was dinner time, I’d already eaten enough for a few nights anyway. Our gracious hosts and other friends had brought along enough to feed us all including children and then some.

Plate one for me

The coleslaw brought by @Bron99 was awesome and not traditional. I the potato bake was fantastic. Creamy and good. I haven’t had a snag and hamburger for ages. So this image has been captioned Plate one for me because I ended up going back twice more. My second plate was piled high with coleslaw and potato bake and a piece of honey soy chicken. The third plate was mainly coleslaw and another piece of chicken.

Then came the desserts. I’ll just list them through photographs.

Pavlova, Australia's greatest invention. I LOVE PAVLOVA!!! :-)

I can never resist pavlova. It brings back so many happy childhood memories.

This white chocolate cheesecake was amazing

@Bron99 made this lovely white chocolate cheesecake which came with a strawberry coulis.

Apple pie

I confess my eyes were bigger than my belly. I wanted apple pie but after the pavlova and cheesecake I could not go back for the apple pie.

Chocolate wafers, jaffas and spearmint leaves

I do not know what this is called but @TinyTheCabbie brought them. So colourful and everyone raved about them.

My plate of dessert

I have with much sadness and self condemnation have to admit I could not finish this lovely plate of food. My grandmother’s voice echoes in my head about the starving children in Africa, but after the gluttony of snacks and then three plates of dinner, my dessert stomach (also known as the œsophagus) failed me and certain sphincters sending signals to my brain to stop eating or eject food upwards.

At the end of the evening, we had a tweet up photograph which I won’t upload because I don’t have everyone’s permission to share. Suffice to say it is a great photograph and it was a wonderful and happy evening.

I think I can safely post one blurry image of a subset of us who preferred the company of mosquitoes so they could talk about the others :-)

Some of the tweeps

It really was a fantastic evening.

Epilogue

This morning I woke up feeling full. What better way to celebrate a new day than with brunch. Off to Black Pepper we went for a Black Pepper big breakfast.

Black Pepper big breakfast poached eggs, bacon (lots of bacon), chorizo sausage, mushrooms, tomato and a potato cake

Did I say there was lots of bacon?

Lots of bacon

Yep lots of bacon.

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