I really need to lose weight. The only successful way I’ve lost weight has been to take a low carb approach. Whether this goes on or not will depend on motivation. Today I was motivated.
The thing about low carb eating is that it isn’t as easy as it sounds. You may think it’s all bacon and eggs and meat but it isn’t. It’s important to carefully choose vegetables and during the initial induction phase it’s important not to eat fruit. The big risks in the induction phase are constipation and gout. Both are uncomfortable and painful. Whether I continue depends on how I feel.
For breakfast I prepared a low carb fried egg, bacon and parmesan cheese dish.
Saturday morning fried egg with cheesy bacon
I really like cooking my bacon in a small benchtop oven which allows easy melting of cheese.
After grocery shopping I went for a walk around Lake Ginninderra and found a pelican, black swan and some other water birds
Pelican and water birds on Lake Ginninderra
It wasn’t a great day for photography
I had a coffee at Heather’s House of Cake
For lunch I made a beef mince roll with tasty Coon cheese wrapped in iceberg lettuce
Lettuce wrapped beef mince roll
This didn’t look that exciting but it tasted surprisingly good.
It’s a Thursday night in Canberra and it’s the (Lunar) Chinese New Year.
Even though I’m Chinese I have no idea about the traditional aspects of how this is celebrated. I just know it’s a good time to eat, there are lots of lanterns on display, dragons may appear and did I say it’s a good time to eat?
Bron, Li Peng, Peter and I, went to celebrate the Lunar Chinese New Year at the Lanterne Rooms in Campbell. The Lanterne Rooms are part of the Chairman group of restaurants in Canberra and it was doing a special dinner menu to ring in the new year.
I booked a table via http://dimmi.com.au for 6.30 pm. It’s a very dark restaurant and my mind went to poor available light for food photography (as it does). I arrived a few minutes early and the wait staff were very friendly and helpful. While I was sitting three of them approached me to ensure I was okay and to find out if I wanted a drink. I was asked about food allergies and any special requirements.
With the arrival of Bron, Li Peng and Peter we agreed on the special set menu and waited to be served delicious yummy Chinese food with a twist of which the Chairman group of restaurants is known for.
The first dish was longevity noodles with cured trout, eshallots sauce and salmon roe. I LOVE salmon roe. Lovely salty balls of happiness that pop when you gently bite down on them.
The second dish to come out is Tom Yum infused crispy prawns with rock melon and apple slaw. The prawns were cooked perfectly.
The next dish is a duck roll with kaffir lime chilli dressing. The duck was yummy.
Then we get three dishes with some rice. This part of the dinner consists of blue eye cod with pickled mustard leaf and ginger broth, shanghai rice cake with caramelised pork and scallions and to round off some warm roasted vegetables. The fish was nice and the rice cakes had a really intriguing texture.
The final flourish included more rice and a dish of slow cooked blackmore wagyu, pork ribs with smoky black dates, jackfruit and pickled green chilli and some greens, i.e., sauteed sugar snap peas in XO sauce.
Every dish was good, some better than others. I really liked the noodles and trout, the prawns, duck rolls and pork ribs. Towards the end I forgot to shoot photographs of the dishes as they were arriving. Sorry about the messy photographs.
It was a pretty filling meal and I woke up feeling quite full
It was a good meal with good company and a really nice environment to enjoy the Chinese new year.
Did you do anything to celebrate the Chinese new year?
On Christmas eve I went to lunch at the Ginseng Restaurant with a couple of blokes from work. The Ginseng Restaurant is in the Hellenic Club at Woden. It always amuses me that this centre of Greek culture has both Chinese and Italian eateries in it.
I was eating with a couple of work friends. I mentioned to one of them that I never worked as a waiter while I was at medical school. He suggested I’m not really Chinese
The good thing about Ginseng is the service is quick and the restaurant is cheap and cheerful.
We each chose a dish for sharing. I chose the sweet and sour pork not because I particularly like it but because it connected with a story from earlier in the day. Christmas eve in Canberra started as a fantastic warm and moderately humid day. I sent a text message to my friend, who was born in Victoria, about just how good the weather is. He responded that he was growing mold in his nether regions. I suggested coating his scrotum with corn flour as per the movie Chef. I also added we could cut them off and make hush puppies in a deep fat fryer. You really need to have seen the movie Chef to understand the connection. The closest thing we were going to eat to hush puppies that day would be sweet and sour pork.
We shared duck pancakes for a starter and then got stuck into some sweet and sour pork, chicken and noodles with ginger and some prawns.
Roast duck pancakes Apple iPhone 6 Plus with iPhone 6 Plus back camera 4.15mm f/2.2 at 4mm and f/2.2, 1/15sec, ISO 125Sweet and sour pork Apple iPhone 6 Plus with iPhone 6 Plus back camera 4.15mm f/2.2 at 4mm and f/2.2, 1/15sec, ISO 125Chicken and noodles Apple iPhone 6 Plus with iPhone 6 Plus back camera 4.15mm f/2.2 at 4mm and f/2.2, 1/15sec, ISO 125Prawns Apple iPhone 6 Plus with iPhone 6 Plus back camera 4.15mm f/2.2 at 4mm and f/2.2, 1/15sec, ISO 100
It was a very nice lunch. It cost us about $30 each and were in and out within about an hour.
Earlier in the day we enjoyed a Kirkland pavlova too.
Kirkland pavlova Apple iPhone 6 Plus with iPhone 6 Plus back camera 4.15mm f/2.2 at 4mm and f/2.2, 1/10sec, ISO 100
I hope your work place Christmas lunches went well.
There was one requirement, at Wild Duck we needed to eat duck
It’s been a busy week and Bron and I had a reservation at Wild Duck on a Thursday night. The reservation process was dead easy with Dimmi (electronic reservation). What I like about Dimmi is the reservation gets locked in and confirmation/reminder e-mails are sent which gives me reassurance.
We had agreed beforehand like we did at Olive at Mawson, that since it’s Wild Duck we need to eat duck (at Olive at Mawson we agreed someone had to eat an olive dish).
Wild Duck describes itself as fine Asian cuisine. The menu however is not your typical Chinese restaurant. It’s more of an abstract of traditional dishes cooked beautifully with flavour as a priority.
We decided on mains before we settled on entrées. We chose the pork belly and lamb ribs for mains after thinking about the ocean trout and spatchcock. To begin dinner we agreed on duck in rice wrappers and king prawns.
Roast duck rice paper rolls. Chinese roast duck, cucumber, spring onion in Vietnamese style rice paper roll served with Hoi Sin sauce.
These wraps were served on a cute duck plate
King prawns and green pawpaw. Pan fried King Prawns with Cajun spice, served with a Thai style Green Pawpaw and Granny Smith apple salad.
The duck rolls were pretty good. The sauce that came with it was superb. I found the pieces of duck meat were quite large and rather than being a negative, I loved having a nice big piece of tender duck meat with skin on it. The prawns were nicely cooked. They were coated in a lovely spicy mix which was complemented nicely with the refreshing shredded green pawpaw and green apple.
Pork belly in lotus leaf. Slowly cooked pork belly with 3 kinds of soy sauce, rock sugar and mixed spices, wrapped in Lotus leaves with sticky rice.Manhan lamb ribs. Slow cooked Lamb Ribs in ‘One Hundred’ spices, finished on the grill, served with aged Chinese vinegar caramelised Banana chillies and soy caramelised leeks.
Both these dishes were fantastic. The pork belly was tender and sweet and accompanied with some lovely sticky rice that had soaked up all the lovely pork juices. The lamb ribs had the most tender meat ever. A spoon would have separated the meat from the bones. The flavour was amazing. The fat had been rendered out and gave the meat a lovely unctuous texture. The nice thing about sharing the meal was that we could eat a small amount from each dish and go back for more. I started with the pork then had some lamb and then pork and finished with lamb. I commented that I wish I had finished on the pork because the sweetness would have been perfect for me. Bron loved the lamb and said she was happy to finish with the lamb because it was a dish she wasn’t expecting in that she’d eaten pork belly many times before but this was the first time she’d eaten lamb ribs. Both dishes were fabulous and I’d happily go back and eat them again.
Black sticky rice. Cinnamon infused black sticky rice with salted coconut custard on top. Vanilla meringue and Persian candy floss. Thanks Bron for shooting this photograph.Banana split with a twist. Bitter chocolate glaze, lotus seeds on rum and almond crumble, served with coconut ice cream.
Bron chose the sticky rice and I said I’d probably go with the five texture mousse and summer berries. As our requests were being taken I quickly changed my mind and asked for the banana split. Bron just stared at me (death stare). She had (been hoping) hoped to check out some of the mousse and berries. There was a bit of face palming lol
All in all it was a good night. The setting is very pleasant and not too noisy. The service was great, it was friendly and attentive but not too in your face. We both commented on the timing of the dishes. We were not left waiting long between courses and if I had one reservation it would be to leave a few more minutes between courses.
I’m happy to recommend Wild Duck to anyone living in or visiting Canberra.
So now for a rating. 4.5 out of 5 colonies 🙂 Fantastic. I’ll be back.
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