Inspired By Meeting Rene Redzepi of Noma and Martin Boetz of Cooks Co-op

Inspiration. Passion. Effort and perspiration. Working smarter and working harder. All the things that I've been trying to implement in my life.

It's been two years since I have posted. Not because I haven't been inspired, I am inspired daily. However, it takes conscious effort to take the time out of our busy life to write a blog post.

A few weeks ago, I was so happy that I met Martin Boetz, a famous Chef in Australia. I've come across Peter Gilmore, the number one Chef in Australia, in the lift out of all places in the past but it doesn't compare to having a conversation beyond greetings! For those that enjoy their food, it's like meeting your idols.


Last week, I was so stoked that I met Rene Redzepi, the Chef of the Danish restaurant Noma. Noma is the number one restaurant in the world. I am so full of admiration for those who have worked so hard to learn, create, inspire and become the best in their field. It takes natural talent and also the ruthless ability to conquer politics and public opinion.

I've met other famous people but not really inspired enough to write about it. It's just that I was so inspired by Martin and Rene that it's sparked my interest to write again. They have such a passion for their field of food.

When I was avidly blogging all those years ago, I was contacted by politicians who wanted to have coffee and lunch, the Australian Internet Fraud Squad who was wondering if I could assist them in online fraud research, the Managing Director of Hermes(home of the luxury handbag retailers who charge $15k for their handbags), Karen Upton who threatened to sue me for defamation if I didn't remove my post about her financial woes. It's been an interesting ride but life got very busy.

Happy to say that I am back to blogging again, and I do thank Rene and Martin for re-sparking my inspiration and desire to write again for the public. Even though I haven't posted for two years, I was still receiving personal emails from those who had been touched and affected by what I had written. It does remind me that if readers are making the effort to contact me about my blog and posts, I should make the effort to blog effortlessly.

Here's to a glorious 2015 and beyond!

Eggplant Grilled With Miso Sauce

During cold days... I get some seriously weird cravings happening. Today...I suddenly crave grilled eggplant after seeing ChocolateSuze's eggplant photo. Just recently I wrote about my cabbage love affair which ultimately ended as an accidentally gruelling  one week cabbage diet.

The miso eggplant is from Umi Sushi & Udon in Darling Harbour. But I'm rarely in Darling Harbour on the weekend nowadays so howami gonna get my hands on grilled eggplants that looks like that photo? *sadness*

Just when I thought I'm rather veggo these days, I see a ChocolateSuze deep fried chicken post about a Korean restaurant nearby in Epping. It swiftly brings back memories of my student days and how I went through a deep-fried-chicken-Korean-style stage.

That's what happens when you live within proximity to Korean-ville-Eastwood. You learn to wield Korean BBQ tongs in self defence around the BBQ and get addicted to spicy hot pots and bulgogi.

Back to the fried chicken topic ~ at least Beshico Epping is closer than Darling Harbour. Oh yes Beshico, you will be seeing me around:

There's hope for me yet...in the SMG pantry there is: miso paste, soy, green onions(shallots) and sesame seeds, so the dish can probably be easily recreated at home without having to traverse to Darling Harbour to eat grilled eggplant. Yay!

Happy Mothers Day: Lemon Madeleines, Caramel Cookies, Creme Caramel & Jap Chae

Today, I want to dedicate this post to my mum and all the mothers out there who have tirelessly worked to raise their kids and try to give them everything they possibly can- especially unconditional love.

Because it's Mothers Day, I spent a lot of time in the kitchen cooking  Korean vegetarian Jap Chae recipe from Alice at Savoury Sweet Life (image above), Korean bulgogi from Katherine Joy at Food.com and from the Women's Weekly Biscuits book, lemon madeleines and chocolate caramel cookies. Also tried another creme caramel recipe as well but unfortunately that didn't go to plan sigh...I accidentally bought fat free skim milk and I think that affected the richness of the creme caramel.

I've cooked the Korean vegetarian Jap Chae recipe a few times because my family likes the noodles. The bulgogi, I've tried a few recipes trying to find an authentic one.

The lemon madeleines are really yummy although they are best out of the oven and doesn't keep very well during cold days:

Lemon Madeleines

2 eggs
2 tbsp caster sugar sifted
2 tbsp icing sugar sifted
1/4 C self raising flour
1/4 C plain flour
75g melted unsalted butter
1 tbsp water

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees celsius or 180 degrees fan forced. Grease two 12-hole madeleine pans if you like them petite and only 1 tray if you'd like them large and supersized
2. Beat egg and sifted sugars together until thick and creamy
3. Triple sift flours and then sift over egg mixture and fold to combine
4. Pour combined butter and water down the side of the bowl and fold mixture together
4. Drop mixture into madeleine pans and bake approx 10 mins. Tap hot pan on bench to release madeleines and turn onto cooling racks. Serve dusted with icing sugar


Variation for lemon or orange madeleines: Add zest from either 2 lemons or 2 oranges into eggs before beating. Omit the water and replace with 1 tbsp of lemon or orange juice.

Chocolate Caramel Cookies

125g softened butter
1/2 C caster sugar (110g)
1 egg
1 C plain flour (150g)
2 tbsp cocoa powder
2 x 60g Chokito bars, chopped finely

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees or 160 degrees fan-forced. Line baking trays with baking paper
2. Beat butter, sugar and eggs until smooth. Do not overbeat
3. Stir in sifted flour and cocoa, then chopped chocolate bar
4. Drop tablespoons of mixture about 5cm apart onto trays and bake for 15 minutes

The madeleines are yummy. Very quick and easy to make with no need to soften any butter beforehand unlike other baking recipes. The cookies are just your average caramel cookies and very chocolatey- the original recipe recommends cooling on the trays but I think that dries them out just a bit as they continue cooking until the tray is cool.

Happy Mothers Day to my mums and all mothers out there!

x

Do Buddhist Monks Survive Solely On Donations?

This question arose in my mind after seeing the poor state of the lemongrass rows at the farm.

One row is grown for family consumption and one row is grown for the Khmer Buddhist temple. Occasionally, a car or van load of people visit my folks' farm to cut piles of lemongrass stalks for cooking and for fundraising purposes, raising funds for upkeeping the temple and the monks.

Monks aren't allowed to work for a living. My Mum tells me that they must survive on donations and if there are no donations, then they starve. Whilst that is a harsh way to live life, I do wonder about whether the Monks are allowed to grow their own veggie patch? Instead of driving around giving predictions about the future of my life and my friends life(we have both had our fortunes 'read' involuntarily by Buddhist Monks)- are Monks allowed to be productive and helpful?

Buddhism itself was a concept created by someone in our past so why can't the modern day Monks alter the concepts for the modern environment?

So back to the lemongrass patch. It is wildly overgrown with weeds. I was busy cutting a few stalks off when I realised that there were several dead patches of the herb in amongst the weeds. Why wasn't the patch maintained? Since the lemongrass row was donated to the temple why couldn't they help maintain the rows? By letting patches in the row die off and be overgrown by weeds, did they realise that eventually, there won't be much lemongrass left to cut for their charity and upkeep?

I don't know if it's due to religious restrictions or laziness but if I were reliant on a patch of donated garden herbs, I'd be there to maintain the patch so that it would grow perpetually. Am I even sinning by thinking of these questions? Does sinning even exist in Buddhism or is that a concept belonging only to Christianity and Catholicism? I'm pretty mixed up over religion as you can tell.

If I spend my next weekend eradicating the weeds and replanting the dead ones, then have I done my good deed for Buddhism? Lemongrass is usually $1 per stalk at the grocers so I'm simply surprised that they don't help maintain what they're reliant on...

If anyone knows about Buddhism, please do leave a comment. I couldn't find my answer on the internet so may need to borrow a book to read up about it.


[Image source: http://ilibees.hubpages.com/hub/Herbs-Lemon-Grass]

How Many Ways Can You Eat Cabbage?

Under the Greengrocer's fluorescent light, the cabbages were neatly stacked in orderly rows and looked innocently super fresh, so I bought a decent sized one for about $2.50.

I'm not sure if that was one of the best deals of my life or the worst decision I've made for a while. Usually mum halves her cabbage and gives me half. I haven't visited home for a while so I was craving cabbages somewhat. Yes, I can imagine how weird that sounds. While some folks crave chocolate and donuts, yours truly was busy craving cabbage.

The first stir fried cabbage meal was delicious. The second one just as yummy. The third, fourth and fifth one and so forth not as much ...cabbage was wearing me out. It was like an endless cabbage lifestyle. Jesus turned a loaf of bread and a fish into enough fishes and bread to feed forty (I may have stuffed up that biblical story) but maybe he should have used one cabbage and then he could feed four hundred.

Meat is starting to turn me off a fair bit, especially after seeing the inhumane abbottoirs in Indonesia and also reading about pain that animals go through just so that we could eat them. Anyone who wishes to lose weight should just eat more vegies and fruit- it's that simple. I've been the same weight for over 5 years now without even trying.

That $2.50 cabbage ended up in the following dishes:

* Cabbage stir fried with vegies and vermicelli
* Cabbage stir fried with other vegies
* Cabbage turned into a cabbage salad and a cabbage coleslaw
* Cabbage stir fried again with vegies and eaten with Lap Cheong (a fatty Chinese sausage)

That was enough for 10 meals. Dinner for two on with cabbage on the menu was less than $2 for the night. If I could love cabbage to that extent, I guess the dinner budget could be $730 for two people for the year but then we'd be dying from malnutrition.

You're probably thinking, 'You could've thrown the cabbage out...' but I've never been the type to chuck something simply because I was 'fed up' with eating it.

On the bright side, cabbage is loaded with nutrients according to theveganproject.ca:

"Cabbage is considered highly anti-inflamatory, rich in vitamin C, dietary fibre, calcium, iron, and potassium.  Medical researchers are finding that vegetables in the cabbage family (broccoli, kale, cauliflower and brussel sprouts) contain compounds which assist in preventing several types of cancer"

Readers: How many ways can you cook cabbage?

[Image source: http://theveganproject.ca]

Vietnamese Cooking Class at Sydney Fish Markets

 

Last Monday our friend A organised a Vietnamese Cooking Class at the Sydney Fish Markets in Pyrmont. Sydney Fish Market is the second largest fresh seafood auction in the world, second only to Tokyo's Tsukiji Fish Markets. 

It was a bit odd really. We were the only Asian girls in the room. Our parents originally migrated from Taiwan, Cambodia and Hong Kong with some of us being of mixed Chinese heritage in addition to those nationalities. Our cooking teacher was Caucasian and it felt odd being taught Vietnamese cooking by a non-Vietnamese teacher but that's the way Oz is heading with the multilingual and multicultural society that we've got here.

The Little Ones (we have similar petite heights) were the last to finish! At first we were panicking because it's SO embarrassing to be Asian and also be the slowest at cooking Asian food haha! 

But then it occured to us that we were slowest because we were so busy rinsing the utensils, rinsing the chopping board and all the vegetables prior to using and chopping! All the others had simply taken what they were given and didn't rinse anything (that I saw anyway).

If our parents taught us anything, it's to always rinse and wash everything if possible prior to using and guess that has been drilled into us.

Anyway, we still set a record. We were last to finish up cooking in the kitchen and first to finish eating haha! ;) 

Arthur's Bavarian Bakehouse: Tasty But Poor Service

One of my colleagues was raving about the sourdough and pies that he bought from Arthur's Bavarian Bakehouse so I was very eager to visit the store to try their goodies for myself. The shop had artisan breads alongside the wall, pretzels dangling from the ceiling and an array of Northern European baked goods on tables.

I bought some pies, a pumpkin and fetta sourdough, vanilla kipferls, macarons (yea I know they're French and not Bavarian but they're in fashion right now in Sydney and most bakers are cashing in on the macaron wave).

As the greyish, blond haired lady tallied up my purchases, I was holding a $10 note in one hand and about to get the rest when she finalised the total. Instead she turns around and says in a cranky rude tone, "That's not going to pay for it!"

Well duh. I work with numbers all day for a living so I should know better than most folks how numbers work. The total was around $31 and I had $10 in my hand thus far. I was clutching $10 because originally I was going to buy only two pies and got slightly carried away. Her tone and manner was abrupt and rude. We had driven there specifically for the bakery and to be subjected to rude service made me want to put everything back on the shelf and leave.

Although this is the most challenging retail season because shoppers are predominantly tired, cranky and harrassed doesn't mean you should be rude to the ones who are polite just because you're in a foul mood. I've worked in retail before when I was a student and I have always tried to be polite, helpful and kind to all customers despite how challenging some of them are occasionally.

Christmas is drawing near and yes, I know the car parks at shopping centres are full, there's bad traffic jams and dazed fatigued shoppers stumbling around everywhere. Is this any excuse for poor service?

Rudeness isn't going to buy you any customers and ongoing sales. The pies had tasty fillings but the dough pastry was still slightly uncooked. I would rather spend my money at my local bakery where the staff are always friendly, kind, helpful.

This must be the silly season for poor service. Sigh.

Beautiful Winter Weekends

Spring is tender green buds and pretty flowers blooming, Summer is fish and chips by the beach, Autumn is blazing red and oranges while Winter is suppose to be dull and dreary.

For the first time in a long time, I fell in love with Winter again for reasons other than snow sports. We enjoyed a Sri Lankan lunch at Roselea Community Centre, where a friend of mine was involved with organising a Sri Lankan fundraiser.

It's the first time I've tried Sri Lankan cuisine. It's similar to Indian cuisine (Dosai anyone?) but not as oily. Chilli was litterally used and that had me huffing and puffing but other than that, it was delicious-particulary the potatoes and the spice combination used. Fish hopper, pronounced as 'Op-pah' in Sri Lankan. It was delicious. The flour net had the consistency of a French crepe. It was a batter mixed with rice flour, coconut milk, water and a bit of salt? Cooked on a tiny gas stove pot:

Went for a much needed walk around the neighbourhood afterwards to aid in digesting all the rich and spicy food that we had consumed. It was amazing to see that all the succulent plants were blooming madly. Other winter plants that I adore are the Camellia trees, African daisies, Dandelions and well, pretty much anything except for huge electricity power plant poles ^.^

 

Ducked into a house that was having a for-sale-open-house and saw the oddest looking tree with what looked like a white fluffy beard dangling down. Also saw a fat, fluffy cat idly lazing on a table. It was adorable, cute and friendly. Contentedly meowing as I petted it :)

Books and Chocolate Chip Cookies

Found myself making a trip to the library last night. I ended up borrowing so many heavy books that I could barely even carry them back to the car. I needed a luggage or shopping trolley to cart them back! With the library closing at 9pm, I really didn't have much time to slowly deliberate, so randomly grabbed piles of books from different sections. The top ones are romance novels by Jude Deveraux, one of my favourite authors along with James Patterson. James Herbert is probably a better writer but I didn't see any of Herbert's books. The Ten Trillion Dollar Gamble is a book about the downfall of Wall Street and hypothesising about America's future. The Barefoot Investor is rather popular in Australia so I thought I'd have a read to see what the fuss is all about. Find It, Buy It, Fix It is a real estate book about renovating because I'll probably be doing some renovations in the near future. Female Entrepreneurs sounded interesting. Grow Herbs...well I've always loved gardening and am always looking to learn more about everything. Sunday Roast, The Country Table and The Food and Cooking of Vietnam and Cambodia are cookbooks.

With a name like mine, there's no disguising my Asian background. Although I've never mentioned it before, I'm an Australian Cambodian. My family migrated to Australia as refugees. Maybe someday soon I'll write about that part and how we can to be Australian citizens instead of French citizens. That's why I was excited to finally see a Cambodian cookbook that has pictures of food that my beautiful mum cooks. It was only earlier in the week that I stumbled across an American Cambodian blogger, blogging about Khmer/Cambodian food recipes.

Much as I love finance/accounting/economics, I also love food, cooking, gardening, outdoorsy stuff, snowboarding and plenty of other stuff and can only blog regularly if I make blogging detours. Anyhoo, whilst on the subjects of books and cooking, this is the cookbook section of the cupboard:

Recipes from friends, newspaper or magazines are filed into the ring binder folders in plastic sleeves as Entrees, Mains, Desserts and Favourites. With the books and magazines, I tag the recipes I plan to try so that I don't have to keep flicking through all the time. It's more inspiring to pick one up and see which one was on your to-try-cooking-wish-list.

Last weekend, I baked Salted Chocolate Chip Cookies from Stonesoup's recipe. I failed to salt them haha ..but they still tasted wickedly, deliciously good even without the salt. Good quality dark chocolate is KEY. I used 50% cocoa Lindt dark chocolate. The higher the cocoa content, the bitterer the chocolate. My baking efforts yielded GINORMOUS cookies about 9cm in diameter ;p~~

 

Indonesian abattoirs fail on humane killing of Australian live exports

See the screenshot I've posted up. The cows in line at that abattoir were trembling with fear and terror as they watched the cows next to them get maimed and slaughtered, skinned and cut up before their very eyes. They are afraid and terrified. 
 
Have you ever watched the distress on an animal's face?

It was very distressing to see what happened to Australian cattles that are exported live to abattoirs in Indonesia. If humans treated each other like that we'd be screaming cruelty and begging for our rights.

To open your eyes about what is happening in various slaughterhouses across Indonesia, watch this Four Corners/Animal Australia/RSPCA expose 'A Bloody Business': http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/special_eds/20110530/cattle/

What about animals? How can they express themselves when we don't understand them? I can certainly see why some friends have become vegetarians and the longer I live, the more I am turning towards a diet predominantly featuring more vegetables and fruits with very minimal meat. 

I have no grudge against live export or meat consumption but please slaughter the animals as humanely as possible and don't torture them. Ever.

Instead, at the Indonesian and Egyptian abattoirs, they whip the cows, caning their heads with sticks, cut their muscle tendons so that they can't get up, slash their necks multiple times for 'halal' killings and the terrified cows can sometimes struggle for several minutes in absolute terror and pain before finally dying. What can be more distressing than the poor animal seeing it's dead friend on the floor with the head sawn off and the smell of its blood permeating the air? Or trying to stand up but slip because the floor is thick with blood and faeces from previous slaughters?


Cameron Hall, the CEO of LiveCorp was interviewed and all he did was waffle, waffle and waffle. He says, "We know that poor practices have to be improved and that's what we're working hard in the market place to do." Despite the same poor abattoir practices existing in the 1990s until now.

Professor Ivan Caple who is supposedly a 'Leader' of the 'animal welfare review team' was interviewed giving glowing reviews of the practices that he witnessed in Indonesian slaughterhouses. WTF?! "A couple of the handlers were a little bit exuberant with the use of a goad and a very long pointy stick, sometimes a finger were in eye sockets...all of those issues can be picked up by a trainer." The problem is- where are the trainers?? They had over 10 years to rectify this issue and implement training but why hasn't it happened?

If the live animal export industry wants to continue, they need to face up to this problem in Indonesia and in abattoirs elsewhere. Live exports to abattoirs that aren't compliant with humane standards of operations need to be ceased immediately. Until they fully comply, they shouldn't be receiving any Australian livestock.

There are so many things that they can do to try and minimise the bleak conditions of the abattoirs over there:

• They should have an experienced staff from Australia over there monitoring the abattoir and providing training programs
• Supply them with stun guns (if that helps minimise the suffering?)
• Open up their own professionally operated and managed abattoirs that complies with Australian standards
• Keep providing training sessions and establish standards for abattoirs to comply with in order to qualify for live exports 
• Allow animal welfare associations to visit the premises at any time to evaluate the conditions to ensure that they are complying with welfare standards

Don't stick your head in the sand, take action against this cruelty whether you're Australian or a reader from another country:

• Sign the GetUp petition
• www.animalsaustralia.org/take_action/festival-of-sacrifice
• http://www.banliveexport.com/#takeAction 

The best way to save is by learning how to cook

Knom Bujok - It's a traditional Cambodian dish which consists of a lot of fresh(raw!) vegies and can be accompanied by steamed pork belly sliced thinly or shredded chicken, all wrapped up in the lettuce and dipped into the dipping sauce

 Watch Masterchef and be inspired in the kitchen

The TV show Masterchef, is crowned with the title of introducing the kitchen to a lot of Australians who previously did not cook often. By learning how to cook proper meals, you'll enjoy your food more and it's usually more nutricious because you can use quality oil and quality ingredients.

Last night, I had a marathon session in the kitchen where I prepared a simple fresh, raw vegetable dinner with steamed chicken and also prepared a huge pot of pasta because we haven't eaten pasta for a few months now.

Just don't be like me and stockpile your groceries or else you'll end up throwing out some ingredients.

$32.40 worth of groceries bought=14 servings=$2.32 per serving

0.99 bean sprouts
1.29 mint
1.59 for 815g of apples
1.45 for 1kg of carrots
1.59 for 1kg of tomatoes
1.59 for 1kg of zucchinis
1.29 iceberg lettuce
4.17 for 464g of beef mince
6.83 herbed Italian sausages
7.60 for roasted garlic pasta sauce
3.98 for 6 chicken drumsticks

Despite the media repeatedly publishing articles about how groceries are so expensive and unaffordable, healthy ingredients such as fresh fruit and vegetables are cheap, particularly when they are in season.

It's not the fresh unprocessed food that is unaffordable, it's the processed junk, chips, lollies, snacks and meat that have gone up in price drastically over the years and have become relatively unaffordable. After reading about the pain of animals being slaughtered, I've been decreasing my meat consumption. Cooking with less meat, more vegetables and eating vegetarian meals more frequently.



$2.32 per serving

It never ceases to amaze me whenever I check to see whether the proponents of takeaway food are right in their belief that buying takeaway is cheaper than cooking at home. Everytime, the numbers for cooking at home trumps the takeaway option.

If instead, I decided to buy 14 takeaway meals, assuming I even chose the local Chinese $10/meal option, then it would cost $140 to $150 instead. If I were to dine at popular restaurants at $30/meal then it would be on average $420 for 14 meals.

Benefits of home cooked meals

* You can use better quality ingredients and oil than what the restaurants and takeaway shops usually use
* You can omit any vegetable or ingredient that you dislike
* If you use more vegetables and eat more fruit then it's great for weight control
* Better health means less trips to the doctor and less medical problems further down the track
* It's definitely cheaper than buying takeaway or dining out
* You may find the process of cooking relaxing and a stress reliever
* You can learn to appreciate quality meals and may find dining out a lot more pleasurable since you've cut back on dining out often

Further reading:

1. Stockpiling food is such a waste
2. Buying lunches and dining out
3. Update on progress bars and interest income

Stockpiling food is such a waste

 I've been struggling against the urge to buy groceries. It really is a weakness of mine, this tendency to keep buying too much food, too many ingredients, too much groceries. What ends up happening is that we don't consume things in time and I have to dump the food stock. Such a waste...

I cook a lot. It's something that I enjoy doing. However, this means that I end up buying a lot of ingredients and can't finish them before expiry. A quick perusal into our pantry will find a mind boggling array of ingredients:

• Soy sauces- light soy, regular soy, dark soy, dark mushroom soy, kecap manis soy, ponzu soy sauce (a Japanese citrus soy), thai soy etc
• Spices- at least 30 spices in small packets and jars and they have short shelf life
• Sugar- white caster sugar, regular(granular) white sugar, icing sugar, brown sugar, palm sugar, demerara sugar
• Oil- peanut oil, sesame oil, dark sesame oil, canola oil, olive oil for pouring, olive oil spray
• Flour- corn flour, plain flour, self raising flour, rice flour, tapioca starch flour, glutinous rice flour
• Vinegars- white vinegar, brown vinegar, red wine vinegar, white wine vinegar, rice wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar etc
  
  The quantity of food stock in our pantry is insane. While others battle with cigarette or an alcoholic addiction, for years, I've battled with a food stockpiling habit. When I find myself throwing out unopened food, I often berate myself about wastefulness and the usual saga of how many hungry people in third world nations could have been fed...

Anyway, these past two weeks have seen a remarkable drop in my grocery purchasing habits. I've been restraining myself from stockpiling.

There's only one other pantry that I've seen which dwarfs our pantry. This infamous pantry that I've seen is really amazing; 4 jars of vegemite, 6 bottles of salad dressing, 3 jars of mustard, 3 bottles of tomato sauce, 3 bottles of BBQ sauce, 3 tubs of mayonnaise and that's just the first shelf... 

What's so amazing about that? Vegemite is eaten so sparsely on toast that 4 jars of vegemite is literally 10 years worth of vegemite. The same could be said about mustard. And that's just a sample of the stock range from the infamous pantry. No doubt a lot of that food will go to waste due to expiration.

So I've been good these past two weeks. I've restrained myself from grocery shopping. I've pulled out ingredients close to expiry and cooked with them. I've used up condiment jars that have been sitting in the fridge for indeterminate periods. I haven't bought a lot of groceries for these past two weeks and have been rampaging through our pantry to use what we've got. I've been good.

Further reading:

1. Test of the blueberries: How much would you pay for fruit?
2. Wedding, weeding, gardening and zucchini plants
3. Best orange cake recipe

Test of the blueberries: How much would you pay for fruit?

Sadly, blueberries are going out of season. During their season's peak a few weeks ago, we could buy a punnet for $3 to $3.50 and now they're $6/punnet.

I've been grocery shopping with a friend before and have seen her pay $7-$9 for a 200 gram punnet without any hesitation. Not that she's a super millionaire or anything. Just simply a less conscious consumer.

How much would you pay for a 200 gram punnet of blueberries?

Strawberries are also at $5/punnet for 250 grams and I knew the strawberry season was over for me because the idea of paying $5 for a punnet when you can buy 5 punnets for $5 from Flemington markets in the middle of summer. Goodbye summer....

How much would you pay for fruit?

We try to eat seasonal fruits and vegetables. Not only do they taste far superior in their proper season, they are also vastly cheaper. Whilst shopping for fruit, it was the choice of:

* Pears at $2/kg
* Apples at $1/kg
* Oranges at $2/kg
OR
* Blueberries at $6/200 grams and $30/kg
* Strawberries at $5/250 grams and $25/kg
* Bananas at $10/kg

Of course, we have a lot more choices but they are some simple comparison. I'll usually go for the seasonal produce being cheaper and probably at their peak taste. Not sure what everyone else goes for but there must be someone out there buying them at that price?

I know shops and particularly restaurants, have no choice - if it's on the menu, it's on the menu and diners won't be impressed if they swapped the berries for something such as apples.

The burgers are better from Hungry Jacks?

If this is the best that Hungry Jacks can do, they're going to have to give up their slogan or change their picture so that it reflects reality. This is what happens when reality falls short of expectations:

Flying Fish: The restaurant, review and pictures

North Sydney just before reaching the Harbour Bridge, sunset was unbelievably fiery and gorgeous.

Restaurants boasting of harbourside or river views are such a waste at night. During the day, the views are stunning but at night, this is what we see at the wharf just outside Flying Fish. You can just barely see the Harbour Bridge in the distance:

View from Flying Fish wharf at night- not really a view...

Parking is a nightmare. We eventually decided on the valet parking at the location ($25) but if you want to keep running out to renew the 2hr parking ticket because the dining experience could span five hours, feel free to park on the street at $5 or so every two hours. Our friend had to rush out every two hours three times before we were finished for the night.

You can order individual dishes or you can choose the Tasting($110pp) or Degustation($150pp) menu. We settled on the degustation menu and this is what you get for the degustation menu:
 

 

Seared yellow fin tuna with ruby red grapefruit, sweet pork crackling and black pepper caramel - my favourite dish!!



Confit of Petuna ocean trout with pea and black sesame mousse, puffed quinoa and tangerine oil - my second favourite!

Crisp soft shell crab with black pepper curry leaf sauce, crispy shallots and coconut salad: a bit bland but then I have a weakness for soft shell crab with green mango salad aka the Thai way

  
Left: Pan roasted hapuka (fish) with hazelnut, white balsamic potato, Pantelleria capers & beurre noisette- the fish was incredibly tender and the potatoes looked like they had been tortured with a melon scoop since they were perfectly spherical. There was a single grape that had been peeled and cooked and it was exquisite, makes me want to denude all my grapes now lol

Right: The palate cleanser: Too sour for two of our friends but just perfect for me. The lime sorbet was so tangy and the pomegranates & jelly balanced out the sourness.

Wagyu Mb7+sirloin & braised short rib with smoked leek, king brown mushroom, beetroot and horseradish: The two sauces, smoked leek and wagyu was incredibly delicious. I could have give the chewy mushroom a miss and I gave the braised shredded beef away because it was just too rich in taste.

Banana tart with salted peanut semi freddo, popcorn and banana curd: The tart is good but I would have preferred a huge piece of semi fredo and lashings of the crumbled popcorn. Or a big bowl of banana curd -YUM!

"Taste and Textures of Apples": Apples in several different ways, apple puree, apply jelly, apple mousse, apple sorbet, apple in rose water and some type of cake with cream cheese. The apple bits were so GOOD!! I couldn't eat the apple in rose water, it's too controversial for my taste buds and the sliver of cake with cream cheese was the odd one out. The sorbet is yummy!!



The coffee was beautifully frothy and creamy. The rock sugar was in little packets- I liked that because it gives the impression of being hygienic

Petit fours: Aargh...so wasted because I was sooo full already ;_; ...infact...so full that I ended up with a stomach ache from over indulging!

Hand cut chips with delectably flavouring: A bit soft and I would have like them a bit crispier but it reminded us of the mamee noodle snack sachet that you sprinkle on the noodles - fingerlickin' good!

The interior. So pretty. The lights were dangling like little stars in the sky. They look like quartz rock with inserted lights, dangling from the ceiling.

I'd go back again to Flying Fish but next time, I know what I want to order larger serving sizes of. It was a great night and now, back to the kitchen again for some more food preparation for our dinner party tonight :)

Wedding, weeding, gardening and zucchini plants

It takes a lot of effort and dedication to maintain a blog

What a crazy busy weekend. I didn't have time to blog. I was aiming for roughly three posts or articles each week but it does take a lot of effort to post regularly like that. That's probably why the bloggers with huge number of followers eventually quit their jobs to maintain their site (eg: Corporette - my favourite female blogger who blogs about fashion, lifestyle and working in New York's legal profession).

The weekend was flat out with swimming, an all day wedding to attend, gardening and the usual bunch of household chores that occupies the weekend.

Since I haven't had time to write about personal finance, I thought I'd post up some photos from the hectic weekend. I only had my Canon point and shoot camera with me so the images are rather blurry and not as sharp as they should be.

The wedding

A friend of mine got married on Saturday. It was warm but a beautiful day to get married. They were married at St Phillip's Anglican Church in Sydney - this is Australia's oldest parish and was originally built at the location in 1793. The current structure replaced the older structure in 1856. This is a snapshot of the church's interior:


Afterwards, the wedding reception was held at the QVB The Tea Room in Sydney:


The weeding and gardening

My parent's garden needed some weeding done big time so I helped with their garden. This is what hard, sweaty and back breaking work looks like, the before and after shots are below:



Even a spotty black and white butterfly couldn't resist the lure of the flowering mint plants:



The zucchini plants that my parents planted are flourishing:



Hope you enjoyed the photos. Our Autumn season has just started so no doubt there won't be anymore gorgeous blooms and summer fruit and vegetables any longer. Although rhubarb season will be coming around and there's nothing better than rhubarb and apple crumble. Or a rhubarb butter cake :)