A Few of My Favourite Things !

We only spent 1.5 days there but I think we manage to fit an admirable amount of food in during this short period! On our first night, we visited Guerney Drive. It was pouring with rain so we wandered through the shopping centre next door until the skies let up. As soon as the rain eased, we were out of the shopping complex and in amongst the stalls. Good timing because we managed to get seats just before the crowd descended.

We started with Assam Laksa, one of A.’s favourite dishes, and boy was it good. Fantastically sour and spicy, the only thing it was missing was the black sauce - what’s that called again? We also tried a cuttlefish salad (Ju Hu Eng Chai) and I cannot recommend this dish highly enough - I just couldn’t get enough of it!

Of course, after reading so much about Poh Piah, we had to try this as well. Nyeh, wasn’t the greatest poh piah that I’ve had. A little on the soggy side.

This was washed down with soya bean milk, which we kinda had to order whether we liked it or not because the tables belong to that stall. Good thing that we did like it. I was told off at another table because I didn’t want to order freshly squeezed fruit juice and the guy grumbled that I couldn’t just sit there and not order from them! Ooops!

A. decided that he couldn’t leave without tasting the satay too so here’s the picture.

We came back to Guerney drive another night, after spending a couple of days in Langkawi, and ordered the Assam Laksa from another stall. This one did come with the black sauce but A. thought that the Laksa from the first stall was better.

The ice kachang served in Penang is also slightly different, made more decadent with the addition of ice cream. The one you see here had peanut icecream. Yum, I love ice kachang. I used to just eat the shaved ice sweetened with rosewater and evaporated milk from the top and leave the other stuff at the bottom of the dish for dad. Naughty, huh? I didn’t like all that red bean, corn and attap although the grass jelly was okay. Now, I’m happy to try some of it but my favourite part is still the flavoured ice.

One of my other favourites is Ban Chang Kueh, a pancake sprinkled with crushed peanuts and sugar. I had a really hard time tracking them down both this trip and the last, especially the thin crispy ones, so when we came across this stall selling Apong Manis and Apong Balik, we got a serve of each. The Apong Manis just consisted of batter spread very thinly over the little wok so it’s very light and airy. Didn’t love it. The Apong Balik was better though and I think it was filled with corn and coconut.

A. loves anything with peanuts so we tried these thingys as well. I cannot remember what they are called although I’m sure some Malaysians could help me out with this. We really liked this version cos the pastry was really thin and it was choc full of peanuts (makes it sound like a Snickers bar, doesn’t it?).

We have been home for more than 2 weeks now and I still have not posted anything from our Malaysian holiday. Why not? Well, we had so much wonderful food that I have no idea where to begin. How’s that for an excuse?

I suppose I could start with one of our more memorable meals. Our two week visit coincided with two festivals, one of them being Diwali (Deepavali) the Hindu Festival of Lights. Deepavali is celebrated as a public holiday in Malaysia and traditionally small earthen lamps are lit to commemorate the victory of brightness over darkness, good over evil. The city was decorated brightly for this festival and we saw a number of colourful images like these in the shopping centres:

The night before the Indian community went on holiday, we visited a banana leaf restaurant with some new blogosphere friends. K.L. from Masak Masak had kindly offered to show us around when she found out that we were visiting. We made plans to dine at this restaurant but instead of just meeting there, K.L. and her boyfriend came all the way into the city to pick us up - typical Malaysian hospitality!

After selecting a few marinated seafood items that we wanted to try, we sat at the table in front of our banana leaf plates. The waiters then start piling white rice, pickled vegetables and potato curry onto the leaf - as you can see, my waiter got carried away scooping rice onto my ‘plate’ while I was busy taking photos!

A trio of curry sauces - fish, chicken & dahl - served in silver canisters are also placed on the table for you to pour over the rice at your leisure. We were also served papadums and deep fried bitter gourd (if I remember correctly).

We had a prawn curry, fried calamari, two types of fish and roe. We managed to eat all this without any cutlery, trying very hard to neatly mould rice, sticky with curry sauce, with the fingers of our right hand and manouvering it into our mouths.

A. & I both thought the deep-fried roe was fantastic in all its salty and crunchy goodness!

Here is an ‘after’ shot:

Thanks, K.L. & Y., for being so generous with your time

WELCOME to my new home and thanks for joining me here!

I have finally made the move, much to the relief of Matt who has been waiting rather (im)patiently for this moment - but with good reason. See how pretty the background is and how everything looks nice and neat with the sidebar exactly where it should be? Well, that’s all thanks to Matt who has been incredibly helpful and tireless in his efforts in enabling my move.

Don’t forget to update your links and bookmarks and join me as I embark on our latest food adventure in Malaysia! I’ll leave you with this photo of our ‘not-so-recent’ Mud Crab Feast at Pearl for now until I get a chance to post about all the food we have in M’sia - drool…

This is the last of our Sydney posts. We managed to score some great Sydney weather, the kind of mild sunny day that is complemented by the gentlest of breezes. Perfect for a stroll through The Rocks where the Sunday market takes place. At one of the first stalls we across, there was a fantastic looking garlic ciabatta that called out to us. The stall holder directed us to the Fine Food Store within The Rocks Centre. We bought a loaf of the ciabatta, seduced by the golden caramelised whole garlic cloves but alas the bread itself was disappointingly stale. The shop was cute tho…

From the Rocks, we made our way down to Chinatown, stopping by at the sardine-packed St Honore Cake Shop on Sussex St to pick up some treats, including the Szechuan pork bun below. Definitely worth pushing your way through the Sunday lunch-time crowd to snag a bun or two or three.

At the other end of the arcade way is Mother Chu’s Taiwanese Gourmet, where we had lunch- a taiwanese seafood combination soup and an interesting sounding savoury bean curd soup. I’m used to having sweet bean curd soup, Tau Foo Fa, at yum cha but have not come across a savoury version before. I think I’ll stick with the sweet from now on as this broth had aas much flavour as tepid tap water. Actually, both dishes could have done with more seasoning. I think we may have ordered the wrong things as other tables seemed to hold all sorts of delicious-looking dishes…

Long have we waited for this moment - the chance to dine at Australia’s best known and most highly rated restaurant, Tetsuya’s. This year, the Restaurant Magazine rated Tetsuya’s 5th in the world after El Bulli in Spain, The Fat Duck in Britain, Pierre Gagnaire in Paris and French Laundry in California. Time and again, I had tried to book a table only to be told that they were full for the night. This time, knowing that we had a trip to Sydney coming up I booked well in advance for our dinner on Friday 4th August.

We hurried by foot from The Rocks to Kent Street, eager for this culinary experience to begin. Finally locating its gated entrance, we walked down the driveway to be greeted by about four or five attendants who were presumably waiting to park cars. We were seated in a room with only 6 tables but there were at least 6 waiters for that section alone.

Warm Sweet Potato Soup with Feta & Rocket

Pacific Oysters with Rice Vinegar & Ginger (additional item)

Tartare of Tuna on Sushi Rice with Avocado

Tuna Marinated in Soy & Mirin; Soft Smoked Ocean Trout with Asparagus; Marinated NZ Scampi with Chicken Parfait & Walnut

Spring Bay Scallop with Wakame & Lemon

Tetsuya’s Signature: Confit of Petuna Tasmanian Ocean Trout with Konbu, Daikon & Fennel

Ravioli of Queensland Spanner Crab with Tomato & Basil Vinaigrette

Roasted Breast of Quail with Soft Polenta & Shiitake Mushrooms

Seared Fillet of Veal with Wasabi Butter

Strawberry Shortcake; Beetroot & Blood Orange Sorbet

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream with White Beans & Dates

Floating Island with Praline & Vanilla Bean Anglaise

Flourless Chocolate Cake with Orange and Chocolate Sorbet

Coffee

The whole meal was worth every cent but which dishes did I particularly enjoy: the tartare of tuna was easily the best I have ever had the pleasure of tasting, the barely cooked scampi, the confit of tuna which is marinated in oil then cooked in a very low oven, and oh the quail …smacking of lips… I was almost too full to have dessert by the end of the savoury courses but when they arrived, well that was another matter. I could have had an entire bowl of the strawberry shortcake although it probably wouldn’t look quite as elegant served like that! The lightness of the floating island surprised me, as did thin stripe of chocolate and raspberry within. We had a special dessert at the end of all that too - thanks, A!

The day started off promisingly enough despite the weather report warning of impending showers and so, with grey clouds looming, A. & I bravely set out from our hotel at The Rocks in Sydney’s CBD. Following Helen’s impeccable and detailed instructions to “head down George Street (away from the Opera House and towards Chinatown) until you get to Market Street (walk = 17min or bus it). Turn right at Market Street and continue down the hill, up the ramp and along the pedestrian bridge over the water”, A. & I found the Good Living Growers Market in Pyrmont with no trouble at all.

With great foresight, we headed straight to the coffee stall to pick up one cup of coffee and one sweet milky tea. It started drizzling as we stood in line for our hot drinks, then two stalls further on, it poured! We took shelter under a large unbrella that the busker had set up, happily nursing our hot drinks. Hey, being Melburnians we’re used to the weather being unpredictable.

The rain let up not too long after and we were able to browse through the market stalls quite freely, sampling Pink Lady apples, lamb burgers, spiced macadamias, dried fruit & nuts, cheeses, honey, olive oils and the odd french pastry or two (okay, we had one whole escargot and palmier):

Amongst other things, we ’somehow’ (read ‘courtesy of A.’) ended up with a bag of apples. What’s the big deal with that, right? Well, we were heading back to Melbourne the following day and Victoria has strict rules about bringing in fruit from interstate. I don’t think we’ve eaten quite so many apples in one and a half days before.

Having had our fill at the market, A. & I , made our way towards the Sydney Fish Market on Bank Street, Pyrmont. It was still early enough in the day for the market to be relateively quiet. I expected the market to be a lot bigger than it actually was so it didn’t take us long to look around and decide that next time we would stay somewhere with cooking facilities. We had an early lunch of tuna kebab and, of course, grilled fish and golden chips. 

When we are away on holidays, I usually start missing the comforts of home after several days of suitcase-living. I miss the freedom of being able to throw a simple meal together for dinner or even to boil some hot water as many hotels do not offer tea and coffee making facilities. My preference is to stay in a self-catering place or in an apartment, but when this is not possible for whatever reasons, I like to find a hotel that provides as many of the facilities that will allow me to do most of the things that I do at home. For example, exercise goes a long way in making me feel less jet-lagged so I will try to find a hotel that has a gym. I enjoy drinking hot water first thing in the morning, so having a kettle in the room is good.

Before booking a room, I will check the hotel reviews in Trip Advisor. These are far more accurate than going by the pictures shown on a website (which can be very deceptive!) or the facilties that the hotel lists on its website.

On this trip, A. & I found a fantastic hotel in Prague that I had to write about. Designed by Eva Jiricna, Hotel Josef has a brightly-lit and very contemporary interior. We were initially given a room in the older part of the hotel but upon requesting a room at the front, our belongings were moved to a room in the newer part of the hotel while we were out sightseeing. When we asked for a kettle, one appeared at our door as soon as it was made available. We were mistakenly told upon checking in that our breakfast was included so they provided us breakfast free of charge the next morning. The service was just outstanding at this place and nothing appeared to be too much trouble. The front-of-house staff always had a friendly smile ready and greeted us upon our return.

We had quite the opposite experience in our next hotel, the Regent Petite France in Strasbourg. I don’t really like the ieda of putting out a ‘bad’ review of any place and I don’t think that I have anything really terrible about this hotel. I think it’s just that the indifferent service was so contrasting with our Prague experience that it felt like a real let-down for us.

Let me give you some examples:

1. we were watching one of their pay TV movies on night when the movie suddenly stopped playing. My husband spoke to reception and was told that the movie had finished because the video had stopped. When he explained that it had in fact not finished, the receoptionist asked ‘Are you sure?’. Well, it’s kinda obvious when you haven’t seen the end.

2. The front-of-house never greeted us once when we came downstairs or when we returned for the evening. Now, in a place where almost everyone greets you with ‘Bonjour’ when you pass in the corridors, it did make us wonder why the staff wouldn’t even bother looking at us. We did notice that they were quite good with the other guests, who generally tended to be slightly more mature with young or teenage children. Was it a case of being biased against visitors who did not look like they should be staying at a stuffy hotel?

3. I noticed that the hotel advertised a fitness centre when making the booking. On the first morning, I wandered down to the first floor for a quick workout, and well, it turned out to be a LOT quicker than I expected. I walked into a dimly lit room to see 2 deck chairs in the middle of a small room. There was a decrepit bike at one corner that had seen better days and a sauna next to it. I’m not sure why the deck chairs were there given that it was obviously not for sunbathing - the window coverings could not be open and there was barely any direct sunlight into the room. But, seeing as the bike was the only form of exercise equipment there, I hopped on. When I described it as decrepit, I really do mean it. You had to change gears by flicking a metal rod out of one setting then pushing it into the next gear setting. The best thing about it was that it started making a clack-clack sound whenm I started cycling, which increased in speed as I cycled faster. I managed about 30 or 45 seconds before almost falling off the bike ‘cos I was giggling so hard. Fortunately no one else was in the room I then called A. and told him to come down and check out the great gym

Anyway, we didn’t stress out too much about the second hotel, but it really confirmed to us what a great place Hotel Josef is. I would definitely recommend this hotel if anyone is staying in Prague and we will be staying there again in the future. Thanks to all the staff there!

View from our second room at Hotel Josef

One of my most enduring memories of Europe is the mouth-watering aroma of roasting chestnuts. Wandering through the Christmas markets of Prague and Strasbourg, we would often find ourselves gravitating towards the stands where chestnuts were being roasted over red-hot coals, drawn by their wonderful, warm and inviting fragrance. Then when you finally have a cornette of hot chestnuts in your gloved hands - ah, what bliss! Of course, my wonderful husband would then have to de-glove in order to peel the chestnuts while they were still hot.

As we find ourselves settling in for the cooler Melbourne months, our thoughts turn once again to ‘kastany’, as they are known in Prague, or ‘marrons chauds’ in french. Although our winters are not nearly as cold, I’ve noticed chestnut stands popping up around the city over the last few years. I’m not sre how well they do in terms of traed, but I’m quite happy to roast chestnuts myself at home and A. is still quite happy to peel them for me so I don’t burn my fingers

Okay, I think this is the final update on my trip. We had a brief stopover in Singapore on the way home &, of course, went in search of some good food!!! We managed to fit in kaya toast & nasi lemak for breakfast, spicy soup noodles from a halal food stall during a break from shopping and some noodles accompanied by really tender beef brisket from Lau Par Sat that was on the bland side.

Of all the meals we had though, the most memorable one from this trip was at Sin Huat Seafood Restaurant. I searched out this place after reading about it here. Despite the warning to show up either really early or really late to avoid the crowds, only two other tables were taken when we arrived. As there were only two of us, we only wanted to order the crab beehoon, however the chef/owner seemed a little put out and kept recommending other dishes that we might like to have as well. I love suggestions (which is why I like reading other people’s reviews), but when I’m made to feel like I have to order something…well, that doesn’t go down as well. We ended up with a half-dozen steamed prawns, crab beehoon and gai-lan knowing that there was no way that we were going to finish it all, with the chef himself all but admitting the same. But, hey, you don’t want to displease the guy who was going to be cooking your food, right?

The prawns were juicy and tasty and the gai-lan suitably garlicky, but the highlight was the crab beehoon, which was loaded with flavour. I did find that he was quite heavy-handed with the oil but maybe that’s why everything tasted so great. It was disappointing however to see half the meal being left behind because there was just too much of it. I was glad later on in the night that I hadn’t eaten more though because the food made us soooo thirsty!

Yes, this post is way late, but I’m still catching up on posts from our trip…

We spent New Year’s Eve in Paris but instead dining at a swanky restaurant and joining the Champs Elysee crowd for the fireworks, we chose to have an intimate dinner for two at our hotel room. That morning, we left our bottle of Veuve Cliquot to chill (the balcony was colder than our bar fridge) while we gathered our menu items from a little place located on a little side street just off Rue St Honore. They had scallops, sea urchin, prawns, crabs and a host of other delicacies to tempt us but we (only) ended up purchasing a cooked lobster, seaweed salad and some caviar.

The hotel kindly provided us with dinner plates, champagne glassess and cutlery, and we were set to go! We laid everything out on a tray and sat on the bed for a simple, fun hotelroom picnic - just the two of us.

We chatted, read and watched television while waiting for the countdown, then rushed out onto the balcony when the clock struck 12, with me wrapped in a thick blanket, to clink our glasses of champagne and gaze at the firework display.