A Few of My Favourite Things !

Further along the same bustling street, we encountered dessert of a different kind. The base, when we got to tasting it, was like claggy batter but the top was prettily studded with dried and glaced fruits and nuts. There was a HUGE and I mean HUGE line waiting to get a cup of this but my recommendation is ‘watch the guy making them – the pan is an interesting shape – but don’t go out of your way to try’.

Thsi vendor was making four different types of filled pancakes but I could only understand what two of them were – red bean and chesnut paste. My recommendation is ‘Skip these – sticky (undercooked?) and bland’.

These grilled scallops created the most heavenly smells and I would definitely try them next time.

Can you see the hand just to the right of the photo? Well, they weren’t too pleased with us taking photos. Maybe they thought we were about to run away with their secret traditional method of making these fairy floss-like sweet (I’m thinking, surely there is a less labour-intensive way).

Funnily enough, I saw a lady making the exact same thing in the exact same way in London’s Chinatown a week later. Too late!

Adventures in Shanghai – Part 1
Adventures in Shanghai – Part 3
Images of Shanghai

This was our first breakfast in Shanghai, savoury tau fu fa accompanied by a yu tiao and milky coffee, followed by a spicy noodle dish. Enjoyed the tau fu fa but I stuck to the hot weet version for the rest of the trip. The noodles looked great but were a little bland. The rest of the crowd were ordering yu tiao and siao long bao so this may not have been a speciality of theirs.

Going for a walk later on that day down Nan Jing Lu, we stumbled across an extremely busy little alley that had the most heavenly smell of food cooking. A detour was in order here and we came across some unusual and delicious foods.

We managed th snag the last of this batch of fried beef dumplings (not sure about name). Really delicious and the line of people waiting to get their hands on one was justified.

Steamboat-style meals are also available. Great if you want to pick and choose.

We saw these siao long bao stalls everywhere and the great thing you could always see a small huddle of workers, with disposable face masks on, moulding these. The dumplings then went straight into the frying pan. How much fresher can you get? Sold in portions of four, the trick to eating these was to make a small bite into the skin and allowing the very hot steam to escape then slurping some of the juice out before eating the meaty part. HUGE queues everywhere for these! I think the Shanghainese must literally live on these dumplings. (Warning: Don’t get the ones on the streets immediately outside the ‘Old Town’ area though as you pay tourist prices for inferior food).

Lots of smoke coming from these portable barbeques:

…more soon…

Adventures in Shanghai – Part 2
Adventures in Shanghai – Part 3
Images of Shanghai

So, I was walking down Edward St towards Brisbane’s botanic gardens early on Thursday morning. Other than the suits heading to work, it was fairly quiet on the city streets so I was quite surprised to come across a corner that was buzzing with a subdued energy. Four tables in front of a pub were filled with diners and across the road, there were two lone market stalls with a crowd of people milling about in front.

Odd, I thought, that there were only two stalls because that kind of market would surely not attract many shoppers. As I crossed the road and walked past the diners, I noticed that not one had a breakfast dish in front of them. Moreover, these patrons were just that little bit too shiny to strike me as being ‘normal people’.

Yesterday, I got on the plane to head home. I was presented with a Courier Mail newsaper only to come across a story about this. Well, that would certainly explain the spiffy-looking extras…

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.