A Few of My Favourite Things !

This dessert is definitely a showstopper - a dark meringue base smothered with King Island cream then topped with mixed berries.

It just looks the very part of a decadent dessert and delivers on taste too. The huge chunks of chocolate bits in my pavlova formed a lovely textural contrast to the chewy base while the tartness of the berries off-set the sweet chocolatiness of it all .

It’s true that Saltimbocca is sometimes also written as Saltinbocca. But the way this is written, it looks like they are just going to sprinkle some salt in your mouth, ‘Roman-stye’ of course!

Salt in your mouth or jumps in the mouth, your choice!

Using Nigella’s recipe for a Strawberry Meringue Layer Cake, I made these baby cakes for A’s birthday. The base was far less sponge-like than I had imagined and more like a shortcake, with a biscuity bite.

There was way too much egg white for the amount of batter I had in the paper bases butI used it all anyway. The meringue top puffed up beautifully in the oven and would have looked a treat that way however I specifically wanted to layer King Island pure cream and strawberries on top of mine. So, off the foamy meringue heads went - a good decision too because the cake is sweet enough on its own (although I have noticed that I’m not as fond of sweet things as I used to be…). They looked great with sparklers although these left tiny little black sooty bits on the pure white cream

More strawberries later on, coutesy of Edible Blooms. These were really amazingly fragrant and sweet and juicy, everything a strawberry should be. Easy to make too, if you are so inclined. Just arm yourself with a few skewers and a head of lettuce!

The scene between A and myself as we are walking down Elizabeth Street towards Flinders Street Station:

A: “So how was your day?”
Me: “Busy. I’ve been working on the catering and merchandising for the office launch”
A: “I was going over the invitation list for the launch and wondered if we should send an invitation to S. & H. What do you think?”
Me: “That sounds like a good idea but I’m not sure…..BEARD PAPA!” (stopping dead in my tracks)

I didn’t quite scream those words out but I definitely said it loudly enough for A. to freeze in his tracks and wonder who was about to attack us.

Anyway, the news is that Beard Papa has opened it’s first Victoria store on Elizabeth Street, near the Flinder Street corner. It’s just a shop front actually so it’s more difficult to hear their “IRASHAIMASE!” greeting.

Get there and get one (or twelve)!

This is a lesson in not relying on my memory! We had dinner at Bala Da Dhaba a few weeks back but, of course, I didn’t get around to posting until now. The problem is that I cannot remember the names of all our dishes.

Well, we started off with the samosas, which resemble a little tribe sitting cross-legged around a campfire. They were described as ’spicy’ on the menu but I could have handled quite a bit more spiciness. Some beautifully tender and moist chicken tikka followed.

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I haven’t been a fan of paneer in the past but we tried this one and I really enjoyed it more than I havd expected to. I suppose it was because the curry was tasty and the paneer absorbed this flavour.

The waiter recommended the special Punjabi fish masala (it had a really long name and if we could repeat it, he would have given it to us free). One of my favourites for the night - all sour and tangy, I’m salivating just thinking about it now.

I think the final dish was lamb something. Maybe someone can identify it?

All in all, a better dining experience than what we have had in the past. We’re not usually big fans of Indian food but the fish would have me going back. On second thoughts, I would probable get takeaway though because it took me at least a week to air my clothes out after that night!

I can’t do wontons.

What I mean by this is that I cannot wrap wontons in the traditional way, that ‘money bag’-style. When I have tried, they would just look like I had squished the top together and taste too much of dough in one spot.

I don’t know where or when I pick up this wrapping style but nowadays my fingers automatically shape these tortellini-looking wontons.

You won’t see them looking like this at your local yum cha restaurant but they taste GOOD, and have a better texture, in my opinion. These dumplings were filled with a mixture of minced pork, roughly chopped prawns, shao hsing wine, shoyu, sesame oil and seasoned to taste. I usually form a couple of tiny meatballs and cook them up so that I can check the seasoning before wrapping the rest.

This entry is my submission to the ‘Waiter, there’s something in my… dumplings’ event that Johanna, The Passoinate Cook, is hosting.

Like most of you, I think about food a lot. What we’re going to have for lunch, for dinner, what I’m going to cook for tomorrow, for the next day, for the next week. But most of all, I think about all the desserts that I would like to bake, the biscuits that my work colleagues are going to love, the cake I would like to share with my friends. There are so many goodies that it’s always difficult for me to settle on one thing. My mind is always leaping here, there and everywhere trying to decide what to bake next.

So this month’s SHF challenge from Jennifer, to post about our most craved dessert, just about had me tearing my hair. How to choose? How can anyone be expected to choose??? ARRRGGGGGG!

To be honest, I don’t actually have one dessert that I crave with a passion above everything else. When faced with a dessert menu, I normally chicken out of having to make the final selection by pointing out about 3 choices then leaving it to my husband to order.

But I remember one cake that mum used to bake when I was in primary school that I had the greatest fun eating. An INDONESIAN LAYER CAKEthat I could savour slowly by peeling off and letting each fine layer melt in my mouth. This cake takes the baker 2 hours in front of the oven to bake so the only ones I’ve had recently are not very good store-bought ones.

It was time. I browsed through several recipes on the internet and got mum to read hers to me over the phone. Making a couple of alterations here and there, I mixed together the batter and brought a stool over to the oven in preparation. For this time-consuming cake, a spoonful of batter is ladled into the baking tin and grilled, then the next spoonful ladled on and grilled, and so on until all the batter is used up.

Based on my internet research, each layer should be grilled for 5 to 7 minutes - WRONG!!! My cake turned out completely overdone and burnt in some sections. Imagine my disappointment after spending 5 hours baking this THING! I couldn’t let it defeat me though so I tried it again the next day. This time, I listened to mum and only grilled each layer for a mere 2 minutes, taking me around 2 hours in total - PERFECTION!

The result 36 eggs and 25 layers later…

It’s not a flashy look-at-me-I’m-so-gorgeous kind of cake but it is buttery and perfect for a pick-me-up at teatime. Especially if you eat it layer by layer.

My father-in-law has the most amazing green thumb. Or should that be green thumbs? Whichever it is, I love visiting his backyard to admire the fruit trees bearing loquats, pomegranates, apples, lemons and the vegetable patch filled with a variety of tomato, cucumber, chilli and capsicum plants. They are his pride and joy and he loves sharing the fruits of his labour with us.

Recently, we received a couple of eggplants which I steamed over simmering water for about 15 minutes. While the cubes of eggplant were cooking, I boiled down a simple sauce based on a Kylie Kwong recipe of soy sauce, malt vinegar, Shao Hsing wine, sugar, sesame oil, garlic, salt & pepper.

Plate the eggplant, sprinkle chopped spring onions and thin slices of chilli, then pour over the sauce. Absolutely delicious with some white rice!

This is my entry for Heart of the Matter 4 which is focussing on vegetables this month. Head to Joanne’s for the roundup!