A Few of My Favourite Things !

My 3 year old’s birthday is coming up next month so I’ve been thinking about cakes. I realised after looking back at photos of last year’s cake that I hadn’t even blogged about it. That’s how behind I am in my posts!

I went with the train theme for his 2 year old birthday party and had such a ball making this cake. I actually had a cake mould for the individual carriages from my pre-baby days so I decorated and buttercreamed my way around the moulded cakes, then went all out with various sweets/lollies, biscuits, dried fruit to decorate and desiccated coconut for the grass. I also baked a square cake, cut a ‘slope’ out and arranged the train so that it was chugging up the hill. Tiny teddies are waving at the train from the grassy area and the front. My son was delighted with the cake and could not take his eyes off it.

Unfortunately, the colour from the train wheels – smarties – ran onto the frosting after sitting in the fridge overnight and there was condensation on the biscuits. I’m not sure how to solve this problem but it was too hot to leave the cake out. Of course, what I mean is that it was too hot until it started hailing. It was that day in early March when roads were flooded, hailstones the size of golf balls damaged car roofs and strangers were offered shelter in the safety of their cars to pedestrians. Just as the party was meant to be kicking off, I was fielding callers saying “We can’t make it to the party” or “We are on the way but had to pull over under the bridge because we can’t see the road”. Yes, it was THAT day. I am simply amazed that almost everyone turned up in the end, albeit rain-drenched and late.

This year, I’m thinking circus – maybe a big top cake with clown cupcakes…

Well, not completely true, as there actually is a very large one at the entrance and I really wanted to take a photo with (read ‘sitting atop’) the wood/metal Charging Bull-inspired sculpture and now I’m regretting not doing so. But I certainly don’t regret accepting the invitation to a Bloggers’ Dinner last night. I’ve been an irregular poster (at best) since having my two boys so I was surprised to be included on this list. But it happened to fall on the day EJ & Z stay over with their grandparents, so why not. Plus there’s not a whole lotta Brazilian things in Melbourne and I get to eat Brazilian one night and work it off with capoeira the next. Although Steer doesn’t claim to serve Brazilian food as such, but rather uses flavours and techniques to pay homage.

Thinking I was running just a few minutes early, I found a third of the table already filled when I arrived. I managed to score a seat near Thanh and Claire, whom I first met about 2 years ago at Jamon Sushi, as well as Penny, Billy, Adrian and Emily.

So the night started with the national drink of Brazil, a Caipirinha, which I declined as I was going to be driving. After a long pause, during which we waited on a few late arrivals, the amuse-bouche of Wagyu short ribs with soy glaze and smoked eel arrived, much to the relief of all those growling stomachs whose owners had been pitifully crying out ‘I’m SO hungry. Where’s the food?’. This was accompanied by the Argentinian NV Familiar Schroeder Brut-Rose ‘Rosa de Los Vientos’, which I had a sip of thinking it’s just a sip. Talk about melt-in-your-mouth – I think that little cube of beef was falling of my little starter fork. The little potato gem could have brought its family and I would have been happy to house them all.

Next up was octopus with a mixed melon terrine, squid ink gnocchi and black garlic puree accompanied by a Barossa Valley 2006 Rockford Semillon ‘Local Growers’. The terrine looked just like my mum’s kueh lapis with its alternating layers of red and pink but it was the black garlic sludge that got the most oohs and aahs.

Until then, I was wondering where the Brazilian influence had been hiding so I was looking forward to the next dish, titled Acarajé, a traditional Brazilian street food. This is normally a deep-fried black-eyed pea patty stuffed with tomatoes and a spicy paste of dried shrimp, ground nuts and coconut milk but Steer gave us a restaurant (read ‘deconstructed’) version of it served with a soft shell crab leg and prawn. Even knowing that Brazilian food is quite eclectic and influenced by many cuisines from around the world, the spicy paste was so reminiscent of a laksa paste that I still wondered which came first. How can you not love this dish with all that deep-fried tastiness sitting atop the spicy paste? This was served with what was my favourite wine of the night – a 2007 Laplace Pacherenc du Vic-Bilh Sec from France. I should mention that by this stage I had cajoled my husband to take a train in and drive me home so all was well.

I think what was the dish of the night for just about everyone was the assiette of mushrooms – an array of pickled, braised and sauteed wild and seasonal mushrooms, duxelle tortellini and field mushroom puree. All I could think of when I was eating this was that my boys would have fallen over themselves to get to it. I would have had to draw the line for my 3 year old with the 1962 Carlo Peregrino Marsala Vergine Riserva though!

I have to say that the Marsala Vergine and the açaí sorbet confused instead of clearing my palate and my stomach had expectations that the meal was coming to an end. But no, there was a dish of roasted duck breast with caramelised witlof, confit duck leg boudin, smoked brazil nut and quinoa. I offered Adrian two slices of the duck breast but after trying it, I was ready to shout ‘give it back!’. The sausage slices however did not stand a chance against that and the sweet crunchiness of the witlof and I would have been happy to give them away. Oh, as well as the 2005 Martinus Estate Pinot Noir from New Zealand which I simply found too dry and intense.

Taking a breather at this point to step away from the Chef’s table that we were at, I had a chance to admire the decor and the artwork, as would be required when you’re sharing a site with The Olsen ‘Art Series’ Hotel, of Cezary Stulgis. I was quickly called back to enjoy the action of serving the Churrasco, whereby executive chef Stacy Thompson and his team gave each of us a turn to grab the meat with tongs as they walked around the table slicing it. A platter each of rump and sirloin slices were then brought to the table and served with feijoada, a black bean and chorizo stew, and chorizo stew and fresh orange slices. I found the rump most enjoyable of the three cuts and it still made me salivate despite protestations from the groaning stomach. I’m sure the feijoada is great but I think it was just too heavy for me by this stage. I also wasn’t taken with the only Brazilian wine of the night, a 2005 Miolo ‘Gran Lovara’.

The comeback arrived in a BIG way with dessert – a petit gateau de dulce de leche served with caramel fondant, a flourless (?) pistachio cake, cubes of goiabada (guava paste) and açaí sorbet. I want the recipe for that gateau!!! STAT! NV Chambers Muscadelle ‘Old Vine’ Classic.

Finally, our night finished off with little brigadeiro truffles made of condensed milk, butter and cocoa powder then dusted with either coconut or cocoa. I don’t have a photo but I can report that many took seconds for the road when the plate was passed round again. This was followed by a digestive, 1998 Chiyo Shuzo ‘Genshu Koshu’ sake. It smelled and tasted medicinal -herbal and bitter. Sommelier Raúl Moreno Yagüe said that it would settle our stomachs so I drank it in the same way that I might drink a herbal soup that mum brews for its cooling qualities – holding my nose.

I already want to bring my brother to try out the place but enough about the food already. There was also a surprise announcement when we were there – Steer are offering two bloggers an opportunity to undertake a 2 week stage or internship to experience a little of what goes into running a restaurant. Only a small taste, of course, but what an interesting opportunity for putting out your tentacles and getting a feel for the industry, especially if one is considering foraying from their current career path. The decision was made to come to a decision as to who would participate by COB Friday. Am I contemplating it? As with most, the concern was being able to put the time into doing it. But also, the other question is do I want it more than the four hands that went up when the question was asked?

Others who were also there included Joyce, Joanna, Ben and Phyllis, Tristan, Neil, Matt. I hope I didn’t miss anyone…please let me know if I did.

So I sent my husband, A, to the supermarket last night:

A: (after looking around for a little) “Do you have sago?”
Girl at Coles: “Sago…do you mean the watch brand?”
A: (incredulously) “That’s seiko. I’m looking for sago.”

That’s all.

I finally made it to Adriano Zumbo’s patisserie! There was a queue,a s expected, but not huge so it only took 5 minutes before I got to put my order in. I got one flavour each f the macarons and four pastries, none of which seem to be listed on the website as yet.

1. The cakes do NOT travel well so don’t try to bring them home on the plane like I did. Just eat it on the day you get them.

2. The ‘Charlie Brown’ is to-die-for, peanuts, chocolate….mmmm… the others didn’t get a fair tasting as they were smooshed and overly soggy by the time I got them home so I won’t even speak of them here.

3. The macarons were incredibly disappointing. The texture was great, with the requisite crunchy shell and chewy interior but, gosh, the flavours were so ordinary. There was oatmeal and ylang ylang (I thought it tasted like soap), pistachio and apricot (my husband thought it tasted like soap), strawberry and balsamic, my memory fails me on the other two. I was ready to be wowed but they did not live up to expectations. In fact, the few that I tried from Cacao upon my return were better, not what I was expecting at all.

4. The patisserie has a greater range than does the cafe but there’s not seating.

A friend of mine is currently in Tokyo. Don’t ask me why but he decided to bypass all the ramen places and visit a French restaurant. Here’s the menu:

We went to the Taste of Melbourne on a Friday afternoon again this year to avoid the crowds, and what a lovely way it was to spend a rainy afternoon. Thanks to Green & Black’s, entry was free so we just had to buy crown currency to use at the stalls. Despite concentrating solely on food and skipping all the wine stalls, we still managed to spend a leisurely three hours at the impressive and gorgeous Royal Exhibition Centre. My friends who went the next day, and did all the wine stalls as well as the HSBC VIP Lounge, stayed until they got kicked out at 4:30pm.

Onto the food then and in order of appearance:

Mezzo Bar & Grill’s organic slow braised pork cheek, white polenta, raisins and marsala sauce. So delightful that the woman standing across from us felt a need to share with us how much she enjoyed hers. Maybe it’s not a bad thing that Mezzo has gone Italian since reinventing itself after Oyster Little Bourke.

Melbourne Wine Room/Mr Wolf‘s Livornese seafood stew. Just one whiff of this could have sent me to heaven however I nearly broke my tooth on that bread stick! Such an appropriate dish for a cold, grey day so more of the broth would have been welcome. That said, it didn’t diminish our enjoyment of the stew, especially as we watched the queue crawling slowly towards The Palace for Luke Mangan’s Wagyu Burger. Being the most substantial dish and for just 10 crowns may have explained the lines, but we had been forewarned that the burger was nothing special.

Mmeh, The European’s duck tortelloni with pea puree & truffle oil really did not do it for me. One bite and I was happy to leave the rest to A. who ate it more out of hunger than desire.

Thankfully, it was a completely different story when we got to Comida Bebe. We chose to eschew the more popular Paella Fiesta for the baby chorizo glazed in cider, served on a skewer with candied and fresh apple and topped with an apple toffee sauce and boy, was it worth it! The chorizo was smokey, chewy and mouthwateringly moreish. They really should do more than just pop-up here and there.

Next door was the Libertine/Le Traiteur stall where the entire menu had my eyes popping. As I was getting quite full though, we skipped the pissaladiere feuillete and smoked duck, apple & walnut rilettes for the game consomme and truffled rabbit agnolotti – clear broth spiked with amontillado sherryl. A very delicate dish that A. enjoyed more than me.

Onto the opposite side where the (IMO) most eye-catching stalls had been set up – Longrain and Longrain Bar. Although the yellow curry of wagyu beef with cucumber relish looked tempting, I immediately wanted the salted Western Plains pork prawn sweet roll with pickled vegetables. Unlike Circa’s try-hard version of the banh mi last year, this one hit the mark and was one of my favourite dishes of the afternoon. Crackling pork skin with sweet chilli sauce – I could have had 3 of these if I wasn’t so full.

We also had their vanilla tapioca pudding with poached pears and jackfruit.

Charcoal Lane is restaurant, supported by Mission Australia, that enables Aboriginal and disadvantaged young people to obtain comprehensive hospitality training. A good enough reason to try their food and visit the restaurant, right? But what makes it better is that the food is actually well-worth tasting. We only had the seared Kingfish, red curry, puffed rice and coconut dish but it’s enough for me to want to schedule in a dinner there soon.

To finish off, we had the pistachio ‘panna cotta’ with caramel salted popcorn from Sarti. Salted caramel is really taking off in Melbourne in a BIG way but so few places get it right (I think the only place that A has give the thumbs up to is the creperie in Hardware Lane). Unfortunately, this was one of them. The popcorn did not taste of salted caramel at all but it was saved by the amazing pistachio panna cotta.

Well, we finished up at the restaurant stalls but, of course, there were a few other things we had to taste =) The original Monaco Bar was one of my favourite ice creams as a child so when I first read about Pat & Stick’s ice cream range in Gourmet Traveller about, oh, 6 years ago I knew that I had to try it. Unfortunately, their products were not stocked in Melbourne so I’ve had to wait until now for one of their sandwiches. Apparently the Caramel Pecan is one of the more popular so that’s what we got. It was good but, really, it could be SOOOOO much better. The cookie could and should have been nuttier and it reminded me of the cheap peanut cookies that you can get at Aldi. I hope the rest of the range is better but I’m more inclined to make my own next time.

Then there was the Green & Black’s chocolate fountain. A pile of skewered marshmallows to hold under the flowing river of chocolate, it was funny watching a woman tentatively reaching her skewer towards the waterfall and pulling back just before it touched. So good that I had two and would have gone back for a third before heading out the door before remembering that this afternoon was already going to mean extra gym time.

We enjoyed Dello Mano’s gourmet brownies so much last year that I made a beeline as soon as I spotted their sign. Of course, it helps when you have an owner like Bien who is passionate about their product and wants you to enjoy it as much as they do (unlike a certain fussy helper at the King Island Dairy stall).

We bought a few chocolates from The Chocolate Master but haven’t tasted them as yet as we are fairly chocolated out right now.

Who else has been and blogged (so far)? I have to slowly make my way through all these posts over the next few days…
Jeroxie
I Eat Therefore I Am
Travelling in Mary Janes
My Food Trail
Iron Chef Shellie
Green Gourmet Giraffe
Kitchen Wench
…It Pleases Us
Melbourne Gastronome
MEL: hot or not
The Chronicles of Ms I-Hua
Sweet Cherrie Pie

Did anyone NOT watch the Masterchef Finale? And did anyone NOT love both the finalists, Adam & Callum – whom both have blogs now.

Seeing as we had not done a potluck since our Neil Perry special, I decided it was time for us to have a Masterchef cook-off, the idea being to cook a recipe from the Masterchef website and bring it along for all to try. As I didn’t bother asking what anyone was making, I was a little concerned that we would end up with four desserts and one entree and we’d have to order in pizza – not that there would have been anything wrong with eating four desserts for lunch. Fairytale ending…

We started with Adam’s Prawn Scotch Eggs with a Coconut, Chilli Sambal. So good.

This was followed by George’s Open Beef Kofta and George & Gary’s Chicken Winglets, Hummus and Raw Vegetable Salad (I took the photo before the winglets were placed!)

To end the meal, we had George’s Braised Tomatoes with Smoked Chocolate Mousse – my effort – and a Fruit & Cheese Platter.

These eye-catching cupcakes were so popular last time I baked them that I decided to do them again for a 1st Birthday Party. Everyone wonders how you get the cake in the cones and the answer, of course, is that they are baked in there. Exactly the same as you would normally bake cupcakes but substitute cupcake cases for flat-bottomed cones. My dilemma came in the form of transportation. These cupcakes were top-heavy with the weight of the frosting so how could I ensure that they got to the party venue intact? Lightbulb moment! I remembered that we used to melt wax into birthday candle holders to make the little candles stay. Of course, I used something far more delicious than wax. I painted the bottom of the cones with melted chocolate and stuck them onto my cupcake tray and let the chocolate set overnight. Those cupcakes didn’t budge the next day when I was carrying them to the car but then I was beset by doubts about whether they would come off when the partygoers tried to remove them. I needn’t have worried after all. A few jiggles and the cupcakes were theirs for the tasting.

This is very last minute so you’d better get on your bike if you’re interested in free entry to the Taste of Melbourne. I have 4 double passes, courtesy of Green & Black’s, valid for Opening night, Thursday 26th or Friday 27th to be won. A great opportunity to sample (yes, one of my favorite words) dishes from some wonderful Melbourne restaurants as I did last year. You’ll also receive a little Green & Black’s gift pack – yum, yum!

Simply leave a comment sometime over this weekend or early in the week. This competition is open to people in Australia only.

You can also purchase tickets here.

Session times:
Thursday 26 August – 5.30pm – 9.30pm
Friday 27 August 12.00pm – 4.00pm and 5.30pm – 9.30pm
Saturday 28 August 12.00am – 4.00pm and 5.30pm – 9.30pm
Sunday 29 August 12.00pm – 5.00pm

This post is very, and I mean VERY, late. This cake was baked 10 months ago for A’s birthday and since then we have celebrated Christmas, moved house, had our son’s 2nd birthday party, had a new baby and celebrated my birthday. I was reminded of this cake when someone from Green & Black’s contacted me this week with tickets to the upcoming Taste of Melbourne (more on this in the next post).

So on a Saturday night, after putting my son to bed, I finalised the preparations for the party. I had made mini burgers, and was serving them with peking duck rolls and assorted mini dim sum.

Guests started rolling in and food was rolling out. The doorbell rang and the singer that I had inadvertently stumbled upon when visiting the city library one afternoon came in to play a set for us.

Finally, the candles were lit and the cake was placed in front of the birthday boy. He chose this cake from my Alice Medrich bittersweet book after flicking through and looking at the pictures. I looked at the photo and thought ‘That looks easy enough’ and ended up having to purchase a $69 roll of plastic liner to make the the thin chocolate layer surrounding the cake as none of the stores sold smaller rolls.

We also had a smaller family celebration earlier in the evening but they didn’t want to stay for the main event. Here was the cake we had:

Strawberry Celebration Cake

Soaking Syrup
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup water
1/3 cup rum

Cream Filling:
2 cups mascarpone cheese
1 cup thickened cream
1/4 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate Genoise

100g Green & Black’s Dark (85%) organic chocolate, melted

2 punnets strawberries

1. Pour melted chocolate along a strip of plastic liner that fits exactly around the inside of the cake tin and spread with spatula. Lift strip and fit ito tin with chocolate facing the inside. Refrigerate until set.
2. Combine ingredients for soaking syrup in saucepan and simmer until sugar is dissolved. Cool then add rum.
3. Combine ingredients for cream filling in large bowl and whip until the mixture is almost holding stiff peaks.
4. Cut the Chocolate Genoise into 2 layers horizontally and fit bottom layer into chocolate-lined tin. Brush bottom layer with 3 tbs soaking syrup and spread half of the cream evenly over the cake layer. Arrange and press strawberries into the cream. Cover the strawberries with a litte more cream.
5. Moisten the top later of cake lightly with 2 tbs syrup and fit it, moist side down, into the tin Press into place and moisten top of cake with the rest of the syrup. cover with remaining cream and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.
6. Remove sides of springform tin very carefully and decorate top of the cake with cream, strawberries and chocolate fans. Carefully peel plastic strip off the cake and serve.