Archive for category Uncategorized
Mamasita – the tube is faster
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on August 27, 2010
Do you remember how many hours they told you?
Been there (photo), done that? If you didn’t go for lunch, you probably waited outside 7-Eleven for 20 minutes before being told to come back in 2-3 hours (ie. go watch a movie, or visit a few bars before thinking about getting a call).
The Epicure had an article on how popular Melbourne restaurants are getting harder to get in. What do you think? This was my comment:
TV shows, internet and newspapers are all making celebrity chefs and now celebrity restaurants. I acknowledge that one cannot know how good a restaurant is until someone else has been (review, friends, word of mouth) but there is a disproportionate hype in the restaurants featured on, eg, Masterchef and Epicure. Fixable? not really. The hype is just a side effect of our desire and ability to eat better. Chose wisely. Use multiple review sites and opinions. Sure rock up to a bar or no bookings restaurant if you are two. But for a group of friends, book a restaurant.
Out of the no-reservations restaurants in Melbourne Mamasita is perhaps the most difficult to get dinner currently. It’s popularity and infamous queues have been the topic of discussion and some angry posts. I went a month ago not knowing what to expect. Was it worth the wait? No, but I had good company for the drinks and conversation that spanned 3 hours. Good food? Pretty good. Since Mexican food is not common in Melbourne, the restaurant has hit a niche market by combining the unique food with a bar/casual dining area that Melbourne boasts about. My favorite was the choice of 4 tostada plate. It’s a small sized corn chip base with various toppings. The best one came with a slowly cooked sweetcorn and black beans.
Tostada plate of 4
The surprise of the night was the corn simple grilled, topped with a queso (or cheese), chipotle (smoke dried jalapeño) and a squirt of lime. Simple but really spoiled by the fact that you cannot get this as ’street food’ in Melbourne.
This 'street style' corn is delicious but ruined by the fact that you need to wait for hours
So overall the food is enjoyable and not often found in Melbourne. But they really should turn the music down to sub-night-club level. How long should you bother waiting for? 25 min max. Maybe the time worth waiting for should be the new rating system for restaurants.
A moment in the fog
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on August 16, 2010
Kiritappu Wetlands, Hokkaido, Japan
Yep, these are wild irises and Hemerocallis middendorffi (yellow). To give you an idea how dense the irises were in some places here is another photo taken a few hundred meters away. It is difficult to make the irises show well in this photo since the green and purple are both quite dark. It’s either close up and beautiful flowers or wide angle but not much contrast.
Irises
Breakfast for champions
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on August 4, 2010
When I don’t sleep enough, breakfast taste like nausea. My standard is cereal (usually Uncle Toby’s Quick Oats) with soy milk, yogurt (I like Gippsland). If I am more industrious I add frozen berries and some muscovado sugar. Of course there is also a flat white with a pretty pattern on top. I wish someone made me something warm and savory like this:
7 am, Utorohigashi, Hokkaido, Japan. Salmon roe on rice
7:30 am, Daisetsu-zan YHA, Hokkaido, Japan. Salted fish, scrambled eggs, rice.
Maybe that’s going a little over the top. But the salted fish breakfast came from a YHA (a super clean and nice YHA). in japan I have not come across a accommodation serving breakfast that did not include some sort of fish. It is usually lightly salted salmon or a small fish that is related to the mackerel (does anyone know the name?). Pickles that taste fresh and only lightly acidic or salted are a fantastic way to eat vegetables.
Maybe I should just sleep earlier.
Ramen like my first date
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on July 24, 2010
I am full – 7 different ramen shops in Hokkaido. From the humble eatery in the cable car station to get to the highest mountain (Asahidake) to the packed ramen shops in the Ramen Alley in Sapporo. Those who know me well would also know that I have a weakness for ramen – specifically the tonkotsu based broth. Warm, full of bony goodness and marrow, the soup makes my heart beat like I am on my first date. Heck, for less than $10 a serve, the date has serious competition!
The Japanese really pride themselves on what they do. Each bowl is served with great attention to detail. The movie The Ramen Girl sums it up (despite the crap and annoying acting). The master-apprentice relationship and the kind of soul that people speak of when referring to the broth. The chef Maezumi might be a tyrant but each bowl is ‘a gift to the customer’ and ‘if you look at the ramen you feel it’.
The original shop of Santouka
My favorite on this trip is Santouka (fire, head, mountain) in Asahikawa. I later find out that shop is the original shop, now having a chain of restaurants in the US, Canada, Singapore and Hong Kong. The shop was busy, fluorescent lit with basic chairs and table on the side while a stool lined bar was adjacent to the kitchen. I ordered their signature dish – the shio (salt) ramen. The stock is essentially a pork bone based (tonkotsu) that is salted, like all ramen soup base is. What this shop did well was not over salt their soup. My friends often complain that ramen soup is mostly too salty. I have to agree. But this bowl hit the salt level perfectly for me. Enough to really bring the broth to life but also to be able to finish all the soup without feeling that your blood pressure is shooting above 180 systolic. David Chang describes in his Momofuku cookbook that salt need to be almost ‘too salty’ for the soup to be ready.
Expect awsome ramen
The shio ramen - a bowl of awesomeness
Just look at how creamy the soup is! For a similar reaction to what I had…try this clip on a ramen shop in Tokyo. The soup in the clip is a triple stock, using 60 hours to make!
Simply amazing. Has anyone visited Santouka or one of their offsprings?
Salmon roe, raw scallops and sea urchin
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on July 18, 2010
Why does it always rain?
I am in my 3rd week of holidays (2 left) and have returned from Hokkaido. Right now it’s Kaoshiung, Taiwan, with all the tropical heat one can imagine. Thunderstorms have been forming every afternoon in Kaoshiung this week. On the news there was a video of a small tornado. Yesterday I was at a sushi train restaurant (everything equivalent to 60 cents, including Sapporo draught) and the rain fell so hard water flooded the floors. I suspect little sailboats were needed to replace the train.
Rain fell on most days in Japan to my camera’s annoyance. Seafood and ramen was clearly not affected.
Rain fell hard on my drive to Coonawarra last year. Rain fell still on my drive to Yarra Valley this year.
When it rains, you need what I am holding below. The back of the shop opens to the a fish market in Otaru. There IS a huge difference between very fresh and ‘ok’ seafood. More posts to follow!
Salmon roe, raw scallops and sea urchin on rice - less than $10 AUD
I’ll leave a nice arrangement of fireworks here.
Lake Toya
Brie de Meaux
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on June 25, 2010
From Cheese Slices by Will Studd
The earliest account of the flat, disc shaped cheese we now know as Brie was written by Emperor Charlemagne’s private secretary in the seventh century. On a visit to a priory near the town of Meaux, the King was offered the cheese from the monk’s cellars. On tasting it, he is said to have declared, ‘Je viens de trouver un des mets les plus delicieux’ (I have just discovered one of the most delicious of all dishes’). He placed an annual order of Brie from Meaux to be delivered to his places at Aix.
Brie continues to be a favorite at the French cort but, by a strange twist of fate, the royal fondness for Brie eventually had fatal consequences for the monarchy. When Louis XVI fled the revolutionary turmoil of Paris in 1791, he stopped for a meal near Varennes, where lingered to finish a delicious Brie de Meaux. The delay gave his pursuers time to catch up, arrest him, and return him to Paris for trial and execution.
A slice of Brie de Meaux. Very creamy. Taste like sniffing a bag of fresh button mushrooms.
Soufflé – take 5
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on June 23, 2010
soufflé with raspberry foam
So begins again with the joke “saw-fall”
An ever so light combination of egg whites and the setting agent of yolk and small amount of flour. Add some flavour like chocolate or pistachio or passion fruit or cheese or anything you want. But it’s difficult to make an airy-wonder, rise up clear of the ramekin and hold itself up modestly from the torture of gravity after it’s cooled. The air in the meringue expands with heat, pushing the mixture up. The heat also sets the protein of the egg yolk and stiffens the flour – producing a scaffold that holds the expanded air mass. By this analogy, soufflé are bound to collapse as it cools. The trapped air bubbles will decreased in volume as it cools, shrinking the souffé. But just how much can the cooked egg and flour mixture compensate and keep some of the volume? Who has a good explanation of what a soufflé does when it sits in the oven? And what settings on the oven should I have? Pure air convection or some above and below heating as well?
this one had a bit more lift!
Here is a second attempt at a pistachio soufflé. Still in trial and error phase. This time I grounded up the pistachio with the Barmix spice grinder. The pistachio meal was then added to the milk-sugar-vanilla mixture to infuse. After 8-10 min of gentle warming, the mixture was passed through a fine sieve to remove the gritty texture of the ground pistachio. A slightly thick, green milk speckled with vanilla remained in the pot.
milk, pistachio, sugar and vanilla
I made some raspberry foam to go with the soufflé – though a thick, cold coulis might have been better.
Boeuf Bourguignon
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on June 20, 2010
Boeuf Bourguignon with fettucini
What’s the best cut of meat to use?
Chunks of beef slowly cooked in red wine and lardons until it’s soft and the liquid is thick and dark – that’s the simple aim. But there are so many versions of this peasant-turned-classy dish that many of the finer points are just garnishes to the main meal. Here are a few variations.
A Table for Two: Recipe derived from Trish Deseine. Chuck/rump steak, marinated in wine. Bacon and mushrooms added. Anthony Bourdain on Techniques: Suggested the best cut is neck, next is shoulder (which is where chuck is derived from). Don’t worry about the marinating just get on with it! Julia Child’s version also forgoes the marinating. Guillaume Brahimi (check his Frenchy-ness at 1.48 min) has a version with a cut of Wagu beef. He doesn’t marinate the meat ( I hope the white streaks is connective tissue and not fat). To thicken the sauce, Guillaume added carrot purée.
When you think about it, boeuf Bourguignon is really the same as coq au vin – rooster cooked in wine and lardons.
After browsing through the web and attempting my own, here are some important points.
- The cut of beef is important. Chuck and oyster blade is good and easy to get (cooking time 3-4hrs). Ox cheek has much more connective tissue and gives a very tender texture in the end. Some butchers sell them, though they can take a bit more effort to cut up. The cooking time also increased to 4-5 hours for ox cheek.
- Marinating probably doesn’t matter much since the beef is cooked for 3-4 hours in the same liquid. When kept overnight and re-heated, there is ample time for all the flavours to develop
- If you marinate, patting the beef dry is paramount to the next point
- Brown your meat! Brown your meat!
- Coating the beef in a light coating of flour might help with browning/flavour, but it helps to thicken the sauce. I avoided this by point 7
- Depending on how you want your carrots and small, whole onions/shallots in the end, add them 1-2 hours before you finish. Onions will start to break apart after 1 hr. Carrots just get softer.
- Apart from the wine, most recipes call for beef/veal stock. supermarket stock is ok but never as good and homemade. I improvised with added 5-6 pieces of ox tail as it has ample gelatin in the connective tissue. The gelatin thickens up the sauce and give it a slick mouth feel (jus is really a concentrated version of stock containing gelatin from the meat). Ox tail also has some very tender meet on it. Just remove meet from the bone near the end of cooking time and return the meat back in the pot.
- I like adding soy sauce instead of salt. More umami flavour. People wont recognize and ‘Asian’ flavours in the final product
brown the meat for the 4th time!
The version I made this time does not contain lardons (or bacon). I wanted something that tasted of pure beef and wine.
- Chuck steak, 0.8-1kg, cubed into equal sizes, around 3cm size
- 6 pieces of ox tail. Small ones with less meat is fine. The connective tissue is the important component
- 1 large onion diced
- 1 bottle of red wine
- 1 celery stick or a few parsley stalks
- 2-3 bay leaves
- 3 carrots, cut into equal 3cm sized cubes/lengths
- soy sauce, 30 ml
- 1 stable spoon of tomato paste
- 12-15 shallots or small white onions
- 10-12 white mushrooms, sliced thick (3-4 slices per mushroom)
- Flat-leaf parsley
chuck steak, whole slice
- Put a thick based pot on medium-high heat, add some olive oil/grape seed oil. Brown the ox tail and beef cubes in small batches to ensure the pan is always hot. Remove the meat and set aside
- Sweat onions in the same pot, then return the meat into the pot
- Add all the wine. If the meat is still not covered, add some water
- Add a stick of celery, pepper, tomato paste, bay leaf, carrot and soy sauce
- Place lid on and cook on low heat for 2 hour
- Remove celery and bay leaf
- Brown mushrooms in some butter or olive oil. Add some water to start with helps.
- Add mushrooms, shallot/white onions into the pot
- Cook lid off to reduce the liquid until the sauce can coat the back of a spoon or you feel like it will sit well on pasta. About 1 hour.
- De-bone the ox tail, return the meat back in the pot
- Cool the pot down, then in the fridge overnight
- Skim the fat off the top
- Re-heat, garnish with parsley and it’s ready!
developing a deep colour
Just added carrots and shallots, time to reduce with lid open
If you want to add lardons, have 150 gm slices into strips 1-2cm wide. Render the fat and lightly brown the smoky pork goodness just after browning the meat. Add the onions after the lardons are just lightly coloured.
Serve boeuf Bourguignon with fettucini or pappardelle or mashed potatoes. On a cold night like this, returning home to the smell of this concoction bubbling away is comforting. Note, best results if you walk into a house with someone making the dish. You can bring the wine.
Scallops Snack
Posted by tzuyang in Uncategorized on June 17, 2010
This is by far my favourite snack after a busy day before rest of the dinner is cooked. Japanese scallops keep well in the freezer and is always ready. I sometimes make it into nigiri or served whole. brushed with some Japanese soy/dashi reduction or just a bit of lemon and salt. Blow torched to add charred flavour. Ready for the next course.
Mushrooming
Posted by tzuyen in Uncategorized on June 12, 2010
Spring in Oslo
I want to go next week with a guided tour
For some, it happens every year – like how AFL happens every year in Melbourne without question or raising an eye brow. During my half year in Norway, my friends talk about how every autumn people in many parts of Europe would go walking into the forest looking for berries and mushrooms. Unfortunately I only saw winter, spring and summer (or fortunately as I might have overdosed on both food types).
Then this month I read an article from The Age about mushroom foraging around Mornington Peninsular.
And today I read this passage from Omnivore’s Dilemma:
When Ben spotted me hunting in a prone position, he approved. “We say ’stop, drop and roll,’ because you can see things at ground level you’ll never see from above.” Ben and Anthony had a slew of these mushroom-hunting adages and I collected them over the course of the day. “Seeing is boleting” means you never see any mushrooms until somone else has demonstrated their presence by finding one. “Mushroom frustration” is what you feel when everyone around you is seeing them and you’re still blind-until, that is, you find your first, thereby breaking your “mushroom virginity.” Then there’s the “cluster fuck,” when your eyes are on and other hunters crowd you, hoping your good fortune will rub off. Cluster fucking, I was given to understand, was bad manners. And then there was the “screen saver” – the fact that after several hours of interogating the ground for little brown dunce caps, their images will be burned on your retinas. “You’ll see. When you get into bed tonight,” Ben said, “you’ll shut your eyes and there they’ll be again – wall-to-wall morel.”
Who wants to go!?
Right now the house house smells like boeuf bourguignon