Spatula, Spoon and Saturday

This place comes strongly recommended by a friend who lives locally. Who am I to say no to good dim sum! The last time I had some really good dim sum, I was at the Mandarin Oriental in Singapore.

We rocked up at 11.30am after having made a booking on a Saturday morning. Wasn’t really necessary at the time because the place was huge! It was very clean and there was actual linen on the table. According to my friends, real linen means real service. And they were definitely right. The service at Imperial Kingdom was spotless on the day.

Note: I took care to write down the pricing but with quite few dishes I can’t guarantee I didn’t make a mistake.

(pork and prawn dumpling – $4.80)

We were starving and picked out the first thing that came along Pork and Prawn dumplings. They were really good. Perfect balance between the filling and the pastry. It didn’t look interesting but it definitely was good. Recommended.

(Century egg and pork congee – $3.80)

Century egg and pork congee is my favourite dim sum dish. Unfortunately this one was pretty average. Too watery and the taste wasn’t too interesting. I wouldn’t have it again. I would rather concentrate on other yummy things they have.

(a close up of the congee)

A congee is basically a rice gruel dish made with boiling rice in stock until it becomes thick and soup-like. Century eggs are Chinese-preserved eggs. I think they are coated in lime, the egg white becomes jelly-like rich amber colour and the yolk turns grey. It’s good. Some people think it’s disgusting, Josh included. But I’m definitely a fan.

(steamed prawn rolls – $5.50)

Another family favourite – prawns wrapped thick rice noodle sheets topped with seasoned soy sauce. My mum always orders this when we go for dim sum together. The rice noodle skin was thick but this time, I actually liked it. Recommended.

(vegetarian dumplings – $3.80)

Vegetarian dumplings – I think they were quite average. Josh rather liked them.

(the inside of a vegetarian dumpling)

The filling had ‘typical’ Chinese vegetarian things like shittake mushrooms, woodear, firm beancurd and bamboo shoots. You might be surprised to know that in vegetarian does not mean fresh vegetables in some Chinese restaurants. I once ordered the vegetarian combination on at the Shanghai Noodle House thinking it would be mixed veggies but I was sadly wrong. It was a plate of stir-fried dehydrated mushrooms, canned bamboo shoots, wood ear, etc. Not a single piece of fresh vegetable in sight!

(scallop dumplings – $4.80)

The scallop dumplings were very good. Nice juicy filling with perfect dumpling skin. Definitely recommended.

(the inside of a scallop dumpling)

I think the filling also had some minced prawns in it but I honestly can’t remember. This post is about two weeks behind the actual event.

(Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce – $6.80)

Another family favourite: Chinese broccoli (kai lan) in oyster sauce. This is not something I have successfully replicated. I have been assured by a couple of Hong Kong friends that all I have to do is blanch the vegetables in boiling water (that contains some oil and a bit of sugar) and pour bottled oyster sauce on top. And that there is absolutely no trick to it whatsoever. Still failed. Many times! This was well done. Josh really liked it.

(sugarcane prawns -  $4.80)

This was the only fried dim sum we had. We aren’t really a big fan of fried dim sum at all. This one was lovely. It was minced prawn mixture shaped around a tiny sugarcane stick (which we chewed on) and lightly crumbed and fried.

(the fried dim sum trolley)

I took a very rushed picture of the fried dim sum trolley because the size of the oysters just amazed me. And I felt bad asking the waiter to pause. They were quite nice and a couple of them actually smiled! Seriously! Do you even know how rare this is at a Chinese restaurant in Australia?!?!

(steamed pork spare ribs – $4.80)

This was another one of my favourite dim sum dishes. Can’t say I was that impressed with it here though. I found it a tad too oily and I’m used to the slight spicy edge that usually accompanies this dish but it wasn’t. I think I might pass on it next time.

By this time, we were absolutely full. Even Josh had decided that he didn’t want any mango pudding (his favourite) but I think it was due to him seeing this young guy at the next table eating chicken feet. Josh was a bit put off after that. Until of course…

The dessert cart showed up! I mean, have a look! How could you say no?

Carp jelly! How cool is that!

And then we spotted the mango pudding.

(mango pudding – $3.80)

The mango pudding was served topped with evaporated milk. I’m personnally not a fan of evaporated milk on mango pudding and would have done without but this was Josh’s. The pudding was very nice and mango-ey. With realy mango pieces and not one of those icky fake mango flavour. Definitely recommended.

(bean curd with minced prawns – $4.80)

I figured if he could have dessert, so could I. But I preferred another savoury. This was pretty good. I loved the silky egg tofu texture with the flavourful prawn topping. Amazingly steaming hot I almost scalded myself a few times eating it.

(Jasmine tea – $1.50)

Me: What do you think my tea leaves say?
Josh: That you married a handsome man and will live happily ever after!

We were definitely impressed with the place and would definitely go back there. Food was awesome and the service was good. They do charge you for tea but not before asking if you actually want tea. I really hate it when they plonk tea (or peanuts, or whatever) in front of you without asking whether you want it and then charge you for it.

It’s a bit out of our way but it’s definitely no worse than going into the city. And parking is an absolute breeze. Will try not to order so much next time though. Bad idea to go without breakfast!

(Josh: Get the neon sign! Get the neon sign!)

Imperial Kingdom, 546 – 554 Waverley Rd. (cnr Blackburn Rd.), Glen Waverley
Entries from Waverley Rd. and Blackburn Rd.
Yum cha daily

I love the Japanese omelet rice! Of course when we went past a little cafe in Harajuku that specialised in omuraisu, we could not not go in. From my hazy recollection, we were absolutely starving on the day so excuse me for quick, useless photos. I’m pretty sure my hands shook from hunger.

Naturally this was what drew us. The food models. I love Japan for their food models. So we walked down the tiny (seriously you don’t know tiny until you go to Tokyo, and I’m like 5′ 0″) stairwell to a little cafe full of Japanese teenagers. You know, the usual Harajuku crowd. God I love Tokyo!

We were presented with the menu with, thankfully, had pictures on them. I decided on the brown sauce looking one (E). No idea what it was. I kinda thought it was gravy/brown sauce type thing, which I was led to believe to be one of the popular omuraisu toppings.

(Omuraisu with beef and red wine stew – 850 yen)

But I was wrong (naturally). I was correct that it was the standard omuraisu but the brown sauce wasn’t gravy at all. It was beef and red wine stew. I can’t say there was a lot of beef in it (compared to the plastic model). While it was all right, I wasn’t (still am not) a fan of anything red wine-y taste in food. The rice was well made with tomato sauce flavour. The omelet was lovely and soft as it should be.

(my meal – the plastic version)

Josh ordered what we presumed to be the takoyaki omuraisu. I mean, think about it! Takoyaki in your omelet rice. How cool is that?

(Takoyaki omuraisu – 850 yen)

I think Josh won this one. It was absolutely yummy. It was served topped with takoyaki sauce, mayonnaise, seaweed and of course, the beautifully dancing bonito shaving. The most surprising thing was the rice inside the omelet. It had actual tako pieces alongside the usual takoyaki ingredients like ginger, spring onion and cabbage. It was very yummy. Definitely recommended.

(Josh’s meal – the plastic version)

So if you’re ever around there, I strongly recommend it.

Apple Tree, somewhere in Harajuku. I honestly can’t remember where it is. It’s not very far from JR Harajuku though.

PS. I’m so making omuraisu this week! I miss Japan.

I was lazy so I got Josh to make lunch. Since I took over most of the cooking (unemployment, y’know?), I almost forgot what it was like to just sit there and wait for food to appear!

This is how he does a carbonara for two*:

1. 1/2 onion, diced
2. 2 rashers of bacon, chopped
3. 1/2 red capsicum, cut into thin strips
4. 3 button mushrooms, sliced
5. 1/4 cup of white wine
6. 1 egg
7. 1/2 cup cream
8. 1 tbsp of grated parmasan
9. 1 tbsp of grated Colby cheese
10. a pinch of dried tarragon
11. 1 tsp of dried parsley
12. 2 shakes of freshly ground black pepper
13. 200 g. of spaghetti

Cook spaghetti in hot boiling water. Add a bit of olive oil to the frying pan and sautee the onion, bacon and garlic until the onion is softened. Add mushroom and capsicum for a minute or so. Add the white wine to the vegetables and let them steam in the wine for a minute or so. Add cream, tarragon and parsley and bring to boil. Turn the heat all the way down and add in the egg, whisk very quickyly so it doesn’t scramble. Add the cheeses.

Toss the spaghetti through the sauce. Serve.

* Actually that is how he does a carbonara this time. He has a tendency to put in whatever he can find in the fridge. If you’re interested, this is how I make carbonara.

I bought a whole butternut pumpkin a couple of weeks ago and had used up parts of it. But now it’s begging to be used up! So pumpkin gnocchi it is.

This gives you four serves. They are not big serves but because the sauce is so rich, you probably don’t want a lot of it anyway.

(pumpkin pieces in the steamer)

Pumpkin Gnocchi

1. 600 g. pumpkin
2. 1.5 cups of plain flour
3. 1 egg yolk
4. 1 tsp ground nutmeg
5. 1 tbsp of butter

(‘dehydrated’ pumpkin mash)

Cut pumpkin into thin slices and steam them until tender (about 10 or so minutes). Remove the rind and mash the pumpkin with a fork until very smooth in a saucepan. Add butter and nutmeg into the mashed pumpkin. Place on heat and keep stirring the pumpking mash to dry out any water that’s in the pumpkin for about 10-15 minutes. We need to get rid of as much of the moisture in the pumpkin as possible otherwise your gnocchi won’t form properly. Leave the pumpkin to cool, keep stirring if you can so that all the steam escapes.

Once the mash is completely cooled, add an egg yolk to the mash.

Slowly add in the flour and keep mixing with a spatula until the mixture becomes smooth and pale yellow colour.

Once your dough is ready, pat your hand with some flour and cover your work surface with flour. Take a small piece of the dough and roll them up into long shape – size of a small leek. Cut the dough crosswise into rectangular-ish gnocchi pieces. I don’t bother shaping them other ways. Seriously, once they’re covered in sauce, it really doesn’t matter how well shaped they are.

Brie and Walnut Sauce

1. 1/2 cup of walnuts
2. 1 cup of cream
3. 50 g. of brie, cut into small cubes
4. 1 tsp of Vegeta gourmet stock powder (or salt)
5. 2 tsp of fresh tarragon leaves (optional)

Toast the walnut on dry heat for a minute or so. Add cream, brie and stock powder and bring to boil. Add some fresh tarragon if you have any (I don’t but it would have been ace if I do) and leave the sauce to simmer while you cook the gnocchi.

Bring a pot of water to boil and add the gnocchi. Once they float, leave them to cook for 1-2 more minutes. Using a slotted spoon, pour the gnocchi straight into the sauce and mix.

As the sauce is very rich, you just want the sauce to coat the gnocchi so use a slotted spoon to fish out the gnocchi from the sauce as well. Serve.

Note: I’m filing this under Pasta but yes I am well aware that it’s not a pasta!

Jacqui had been raving about Dweezil for the past few weeks now. She worked in the area and reckoned the food there was the bee’s knees. She also mentioned nonna-made pasta which sold me. Who am I to argue against a Nonna-made pasta? Plus I ran out of peanut butter and the Carlisle Health shop nearby sold the most yummy fresh 100%-peanut peanut butter.

We arrived at Dweezil in the afternoon, starving. But that didn’t stop me from admiring its warm wooden interior. I loved the way the place was decked out. They had the usual cafe fare like breakfast dishes, toasted foccacia, pastry, sandwiches and various cakes. And of course the daily pasta specials.

After pondering whether I should go for a breakfast dish (as usual) and decided against it (as usual), I settled on the day’s special: Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni. Josh, being a predictable soul, went for the Chicken Puff Pastry Calzone.

(Spinach and Ricotta Cannelloni – $10.00)

This. Was. The. Yummiest. Thing. Ever. Served by Nonna herself, I don’t know how else to describe it but it was one of the best pasta dishes I ever had. It’s as good as Pelligrini’s lasagne (which I think is the bee’s knees) except it had ricotta and spinach in it – two of my favourite things in the world.

(Dweezil’s cannelloni – it ain’t pretty close up but it’s beautiful!)

The sauce was yummy. The pasta was yummy. The filling was yummy. Everything was yummy. Jacqui was right.

(Chicken Calzone – $7.50)

(the chicken calzone filling)

Josh’s calzone came with tomato relish. It was lovely. Of course I had a bite. Josh reckons it was ‘better than that chicken pie at that place with the cute waiter.’

(Side salad – $6.50)

We both wanted side salad but Josh’s calzone had an option to include salad and mine didn’t, we ended up with a serve of side salad on its own to share. It was very good. Very well-dressed and the lettuce were beautifully crunchy. I didn’t realise normal iceberg lettuce could be so yummy. I think side salad should be something that makes or breaks the dish and often it’s what I use to determine how good a cafe or a restaurant is. If they do side salad properly, everything is bound to be good.

(Lemon tart – $4.00)

Being greedy guts that we were, we opted for dessert. I went for the lemon tart (How could I not? I was told,  ‘I have the best lemon tart in town’) and a coffee while Josh opted for a hedgehog slice.

(Hedgehog slice – $4.00)

The lemon tart was good though I’m not too sure about best in town but it was yummy nonetheless. Josh liked his hedgehog slice. I’m not a fan and never really found one to be any good anyway. We were served our dessert and I pulled out my camera to take pictures, the waiter/cafe manager saw and said ‘Do you want me to pretty them up for the pictures?’ so I said yes. She came back with coffee beans on the hedgehog slice and lemon slices on the tart with a bit of icing sugar dusted on them. Very creative!

(coffee – $3.20)

It was lovely. The coffee was also very good. I love it when I get a bit of latte art on my coffee. We would be sure to go back when we’re on that side of town again!

Dweezil, 172 Carlisle St., St Kilda

Defintely a winter thing, we have been crazy about our risotto. I have discovered a new combination that I like.

You’ll need the following for three people:

1. 1 chorizo
2. 1.5 cups of Arborio rice
3. 1 litre of hot vegetable stock*
4. 1 cup of fennel, sliced
5. 1 stalk of celery, chopped
6. 1 clove of garlic, chopped
7. 1/2 small zucchini, diced
8. 1/2 tomato, chopped
9. 3 tbsp of frozen peas (optional)
10. 2 tbsp of butter
11. 1 tbsp of olive oil
12. 1/3 cup of white wine

First thing first, we need to grill the chorizo. I use a pair of tongs to hold the chorizo over the gas flame.  It’s messy because the chorizo will spit oil and catch fire and you’ll end up with huge flames some times. Keep turning it around until browned on all sides. It’s much more fun this way but I am a bit of a pyromaniac. You can put it under the grill if you want. Slice the chorizo in bite-sized pieces.

Place 1 tbsp of butter and olive oil and sautee the fennel and celery until soft. Add garlic and rice and fry until the rice is too hot too touch. Add the white wine and stir until the wine is evaporated. Add a ladel of hot stock. Fry until each ladel of stock is evaporated before adding a new ladel. Keep adding stock and stirring for another 5 minutes

Add the chopped tomato. Keep stirring and adding stock for another 5 minutes.

Add the zucchini and chorizo. Keep adding stock and stirring for another 5 minutes.

Add a tbsp of butter and frozen peas, if using. Stir for another 5 minutes and add stock if necessary. Turn off the heat and grate in a little bit of parmasan cheese. Rest the risotto for 5 minutes, covered.

Served garnished with fennel tops. Grate parmasan cheese over as desired.

* I use 1 litre of water, some tough fennel bits and 1 tsp of Vegeta gourmet stock powder. Bring to boil and simmer before adding to the rice. The stock must be hot.

When I was in a boarding school, chicken a la king was one of those dishes that was served and I actually liked. The way I recalled it, it had chicken in a pure white sauce and it was always served with this rice dish that had onion and peas cooked into it. Never had any pimiento in it though.

After consulting many many chicken a la king recipes online, it seems like most of the recipes are a blend of those two dishes I was served in a boarding school (minus the rice of course). So I just went with the general idea. Unfortunately, at the time I had no onion in the house. Definitely a required ingredient in chicken a la king!

This is the result.

You’ll need, for two people:

1. 2 cups of cooked chicken (I used the barbecued chicken that we bought earlier)
2. 1/2 onion, chopped (I didn’t have any and it definitely was lacking)
3. 1/2 red capsicum, cut into thin strips
4. 1/2 cup of frozen peas
5. 3 mushrooms, sliced
6. 2 tbsp of plain flour
7. 2 tbsp of butter
8. 1 tsbp of Vegeta stock power (or some salt)
9. 1.5 cups of milk
10. 1 bay leaf
11. 2 tbsp of tomato ketchup
12. 1 tbsp of Worcestershire sauce

Add butter to a frying pan until it bubbles, add onion, bay leaf, capsicum and mushroom to fry. Stir for 4-5 minutes until the mushrooms colour and the capsicum softens. Add the flour and keep frying for a minute or so until the flour is cooked. Add milk and stir vigorously to get rid of any lumps. Season with the stock powder or salt and pepper and bring the sauce to boil. Season with the tomato ketchup and Worcestershire sauce. Add any water if necessary. Add the cooked chicken and frozen peas and simmer for 10 minutes until the peas are cooked.

Serve on a bed of rice or cooked fettucine.

Edit: OMG I completely forgot to write about the tomato ketchup and Worcestershire sauce. Add them!

(Chicken and Tortilla Soup, topped with avocado, lime and coriander)

Last week I was pondering whether I should do up a brenner feast (if you watch Scrubs, you’ll know what I’m talking about but if not, maybe next time) but Josh and I started talking about ‘that-Mexican-place-we-went-to-on-one-of-our-first-dates’ and I decided that I would do up some yummy Mexican stuff.

(Ocean trout enchilada)

The Menu

Entrée
Chicken and tortilla Soup

Main
Ocean trout enchilada served with spicy Mexican rice (arroz)

Dessert
Cinnamon-dusted oranges

(Mexican rice – Arroz)

I have decided to split this into three separate posts (and this one, so maybe that’s four? clearly I can’t count) for ease of categorising and to prevent this post from becoming wayyyy too long.

(Cinnamon dusted orange)

But before I launch into the making of each dish, the bill!

The Bill

Total $19.11

Ocean trout                  __________  $6.30
Canned tomato           __________ $0.75
Barbecue chicken      __________ $1.50
Enchilada kit                __________ $3.99
Celery piece                 __________ $0.10
Avocado                        __________ $0.62
Orange                            __________ $0.15
Coriander                      __________ $0.40
Carrot                             __________ $0.20
Red capsicums            __________ $2.00
Lime                                 __________ Free
Onion                               __________ $0.40
Seasoning                      __________ $1.50
Mushroom                    __________ $0.40
Basmati rice                 __________ $0.80

Now scroll down for each separate post. Or Part 1: Chicken and Tortilla Soup, Part 2: Ocean Trout Enchilada, Part 3: Mexican Rice. Err.. I don’t need to tell you how to dush orange segments with cinnamon, do I?

This is part 3/3 of this week’s $20 Mexican Feast.

This is a really easy side dish. I looked up a few recipes on the internet and came up with this one. I used my rice cooker and it takes minimum of two cups of rice (there’s always leftover rice in this household! I had this for breakfast with bacon and eggs the next day). This makes a lot of rice! Enough for 4-6 people.

1. 1/2 onion, sliced
2. 1/2 red capsicum, cut into strips
3. 1/2 yellow capsicum, cut into strips
4. 1 coriander (4-5 stalks), chopped
5. 1 tsp tumeric
6. 1 tsp ground coriander
7. 1 tsp ground cumin
8. 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper (or chilli powder)
9. 2 cups of basmati rice
10. 4 cups of water

(in the rice cooker)

Turn the rice cooker on ‘Cook’, add 2 tbsp of oil to heat up (you might need to hold down your rice cooker button), fry the onion and capsicum for a minute. Add the spices and rice. Stir until the rice is heated through. Sprinkle with coriander. Add water (this depends on your rice and rice cooker, so you’ll need to adjust accordingly) and cook in the rice cooker.

If you don’t have a rice cooker, do the same on a stove. Add water and cover the rice and turn the heat down to simmer and for to cook for 10 minutes. Rest the rice off the heat for another 10 minutes.

Part 2 of the $20 Mexican Feast continues…

I felt like a bit of fish and since enchilada seems to accommodate fish very well, I decided that enchilada would be perfect. I bought a nice ocean trout fillet from the fish monger (possible about 200g) and that was plenty enough for two of us. Remember to uncook the fish because you’ll have to bake it.

I ended up buying the Old El Paso enchilada kit from the supermarket which consisted of 8 (tiny!) corn tortilla and enchilada sauce. I know. It wasn’t supposed to be though. Unfortunately, my local supermarket didn’t carry corn tortilla on its own. And there was no way I was going to make enchilada with flour tortilla. So recap: corn tortilla not flour tortilla.

Note: this recipe makes 6 small enchiladas (there were 8 in a pack, used 2 for the soup)

Making the enchilada sauce

(Peeled, roasted capsicum – still steaming!)

I start by roasting a capsicum under the grill on medium for about 5 minutes on each of the four sides until the skin blackened and blistered. Cover and rest the capsicum. The steam will continue to cook the capsicum until soft. Peel the capsicum, discard the seeds and chop it into piece.

(Adding roasted red capsicum, fresh chilli and coriander to prepacked sauce)

Bring the pre-packed enchilada sauce to boil (or if you want to make it from scratch, simmer a can of diced tomatoes, chopped onion, garlic, 1 each tsp of cumin, coriander, tumeric, salt and a bit of chilli powder for 20 minutes), add the chopped roasted capsicum, 1 chopped fresh red chilli (alter depending on how spicy you want it) and 4-5 stalk of fresh coriander chopped. The one trick I learn is to add fresh ingredients to zing up bottled sauces. It tastes fantastic like you make it from scratch!

(the sauce after fresh ingredients have been blended in)

Simmer the sauce for a few more minutes. Blend the sauce and put aside while you prepare other ingredients. I used my Sunbeam Stickmaster and I can’t rave about it enough. It was the best wedding present ever!

Making the enchilada fillings

(cooking the vegetables)

1. 200 g. ocean trout, pinboned and cut into 3 cm cubes (don’t worry about remove the skin)
2. 1/2 onion, sliced
3. 3 button mushrooms, sliced
4. 1/2 red capsicum, cut into strips
5. 1/2 yellow capsicum, cut into strips
6. Yet more coriander! Pile them on!

First of all, start by preheating your oven now to 200′C. Fry the onion, capsicum and mushroom together in a bit of oil until the vegetables soften and start to colour. Add chopped coriander. Set aside.

(pan-frying the trout)

Turn the heat way up and add oil. Cut the fish into 3cm cubes and fry very them quickly on high. No more than half a minute on two sides only. You need to really under cook the fish here because it will be baked later on as well and nothing is worse than overcooked fish.

Putting them together

Heat the sauce up and fill the bottom of a baking dish up to about 2 cm.

(putting the fillings together)

Place a corn tortilla on a plate. Spoon some vegetable filling (about 1 tbsp), place two cubes of cooked trout (the skin will come off easily here if you wish to remove it) and flatten the fish a bit. Roll the tortilla by folding the two side into the centre. Hold the side that the two ends meet up. It won’t stay close, don’t worry. Place the tortilla into the sauce in the baking dish, move the tortilla in the sauce a bit and then turn it upside. So now you end up with the sealed part at the bottom and the other side nicely sauced. Are you confused yet? This is basically to dispense with the need to spoon more sauce on top of each enchilada. It gets messy so I do it this way. Do the same for the rest of the enchilada. It’s important to use a baking dish that fits all of your enchilada properly.

(bake until the cheese melts)

Sprinkle with some grated cheese. Tasty is good. American Cheddar even better. But I have mozzarella. It doesn’t matter so much (imo, anyway). Bake for 10-15 minutes until the cheese melts.* We don’t really have the luxury of baking it until it’s nice and golden because the fish will be overcooked. If you’re using another meat, or like to cook the hell out of your fish, I recommend baking it for longer.

* The more I think about it, I should have just grilled it so the cheese will melt and browned and the fish won’t overcook. Ah well. Next time.