A change to hearty meals with the cooler weather.

With the cooler weather, we have been eating fewer salads and using the oven more.  I have been particularly been missing roasts, so one night, I seasoned and roasted a chicken, and had it with baked potato, and sweet potato with peas.

 

The next night, I used the rest of the chicken to make a Jamaican-style soup like mum used to make, with Jamaican dumplings, noodles and chocho to remind me of her.

 

Another night, I made a curried fish dish using smoked salmon and smoked cod with brown rice and stir-fried green vegetables.  This was voted a great success, but I am not sure I could ever make it again!  I have no idea what I put in it as I was cooking by taste.

 

And we had okonomiyake again.  This time I used thin slices of pork which turned out to be very good indeed.  I like the versatility of this recipe.  So far, we have used ham, dried shrimp, prawns, pork and chinese sausage, and they all have been very tasty.

Bob has also been doing his bit.  He bought some red emperor and seasoned it and fried it one night.

We made a bolognese type spaghetti sauce another night using pork with a bit of salami to give a smoky flavour and a lot of vegetables.  Very warming!

And last night we cooked beef and vegeable stir fry with rice.

As usual, we have eaten out.  We revisited Morgan's at Scarborough to have fish and chips by the harbour with the dogs the other day.

 Bob had mackerel and was very disappointed with the flavour. 

The dogs had his in the end, it tasted so odd. They didn't mind, but he was very unhappy.

 I had whiting and prawns, which turned out to be a bit tasteless.  But, the chips were good,  so the waiting gulls and dogs got nothing.

We have eaten at Morgan's before - both at the restaurant and the takeaway and the meals have been good, if not as spectacular as its reputation, so we  weren't terribly impressed.  However, we all enjoyed the walk along the foreshore, checking out the boats and pelicans, and wishing we had a boat too so we could catch our own fish.

I went to the Providore store in Albion with friends twice this week.  It is very handy because it is the nearest cafe to the BIA where I have art classes, but though the food and atmosphere is quite nice, I found the service a bit slow and forgetful when the cafe was full and we had a big group - even though we had booked.  I think it is still finding its feet a bit.  Nevertheless, the frittata and salad I had there was very enjoyable.

I also visited one of my favourite coffee shops in my area with some friends.  Idea Caffe is owned by a very nice Italian couple.  We have a lot of cafes in our area, and they all offer something slightly different as well as the coffee.  The Coffee Guy in Junction rd, Wooloowin, is very urban chic, with antiques and is very couture coffee in style.  They roast their own coffee, sell coffee making accessories and a nice range of biscuits.  People who go here tend to be well dressed and  professionals, though they do get students popping in for a take-away before school, or labourers popping in for a take-away.  The magazines are design oriented.  I tend not to go there after a walk with the dogs, when I am hot, grubby and sweaty, feeling far too gauche.  I rarely take friends there since they don't provide meals, but my husband often has business meet-ups there, especially with those who are good coffee fans.  Idea Caffe in Shaw rd, Wooloowin is quite different in style as it is vey open and casual, frequented by cyclists, families, dog walkers, locals and passers-by.  I don't have to get dressed up or down there.  It offers simple Italian style meals, some cakes and biscuits and breakfasts, so I take friends there.  It stocks a few home magazines but mostly newspapers.  I ordered a set salad there and even though it turned out that they had run out of bocconcini, they worked with me to create an individual salad that would please me:

It was as good as it looks.

My friends also ordered something that they had run out of and again they went to a lot of trouble to make something special for them.  When we came to pay, my friends were given a large discount to make up for the trouble with ordering.  This friendly, helpful attitude and the warm rugs to wrap ourselves in against the cool breeze are a big positive for this place.

This week's recipe is

Pecan Chocolate Brownies

Ingredients
150 g pecan pieces
180g butter
250g dark chocoate
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 tsp vaanilla extract
1 cup plain flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder

Method
Preheat oven to 170 degrees.  Spray square tin and line with greaseproof paper.
Chop butter and chocolate and melt over low heat, stirring, until smooth.

Cool.
Place eggs, sugar and vanilla in mixing bowl and beat unil thick and pale.
Stir in cocoa and flour.
dd nuts.  Stir in chocolate mixture.
Pour into baking tin and bake 30 minutes.
Remove from oven and leave to cool.

Remove from pan and cut into squares

 

It is lovely and sticky when cut, and always disappears fast.

Stuffed Capsicums, the Patapan Food way.

This week has been a bit of a whirlwind due to several birthdays and lots of trips south of the border, down Victoria way.  Nevertheless, I managed to come up with a new recipe for you this week, due to the cheap price of green capsicums this week.

Stuffed and Baked Capsicums.



Ingredients:

2 green capsicums (you can use red ones, cabbage leaves, tomatoes, too).

1 cup long grained rice

250g mince (I used lean pork this time)

I small onion, diced

2 cloves choppped garlic

scattering of pine nuts

scattering of cranberries

2 diced tomatoes

handful of chopped parsley

salt and pepper to taste

olive oil 

water

Method:

Preheat oven to 180 degrees.

Cook rice with 2 cups of water in rice cooker and put aside to cool.

Cut the cap off the capsicum.  Clean the seeds from the capsicums and trim the stems of the caps.

Heat oil and saute onions and garlic until soft. 

Add mince and cook till browned. 

Stir in tomatoes,pine nuts and cranberries, tomatoes and parsley and warm through.  Stir in seasonings. 

Remove stuffing from heat and pack into capsicum bodies. 

 Place capsicums in ovenproof dish and place lids on. 

Pour enough water to cover 1/4 of the base of the capsicums.

Place in oven and cook for  about 45 minutes.

We also experimented with lunches.  These ones are  sauted mushrooms, salami and parsley, with olive oil, lemon, salt and pepper, and seasoned tomatoes and goats' cheese with parsley, both on wholegrain sourdough toast.

On one occasion, we went to dinner in Bairnsdale, Victoria, at the River Grill, and had a very nice dinner.  We shared entrees of

Pork in chinese pao rolls

 and dumplings in sauce.

I had the whole local snapper, served in an Asian style and ate it before I thought to photograph it.

Next was dessert:

Rhubarb and creme brulee and icecream

and icecreams with a caramel sauce.

We all enjoyed our meals, and although it is pricey, we were mystified at being the only diners, save for a couple who popped in for coffee and dessert. It is unfortunate that the restaurant has just been sold.  Hopefully the new owners will be just as creative in their cooking as the present owner.

In Brisbane, we dined at a local favourite, Campo Dei Fiori, in Clayfield, for an Italian fix.  As usual, there were a lot of diners.  And, as usual, I had my favourite, Spaghetti Marinara, which I love because it varies each time I go in the seafood ingredients which are used, but always is delicious.  This time there were a lot of sweet little pippies.  Sometimes there is a lot of fish, other times baby octopus, and other times prawns.

Bob ordered the Risotto marinara which he felt was nice, but not as good as my choice. 

We finished with something we find difficult to find in Brisbane, cassatta.  Very nice.

Service was, as usual, welcoming and efficient.

In Bogong, Victoria I bought a bag of local persimmons, the non-astringent sort, which are also difficult to buy in Brisbane at a reasonable price.  It was suggested to me that I should try slicing them thinly and layering them with cheese slices in sandwiches.  Must do!

We also were given some beautiful home cooking by our children while in Melbourne:

chocolate brownies

rocky road

and chocolate and berry cake.  Chocolate is obviously a family favourite!

 A real mixture of locations, types of food and cooks this week, as you can see!

Eating out in Brisbane

We revisited Viale Canova in Clayfield to celebrate Bob's birthday as we had had a wonderful Italian meal there a few years ago, with very impressive service and tasters between courses.  Our host that day was one of the owners and we had really enjoyed ourselves.  This time, there was a mix up about the booking time at their end, and we were telephoned to see where we were.  There were apologies about the mistake, but this should have warned us that things were not quite controlled this time.  We treated ourselves to a nice bottle of red wine - beautiful but overpriced in my humble opinion.  We were given a free taster plate of what seemed to be a bacon and puff pastry slice.  Nice, but not outstanding, and not very crisp. We both shared bread with dipping dishes available of olive oil, balsamic vinegar and butter.  We were also given a grinder of sea salt just in case we wanted salt.  For main course Bob chose the rabbit and pasta and I had the seafood soup.  Both of us enjoyed our meals, but Bob thought his had a bit too much pasta and too little sauce.  Plus, he felt that the sauce was a bit too buttery.  I liked my soup a lot more, but it wasn't as outstanding as I remember the past meal.  Unfortunately there was only one serve of pana cotta with a berry sauce left - they had had a large party for lunch that day and they had eaten everything, which was a bit of a disappointment.  By that stage, the only other patrons had left, and the waitress told us she was leaving too, but that the chef was still theres , so we felt rather  encouraged to cut short our evening and leave too. The whole evening wasn't as lovely as I had hoped, but  I suppose our expectations after our last experience were very high.  No photos, I am sorry, I forgot.

Next door to the Viale Canova is Dolce Sapori, and, on another day, I really enjoyed the Italian experience there.  They do make wonderful Italian cakes there.

They were so wonderful, I knew Bob would love them, so got him one of their gift boxes.  I was right, he enjoyed it.

 

 

Bob and I also went to our local Thai restaurant, the Siam Pagoda Thai Garden Restaurant, for dinner one night.   It is a very welcoming atmosphere with a sweet little garden if you want to eat outside, though not grand. The food is nice suburban food and good value, though suited to Australian tastes.

 

 We had Thai fish cakes, which were nice, but not overly special:

 

 

We also had the beef Pad Thai, which was very tasty indeed, steamed rice, and the Pad Krapow, which was pleasant

 

We also went out to dinner with some friends to a restaurant which I have wanted to visit for years because of its dedication to Australian native food, Tukka.  I started the evening with a very nice mojito with spiced dark rum and finger limes.

Then, we all were given a taster of escavietched crocodile

 

I found that the tomato overpowered the crocodile a bit, and the crocodile is very chewy, but I did enjoy it.

Then, we ordered the sides as entrees. We had the damper with macadamia oil, and lemon myrtle dukkah. The bread was sweetish and the combination was quite nice, but I think it would have benefitted with some salt too.

 

the other side course/entree was a bunya nut and macadamia nut salad, which I really enjoyed.  I have never tasted bunya nut before and I loved it.

 

For the main course, Bob had the kangaroo, which he found a bit underwhelming.  I think he prefers the barbequed kangaroo the children have cooked him:

 

 

 

I ordered the sole, which I enjoyed, though some of my fellow diners found it a bit too bony a fish.I liked the idea of the paperbark, but it didn't realy add anything to the flavour.

 

 

 For dessert, Bob had the figs and pain perdu. He again was a bit underwhelmed by it.

I had the grilled grapefruit and mascarpone, which was pleasant but not overwheming.

 

So we enjoyed the meal, but were not blown away by it.  I think I would have liked to have  stronger tastes and probably more native foods than we had. Maybe I should have tried the emu. I was expecting , perhaps, a bit too much, but given the wide range of indigenous food we now have available, I think I would have liked a bit more represented in the menu.  However, the service was very good, the staff very helpful and efficient, and it was a nice evening. ( I am beginning to feel a bit like a sourpuss about being so negative).

 

As well as eating out, we have been eating at home.  One night, we had a seafood and chicken paella

 

with a dessert of floating islands.

We also had our first taste of kale, stir fried with pork.  I like it and will be trying it again.

Another night, we had grilled chicken, green papaya salad and chips made from purple yam, white sweet potato and taro.

We also had yam rice for the first time, which we aso liked a lot.

 

No recipe this week!  Sorry! 

 

Eating at home

This has been a great week for cooking.  The weather is a bit cooler and I am in the mood!  My lucky partner has taken advantage of this, as have some of his colleagues.

This week's recipe looks a bit weird in the photo, but got the thumbs up when we had it for dinner:

Smoked salmon salad.

Ingredients:

1 packet of hot smoked salmon, flaked
6 baby potatoes boiled in salt water, and sliced when cool
1 head of broccoli flowerets,  1 bunch asparagus,1 handful of French beans cut into chunks,  and blanched in boiling salted water
handful of dill, chopped
1 tablespoon capers,
( could add chopped red onions too)
2 heaped tablespoons light sour cream,
1 heaped tablespoon seed mustard,
freshly ground black pepper to taste

Method:

Prepare the salmon and vegetables as per ingredients.
Cool vegetables to room temperature
Put salmon, vegetables, dill, caper and red onions if used in a salad bowl and mix.
Mix together the sour cream, mustard and pepper.  Pour on ingredients in salad bowl.
Mix gently, then serve.

We also enjoyed a brilliant dish that I have adapted from the one I used to cook for the family: lamb shanks in an orange sauce:

 

 (PS Yes, I finally found some yam, in the Toombul vegetable shop).

One night we had spinach and feta in filo pastry



and for lunch one day, we had quinoa salad with pomegranates

 

 We experimented with the last dessert from the Thai shop that I showed you last week.  It is called "Assorted Beans in Syrup", but turned out to be longan, barley, coconut, sago, jujube, lotus seed and kidney bean in a light syrup.  Quite refreshing actually, and not too sweet.

I had found this dried fruit in the shop and liked its appearance so much, I brought it home to display in a bowl.  At the same time, I discovered that the shop sold packets of dried tea made from it, so I bought a packet too.  Turns out it is a Bael fruit, and the tea is purported to be very good for you.  The tea is quite palatable for something that is good for you, sort of woody, sweet and sour at the same time, but very light.  Glad I experimented!

As well as meals for us, I made some sweet treats for the workplace: a molasses slice:

and baklava

 

Apparently they went very fast.  Luckily, I kept some aside for Bob to have at home!