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!

Socialising

I rather like having visitors to stay.  One big advantage, apart from the company, is that it forces me to clean up, dust and vacuum, chores I am not terribly fond of, but do because I hate dirt and squalor.  When visitors are coming , I actually see the house with new eyes and chuck things out, rearrange and buy flowers too. For me, flowers are welcoming and give the illusion of homeliness and house-wifeliness.  But, the most fun comes from buying food and drink that I think my guests will like, and that I don't usually have in the house.  I love it when people do that for me.........I remember that years ago,  I went to work for my sister-in-law at her property, Ocean Grange, on the Gippsland Lakes, when she was running school camps.  When I arrived at my sleeping quarters, I was greeted by a tin of home made biscuits and a vase of daisies.  It made such a lovely welcome.

Anyway, these friends from Melbourne were the sort you feel comfortable with, and they are foodies, though one is not able to eat onions or wheat.  Bob made gluten free biscuits, which it turns out have to be cooked for a shorter time in our oven and are flatter than the usual, and I went out to buy all sorts of treats for nibbles : Segret brand Smoked Salmon dip ( gluten free), which is absolutely delicious served with carrot sticks or rice crackers., Yun's Spicy Mix and Orient Mix rice snacks, sheepsmilk cheeses, Jamon Serrano, olives, nuts......and lots of fruit.  Of course there were the favourite drinks: white wine, and Rekorderling  and Dirty Granny cider.  But this visit, we avoided chocolate to avoid temptation.

We are all theoretically eating healthy though, so I tried to make the meals healthy. It sort of worked while we were home, But when we went out, things fell apart!

Lunches were salads and cold meats, and cheeses.

One dinner was flying fish roe,

 sweet potato chips,

seasoned wakame, pickled radish, pickled vegetables and pickled ginger,

 edamame, asparagus,

grilled mackerel,

 and enare with sushi rice and seasoning.

To drink, we had Choya Umeshu, with a pickled uma in it.  Very nice indeed!

Another was marinated and grilled lamb steaks

baby potatoes

and salad.

We had an old family favourite we call Eggs Flamenco, as well.  We make this when we don't need a full meal and it is particularly nice in winter.

Eggs Flamenco

Ingredients:

Olive oil
chopped salami or chorizo (I used Schukltz's garlic salami)
Bottled tomato pasta sauce (flavoured is nice.  I used a pepper one)
Frozen peas
pipped black or green olives
2 eggs per person
Sherry
Tomato ketchup
Ground pepper

Method:

 

Preheat oven to 180 degrees
Grease ramekins with olive oil.
In the bottom of each ramekin put enough chopped salami, olives and  frozen peas to fill half the ramekin.
Add tomato pasta sauce, leaving room for the eggs.
Add 2 eggs per person.
Top with ground black pepper, a dollop of ketchup and a slurp of sherry.
Place in oven and cook for about 15 to 20 minutes if you like your eggs totally cooked, less if not.

(Some nice bread to sop up the juices can be added if you like.)

Generally, we had fruit for dessert, like this pawpaw:




Last week, the Ladies Who Lunch took me to the Dudley Street Cafe, in Annerley, for lunch, but we had to evacuate after a cup of coffee because the traffic made conversation impossible.  We ended up at the nearby Great Cafe and Restaurant,  which looked pretty unimpressive, and had that rather ominous sounding name, but which served up rather good lunches of a prawn salad,

spring rolls and salad

and toasted bacon rolls and salad:

It was certainly a nice surprise.   ( We also visited the very nice gift shop next door,  Peter Baker-Finch and Co., and left with several brown paper bags)

With these Melbourne friends, since we were in Fortitude Valley hunting for clothes at Dogstar and wool at Tangled Yarns, we went to our favourite PhoB in Fortitude Valley for rare beef pho. Huge serves, tasty and filling as usual.

On the way back to the car, we decided to explore a Thai shop I had been meaning to visit.  The lady in there was eating a snack made of browned coconut and  peanuts, chopped ginger, red onion  and lime (with peel still on), small bird peppers, and dried prawns with a sauce poured on, all wrapped up in a leaf  She offered me one, advising me to eat it in one bite and it was so delicious I had to buy a pre- made packet of the ingredients to have at home.  Apparently it is called Mieng Kham.Here's what it looks like:

We also bought other goodies like Chiang Mai dried cherries, salted sunflower seeds, and spiced and sugared nuts.  We were very taken by the packets of these desserts of Black sesame balls in ginger syrup, Taro pearls in coconut cream and Assorted Beans in syrup

so we had the first two for dessert one night.  We roared with laughter when we found out how much the packets lied, but we still like the desserts.  The sesame balls got our vote.

We also went down to Albert Street in the city to try out the Japanese burgers at MOS Burger.  What a nice difference to the usual fast food burgers.  Our buns were made of rice and came with a range of fillings.  They were small, but very tasty.  We chose seafood kakiage (pictured), beef yakiniku, seafood okonomi and kimchi yakiniku rice burgers

 

 

 

   and they gave us these apple bites (which were a bit ordinary.  Sorry for the ingratitude).

We also tried the salad - uninspiring lettuce, tomato, corn, and onion, but the sesame flavoured dressing was beautiful.

 and cranberry iced tea ( fantastic!)

Then it was off to Gelatissimo for gelato.  Bob reckons Maleny is better, but they still enjoyed it.

On their last day here, we went to GOMA and  while we were there, tried out their Cafe Bistro.  We were impressed by the friendly staff and the confit duck, Toowoomba leaf salad, orange, kipfler potato and mustard dressing salad

and the Bangalow pork belly, du puy lentils and red cabbage slaw.

 

 

 

We took another break later in the afternoon for afternoon tea and tried out the QAG cafe by the water gardens.  Watched by a very friendly, very handsome lizard, we really enjoyed our cakes:

 

 

orange cake

 

 

 passionfruit tart

and berry cheesecake.

 

 

What a great long weekend holiday !