Black Wagyu Ramen (by Biggs)

After work I was heading to the Old Museum with Bonnie to see the ever-charming, ridiculously talented Dan Sultan.

We decided to have some dinner first and it was a somewhat shambolic experience. We were headed to a Japanese cafe I often frequent but got distracted on the way by a flashy new Japanese restaurant with a trendy hipster vibe. Mistake.

Between the incompetent waitstaff, shortage of supplies in the kitchen and a very complicated ordering / paying / food delivery system I was pretty frazzled. Even more frazzled when I ordered ramen only to be told the ramen restaurant had no ramen. But, it turns out if you pay enough ($33!) they will infact rustle you up a beer and a bowl of ramen.

I'm not scared to pay generously for Japanese food. In fact G and I have been known to sink a far chunk of life-savings into this habit but this was not the time and definitely not the place!

The ramen was actually quite good - savoury and served in a giant bowl - but I really do wish we'd just gone to a dingy, hole-in-the-wall place.

All I can say is.....Thank Fuck Dan Sultan saved the day.....ever-charming, ridiculously talented.

Beef Olives (by G)

Biggs is out tonight so I was cooking for myself. I was looking for something Japanese and came across a recipe for Beef Olives. I made them years ago and remember them to be excellent.

Unfortunately that was not the case today. I mis-remembered the timings and over blanched the carrot and asparagus. Under-marinated the meat (in soy, sugar, mirin and sake). Undercooked the rice - the mushrooms were good though, and the frozen parsley added a nice touch of colour.

Oh, I forgot... the spring onions were stringy and made the whole thing hard to eat...

Death Tortillas (by G)

I was prepping for dinner last night and realised, shock horror, it was Tuesday and I was not prepping tortillas. "*Naughty Word*", I said, "I completely forgot it was Tuesday".

Hopefully I rectified that tonight.  There are at least 3 reasons for tonight's combo. We still have a sirloin steak glut, I've never had blue cheese on a tortilla and I'm lazy.

The laziness led to packet tortillas. I fried up some coarse chopped sirloin steaks, red capsicum, red onion, garlic powder, cumin and paprika. Baby endive for healthfulness. Blue cheese out of curiosity.

These were pretty good tortillas, not enough meat and probably too much cheese... so much cheese... there's a bulge in my pants and it's not because I'm happy to see you.

The Full Miso (by G)

I've had miso in many forms but it is never very filling. We have quite a bit of sirloin in the freezer so I thought it would be nice to coarsely mince it and add it to something - suddenly there's a way of making miso a meal.

So I par boiled a potato and a carrot, chopped the beef up, seasoned it and fried it with some left over shallot and coriander, independently fried some shimeji mushrooms, steeped some yakisoba noodles in boiling water... then mixed it all up with some packet miso soup.  There was a shortfall in flavour so Biggs and I added some  surprisingly-mild-homemade-scorpion-chilli-sauce and some ketjap manis. That did the trick - flavour all the way through.

Miso, it rhymes with please-o - I don't think that is a coincidence.

Seafood with Beer Battered Vegetables (by G)

We had a bit of salmon in the freezer so I decided to use that for dinner, there wasn't much though so I also got some prawns. I was thinking oven fries for a side but then decided that, while potato is a vegetable, it might be good to get a bit of variety so I got a mix of the coloured stuff. Vegetables healthy - yes, normally - coated in a beer batter and deep fried, probably less so.

The salmon was fried, glazed with miso, soy sauce and honey then oven baked. The prawns were fried in oil and butter and garlic.  The vegetables (potato, cauliflower, carrot and beans) were par-boiled then coated in a mix of plain flour, corn flour, baking powder and beer then deep fried.  I also did a sauce of egg yolks, olive oil, peanut oil, lime juice, red wine vinegar, capers, parsley and coriander.

Steak with Chimichurri (by G)

We have an oversupply of sirloin steaks at the moment. I was thinking about what to do with them and remembered chimichurri - the Argentinian meat sauce comprised of parsley, coriander, garlic, onion, oregano, salt and pepper - I also added dried chilli flakes because the recipe called for red pepper (which I'm not sure what is).

From my research I discovered tomato and onion salad and green beans with a garlic oil dressing are typical, so I did that. I also served bread with garlic oil.

Those Argentinians know a thing or two about meat and what to put on it.

Part Spit-roasted Pork (by G)

I had the ambition of spit-roasting pork on our own little barbeque at home. I got a battery powered spit roaster and worked out how to arrange it over the coals of our barbeque, threaded on a small pork roast and let it fly.  Unfortunately I hadn't really considered how long it would take to cook the meat - after an hour the meat was still basically raw so I bailed on the barbecue idea, chucked the meat into a super hot oven for another hour - then we ate it.

For sides I boiled up some potato pieces and fried them with bacon, white pepper, salt and garlic powder. I also fried up some onions with salt and a little vinegar.  The gravy came from a tin, but was mixed with some of the rendered pork fat for added flavour.

Despite mis-handling the meat it turned out to be delicious - probably the best pork I've ever had. 'Do you think the spit-roasting maybe added some flavour?', Biggs asked hopefully.  My suspicion is that it was just that the pork was organic and not the torture pigs we usually eat. Happy pigs are provably tastier.

Ox Heart Tortillas* (by G)

I've been thinking about getting a bit more authentic with the tortillas lately and when I discovered that the local supermarket sold Ox heat (which I suspect is just beef heart) I decided to go that way.

I was surprised at how small the heart was, until I got it out of the packet and discovered I'd only bought a couple of strips of the whole beast... luckily.

Given that the heart was already cut down there was not too much trimming to do - just slicing off the outside and the inside - then I cut it pretty thin, fried the shit out of it in smoking hot oil, added paprika, cumin, garlic powder, salt, white pepper, pre-fried onions, red chilli, cognac, vinegar and coriander (all to get a little flavour into the meat incase it proved unpalatable). After it was bowled up I added some parsley (by mistake - I thought it was coriander) and packet fried onion.

I went pretty bold on the sauce as well - avocado, salt, coriander, lime, red onion and a whole green chilli.  The tortillas themselves were hand rolled - hence the irregular shapes - they turned out pretty good.

For me, the heart was a bit meaty. Biggs seemed to enjoy it (I didn't tell her before-hand that we were eating Ox heart) so, unless she is better at bluffing than I realised, there will be more heart in our future.

*Made with heart, not love.
**The photo was taken in haste so it didn't get cold and more weird. Sorry for the blurriness.

Spaghetti Marinara (by Biggs)

A lot of people who read this blog comment on how lucky I am to eat so well living with my brother. But, for once, tonight eating well was thanks to me.

Cooking seafood makes me nervous but tonight I decided to go for it and made a marinara. G tells me that marinara means 'sea creatures' and sea creatures we ate. I suspect G's Italian is a bit sketchy but fish, prawns, squid, mussels and scallops were cooked in a tomato sauce with wine, chili, lemon and parsley and thrown over a spaghetti.

I've watched enough cooking shows to know that seafood should be cooked in water as salty as the sea......or maybe that's pasta. To be on the safe side I went with both.

I usually do a pretty good job of over-cooking seafood and pasta but tonight I worked really hard not to. And, had success!

I rewarded myself with the left-over wine.

Lamb and Haloumi Salad (by Biggs)

I had a Board Meeting tonight but fortunately we hold our Charity Board Meetings at the pub over dinner and drinks and it means I get to hang out with the delightful Kristy.

We headed to The Loft on Boundary Street and stumbled across two for one night. I concentrated on dining on the lambs and Kristy focused on eating the pigs.

Dinner for me was a lamb and haloumi salad with rocket, couscous, sweet potato and a spiced, savoury aioli type sauce. The lamb was ridiculously tender and cost me $10.

I'm not sure we've saved the world quite yet but the lamb sure did help!



Steak Sandwich and 'Chips' (by G)

I've been thinking about having a steak sandwich all day - unfortunately by the time I got home I was feeling a bit under the weather and didn't much feel like eating.  I'd bought all the stuff required though so I pushed ahead.

Another drawback I discovered when I went to make the sandwich is that, rather than get a nice sourdough loaf of bread, I'd bought a pumpkin loaf. I sampled a piece - it was too dense and dry to make a good sandwich so I had to drag my ass to the corner store to get a 'white loaf'.

For the steak sandwich I fried a couple of steaks (naturally) - thin cut sirloins.  I also fried some short cut bacon and shallots with cognac. Other toppings included tomato, home-made chilli sauce and 'swiss style' cheese.  Normally I would have had steak-house fries with something like this but, to stave off death, I had vegetable sticks - the garlic aioli was scratched because I couldn't summon the energy, instead I used some left over vinaigrette.

The sandwich was excellent - a perfect balance of all the fillings. 

Biggs is out saving the world today so stay tuned for her evening meal.

The German Club (by Biggs)

We used to frequent this fine establishment a lot, we had quite a break for several months, but tonight we came back with a vengeance.

Entree was fried Camembert.

Next we ate pig. G had a Pork Knuckle.....best pork knuckles in Brisbane according to the sign out the front....and G. I had Pork Belly......best crackle in Brisbane. There is much we could say about this meal, all positive, but we might just let the photos speak for themselves.

Breakfast Salad (by Biggs)

After bailing on making dinner last Thursday night I found myself in a cooking debt so was put in charge of this evening's meal. I decided to make a version of a Breakfast Salad I once had at Lock 'n' Load, a cafe in West End. The salad was spinach, toasted bread with garlic, fried tomatoes, bacon, sausages and a boiled egg. I also made a fairly sensational dressing from wholegrain mustard, olive oil and a touch of balsamic. 

Yesterday I was watching a Wylie "The Eggman" Dufresne interview and he mentioned that adding bi-carb to the water you cook eggs in raises the PH, impacting the membrane between the shell and the white making them easier to peel. After thinking about it all day, I forgot to actually do that at the crucial moment. I won't forget again because peeling the eggs was super frustrating, painful and time-consuming. 

For those of you who doubt this dinner actually constitutes a salad, look it up. A "salad is a popular, ready-to-eat dish made of diverse ingredients, usually served chilled or at a moderate temperature". After I'd stuffed about for 15 minutes peeling the eggs dinner was definitely at a moderate temperature. 

I think I've adapted the recipe a fair bit from the original but the ingredients are so versatile how can you go wrong?

Not a Nicoise Salad (by G)

I watched an interview with Hugh Fearnley-Wittingstall and he somehow guilted me about the amount of meat we eat so I resolved to be a bit more vego-centric and less carnivorous today.  I had meant to make a Nicoise Salad but forgot the beans... not a Nicoise Salad.  That said, there was a lot of things in this salad:

A packet mescalin salad mix, quail eggs, cucumber (in place of beans), boiled potato, capers, olives, mixed tiny tomatoes, smoked salmon and tinned mackrel. Over the top was a dressing of cornichon  liquor (sadly the cornichons themselves were eaten yesterday - cornichons don't last more than a couple of hours in our house), vinegar, Dijon mustard, olive oil and shallot.

It was a pretty good salad and seemed quite healthful - the mackrel was a bit of overkill though. 

Hors D'oeuvres (by Biggs)

Tonight was the wedding night and we were spoilt with lots of lovely treats. There was also lots and lots and lots of beer and champagne. As a result my memory is a little sketchy but from the photographic evidence dinner involved a piece of chorizo with balsamic onions, a prawn, an oyster, a spring roll (perhaps duck?) and some calamari. These are five of my favourite food groups so I guess it was pretty bloody good dinner. I heard rumours of mini-quiches, pies and meats on sticks but I have no memory or even photographic evidence to support that theory.

 

Steak Tartare (by G)

I've had this Anthony Bourdain steak tartare recipe in my recipes folder for almost 3 years - Biggs does not seem too keen on the idea so I've never made it.  As Biggs is still out of town I thought that now was my chance.

I figure that when you decide to eat raw beef it is no time to fuck around with the quality - I bought the best porterhouse I could find (the recipe called for sirloin but they don't seem to sell that particular cut anymore - I'm not even sure what the difference is).

The beef is flavoured with pepper, Dijon mustard, anchovy, ketchup, oil, Worcestershire sauce, tabasco, cognac, egg yolk, onion, capers, parsley and cornichons.  I made some bread croutons and de-packeted some pork rinds to serve it with (I stole the pork rind idea from Top Chef Canada). I know it makes me seem like a bit of a bourgeois asshole but I didn't have any chicken eggs at home, only quail eggs - the yolks are much harder to separate form the whites with those little bastards.

There was nothing challenging about the flavour or texture of this dish - how can you go wrong with capers and cornichons?  I'd recommend it to anyone looking to reduce their cooking related gas or electricity expenses.

To get the meat well chopped I busted out the frighteningly sharp Sugimoto I bought at the Tsukiji fish market more than a year ago but have been afraid to use.  I managed not to cut myself - my fingernails got a bit of a trim in places though.

BBQ Leftovers (by Biggs)

This weekend I was up at Coolum for the wedding of my two dear friends Fi and Dan. They'd hired a big house on a hill overlooking the ocean and spent the couple of nights prior to the wedding hosting dinners for family and out-of-town guests. By the time I rocked up their fridge was full of BBQ leftovers and I well and truly indulged. Chops, sausages, chicken and salads.....all delicious. The best bit was it was all served up on a massive Lazy Susan. We also had one or two (bottles of) champagne.

Sushi Train (by G)

Biggs is out of town this weekend and after a day of rain I didn't feel like cooking for myself so I went to the best place for a person dining alone - a sushi train.  There is always so much to occupy you at a sushi train that other people are generally a hindrance to the important business of eating.

While the place I went to is not the best sushi place in a city of a million sushi places but it is spectacular in one particular respect... it is a 5 minute walk from my front door.

Shown below are the items I ordered from the menu - Gyoza, Karaage Chicken and Salmon Sashimi (which regular readers will know is the last thing I want to eat before I succumb to mortality).  Not shown are the plates from the train - Seared Beef, Crumbed Pork, Lobster Roll, Chicken Teriyaki, Ebi Shrimp (I think it's called), Cucumber and Avocado, the weird one with the tinned tuna that I find strangely satisfying and Seared Salmon.

All the train items were good, the gyoza were standard, the karaage chicken was pretty fatty and not too flavourful and the salmon sashimi was a bit haphazardly sliced, never-the-less I could have gone on eating and eating but John Lennon's 'Nobody told me there'd be days like these' came on over the speakers and he told me '...they're starving back in China so finish what you've got' and I took that as my cue to leave (though I don't think that was John's point exactly).

Pizza (by Biggs.....but mainly by G)

New lesson: if you are meant to make dinner but have a really bad day and get home almost in tears G will order pizza! Winner. 

There was a meaty one, a hot one and one with a bunch of different things on it. There was also garlic bread and chicken lumps. G and I both particularly liked the chicken lumps. 

My dinner was served with a cola drink. 

Cebu Style Lechon with Spicy Potato Salad (by G)

When I was at the supermarket the other day I picked up some pork belly - I didn't really mean to, it was more an unconscious action.  Thinking what I should do with it I remembered that they know how to treat pork in the Philippines so I did an internet search and came across this preparation.

The pork is seasoned and slow roasted in the over for 2 hours over a mix of lemongrass, garlic and water - then soy sauce is brushed on the skin and the oven is turned up a bit to get a good crackle.  I followed the recipe exactly and, sure enough, the meat was tender and the skin had an excellent crunch to it.

With all that fat it was obvious that some vinegary side dished were required. I was planning on German potato salad but discovered we did not have some of the requirements so I boiled some potatoes and eggs and mixed through some home made chilli sauce (the chilli sauce was made with garlic, onions, tamarind paste, 24 Birdseye chillies, 1 regular red chilli, 1 scorpion 'hottest chilli in the world' chilli and some tomato puree). The chilli sauce, rather than turning out to be a blow-the-top-of-your-head-off hell brew, turned out to be moderately spicy and nicely savoury.

The other side dish is packet coleslaw with the dijonaise and vinegar dressing that Biggs had prepared last week.

Somehow (once again) a meal for 6 was polished off in one sitting - disgraceful... deliciously so...

Lazy Tortillas (by G)

In the morning I remembered that we do not currently have a tortilla press and, being a lazy kind of fellow, I decided to get some packet flour tortillas instead of hand rolling my own.  A couple of minutes in the microwave and - bam! you've got tortillas.

I also copped out and got a can of refried beans that were reheated and ready to serve.  I couldn't find plain pork mince at the supermarket so I went with the closest thing I could find - a pork and beef mix. This was fried then liberally sprinkled with paprika, garlic powder and cumin powder then simmered in chicken stock 'til it thickened up again.

I did try to do something different with the salsa. I roasted a red capsicum in the oven then skinned it and blended it up - instead of getting a smoky flavour it went a bit bitter... too bad... to that I added finely chopped red onion, cucumber and coriander along with some lime juice. I managed to slice my thumb while admiring my fine cutting skills so I nearly put more of myself into this meal than I'd intended...

Beef Stew and Herby Dumps (by G)

I was not in the mood to make anything too complicated for dinner so I made what is perhaps the easiest thing to make - stew.

It was originally going to be a straight vegetable stew but I chickened out on that and bought some chunks of beef.  These were fried off with salt, pepper and leeks then whole shallots, chunks of potato and carrot were added. This was then deglazed with a little white wine then some bay leaves and chicken stock were added and the whole thing was simmered for about 2 hours.

In the morning I had researched dumplings and found a recipe of 2 parts flour, 1 part butter, 1 part cheese and some herbs.  When Biggs asked if dinner was going to be healthy I said it should be pretty healthy - that was just before I started working a block of butter into some flour, which seemed to put a little doubt in her mind.

The dumplings went into the stew about 15 minutes before serving. I don't know if I got the proportions a bit wrong but they did start to disintegrate a bit in the hot liquid. I guess that makes sense given they were 1/4 butter - I'm 1/4 butter and avoid hot water for just that reason.

Spicy Barbecued Chicken with Skewers (by G)

I figured Biggs and I could take a break from the healthy eating for one night and that, being Sunday, a barbecue would be in order so I whizzed up some green chillies and garlic along with some olive oil, white pepper and paprika and marinated a couple of spatchcocks.

After a few hours of marinating the bird went over the coals until charry-good then into the oven while I cooked up the skewers.  The original idea was to have vegetable skewers but I picked up chorizo and haloumi at the supermarket and I recognised their skewering potential immediately. Also on the skewers were red capsicum and some shallots (that I had previously blanched).  The skewers were not the ideal barbecue item because the cheese kept trying to escape (and infact a couple of cubes did manage to escape). 

I forgot that I was also going to put mushrooms on the skewers so I fried these off with some left over shallots and capsicum and some chives. We had leftover garlic butter and anchovy butter in the fridge so I used these to fry the mushrooms in.

On the whole the meal was pretty good. The skewers could have done to be cooked a bit more and the chicken marinade could have imparted a bit more flavour - but any day the barbecue gets fired up is a good day.

Mussel and Brie Pie (by G)

I've been having difficulty fitting into my pants lately so I though I should make something super healthy for dinner... then I remembered that we had some left-over smoked mussels in the fridge that I should probably use sooner rather than later. When I did an internet search of smoked mussel recipes I found one for a pie topped with brie.  It did not meet the healthy criteria but it did meet the use-up-the-mussels brief.

The pie starts off by frying off the holy trinity (I know this is the term for the use of onion, capsicum and celery in gumbo but my personal holy trinity is bacon, onion and garlic <BOG>).  Once they were ready the chopped mussels were added along with lemon juice. This was all tipped into a pastry filled tin, topped with and egg/milk mix and brie cheese then oven baked.  The recipe called for filo pastry - unfortunately I broke all the filo when getting it out of the packed so had to resort to puff pastry.

We still had a quantity of pate leftover so I toasted some breadstick rounds and topped them with pate. Also served was a green salad. I took a bit of a late afternoon nap and, as a result, was a little time poor so instead of preparing a vinaigrette for the salad leaves I just served them plain.

Snacks and Takeaway (by Biggs)

I went to Bonnie's for dinner tonight and like any good girly sleepover we started the night out with a ton of junk food. Biscuits, chips, dip, chocolate and lollies. The standout was a layered dip of baba gahnaush, hummus and BBQ eggplant called Heavenly Hummus. Worth looking into.





You wouldn't think we would actually need dinner after that but we thought otherwise and headed out to collect some takeaway from Thai Lada (formally Thai Star). I had huge confidence in the place the second I saw it. Dodgy little corner store, crammed with tables, coriander and coconut smells wafting through the air, staff speaking the right language and a conclusive sign above the door: THAI RESTAURANT.

We ordered a Massaman Curry and a Chicken Pad Thai. Both excellent. I love a Pad Thai and the beef in the curry was ridiculously tender. We were also treated to the September Special of a complimentary half serving of spring rolls even though it's October. A good night all 'round!

We noticed another restaurant near the Thai place claiming Jamaican, Malaysian and Japanese food called Roti-I-Roll. You can bet we're heading there soon.

Steak and Pâté Sandwich (by G)

Yesterday I made some pâté out of the left over chicken livers from the dirty rice dish the day before. The pâté turned out pretty well (mainly due to the addition of bacon and shallot I think) - the only issue being that I made too much for regular human consumption. I figured the way around this was to add it to a sandwich (normally I would recommend putting any left over animal parts in a pie but adding them to a sandwich is acceptable in some cases).

I was a bit tipsy when I made the sandwiches so they do not appear to be very appealing but they were not too bad. Underneath the tomato is some caramelised onion - I was going to add lettuce as well, I didn't think the sandwich would be manageable if I added it, so I left the lettuce off.

Crumbed Pork and Apple Salad (by Biggs)

I promised G a decent dinner this week so figured fried, crumbed pork might be the way to go. I dismissed this plan almost immediately because it seemed like a whole lot of effort but, when a better idea didn't present itself I was stuck with it. Also, G mentioned we had a stick of celery and this recipe mentioned celery. Serendipitous. 

For once I was pleased with my lack of imagination because fried, crumbed pork really is very good. I got the meat mallet out, double-crusted the pork with panko crumbs (because that's the law), fried it up and threw it in the oven to finish (because regardless of what every recipe says two minutes on each side doesn't cook pork through).

G isn't keen on fruit in salads.....or fruit in anything at all really, but he dutifully tucked into a salad of spinich, celery, apple, lime, cider vinegar, brown sugar and olive oil. The sauce on the pork is Dijonnaise mixed with cider vinegar. 

The whole thing was quite sweet and apple laden but pork loves apples and apples love pork.... more law right there.  

Rice-paper Wraps (by Biggs)

I dabbled in a bit of bartering tonight, exchanging baby sitting services for a home cooked meal. My friend Nancy made some delightful rice-paper wraps which is one of my absolute favourite meals. Served with the rice-paper and noodles was some marinated tofu, cucumber, carrot, snow peas and mint and a homemade hoi-sin type sauce with a lovely nutty flavour to it.

You may be able to tell by the photo that I was pretty pumped to be sitting at a genuine family dinner table with placemats and everything. No need for cutlery to be involved with this dish so these funky blue napkins were put to good use. And who doesn't love a napkin that provides instructions for the meal - EAT.

Dirty Rice (by G)

I like sausages, the difficult thing is to come up with different ways of serving them. Luckily Biggs owns a copy of 'Sausage - A country-by-country photographic guide with recipes' by Nichola Fletcher.  It has sausage recipes.

Dirty Rice is a Cajun dish, normally made with chicken giblets - this recipe called for chicken livers.  I, personally, have never met a liver I like... the metallic taste and weird grainy texture does not thrill me.  Even better, I couldn't buy any less than 4 times as much liver as I needed for the recipe.

Anyway, the dirty rice is made from fried onion, green and red capsicums, celery, garlic, chilli, paprika and coriander, livers and sausages (I used beef/pork chevups - skinless and delicious). Once all those things were good and fried I added rice and stock then popped it all in the oven for 40 minutes.  When it came out of the oven I stirred through fresh parsley, thyme and oregano and served it up with some nice bread. The recipe also called for a green salad as a side - sadly our lettuce had frozen so I only used some of the less solid bits.

This was pretty good, the liver is definitely there but joyously overpowered by the other flavours.

Pork Chop (by G)

Pre-warned by Biggs that I should eat before heading off to the art exhibit so I had a pork chop. I seasoned the crap out of the chop (white pepper and salt) before frying. Then I popped him into the oven for half an hour to get the meat by the bone nicely cooked.

It was an awesome pork chop, no crackle but I've come to expect that of supermarket pork.

BBQ Bacon Crispy Burger (by Biggs)

There was a busy night ahead volunteering at an art exhibition so I filled my stomach early with what was easily accessible - a BBQ Bacon Crispy Burger from one of the many, many chain chicken stores available in inner-city Brisbane. 

Although it photographed well it was pretty soggy and tasteless....infact, now that I reflect on it I don't actually think there was actually bacon on it even though bacon was specifically mentioned in the name of the burger. Disappointing. 

Regardless, I imagine I'll eat plenty more of these before death is upon me.  

Tomato and Basil Pasta with Prawns (by G)

This was planned as a quick meal and turned out to be just that - less than 30 minutes. The original plan was to use penne, but I thought - rather than buy yet another packet of pasta I should use one of the half packets we have in the haunted pantry... it turned out to be elbow pasta.  In the spirit of using leftovers I thought I should also use some of the various herbs we had in the vegetable drawer of the fridge.

So, I fried off a diced onion and some shallot and some garlic - then added some leftover anchovy butter and a couple of extra anchovies. We also had some leftover prawns so I chopped them into little pieces and overcooked them to perfection. Some wine was added, because that seemed like a good thing, then some part full tins tomatoes I'd been storing in the freezer. Once this had reduced a little I added some packet Parmesan, added the pasta, sprinkled in the chopped herbs and topped with some more cheese.

Cheese and seafood? Why not?

Sunday Roast (by G)

I was watching an episode of 'Save With Jaime' the other day and saw him make a roasted lamb shoulder, Biggs requested a roast for today so I went with it.

I'll be honest and say I didn't pay all that much attention to lord Jim (I was flicking the channel). I didn't see the start so I studded the shoulder with garlic and rosemary then stuck it in the oven for 3 hours (that much I did see), then Jim did something with the meat and put it back in for another hour (I uncovered it at that point).  I also saw him make some mint sauce (kind of) I covered some chopped mint with hot water, added sugar and vinegar and mixed it up.

For sides I roasted some potatoes, sweet potato and pumpkin (all a bit disappointing) and fried off some asparagus, bacon and quail eggs (I had them handy and couldn't imagine when I might use them in the near future).

The potatoes were frustratingly not good, I was trying to get them crispy and good - but they were not.

Steaks Morateur with Seafood Cocktail Entree (by G)

Today I was looking through 1960's cookery magazine Cordon Bleu Cookery Course for inspiration. Rather than inspiration I got two whole recipes. In 1960's dinner party style I made an entree and a main. For entree we had a seafood cocktail - a mix of celery, lettuce, frozen prawns (as specified), preserved mussels and crab (the recipe called for tinned crab - I couldn't find that, though I didn't look too hard. We had cooked and defrosted king crab instead).  For flavour there was an awesome vinaigrette of chardonnay vinegar, olive oil, salt, pepper and parsley.

The main was pretty simple. I made an anchovy butter by mixing anchovy and butter. Then it was just a matter of oven cooking some chip potatoes (as they called them in the 60's), boil some green beans (I added the rest of the cocktail vinaigrette for flavour) and fried off some very nice steaks in butter with fine chopped shallots and white wine.

 

 

Though the photo of the steaks is pretty bad I think it looks more appealing than the weirdly grey ones shown in the magazine. The flavours of the whole meal were great and, though I say it myself, the steaks were perfectly cooked to my liking.  I may have overcooked the chip potatoes slightly - I always have difficulty with those things. I know they need more than the 10 minutes listed on the packed but 1 1/4 hours was probably a bit too long.

Sausages and Tarts (by Biggs)

I don't know why G still lets me cook dinner once a week. I'm totally crap at it. I'm always very concerned I'm going to bitterly disappoint the household when I'm in charge of dinner so, this week, I decided to manipulate G's emotions with his favourite sausages to convince him I should still be allowed to step foot in the kitchen.

I was going to do sausages with a trio of healthy salads. I'm not sure what happened to that plan but I spent a bit of time on the Internet today and the next thing I knew I was making tomato tart things. The pictures of them with the recipe were a lot more dainty but after a couple of Friday night beers that went out the window too.

I almost ruined the whole thing by accidentally glugging truffle oil over everything but the tarts were tasty enough. They were puff pastry, parmesan, onion and garlic fried off, slices of tomato, chopped basil and mozzarella. The sausages were.....sausages.

The Vietnamese Restaurant (by Biggs)

Tonight I met my friend Red for after-work beers. After a bunch of them we decided we were ready for some dinner and being close to Chinatown decided to head there. The Vietnamese Restaurant is a favourite of mine so instincts lead me to their front door. 

I first started going here when I heard that it was owned by Regurgitator Quan's Mum. I've since learnt that that's actually Green Papaya but every time I remember the error in my ways Wooloongabba seems a long way away and I really do love this place so I stick with it. 

Red and I made an agreement to order big and big ordering we did. Entree was salt and pepper quail (my absolute favourite), steamed dim sims and pork stuffed chicken wings (not as exciting as you'd think)

For mains we ordered crispy duck and pork with vegetables and crispy noodles. The crispy duck pretty well blew my mind. I don't know what they did but it was pretty magic. My guess is it involved a light dusting of corn flour and a deep-fryer.

I declined an after dinner whiskey. I think this was a miscalculation. Idiot.

Potato and Chorizo Frittata (by G)

I has been way too long since I last had chorizo so I decided to get some into me today before I died of a flavour deficiency.

I didn't follow too much of a recipe for this frittata just boiled off some thick cut potato slices, added them to a small pan with fried slices of chorizo, caramalised onion and sage, Parmesan cheese and a bunch of whisked eggs.  After frying on the stove top and under the grill I popped it into the oven to make sure the egg was cooked through.  For a side I made a simple salad of cucumber, tomato and shallot.

The frittata was pretty good, it could have used a bit more chorizo - problem is, I decided to have a little quality check on the chorizo when I got it home and inadvertently ate one of the two I was going to use for dinner.