Tomato Tartare and Things on Sticks (by G)

It has been seasonably warm lately so I thought it would be a nice idea to have something refreshing for dinner.  I came up with the idea of a tomato tartare and, of course, there is such a thing. Both Ferran Adria and Thomas Keller have a version but I'm very lazy so I made the very lazy persons version.

I skinned and chopped some tomatoes, then added lemon juice, basil, salt and pepper and let it chill - then moulded it up on a plate and topped it with parmesan.  I also sliced up a large bread roll, sprinkled the slices in oil and oven crispied them - while they were still hot I attempted to rub the croutons with garlic - the bread was a bit brittle so that was not altogether successful.  My tartare was a bit weepy when I plated it so I squeezed out the excess moisture before serving Biggs' portion.

A tartare on its own would not be much of a dinner so I augmented it with some skewers of cabanossi, olives, capsicum, celery, ham, cucumber and cheese.  I had meant to top them off with some leftover de-tinned beetroot - alas, I forgot.

I guess, on the whole, this was a pretty healthy and fresh dinner.

Porterhouse and Beetroot Salad (by Biggs)

The other day, G mentioned that he really likes beetroot which surprised me but it inspired me to make a beetroot salad. This one was made with rocket in a red wine vinegar, beetroot, feta cheese and toasted walnuts.

I served the salad with a porterhouse steak that was on quick sale for half-price at the supermarket. The steak had stickers all over it assuring the buyer (me) that the steak was 'still fresh'. I still decided to overcook it to be on the safe side. Actually I overcooked it because I was temporarily distracted by the cricket but we grew up on overdone steak so didn't have too much trouble choking it down.

Not sure what else to say. I served it with a shite-load of grain mustard.

The Vietnamese Restaurant (by Biggs)

The Vietnamese Restaurant has featured on the blog before because it's a bit of a favourite....especially before a gig at the Tivoli. Fi and I headed here before going to see the Lumineers tonight and ordered up big. We had dim sims, lemon grass beef rice paper wraps and some sizzling lamb. It was all excellent especially washed down with a bottle of white wine. We enjoyed dinner so much we almost missed the Lumineers. Not much more to say.....the night was swell.

Spicy Pork and Vegetables (by G)

All week I've been looking for pig skin to serve as a plate for a dinner meal. Today I found pig skin so I decided to crisp it up and top it with a spicy pork dish.

 

Unfortunately, despite crisping up the pork skin it shrank in size and there was nowhere near enough to serve as a plate - so I served it on the side.

 

The spicy pork was made by marinating pork in white pepper, garlic powder, chilli powder, cayenne pepper, black pepper, dried chilli, some chilli sauce, soy sauce and sugar. Then I fried it up in some rendered pork fat with some blanched carrot, broccolini, whole garlic cloves, spring onion and capsicum. 

 

This was an okay dinner, the pork was surprising bland despite all the spicy input. The crackled pork skin was awesome.

 

Mini Hot Dogs (by Biggs)

We've done pretty well with vegetables and salads this year (comparatively) so I decided it was time for a sausage sizzle reward, just like on election day.

I had planned to use small dinner roles and little chipolatas but couldn't find dinner rolls in our suburb and sure as hell wasn't going to leave our suburb on my day off. Instead I just bought normal bread rolls and larger Irish chipolatas.

I halved the bread rolls, slathered them with mild English mustard, filled them with some fried onion and jalapeno, added a chipolata and topped them with some tomato sauce. They were excellent.

For our second round G and I free-styled. Well, G free-styled, I had mine exactly the same way. He trialed his with mayo and parmesan which I can only assume was weird.

Not Szechuan Chicken (by G)

I had a barbecued chicken carcass in the fridge that required eating so I spent some time today thinking about what to do with it. I remembered I also had some Szechuan peppercorns at home so I decided on barbecued Szechuan chicken.

Unfortunately, when I got home, the peppercorns eluded me. Turns out you can make a pretty close approximation of Szechuan pepper by blending white pepper, cardamom seeds and star anise.

I stripped the chicken carcass of all the meat then chopped it up (the meat that is) and fried it with some red capsicum, steamed carrot slices, spring onion and Chinese sausage - then I added a healthy dose of my pepper substitute, a sauce of white vinegar, sugar, chilli sauce, Chinese cooking wine and soy sauce. To finish I stirred through some thin noodles and corn flour slurry to thicken then topped with some spring onion greens that I had sliced thinly and soaked in cold water.

I really enjoyed this dinner - very savoury and spicy... though I do pity Biggs, she doesn't handle the heat so well.

Smoked Salmon (by Biggs)

Even though G and I live only marginally above the poverty line*, tonight we had smoked salmon and 'caviar' for dinner.

I originally decided I was going to make halloumi, asparagus and salad for dinner but then I thought smoked salmon would go nicely with asparagus. I tried to think of other things that might go well with salmon and decided on potatoes, eggs and bread.

I was a bit intimidated making potato salad for G as he is quite the expert (both at making and eating it) but it went quite well. I mixed the potatoes with mayonnaise, wholegrain mustard, chives and fried ham steak. It was probably the highlight of the meal.

I tried Wylie's trick of adding bi-carb to the egg water to make them easier to peel after cooking. It definitely worked but the result of substituting bi-carb with baking powder was that the water foamed up at an exponential rate filling the whole stove with powdery foam creating a scene very reminiscent of horror movie The Blob. I topped the eggs with 'caviar' 'cause there was some leftover from G's Sunday soup and salad.

Turns out smoked salmon gets very, very rich when you eat as much of it as we just did. It almost killed us but was well worth it. The ciabatta I served with dinner was a lifesaver cutting through all the rich.

*Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, "Poverty Lines: Australia, March Quarter 2013", ISSN 1448-0530