Lamb Cutlets & Creamy Pasta!

A couple of weekends ago, for the first time, I cooked lamb cutlets! I have never cooked lamb before... I'm not sure whether it is an asian thing, but we were never really brought up to eat much beef or lamb - we ate pork or chicken much more! Asian people often think lamb and beef have a "smell". Anyhow, these cutlets were easy to cook! You should try it sometime!

Taken from Jamie Oliver's cookbooks, he suggested to marinate the cutlets with olive oil and thyme leaves (I added in some garlic myself :P) and then for medium cooked lamb, 3mins on each side. Talk about accurate! The cutlets came out just right! :)

The recipe also suggested field mushrooms which I chucked dry over the pan to heat it up and then once warm to put it into the bowl, which the cutlets went into when cooked and to squeeze lemon juice (weird you might think but it was an excellent touch! Probably took away any potential "lamby smell"!), swirl some olive oil and to season with salt and cracked pepper.

To accompany the cutlets, I made a creamy garlic, mushroom and spinach seeded mustard pasta! Yummy! I received an excellent review from my dinner partner! Haha! :)

Hummingbird Cake!

This is called a Hummingbird Cake! Huh you might say?! Where is the bird?! No bird... just some yummy cake! I'm still not sure why it is called a Hummingbird cake - since there are no seeds or any bird related ingredient!!!


A colleague at work brought in a cake his wife baked - and it was YUMMO! He was so sweet, totally promoting his wife's cake and he was right - it was lovely! A very nice home baked type of cake - the ones that make you feel totally comfortable as you take a huge bite out of it! It's a very homely type of cake, and the beauty of it is that it is SO simple to bake. The ingredients are banana, crushed pineapple and chopped up walnuts. I always have my doubts when a recipe is too easy - esp with desserts - so I decided to give this a go! They were right - this one was literally throw everything in the mixing bowl, do a few swirls and DONE! :) and it worked!!!

It was a heavy dense type of "afternoon tea with a good friend and cup of tea" type of cake! :) It was a very satisfying bake! :) The cake rose perfectly and ahhhh.... talk about a wholesome type of cake!

Talking about cakes - I am starting cake decorating classes this Thursday for 7 weeks - so I'll try to post some pictures up! I have been waiting for YEARS to do this - super excited! :) Let's see if it's everything I've imagined it to be! :) Hope you are all doing well - drop me a line sometime! :)

I'm back! - with a little Japan!

Hihiii!!!

I'm back! Well I have heaps of entries, so stay tuned... although I might appear to have been MIA - I have lots of pictures to post and things to write about, so thank you for being patient! And thank you to all those who have asked where I have been! Hope you all have been doing well!

Okay a few entries ago, I mentioned that I had something a little Japanese to post! (sorry title may be a little misleading... I didnt go to Japan :P)

So here it is... green tea cookies! Have you ever felt that green tea tastes like fish food? It's bizarre, but it actually tastes like the smell of fish food! The odd thing is that I still eat green tea stuff! By the way, Baskins and Robins has some great green tea ice-cream!

Anyway these cookies were a little different - I was a little too generous with the matcha (green tea powder). This cookie had a bit of a different texture - it isn't crispy and light like choc chip cookies, in fact it felt a little denser but still a nice change! And it's green! Try it for a change!

Receipe courtesy of this fantastic food blog called "Lovescool" : http://www.lovescool.com/

Green Tea Sweets

Ingredients
Yield (2” leaf shape): Approx 25

3/4 cup (2.25 oz) Confectioners sugar
5 oz Unsalted butter, cut into cubes
1 3/4 cup (8.5 oz) All-purpose flour
3 Large egg yolks
1.5 TBS Matcha (powdered green tea)
1 cup Granulated sugar (for coating)

Directions

• Preheat the oven to 350F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
• Whisk the confectioner’s sugar and green tea together in a bowl.
• Add the butter and green tea/sugar mixture to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix until smooth and light in color.
• Add the flour and mix until well combined.
• Add the egg yolks and mix just until the eggs are fully incorporated and a mass forms.
• Form the dough into a disk and chill in the refrigerator until firm (about 30 minutes).
• Roll the dough out to ½” thickness.
• Cut the dough with a leaf cookie cutter.
• Toss each cut cookie in a bowl of granulated sugar to coat.
• Place the sugar-coated cookie on a parchment lined pan. Bake at 350F for 12-15 minutes, or until slightly golden around the edges.

First Day of Spring!

After recently acquiring the "gift" of flowers, gardening and even weed appreciation, a trip to the Araluen tulip festival was indeed on the list of "Things to do".

Many many years ago, my family made a trip to Araluen, but I think I was obviously young and immature and did not appreciate nature and must have declined the trip. I think. I wasn't in any of the family photos. I suspect I was in that stage of life where a trip to a park to me was just a larger version of my backyard was not how I wanted to spend an afternoon.

However, now obviously a lot more matured *ahem*, and with much influence from my friend EH, who has taught me to become friends with my garden rather than the enemy, I looked forward to checking out the tulips!

We arrived at about 930am on Saturday morning, and the air was crisp, a little chilly but extremely fresh. You could almost taste the clean air! :) There were these people that must be keen photographers out with their huge cameras... G, you could have been one of them! :P

Anyway, check out the tulips below - the festival runs till the end of Sept, so be quick and make a trip up there! The bright pink tulips were my favourite...! The tearoom at the Araluen Park is really nice too - it's an old wooden house, up in the hill... ahhh homely kinda cool! :)

There is also a tearoom and potted tulip place on Croyden Rd on the way to the Araluen Park where we stopped on the way back to buy a few tulip plants (*Note: Araluen Park doesn't actually sell tulips) Unfortunately, they did not have any of these pink ones, but I bought 2 red ones for Mum (oh my gosh, they are amazing.... I am not sure whether I love roses or tulips more now!) and an orange and yellow one for EH :)

Make a trip there within the next month if you have the time! It's only about 45mins away from Perth, a quick getaway and you get to enjoy Spring in its truest form!

Hope you all had a great weekend!

Ooohhhh.... cherry blossoms.... and we didnt even have to go to Japan!!! :) This is such a pretty tree!!!

(http://www.araluenbotanicpark.com.au/)

(P.S. sorry no food pictures this weekend!)

The Harvest, North Fremantle

This is ONE great restaurant you should visit! As you can tell, it is a "house" restaurant, located in North Fremantle, in a location that could be easily missed (we almost did!). However, do not let the looks of this house deceive you, because behind the doors a cosy, homely dining experience awaits you!

This is "The Harvest", a very cosy, personal restaurant in North Fremantle.... the minute you step into this place you know you're going to have a great time! They had really nice funky type of music, and the place was buzzing! We went there for breakfast on a Saturday morning (quite a few weeks ago! This is a very overdue entry!) and no bookings were allowed, but we took the chance.

The door is old - infact you might have thought this was one of those unkempt houses, but once you open it, it's a whole other world! The walls are lined with flowery wall paper, coffee aroma and the happy clinking of utensils. We had to wait for a bit, and they have these large homely leather sofas for us to sit on. Wooden floor boards, bold coloured walls and funky music.

Scrambled eggs and salmon on toast, with little bits of shaved truffles

"The Harvest" - instead of hashbrowns, they served cubed roasted potatos

Waffles with stewed pears and very decadent chocolate mousse.

Unfortunately, the food for its price was not as fantastic as the actual restaurant's atmosphere itself. It was rather pricy for the quantity, and taste wise, it was nice, but nothing I would really rave about. However, I would recommend this place just for its atmosphere and the coffees were served really fast, and the service was pretty good too. They do open for lunch and dinner too, I would like to go back and try that!

(Photos courtesty of G - many thanks!!!)

The Harvest
1 Harvest Road
North Fremantle WA 6159
Phone: (08) 9336 1831

Chorizo Pasta & Caesar Salad!

Despite it being a weeknight, I just could not resist cooking! Had some friends over for dinner, and we said that we would just do a takeaway because we work and there would be no time to cook.... but as the dinner day came closer, I couldnt resist a chance @ cooking! So whilst this is nothing fancy, it is pretty delicious, wholesome and a great winter comfort dish!

Chorizo sausages, olives, semi-sun dried tomatos, fresh basil, cans of tomatos, fresh garlic and onion and pasta! Honestly, that's it! You basically fry up the garlic and onion with the sausages, add in the cans of tomatos, season to taste and chuck in the fresh basil and the al dente pasta! Mix all together and serve! This is a great combination - lots of different bits to eat in one mouth full!


Caesar salad - tossed to perfection by Shona! :)

I just found a new recipe I'm dying to try out - so I shall attempt to do it this weekend, will keep you in suspense for now...:P and a couple of outstanding restaurant reviews will be coming up soon too.... Have a great week all!!! :)

"Man" Biscuits!

Now you boys can bravely eat these Pocky sticks! We figured it must be "men" biscuits because it was a dark chocolate pocky stick! haha!

And boys, incase you wanted some advice, wisdom and encouragement.... turn to Pocky! :P

Melt & Mix Mud Cake!

You know those days where you feel like eating a real cake (ie not from a cake mix!) but yet you want it to be as easy as a cake mix? Well I had that feeling this weekend! I miss the kitchen... I feel like I haven't been in it much!!! And one of the best things in life is a rich smelling cake baking in your oven!

I found this recipe "Melt & Mix Mud Cake" from www.taste.com, which is a fantastic website for pretty easy recipes and they have a million chocolate and pasta recipes! I liked it because you literally just melted and mixed the ingredients, stirred it and put it in the oven! I have doubts on such recipes at times, but this one really did prove me wrong! It is a COMFORT cake! Rich and friendly! But on happy days, well, it can just make your day that bit better! :)

Ingredients (serves 8) (Thanks to www.taste.com.au)

• 200g butter, chopped
• 300g good-quality dark chocolate
• 1/4 cup hot water
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup caster sugar
• 3 eggs, lightly beaten
• 3/4 cup self-raising flour
• pure icing sugar, to serve

Method

1. Preheat oven to 160°C. Grease a 6cm deep, 20cm (base) round cake pan. Line with baking paper.
2. Place butter, 200g chopped chocolate and hot water in a heatproof, microwave-safe bowl. Microwave, uncovered, on HIGH (100%) for 2 to 3 minutes, stirring every minute with a metal spoon, or until smooth. Add cocoa to warm chocolate mixture. Stir until smooth. Stir in vanilla, caster sugar and egg. Sift flour over chocolate mixture. Stir gently to combine.
3. Pour half the batter into cake pan. Chop remaining chocolate and sprinkle half over batter. Top with remaining batter and chopped chocolate. Bake cake for 55 to 60 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre has moist crumbs clinging.
4. Allow cake to cool completely in pan. Remove and dust with icing sugar. Serve.

It's crusty on the top and sizes, and inside the cake literally melts in your mouth... crumbly but soft and moist - for max. taste and cake experience, put it in the microwave for about 10s to soften it and honestly, with a cup of tea or coffee, you will add this to your list of blessings!!! :)

Happy weekend all! :)

Blueberry filo tarts!

Hello hello hello! Very strange, but I havent been cooking much in the past couple of weeks... life seems to have got busy! However, my mind hasn't been too far from the kitchen!

Yesterday, I learnt a new skill - weeding. I almost wanted to cry looking at it, but thank God my very very very good friend EH helped me out (this is self sacrificing... weeding on the weekend...:P) - she probably did more of the weeding than me... it was hilarious though on reflection! 2 asian girls wrestling with the weeds (and Im not exaggerating here!!!) and even wondering which were the weeds and the plants! Sometimes you couldnt tell! So although I will never love weeding, I'm glad to have learnt something new, and EH's advice: when you see a small weed, PULL IT OUT STRAIGHTAWAY!!!

Before weeding, we baked a New York Cheesecake! I havent got any pictures, but apparently it was nice! There was lemon and orange zest in the cheese mixture, and we used Arnott's Nice biscuits and butter as the base!

Okay, back to the Blueberry Filo Tarts (taken from Donna Hay's Aug/Sept 2007 Issue) - original recipe asked for fresh strawberries, but as I didnt have any, I used blueberries instead and they were really quite nice! Filo is an interesting pastry... it reminds me of the spring roll pastry... pretty dry, thin and very very delicate!

The mixture was almond meal, butter and caster sugar and an egg yolk! Mixed together and served in the centre of the filo pastry, topped with some blueberries. Baked in the oven for about 8-10 mins and you have this very simple, fairly quick (although a little fidley!) dessert! The filo pastry was so crisp! Yum yum!!! :)

Pretty Wedding Cupcake!

The latest craze in Wedding cakes seem to be these cutely decorated individual cupcakes!!! Isn't this SO cute! I was flipping through some wedding cake magazines and my my, the cakes are gorgeous! No wonder they can cost several hundred dollars! Anyway, it does seem these cupcakes are quite the craze! Tiers and tiers of cupcakes!!! Ahhh!!! :)

My parents recently went to an old friend's son's wedding and the above was their cake! Each guest had one of these cuties to take home! We could hardly bring ourselves to eat it! :)