I love to travel for food. It helps having a car and a husband and friends also willing to travel for food. To us, a night out is not going to a bar but it’s bundling into the car and driving somewhere that we seldom get to and eating a fantastic meal. This particular evening, Queen Viv and Miss America and I are on the pursuit for dumplings. Xiao Long Bao to be precise at Miss America’s and my husband’s request. Of course I am not averse to these little gems pursuing them across Sydney like a fashion lover lusts after the latest Limited Edition bag. Traversing the North to the South is not an easy driving experience this Friday night but we eventually get here. Queen Viv and Miss America have busied themselves waiting for us with a visit to the nearby pub.
The enormous menu, about 50cms high, contains 30 pages worth of items, all pictured. There are 300+ dishes and we can only imagine Gordon Ramsay’s head spinning at the large menu. We ask the waiter their specialty and it’s crab, as evidenced by the many pictures of crab and the fishtank. He also recommends something from the salted Duck egg yolk page and the Eel menu page. And of course we have to have some dumplings because that’s why we came here.
Iced Soy drink $2.50
A childhood favourite of mine, I recall when my dad used to painstakingly make his own soy milk. This one is from a bottle but nevertheless refreshing and not too sweet.
Yang Zhou Aromatic Crab $61.50 ($32 per 500g)
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The best part of Easter, aside from the 4 day long weekend is of course Hot Cross Buns. Chocolate is fantastic of course but it is available all year round, but the appearance of the Hot Cross Bun (that seem to appear earlier and earlier every year much like Christmas decorations in October), signify an impending 4 day long weekend!
I know people are divided with Hot Cross buns, some like no peel, some like a lot of fruit, some like a little spice, some a lot. And then there are those that don’t like fruit at all and go for the Choc Chip Buns. I wanted to do something slightly different this year though so I went to my cupboard and what jumped out at me were the wonderful Cinnamon chips that Barbara sent me. I decided to make Cinnamon Chip Chocolate Hot Cross Buns.
I always feel like the cross should be sweet, like icing I suppose and am always a little disappointed when eating the cross. I decided to make the crosses out of white chocolate and I hope that doesn’t violate some traditional Easter tradition but hey as the saying goes Jesus Loves You no matter what you do, right? I think that includes fiddling around with a Hot Cross Bun recipe which is a lesser sin than others. The smell of these baking is truly incredible and as for the taste, imagine a Norwegian cinnamon bun crossed with a Hot Cross Bun. Try to resist them, if you can. I wasn’t able to and ate my record in no time.
On another non-Easter note, big thanks go to the lovely Darcie from Zing PR and the very nice people from Lap-rap who gave me my very own Lap-rap which I heart very, very much. See their website for other cool designs or design your own as I did.
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“Ouzo88…” we all say. It sounds familiar to us and then we recall where we heard the name-they were the restaurant on the Chopping Block reality tv show where 2 restaurants compete for a monetary prize. They were pitted against Baja Cantina, and if I can be honest, were my favourites because they seemed to have a nicer attitude to things. We’re booked here tonight as it’s Hot Dog loves Greek food and it just happens to be his birthday.
Ouzo88 is situated at the quieter end of Crown Street, away from the hustle and bustle and perhaps as a result, the space is quite huge when you compare it the smaller places closer to Oxford Street. In fact it’s nice and spacious which is something of a rarity unless you’re dining in the high end of town. We’re given our menus, a cocktail menu and a food menu and our waitress is a very friendly woman who has the troublesome Hot Dog wrapped around her finger. He can either be a waitresses worst nightmare or best friend and we breathe a sigh of relief that she banters back with him.
First to arrive are the complimentary Ouzo shots, of which Hot Dog has many.
Four of us have decided to get the banquet for $46.80 per person with two us getting a la carte dishes in order to maximise sampling opportunities. The banquet includes a trio of dips & flat bread, Greek salad, Pan fried Halloumi cheese, Salt& Pepper squid with ouzo aioli, Chicken souvlakia and Slow cooked lamb served with roasted potatoes & vegies. We also order the zucchini, whitebait & 3 cheese fritters with ouzo aioli; chicken, feta, ricotta & dill pastries with skordalia and macaroni pie with beef mince, béchamel, mizuna & kefalotiri.
Trio of dips: clockwise from front Feta & Chili, Taramasalata and Eggplant dip
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On our recent trip to New Zealand I watched the movie Twilight on the plane. Initially, I was only partially interested because I am interested in all things slightly dark but dismissed it as Teen Fiction. I am not a Teen nor do I read a lot of Fiction. What I didn’t expect was to be completely entranced by the movie and as a result the book. I was then inspired to make these by Cakelaw’s Edward and Bella cupcakes. I was particularly taken by the image of the apple in the hand on the cover of Twilight.
When the flight attendant tried to ask me what I wanted for lunch while Twilight was on, I simply didn’t hear her. I was too engrossed. And when she asked me again I felt like getting one of those “Do Not Disturb” signs. Speaking of which, wouldn’t it be nice to be able to wear one of those during the work day when you just aren’t in the mood for human contact or non human as your colleagues might be. I was discussing this with friends and we discussed the idea of a “no contact” option on home delivered pizzas whereby one could order and pay for a pizza online and then tick the “no contact” option and have the delivery person leave it at the front door. I suspect we wouldn’t be the only ones taking it up either for loathe of wanting to change out of your PJs or brush your hair in an effort to look presentable.
Back to the cupcakes – I knew a Red velvet cupcake would have to do for this. After all there’s nothing more Vampirish than the redder than red of a blood red velvet. I will warn you that there is a lot of red colouring used in both the cake and the frosting so if you have issues with this or have some potentially hyperactive kids, friends or significant others, you can certainly make a chocolate cupcake and then frost it with the red icing to avoid doubling up on the food colouring. I wasn’t exactly faithful to the cover in that I painted my nails but I felt the shade was appropriate: Chanel’s Vendetta. As for serving suggestion, there’s no better one for your resident Twilight fan than cradling the little cupcake in your outstretched hands.
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Queen Viv has had many careers in her lifetime. When she was younger, one of her part time jobs was fruit picker and I was fascinated listening to her stories having never done it before. And for those of you that haven’t picked fruit before, she gave us the low down on the best fruits to pick. Raspberries are the best as they don’t require any crouching or much bending and are light. Apples are ok but are heavy to carry. Fruit such as strawberries require a lot of bending over are the most difficult to do.
On our way back from Mapua to Nelson, my husband and I spotted a PYO (Pick Your Own) orchard. We didn’t realise this, just thinking it was an orchard selling fruit but when we drove up we saw a big sign that said “Pick Your Own Raspberries $4 kg”. I was shocked. Raspberries are $9 at my local fruit store for a 150g punnet so the chance to pick our own and pay only $4a kg was exciting. I wondered for a second if the sign meant that we would get $4 if we picked a kilo, in which case I would only have a fleeting interest in trying it just to see what picking fruit is like but my husband set me straight.
The woman behind the counter passes me a white tray and tells us directions to the raspberry picking area. We are to pick any raspberries from rows 1-6. And how do we tell which are ripe for the picking? “You’ll tell pretty quickly once you taste them” she answers. Music to my ears.
We get lost on the way of course, we turn left instead of right and I am horrified when I see the rows in which I have to pick from. The grass is quite high and although my husband reminds me that NZ has no poisonous snakes or spiders or creatures I refuse to go in. However once we realise that we are indeed in the wrong spot, and find the correct spot I’m relieved to see that it’s walkable having been trimmed.
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