For this recipe I must put my hand up for being incredibly tardy. I received the Silver Spoon for Children book last year from Phaidon before Christmas and it has taken me a long time to get to the stage of cooking from it. Of course the main obstacle was that I had no kids of my own and harassing pint sized strangers is often frowned upon. Months passed and I forgot about the book and it was only when Teena returned it to me that I remembered that I had meant to cook something from it.
The alarm went off on a Sunday morning at 5:45am. It wasn’t a pretty sight, I had only had a few hour’s sleep and I make it a rule to sleep in on Sundays. Unless of course I’ve got something I’ve been looking forward to all week and that was the Lovedale Long Lunch. The nice people at Tourism NSW are taking a bus load of us from Sydney to the Hunter Valley for this annual event where you can participate in a progressive lunch across seven vineyards in the Hunter Valley that pair up with seven restaurants. For $42 people can buy a main meal, a cheese or dessert course and tasting glass which allows you to sample the wines at each winery. The bus was a great idea as it would allow us to enjoy ourselves tasting the wine without having to worry about getting back home.
We got onto the bus with the other journalists from Masterchef magazine, Ninemsn, Daily Telegraph and Getaway and everyone is friendly and excited. We all have a little breakfast box packed for us and we take the 2.5 hour drive to the Hunter Valley napping and chatting on the way. We use the time to go through the menus to see what we like the sound of. There are gluten free as well as vegetarian options at some.
Wandin Valley
First stop: Wandin Valley Estate! We survey the location and see that there are bales of plastic wrapped hay for people to sit on and there are two wine tasting areas. The first tasting area has the more premium wines where there is a $5 refundable entry upon purchase and then there’s a second a free wine tasting area. Mr NQN has become a bit of a wine lover so he became rather excited at the idea of coming along and he goes forth to try the wines here. He finds that the premium wines are worth trying as do the rest of the group who like the sparkling red.
As it’s rather early we walk around and take a look at the River Flats Estate produce that is sold here and try some of the cheeses. I like the feta cheese marinated with garlic and dill and we buy some of that. Their signature item is the pineapple and macadamia chutney which they’ve completely sold out of but they offer us a sample of it. It’s gorgeous and such an unusual pairing with a slight tingle to it. It sounds like everyone else loved it yesterday having depleted their supply! 
Succulent barbequed pork loin on roasted seasoned cocktail potatoes, topped with white balsamic apples and finished with an orange & red current glaze
There’s a brutal change in seasons around this time of the year. For us Sydney-siders it happened this past two weeks. Rain poured down relentlessly, laundry went unwashed for some, dryers spun for others, shoes got soaked and umbrellas bore the brunt of most of the pluvious assault. Then it became sunny but cruelly the temperature dipped to the low teens. So what does a good eater do in times of these? Ok your first reaction might be to seek the sunny Summertime shores of the Northern hemisphere (and I’m coming in your bag) or embrace the Wintry cold by indulging in my favourite Winter past time. Stuffing oneself with dumplings.
Wang Wang Silver Star is a newish place on busy Anzac Parade in Kingsford. Serving Shanghai style dumplings it was a closer version than busy Ashfield’s Liverpool Road. The dumplings were said to be good although the general consensus is that they were no Shanghai Night. We were a motley crew that night, my parents wanted to have dinner with Mr NQN and I and my mum asked us to invite along the Assman (Mr NQN’s brother). Ahem…yes the Assman has this effect on many women.
At 7pm, it’s busy and there’s queue outside. My parents seem to know the place so they tell us that there’s an upstairs where we head towards winding past the boxes of tissues, plastic spoons as the stairwell is used for storage. Despite it being fairly new, the double sided laminated picture menu already shows signs of being pored over again and again. Some dumplings are priced per dumpling (these are the larger fluffy white baos) whilst most are grouped together in lots of 4 or 6. Prices are higher than Ashfield but they would never qualify as expensive under anyone’s definition.
Kelp salad $3
Alas this is nothing like the moreishly fabulous Japanese seaweed salad but it’s not bad. Slightly slimy as seaweed is, it’s flavoured with garlic and soy sauce and is served cold.
BBQ Pork buns $1.20
Nicely fluffy and enormous, the filling is filled with the distinct aroma of cinnamon which is odd. I’m not sure if this was a strange batch and whether these are meant to taste like cinnamon.
Shanghai Steamed Mini Pork Buns $4.80
Dear Readers, I have a wonderful little aromatic treat for you today! iFlavour flavour sprays are highly concentrated sprays that give food a flavour and aroma injection. They do cuisine blends in African, Asian, Italian. Indian, Mexican and Native Australian with scents like Ras el Hanout,, Malaysian Laksa, Goan Vindaloo Curry and even. There are also sweet sprays such as aromatic chocolate which can also be layered with their zesty citrus or exotic orange sprays. My favourites were the magnolia blend (yes magnolia flower!), the bouquet garni (which I always seem to run out of) and lemon myrtle. These iFlavour sprays do not require refrigeration, have a 2 year shelf life and are made of natural flavours without additives, preservatives of bulking agents and each 15ml bottle gives you 30-40 family sized meals. One spray is all you need as they’re so concentrated. They were also featured on Masterchef this past Wednesday night.
Vienna lights-powered by environmentally friendly LED
After a three hour First Class train ride from Salzburg, we arrived at Vienna station. Gone was the village style charm of Salzburg and in it’s place was the glamorous, brightly lit Vienna. We checked into our hotel called “The Ring” in the centre of Vienna and I set about checking out the room.
I’ve often wanted to have the job of hotel reviewer (is there even such a job or it just one of those fantasy jobs?) and I was pleased to see that it was a spacious room with a walk in wardrobe (so nice), sensor lights for the closet (me likey!), a very good music selection on the television, temperature controlled bathwater, nice slippers and my own coffee machine. Apart from that there was a donut in a box (a “Ring” get it? 
) and a personalised note which was nice. I am lucky to score a non smoking room as my other travelling companions all get smoking rooms (and request to be moved). We spot Barbara Becker in the lobby and the list of celebrity guests is long.
On the way to the Christmas Markets we have a quick tour of Vienna. We walk past the Opera House where there is a production on every single night of the year. They have a total of 60 productions and each one is never repeated for more than 4 days in a row. A ticket can cost as little as E3 although this is a standing seat which is only sold a few hours before the event and prices range from E20 to several hundred Euros. Vienna is awash with tiny lights each resembling dazzling crystals and these are powered by environmentally friendly LED.
“We’re going to start off tomorrow with some Sacher Torte, I hope that is ok?” our guide tells us and I grin broadly. How does “Hell yeah!” sound? Those that know me know that my schedule in Australia is strictly 9am-midnight. I get up at 8:45am and walk across the apartment and get started on the blog. So getting up early as I do here is harder for me but it’s something that I happily do because I know that I have such fabulous things waiting for me.
Weiner Melange E4.70
The next morning we find ourselves seated in the famous Sacher Hotel, Vienna sitting at a table with a newspaper style menu. Of course we’re here for the Sacher Torte but we start with the coffee. There is a popular coffee called a Weiner Melange which is an espresso coffee with foamed milk and cream.
Eispanner E4.70
I order something else to try another item and I order the Einspanner which is named after the horse carriage drivers of the same name. These are the drinks that they used to give them to keep them warm and is made of black coffee with whipped cream. The coffee is excellent indeed.
Sacher Torte E4.90
Receive daily updates via email. Just enter your email address and press Subscribe.
Thanks to our sponsors.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 Australia License.
What is NQN up to now? 
NQN on Facebook
RSS