Saturday 17 April 2010

Remi de Provence

Went last Sunday. Will write review tomorrow when I need a break...someone remind me why I though telling my supervisors on Monday that I would get them 2 chapters (neither which is anywhere near complete) by the end of the month was a good idea?

Sunday 11 April 2010

Passata

This weekend has not been so good. I worked yesterday (which IS good), but came home at 2pm feeling light headed, queasy and generally blergh. Slept for 15 hours last night and after SOMETHING went straight through me I feel slightly better.
Well enough infact to make Passata with the last of the tomatos from the 3 bushes I have had growing in pots in the front bed.
Now I know technically you should follow recipes and stuff, but I didnt have that many tomatos left (I didnt weight them, but I suspect there ws about 3/4 of a kg) so couldnt be arsed halving or quartering the quantaties of the recipes I found online - so I winged it.
I cut all the red tigrellas in half, drizzled olive oil on them and sprinkled salt on them. Bunged them into a pre heated 220C oven for about 2o minutes with 4 cloves of garlic. Took the tiny yellow grape tomatoes and dumped them straight into the pot with some olive oil. Heated them up slowly, and then dumped the roasted tomatoes into the pot as well and slowly stirred. Added 2 pinches of castor sugar, 5 bay leaves from the tree outside, and a generous wack of left over ground mustard seeds. Left it to simmer for about 15 minutes then came back and stirred it all again. Left it to simmer for another couple of minutes while I stuck a fairly small jar in the oven to dry. Poured the resultant mixture into a sieve and worked it through to remove skins and seeds etc. Put the bay leaves back in, stirred for a few minutes until desired thickness reached. Poured into small vegeimite jar and a small plastic container. Container went into freezer for when I just need a daub of sauce, jar got a lid and is sitting on the bench cooling before joining the relish and cherries in the food cupboard. It tastes pretty good, but is probably only enough for 1 pizza!

Monday 5 April 2010

Peppermint Bay Revisited

Its been awhile since the last not so good meal at Peppermint Bay. Since then they have changed chefs at least once, undergone a bit of a rearrangement of menus and decor and generally being given a kick up the posterior.
I ventured out today with the ex (yes it was a horribly amicable break-up and we are still on talking and enjoying each others company terms) to see what we could find down the Chanel.
Of course we ended up at Peppermint Bay. It was either there or see how much debauchary was happening at a mates shack at Randalls, and my brain was not up for that after a late night thesis inspiration.
Walking in the main doors the first thing you notice is that the providores has been totally re-organised. No longer a discreete enclave, its been reduced to the back wall and the chiller cabinets - which are now behind the till, instead of the till being out the front. Alot of the "Kitsch" stuff has disappeared - the kiddies cooking gear and the bowls etc were the ones I noticed straight away. Much of the stock appears to be locally sourced, though there are still some mainland brands such as Waji.
Menu at the bar is much smaller than it used to be. Essentially a burger, a salad, a pasta and fish. There are a few others such as bread and a taste plate, as well as oysters, but essentially its standard pub grub menu. I chose the smoked trout salad with spinch, kipflers, and orange and the Ex had the Peppermint Bay burger with chips.
The salad was a good size, with a generous serving of smoked trout, lightly dressed with I think balsamic vinegar and lovely crunchy baby spinach leaves. This was offset by the inspired addition of caper berries sprinkled over everything, adding a lovely salty crunch when you bit into a piece of orange. Compared to the Fish pie I had last time this was 110% better, with a great balance of sweet, sour and salty. It was a perfect temperature, not too warm but not crunchy icy cold either.
The Peppermint Bay Burger came out with a generous serving of shoe string fries which were crisp and slightly salty - very morish and nickable. The burger itself was pronounced a success, with the balance of wet and dry being achieved admirably, and it apparently was not to lettucy. the one bite I had was very yummy, though I doubt that I could have eaten the whole thing plus the chips by myself. There was definately a sweet onion something on there, it wasnt fried onion, so may have been onion jam - but it complimented the beef in the burger really well. The burger itself was fairly roughly minced beef, which gave it a good texture in the mouth as well as some bite.
We skipped the very decadent sounding easter dessert taster which involved chocolate jelly as well as 3 or 4 other chocolate things. Mainly as we were both full. Not sure on final cost, as I didnt pay, but I know the burger was about 20 dollars and the salad 18.
Overall, MUCH MUCH MUCH improved from last time, and I will be going back again.

Sunday 4 April 2010

Hot Cross Buns.....

This is the results of my Hot Cross Bun baking late Thursday night. Hot out the oven with 2 lots of sugar/water/milk glaze on them. They still taste fairly ok today if heated up in the microwave for 30 secs. I think I slightly over kneaded the dough, so next year I will only knead for 6 minutes not 10. Rose really well though, considering how cool it was on Thursday night. However my trick to get things to rise is to turn the oven on early, open the grill compartment and stick whatever needs to rise on the open door. Warm air but it wont bake.


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