We went to Newtown for a walk and some window shopping right after our quick picnic with our
favourite chicken roll. It's been probably a year since we last went there. Talk about speed of time! We didn't even realise we hadn't visited Newtown for a little more than a year.
Newtown is the place for Thai food. You will find a long trail of Thai restaurants along King Street though we have also spotted other gems:
Thanh Binh on King (Vietnamese, love their roll your own viet rolls!),
Burgerlicious (love their build your own burgers!),
Green Gourmet Vegetarian Restaurant and not to mention coffee to die for at
Varga Bar Espresso! We would describe Newtown as an alternative suburb with its vintage shops, unique yet homey cafes and a suburb full of blossoming Australia designers.
It's been such a long while since we last visited, we were very delighted to find a new gelato shop. I was overly excited and couldn't even wait for the red lights before we crossed the street, just so I won't waste any second to drool at all those yummilicious gelato. Yes..we j-walked *sweatdrop*
♥ tabeshimashita @ Gelatomassi on 26Jan2005 - Australia Day!
♥ Gelatomassi
In my excitement I didn't even notice the name of the shop. I just dived straight in there and look at all the gelato on offered. The first thing we saw was this high stack of
Gelato Baskets (A$1 extra). It looked so tempting.
♥ So many different flavours
And now look at the many different gelato flavours! The one that caught my sight was the dark pink one with a roundish thingie sitting on top. It was fresh fig. Definitely a must try! There are way too many sorbet and gelato flavours for us to remember!
♥ Gelatomassi Man
Again, in my over or hyper-excitement, I started snapping photos of the gelatos and the shop (it has a cool blue interior. Very sleek and comfy.) before noticing the management of the shop wasn't too happy about me snapping photos. *Oops* My apologies. I guess I should have asked before I took photos.
Anyhow, this gentleman was very energetic and I could tell he loves his gelato! He also mentioned he won't mind me taking his photos instead of the shop. Very nice way of letting me know that photos of the shops and interior aren't that alright but photos of people inside the shops are ok. You can tell from the many photos of their custormers that they have posted on their walls.
♥ Almond, Lime and Fresh Figs Gelato
We opted for 3 flavours in a cup (A$5.80). There were just so many flavours that it was so hard for us to decide. I picked fresh figs and ShinChan decided to try out lime. Gelatomassi Man recommended some cream-based gelato: mascarpone, almond and panna cotta. We opted for almond.
The almond gelato was smooth and velvety. Just very mellow. The lime sorbet was citric and light, very refreshing for a hot day. We did find it a little too soury especially after we had the sweet almond gelato. We couldn't find a word to describe fresh figs. It's a little gooey when compared to the lime but it has a nectareous flavour. Just very smooth and palatable. We'll definitely come back for more!
♥ Gelato Cakes
While we were there we noticed they also had Gelato Cakes and for Valentine's special too. The Valentine's Special (A$8.50) is a pink heart-shaped cake, chocolate-coated with rich white chocolate gelato inside. Sorry no photos here. I think I might have touched on copyright issues here....Their other gelato cakes looked just like the one on the posters with price starting from A$35.
♥ Gelatomassi
262 King St
Newtown NSW 2042
Australia
tel. +61 2 9516 0655
fax. +61 2 9516 0755
Continue Reading Gelatomassi
We decided to grab a cheap lunch while we were in the Eastern Suburbs.
♥ tabeshimashita @ HongHa Hot Bread
on 26 Jan 2005 - Australia Day!
♥ HongHa Hot Bread
So we headed to Mascot for our favourite Vietnamese Chicken Roll. Usually, there would be a really long queue emerging from the shop. There wasn't anyone inside the bakery at all when we got there which was not at all that strange because it was already 3pm. Lunchtime was long over! In fact, the bakery has already started cleaning up.
♥ The Menu
In we went to the strangely deserted shop and to our horror, oh hm I mean surprise, HongHa had decided to increase their price. Everything up by 50c! So our favourite chicken roll has gone from A$3 to A$3.50! My favourite salad and cheese roll (A$2.50 to A$3) with extra cheese (A$0.50 for any extra fillings)would now be A$3.50 instead of A$3. *sigh*
♥ Lady filling up our rolls
It was a rather hot day and pinkcocoa didn't have much appetite so we decided to grab just a chicken roll without chilli since the two of us had sorethroat.
On a normal day, there would be at least 3-4 persons at work behind the counter at HongHa. There was only 1 lady when we were there yesterday and the clear glass counter had already been cleaned. Clearly, the bakery was preparing to close soon.
♥ Chicken Roll A$3.50
Here's the chicken roll that would have the two of us drool most if ever we were to leave Sydney.
♥ Revealing our fav: Chicken Roll
Inside the chicken roll are shredded pickled carrots (it tasted a little soury and very appertising), cucumbers, corianders, tomatoes and of course shredded chicken with some mysterious seasoning and mayo.
♥ Crusty Spongy Bread Roll
We just love the crunchy crust and the soft spongy bread roll. My favourite of the chicken roll would be the carrots. It's slightly pickled so it's very more-ish. I also love the combination of cheese with salad in the bread roll. ShinChan had to pick out the shredded chicken for me when we shared this chicken roll. (Have I ever mentioned that I am half-vegetarian with a weak spot for sausages.......)
We have not tried their meatball rolls or pork roll yet. Somehow we always ended up buying chicken roll, and salad & cheese roll even though we were determined to try their meatball rolls and pork roll. Weird huh? Maybe next time.......
♥ HongHa Hot Bread
1151 Botany Road
Mascot NSW 2020
Australia
tel. +61 2 9667 2069
fax. +61 2 9667 0557
Continue Reading HongHa Hot Bread
It was
Australia Day yesterday. We were thinking about joining the crowds in the city for some Aussie celebrations. Afterall, it's my first Australia Day in Australia. Er... This sentence sounds a little weird. What I mean is I have never been around in Australia when it's Australia Day.
Anyhow, the two of us came down with a cold last week so the idea was scraped. Instead we stayed home (beside heading out for lunch and gelato! post to come next) and pigged ourselves out. *burp*
♥ tabeshimashita on 26jan2005 Australia Day!
♥ Tropical Okara Pancake
To start the day, we had
okara pancake topped with lemon butter from Blue M Food Co. purchased at the
Northside Produce Market and some diced fresh mangoes! The breakfast was very much like a yummilicious dessert. Great treats to start the day!
We bought some dinner ingredients on our way home from window-shopping.
♥ Aussie-inspired Salad
I guess I am lacking the black colour here to represent the Aboriginal Flag. This was a quick salad. I put together shredded cabbage, carrots, cucumber, beetroot and tomatoes and dressed with a mixture of honey, plum vinegar and olive oil. I shouldn't have included the lemon there because I didn't realise the plum vinegar was already sour and salty! I had to add extra sugars to balance out the acidity and saltiness. I should really tasted the vinegar before I use it. :p
♥ Aussie-inspired Dinner
Here we had beetroot papperdelle from
Pastabilities (purchased from
Northside Produce Market) in a bacon and sour cream sauce. The lady at
Pastabilities told me the papperdelle is delicious with sour cream so I gave it a go. I cooked the beetroot papperdelle salted boiling water with a few slices of beetroot: an advice from
Pastabilities so the pasta would retain a beautiful redish colour.
As for the sauce, I panfried diced bacon until fragance then added a tub of sour cream (lite of course). To my horror, the sour cream turned into liquid the moment it hit the hot frying pan! I tried adding some cheese but it was still liquidy. So in the end, I had to resort to some liquid thickening agent: cornstarch and water. And yes! It worked. The sauce thicken quickly. So in went the pasta.
We grabbed the Thai beef burger pattie on our way home. So for dinner, we had some strange Aussie images compiled all on one plate. Somehow, I just couldn't shake off the idea of beetroot and bacon in burgers. Thus the beetroot papperdelle with bacon. The BBQ beef burger reminded me of my first ever Oz barbie. It was in an emu farm! ;-)
The papperdelle was very light and so easily to overeat! The sour cream brings a soury taste to the sweet beetroot papperdelle, creating a wonderful palatable combination that prompts you to have more, more and more!
♥ Divine Dessert
Seriously, I think we should pigged out on
lamingtons and
pavlova for Australia Day. But these two grabbed our attention when we were buying our desserts.
♥ Caramel Kisses A$2.50
The caramel kisses was a tad too hard to bite on when it was just out from the fridge. We had quite a good right arm exercise to get out first bite. We should have left it return to room temperature first before digging in. :p
It has a soft chewy coconut shortbread-like crust with a soft & sweet caramel centre. The caramel centre was chewy too. This caramel kisses is indeed a hard dessert to bite off. It requires a bit of an effort from your mouth before the dessert came apart from its main body. I guess this kissing-like action is what gives its name!
♥ Sour Cherry Tart A$3
Sorry about the blur photo here. I was in a hurry to go enjoy my dessert before it's all gone. The sour cherry is very..hmm..sour. Very appertizing I must say and went along very well with the sweet custard. The tart is light and a little crunchy. I suspect much of the crunchiness came from the chocolate court on the inside of the tart.
We had a rather relaxing Australia Day. Too bad about our cold else we would have loved to join the crowd for some fireworks!
Continue Reading Australia Day!
This is a follow up to my
IMBB11 - Mr Bean Breakfast post. I thought it would be good to post about how I went about making my own soy milk at home from scratch. This is just a series of photos snapped during the soy milk making process. Not much typing involved in this post, I guess. I will, again, let the photos do the talking.
...alright...I admit I am lazy to type.....*blush*
♥ tabeshimashita @ pinkcocoa's kitchen
on 23 Jan 2005
Soy milk is a great alternative to animal's milk. I have always enjoyed soy milk as a kid. My favourite soy milk would be
pandan (screwpine or pandanus leaves) flavoured soy milk which comes in a light green colour. But then at some point, I started to dislike soy milk and my breakfast passion began to shift towards the Western-style: cereals with milk or toast with milk.
As I grew older, I found myself missing traditional home food more and more. I have even started to enjoy hot savoury soy milk which I despised a few years back when I was at the rebellious age.
This recipe is for making Asian-style soy milk which is most diluted and watery than the soy milk found in the milk section at the supermarket.
♥ Asian-style Basic Soy Milk Recipes
1c soya beans
6c water
water, extra for soaking
sugar, to taste
Basic ratio of soya milk is
soya bean : water = 1 : 6
♥ Soya Beans
I used organic soy beans (A$4 per kg). Give it a quick rinse in water.
♥ Soak in water
Soak soya beans in water overnight. Here's a rough guide to how long you should soak the beans: about 8 hours in a hot weather (summer) and roughly 20hours in winter. When the weather is hot, you might find the need to soak your beans overnight in the fridge or else with the high temperature, the beans would sprout easily.
This is just a rough guide. Just soak until the beans are double its original size.
♥ After about 12 hours
I soaked mine in room temperature for round about 12 hours given the cool weather we were having. Once the beans have double in size, drain the liquids off.
♥ Before and After!
Here you see the beans swelling up (right) to more than double the original size (left).
♥ Blending in a blender
Place beans in blender together with 4 cups of water. Blend or puree until you get a smooth watery mixture.
Now, there are two different methods of making soy milk from here.
Method #1
♥ Boiling soy milk
Bring the remaining 2 cups of water to boil in a saucepan (non-stick would be good). You must be wondering why I did not blend all 6 cups of water together with the beans in the blender and instead bringing to boil 2 cups in a saucepan. This extra step actually helps prevent the ground soy in the milk from sticking to the bottom of the pan and burn. So to speak, you still have to sti the mixture occasionally to ensure it is not sticking to the bottom.
Pour in ground soy mixture into the boiling water and stir gently. Using small-medium heat, bring the soy milk to an almost boiling point. Making sure you stir every now and then. Cook and stir for about 5 - 8 minutes. When almost done, add sugar to taste. Or if you prefer unsweeten soy milk, leave this step. You can always sweeten your unsweetened soy milk later.
Remove from stove and let cool. Once cool, place a large piece of muslin cloth (or tea towel) over a strainer. Drain the soy milk mixture.
Notes:
* Add a knot of pandan leaves at this step, and you get pandan flavoured soy milk!
**I found a lot of foam forming on my soy milk mixture. I just skim them off. You might also find a thin film forming on the surface of your soy milk. Do not discard this. Simply leave it out and let dry on a plate for 10min and you get yuba (fresh soybean sheet)! It's delicious with soysauce.
♥ Okara - leftover ground soy
This is what you get after straining the soy milk mixture:
okara.
♥ Dry Okara
What you want is a dry ground soy to use in cooking. So now a strong pair of hands come in handy. You need to squeeze and squeeze the ground soy wrapped in muslin cloth until all excess liquid is rid. (The excess liquid is of course soy milk!)
♥ Pinkcocoa's Homemade Soy Milk
taaaa-daaaaaa~ Here's my version of soy milk.
Method #2
There is also another method which probably looks easier although the steps are similar, except that it takes less time.
After blending, place a piece muslin cloth over a strainer. Strain the raw soy milk mixture. What you get is raw soy milk. All you have to do now is to bring the soy milk to boil and you can enjoy instant hot soy milk!
I personally prefer soy milk using method #1. I found the soy milk to be thicker, richer and very flavourful. Soy milk using method #2, on the other hand, gives a store quality soy milk ie. a little bit more diluted and less flavourful.
There are so many things you can do with unsweetened soya milk. One of my favourite is the hot savoury soy milk (
xian dou jiang - savoury soy milk) from Taiwan. Hot unsweetened soy milk is seasoned with salt and sesame oil then onto it a generous sprinkle of chopped spring onions and deep fried nion shallots. On standing, you will find the soy milk started to form curd. So it tasted a little like having a hot savoury soup with tofu.
I am still wanting to get my hand on a soy milk hot pot but I guess I will wait until the cooler weather arrives. ;-)
Continue Reading IMBB11 - Soy Milk
♥ Mr Bean Breakfast
This is my first
IMBB participation. It is the 11th edition hosted by Cath of
My Little Kitchen and she has picked an interesting theme:
Beans! I have always watched with great admiration the creative recipes everyone has come up for every
IMBB. My recipes aren't at all creative.
IMBB 11 has come in the right time, I would say because I have just started making my own soy milk and slowly venture into experimenting with various recipes using the leftover ground soy from making soy milk.
The Chinese has been cultivating and using soya bean in many different ways for thousands of years. In China, soya bean is considered as one of the 5 holy crops, along sides rice, wheat, barley and millet. Soya bean is very versatile and is consumed in many different ways: soy sauce, tofu (beancurd),
tempeh (fermented beans), soya sprouts,
miso and soy milk.
I have always preferred soy milk to cow's milk, mainly because I found cow's milk gives me a bloated tummy. Besides, soy milk is said to be a lady's beauty drink. It is rich in
isoflavone and a rich source of
proteins for a vegan. It also helps in
lowering blood pressure,
assist with diabetes and most importantly it has
no cholestrol. And for those on a weight management diet, drinking a small glass of soy milk before bed is said to help speed up your metabolic rate so you burn more fats when you sleep. Soy milk is definitely a magical staple for the ladies!
♥ tabeshimashita @ pinkcocoa's kitchen
on 23 Jan 2005
♥ Okara Pancake
Okara is the leftover ground soy from making soy milk. Usually this is deemed useless and thrown away. This was what I did before I found out its nutritional value.
Okara is very rich in isoflavone and a very good source of fibre. I have used it to thicken sauces, added to dumpling fillings and mixed with mashed firm tofu and chopped veggies to make tofu patties. You can even stirfry it with a little bit of oil, soysauce until it is dry and fluffy and you get instant vegan pork-floss! If you don't fancy cooking the leftover ground soy then use it as fertilisers to your plants. It's just so rich in nutritions and very versatile, so don't throw them away but start up your creative engine and try and do something with it!
Our breakfast today is totally very soya beany so we named it after our favourite funny man: Mr. Bean. The recipe uses Asian style soy milk which is more diluted than the usual soy milk available in supermarket.
♥ Okara Pancake
recipes from Happy Kitchen Magazine (Taiwanese Mag)
60g cake flour*
1tsp baking powder*
2 eggs, beaten
150g
okara**
300cc soy milk (original flavour)***
1tbsp honey
25g butter, melted
1. Stir together cake flour and baking powder until well mixed. Then sift once.
2. In a large bowl, mix beaten egg with okara. Then slowly stir through soy milk until well combined.
3. Sift in flour mixture and mix. Stir in honey, followed by melted butter.
4. Let sit for 30 minutes.
5. Heat up a non-stick frying pan or skillet and spray a thin layer of oil or butter over. Spread about 2-3 tablespoons of the pancake mixture into the pan.
6. Flip the pancake over when bubbles started to appear on the surface. Cook for a further 30second to 1 minute.
7. Serve with honey or maple syrup.
Notes:
* You can substitute self-raising flour and it works well. I used wholemeal SR flour.
** Make sure the okara is well rid of liquid. This is important in using okara in cooking else you might have a soggy dish. However, whether the okara is well dried or not isn't that critical in this pancake recipe. Just make sure you have a reasonably dry ground soy is good enough.
*** You can also use unsweetened soy milk. Simply add 3 heaped tbsp icing sugar to the mixture before step 3. Or you can omit the honey and use the mixture to make a savoury pancake by mixing chopped veggies like corns, capsicum etc and a pinch of salt with the pancake mixture just before you are about to make the pancake.
♥ Okara Pancake with honey
The pancake is soft, smooth and silky. It kinda resembles McDonald's breakfast pancake except that this is a healthier version with hidden fibre inside. We couldn't really taste the ground soy in the pancake. ShinChan (my kitchen lab guinea pig) was surprised when I told him after breakfast that the pancake was indeed made of soy milk and the leftover ground soy. He thought it was ordinary pancake I was serving him.
Served together with a warm or cold soy milk, this breakfast is indeed very beany!
♥ Chocolate Okara Pancake
I have not forgotten fellow chocoholics out there. I have also made a chocolate version of the okara pancake by adding a couple spoonfuls of cocoa powder (you can even use Milo) to the pancake mixture. Just another great excuses to start my day with a luxurious yet healthy chocolicious meal!
Continue Reading IMBB 11 - Mr Bean Breakfast
♥ Tabeshimashita @ Northside Produce Market on 15 Jan 2005
I headed to the
Northside Produce Market last Saturday since there was no Pyrmont Grower's Market in January. Needed to stock up my pantry with goodies so I decided to head to the
Northside Produce Market held every third Saturday just outside the North Sydney Council.
Not much of writing this time. I will just let the photos do all the talking! I have snapped up quite a few photos while I was there. ;-)
♥ super fresh green vegetables straight from the farmers!
This was the first stall that greeted me. Minding the stalls were a few young Asians in their early 20s. Veggies weren't exceptionally cheap at the market but they are so fresh, it's hard to not buy them!
♥ Wagyu Beef
Very expensive beef. Haven't yet tried them. Have any of you tried them?
♥ Goat Cheeses
There are so many different types but I didn't try them. I am a little scared of the special smell!
♥ Honest to Goodness Organic and Natural Foods
Honest to Goodness offers organic and natural dried fruits and nuts at a very reasonable price. Just look at the long queue. It was truely a test of patience for pinkcocoa. I waited there for probably about 15minutes and a man jump-queued by rudely budging in right in front of me. He had been waiting for about 3 min I would say and he was already losing his patience. When he budged in, he slamped his shopping trolley on the ground almost hitting my left foot!
♥ Italian Woodfire Oven Bread
I was tempted to grab a few of this home, especially the pizza bases. Hmmm, maybe I should have done so and I would enjoying a slice of pizza right now as I am typing this.
♥ Italian Gourmets!
Lots of people were seen buying the canoli and the mozzarella rolls for an instant breakfast!
♥ Blue M Food Co.
Have I ever told you I am hooked with their lemon & mango butter (A$7 ea)? I have their lime butter, lemon butter and mango butter in my fridge. It's really yummy on yogurt or ice-cream! Perfect for an instant dessert!
♥ Berries Products
Lovely blueberries, raspberries, gooseberries and strawberries. It's cute berries heaven at this stall. Assorted berries jams and dessert sauces were also spotted here.
♥ Homemade Country Apple Pie
This reminds me of having a picnic in the woods (think Enid Blyton!). :p
♥ Fresh Juicy Peaches
These were a bargain. I think it was $5 for a box but I am not sure. There were many stalls selling peaches that day since they are in season right now.
♥ Succulent Nectarines
I like nectarines better than peaches but I don't mind either. I love stone fruits especially white nectarines and white peaches! Oh, apricots are yummies too.
♥ Homemade Pies from A$10 - A$18
The peaches and nectarines stall also had homemade pies with different fillings: apple, nectarines, currants, and apricots.
♥ Summer Fruits
Mangoes, passionfruits and lychees make perfect summer fruit salad. Topped with a large scoop of ice-cream. It's heavenly!
♥ Whisk & Pin
I heard
Whisk and Pin has the best muesli in Sydney! Grab them at gourmet delis and
David Jones. Didn't spot the Rocky Road Muesli as seen at
Grab Your Fork.
♥ Yummies Goodies from Whisk and Pin
Did I tell you how good the mueli cookies (A$3 ea) were?
♥ Relaxing....
Relax with a good cup of coffee and danishes on the greens after a quick round of shopping.
♥ now...what pinkcocoa bought:
♥ organic bacon rounds
Can't remember the correct name for this bacon but the pork is organic, free range, free of chemicals and antibiotics etc....
♥ Fresh figs
Couldn't believe myself for grabbing a bargain here. A$0.50 for one fig! I bought 6 but now I wish I bought a box!
♥ Kangaroo shaped pasta A$6
Too cute to miss.
♥ Pastabilities
I am in love with their tomato & chili jam. They have magnificent ravioli!
♥ Assorted very fresh veggies
Carrots A$2.50 a bag; beans A$2.50 a bag; lemongrass A$1 per stalk and baby spinach A$4 a bag.
♥ Northside Produce Market
Every 3rd Saturday of the Month at:
200 Miller Street
North Sydney NSW 2060
Australia
ph. 02 9922 2299
Continue Reading Northside Produce Market
This place is definitely for the budget conscious who is not fussy over quality and taste. YangWoon and I headed to Yutaka for buffet lunch last week. It's A$12pp for adult with a 60 min limit or A$16pp for 90min. Definitely dirt cheap, considering the restaurant is in the city.
♥ tabeshimashita @ Yutaka Japanese Restaurant
on 12 Jan 2004
The restaurant was already quite packed when we got there at around 12noon. We took a glance around and noticed most of the tables were either Chinese or Koreans. There were also quite a number of Australians but the Chinese and Koreans definitely outnumbered Japanese and Australians! There were many tables with kids too.
By 12.30pm, there was already a queue outside the restaurant. Lucky we got there just before the peak hour.
♥ sushi
We started off at the sushi bar. There were sushi of salmon roe, tuna salad, potato salad, seaweed and seafood salad.
♥ Maki-Zushi
Here they offered teriyaki chicken roll (right), seafood (?) and vegetables (left).
If you are looking for quality sushi, this will be disappointing. The seaweed sheets were soggy and soft. I found it hard to chew off. The fillings were alright. Rice was on the soft side and not so much vinegarette flavour. I dipped mine in lots of wasabi and soy sauce.
♥ Salad Bar
Followed after sushi, we had some salad. Sorry about the bad photo here. A lady just came out of no where all of a sudden when I hit the button. I didn't manage to grab another better photo because the restaurant was packed. There were a lot of people waiting at the counter to be seated and the salad bar just happened to sit right next to the counter. I felt a little embarrassed about snapping photos in such a busy place. People were staring at me. *blush*
The salad bar offered cooked prawns, potato salad, edamame and mixed salad. Many came for the prawns and I saw many tables with mountains of empty plates of prawn shells.
♥ Seaweed Salad
I enjoyed the seaweed salad very much. This was actually on top of the mixed salad. I grabbed plates and plates of this with generous drizzle of
goma (sesame) dressing. This was very refreshing and the dressing was flavourful.
I would love to make this at home. Anyone could help me out there? Please? Pretty please?
♥ Miso Shiro
Bowls were pre-filled with
wakame (seaweed) and tofu cubes. All you have to do is scoop and pour the miso soup yourself.
♥ Hot Food Bar
The hot food bar offered a numbers of popular Japanese dishes.
Top row from left to right: Oden, sweet corn, teriyaki chicken, spring roll and karaage chicken, steamed rice, and yaki soba.
Bottom row from left to right: agedashi tofu, tempura, teriyaki beef (I think), assorted deepfried stuff, Japanese curry, and fried rice.
♥ Noodles and Gyoza
There were also noodles and gyoza. You could choose to have either hot or cold noodles. Hot noodle broth was just next to the pot of miso soup. There were two types of
gyoza:
yaki gyoza and
shui gyoza. The gyoza had thick and floury wrappers with very little fillings.
♥ Hiya Yakko
The tofu was very smooth and silky. I had plates after plates of this. Don't think I will ever get sick of eating this! I found the soy sauce too salty so I had the rest of this tofu with Japanese mayonnaise, BBQ sauce and a sprinkle of green onions and bonito flakes. No photos I am afraid. Time was running out and I had spent most of the first half photographing. So the second half of the hour
♥ Hiyashi Soba
This was YangWoon's. She had it cold and said it was alright. Nothing spectacular about it besides it's very easy to make at home!
♥ Hiyashi Somen
I had the somen (very thin noodles) instead. I agreed with YangWoon. It was nothing spectacular. Just something very normal.
♥ Fruits and Desserts
After a few rounds of the savouries, we headed back to the salad bar. On the left of the salad bar were fruits and some cakes.
♥ Cake
YangWoon had the cake before me. She gave me a strange look after her first bite. Then took another bite.
YangWoon: what is this?
pinkcocoa: isn't it coffee cake?
YangWoon: no, I mean is this cake?
pinkcocoa: huh? It's cake of course. It looks like cake.
YangWoon: but er.....it's frozen!
*yikes*
♥ Fruits
I guess fruits were a better choice!
♥ Snacks
This is definitely a kids section. I saw a lot of kids enjoying all these snacks and not have any of the savouries.
If you are after quantity, head to Yutaka for lunch. My guess is most food came from those heat-and-eat frozen pack or ready to eat packs. Just look at the
frozen cake, you'll know what I mean. But I guess I can't complain much since it's so cheap! The restaurant is also very popular with students.
Yutaka also serves dinner but it's much pricier. Their dinner buffet is A$30pp but offers a much greater variety: fresh oyster, mussel, grilled eels and assorted sashimi.
♥ Yutaka Japanese Restaurant
125-129 Bathurst Street
Sydney NSW 2000
Australia
tel. 02 9264 3700
mon - thur 11am-3pm & 5-10.30pm
fri & sat 11am-3.30pm & 5-11pm
Dinner Buffet:
A$30pp (mon-thur)
A$32pp (fri, sat & public holiday)
A$20pp 7-10yo
A$10pp 2-6yo
Lunch Buffet:
A$12pp (mon-fri) 60min limit
A$16pp (fri, sat & public holiday) 90min limit
A$10pp 7-10yo
A$8pp 2-6yo
Continue Reading Yutaka Japanese Restaurant
♥ Tabeshimashita @ Goodies For You Bakery on 11 Jan 2005
♥ Goodies For You Bakery Banana Cake
The weather in Sydney is finally warming up. With the hotter weather approaching, I find myself getting a little low in energy and rather unmotivated to do anything. Human body is just amazing. It can pick up on the nutritions that you lack and send you off to a particular cravings on certain food. My lack of energy is being treated to a craving on banana bread. So I bought half a loaf of banana bread from
Goodies for You Bakery for A$7.50. Better value than just buying one slice for A$2.90.
♥ Rich and Dense Bread
The banana bread is moist, low fat, no yeast and no dairy! Note the power word there:
low fat. This means that I can enjoy the bread without worrying too much! Yippeeee.
♥ Moist and Sweet
The banana bread was a little sticky on the outside and rather heavy on weight. On opening the clear plastic wrap, I was greeted with a nice caramel-honeylike aroma but not so much of a banana flavour. I also couldn't trace any tiny black bits that you spot on the usual banana bread.
♥ Toasted Banana Bread
I decided to enjoy the bread toasted with honey drizzled on top. The banana flavour was a little more distinct after toasted. At least, I could smell a faint banana aroma coming from my toaster.
♥ Crispy yet Smooth
The bread is already rather sweet in itself. I really like the crispy part of the bread after toasted while the inside is still soft and moist. I find adding honey can be a bit on the sweeter end but then again, honey adds compliment to the banana flavour. So I added a just a tinted layer of honey on top. This can also be enjoyed butter.
I froze the rest of the bread and this means I will have ample supply of an instant energy boost breakfast or afternoon tea at home. Oh and don't forgot a cup of hot chocolate to go with the bread! This is just superbly divine!
♥ Goodies for You Bakery
Shop 20 (of Crows Nest Plaza)
103-111 Willoughby Road
Crows Nest NSW 2065
Australia
Orders can be placed via
phone: 1300 660 643
email: order@goodiesforyou.com.au
website: www.goodies.com.au
Continue Reading Goodies for You: Banana Bread
♥ Strawberry & Orange Juice Smoothies
Following days of warmer weather and an addiction to smoothies, we enjoyed a refreshing (and cheap!) home-made low-fat, low-sugar and dairy-free version of smoothies. This should really be refered to as an
ice crush or
frappe or in mandarin '
bing sha' (crushed ice as smooth as sand) because I have no added any milk of any types nor is there any ice-cream or sorbet.
I became a member of the smoothies addict society after sampling a chocolate smoothies (minus the banana) earlier this year. It's sweet (very!), cold and smooths down your throat easily. Perfect for a hot day when you just don't want to eat anything. Last year, we saw the mushrooming of other juice (and smoothies) bars.
And then I finally woke up and realised these smoothies are as deadly as any other sinful sweets. Think ice-cream. Think cakes! True, the smoothies are low fat. But what about the high sugar content? You consume as much as 2 large scoops of frozen yogurt in just one large smoothies. Not to mention there are fruit juices with little nutritional value and a few miserably tiny amount of frozen fruits inside. I might be touching on sensitive topic here and probably have offended smoothies lover out there. If so, I am sorry. This is merely one tiny opinion among the vast ocean out there. So to speak, I still buy smoothies every now and then.
♥ Mango Smoothies
I find having some frozen fruits and some juices in the fridge very useful. The mango smoothies was whipped up just a little before midnight. It was very hot and we were a little restless. The smoothies helped calm us down a bit.
What I did was take a cup and fill it about 70-80% full with ice cubes. Then add juices or milk of your choice (I used orange juice) until the cup is full. Empty the content into a blender. Make sure you blender has blade that can crush ice. Then add chopped frozen fruits, about one big handful or more if you like. A generous drizzle of honey. You can omit this if you want but the smoothies won't be as smooth. Lid on then blend. You might find you need to add a little more juice if it is hard to blend. Blend until smooth. Voila! Instant healthy ice-cold fruit refreshment! If you are like, you can also add sorbet or ice-cream and even yogurt to make the smoothies richer and creamier.
We have also tried making green tea frappucino using vanilla protein shake powder, maccha powder and green tea ice-cream. It was just divine except that the vanilla was a little on the heavy end. Too bad no pics here. Drank it all before I remember to take out my camera. Next up, I might try to make myself a
"real" chocolate smoothies or even mocha smoothies with
real chocolate! The combination of pineapple, orange juice, lemon juice and mint is great too! ;-)
Continue Reading Smoothed and Refreshed!
♥ tabeshimashita @ home
on 07 Jan 2005
♥ Vegetarian Curry Dinner
This was the dinner we had before ShinChan left for Kuala Lumpur. We were trying to clear the fridge before he left. Rumbling through the fridge and pantry, I found:
- cabbage
- firm tofu
- carrot
- onion
- Jap curry cubes
- egg
- sweet corn
Not sure of what I could do with them, suddenly
Asian Vegan creative dishes popped into my mind. Taaaa-daaaaaa. That sure was a glowing-lightbulb-above-my-head moment!
I used the first 5 ingredients to make a quick vegetarian curry. The Japanese curry cube was not spicy enough, so I added some other spices to spice it up a bit. Unfortunately, I didnt have turmeric powder at home so I added paprika and cayenne pepper, and also a sprinkle of cinammon powder. I also sauteed the carrots and onions with crushed ginger and garlic, and some Indonedian deep fried shallots. The result was wonderful!
Had some firm tofu leftover, so I marinated them in a mixture of fish sauce, soy sauce, ShaoHsing Wine (Chinese Glutinous Rice Wine), grated palm sugar and lemongrass. Then panfried it. I used the egg and sweet corns to make golden fried rice. I didn't season my fried rice though since the curry was already spicy and heavy taste.
ShinChan was dreading a vegetarian meal but had found this to be wonderful. He certainly would be getting more of vegetarian meals in the future ;-)
Continue Reading Asian Vegan Inspired!
I had been meaning to post this up last november. Alas, I got lazy and this became my third post for 2005. This luscious chocolatey dessert is given to us as a house-warming foodie gift when we moved last year. What a perfect gift for the two foodies!
♥ Kiki's homemade Tiramisu
This is homemade tiramisu by our cute friend, Kiki. Looking at the amount of chocolate flakes on top, I couldn't wait a second more to dig into the homemade dessert after dinner!
♥ Rich luscious tiramisu
The sponge fingers were moist and very well flavoured with a rich flavoursome combination of espresso and coffee liquer . Sandwiched in between the sponge fingers was a sweet creamy and voluptous mixture of sugar, beaten egg, coffee liquer and mascarpone cheese.
According to Kiki, tiramisu is really easy to make. She already has the recipe engraved inside her head. She actually dictated the recipes and procedures to me while we were enjoying the rich Italian dessert. I would have to try out her recipe one day. This makes a good potluck dessert dish too!
Continue Reading Pick me up to heaven: Homemade Tiramisu
On the second day of 2005, we decided to start the year (we slept through the first day *yikes*) with wholesome meal. We headed to
East Ocean Restaurant for yumcha because of its auspicious relation to chinese proverbs:
fu ru dong hai , meaning to have good fortune as immense as the East Ocean.
East Ocean Restaurant has always been a popular yumcha spot for students. Back in the care-free uni days, we would head to East Ocean for Sunday yumcha not only for the less waiting time but also for the quality food with a much affordable price. We have not been back to East Ocean since its refurbishment and were amazed at its transformation from the dim yellowish interior to a bright and more contemporary interior. The restaurant clearly feels spacier and much more vibrant than pre-refurbishment.
However, we weren't too pleased with their seating allocation services. We were told we had been allocated a table after a 20 minute wait on the stairways leading to the restaurant. After whirling through the tiny paths in between tables, we found the manager had decided to give our table to a couple. We were then allocated another table near the first table only to find the manager had again decided to give the table to a party of four person who came in much later than us. We came in a group of three. Clearly odd numbers are not welcomed. We had to stand admidst the many full tables, waiting and feeling rather humiliated. Of course there was also the worries that we might have been forgotten and left waiting until we starved.
Apart from this tiny episode, the brunch was clearly enjoyable with good company and good food.
♥ tabeshimashita @ East Ocean Restaurant
on 2nd Jan 2005
♥ Pai Kuat - Steamed pork ribs in chili and black bean sauce
The first cart offered the more common dimsum dishes:
pai kuat (steamed chinese-style pork ribs)and
fung jao (phoenix claw). We ordered
pai kuat. For a picture of fung jao, check out
Grab Your Fork's post on East Ocean!
The pork ribs, according to ShinChan, was a tad too flavourless. I had no comment since I didn't eat my share of the pork ribs. The hands you are seeing are another food enthusiast's: Ah Meaow~ She holded up the bamboo steamer so I could take a clearer view of the
pai kuat. How sweet!
♥ Xiao Long Bao - Shanghai-style steam pork-filled dumpling
This dish was marked under the chef-special column (A$6.50). Juicy succulent minced pork-filling wrapped in paper-thin dumpling skin and bursting with rich broth on biting, served with a sauce of chinese dark vinegar and julienned ginger.
♥ Zar Leong - Chinese cruller wrapped in rice paper sheets
This is one of my favourite dish at yumcha. It must be the amazing contrast between the soft and smooth rice paper sheets and the crunchy deep fried Chinese cruller that got me hooked. I much prefer this than any other
cheong fun (steam rice paper rolls, usually comes with a filling or prawns or beef or bbq pork).
♥ Har Gao and Siu Mai
Here comes the most common dimsum dishes:
har gao (prawn dumpling) and
siu mai (pork-filled dumpling wrapped in egg dumpling sheets).
♥ Jin Cheong Fun and Fa Sou Gao
ShinChan had never tried
Jin Cheong Fun; pan-fried rice paper rolls; so we ordered one. It is served with 2 sauces: peanut sauce and sweet bean sauce.
We order
Fa Sou Gao (Vegetarian dumpling) by mistake. It was more like the cart lady misled us. She told us she had "
lo hon zai guen" (
luo hai zhai juan in mandarin) so we ordered that but what came to our table was actually
fa sou gao (
hua su jiao in mandarin, literary flower vegan dumpling). Inside the chewy transparent skin was a mixture of carrots, black fungus, chinese mushroom, chinese pickled cabbage (
xue cai) and mung bean noodle (
dong fen).
♥ Char Siew Sou - BBQ Pork Pastry
This is my other favourite dim-sum: sweet puff pastry with BBQ Pork fillings.
♥ Sweet succulent bbq pork filling with flaky pastry
The pastry is sweet and flaky with a melt-in-your-mouth texture. The bbq pork filling has flavour between sweet and savoury. I am really a sucker for anything that has both sweet and savoury taste.
We didn't order another yumcha must-eat:
char siew pao (steam bbq pork bun) because we ordered
char siew sou first. We didn't want two bbq porkThis bbq pork pastry is rather filling so best to eat later during the meal.
♥ Ye Zhap Gao - sweet coconut jelly/pudding
This is sweet, soft, light and fluffy with a rich coconut flavour. I still have to find a recipe for this. I am having a craving for pandan-flavoured
ye zhap gao, one of my favourite dimsum dishes as a little girl in Brunei. That's when my family would head to the famous chinese restaurant in Bandar (Brunei Town Centre) every sunday for yumcha. My friend and I would order the
pandan ye zhap gao every single time we went. And there was also pandan-flavoured
ling yong pao! Those were the good old days!
♥ Daan Tart - Egg Custard Tart
No yumcha can be completed without a warm delighful chinese egg custard tart. You have to order the big egg tart and not the tiny one. They have different pastry shells. The bigger one has rich meal-in-your-mouth flaky pastry while the smaller one is of shortcrust pastry. The big one comes in two on a plate. The smaller one in three.
It was a very satisfying brunch. All of us had a bulgy tummy after the not-so-light
dimsum meal and taken to a slow stroll and shopping exercise through Sydney City. It's sale season in Sydney right now and we headed to David Jones om search for cheap Christmas leftover goodie yummies, most of them 50% off. Pity the panettone wasn't on sale.
The yumcha came up to around A$47 for a total of 11 plates - approx A$16pp. Very reasonable I would say since the three of us were complaining about a slight stomachache from our gluttony!
♥ East Ocean Restaurant
Entry from
421-429 Sussex Street, or
86-88 Dixon Street
Haymarket, Sydney NSW 2000
Australia
tel. 02 9212 4198
fax. 02 9280 0172
Continue Reading East Ocean in search of Good Fortune
Sorry about the lack of updates lately. I am experiencing a tiny glitch in food blogging after hearing about the tsunami tragedy. But, I am back now. Yes. Once again. I am back. Sorry to have taken so many holidays on food blogging. *blush* I shall update on my Christmas dinner soon. No new year food pics though since we decided not to do anything.
♥ Pinkcocoa's Taiwanese Scallion Egg Roll
To start off my first post for the year, I am sharing a very simple recipe of Taiwanese breakfast delicacy:
cong you dan bing (egg pancake with scallions). This is, of course, my own version and does not look anyway similar to the real thing.
♥ Cong You Dan Bing
Ingredients:
1 pc store-bought dumpling skin*
1 egg, beaten
1 tbsp chopped scallions or green onions
Oil, amount depending on whether you are using non-stick or not.
Salt, to taste
To Make:
1. Roll out the dumpling skin into a large almost transparent round as thin and as large as you can.
2. Heat oil in pan. Add dumpling skin and panfried until the underside is slightly brown. Sprinkle some salt over.
3. Pour egg onto the skin. Sprinkle scallions over. Using a spatula, lift up any bits of egg that overflows the dumpling skin and bring it back towards the center of the dumpling skin. This is to maintain the circular shape of the egg roll.
4. Once the egg is slightly set, roll up the egg pancake** (egg side in). The egg will continue to cook inside the pancake.
5. Eat as it is or enjoy with Taiwanese sweet and spicy sauce (
tian la jiang).
Notes:
* I used left-over dumpling skin/sheets (sui jiao pi) . I particularly like this brand called "xuan yan" (double sheep). You could buy a pack of 30 sheets at Coles or Woolies for around $1.50.
** I didn't roll up my egg roll this time because I was craving for cong you bing (Chinese savoury scallion pancake) so I left it as it is. I added the scallions also because I wanted cong you bing. You could use leftover dumpling skin to make cong you bing too but I was a little lazy to do so besides I wanted to use up the eggs too.
♥ Pinkcocoa's scallion egg pancake
I guess this would classify more as a pancake instead of a roll since it is not rolled up. We had this for brunch the day following boxing day. This homemade version has much less oil and fat so makes a good meal following days of over-indulgences.
We also had a gourmet rolled up version with heaps of prawns inside. It makes a good food-to-go too, particularly for picnic. I have also slipped shredded cheddar cheese and smoke salmon in too.
This is just a quick and easy way to use up leftover dumplnig skin. Most of the time, we don't know what to do with the extra dumpling skin. I have found dumpling skin to be quite versatile. You can even use it to make lasagna! So don't throw away any leftover dumpling skin or let it dry up in your fridge. Use them to create any dishes that involve a plain flour dough ;-)
Continue Reading A Good Breakfast to Start!: Pinkcocoa's Savoury Egg Roll
