books, recipes, parenting & other things
The boyfriend is a fan of stouts and dark beers, so the sight of any sort of Irish brew is an immediate draw. “Aptly named, the cream factor is unsurpassed. The flavour is mellow, and eminently drinkable.”
I personally like these cans because of the intriguing little metal ball that rolls around in them, mysteriously keeping them foamy, or some such thing.
The boyfriend just interjected to inform me that the little ball is in fact made of plastic. It sounds like metal, clinking against the can.
A new, enormously large liquor store has opened up down the road, carrying all sorts of exotic beers. The boyfriend has been experimenting with different flavours, mostly dark beers and stouts from the British Isles.
The boyfriend says, “Abbot Ale is a mahogany coloured, richly flavoured brew. It has a slightly fruity tang, mixed with the punch of fresh hops.” Thank you, boyfriend, for that verbose review 🙂
When I wasn’t devouring chocolate in Tasmania, in both liquid and solid form, I was eating cheese. We visited two cheese factories while we were there, and bought an enormous amount of cheese from both places.
The first we visited was the Pyengana Cheese Factory, which is about 20 ks out of St Helens, and sells a few varieties of clothbound cheddar. After having a tasting, we bought a mature cheddar and a chive & onion flavoured cheddar, both of which were beautiful – we ate them with crackers as a prelude to a crayfish dinner that night. The following day we returned to the Cheese Factory to buy some cheese to take to the boyfriend’s sister – we got another mature cheddar and chive and onion, and I bought a sundried tomato flavoured cheese. Fortunately, his sister really liked the sundried tomato cheese, as I didn’t like it at all – it was a very bitter cheese. I expected the sundried tomatoes to give it a much sweeter flavour.
When we were based in Hobart, we drove out to the Grandvewe Cheesery, which specialises in sheep’s milk cheeses. We had a very informative tasting, although some of the flavours were way too strong for me – notably the blue cheese, and their version of pecorino. I ended up buying a primavera, which was delicious (on the left of the above photo), and a soft cheese wrapped in vine leaves called Ewe Beauty, which had an unbelieveably silky texture – it’s the round cheese in the photo. I also bought a cow’s milk cheese called Manchego, and a fermented mutton sausage, which in hindsight was a bit of a mistake – I discovered I don’t particularly like fermented meats.
Visiting both cheeseries was fun. Pyengana was much more reasonably priced than Grandvewe, but they are offering more mainstream cheese. If you’re really into cheese, I’d definitely recommend visiting Grandvewe if you’re heading out that way (although don’t go too crazy over the cheese, as I did – you do have to eat it all, remember!). If you’re in a rental car, as we were, there’s a short dirt road (about 1 k) out to the cheesery, but it’s in good condition. Seeing the sheep in the barn was fun, and I wish we had been there in a season where they did milking demonstrations. I still have quite a few chunks of cheese to finish up – I’m thinking of using some of the sheep’s cheese in a souffle, which might highlight the flavours nicely. They’re lovely just in sandwiches, but there’s only so many cheese sandwiches I can eat!
I am completely unable to resist handmade chocolate, and I bought them twice while in Tasmania. The pictured collection was bought at Jam Packed in Hobart, and included some very cute little chocolates.
The snail to the right was filled with chocolate ganache, and was delicious. The curl of a tail towards the bottom of the picture is attached to a caramel mouse. The coffee bean was an espresso flavoured chocolate, which was delicious. The white striped chocolate was a sticky date pudding flavour, which I didn’t like at all – far too metallic and chemically. The chilli chocolate, with the little red chilli on top, I found far too hot. Previously, the only chilli chocolates I’ve had have been pleasantly warm, but this just burnt my mouth – perhaps you have to be more of a chilli lover to enjoy it.
Also in the box is a chocolate with a treble clef on it, which had a whole hazelnut inside, a mudcake truffle, which was just as lovely as it sounds, and finally, a penguin shaped chocolate, which rather stole my heart. You can’t really see it properly in this picture – he’s facing towards the back of the box, but you can see the beginning of his white front and the bulge of his eye. He was filled with mango flavouring, and was delicious.
While these chocolates were gorgeous, I thought they were pretty overpriced. While I was in St Helens, in the north-east of Tasmania, I bought a box of handmade chocolates from Choc-a-Lolly, which were gorgeous, beautifully presented, and very decently priced.
While at Salamanca Markets, we visited a store which sold handmade chocolates and confectionery and bought several things, one of which were Caramel Balls, which we’d been hearing about from Prince Valiant’s sister for months. They were delicious – large round balls of chocolate filled with thick, chewy caramel. We bought a packet home, and the boyfriend polished them off – I was too busy with the remains of my chocolates from Jam Packed to notice.
The boyfriend and I recently spent about 9 days on holiday in Tasmania, which we enjoyed immensely. I spent much of my time eating enormous amounts of lovely fattening things, which I’ll outline in the next few entries. But firstly, my Tasmania hot chocolate experience. I drank a lot of hot chocolate in Tasmania, because the chilly weather was perfect for such a deliciously warm treat. And I adore hot chocolate.
I will diverge here for a moment, and mention a very memorable hot chocolate that I had in the cafe at Merricks General Store in Victoria. It was described French-style, as chocolate chaud, and as you can see, arrived in a bowl, complete with spoons, a dish of marshmallow, and a dish of dark chocolate shavings which I have already stirred into the drink at the point of this photo.
It was divine – mostly dark chocolate and cream, melted and whipped together. I couldn’t bear to use any of the marshmallows as I thought their sticky sweetness would spoil the rich lusciousness of the drink. That was one of my most memorable hot chocolate experiences.
The hot chocolate pictured at the beginning of this post (and I did put the marshmallows in this one!) was a sweet milky concoction I had at a cafe called Jam Packed in Hobart. It wasn’t a stand-out hot chocolate, but it hit the spot after a chilly morning wandering the Salamanca Markets.
I had another wonderful hot chocolate experience in Bellerive, home of the Bellerive Oval. We explored the gun battery at Kangaroo Point, and then went to Jean Pascal Patisserie on the main street of Bellerive for breakfast. I had a hot chocolate, accompanied by an utterly divine chocolate croissant, while Prince Valiant had a pot of tea and a sausage danish. It was a wonderful experience, mostly because of the cosy atmosphere of the place, and the sound of someone bellowing in French in the kitchen. They had a wonderful selection of bread there, including a jalapeno and cheddar loaf which looked very tempting, but we were eating out a lot so I resisted buying any. If I’m in the area again, I’ll definitely be returning there for another pastry.
This dish is one of the boyfriend’s creations – a fragrant mixture of spices, herbs and ham tossed through spaghetti, and served with plenty of cheese – inspired by a rather bare refrigerator.
dried spaghetti (this is also great with fettucine – I’ve been using Barilla pasta recently, which is really nice, and I like the boxes it comes in)
100 grams ham slices
1 onion
small tin of crushed tomatoes, or several cubed fresh tomatoes
mountain pepper berry (a native Australian spice)
fresh thyme
fresh oregano
olive oil
Put the water onto boil for the spaghetti, and at the appropriate time pop it in to cook. I generally snap my spaghetti in half – dreadful, I know – to make it easier to fit into the saucepan.
Chop the ham and onion, and pop them into a gently heated and oiled frying pan. While they’re cooking, grind the mountain pepper berries in a mortar and pestle, adding several good pinches of fresh thyme and oregano and a slosh of olive oil to make a peppery pesto-type mixture.
Add the tomatoes to the ham mixture, followed by the ground herbs. Stir well. When the spaghetti is cooked, drain it, and add it to the frying pan. Using tongs, carefully mix the sauce through the spaghetti (this is a rather delicate procedure in our small frying pan), and continue mixing over the heat for several minutes. Serve immediately with a nice sharp cheese grated over the top.
This week’s icecream treat – Heaven’s latest variety, Ganache, which comes in several flavours. This particular one is Double Chocolate. And it is delightful. Lovely dark chocolate on the outside, silky smooth chocolate icecream on the inside. As you can see from the photo below, it’s supposed to taste like mud cake in icecream form, and it does the imitation wonderfully well.
I want to try the other flavours – macadamia, coffee, and some others I can’t recall. But I enjoy the chocolate one so much, I’m afraid the others will be a bit of a let down. I’m rather predictable in my icecream tastes – chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate will always be a favourite.
Baked fish is such an easy weekday dinner – very quick and simple. We grabbed two reasonably sized fillets of mangrove jack from the supermarket and baked them with shallots, chives and pepper.
2 fillets fish (roughly 500-600g)
butter
shallots
red onion
chives
pepper
salt
Finely slice the shallots, red onion and chives. Place the fillets of fish on some tinfoil, and sprinkle the chopped herbs over them. Season the fillets with salt and pepper, and then if you wish place some lumps of butter on top of them. Place a second sheet of foil over the fish, and carefully fold in the edges, so that the fish is in a sealed packet.
Place the foil packet on a baking tray, and put in a 180C oven for about 10-15 minutes, depending on how thick the fish is. Fish cooks surprisingly quickly, so don’t overdo it.
Serve the fish on a bed of rice, with a drizzle of the butter over the top. I’d like to try this with a dill and lemon topping as well.
Thanks to the generosity of several people giving us gift vouchers to celebrate our engagement, we recently bought (among other things) this gorgeous stainless steel wok, which has enabled us to whip up quick stir-fries for dinner during the week. While we unfortunately have an electric stove, our barbecue has a gas burner, which means we can relax out on the verandah and create as much smoke from the wok as we like.
First we quickly brown the meat (mostly strips of beef, although we’ve also tried chicken) in a mixture of canola and sesame oil. Sesame oil is gorgeous – it gives everything a delightfully nutty flavour. When the meat is browned, we pop that into a bowl, and then pour the vegies into the wok. Our favourite vegies to stir fry at the moment are fresh beans and snow peas. I enjoy broccoli as well, but steam it for a couple of minutes beforehand so it doesn’t need as long in the wok.
When the vegies are cooked to our satisfaction (we like them fairly crunchy), we remove them as well. Some fresh sesame oil goes into the wok, along with some finely diced shallots and garlic, and several sloshes of soy sauce and hoisin sauce. We play around with the amounts until we’ve got a reasonable amount of sauce, then add the meat and the vegetables back into the wok. We fry it around briskly for a minute or two, until the meat is completely cooked and everything is coated in sauce, then remove the wok from the heat and serve it immediately with rice. Gorgeous.
Another recipe from Doris Brett’s Australian Bread Book – a delicious cheese-filled bread which is wonderfully flavoursome. It would be gorgeous with soup or pasta, in thick warm slices, scented with sharp cheese.
3 1/2 teaspoons (two 7g sachets) dried yeast
1/2 cup lukewarm water
100g melted butter
1 cup milk
3 1/2 cups grated very tasty cheese
1/4 cup white sugar
3 teaspoons salt
2 1/4 cups white flour
2 cups wholemeal flour
Dissolve the yeast in the lukewarm water with 1/4 teaspoon sugar. Stand for 5 minutes until the yeast is frothy.
Meanwhile, in a large bowl mix together the melted butter, milk, remaining sugar and salt. Cool until lukewarm and then add the frothy yeast mixture.
Add 1/2 cup flour, and beat well. Add the grated tasty cheese, followed by three cups of flour, a cup at a time. Mix thoroughly.
Add the final 3/4 cup flour slowly, until the mixture has formed a dough. Remove the dough from the bowl and knead for 15 minutes, until the dough is smooth (although the cheese will still be lumpy) and elastic.
Brush a large bowl with oil, place the dough in it, and loosely cover it. Leave until it doubles in size.
Punch the dough down and knead briefly. Either shape it into rolls in a greased muffin tin or a baking tray, or place dough in a bread loaf tin. Bake in a preheated oven at 190C, for 15 minutes for the rolls, or 30 minutes for the loaf. To test whether it’s done, tap the bottom of the loaf – it should sound crisp and hollow.
o frabjous day! 