My Cooking
Photo by Jun Pang
Two simple things I love, warm apple pies and warm apple tart tatins, both served with vanilla ice cream.
I grew up eating Granny Smith apples straight from a tree my mate’s dad grew. I love the tartness of these apples, the crunch and the floury texture on the inside. I remember eating them right to the core.
I think that breakfast can be the most enjoyable meal of the day.
There is nothing better than waking up on an “early-ish” Sunday morning, going to the farmers market and shopping for fresh ingredients like fresh mushrooms, freshly baked bread, eggs fresh from the farm and herbs straight from the farm garden. It’s a peaceful start to a day, no rushing about and you can really enjoy these wonderful stress free moments and for me, to enjoy that part of the day is rare because it is usually the busiest time of my normal day. You can really let your mind wonder and relax.
Continue reading “Sauteed Mushrooms, Toasted Sour Dough, Poached Eggs and Hollandaise Sauce”
Photo by Jun Pang
Nicoise salad is a salad that is traditionally served with tuna. Usually, it is a salad of beans, tomatoes, nicoise olives and boiled eggs then served with a vinaigrette. There’s a lot of speculation as to where it originated and even the great Julia Childs gets a guernsey.
Continue reading “Nicoise Salad – nothing cheffy here, just healthy stuff!”
Pasta is one of those items you should always have in the pantry. Instant pasta is so easy to cook and there are so many good quality “fresh” dried pastas in the market, you can really have a good choice between almost every type of pasta from your normal spaghetti right through to lasagne sheets.
There is another use for lasagne sheets other than in lasagne’s. When I was a young apprentice, I remember how much it surprised me when I was shown another use for lasagne sheets. The chef cooked a chef’s meal by simply heating a pan really hot, cooking lasagne sheets, ripping it into smaller strips and browning it in a pan until it’s slightly “crispy” then adding all the other ingredients through for flavour such as the shallots, garlic and chilli. Simple dish, quick and using only the ingredients available in the kitchen.
Continue reading “Vego Pasta with Broccolini & Goats Cheese”
Photo by Jun Pang
Lets not forget about the vegos hey!!
it seems that there are more vegos out there in the world. I don’t know why and hey, it’s not a bad way of eating, it’s just that the world doesn’t really accommodate for them as easily as we would expect. I’m not a vego but I can sympathize for them though. So many times I’ve been out at a restaurant and the choices for vegos are very limited. I like to change that as much as I can in the restaurant, I mean why wouldn’t you do it, there’s so many fresh indgredients grown from the ground that it would be sacrilege not to use them.
Photo by Jun Pang
Nothing fancy here but it’s open for fancy stuff. Chuck some smoked paprika into the braise to add little more flavour or saute some chorizo sausage in before you add the liquids, it lifts the dish to another level. The polenta can also be added to like a little truffle oil at the end or saute mixed mushrooms in butter and fold it through just before serving and finish it off with a poached egg – bloody beautiful!
Continue reading “Tomato & Pork Neck Chop with Olives, Capsicum & Speck served with White Polenta”
Photo by Jun Pang
So now that you know how to butcher and roll a lamb loin, you can now roast it and come up with a simple dish.
Lamb, peas and mint; is there any other match that is so made for each other? Minted peas is one thing but when paired with lamb, it is a match made in heaven!
Photo by Jun Pang
You can’t get any easier than this recipe!
Just about every Asian country has a version of this dish. Most use the same spices to flavour the braising liquid and the end result is subsequently similar in taste and appearance.
This is a Chinese version, using many and very different spices. It is a very simple dish, simply place all ingredients in a pot and let it braise away for a period of time, perfect for those people who love on pot wonders.