Spatula, Spoon and Saturday

Hopefully everyone has realised by now that good food is all about love. The food is only as good as the love and care that has gone into it. It’s not about how exclusive and trendy the restaurant is, or how many types of purees there are on the food or how artful it is.

Why is this the best lasagna in the world? It’s because it’s made by one of the person who loves me the most in the world. And, that, is worth everything.

Josh first made this for me about three dates into our relationship. That was the day I distinctly remember as the day I totally fell in love with him. It was a lovely summer day, his plum trees were full of red plump fruits, the sky was bright blue, his roses were in full bloom and the bees were going crazy on the flowers, and I had the best comfort food in the world, lasagna, without the luxury of having an Italian mother.

This is the way Josh makes his lasagna:

He would heat up a tablespoon or so of olive oil, to which he would add half an onion that has been carefully diced. He then adds two chopped rindless bacon.  He would slowly cook it until the onion goes all soft and translucent and the bacon slightly coloured. Then, he would take about 300 g. of good minced beef (not the fatty horrible supermarket one) and two cloves of crushed garlic and add that to the mix.

He would stir until the mince browns and all the juice evaporates. He would add a can of diced tomatoes and two tablespoons of tomato paste (he usually buys those sachet ones that individually contain two tablespoons per serve).

He would then pick leaves from two or three sprigs of fresh oregano and add to the mince sauce.  Sometimes he would put other fresh herbs in. He likes to grow rosemary, sage and thyme together because the combination amuses him (greensleeves, geddit?) When we have some fresh parsley growing, usually in summer, or I bought a bunch from the market, he would chop a handful of parsley stalks in, reserving the leaves for later.

He would then turn the heat down to simmer and let it stew over for twenty minutes. This is where patience comes in. He doesn’t rush. There’s no rushing, no shortcuts to good food for him. He would give it a stir once in a while but mostly just let it sit there, bubbling.

After twenty minutes, he would chop up the reserved parsley leaves and add that to sauce and stir it through. He would get his old faithful glass baking dish and spoon the mince sauce onto the bottom of the baking dish and layer instant lasagna sheets on, ensuring every inch of the sauce is covered, breaking off bits of the sheet if he has to. He would repeat this until the baking dish fills up. There’s no bechamel sauce. No creme fraiche. No cheese in between the layers. Just the mince sauce that had been patiently stewed until it’s just right and the pasta sheets.

He would cut a few slices from a ball of good quality mozzarella cheese, not a fresh white ball, the normal pale cream diseccated one that you get from a deli (or a supermarket with good selection of cheese) and top off the last layer of the lasagna. He would grate a thing sprinkling of parmesan cheese as well. There’s no buying of pregrated icky supermarket cheese, of course.

He would then carefully cover it with a layer of foil, then off it goes into the oven at 180′ c for another good twenty minutes. He would then uncover the lasagna and turn the heat up to 220′c and bake for another ten minutes until the cheese is golden brown.

He would then cut up a good section and plonk a good portion of it for his hungry wife (who would usually be very hungry by now because he needs at least two hours to ‘make it properly’) Sometimes he would do up a nice green salad with various ingredients that take his fancy (I once discovered strawberries and pineapple in his ‘green’ salad, ‘it’s half way fruit salad, isn’t it awesome?’) to go alongside the lasagna.

There’s always leftovers to take to work the next day.

(our ‘lure’)

Pim and Hong came over to Melbourne. And of course one of the top ‘to-do’ list is eating out on Lygon Street, the Italian heart of Melbourne (Seriously, do I sound like a food journo yet? Can I quit my IT job now?)

I love Lygon St. Sure it’s a bitch finding parking there on Friday/Saturday night but I just can’t get enough of it.

(awww, first date I’m sure)

On that night, I could swear all of Melbourne were on Lygon St. Every single restaurant was packed. We couldn’t get a seat at our favourite restaurant but let’s face it pretty much every Italian restaurant on Lygon St. served more or less the same thing. Pim and Hong had wanted ‘a good spaghetti meal, maybe with vongole’ so as we walked past Pasta Rustica, a nice Italian gentleman managed to lure us in (I’m loving how they all hire men with Italian accent to stand outside the restaurants and talk you into them).

So we went in. Intent on a good pasta meal, we all went for pasta options. Entree size, of course, because let’s face it we are not Italian. Entree size is definitely plenty!

(Linguini Vongole – $19.90 entree size)

Pim got her wish with Linguini Vongole – linguini with clams, white wine, tomato and caper sauce. It was on the specials board. I can’t imagine it ever leaving the specials board actually since it’s one of those really popular pasta dish. The sauce was very good with just a slight toss of chopped fresh tomatoes. Read the rest of this entry »

(Gyu No Chikara, Ueno, Tokyo)

We stumbled upon this place while walking around Ueno area in Tokyo. What drew us there was a TV that sat in front of the restaurant playing a program (in Japanese, of course) about how a good gyudon is made. It took us quite a while to realise that the program was about the gyudon shop that we were standing in front of.

Gyudon, in case you don’t know, literally means beef bowl. It is a all-in-one rice dish which is topped with beef and onions cooked in thin sauce concocted from soy sauce, dashi, mirin, etc. It’s one of my favourite Japanese dishes (I have a feeling I repeat myself a lot, don’t I?) so we decided, why not? And walked in.

(Original gyu-don – 800 yen?)

We were confronted by yet another vending machine and thankfully this time the vending machine had tiny little pictures in on each of the button. So we sort  of guessed our way (again!)

Josh settled for the plain gyudon. And I settled for a gyudon that looked like it had poached egg and saffron threads on it. We sat at the counter (this place was also counter- only) and was confronted by the usual array of chopsticks, tea cups, fresh garlic and pickled ginger. It seemed like one of the ways to eat gyudon is crushing fresh garlic into the rice (garlic crusher provided).

(My gyudon, with what I thought was chilli sauce but I wasn’t sure)

Our food arrived a few minuites later and oh. my. god. It was delicious! It was one of the two gyudon meals in Japan (another was at the chain Yoshinoya, which, while good, was nothing compared to Gyu No Chikara) . The meat was tender and the sauce was just perfect. I loved the poached eggs with gyudon. Our rice bowls were also accompanied by a little bowl of soup with colourful bits of some sort of fish sticks and seafood. We washed our meals down with free green tea.

(I stirred the poached egg through the rice, yummy!)

My dish seemed to have some sort of chilli sauce to it but it didn’t taste spicy. The red threads seemed like saffron thread but didn’t taste particularly saffron-ish. Frankly I really couldn’t tell what I ate! I preferred Josh’s plain gyudon but nonetheless each gyudon was perfect in its own way.

Oishii ne!

Gyu No Chikara, somewhere near JR Ueno station.

I bought these at the Arts Centre Sunday market. They all looked so pretty I couldn’t resist.

(raspberry white chocolate cupcake with raspberry icing – $3.50)

If you look carefully, you’ll see that the pink sugar flower had glitters on it. Sometimes I wonder if it’s safe to eat. But it’s just so damn pretty! Who cares if it kills you!

(Vanilla cupcake with strawberry icing – $3.50)

I actually took the train home with little takeaway boxes with a cupcake in each of them. I was extra careful all the way on the train ride, only to knock one of the boxes over in my own kitchen!

The cake texture was nice and fluffy. To be honest, I’m really not that much of a sweet tooth and I just find the any cupcake icing too rich and sweet. Nothing against Cupcakes to Go’s cupcakes. Even the Crabapple cupcakes were too sweet for me and I had them at my wedding. The strawberry icing was very strawberry-ish though. It smelled wonderful. I guess I love cupcakes for their prettiness rather than their taste. Josh loved them. He’s a total sweet tooth.

(the noodle box type container that each cupcake comes in)

(of course I dissected them, I’m a freak like that)

The Arts Centre Sunday Market, 100 St. Kilda Road, Melbourne City

The market is located over two levels, along St Kilda Road between Hamer Hall and the Theatres Building as well as in the Undercroft of Hamer Hall, beside the Yarra River.

This dish is based on the recipe from Jamie Oliver’s Happy Days with the Naked Chef book. Have I mentioned I absolutely love Jamie Oliver? Maybe not.

(served with soft polenta)

It was quite easy to make. Basically, you put two chicken breasts with various ingredients in a foil bag and bake them in the oven until it’s nice and juicy.

For two people, you’ll need:

1. 2 chicken breasts – about 500 g. (if they are skin on, use less butter)
2. 4 button mushrooms, sliced
3. 4 Swiss brown mushrooms, sliced
4. 3 dried porcini mushroom slices
5. 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
6. 1 tbsp of butter
7. 4-5 sprigs of thyme
8. 1/3 cup of white wine
9. 1/2 tsp of Vegeta gourmet stock powder
10. Good pinches of salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 220′c. Line a baking dish with two pieces of foil (about the size of a shoe box). Place chicken breasts on the foil, sprinkle with salt, pepper, stock powder, garlic and thyme leaves. Top with butter, mushroom slices and pour the wine over the chicken and mushrooms. Fold the rest of the foil over the chicken to cover them and bake in the oven for 30-40 minutes. Check the chicken breasts half way through and turn them over so they cook evenly.

I served them with polenta which was just cooked in vegetable stock with butter and grated parmasan added to it. Simply cook 1 cup of polenta according to packet instructions and add butter and cheese.