Oh for fork's sake

Our latest household dilemma finally reached crisis point this week. Allow me to explain:

We had suspicions earlier in the week, but had managed to soldier on. Last night however the previously mentioned crisis point was reached when, even with a just cleaned load of cutlery from the dishwasher, the number of forks remained at one per diner – seven.

Given that we have a household of two adults plus assorted teenagers and twenty-somethings, numbers for dinner can be a little fluid. People are encouraged to invite others for dinner (on their cooking night) but having seven forks was cutting it a bit fine, I suggested that next time anyone invites someone for dinner they tell them to BYO fork.

I was worried that we were going to get down to so few forks that we would no longer be able to encourage each other to ”use the fork Luke – use the fork” (in spite of the fact that no-one in our house is named Luke this joke never wears thin).

First of all – what has happened to the forks? We still had the regulation amount (ie more than enough) knives and spoons. Could it have been the workers or the students of the house – taking a spoon to eat lunchtime leftover pasta or was it late-night snacking culprits with the cutlery hiding under their beds – I didn’t want to go there.

An antique fork, probably found under a teenager's bed five hundred years ago

Laying blame was not going to solve the problem in the short-term, how to solve the current cutlery crisis?

I considered switching our regular diet to spoonable meals only, but the prospect of only soups, stews and risotto, whilst doable in the short term, could start to wear a bit thin by summer.

Not wanting to spend a small fortune on cutlery, which I keep promising myself I will do one day, I took myself off to the local $2 shop – a misnomer if I’ve ever heard one considering it sells some furniture upwards of the two hundred dollar mark, confident of making a purchase of an extra few forks for the household.

The shop had cane baskets full of cutlery – knives, spoons, teaspoons – no forks. Moving down the aisle to the pre-packaged cutlery section there were packets of teaspoons, spoons, knives, ridiculous looking seafood forks, a set of six cocktail forks – but no regular dining forks.

Unfortunately these handy, yet lethal finger forks are no longer in stock...

I approached the girl packing the shelves with the eternal question – “were there any out the back?” She rolled her eyes at me (at me! I've been eye rolling since before you were a speck in your own eye rolling father's eye girly!) and said she would check. She returned with a variety of plastic forks. I considered them momentarily, especially the sturdy looking metal coloured ones, but decided against them in case they melted in the dishwasher.

So, obviously this is not a phenomenon only occurring in our home but in the wider area – where have all the forks gone? I will of course venture further to search over the next few days, but in the meantime I can only conclude that they have gone off to join their spiritual cousins – the single socks.

Pikelets - Masterchef Style

There are some recipes where repetition, or longevity, mean that they achieve “off by heart” status, no longer requiring reference to the cookbook – in this case I think it was the ubiquitous Good, Cheap Cookbook that has now sadly fallen apart.

In the olden days – when the kids were all at school and I was a stay-at-home mum this was one of those great recipes that I could whip up when they came home from school and let me feel like some sort of freakish super-mum.

These days it’s morphed into flapjack style pancakes for lazy weekend mornings, (now made by Rick) achieving new heights when I made them whilst we were camping for Nick’s birthday, served with the requested raspberry butter (a la Fireworks Café).

But, in my capacity as an assistant leader for Saints Plus (our church’s Sunday School group for kids in Year 6 – Year 8), I thought it would be fun to have a Masterchef style pikelet cook-off. Fortunately on the night, there were 6 kids – three girls and three boys. They were separated into two groups, strictly by gender of course.

After encouraging the boys by informing them that all the best chefs in the world were men, both teams managed to be quiet long enough for me to tell them the ingredients. The boys started well, but perhaps slightly overshot the mark with a giant pikelet, which then turned into something resembling “The Blob”.


The girls meanwhile were fashioning piping bags out of foil (all they could find), creating perfect circles and cute heart shapes and plating up their pikelets like something from, well… MasterChef.


So the winners were (taking into consideration team work, cleanliness & tidiness of work space, presentation and above all taste) Team Girl!


Of course, the winner on the night was the pikelet with lashings of jam and before I could stop BOTH teams, some extra sugar sprinkled on top!

So what’s your favourite “off-by-heart” recipe? If you send me the recipe, I’ll try it out and let others know all about it!

Recipe for never-fail pikelets:
2 cups self raising flour
1/3 cup sugar (caster if you have it)
2 eggs
½ cup milk (add more if necessary)
30 g melted butter (optional – makes the surface of the pikelets softer)
Extra butter for frying

Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until smooth. Leave to rest if you have the time.
Heat a frypan until the butter sizzles (but does not brown). Add spoonfuls of mix to the frypan, well spaced.
Turn over when bubbles burst on the top.
Remove when golden brown and repeat until all the mixture is used up.

Serve with: jam, cream, maple syrup, lemon juice and sugar or my personal favourite, fresh seasonal fruit (think mango, strawberries, banana, passionfruit) and yoghurt.

Variations:
Add frozen blueberries to the mix just before cooking for blueberry pikelets.
Add grated apple to the mix or, finely slice apple, fry slightly in the butter, then pour the batter over the top. Serve with maple syrup.
For a savoury variation, omit the sugar and add corn (tinned or fresh), diced spring onion, grated zucchini and grated cheese. The mixture should still be able to hold together. Serve these fritters with bacon, caramelised onion or tomato relish – good enough for breakfast or dinner!

Raspberry Butter
This was an experimental venture, and I was camping at the time, so measurements are a little flexible. When I added the raspberries, it looked like brains as the butter/ sugar mix separated, now that I beat the butter/sugar/ raspberries with the conveniences of a modern kitchen, this doesn’t happen!

125g butter – unsalted is best if you have it
100g caster sugar
150g frozen raspberries

Beat butter & sugar until light & fluffy, then beat in defrosted, drained raspberries. Adjust raspberries & sugar to taste. Serve dollops on warm pancakes.

Enjoy!

I'm baaaacckk....

Ok, after desperate entreaties (polite enquiries) from many of my followers (two cousins and a friend from church) I have decided to jump back on the blogging band-wagon. I'm not quite sure how I fell off, because there is plenty to talk/ photograph/ eat/ cook/ write about. I guess I am busy, but no more than pretty much every other person I know. I'm actually surprised that when I went back to my blog, the last post was in December, I feel that I have plenty of things to write about that according to my diary (in my head only...and trolling through old emails) actually happened in November.

And I think that is the crux of the matter - that there is just SO much to write about. And where to begin. Do I start from now and keep going? Or do I look back at my list and try and re-hash (get it? the foodie reference??) the events/ dinners/ circumstances.

I think I will try a combination of the two, and to keep me honest I will put a list here of blog topics that I want to write about (from the recent past).

Events:

Cooking for 20+ for a weekend at craft camp - not just the cooking, but the fun of talking it over with my co-conspirator Michelle, the planning and the shopping.

GingerBread House Decorating - too much fun...and also a little too serious....

Austi Women's Night Out: Food for body and soul - recent cooking demonstration at my church.

Christmas - Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Week before Christmas family Christmas celebration - you get the drift.

An amazing Champagne Hour Champagne Tasting - 4 bottles of top notch champagne, 5 thirsty girls...

Reviews:

So many new restaurants/ cafes opened in the northern suburbs of Wollongong towards the end of last year! All are still open! And there is not really anyone else writing (good) restaurant reviews. Some of the places we've been to:

The Point - new cafe on Point St Bulli - rough review: good

Sea Salt - where Ruby's used to be - rr: not good

Flanagan's - at Thirroul. Have blogged a work lunch but have since been there for dinner and lunch again - rr: great

New sushi place in Woonona (the name escapes me right now...aahh thank you google - it's Sushi Moon) - rr: good with reservations

Gone Burgers - hip & funky beer and burger place in a Woonona laneway (who would have thought Woonona was NSW's answer to Melbourne?) - rr: good

The Bar Next Door to Samuels - aka TBNDS. Where the cool kids go - rr:great

Chedo's - at Coledale. An oldie, but a goodie. rr: good

One on Park at Woonona. Dan's workplace, but it would be good anyway. rr: good

Bon Aroma - had a lovely Christmas get-together with "the girls" with an absolutely hilarious meal. rr: interesting

Berry Sourdough Bakery - on the way to camping - rr: great

The Gelati Clinic, Bermagui - holiday time - rr: fantastic

Mimosa Winery, near Bermagui - luxury lunch - rr: good

Cream, Bermagui - great cakes, great coffee, always the first place we head to - rr:great

Montague Cafe, Bermagui - and I wonder why my nephew-in-law calls us "cafe campers" - rr: good

Cookbook and books about cooks reviews:

I gave, received, read and even compiled some great cookbooks since Christmas, mainly:

The Songs of Sapa- Luke Nguyen

Food Safari - Maeve O'Mara

Meals:

Camping - we had some fantastic meals while we were camping. Including:

Paella

A seafood extravaganza for Nick's birthday

Yum Cha - yes, whilst camping, then repeated a fortnight later...

A birthday breakfast extravaganza

The cooking roster also continues, pretty much without fuss (from me that is). Everyone is starting to get their specialities, which I will let you know about.

Miscellaneous:

Onions vs Shallots vs Spring onions - I think this is what did my head in and made me stop blogging - way too much research...

New Year's Eve on Cockatoo Island- the food was good, but the experience was fantastic

And if you've read this far, my most ambitious idea for the year ahead is a Cookbook Swap. I'm still working on the logistics and the fine print, but I hope to go ahead with it soon. I'm thinking along the same lines as a clothes swap, but am still working on it. Any suggestions gratefully received...

So, sorry there's no photos this time around, I'm on the wrong computer. Please let me know what you would like to hear about first, plus I'll be keeping current - the aim is to blog at least twice a week.

It's in! It's in! It's in! It's in!

Our lovely new oven and cook-top was installed today. You may recall my excitement when we bought the oven a few weeks ago. The gas company ended up surprising us by installing the gas in only two weeks instead of six, but then we still had to prepare the space.

Before: Originally this was where the wood stove was, our fire-place is behind it, with a shared chimney. By the time we bought the house, there were already cupboards here. When we renovated the kitchen in the early 90's, we put the cook-top above the large cupboard.

Before

During: We had always wanted to tile the space around the stove top, so this was our opportunity. Who would have realised there were so many different white rectangular tiles? Well, lots of other kitchen/ bathroom renovators I guess, but it allowed for some frank exchanges of opinion between Rick and myself. I thought I didn't mind what we did, but then when something was suggested I would recoil in horror at the idea! And the edging of the tiles! That was another major topic of discussion, negotiation and compromise :-)

During - the hole in the wall

But, I did learn a new skill - you can call me "The Tile-cutter". I don't think I'll be giving up my day job any time soon to go into the tiling trade, but it was very satisfying to learn something new and be able to help Rick who did the majority of the work.

Of course, in an old house, there are no square edges and few straight ones, but Rick suppressed his engineering exactness and fudged as necessary.

After: At last! It's in. I was at work and popped in at lunch time to see a pot of pasta that Jono had already cooked on the new stove! With cherry tomatoes and home-made pesto no less.


Jono and his friend Danny then christened the oven by baking a deliciously moist apple cake. I hope this cooking style continues (ie me NOT cooking).

All that was left by the time I got home.

I didn't get an opportunity to cook on it tonight as we went out for fish and chips with friends, but here's a picture with the complementary grill plate in place and the wok - ready for action!


I feel ready now to tackle lots of Christmas cooking.... any requests?

Feeding the five thousand

Well, not really… maybe 50 – max. But the biblical allusion stands, because I was cooking for our church’s café. Every Sunday evening, different groups or families take turns to provide a meal and dessert for people to enjoy together after the service. A nominal amount is charged – just to cover costs. Coffee, tea and biscuits are free! Some nights the meal will be pizza by the slice, other nights it will be something a little more wholesome. Occasionally, we’ll go all out and do a special themed night as a fund-raiser. This night however was something a little more prosaic – pasta bake.

Although I find myself often cooking in bulk, it can sometimes be a bit hit and miss. In this instance I had a recipe (in my head) and then timesed (ie multiplied – sorry a relic of primary school children’s maths) it by either three or four (depending on, hhmmm… what it was? how I felt? the weather?).

Seeing as how I usually cook for at least six people, everything is either a multiple or divisor (?) of that. So if it’s just Rick and I, I will divide it by three (actually that’s not true – we’ll go out for dinner :-)). A few extra for dinner – 1 ½ times. Craft camp – 3 or 4 times (20’ish people) Cooking for café at church – 3 or 4 times (servings are smaller).

So back to the pasta bake. I used 1 ½ kilos of mince (for 6 I would use 750g). We are trying to get less meat and more vegetables in our diet, so we grate carrot & zucchini in with our “spaghetti bolognaise” sauce. Grating and chopping things is a lot easier with my wonderful new food processer – much quicker than trying to coerce a son to do it. The meat sauce also includes tomatoes and tomato paste or passata – whatever is in the pantry. The complete recipe follows. You will have to do your own mathematical calculations if you don’t need to feed 30 or so – like this batch ended up doing.

Ingredients:

Meat sauce:
1 ½ kilo mince
6 x 400g tinned tomatoes, chopped
1 jar tomato paste or passata
3 zucchinis, grated
4 carrots, grated
3 onions, finely chopped
6 garlic cloves
4 tablespoons sugar, or to taste
Oil

3 x 500g packets pasta (spirals are good), cooked

Cheese sauce:
1 ½ litres milk
Enough corn flour to make a smooth paste (sorry I can’t be more precise – there are instructions on the packet)
300g cheese, grated


Topping:
Bread crumbs (fresh is best, I processed 4 bread rolls that were slightly stale)
Paprika, to taste
Mixed herbs, to taste
Salt & pepper , to taste

Brown the onions and garlic with some oil and then add the mince to cook. I do all of this in my large electric fry-pan, so don’t really need to do it in batches, but you may have to if you’re using a smaller pan. Strain the liquid off if there’s a lot of it.

Add the rest of the meat sauce ingredients and let it simmer, at the least, while you’re preparing the rest, at the most 2 hours.

Simmering in the frypan

Cook the pasta, and prepare the cheese sauce.

Combine the ingredients to make the topping ( I had a little “accident” with the paprika, so mine had a bit of a fake tan look about it, 1 tablespoon would probably be enough).

To assemble:

Spray oil the baking dishes and divide the meat sauce between them. Put the cheese sauce on top and then the bread crumb topping on top of that. Cook in a moderate oven for around 20 minutes, or until the topping is nicely browned.

Before...

...and after!

If taking the dish elsewhere (like church café), wrap it in foil and then in an old towel to help keep it warm.

Each baking dish should feed 8 – 10 people, even more if you add garlic bread and a salad.

Pasta bake... as far as the eye can see

Happy eaters

Happy talkers & helpers

Quote from Zanko: "that was a-maz-ing"

Next week, loaves and fishes ;-)

Eating out: Flanagans Fish Cafe

It had been slightly more than the usual hectic week at work. Most of us had put in a 16-20 hour day on Monday, then had fronted up again at seven the next morning. So on Wednesday, our boss shouted us lunch (whilst we had our (sometimes) weekly team meeting).

The view from my seat - looking south

The view from my seat - looking north

The location of choice was Flanagan’s. This establishment had been located as a take-away on Lawrence Hargrave Drive a few years ago. When they moved to the kiosk on Thirroul Beach, they seemed to be continuing to focus on “high-end” seafood take-away, but now also with the facility to dine in.

Since a few months ago when I had visited last, they have now physically separated the restaurant into take-away and dining sections. Both have table seating out the front, though this too is separated by a wood/rope barricade. The signage is not immediately apparent so in the time we were there, I saw 3 couples directed away from the dine-in section and around the corner of the building to the take-away section and a couple vice-versa.

The location is magnificent. Separated by a walk-way from the sand of Thirroul Beach, you can’t get much closer in this country to dining by the sea. It is a beautiful day when we are there, and for the days that are not so pleasant there is still adequate table space inside.

The service is a little curious. No-one came out to our group of seven, so we went inside and took some menus back to our table. There were also a couple of blackboard specials to choose from. Choices were mainly seafood oriented, though there were also some burger and Caesar salad options. The specials were the salt & pepper squid and Atlantic salmon. Once we had decided what we wanted, we then went back inside to give them our orders.

My choice was the King Prawn Wrap with aioli, cucumber and salad greens ($13). It came accompanied by a salad. Although the prawns were not really king-size, they were sweet, fresh and full of flavour. You could taste the aioli without it being over-powering and the wrap was fresh and nicely crispy.


Others at the table tried the specials: the Atlantic salmon ($18.50) came with hand-cut chips and salad with a pot of thick hollandaise sauce and was plated nicely and pronounced beautifully cooked; the salt & pepper squid ($14.50) was cooked to perfection.

Salt and pepper squid in the background, note-pad and pen in the foreground thereby proving our meeting intentions

The gluten-free member tried the Greek salad, which had generous chunks of feta and tasty olives, and a bowl of hand-cut chips that we were able to share.



They also have a wine list with a small, but thorough selection of bottled wines and beers. A waitperson came to clear our table, but did not ask for coffee orders, so our Akubra wearing stand in volunteered to take our order in (thanks John!).


Staff started taking in tables and chairs at 3.00 o’clock and when asked, they advised that they closed at four, which seems like a missed opportunity for the after-school crowd. However they did advise that they would be opening for dinner on the weekends from the beginning of December.

Food: 17/20 – Tasty, generous servings for a reasonable price
Coffee: 18/20 – Strong, flavourful and not too hot
Service: 14/20 – Full table service would have been nice
Location/ Decor: 20/20 – Right on the beach at scenic Thirroul

Flanagans Fish Cafe
At the beach, Thirroul
02 4268 1598
Open 7 days, 7.00am - 4.00pm
Check for evening opening days and times

Getting our just desserts at Samuel's

Rick and I are in what I would like to call the pre-empty nest stage. Our little chicks (I use this term very loosely) are getting ready to leave the nest for good. This stage however is characterised by: lots of driving them around to their evening or weekend events; intensive logistic planning in order to carry out all the driving; making sure our phones are charged in case we get last-minute changes to the carefully planned itineraries and then the welcome surprise of an empty house and time to ourselves.

So, once upon a Friday night, after making TWO round trips to Wollongong, I arrived home at 9.30pm and suggested that Rick and I go down the road to Samuel's for dessert. Samuel's is one of a handful of good restaurants in the Northern Suburbs of Wollongong. I have been there for lunch and dinner several times over the last few years and have enjoyed it every time. One of the features of dinner is that you can choose two side dishes to accompany your main course selection, that means four side dishes between two people - a great way to experience a cross-section of dishes.

But tonight was dessert. We walked down to Thirroul, arriving at 9.30pm just as the rain made good its threat to come down. It's always a bit awkward arriving in a busy restaurant when none of the wait-staff acknowledge your presence, and I don't think I imagined a slight raise of the eyebrow when we said we were just there for dessert. However, once we chose our seats in the undercover outdoor area another young waiter promptly brought over menus and water.


With delicacies such as banoffee cheesecake with caramel gelato, toasted apple cake with bonfire apples & chantilly cream and nougat semifreddo it was difficult to decide. However for me the lemon pannacotta with balsamic strawberries sounded spot on for a warm night, and Rick is a sucker for a pineapple fritter especially if it's served with vanilla bean gelato and ginger syrup. We also order coffees - decaffeinated in deference to the late hour. Liquor, dessert and fortified wines are served by the glass and/or bottle and I was almost tempted. Samuel's used to have the liquor or wine suggestions matched to each dessert, a helpful guide that is missed (and might have tipped the temptation into action).

The pannacotta is that perfect balance between creamy and firm, and the lemon has still retained it's tang amongst the sweetness. The strawberries are sweetened by the balsamic vinegar, which is either a very thick variety or a reduction that has been swirled around the plate.


The pineapple fritter is coated with a light sweet batter that is cooked just right - crispy yet the pineapple is not cooked through. The vanilla bean gelato has tell-tale specks of vanilla bean and has good vanilla flavour. The ginger syrup is a bit sweet (well, I guess it is a syrup) and not ginger-y enough for my liking.


The coffee is Withams - a brand I am not very familiar with and I have not tried decaffeinated for a long time, but it is strong and well flavoured (and not just for decaf).

The bill comes just as we are ready to leave and is less than $30. Desserts are $10 each (apart from the Frangelico Affogatto at $12) and coffee is $3.50 - a great bargain in my opinion.

I'm looking forward to going down for a midweek dinner special (Tuesdays, Wednesdays & Thursdays) which is $35 for two courses, especially while Dan is doing his hospitality practical hours there for the next few weeks!

Samuel's Restaurant
382 Lawrence Hargrave Drive, Thirroul NSW 2515
(02) 4268 2244
Open Tuesday-Sunday for lunch and dinner‎