4-Course ... Breakfast?

Good evening (or morning or afternoon depending on where you are) my fellow followers, hope you have all been well. There are a few posts that I do intend on posting up this week if I do get a minute or so. 

Today was a beautiful Sunday, where the sun was shining, sky was magnificently blue, birds chirping outside with a perfect 25 degrees celcius. There was a very slight breeze in the air and honestly, it is definitely one of the most relaxing days I've had in a while (unfortunately still a lot of things I'm worrying about at the back of my mind, but that's not the point). 

One of the most perfect ways to start a day like this, is of course, a sleep in without being woken up by alarms, but rather have the sunshine peeking through the windows. After that, it is time for a 4 course breakfast ... yes, you've heard right, BREAKFAST! The even better thing was, it was actually made by myself. Most of my friends were either busy today (especially at this time of the year) or away on holidays. So I decided to cook up something magical instead of going out for brunch:

4 main course breakfast

As I was feeling creative, I have decided to whip up these four elements, but instead of separating it into different dishes, I was feeling rather inspired by some of the other restaurants and have basically used a similar idea...serve up all the courses on one huge dish. Typically in the 'upper class' chic restaurants, a course like that would be considered a tasting plate with literally sample sizes of each course. However, as I was feeling rather generous at home and this is home cooking at its best after all, I decided to use bigger than average portions to ensure that the breakfast/lunch was adequately filling. So on the menu today was (rotating from bottom left anti-clockwise):

Entree: Butter-infused with garlic, shallots and Italian parsley on rye toast

First main: Portobello mushroom steak with freshly cracked black pepper and sea salt

Second main: Grilled eggs with chilli napolitana sauce

Dessert: Layered blueberry yoghurt with banana and freshly toasted hazelnut and organic maple syrup muesli

So you see, these elements were not very hard to produce individually. The only challenge was knowing what to do whilst preparing the other element as you want all the dishes to be warm/cold/crispy, i.e. as fresh as possible. There was not a better way to start this lovely morning but with a huge 4-course breakfast. I hope this has inspired some of you to start your day with a huge breakfast.

Au revoir ~~

A-Oval Invaded by Pharmacy Students

Bonsoir my dear followers/readers, I have been extremely busy once again this past week, and will continue to be busy for the next coming few weeks, so please do forgive me for my minimal number of posts each week. I will try and post as many as I can (there are quite a number in the pipeline, waiting to be written up!).

Tonight's post is basically about an event which occurred last Saturday (10 September 2011). It was the Guild Annual Pharmacy Ball held by the South Australian Pharmacy Student's Association (or SAPSA). This year, it was held at the Adelaide Oval function centre in North Adelaide on War Memorial Drive. The newly renovated catering function centre looks quite nice, but the food on the other hand was debatable. We had a 3 course meal which is quite a standard format (food-wise) for the evening.

Here were the following dishes for the night:

Roasted pumpkin, leek & sage with black pepper & goats curd

Well, for soup starters are the standard for the ball (need to keep prices low as it is a student event after all). The description of the soup sounds absolutely divine, but the actual taste of it was well... "can-like" to put it in a mild way. It wasn't as thick as I would've liked it (which once again really depends on what people like so it is debatable), but the leek and sage could not be tasted at all. The pepper was evident (at least), but the goats curd was not...the white dash in the soup actually just tasted like ordinary cream, nothing too fancy. So the soup starter was a bit of a disappointment.

Frenched lamb cutlets with rosemary & garlic fondant potatoes, spinach strudel

This was an alternate drop to the chicken (which I cannot comment about as I received the lamb). The lamb cutlets were frenched really nicely and it wasn't overcooked which was good. However, the rest of the 'parts' of the dish was not really up to a very high standard. The potatoes did not have any garlic flavours whatsoever, and the spinach strudel was absolutely terrible — it was basically an extremely dry pie base with overcooked dry spinach sitting in the pie base, and according to them, is a spinach strudel... The tomato and broccoli actually also played no part in the dish. It was there really to make the dish look more colourful, but that actually 'cheapens' the quality of the dish that it could have been.

Eton mess: Vanilla cream, summer strawberries & crushed meringue

Well this was definitely one of the biggest failure of the night. As any close friends of mine would know, I have an extremely sweet tooth and I love sweets! However, I have never been more disappointed with an Eton mess. It can be such a simple dish to do well without being overcomplicated. The presentation looks absolutely lovely. However, the chefs need to seriously reconsider what they are writing in the menu and what they are actually presenting. There was no vanilla evident in the cream; the cream that was there was basically straight out of the container, not sweetened or flavoured with vanilla. It was just eating cream. The supposedly crushed meringue was actually not very crushed. Yes, fine the cream is not sweet and the meringue should sweeten it up, but its not going to do the job if there are only 2 button sized pieces of meringue in the whole huge cup of cream. The summer strawberries also didn't look like strawberries either. They were actually frozen berries. Sorry to be ridiculing this dessert but a more appropriate name for this would be Eton fail: carton of cream with frozen berries and 2 pieces of meringue buttons (at least it would be the correct description). 

So unfortunately, the caterers for this year was very disappointing. Not only was the food extremely average, but the presentation of the plates were so inconsistent. With the lamb cutlets, just from quick glances around the table and at other tables, the plating was horrific; some people had 2 pieces of tomatoes, others one, some with vines, some without...and then comes the broccoli - there were 2 pieces, 3 pieces, brown pieces of broccoli, 1 huge broccoli, and even NO broccoli for some. That was disappointing. Hopefully, the caterers do a better job for your functions in the future if you are looking for a venue, but based on my experience, I wouldn't recommend the venue if you need very decent food to be served (unless you only need a venue for a presentation or showcase and need some drinks and light meals to go on with).

Good Morning Adelaide.. Well the North of it

As promised, here is the second post for the night.

On the recent weekend that has zoomed past, couple of my friends DA and AP decided to roam the city and we had an absolute ball. However, for some unknown reason, I decided to wake up extremely early on Sunday morning. It was a cold, winterish morning; the sun was playing peek-a-boo so it was a bit unpredictable.

I was actually in real need of coffee and was quick hungry (which was unusual considering I ate extremely late, or early some might say). This was of course at around 7.30 in the morning. As I was on O'Connell Street in North Adelaide and the sun was shining, I decided to stroll down the street (yes in my Adidas track pants, Nike jumper and Tigers...I really look like a crazy sports guy up ridiculously early on a Sunday morning). I was really surprised that not only was Un Caffè Bar open, but the machine was ready to go, with their range of take-away breakfast all set up in the fridge ready to go.

What I really love about this particular coffee joint is the location; whether you're sitting indoors or out, on a sunny day, it is beautiful. The sun comes in and just hits the right sections of the store. So I decided to order my usual coffee (my usual at Un Caffè is large skim cappuccino with an extra shot of coffee) and as I was rather peckish, I had to get one of their quick take-away breakky:

Berry granola topped with Greek yoghurt and fresh mixed berries

The granola was a nice mixture of corn-flakes, granola pieces, bits of muesli, dried fruits, and some other bits and pieces. The yoghurt with the mixed berries was a nice substitute for milk (I don't think I was ready to have too much milk this early in the morning since I haven't exercised). It is just a nice and clean start to the day to break the fast on a lovely Sunday morning. If you are ever down O'Connell Street in North Adelaide extremely early on a Sunday morning, I suggest you pop by for a visit for a fantastic way to start your day.

...and into the Lion's Mouth We Go!

Désolé my dear readers, for I have been lazy (and my honours project isn't very light on me, and I am also trying to train with 2 weeks notice for a 12km run!). 

I'll make this post short and snappy, and if I have time, then I may put up another post later in the evening.

So a couple of Saturdays ago (not the one that just went past), a whole group of us went to The Lion for a birthday dinner. I've been there a couple of times, but I'm trying different things each time. There are two sections to The Lion dining area: the 'proper' dining area which is right beside the pub/bar area, or the 'pub' dining area which is more informal. 

Their pub dining menu still had some pretty "proper" dishes, but as to how well done it was, that will come later in the review. People usually go to The Lion for their burgers, steak, i.e. basically their meats. Before I went there, an awesome friend, LP (who is THE dessert queen), recommended that I try out their beef bourguignon which is only available in their pub dining section. It was a struggle to find as it wasn't written on the menu, and there wasn't really a 'specials' board. If you head up to the counter where you order, it is actually hidden tucked away at the top corner in the dark where it says "Winter Warmers". It was an extremely inexpensive dinner (approximately $15AU) AND it came with a free glass of Jacob's Creek cab. sav. (alternatively you can have a beer with it, but I'm not a big fan of beer). 

Winter warmer - beef bourguignon with soft polenta and gremolata

This dish is not only inexpensive, but an absolute flavour explosion in your mouth! The beef was so soft and tender. The polenta was done incredibly - it was soft and creamy, cheesy, yet not sickening...it was amazing; and the gremolata (can't see it very well sorry!) went really nicely- the nice tang and the herb-iness was fantastic.

The Lion Burger - beef, with french fries

WG ordered this and he said was really good (it does look nice). I'm not too sure if it is able to beat the burgers at Burger Foundry, but perhaps next time... 

ML ordered lamb shanks with confit garlic mash, gremolata and glaze which looked pretty good, and he said the shank was done pretty nicely. Unfortunately I did forget to take a photo of it, but the presentation was very decent. There was one dish however that many people who ordered were not happy with - TMN ordered the panfried atlantic salmon with toasted cous cous, green beans, almond figs and cider vincotto, which sounds really lovely, but the taste is another matter. The skin was not crispy at all (very easily fixed by salting it a bit more!), and the salmon was not seasoned properly, i.e. it was pretty much tasteless. If you do happen to feel like seafood, I recommend that you best avoid that dish!

However, I was quite pleased that night with the meals. The dishes were whipped up extremely quickly and there is a vast selection on their menu (considering it was such a big group) ~ they didn't modify the menu at all which means that the whole pub dining menu was available for selection. I would definitely recommend The Lion if you feel like a burger, a winter warmer, or if you have a large group booking you need to make.