hellooo

Hmm so I just checked my blogger homepage and I realised that the last time I blogged was in Feb 2011.
Shock, horror!

Thats practically a century in blogosphere time.
Way too long, and too much has happened for me to do the usual guerilla style blog post to try to catch up.

To be honest I am not sure if I will blog again after this.
I suspect I might, having been blogging for close to 10 years now
I dont think this is a habit that I ll easily break.
But real life gets in the way of updating,
and I am just not motivated enough to stay committed for long.

What drives me though, is how much I like looking back on my previous posts
Remembering events I attended, what I felt at the time, realising how my writing has evolved and yes, even feeling a little embarrassed at how much of a prat I was.
And reading comments from my friends.

So maybe I should make more of an effort..
No photos today as I am blogging from an university computer waiting for clinics to start, though there are several I want to share.

Seem to be at point in life where everything is perfect and I am feeling really lucky
so I really should blog and savour it!

k a chocolate-run calls, I cant resist. :p

st judes

Caught up with a few friends for dinner recently.

Decided to try out raw/vegan food on a whim

and headed out to a korean place on Brunswick Street,

Yong Green Foods.

Now dont get me wrong,

I have nothing but respect for people who choose to eat raw foods,

and the restaurant was really creative with the menu

(think almond milk sweetened with agave syrup, raw brown rice sushi, dehydrated chia seed nachos)

but at the end of the meal, it felt like I hadn't eaten much at all, and what I did eat, wasnt... properly cooked.

which i suppose was the point, but it felt rather incomplete somehow.

Except for the home made kim chee. That, was delish.

Take the green tea raw cheese cake with goji berries for instance.

Not bad, but I just wanted to throw it in the oven for a bit.

Left the restaurant bizzarely hungry and craving something savoury

Did a quick ring-around to my favourite restaurants, who were alas, closed on a Sunday night.

While walking back to car, I suddenly saw St Jude's Cellars.

Decided to give it a shot. And boy, am i glad we did!

No photos of the venue unfortunately,

as I was eager to order before the kitchen shut.

1st dish after the sour dough, charred corn croquettes with mahon cheese. Ummm.

Wont lie to you, this was this dish that I was most looking forward to, and it was good!

Perhaps a tad light on the corn and heavy on the cheese, but then again, I m not much of a cheese person.





Looks great doesnt it? All that ooozy gooey cheese.

Nicely displayed wines. Had a Sicillian zibibbo, which was very yummy indeed.

The rest of our dishes, from L to R, were

snapper and quinoa balls wrapped in wombok and baked in tomato- my least favourite of the night. Needed a tad more flavour, and didnt like it served cold

Jar of salmon rilletes with cucumber and toast- delicious! The spread with light and tangy with satisfyingly large salmon chunks, the toast was crispy, the cucumber was fresh. Umm!

My favourite would definitely have to be the fresh cracked walnuts with apple and double smoked bacon. Genius pairing! The saltiness of the pork cut through the sweetness of the apple and the texture of the walnuts give it bite. How inspired! I finished this whole dish by myself, couldnt help reaching for more.

The last dish in the forefront of the picture is the chilli calamari salad. Pretty tasty and a good smoky flavour.

Because neither of my dinner companions felt like dessert, we skipped it. However, the next time i return, there will be a dark chocolate mousse with my name on it!

Mum has been baking like a mad woman lately
Not that I m complaining.

Look at my dinner!
Hahahah
croquembouche heaven, here I come.



If this is my after dinner dessert at home, I must be truly spoilt, haha.

truffle

Mum has commented recently that my cooking has improved
to which I triumphantly credited to my constant eating out at restaurants.
She then proceeded to shoot me a death glare,
and said ' no no, silly girl, its obviously my genes!'
Haha. Well, be that as it may,
I find the art of cooking especially enjoyable nowadays,
though my repertoire is limited.
Here is one of my own creation, truffle soba!

Bought some summer truffles

and decided to try my hand at making a truffle dish,

The truffle salsa that resulted was very much inspired by Tetsuya's.

Ummm!

dont they look enticing? i find the smell of truffles so delicious I cant resist nibbling while preparing the dish

Made a truffle salsa, there it is sitting atop the soba noodles. I combined

2 truffles, finely chopped

1/2 teaspoon bread crumbs

with the ingredients below, which I sauteed beforehand.

Brown 1 large garlic clove, minced, and

1 small piece of onion, minced, with a small pat of butter.

Add 2 oilves, finely chopped, and 3 large porcini mushrooms- diced

Cook till soft, and add a dash of balsamic vinegar and some salt

Store it in a little glass jar for at least the night!

The soba noodles were store-bought, I was too impatient to make my own.

I blanched them in salty boiling water and kept it in the fridge till I was ready to plate up.

You dont have to do this, but I usually toss through some olive oil so the soba doesnt stick together, and I find it really helps!

Added ice to my soba noodles to make them really cold! Dont have one of those nifty Japanese plates where the ice sits under the noodles, so had to make do. Also had little mini French toasts in the background to spread the salsa on, some oilve oil, a grater and of course, the truffles.

Grated the truffles over the noodles to give it an extra kick .

Bon appetit

And though I do say it myself, it was divine!

queensland

Had a short holiday up in Queensland over the New Year.

Flew up to the Sunshine Coast and then drove up to Brisbane and the Gold Coast,

so its a queer feeling watching footage on the news of the floods affecting areas I was just in.

Really feel for those affected by the flood

I have always dreadedfloods and fires, above anything else,

cant imagine what it will be like to lose almost every material possession

or having to choose your most precious item when fleeing

or losing family and friends

and can you imagine what the clean-up must be like? That mud!

So, here is the link to make a donation.

I hope this post will encourage people to holiday in Queensland

It really is a fantastic place and I always enjoy my visits there.

Didnt bring my DSLR camera up this time, as I really didnt feel like lugging it around.
Was a decision I soon regretted!
Made spicy hotpot and watched asian horror movies the first night I was at Sunny Coast.
Rainie Yang in The Child's Eye? Not good. She's too cute to be a horror queen.
She's screaming in fear and all I want to do is pat her on the head.
Incidentally, what was with the ending of that movie?
Very annoying and the worse thing was I couldnt rant about it to Jin as she gave up on the show midway.



Stayed at the Meriton when we were in Gold Coast, which was a nice serviced apartment just opposite Jupiters Casino. I think I much prefer serviced apartments to hotels, because I can make breakfast!

then partied the night away at Sin City with Kat, Nina, Joe and Chai
hahaha. What a night!

Ah Surfers Paradise.




Went to the Palazzo Versace for dinner the following night.

Had a lot of fun oohing and ahhing over the medusa heads on EVERYTHING

Candlesticks, cutlery, salt and pepper shakers, wine glasses. You name it.

I thought it would have just been the china!

Very pretty crockery which dont seem to be on sale at David Jones?

Probably is customised for Vanitas.

We were seated at a table right in front of the hotel pool,

great view, but unfortunately no swimmers to gawk at.

My entree was kingfish and tuna sashimi. Dish was nice as I am always partial to some raw fish, but to be honest, the food wasnt amazing, it was more of a novelty to dine at the restaurant rather than anything else. Still, good pairing with the sesame and watermelon sorbet!




My main. Was less than impressed with this one. Was bland, and the two potato chips on top of the potato mash was rather confusing. Suppose it was meant to add texture and height, but just felt awkward. Lamb was tender though.




This was a palate cleanser, think it was a mushroom and celeriac shot, but I could be wrong.

Dessert was some rather uninspiring strawberry souffle (Jin's) and mine was a chocolate mille feuille. Good flavour, but the pastry was so hard i couldnt cut through it easily, making rather a terrible mess. I would skip the dessert and go for the petit fours with coffee, served in a delightful winged cup.

Had everyone over the next day (NYE) for some drinks and Thai food.

Quickly evolved into a rowdy drinking game, 4 Kings,

and when everyone was nice and happy, proceeded to walk to Broadbeach for countdown.

I wont post any photos of the fireworks as they dont do them justice

but I can assure you, they were lovely! We were up against the barricade so were close as can be,

and unlike the ones in Melbourne,

you dont actually get burnt with little falling bits.

Played around with sparklers someone had the foresight to bring.

We were trying to write 2011 here, not successful.




Went zorbing on New Year's Day.

Jin and I were strapped into a giant bouncy ball and pushed down the hill.

She was screaming the entire way, was as funny as hell.



Was more a fun ride rather than a scary one, and being able to look at each other was hilarious.

Also did the water ride with Kat, where you are in a ball with 40 litres of water and you swish and slide all the way down in the ball.

I prefer the harness ride though, it lasted longer!

at this point my camera ran out of batteries.

I foolishly overestimated its staying power and therefore had no charger

but we went dancing at a spanish club in Brisbane the night after, where people were doing the samba with lightning quick steps and then the senuous moves of the zouk lambada..

oh i wish i had photos!

miss Jin terribly :(

might take a break now from blogging till later in the night,

typing about the trip has made me hungry and restless!