Sunday at Sittella

On the weekend I went with a small group of other winos to Sittella Winery in the Swan Valley. The weather was pretty awful – cold and windy with the occasional sprinkling of rain – but that didn’t stop us.

Following a few wine tastings in the cellar door (I particularly liked their Sparkling Chenin and a divine wooded Chardonnay), we moved into the restaurant itself, and spent a leisurely 2.5 hours sitting on the enclosed verandah (outdoor heaters on thankfully), with delicious food and a bit more wine.

I say delicious because it absolutely was. Three of us chose the Winemaker’s Taste Plate, which is supposedly designed to share as a starter – but we each wanted one as a main dish so why not! It contained lots of tiny portions but of a variety of things, and in the end was quite filling. I didn’t eat the chorizo/salami parts as I am still not really eating meat, although there was a tiny bit of chicken liver pate and some terrine thing – only 2 bites so hard to tell exactly what it was, but I think probably chicken again. A highlight was the wasabi-dressed smoked salmon, and the port-soaked figs, both unbelievably good. As well as the bread that came with it, we shared a serving of warm breads as well and this was sooooooo warm and soft, it really was melt-in-your-mouth bread at its best.

Top notch food (at top notch prices however……no bargains here), great service, and a lovely view over the Winter-coloured vines. A lovely way to waste a few lazy hours on a Sunday.

Happy Fooding!

Restaurant Review: Hyde Park Hotel

Lamb Pot Pie

Had a yummy lunch on the weekend at the Hyde Park Hotel in North Perth.

This pub is only 5 minutes drive from my house, yet I’ve never been there before in almost 4 years here. I was going to the Perth Mint (having a play-tourist moment!), so looked up the Entertainment Book to see what eating places were nearby, that I had a voucher for. I decided to try something new, and it turned out to be a great decision. The food was truly fabulous, in looks, portion size and taste. These mains were both about $25 each, standard pub prices, but as I had a voucher it was 25% off.

Baked Coriander & Pistachio Nut Crusted Chicken

Service was excellent and staff friendly – and the place was seriously renovated (apparently it used to be a bit of a dive – not so now, it is very upmarket) in 2011 and still looks brand new. It was my first time there, but it won’t be my last!

An added bonus is that there is a very large Dan Murphy’s bottle shop next door, so I made the most of that and stocked up on wine bargains while I was there.

Happy Fooding!

Restaurant Review: Gurkhas Nepalese

11 of us went to the relatively new Gurkhas Nepalese Restaurant in Highgate for dinner last weekend, following pre-drinks at the Brisbane Hotel, which is only a stone’s throw away.

Four of us chose to have the $38.50 banquet so that we could try a few different dishes. The starter was delicious mo-mos (steamed dumplings), with a meat filling and a bit of spice, and little paneer-filled spring roll type things that were divine.

Service was good, our main waiter was super friendly and very happy to change the listed banquet dish of Butter Chicken to Chicken Tikka Masala instead. We also had goat, cooked on the bone – the meat was lovely and tender, but I’m not so fussed about having to deal with big chunks of bone in my meal when I’m out – and very nice Palak Paneer, one of my favourite Indian dishes.

The Tarka Dal was beautiful, quite an unusual blend of spices and unlike any dal I’ve had before – quite runny in texture, but it tasted really, really good. We had plain and saffron rice, and plain and garlic naan bread.

Serving sizes were not overly big – we ate the lot and I was full, but only just.

We could choose whichever dessert from the menu that we wanted (I didn’t have one, as Indian desserts I do not find appealing at all, but the rice pudding and ice cream was enjoyed by the others).

I like my food very hot and spicy, and these dishes were not particularly so – I guess a banquet is designed to suit a blander palate than mine – but it was very happily enjoyed by the other three, who were not very familiar with Indian style foods. Next time I would order my own individual dishes so that I could ask for things to be made extra hot!

Currently Gurkhas is BYO only, with a corkage charge of $2.50 for each wine-drinking guest (this is VERY cheap for Perth), and we were informed that they have applied for a full liquor licence, but the process takes a long time. There is no bottle shop close by, so being licenced will be a plus for those like me who always forget to take a bottle and then have to rush off to the nearest bottle-o to grab something!

Overall a good value eating place, close to the city, relaxed atmosphere with friendly staff – not stupendously fantastic, but then again not horribly overpriced and pretentious like some Perth restaurants. Gurkhas is certainly worth going back to.

Happy Fooding!

Jumpin’ Jezebel(le)….

I had a spur of the moment brunch yesterday, whilst wandering the antique/coffee strip at the historic town of Guildford. It is only 15 minutes drive from me, but I went there by train, as it is their monthly craft market day and I expected parking to be an issue. I have never been to this market before, and was expecting big things….only to be pretty disappointed. It was just one room (the old town hall) with about a dozen stalls selling value-priced but not very exciting stuff. I could easily have found a parking space as well, but it was still nice to just wander up and down browsing – there are several antique/curio/collectibles shops and an excellent secondhand book shop – always worth a delve into.

As usual I had a book with me, so I decided to stop and have an early lunch at Jezebelle, a fairly new tapas bar/cafe. It was too early for tapas so I had brekky instead, which was absolutely delicious. I had the “hot smoked salmon cake, poached eggs & avocado”. There were 2 eggs, perfectly poached, except a bit cold by the time I finished mucking about taking photos haha, but that was my own fault and I am quite happy with cold food anyway. The salmon cakes (x2) were baked rather than fried, so not greasy and kind of like a mini hashbrown/frittata thing. The dish didn’t come with bread apparently so I asked for some rye toast with it, and this came with a tomato/onion salsa on top that was quite spicy and blended perfectly with the other flavours.

I had English Breakfast tea (it was the silk bags from Tea Drop, who seem to have a completely monopoly on coffee shop/restaurant supplying here in WA these days – it is nice tea, but I would prefer it a little stronger – I don’t think they put enough tea in the bags) and a glass of house sparkling. After all, it says on the menu that champagne is okay to drink any time, as it is always 12.00pm somewhere. I took them at their word.

The decor here is very modern – posh toilets! – and the service was good. The staff were all “young and hip” and very friendly. There was a family group arriving at the same time as me, and they were the customers from hell – they asked to be moved to a different table 3 times (just to be painful, as there was nothing wrong with any of the seating/view/light/temperature arrangements and you could choose to sit outside or inside) – I could see the poor staff doing their best to please them and no doubt wishing they would just go away! Thankfully, this lot only had coffees and didn’t stay all that long, as they were loud and had snivelling whiny kids with them, right behind me. When you are alone with a good book and have ‘been there, done that’ you don’t want rude, noisy kids mucking up your quiet Sunday morning! That’s my ‘old person rant’ over with anyway lol.

Prices were comparable to elsewhere in Perth: $16 for my main dish which is pretty good considering there was no charge for the toast (not sure if that was a mistake or not) and $4.50 for the tea. The only thing I realised when I got home and checked the bill, was that they actually charged me $18 for a premium glass of champers, when I asked for the house sparkling which should have cost $9.00. The reason I didn’t notice at the time, was that 1) I thought they were charging me extra for my toast, and 2) I had a 25% off discount by using the Entertainment card, so in my head I thought the total was about right, at the time. Hmmm, well my fault for not checking the bill properly at the time I suppose.

Had I been there a bit later in the day, there is live music from 1-3pm on Sundays, which would have been very nice alongside a few tapas dishes.

Happy Brunching!

Swanning Around….

This week I went out to the Swan Valley. This is an area only 20 minutes North of where I live, (I’m 5 minutes from the Perth city centre) – very quickly you get out of the suburbs and into “country”, and the Swan Valley is a lovely area for visiting wineries, restaurants, cafes and little side-of-the-road places selling all sorts of gourmet delights – chocolate, honey, coffee, lavender, nougat etc.

I try to get out to this area as often as I can, especially when the weather is great, as there are so many terrific places to sit out in the sunshine having an icy cold beer or glass of champers with friends.

This week I had lunch at The Cheese Barrel, a new restaurant that only opened its doors last September and which I had heard good things about. They are mostly open during the day only, although they do have the occasional theme night ie Spanish cheese/tapas night.

You can choose a ‘regional tasting plate’ for 2, from Australia, France, Spain or Italy, OR you can select individual cheeses and add your own choice of condiments/sides – olives, crackers, figs, fruit bread etc.

We went for the French tasting plate (pictured above), plus we added a Tasmanian cheddar (the tiny wedge you can see in the background!). The cheeses were all brands or types I hadn’t tried before, and were all delicious. The portions were not large, and to be honest I think this was quite an expensive lunch for the serving size. For us it was a comfortable amount for 2 girls for lunch, but someone like my 21 y.o. son (a 6′ tall streak with hollow legs!) could have eaten this platter by himself without a problem and still wanted more!

The wine list was from the adjacent Olive Farm Wines, and I had a glass of the Shimmer sparkling, which was quite young and fruity tasting and went with the cheese very well. The platter came with tasting notes and recommended wines, but I just always reckon champagne is good with everything!

The cheeses are available to buy – which we did! Quite pricey, but good for a special occasion.

I like this place, and I like to support local industry, but considering the value for money I think there are better options around in this area – a nice lunch for something different though.

Happy Summer Fooding!

King Prawns As Made By The Experts (Not Me!)

http://www.notquitenigella.com

At work I have to do half an hour of “shelving” in the afternoon, on each week day that I work, and we have a rotating roster each month of which type of item it is our turn to shelve, ie Junior Fiction, Audio Books etc. At the moment I am responsible for Non-Fiction 000-500 (very dreary- computers, religion, self-help etc.), but if I finish my bit and still have time I help out with whatever there is most of waiting to be shelved. I particularly like to pick out the 641’s – the cookbooks – because then I can have a nice browse whilst putting them in order on the shelves!

Last week, I came across the Doyles restaurant seafood cookbook. Doyles is a famous Sydney based restaurant chain, begun at Watson’s Bay on Sydney Harbour in 1885, and still run by the same (Doyle) family. I rarely go to Sydney, but when I do I make a point of going to Doyles for lunch.

I’ve been there several times over the last 20 years, and it’s a fabulous eating experience – crazily busy, totally overpriced (check out the menu, gulp), because they are so famous they can charge what they like, and you have to book weeks in advance if you want to sit outside on the beachfront. But, the atmosphere’s amazing (helped by the wine??? maybe) and the food excellent – the seafood is always so fresh it’s just about leaping out of the fishing boat on to your table! Plus, it’s great with kids as they can play on the sand in front of you quite happily, keeping them from getting bored and hence making a more pleasant outing for you as a parent.

The cookbook reminded me of the most delicious king prawns you can imagine – stuffed and crumbed, with a kind of fruity, herby, macadamia stuffing mixture. I’ve had this as an entree and I knew that the website used to have a lot of their recipes on it, so I went looking for this prawn one, but they seem to have removed actual recipes and now only offer advice on general seafood preparation, plus a “recipe of the day”.

I went back to the cookbook at work, and sure enough, here is the recipe. Actually, it looks like a lot of effort for something so small, and I’m not sure I could do it without the stuffing/crumbs all falling off when being cooked – they come out very big, at the restaurant. But if you can be bothered with it, these are uber-awesome to eat.

I’ve written the recipe exactly as stated, so the quantities are a bit uncertain, and I’ve never seen spinach in tins????  I’d have thought fresh or frozen would work just as well.

I’m thinking maybe I’ll just go back there some time and eat the real thing……with a seafood platter to follow, copious amounts of wine to wash it all down, and a water taxi to get me back across the harbour…..sounds good???

John Doyle’s Stuffed King Prawns With A Rich Sauce

24 large green (raw) king prawns

beer batter (I don’t have the recipe for this so use whatever beer batter you like)

oil for frying

Filling:

6 slices thick bacon, rind removed

1 medium-sized tin spinach

1 onion

butter

1 clove garlic, crushed

1 large egg, beaten

parsley

breadcrumbs

pinch salt

1/2 cup sultanas, soaked in wine and drained

Fruity Curry Sauce:

1 small jar fruit chutney (size ??)

1 tbsp curry powder

6 fine green onions (scallions), chopped

1 small jar mayonnaise (size ???)

1 egg white, beaten

Butterfly and devein the prawns, and remove the heads. Put aside.

Finely chop bacon, and drain the spinach. Chop onion and saute in butter with garlic. Mix all filling ingredients together, using enough breadcrumbs to bind.

Fill the cut section of the prawns with the mixture, press the sides together and put aside in the fridge for a while to firm.

Prepare the sauce by blending all ingredients together carefully, adding the egg white last. Serve in a large bowl or individual dishes.

When ready to cook, dip the stuffed prawns carefully into beer batter, and fry for 5 minutes in oil a deep pan.

Serve with the fruity curry sauce.

Serves 6.

You can buy the cookbook in their merchandise area, but as I write this it is out of stock. There are a heap of other fabulous seafood recipes in the book, tried and true favourites from this fantastic Sydney icon.

Happy Fooding!

(More information & article about the above photo can be found at www.notquitenigella.com)

Another Greek Review…

I’ve been in Brisbane for 10 days, attending the wonderful Koala Conventions annual embroidery week –  loads of fun, fantastic stitching workshops, and LOTS of food! Last Tuesday night we went as a large group, to Kapsali Greek restaurant.

The food was a banquet organised specially for function groups, so large platters were brought out, first of dips, then hot treats like calamari and saganaki.

Between courses the waiters got up and did some Greek dancing, then they made all of us get up and have a go – in fact the whole restaurant pretty much joined in. Lots of fun.

Main course platters included lamb that just melted in the mouth, and delicious garlic potatoes. By then we were all so full because we had pigged out on the dips and cheese, so quite a bit was left on the platters. I hate to see food go to waste but we just couldn’t eat it all. As for dessert (baklava and fresh fruit) I couldn’t touch a thing.

A great night, lots of laughter and big garlic breath fumes in our room (I was sharing with my mum, who flew to Brisbane from Melbourne to join me for the embroidery week) afterwards!

I fly home to Perth today with mountains of washing to do, 2 new embroidery projects to complete (I did actually finish the 3rd one, which is the first time ever that I’ve been able to do that within the workshop week) and a lot of stuff to unpack. A wonderful 10 days was had by all.

Happy Fooding!

Elies Tent

Here’s another restaurant review for you…….I love Middle Eastern food – Lebanese, Arabian etc. so I was really looking forward to this meal at Elies Tent.

Overall opinion – quite nice, but not outstanding and I think I’ll try elsewhere before I go back again.

Hummus & Babaganoush

We had a banquet as this was the best value and is a good way to try a bit of everything. Whilst the dips were pretty good (hummus and babaganoush) I’m sure the pita bread to go with it was just a bought one from the supermarket – VERY dry and brittle – whereas it should be piping hot and soft, served freshly out of the oven.

Falafels & lamb puffs

The nibbles of falafels and lamb puffs were delicious, as were the lamb and chicken kebabs – a tad burnt but for my taste I didn’t mind that really.

Lamb & chicken kebabs

The tabbouleh was superb – lemony fresh and salt with loads of fresh flat-leafed parsley; my photo of that turned out blurry though 😦

Finally there was a big plate of rice, which was quite sweet with cinnamon, fruit and almonds in it – very gluggy – topped with shaved cooked chicken and lamb that was very dry. I ate as much as I could anyway as I hate waste, but in the end we really did leave quite a bit on the plates.

Meat & rice

It was worth a try, but I won’t go back there again except maybe for a big bowl of their tabbouleh one lunchtime!

Happy Fooding!

Mez – Greek Restaurant Review

Grilled Haloumi

Lots of garlic, tender chunks of mouthwatering meat, terrific presentation, HUGE portion sizes, great fast service, friendly staff and a $22 discount thanks to the Entertainment Card!

Grilled Calamari

That sums up my experience at Mez Greek restaurant in Northbridge. I have nothing negative to say about this place, which is right up there with George’s in Subiaco, my up-til-now favourite Greek place in Perth.

Lamb Kleftiko

Awesomely spectacular meal.

Happy Fooding!

Some More Meals….

Beetroot & Orange Cured Salmon

Food makes such a great topic for taking photos. Here are some of the meals enjoyed last week when I was away….totally scrumptious to look at and mostly to taste as well.

Chicken & Mushroom Pot Pie

The salmon and chicken dishes above were from Red Hill Brewery Cafe. I had the salmon (does that surprise you…) and it was divine BUT way too small – it was supposed to be a “light meal” but I was still very hungry after this tiny portion of just a few mouthfuls – more like a tapas plate than a meal for one. I tasted the chicken pie and it too was delicious. I had to have a cheese platter to fill me up (below) and this was mouthwateringly good – the cheese was a locally made camembert from Red Hill Cheese, that had been slightly warmed so it literally melted onto the warm fruit & nut bread.

Cheese Board

Later the same day, I went to The Bay in Mornington, for dinner – herbed calamari for me (I said no to chips and just had salad), and a chicken parma and arancini balls were enjoyed by others.

Then on Monday, before flying home, my son and I had lunch at one of my favourite pubs in the city, PJ O’Brien’s. It is supposed to be Irish but apart from Irish Stew, Beef & Guinness Pie and loads of Irish beer on tap, it’s really just normal pub fare. I love the atmosphere here and the food’s always great. I had a chicken caesar salad and it was out of this world, crispy bacon and a yummy poached egg, mmmmm delicious.

A lot of food was partaken of, in just a few days – apart from the 21st party, and the meals I’ve already told you about, I had fish from the local fish & chip shop twice (I usually don’t whinge about the differences between the states, but the grilled flake is sooooooo much better in Victoria, and way cheaper too). I’m in recovery mode now and made soup today to get back to healthy living….

Happy Fooding!