Posted by anthony at 9:07 AM | Permalink

Appropriately named Loose Produce in Como has something for the kids to do over the school holidays. They'll be running a series of cooking classes from the 11th to the 20th of January on things such as Rocky Road Clusters, Hamburgers, and Rice Paper Rolls.

Numbers are limited and for more details and bookings contact Keryn or Nikki on (08) 9474 9100.

Posted by anthony at 2:25 PM | Permalink

How often have we all been caught out by a menu which sounded like one thing but looked, or was, totally different when it arrived? Too many! What makes it worse is that you may well have enjoyed the dish more had your expectations not been diverted in another direction. “It’s nice” we say, “It’s just not what I expected”.

A couple of months ago on a trip to Margaret River, a dish was described as lamb fillets on artichoke mash. Great, I thought. I love globe artichokes and as it was spring, assumed the restaurant was making the best of the season’s bounty. When it came (suspiciously white) it was clearly Jerusalem artichoke – a very different beastie. In fact, it is a member of the sunflower family not really an artichoke at all and a VERY different flavour and texture from what I was expecting. When the menu says whiting tempura, I expect a piece of that fish – not a mousse that could be anything. At a swanky inner city restaurant a fellow diner was served what had been described as slow cooked beef fillet. Now I wondered then and there why you’d need to slow cook the tenderest part of the cow, however we were curious. It turned out to be braised beef cheeks which were served in that familiar shape of the fillet slice. Again, a completely different expectation. Two of us loved that unctuous, gelatinous, wonderful cut of meat that just falls apart and melts in the mouth when cooked properly, however the new owner of the dish did not! The maitre d’ said when questioned “Diners won’t eat it when we call it beef cheeks but will order it when we describe it otherwise”. I wonder how many are sent back! These are just a couple of examples of diners not being treated as though there have more than a couple of brain cells knocking about in their heads! Today’s diners are mostly very savvy with a huge range of food and cooking styles. I believe we would rather know exactly what the menu means rather than be mislead or ‘babied’. If it’s scrambled eggs say that – not buttered eggs. If it’s mutton or hogget then say so as both those meats have tremendous flavours and textures when prepared properly. And so on and on and on…

Am I the only one experiencing this? Does this attitude from a small number of restaurants get your capretto? Let us know.

-Verity

Posted by anthony at 8:55 AM | Permalink

The traditional family time in Japan is not Christmas, which is for dating, but New Year. Families will gather together in their home towns and spend a few days doing not much at all. Mothers are included in the inactivities so the family feeds on a kind of multi-layered hamper of food to last through the break. If you're interested in snacking on metaphor laden food over the New Year, Yahachi in Subiaco will be home-delivering osechi-ryori on New Year's Eve.

You can find out more at their site.

Posted by anthony at 8:19 AM | Permalink

It's entirely possible that you knew a lot of people that looked like this in the seventies but if you do recognise anybody from these photographs in front of Papa Luigi's in Fremantle around 1976, let us know.

Many thanks to Tim Johnson for the portraits:

My wife and I arrived in Fremantle in February 1974 not long after spending a year living in the hills of Florence, Italy. After asking to be posted as a school teacher in Fremantle because we had read about Fremantle being "...a little bit of Italy.", my wife and I explored all of Fremantle, concentrating on the Italian delis and cafes of South Terrace. In 1976 I decided to photograph South Terrace. Now teaching at North Lake High School in Coolbellup, the “Coobi Boys” in my classes warned me about the “Freo Boys” around Papa Luigi’s. Rivalry abounded. This was the pre-al fresco dining era when the “Freo Boys” dominated the footpath and mothers warned their daughters about venturing south of the High Street Mall. I asked the boys lounging on the window sills of Papa Luigi’s if I could photograph them thinking that they contributed to the Fremantle scene. They readily agreed, anything for something different.

Posted by anthony at 9:26 PM | Permalink

This wonderful dessert is an alternative to the Christmas Pud with an Italian twist. It is made when berries are at their peak, served cold and can be topped with Cardamom Cream. Have fun with the berry mix (1 kilo).

10 slices of Panettone, thick slices
100g black currants
100g red currants
100g blueberries
150g blackberries
200g raspberries
350g strawberries
3/4 cup caster sugar
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 tablespoons kirsch or Cointreau (optional)
4 tablespoons water

extra fruit, and leaves to place around the base of the pudding to decorate

Cardamom Cream
6 cardamom pods, seeds from, very finely crushed
1 1/4 cups double cream

6 servings
35 minutes

Cut a large round from one of the slices of Panettone to fit in the bottom of a six-cup pudding bowl or basin. Cut the remaining slices in half and use to line the sides of the bowl, overlapping the slices slightly and trimming where necessary. Once you have finished lining the bowl, you should have enough Panettone left over for the top.

Put the redcurrants, blackcurrants and blueberries in a saucepan with the sugar, lemon juice, water and kirsch or Cointreau (if using) and heat gently until the sugar has dissolved and the juices start to flow from the berries. Add the remaining fruits - the blackberries, raspberries and strawberries - and heat gently for 5 minutes or until the berries have just softened. Remove from the heat.

Spoon the fruit and juice into the lined pudding bowl and cover with the reserved bread, then cover with plastic wrap. Stand the bowl on a plate or small plastic tray to catch any juices. Place a small, flat plate on top of the pudding and add some extra weight, ideally about 1 kilo. Two tubs of margarine would do the job! Chill the pudding overnight.

When you are ready to serve the pudding, remove the weights and the plate and plastic wrap, and using a palette knife, gently loosen it from the sides of the bowl. Invert the pudding onto a plate, preferably one with a small lip, to retain the juices and keep them on the plate. Shake gently to release the pudding, decorate with extra fruit around the base of the pudding and serve the pudding with cardamom cream.

Cardamom Cream: Mix together the cardamom seeds and the cream and chill for two hours.

Tip:To prevent gaps appearing in the Panettone as you line the bowl, trim the sides of each slice at an angle so that the slices fit more easily around the bowl.

Posted by anthony at 7:48 PM | Permalink