Afternoon tea at Athenaeum Hotel

As a little Xmas holiday treat this year, I took A to afternoon tea as
he has never been all the years he'd lived in London.

This is probably the best afternoon tea I've ever been to. The combination of
the exquisite sandwiches, scones and patisserie served in three
courses, private sumptuous settings, unlimited tea changes and
attentive service. I can see why this place won the Tea Guild Awards
for 2012. All the more fun being A's first ever afternoon tea.

Love love loved it!

First course of sandwiches - you can have as much as you like!

Ham and marmalade, cucumber, smoked salmon, egg mayo and turkey and cranberry. All so simple but executed perfectly on beautiful soft bread.

Our second course of hot buttery scones and being festive menu, mince pies.

Grand finale of the dessert trolley

Top 5 salt beef sandwiches in London

> Subject: Top 5 salt beef sandwiches in London
> http://youngandfoodish.com/london/top-5-salt-beef-sandwiches-in-london/
>
>
> Sent from my iPad

Bouillabaisse

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"Bouillabaisse with haddock, sea bass, line caught cod, prawns and scallops. A bit deluxe for a Monday night but really felt like it. "

Ingredients:

3 pounds of at least 3 different kinds of fish fillets, fresh or quick frozen (thaw first)

1/2 cup Olive oil

1-2 pounds of Oysters, clams, or mussels

1 cup cooked shrimp, crab, or lobster meat, or rock lobster tails

1 cup thinly sliced onions

4 Shallots, thinly sliced OR the white parts of 2 or 3 leeks, thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic, crushed

1 large tomato, chopped, or 1/2 cup canned tomatoes

1 sweet red pepper, chopped

4 stalks celery, thinly sliced

2-inch slice of fennel or 1 teaspoon of fennel seed

3 sprigs fresh thyme or 3/4 teaspoon dried thyme

1 bay leaf

2-3 whole cloves

Zest of half an orange

1/2 teaspoon powdered saffron

2 teaspoons salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 cup clam juice or fish broth

2 Tbps lemon juice

2/3 cup white wine

Sliced French bread

1 Tbsp hot fish stock or clam broth.v

2 cloves peeled garlic

1 small red hot pepper

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup soft white bread, pulled into bits

1/2 cup olive oil

Directions:

1. Heat 1/4 cup of the olive oil in a large (6-qt) saucepan. When it is hot, add onions and shallots (or leeks). Sauté for a minute, then add crushed garlic (more or less to taste), and sweet red pepper. Add tomato, celery, and fennel. Stir the vegetables into the oil with a wooden sppon until well coated. Then add another 1/4 cup of olive oil, thyme, bay leaf, cloves and the orange zest. Cook until the onion is soft and golden but not brown.
2. Cut fish fillets into 2-inch pieces. Add the pieces of fish and 2 cups of water to the vegetable mixture. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, uncovered, for about 10 minutes. Add oysters, clams or mussels (though these may be omitted if desired) and shrimp, crabmeat or lobster tails, cut into pieces or left whole.
3. Add saffron, salt, pepper. Add clam juice, lemon juice, and white wine. Bring to a simmer again and cook about 5 minutes longer.
4. At serving time taste and correct the seasoning of the broth, adding a little more salt or pepper if need be, and maybe a touch of lemon juice. Into each soup bowl place a thick slice of crusty French bread, plain or slighlty toasted. Sppon the bouillabaisse over the bread. If desired, serve with Sauce Rouille.

Serves 6.

Notes

Add 6 scallops pan fried over high heat for deluxe version.

Blitz some of the fish and soup together to get a velvety soup to pour over the fish, prawns and scallops.

Bright Courtyard, London

Bright Courtyard sits directly opposite the Royal China Club on Baker Street and it's easy to contemplate that this restaurant was intended to challenge the RCC in the posh Chinese restaurant stakes.  The modern Chinese decor reminded us a bit of the Princess Gardens in Mayfair.  Our friends G&S had stumbled upon this place to avoid yet another frustratingly long wait at the popular Royal China restaurant (not to be confused with the posh Royal China Club) further down Baker Street.  They had raved about the hot towels and good food so we had to come and see for ourselves.

Uncharacteristically, A and I decided to ride our bikes down on this lazy Sunday morning.  Narrowly avoiding being squashed by three buses on the busy Baker Street I was relieved to arrive at Bright Courtyard safely, and see that there were bike racks directly outside the entrance.  Fab, we can even keep an eye on the bikes through the floor to ceiling windows!

We were seated quickly upon entry - though there was mild confusion at which the waitress was about to seat the elderly couple with their grandkids at our table.  I had to chortle back a laugh as the grandpa gestured to his own table as if to say "Sorry I think we're going to sit at a separate table".  The tables were well spaced out and our table for 6 would normally probably sit 8 at other Chinese restaurants. 

But for us, it's always about the food and we were delighted as we worked our weigh through the dim sum favourites.  The skin of the Shanghainese dumplings (小笼包) were so delicate that it was reminiscent of Ding Tai Feng (鼎泰奉) in Yong Kang street in Taipei.  The top was a little thickly creased and filling a little firm but perfectly delicious morsel.  The shrimp dumplings (虾饺) were full of plump whole shrimp pieces, and the pork puff pastry (叉烧酥) delightfully crunchy. The turnip cake (萝卜糕) was a little lacking in the mushroom and Chinese sausage goodies - but aren't they always in Chinese restaurants - though very moist and tender.  On G&S's recommendation we tried the cuttlefish cheong fun (鱿鱼肠粉) - we'd never had it before - and it was a lot of fun. Crisp pieces of cuttlefish deep fried then wrapped in cheong fun. What's not to love! 

All the dim sum are on the small side, but seems somewhat appropriate considering the delicateness of the chef's handiwork.

The final test was the dessert.  I'd been disappointed by Princess Garden's Heavenly Scent (杨子甘露) dessert which is a sweet cold dessert made up of mango blended coconut milk, sago balls, grapefruit pieces and (very importantly) fresh* mango.  I'm pleased to report that unlike Princess Garden's dessert, the Heavenly Scent was in fact made of fresh mango as promised by the waiter.  Ok so the mango was a little on the green side ... but it was indeed fresh!

All in all, excellent dim sum, ability to book and decent service and having found an alternative quiet bike route (on our way back) means this place is going to be our choice of dim sum venue from now on.  We can't wait to go back to see if this place holds up!

43-45 Baker Street London,W1U 8EW
www.lifefashion-sh.com | Tel: 0207 4866 998
Bookings recommended (online booking available)

Le Relais secret sauce

Our adaption of a recipe from the internet:

1 cup dry white wine

1 cup minced shallots

6 anchovy fillets, chopped

1 cup low-sodium beef broth 

100 gms unsalted butter

1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley

1/2 cup chopped fresh chervil

1/2 cup chopped fresh tarragon

(and any other herbs you like)

2 tablespoons mustard

Either using the pan the steaks were cooked in, or another pan:

Add the wine to pan and deglaze all

the nice brown bits, dislodging them with a wooden spoon if necessary. 

Add the beef stock, shallots, anchovies, and cook until the liquid reduces to a glaze.  Make sure you reduce the sauce sufficiently at this point to around one cup (but its not too salty).

Remove from heat, whisk in the butter a couple of cubes at a time, then add the mustard and finally add the herbs.  

For the next recipe, we'd probably try adding some green peppercorns at the start and possibly even some bone marrow for more depth of flavor! 

Shanghainese sweet & sour porks ribs (糖醋排骨）

I've always loved these sweet & sour pork ribs, with their sticky molassy brown sauce and the meat meltingly tender just about pulling away from the bone.

I found a recipe from Meishi.com Chinese website, which is surprisingly quick.  I would have thought it takes hours to get the ribs tender and sticky but you could get this dish sorted within an hour.  The original recipe is here in Chinese, and I've posted my English translation below with a few of my own additions.

Ingredients:

• pork spare ribs - 1 kg
• salt - 3 grams
• spring onions - 6 stalks, sliced into 5-6 cm lengths
• ginger - 6 slices
• rice wine - 2 tbspn
• light soy sauce (生抽) - 3 tbspn
• dark soy sauce (老抽) - 2 tbspn
• rice vinegar - 5 tbspn
• white sugar - 45 grams
• white sesame seeds - 1/2 tspn
• springs of coriander (as much as you like)

As with most Chinese cooking, the above quantities are suggestions and while it works well, you can definitely adapt it to your own taste buds.

Method:

1. Cut the pork ribs into 4 cm lengths.  I use a large cleaver for this and swing it down heavily to get a clean cut.  Place ribs in a bowl with the rice wine and 1 tbpsn of the light soy sauce.  Mix well and leave to marinate for 20 mins. 
2. Heat up a saucepan, then add around 2-3 tbspn of oil and heat using a high flame.  When the oil is hot, turn the heat to medium and pan fry the ribs until they are half cooked, moving the pieces about when they are frying.  Remove the ribs from the pan.
3. Add a little more oil to the pan.  Once the oil is hot, add the spring onion and ginger and cook for a minute or two until fragrant.  Add the half cooked ribs, the remainder of the soy sauce and sufficient hot water to just cover the ribs.  Then add the white sugar and rice vinegar.  Simmer on low heat for 30 minutes.
4. After 30 minutes, check the flavour of the sauce.  If its not salty enough, add a little bit more sauce.  Afterwards, turn up the heat to high to reduce the sauce. Keep on high heat until the sauce has reduced and thickened to a nice sticky gravy.  This may take 5-15 mins depending on how hot your high heat is! 
5. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and coriander. 
6. Serve with plain white rice & lots of Chinese greens like baby bok choi (these are so rich you'd want something quite light).

I've found that this sweet & sour sauce is also great for coating a crispy pork belly (I'll post the recipe to that next time!).

Guacamole kinda afternoon

GU chocolate cheesecakes

Just love the gorgeous ramekins they come in, so handy for making more home cooked desserts or holding dips or sauces!

Banana "bruffins"

We were recently left with a lot of ripe bananas and I couldn't quite face another banana in my morning cereal so A decided to make a banana loaf from Mary Berry's "Baking Bible".  Unfortunately we realised we didn't have any bread tins in the house so these "bruffins" (bread muffins) were born.

You'll need:

100 g softened butter
175 g caster sugar
2 large eggs
2 ripe bananas
225 self-raising flour
1 level teaspoon baking powder
2 tablespoons milk

(Makes 12 muffins)

1.  Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees celcius.  Line a 12 x muffin tray with muffin paper cups.

2.  Place all the measured ingredients into a mixing bowl and beat for about 2 minutes until the mixture is just evenly combined.  Be careful not to overbeat the muffin mixture otherwise they will taste a little tough.  Divide the mixture up into the 12 muffin cups evenly.

3.  Bake in the pre-heated oven for about 20 mins until the tops of the muffins are just golden and they are well risen.  A fine skewer inserted should come out clean.  Leave to cool in the muffin trays.

You can serve these with vanilla ice-cream as a dessert or have a couple for breakfast with a tall glass of milk. 

Enjoy! :)

It's just so pretty when it snows

In London ...

We woke up to a blanket of snow on Saturday, which continued throughout the day.  It looked more like a french ski resort than NW London.  Somehow the snow just makes everything look so clean and enchanting, a bit of a winter wonderland.

Very very pretty and great day to stomp outdoors with my mukluks. 


A bit more and we would have gotten out the snowboards I think!

Macadamia nut & white chocolate brownies - recipe

 

This recipe is from Ottolenghi's first cookbook "The Cookbook".  So far I'm really loving the cookbook as the recipes are really spot on.  Apparently the key with baking brownies is not to overbake them.  This means you have to take it out earlier than you think it will be done to avoid it turning into into a cake. 


Ingredients:

• 300g dark chocolate, broken into pieces
• 200g unsalted butter, plus some extra for greasing the pan
• 280g plain flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 free-range eggs
• 230g caster sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla essence
• 200g macadamia nuts, toasted for 5 mins
• 200g white chocolate chips (or chocolate broken into pieces)

Steps:

1. Pre-heat the oven to 170 degrees celcius. 
2. Brush a 20 cm tin square pan or similar sized round pan with melted butter and line with baking paper.
3. Melt the dark chocolate with the butter in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water until fully melted.  The bowl should not touch the water, and take the chocolate butter mixture off the heat once it has melted.  If it get too hot, then the brownies can get a bit greasy when it is baked. 
4. Whisk the eggs, sugar and vanilla essence in a large bowl until just combined.
5. Add the melted chocolate butter mixture and mix lightly.
6. Fold in the sifted flour.
7. Add the macadamia nuts and chocolate chips.
8. Bake in the oven for 25 minutes or until a skewer comes out with gooey crumbs (not completely dry).  The top of the brownies should be completely dry.

These were my first batch of brownies and when they came out, they were a bit on the greasy side.  But I let them rest overnight and they firmed up very nicely to a rather dense fudgy texture on the next day.  They were so rich I had to cut them into small squares as I was worried people would OD on chocolate. 

For my next batch I'm thinking of adding raspberries, and maybe almonds or hazelnuts.

What's your favourite flavour of brownies?  Let me know!

Macadamia nut & white chocolate brownies

I'm not sure whether I've never made brownies before yesterday.  After reading a couple of my baking books I discovered that the recipe wasn't as complex as other seemingly simple cakes, like sponges!  Recipe to follow soon.  I promise.  

(Source of recipe: Ottolenghi - The Cookbook)

Stack of brownies, which disappeared pretty quickly. Into my tummy.

Bakerella Cake Pops

I had no idea what cake pops were when they popped out on my screen this morning, turns out they are gorgeous lollipops that you can stick onto top of your cake.

Bakerella makes these fantastic lil cake pops out with cake, melted candy and fun candy bits like sugar pearls for the sheep below.  Super creative and very cute!

Bahhhhh!

Made with mini and regular sized oreos, how cool is that?

New addition to our family

Fire engine red cast iron Le Creuset casserole pot.  We've put it to use already, but more about that another day!  

It's just so pretty!

Top 10 tips for food photography

Some really useful tips on food photography:

I particularly like the one about keeping the background clean, I think I definitely need to do that more often!

http://www.photoble.com/photography-tips-tricks/10-food-photography-tips-to-make-it-look-tasty/

http://www.photoradar.com/techniques/tips/15-food-photography-tips?page=0%2C1&t=1271332508

Sof,

Mist, Japanese ramen, Hong Kong

Since our trip to Hokkaido in February this year, A and I have been trying to perfect the ni-tamago recipe. A fellow food blogger Chubby Hubby had helpfully posted a recipe which we tried out a few times.

But sometimes you just want to have it without the rigamole of cooking it.  Mist, an up market ramen restaurant in Hong Kong (is that an oxymoron?) gives this satisfaction.

It's the only place in Hong Kong so far where I've had ni-tamago cooked properly, a soft boiled egg marinated with the yolk still gooey inside.  Apparently the ingredients have been sourced from all over the place, with the eggs from Toyama and soy sauce from Chiba.  Well whatever it is, it works and the broth is flavoursome and the ramen tastes ... as good as ramen has ever tasted.

The menu is not cheap at around HK$100 per bowl of ramen but I think its worth every penny.  Try their ramen sushi as well, it's an interesting take on sushi ... who says you can't make sushi out of anything other than rice?

Mist
4 Sun Wui Road, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong  
+852 2881 5006
Reservations recommended 
http://www.mist.com.hk

 

Creamy mushroom puffs

Mushroom puffs with quail egg & thyme

"I think we have a winner!" declared my friend D as he munched his way through this little bite sized canape.  This was the same afternoon tea that I made the prawns with garlic aioli.  "Yes", he nodded, "this is my favourite".

I'd made this mushroom canape many years ago but using short crust pastry as a base.  We already had a strawberry tart on the menu so I decided to use puff pastry instead, which makes this recipe quite similar to the mushroom vol au vents that had their heydays in the 80s.  The good thing is that this version is simpler to make. I like simple.

This recipe makes you about 12 of these little puffs. 

You will need:

• read made puff pastry, one large sheet (around 30 cm x 30 cm)
• cookie cutter, around 5-6 cm.  You can use larger puffs of course but
• regular sized muffin tray
• 10 large brown mushrooms, sliced
  
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 large sprig of parsley
• 1 small sprig of thyme 
• 6 quail eggs
• 4 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 cup of cream
• 2 tablespoons milk
•  salt & pepper to taste

Puff pastry shells

You can find the frozen puff pastry in the frozen section of most supermarkets.  It's either rolled up so it comes like cling wrap which you can unroll or flat sheets.  I find that London has the rolled up ones, whereas in Australia they tend to come as flat packs.  Both work fine but with the rolled up variety the important thing is to wait until it's defrosted before you unroll otherwise they will break pretty easily.  I usually let them sit out for about 10-15 mins before I need to use it.  That said, if you leave it too long they will completely defrost and getting a bit soggy which can be hard to handle.

To make the puff pastry shells, cut out the round shapes of the puff pastry with your cookie cutter.  You can use a plain round one or a "scalloped" one shown below.  I had no idea the curly edged ones were called "scalloped" until A looked it up for me but there you go.  Brush the muffin trays with some of the olive oil and place your round puff pastry into each muffin hole, pushing down so it makes a nice little cup shape.  Brush the puff pastry with a little milk.  This will give it the nice golden colour as it bakes.

[Note: At this stage, you can either place the mushroom mixture on top of the puffy pastry (which will help weigh the pastry down, but means your pastry won't be as crisp), or line the pastry with baking paper and baking beans/rice and "blind bake".  I tried the latter but the puff pastry was too strong and puffed up anyway!  I would just let the puff pastry puff up which is kinda fun, and then press it down as described below to create the cavity you need to add the mixture. ]

Place in a pre-heated oven (170 degrees celcius) and bake for 10 mins or until light golden brown.  Now you'll find that it has completely puffed up.  We want to create a hole in the middle of the puff where you want to place the mushroom mixture. So using a spoon or other round heavy object which will leave about half to one cm rim around the pastry shell (I used the top of my wine stopper), push down the middle so that you create a bowl shape.

Mushroom filling

Pan fry the sliced onions in hot olive oil with the chopped garlic and parsley until the mushrooms are nice and golden brown.  Add the cream and cook for another 10 mins until you get a thick consistency, add the salt & pepper to taste.

Boil the quail eggs for 3 mins and peel like normal hard boiled eggs, or 1 mins for a soft runny yolk. Slice in half.  Be careful to spoon the quail eggs gently into the pan of boiling water and not to cook them for too long otherwise they will implode, the shells are incredibly thin.  You'll see in the picture below that I had that accident with a few of my eggs!

Putting it all together

This is my favourite part.  Spoon the mushroom mixture into the puff pastry shell until it is just full.  Top with the halved quail egg and a sprig of thyme.  Voila!  Ready to be served.

What I like about this canape is that the puff pastry is incredibly light but when you bite into it you get this burst of creamy herby mushrooms.  The quail egg on top adds an extra richness and luxe factor as a canape.

King prawn toast with whole grain mustard aioli

Perfect for afternoon tea or canapes

This was a bit of an experiment for an afternoon tea we had at our place recently.  The whole recipe is very simple though, and will only take about 20 mins to put together.

Ingredients:
(makes 12)

• 6 pieces of sliced bread (I used white but you could use wholemeal)
• a scalloped cookie cutter around 5-6 cm
• 12 pieces of cooked king prawn (they came pre-cooked from my supermarket but you can gently cook them until they are pink if you can't find the cooked variety)
• 1 cucumber, thinly sliced into 3-4 mm slices
• sprigs of fresh parsley to decorate

For the aioli: 

• 1/2 cup mayonnaise
• 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 2 tablespoons whole grain mustard
• 2 table spoons lemon juice
• salt & pepper to taste

Aioli is basically garlic mayonnaise.  I first discovered it in Spain when it was served on top of a tortilla, and then together with fiduea, which I call the noodle version of paella.  Fiduea is deserving of its own post some other day when I manage to make it!  Anyway back to aioli, the creamy mayo with the garlic kick just brings out the flavour of foods, particularly seafood, so well.  Now I find it hard to have tortilla without it.  Aioli goes really well with prawns but I didn't have time to make the aioli from scratch so I experimented a bit with the store bought mayo.

1. 

   Scalloped cookie cutter

   Using the cookie cutter, cut two rings of bread from each slice of bread.
2. Toast the bread in the oven at around 180 degrees celcius until just golden brown, which should take around 5-10 mins.
3. While the bread is toasting, you can make your aioli.  Chop your garlic as finely as possible, using a food processor if possible.  Add the rest of the ingredients and mix thoroughly - it should be a nice thick consistency.  You can vary the quantities of the ingredients depending on your taste, e.g. whether you like it more tangy (more lemon) or garlicky! 
4. Place a slice of cucumber on the toast, topped by a small spoonful of aioli and then the king prawn.  The aioli will help keep the prawn in place.
5. Add a sprig of parsley.
6. Serve within 2-3 hours. 

Tang yuan recipe

Going to try this sometime soon!

• 50g of raw unsalted peanut
• 1tbsp of peanut butter
• 1tbsp of icing sugar (taste and add more if you like it sweeter)
• 1 pinch of cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp of grounded ginger

Ginger syrup

• 50g of fresh ginger
• 80g of sugarcane rock sugar
• 10g of pandan leaves
• 10g of chrysanthemum flowers
• 3 cups of water

National Restaurant Awards

The Ledbury was named National Restaurant of the Year 2010, led by Australian chef Brett Graham, the Notting Hill restaurant also received the Best Front of House Award.
Other awards handed out by Restaurant Magazine included The Restaurateurs' Choice, which went to Restaurant Nathan Outlaw (at the St Enodoc Hotel in Cornwall), and Best Gastropub, which went to The Hardwick in Abergavenny (in Wales, near Cardiff).

Rest of the details here: http://www.nationalrestaurantawards.co.uk/.