Pabu, Collingwood

We made reservations bright and early for this restaurant, but we still got bar seats even though there were a couple of tables free.

Gaz thought the nine course banquet menu was a good way to taste the specialties of this restaurant. Indeed, it was recommended to us by our waitress as the ideal for two persons. The banquest costs $55 per person and includes two of their specials - tuna and salmon salad, and hachima slices.

The first few dishes came quickly. We were served miso soup and endamame, then the gyu tataki. It is thinly sliced seared beef topped with pickled ginger and spring onions with citrus soy. It was squiggled with mayo and drizzled with black sesame seeds. The beef was seared well, and the citrus had 'cooked' the thin beef slices somewhat so did not have the smooth texture normally associated with tataki. The mayo did not make the dish smoother.

In quick succession came the hamachi which were thinly sliced king fish topped with pickled ginger, pickled green chilli and spring onions in yuzu sauce. Again the acidity in the yuzu had cooked the fish somewhat so it is not the smooth texture associated with sashimi. When the dish arrived we thought that all it needed was a splash of coconut cream and it would have been a spin off from Chin Chin's kingfish sashimi dish! The pickled chilli and ginger did not add to the dish, but I may be biased because I am not a big fan of either.

Next came the maguro and salmon on rocket salad dressed with chef's secret spicy sauce and mayo. Erm.. The chef can keep the secret recipe to himself. The raw tuna and salmon chunks were fresh and delicious though.

After the salad, the restaurant became busier so the courses stopped for a long while. We could not help but stare at the window where the dishes were pushed out from the kitchen to guess which of the dishes would end up on our table. It did not help that for a time the kitchen was not completing any dishes and when they did the dishes sat at the window for some time waiting for someone to deliver them, or try to figure out where they should go.

It was a busy night indeed, and the volume meant there cannot be time wasted to re-do an order. So, when one of the skewers fell off a dish onto the counter, we saw the chef picking it and placed it back on the plate to be served.

Finally another dish appeared, this time the pork gyozas. There were four of them, which we devoured in quick four quick bites each (did I tell you this is a Jap tapas?). After another session of keeping an eye on the window, we received another dish. It was the nigiri dish, also four pieces in total. Two salmon, one ebi and one tuna, which we also devoured in four bites.

Another long wait followed, which gave us time to admire the lines of sake bottles at the bar. They don't call this place Pabu Grill and Sake for nothing! Many people ordered sake to go with their meals and there are pages and pages of varieties one could choose from. But what puzzled me is the 'grill' after the name... There was only one grill chef, and the taste of two of the skewers we received were not that great.

We were served the mixed grilled skewers next. As the waitperson was still learning, we did not find out what we were actually being served, except that they were chicken kitsune, chicken thighs, chicken and chicken. We ate them in the order they were presented. The kitsune were delicious, so much flavour! The chicken thighs were also very good, seasoned well and I could taste the smoked grill glavour. It was very nice. The last two were not chicken but pork, and beef, neither of which were seasoned nor grilled as well as the chicken thighs.

The waiting game began again. By this time we had been in the restaurant for nearly two hours and rather neglected. Thankfully by sitting at the bar there was always someone we could motion to, and we asked for more water. But they were too busy to take away the dishes piling on the counter.

The next dish was ebi karaage which was spicy marinated prawns. It was whole small unpeeled prawn deep fried to such crispiness you can eat it whole, head and all. The prawns were crispy and retained their crunch well.

The last dish we almost forgot because of the wait, but luckily did not, was thedessert which consisted of one scoop each of matcha, black sesame and yuzu sorbet. There was also half a melon mochi which tasted awesome.

I think we should have ordered individual dishes, perhaps five full dishes to get more food for money and less waiting time. Even though the waitperson who took our order assured us we would feel full with the menu, we still wanted more food, but would rather get fast food because of the wait involved.

It was good to have tried a new place, but this is not one where we would have to revisit.

Update: This restaurant is permanently closed. In 2015, the restaurant was fined $30,000 for unhygienic food practices.

Onde Onde

I made these onde onde two weeks ago, when I was craving for the sweet salty dessert and could not get them anywhere nearby.

 These little balls are a lot work to make. If they were freely available here, I would not have bothered to make them myself. Better to spend the morning lazing in bed..

 First, chop the gula melaka into tiny pieces and set aside. Then blend about 7-10 pandan leaves and mix with 250ml water. Strain the pandan juice from the pulp.

 Mix with 250gm of glutinous rice flour to form dough. Form small balls of about 10 gms each. Press some gula melaka into the balls and roll on the palms of the hand to cover.

 Drop the balls into boiling water until they float. Finally, drain and roll in dessicated coconut which had been mixed with a dash of table salt.

 The centre should be liquid sugar that bursts in the mouth. If they are not, I found a cheat's way to ensure that it happens... just microwave the onde onde for 15 seconds!

El Sabor - North Melbourne

Every so often, we pig out and eat till we can't fit another morsel of food in our mouths. Luckily it does not happen to often because even though it is a joy to have a good appetite, it is torture to eat till the stomach is almost to bursting point and still resist the urge to vomit.

We visited a new restaurant El Sabor on Victoria St in North Melbourne. We had bought one of their 9 course degustation sets for $59 per couple. These are 8 of the 9 dishes we ate, with the most memorable being the beef cigars (crispy!) and churros (the melted chocolate was just awesome).

We really liked the friendly service from the lovely waitresses who spoke Spanish and the delicious food. Some of the dishes did have recurring ingredients which I got a little tired of, but cannot complain because the restaurant needs to turn out dishes as quickly as possible for these types of deals. For example, corn chips made two appearances first on its own with dips then as nachos topped with guacamole, melted cheese and sour cream. And guacamole and tomato salsa made many an appearance either on top of a dish or on the side as dip.

This is a restaurant where the food was good, and we certainly ate till we were about to burst! 

Blue and white corn chips with dips

Grilled corn on the cob

Grilled chicken wings

Chicken tamales

Beef cigars

Churros with melted chocolate

Fish taco

Beef Empanada

Cloudehill - Olinda

Spring and I have a love hate relationship. I love the flowers that that blooms during spring but I don't like the hay fever that comes with it. I used to brag about how immune I was to hay fever. Not any more.

So when Gaz and I visited the Spring Festival at Cloudehill Gardens, Olinda last weekend for some flower gazing, I made sure to bring lots of tissues to cope with my runny nose.

Cloudehill is a private garden, and entry fee is $10 per visit to the gardens or restaurans. Or you can join as member at $49 per annum and get free entry to the garden all year round in addition to discounts to products, free gardening advice, some free seeds and club magazine every two months. But if you have a non-member friend you'll like to go with, they'll have to pay or join as member too unless you bought them a gift membership for the same price, or if it is a family member, a family membership for $18 as long as they live at the same address.

We saw many unique plants at the gardens. There were flowers that look like little polystyrene balls, dark maroon tulips, and peonies. If you wanted heirloom plants, or unique plants then this is one of the places to get them. The Diggers Club which provides seeds and plants for sale in the garden sells many plants which are not available at the mainstream stores like Bunnings.

Flowers were grew at Cloudehill for the florist trade in the 1920s by the Woolrich family who first bought the land in 1890. In those days, the flowers you buy for your home were whatever flowers were in season. These days, with more sophisticated growing methods and imports, one can get almost all types of flowers all year round.

One of the main attractions in the garden was two Japanese weeping maple trees. They were brought from Japan, and may have been growing for a thousand years.

Peonies are also grown in the garden. We met a specialist grower at the festival who shared his tips of growing peonies with us. Peonies may grow wild by the roadside in China where it originated from, but in Australia there is not enough lime in the soil for the flowers to grow. So, in order to grow peonies one must add a thick layer of lime and once the roots are established in around two years, the flowers will follow.

We bought lunch at the deck, where there were only two options - hot dogs with gourmet sausages for $10 or paella for $12. We got one of each and went very hungry because there was only one small scoop of paella. Look at the picture below... The rice didn't even fill half of the bowl.

Nevertheless, we had a great time at the garden, saw many unique plants, broadened our knowledge of gardening (did you know there are such things as $5 seeds, yes one seed for $5, and F1 seeds?) and enjoyed the sun while doing so. But next time if we do return, we will pack a picnic.

O' Town - Glen Waverley

There are a few things that differentiates O Town and the rest of the Malaysian / Asian eateries in Glen Waverley as we discovered last week. O Town is the only restaurant in the Glen Waverley Kingsway area and its immediate surroundings that serves Teochew dishes such as kueh chap and teochew braised duck rice. Teochew is one of the Chinese clans with their own dialect and cuisine. Li Ka Shing, the richest man of Chinese descent in the world is of Teochew heritage.

 The location of the restaurant is not ideal, being located away from the main street and the heavy pedestrian traffic on Kingsway. But on the bright side, it is easier to get a park near the restaurant and I did not have to work up my stomach acids being upset at drivers hogging Kingsway while waiting for the elusive car spot.

 We ordered the Teochew braised duck rice which had fine strips of duck and dried tofu, a hard boiled egg braised in five spice braising liquid.

There was not much duck on the plate, and likewise for the tofu. Now, I understand that pictures in the menu are for illustrative purposes etc etc but when I compared my dish with the menu picture of chunks of duck meat and beautifully arranged braised tofu on the side, I was sorely disappointed.

The serving sizes are also smaller than the other restaurants, so I was not full either.

We ordered the fried noodles O Town style which different in that it had pippies as one of the ingredient. The deshelled pippies together with prawns, chinese sausage, egg, bean sprouts and chives are fried with the noodles. The flavour was on the sweet side, but tasted good. My main gripe is that the serving size was smaller than the other places, yet the price is about the same.

I suspect this restaurant may appeal to Teochew people wanting to get a taste of home, but the small servings certainly does not appeal to me.

Bentoya - Hardware Lane

Gaz bought through Groupon, a voucher for a 9 course Japanese dinner for two at Bentoya Restaurant recently. The voucher cost $50.

When we redeemed the voucher, what we did not expect was a good quantity of good quality food. With these types of promotions, I had come to expect a big selection of fried foods (maybe because it is easier and quicker to prepare) and ordinary items such as rice and miso soup for example, contributing to the count.

At Bentoya, we were provided very prompt service. The dishes were served in quick succession,  which was good because we did not have to wait long in between courses.

The first dish was salmon carpaccio. Thin slices of salmon were topped with seaweed, finely sliced Spanish onions and surprisingly, finely grated cheese. With all the different ingredients in the dish, the taste of salmon was a little lost. It was more like salmon salad, which is not a bad thing.

Pork gyoza, which was deep fried to give a satisfying crunch to the gyoza skin.

The other entrees were takoyaki and endamame, which were not pictured. We were also provided rice and a beverage each.

One of the four mains were the fish pot, a dish I enjoyed very much. The broth was sweet, and the abundance of veges and tofu made it a very satisfying dish to eat with rice.

Wafu steak is the restaurant's specialty. It was served medium rare with a side salad of seaweed and cucumber and onion salad to add acid to the dish. It was a good combination.

Pork katsu which was liberally battered and fried to crispy heaven. The pork was still juicy inside.

The other main was chicken curry. Gaz thought it was not really special as we cook it often at home. Another dish was the vegetarian croquette.  Although it was listed on the menu, we did not receive the dish but we did not mind because by the time the third last dish arrived, we were already very full.

To end our dining experience,  we had green tea mochi which looked to be store bought, and green tea.

Overall it was a very good dinner experience.

Update: This restaurant is now closed.

Supernormal - CBD

Supernormal is a restaurant we have wanted to visit for some time so when we had some spare time this week, we took the opportunity to dine here.

Supernormal is open all day without a break between the lunch and dinner services. It is great for people like us who do not mind eating at any hour of the day. Lunch at three? No problems. Dinner at five? Yup. Snack at four, supper at seven? Perfect.

We arrived at Supernormal at three, well past the lunch rush. We were ushered to a booth table in no time at all. I did not like the cold steel topped tables and the rustic little metal plates they used to serve pumpkin seeds in. But they fit in with the industrial theme of the restaurant and the pumpkin seeds were complimentary.

We ordered steamed grouper, clams, soy dashi and wakame $35. See the muslin like clump on top of the dish? It's wakame layered upon wakame to form a block then dried and shaved. It melts in the mouth to nothingness, leaving only a sweet taste and a sense of wonderment and curiosity of what it is.

The broth so delicious and tasty that we almost licked the bowl clean.

New England lobster roll $16. I placed a pumpkin seed on the plate for size comparison. The roll is roughly half the size of my palm.

After hearing so much about the lobster roll, I had high expectations for it. It was good, the brioche was sweet and buttery and I liked the mayo in the bun but I found the lobster meat to be quite chewy.

Gaz thought the smell and taste of the bun reminded him of McDonald's Fillet O' Fish burger and it did too for me! Perhaps it was because of the mix of sugar and smell of mayo.

The rice cracker with pickled onion and Tasmanian sea urchin was a special of the day. It was $5 per cracker. The cracker was light and crunchy. The sea urchin I thought should have been creamy was more gelatinous but went well with the pickled onion.

Spanner crab salad, cabbage hearts, watercress, and miso dressing $18. We liked this dish very much, it was light and refreshing. There were actual chunks of crab meat in the salad.

The food was fresh, innovative and of good quality. But like most fancy restaurants, we did not feel full afterwards.

Kotaraya - Oakleigh South

Kotaraya in Oakleigh South is a restaurant we visited recently. It has a classier decor than most suburban Asian restaurant. Down lights, a bar, nicely painted maroon walls is classy when put into context with the predominantly $17-18 dishes served.

Kotaraya serves a mix of Malaysian and Thai food. There is also a full page dedicated to Malaysian hawker fare.

We noticed a few dishes in the menu that had won an Asian food festival award 14 and 15 years ago. Perhaps they were trailblazer dishes during that time in Aust... but 15 years is a very long time. Perhaps it is time to ditch mention of the year from the menu?

We ordered the Thai fish (award winner from a decade ago) which was fried fillets of fish topped with sauce reminiscent of tom yum flavour $18. The waitress who took our order tried to explain the dish in Mandarin. She did not look Chinese so when she started speaking in Mandarin I could only gape because it threw me off completely so much so that she asked the question I was going to ask her, 'Are you Chinese?'

The other dish we ordered was the coconut butter chicken $17. We did not expect this dish to turn out also fried. I liked them both but the meal turned out quite dry though.

The restaurant was adequately staffed unlike the typical Asian restaurants where wait staff are scarce and it is considered very fortunate if one did not have to wait ten minutes for any attention.

We give this restaurant a thumbs up for the value for money dishes and friendly service.

Chicken or the Egg?

Meet Cream, that laid these eggs for my breakfast today.

Glossy fresh eggs. Also free range!

A friend very kindly gave me half a dozen eggs from her hens. The difference between supermarket eggs and backyard hen eggs I noticed is that the shells of the latter are thicker. The shells are also glossier.

Gaz can't really taste any differently and neither could I. I doubt there is really any difference in taste, but people always think free range eggs taste better. 

When I was cooking them though, I can see the difference. Fresh yolks are firmer and the whites did not spread as much when broken into the pan. The yolks were a deeper orange. 

We also have the peace of mind knowing the eggs were from a healthy hen raised in a clean free environment. My friend's chickens eat rice, grass from her lawn, worms, and her vegetable patch. Happy hens, healthy eggs. 

Japan Komo - Mitcham

Have you ever caught someone looking at something on the street and you just can't help but look in the same direction so you can see what they're looking at? Well, a similar thing happened to me recently.

We were at Japan Komo in Mitcham ordering our dinner when the occupants of the next table started snapping pictures of the interior, the kitchen, and everything in no particular order. I looked around to see what they were snapping at but could not find anything really outstanding. 

Japan Komo is just an ordinary suburban restaurant. What I did take pictures of were the dishes we ordered, just so when I get the craving for fresh raw fish, I can look at the pictures and salivate over them. They make really nice rolls and there are pictures of these rolls all over the walls of the restaurant. They also serve a nice raw fish which was my order that night.

Gaz ordered the panko bento $14.90 which also came with miso soup. He thought it would be something like tempura but it was just lots of crumbed fried food. The crumbed fried calamari and prawns were just a little too 'processed' for us.

This is my favorite.  Raw salmon don $13.90. Meltingly soft fish on seasoned sushi rice.So delicious!

                                      
Fried prawn gyozas. $5.90 for five. No guesses for who got too hungry before the picture could be taken!

Update: This restaurant is permanently closed

La Cassolette, Northbank

Gaz and I visited a new restaurant tonight, actually it was more a minimalist bistro than a restaurant. La Cassolette is situated at 26 Rebecca Walk, Northbank.

Just opposite the Yarra, there were its richer cousins, restaurants such as Bistro Guillame and Baci. The difference is glaring. The shining lights and crowd on the Southbank, compared to the less glitzy and definitely a lot less crowded row of container blocks housing restaurants, art gallery, barber shop and even a beauty parlour on the Northbank. Nevertheless the food is good, there is the same view of the Yarra, if not more beautiful because at precisely 8 pm just as we were finishing our mains, the spectacular fire show at Crown lit up the river.

We ordered the Cassolette, $35 which is a hearty French peasant food consisting of stewed haricot beans, french sausages, pork belly topped with a duck leg. It was very filling. Gaz liked the duck which had crispy skin.

I ordered the flambe of scallops with cream sauce and parsley ($33). The scallops were prepared in front of us. Grand Marnier was used to flambe the scallops then when the flames had died down, cream was added and cooked down. Lastly, parsley was sprinkled on the dish and served with parisian mash (I take it to mean smooth mash with lots of creamy goodness) and fresh salad.

The scallops were fresh and cooked just nicely although oddly there were two large and two small scallops and they were both of different textures. One was more cooked than the other but both well cooked.

To finish off our dinner, we ordered a creme Brulee to share. I am not a big fan of desserts so I was happy for Gaz to finish off the dish on his own after two spoonfuls.  The creme Brulee was served with a bowl of cream and almond slivers and dried apricot.

Unfortunately La Cassolette will be closing at the end of October. The less glitzy and quieter Northbank is not a conducive place for its business. Hopefully they will reopen in another location which can sustain the business.

As for us, we had a most enjoyable evening having the whole place to ourselves, laughing at our own jokes, listening to French music, eating good French food, listening to the two French owners talk to each other and being transported to France all over again.

Update: This restaurant is now closed.

Half Hakka Version of Lui Cha Fan

At the end of each week, I always end up with a whole lot of vegetables in the crisper. This is because at the beginning of the week I buy different kinds of vegetables with the best intentions to have a balanced diet during the week. During the week, when I come back from work we always focus on cooking the main staples first being rice and a meat/fish dish that the vegetable dish gets forgotten in the process.

So what better way to use up all the vegetables in the crisper than to prepare this dish! This is a loose interpretation of lui cha fan (thunder tea rice), a Hakka dish which has a variety of individually prepared vegetable dishes accompanied by a pounded tea mixture, herbs and sesame seeds.

It is a time consuming dish which involves some effort. The time it takes to wash each type of vege, chop them up, prepare them individually, then prepare the pounded tea 'soup' which involves pounding tea leaves and herbs with a special wooden mortar and pestle cannot be underestimated.

For my half Hakka version of lui cha fan, I prepared:

snake bean omelette
winter gourd stir fried with dried shrimp
stir fried brocollini with garlic
chai poh
peanuts

Mix all the vegetables on a bed of rice. In place of the pounded tea leaves and herb soup, I used steeped tie guan yin tea.

Pipa Tofu

Gaz commented on my recent dishes - 'Why are you using the food processor for everything these days?' It's because I have been making chicken/tofu nuggets, pork/prawn siu mai, steamed minced chicken & tofu recently. Each time I use the food processor, he has to pack it up and place it back in its original position on the top of a shelf. So you see, there is work involved for him besides eating up my creations.

This pipa tofu is one of the dishes in the list of that requires the food processor. Do not fear the blandness of tofu, the minced prawns gave it the slightly bouncy texture and taste that  tofu do not have on its own.

They are called pipa tofu because it resembles the shape of the pipa, a Chinese guitar. The shape of the tofu is achieved by using a porcelain Chinese spoon.

200g tofu (semi firm)
200g prawns
3 shitake mushrooms
1 carrot

Whiz up prawns in food processor, till it becomes a paste. Crumble tofu and finely minced mushrooms and carrot into the paste, mix well.

Season with salt and white pepper. Use a chinese spoon as a mold, heap the mixture into the spoon, then dislodge the mixture from the spoon and fry till golden brown.

I used the ubiquitous soy sauce, oyster sauce and corn flour mixture as a sauce to drizzle over the tofu. There is a little effort required for this dish, but it tastes delicious!

Dragon Cookies

It is the Year of the Horse this year. Do you know the story of how the chinese zodiac signs come to be? Once upon a time, the Jade Emperor called all the animals in the animal kingdom for a feast. He told them that the first twelve animals who arrive at his place would also have the honour of a year named after them. But first, they have to cross a big river to the Jade Emperor's palace.

Both the cat and the rat are intelligent animals, but they were terrible swimmers. They met an ox at the bank of the river and persuaded him to take them on his back. The Ox being good natured, did so. Nearing the other side, the rat pushed the cat off into the river and it drowned. The rat then took off and reached first with the ox in second place. The tiger arrived soon after.

The rabbit arrived next, by nimbly hopping from log to log floating on the river. He explained that he nearly fell off at one point but the wind blew the log to the safety of the bank of the river.

Next came the flying dragon. Although it was strong and the only one who can fly, he was delayed because on the way to the palace he saw the Rabbit clinging on to a log and took time to blow the log to safety. 

Next came the horse with a snake clinging on to its hoof. The sudden appearance of the snake as it slithered away from its carrier to the finishing line spooked the horse and thus was cheated of the sixth spot. 

The goat, monkey and rooster came together. The rooster spotted a raft and together, the monkey and goat pulled and tugged to get the raft across. The goat got the eighth spot, the monkey and rooster the ninth and tenth respectively.

In the eleventh place was the dog, who could have gotten there a little earlier but was too playful and so had stopped midway playing. The last was the pig, who ate too much before going to the feast and fell asleep on the way.

There! Easy to remember? 

Even though this is not the year of the dragon, or snake, I made these dragon cookies for Chinese New Year. They are easy to make and melts in the mouth. Just be sure to leave the butter to room temperature so it whips up light and feathery otherwise the dough will be very hard to pipe.

Beware, these cookies are very crumbly!

120g corn flour

20g all purpose flour

10g milk powder

80g butter

50g icing sugar

1 egg yolk

Whip butter and icing sugar till smooth. Add egg yolk and whip. Mix in the rest of the ingredients and whip till well mixed. 

The dough should be pliant, but not runny. Place into piping bag and pipe in the shape of 'S'. 

Bake at 160c for 15 mins.

Mamasita, CBD

After our afternoon at the Australian Open, we decided to pop by Mamasita for a snack. It was already packed by the time we got there around 5:30pm but we did not have to queue up (who would have thought people queued up for food you had to pay for these days?).

We were shown to our seats at the bar, from which we could see all the mixing, juggling and pouring action behind the bar. We saw one of the drinks being made using a raw egg.. definitely not one I will drink.

We ordered the corn on the cob for starters ($4.90 ea) (not pictured). It was chargrilled, and generously sprinkled with grated cheese, chipotle mayo and queso. It was nice, but I think I prefered the corn at Fonda's. It tasted sweeter.

Next, we ordered two types of tacos ($6 ea). One of it was braised ox tongue & cheek, pickled veges and ghost mayo chilli. It was spicy! The other was the grilled fish taco. They taste good, and was gone in two bites.

The last dish we ordered was the braised pork belly with habanero cream, fried parsley ($25). The pork belly was just a little stringy. Being braised, it did not even have a crispy crackling to compensate. The fried parsley did not give it the difference in texture it needed. Gaz thought it was too sweet, but I think the lime and the habanero cream counters the sweetness.

I can finally say that we have gone to Mamasita, but there is no return trip scheduled in the near future.

Kizuna, Boronia

Gaz and I are always on the lookout for new restaurants to try. Last week, we stumbled upon Kizuna in Boronia Central. The interior was new and looked spick and span, so we asked if they are newly opened. It turned out they have been opened for at least 6 months.

The restaurant looked like a family business, with the husband cooking and the wife serving. There is a new baby on the way too, so in time there will be a little child at the cashier, perhaps?

We had to wait because there was a table of 6 and 2 who ordered before us, and there were only two people working that night (including the chef). But it was not too long of a wait, and our glasses were always promptly filled with chilled water which was really good because it was a very hot day.

We ordered the takoyaki ($5.80 for 8) which came out piping hot. It was so delicious! The batter was gooey on the inside which was perfect.

The next dish was the main sized sashimi $18.50

 
There were 20 pieces of sashimi altogether, with 4 varieties of fish including tuna and salmon.

The last dish we ordered was the Katsu Don $9.80. The katsu was a little soggy but the time it got to our table but it was flavourful, and reasonably priced.

We are so happy to have stumbled upon this little gem!

Kizuna
Shop 3, 123 Boronia Rd
Boronia

Update: This restaurant is now closed

Tomato Harvest 2014

The weather has been very hot recently. There were a few consecutive days with temperatures over 40 degrees.

Although it has been uncomfortable, the hot weather has done good things for our vege plants. The tomatoes are beginning to ripen, and we have a few tomatoes to show for our gardening efforts.

Soon, we will also have chillies, and the strawberries were already fruiting but the snails and birds often get to them first before we do.

Gaz took this picture of one of first tomatoes we harvested. Looks a little naughty doesn't it!

Banana Bread

Someone I know was recently asked to leave after 30 years in the organisation. These days, the expectations are so high, that not even experience, dedication and loyalty matters.

Like bananas, you can transform those that have been out on the counter for too long:

into banana bread. Hot and slathered with butter, it tastes even more delicious.

Here's a lesson for life - There are no place for bananas that do not reinvent themselves..

1 cup self raising flour
1/4 cup caster sugar
1 egg
pinch of salt
2 large mashed bananas

Mix all ingredients well, then pour into greased loaf pan. Bake for 45 mins in a 180d oven or until skewer inserted into the loaf comes out clean.

CNY Fest Melbourne CBD 2014

The CNY festivities in Chinatown were held on Sunday 2nd February. There were stalls along Russell Street selling products like birds nest, phone card and of course property developers selling properties in inner city suburbs or in the CBD.

There were lion dances at shops in Chinatown, I caught around 5 performances on the day. This must be the biggest earning day in a lion dance troupe's business because not only do they receive fees for performing at the shop but they might also receive money from the crowd. This is especially true when they perform for restaurants.

Although there were around 2 or 3 lions performing simultaneously on Russell Street, the most anticipated performance is the big dragon Dai Loong parade at 12pm on Little Bourke Street.

We were all waiting patiently for Dai Loong to make its appearance on Little Bourke Street. The crowd lined both sides of the street. Kids perched on top of their dad's shoulders were eager to catch a glimpse of the mythical dragon which makes it's appearance only once a year, and only on Chinese New Year.

Many had heavy, professional photographic equipment. The rest were ready with their mobile phones for taking the perfect photo. Everyone, young and old were excitedly waiting for the start of the parade.

When the firecrackers started, and the distant sound of clanging cymbals, and pounding drums reached our ears, the crowd started with a renewed enthusiasm. Even the piercing heat could not sap away our energy.

When Dai Loong slowly made its way down the street, many reached out to touch the head of the dragon and take photos. One of the mothers next to me carried her child to touch the dragon head, and doing so interrupted what must have been a picture perfect moment for the photographer next to me. He complained crossly, but she cleverly answered - 'It's a long dragon, it'll be coming for a while!'

Surely it is better to experience the moment rather than placing too much focus on capturing the moment?

Melbourne Government House Open Day

The Government House is usually open to public tours throughout the year for a fee. However once a year, on Australia Day it is open to the public for free. There were many others who took advantage of the opportunity to tour the place for free. When I arrived at the opening time, the queue was 1 hour long.

Only some parts of the house were open - such as the Morning Room, formal dining area, billiard room, the study. No bedrooms and toilets were open. The Governor and his wife does live in the house, so they must have some privacy. No sneaking into their rooms to see what books they read before bedtime!

Inside, the furnishing makes it look like just another residence:

Until you see who their friends are:

And how many friends they have over for a Sunday roast lunch:

But then again, it's OK because they have helpers... buzz, buzz... 'Calling kitchen. Get out here and wash the dishes!'