Peppers on Fire, Forest Hill

Peppers on Fire is a Sri Lankan / Modern Australian restaurant located at Forest Hill. Note that this is not a fusion East + West restaurant. One chooses to have either Sri Lankan or Modern Australian dishes. I did not mind the separation one bit but I do think the restaurant needed to make up it's mind which one of these two cuisines it would like to specialise in! 

The decor of the restaurant is nicely presented. There is also a section at the back of the restaurant for a live band that plays every Friday night. 

We ordered the crispy barramundi with nam jin sauce, and lamb kofta for entree. The barramundi was delicious and so was the accompanying mango and apple slaw in nam jin sauce. 

Crispy barramundi

The lamb kofta came with a sauce on the side which had a lot of nuts, a little curry taste and was watery. I was not sure what this sauce wanted to be, but it felt like some leftover curry sauce jazzed up with some nuts.

Lamb kofta

For mains, we ordered the seafood platter and pork ribs. The seafood platter consists of grilled fish, deep fried prawns, squid, steamed veges and rice. The fish was deliciously cooked as were the prawns. I enjoyed this dish but would have preferred the creamy sauce to be served on the side. The taste of seafood was affected by the greasy feel of the sauce.

Seafood Platter

On the contrary, there was no sauce for Gaz's dish of pork ribs. There was some deeply fried chips at the bottom which would have been nice with some say, mushroom sauce. But the ribs were nicely cooked and Gaz enjoyed this dish. 

Ribs with chips and slaw

Although we did not try the Sri Lankan dishes, they appear to be rather pricey compared to other restaurants. Also, there are 2 other places on the same street that offers Indian/Sri Lankan cuisine which probably explains the restaurant's decision to throw in the Mod Aus slant but I think there are room for improvement with the western food here.

Yellow Tomatoes

I have gone bonkers over maintaining the garden this spring/summer. We have bought new plants, transplanted plants into the ground from pots, pruned the plants, and I have been watering the garden every day. The gardening streak is still going strong, but no doubt it will fizzle when the cooler months approaches. 

Meanwhile, one of the plants that are growing well in the garden are the tomatoes. I bought a yellow tomato variety (botanic name: Lycopersicon Escullentum) from Bunnings late in the tomato growing season. I had bought it as a project for Gaz, seeing how much he enjoys his annual tomato growing efforts but pretty soon I  had taken over the plant and claimed it as mine. It is watered everyday, and twice, I spent an hour peering at the plant to remove all the caterpillars that have been eating holes into the lovely fragrant leaves. There must have been at least 10 caterpillars that were on the plant. 

The plant was a little slow in fruiting, but once it did, there was an abundance of bright yellow tomatoes. They  are low in acid, sweet and fits in one mouthful. Just perfect as an antioxidant snack on days when I feel guilty for having indulged in fried foods. 

It just goes to show that a little love in the garden can bring great rewards!

Bin Monster

The garbage collectors had emptied all the bins on our street early on last morning but Gaz left it till noon to collect our bin from the kerbside. During that time, somebody had put a big bag of their smelly rubbish into our empty bin. When he walked in the front door, his face was as black as thunder. This is the second time that someone had purposely left us a smelly present.

The first time when it happenend, the perpetrators kept our bin for two days before returning it to the kerbside with their smelly package of rubbish in the bin. There was no way that they could have mistaken our bin for theirs because every bin on the street had been collected, which meant they purposely collected two bins that weekend.

I wonder what goes through their head when they commit such an anti civic act. How do they justify to themselves that this kind of behaviour is acceptable? I understand and accept if people have extra rubbish and deposit them into other people's half full bins before the bins are emptied, but not after they've been emptied. If you do not want to live with your stinky rubbish fermenting in your bin for one week while waiting for the next garbage collection, neither do we!! 

Hungarofest 2017

Do you know who invented the Rubik's Cube and the ball point pen? Erno Rubik invented the cube and Lazlo Biro invented the biro pen. If you knew the answers to those two questions, you have done well...

Now, what do Rubik and Biro have in common? They are both Hungarians! I learnt that from the Hungarofest 2017 last weekend. Hungarofest is a bi annual festival celebrating the culture,  food and everything Hungarian. It is held in the Hungarian Community Hall in Wantirna. 

We were very keen to taste the wonderful Hungarian food and had to queue well over half hour to buy food. We got the pork knuckle with sauerkraut and goulash.

The pork knuckle was so delicious. The meat was so tender and flavourful. The pickled cabbage went really well with the fatty knuckle.

The goulash was spicy if you accidentally bit into one of the little pieces of chilli floating in the stew. This is a more soupy version of the goulash I like.

It was a really interesting day out for us, getting to know other cultures in Melbourne.

Sam Sam, Swanston St CBD

It is not difficult to pick a restaurant in the city to have a meal at. The difficulty is to keep track of new restaurants and trying them out. My friend and I decided to walk along Swanston Street and blindly choose a restaurant for lunch. 

Sam Sam looked like the perfect place. It serves Korean food, it was relatively empty at that time which usually means faster service, and the words fried chicken caught our eye.

We ordered the pork belly stir fried with vege with rice ($14), beef bibimbap ($13) and kimchi fries ($12). The dishes were a bit pricey, and they do not come with the usual banchan or side dishes either.

Spicy pork belly

Beef bibimbap

Kimchi fries

The kimchi fries were topped with mayo, kimchi, bacon, jalapenos and was the best dish of the three. We really enjoyed the crispy shoestring fries and the salty, spicy sauce.

Unfortunately, neither the spicy pork belly and bibimbap lived up to our expectations. After scoffing down a whole portion of  delicious fries, and waiting for about another 20 minutes for our dishes, we were a little disappointed with the flavours of the food that arrived next.

My friend commented that his pork belly was not spicy and I also found my beef bibimbap to be rather bland and dry even with the addition of the pepper sauce. The rice was crispy at the bottom of the stone bowl which gave it a nice crunch, but overall it was bland and dry.

Note to myself : stick with fried foods like fried chicken and fries next time.