Sustainable Living Expo, November 6-7

I spotted a flyer for this in the Smith Street Store Cafe on the weekend - it was the first I had heard of it. It sounds fantastic, I'll definitely be checking it out.

Links to the program for each day can be found on their website. I'm especially keen to check out:

• Sourdough breadmaking (Sunday 10:15am)
• The 'Preserving your garden harvest' session by Sally Wise (Sunday 12pm)
• The 'Inspired cooking with sustainable produce' session by Phillip Vakos (of Masterchef fame) (Sunday 1pm)
• Thermomix demonstration - will be nice to see one in action!

Plus lots more!

Facebook link.

World Party Tasmania 2010

World Party Tasmania was held in the Hobart City Hall last Saturday.



It was a fantastic event with an amazingly friendly vibe and I hope to see it back again soon. Here's the food I tried...

Chicken satay sticks and salmon and rice balls. Both very tasty! The rice balls were quite soft.



Inari from Masaaki's sushi in Geeveston. Probably the nicest inari I've ever had, with lots of interesting tidbits incorporated into the rice.



A pandan pancake:



The coconut filling:



And to finish off with, a delicious lemon curd bombolone.

Cookbook challenge, week 48: Brioche

I am so far behind in the cookbook challenge that it's not funny! Things have been a bit too busy to do a lot of new cooking lately, and so I've been sticking to old and familiar recipes. Never mind, I will catch up on the challenges eventually.

The theme for week 48 was bread. I've tried cooking various breads semi-regularly, but without much success in yeast breads (flatbreads, Indian breads are easier!). My plan is to do an Adult Education breadmaking class sometime to try and figure out where I am going wrong - maybe not letting it rise for long enough or not kneading well enough - the new Kitchenaid helps with the kneading part, at least!

I decided to make a fruit brioche for the challenge, and used a recipe from Stephanie Alexander's The Cook's Companion.

Ingredients:
250g plain flour
pinch of salt
1 tsp instant dried yeast
1/2 cup milk
1 tbs sugar
3 egg yolks, slightly beaten
75g softened butter
75g dried fruit (I used raisins and cranberries)
1 tbs brandy

Warm milk and sugar slightly, stirring, until sugar has dissolved, then allow to cool a little.
Mix brandy and fruit and set aside.
Mix flour, salt and yeast in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a dough hook.
Combine egg yolks and warm milk.
Make a well in the flour, then pour in liquid and mix to a dough.
Work until dough forms a smooth ball, about 10 minutes.
Continue beating while adding butter in two lots, until the dough is smooth and shiny (add a little more flour or milk if not right).
Cover bowl with a clean cloth and leave dough to double in size for about 2 hours.
Knock back dough and briefly knead in the fruit mixture.
Shape into a loaf and allow to rise for another hour.
Bake at 180ºC for 30 minutes, then tip out of the tin onto a baking tray and bake for a further ten minutes.
Cool before eating.

It's nice. Not amazing, but nice.

Hello, beautiful!

I'm in love.

Garagistes, Hobart CBD

I went to Garagistes last Friday night with a couple of friends, and tried many of their amazing dishes.

Saltcod fritters, meyer lemon mayonnaise ($14). A tasty little morsel to start with. The mayonnaise was fantastic.



House-made salami ($15). These were both amazing. The larger slices had a slight aniseed flavour and the smaller ones had a hint of chilli.



Chicken liver parfait, puffed buckwheat, radishes and apple vinegar ($17). This was probably my favourite of all of the dishes, and we loved it so much that we got a second serving. We also ordered some bread to go with it. It was beautifully velvety with an amazing flavour.



Preserved trevally roe, tongola billy, soft onions and fried malt bread ($22). The preserved roe are the brown disc - intensely fishy in flavour, I guess the roe has been processed then dehydrated? Although it looks like there was a lot of cheese, the slices were very thin. An interesting dish.



Grilled octopus, braised cauliflower, mustard leaves and almond picada ($26). The menu listed oxtail instead of cauliflower but they didn't have it on this night. This dish worked really well, with the beautifully caramelised cauliflower hiding underneath. The addition of soft raisins added a lovely sweetness.



The octopus was another dish that was so good that we ordered it twice. The second time it came with little yellow mustard flowers instead of raisins, which were pretty but I found myself missing the sweetness.



Raw jack mackerel, pickles, young elderberries, rhubarb and miners lettuce ($22). Fresh and sharp flavours, but it wasn't my favourite dish.



Dessert time! Lardy cake, malt chiffon, dulce de leche ($15). Rich and comforting. By the way, doesn't the pattern in in the plate look amazing? Apparently all the servingware is made by the head chef Luke's father.



Silk oolong cream, quince jelly, gingerbread and salted walnuts ($15). It doesn't look like much but it was completely amazing. I'm not even going to try and describe it, just get in there and try it yourself!



Rhubarb and spiced custard, hazelnut meringue, dried blueberries ($14). A lovely way to finish the meal, it was light and refreshing.



Fantastic dishes, very inspired. It's definitely worth checking out!

Ingleside Bakery, Evandale

Ingleside Bakery is one of several cafe options in the pretty town of Evandale. We decided to sit outside at Ingleside Bakery as it was a beautiful day.



J had the baked potato with cheese, bacon and sour cream. The bacon was great - fantastically crispy. The potato was sublime, it tasted like there would have been as much butter as potato inside the jacket.



I had the salmon, asparagus and brie melt. It had a very generous amount of salmon and cheese, and was really tasty.



The bill came to about $44 including two hot chocolates - good value.

Onba, North Hobart

Duck liver pate with Pedro Ximinez jelly and toasted cornbread ($12.50). Tasty and great value, although the bread didn't seem like corn bread to me.




Single cheese platter ($12). I love that all the extras come with the cheese.

Koh Samui

After bussing from Phuket, J and I caught a ferry to Koh Samui and spent two nights exploring the island. This was the first (and only) place we hired a scooter to look around and it was so much fun, and a great way to really get a feel for the place.

A surprisingly tasty stirfry on the ferry, with a lovely gooey egg:



Dinner at the restaurant in front of our hotel. We chose a 2-person set menu that cost 450 baht total (about $13). It came with fried pork with garlic and black pepper, green chicken curry, Panang chicken curry, tom yam prawns, stir-fried seafood, rice, and finished with banana with coconut milk (which I must have forgotten to photograph).



My plate with the assorted curries. They were delicious and *very* spicy. We discovered that neither of us are fans of the miniature Thai eggplants though.



More snacks! The Shark brand of energy drinks are nice and almost as common as Red Bull.



Some grilled meat from a roadside stall, fish balls on the left and chicken on the right.



A blurry photo of a gorgeous dragonfruit, also purchased from a roadside stall.



The innards. Very refreshing!



A beautifully-prepared pineapple - so sweet and juicy.



Cute penguin icypole:



The incredible range of Pringles in a supermarket:



Some Chinese (I think) buns from the same supermarket:



One had a savoury filling:



And this one was sweet, pandan-flavoured



J's Massaman curry at the hotel restaurant - delicious



I wasn't feeling very hungry and so ordered a chicken salad - but ended up with a huge plate of food!



I developed an addition for seaweed snacks on our holiday, these are some of the types I tried. I've found a limited selection of the same brand at a few places back home, but sadly for about 8 times the price!