Galleon Cafe

You might recall me trying to get into Galleon Cafe (http://galleoncafe.com.au/) a few weeks ago but I wasn't keen on waiting around for a table. So we decided to get up a little earlier the next week to beat the Sunday diners. The cafe is really quirky - the walls are lined with posters and community ads, and the tables and booths are an eclectic mix of old and new. The menus are worn, but still manage to entice my taste buds. One of the first things I notice is the price - most of the items on the breakfast menu are around $10-12. This is a far cry from other local cafes were their prices can spiral upwards of $20. There is a great variety, including some interesting vegetarian options. I went for the sweet potato, basil and feta hash, served with wilted spinach, one poached egg and tomato and chilli chutney. My boyfriend went for the BLAT (a BLT with avocado) and an extra sausage. Unfortunately the kitchen didn't synchronise our order, so by the time my breakfast came out, my boyfriend had almost finished his. The hash was quite tasty, but the meal came with two and one was enough! It also could've done with more chutney as I found it rather dry, but the flavours all together were really nice. I'd definitely go back again, because there's plenty more I'd like to try on the menu and it is excellent value for money. 

Deal Is On

Every time I go to check my inbox, it's been inundated with emails from deal websites trying to get me to 'jump on' cheap car washing, massages and holidays. But every couple of days a restaurant advertises a deal that actually seems worth 'jumping on'. You've got to be careful though. The other day I saw a local Thai restaurant that was advertising a cheap deal, however when I went to their website and added up all the prices of what they were offering it was more of a rip off than a deal! 

A couple of weeks ago I jumped on a deal for 2 flatbread pizzas and a bottle of wine at Cabinet Bar (http://www.cabinetbar.com.au/default.htm) in the city for $29. The bar turned out to be really cool - it has a balcony overlooking Swanston St but because of it's entrance in Rainbow Lane, it was less crowded than other bars on a Friday night. We chose a roast duck, mushroom, blue cheese and plum sauce flatbread,  and one with spicy chorizo and mushroom. The flatbreads were tasty but I wouldn't necessarily return for them (they are usually $17.95 each). But the location and cocktail list is worth returning for!

The Healthy Fry Up

When I'm looking for meals to cook I'm aways looking to try dishes I've never cooked before. But sometimes it's good to go back to basics and cook a classic. A stir fry is a meal I used to put on the weekly menu as a space-filler, but once eating it would remember how fantastically flavoursome and satisfying they are. In keeping with my fast-food style of cooking this week, I cooked a chilli prawn stir fry with hokkien noodles. I used loads of veg (green beans, snow peas, red capsicum, broccoli, green chilli and baby corn), a couple of hundred grams of peeled green prawns (which I cooked for a couple of minutes first, then added them back into the stir fry at the end), ready to use hokkien noodles, and added a combination of soy sauce and sweet chilli sauce. Simple, easy and super quick. 

Fast Food

My crazy busy week at uni is finally over, and I made it out alive (it was touch and go there for a while...) Luckily I'd preplanned all the meals for the week with one thought in mind... Fast food! I'm talking 20 minutes from chopping board to mouth. 

Soup featured pretty heavily this week as I realized I hadn’t made any this winter and spring is fast approaching. The first soup I actually made on the weekend. Mum gave me an intimidating pumpkin from her veggie patch that has been begging me to make soup out of him for the past few weeks, so I made a few batches of Thai pumpkin soup. It’s a delicious take on pumpkin soup – the addition of coconut milk, red or green curry paste, ginger, kaffir lime leaves and lime juice, gives the traditional soup a real kick. Half a pumpkin made about 6 serves of soup, so now I’ve got the remainder of the roasted pumpkin in the freezer, which can be easily added to pastas, or more soup!

The second soup I cooked was what I’d like to call a Spanish minestrone.

1 chorizo

1 can chickpeas

1 can diced tomatoes

4 celery sticks, chopped

1 red capsicum, chopped

¾ bunch silverbeet (or spinach), half roughly chopped and the other half processed

½ teaspoon dried chilli flakes

½ teaspoon smoked paprika

1 teaspoon dried vegetable stock (or 1 cube)

Fry the chorizo for a few minutes then add the tomatoes and a can of water. Bring to the boil then add the remainder of the ingredients. Cover and bubble on high for about 10 minutes. Eat and enjoy!

It was even tastier when I had it for lunch the next day.

The Best Pasta Sauce Of All Time

I know it's a big call, but I may have discovered THE best pasta sauce recipe of all time... You may have had spaghetti alla matriciana before (at La Porchetta perhaps), but never this good. It may not be authentic but it tastes damn good! Give it a try!

100 grams pancetta

50 grams diced bacon

1 onion

2 garlic cloves

1 red chilli

1/2 teaspoon dried chilli flakes

1 tablespoon kalamata olives, quartered

1 tablespoon capers

1 tin crushed tomatoes

1 tablespoon tomato paste

handful of cherry tomatoes, halved

Process garlic cloves, chilli, chilli flakes and onion, then fry in saucepan with some olive oil for about 5 minutes. Meanwhile process pancetta and diced bacon. Once the onion has softened, add the pancetta and diced bacon mixture and fry for another 5 minutes. Add tinned tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, tomato paste, capers and olives, cover and simmer for about 10-15 minutes (while you're waiting for pasta to cook).

A trick my mum taught me is to stir a bit of the sauce through the pasta so all the pasta is covered with sauce, then put a spoonful of the sauce mixture on top of the pasta to serve. Looks good and tastes great!

Omega 3 And Couscous

What better way to start a week of uni than with a serving of brain food? I'm talking fish! One of my sisters gave me Jamie Oliver's book "Jamie's Dinners" for my birthday, and it's a beauty! Omega 3 and Couscous - yes it's really called that - is a great recipe with punches of flavour (http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/fish-recipes/omega-3-couscous) . 

I couldn't get my hands on red mullet, but used a salmon fillet instead. The recipe was really easy to follow, but I went a bit hard on the gas thinking the fish wouldn't cook and burnt the pan a little when the fish, vegetable mix and couscous were simmering. Next time I'll keep it low because the fish cooks in the steam that's produced. The natural yoghurt, fennel leaves and lemon mixture really lifted the dish. It was super easy to cook and the flavours were sensational. I ate the leftover couscous for lunch and it tasted amazing even without the salmon. Go on, give it a try!

Homestyle Pizzeria

After a few heavy nights at the snow everyone was after a little more than a vegemite sandwich for lunch when we returned home. So we made comfort food for the masses - pizzas. We used souvlaki wraps for bases which worked really well for a thin and crispy finish. The bases were covered with a mixture of puttanesca sauce and tomato paste, and mozzarella. We made four styles of pizzas. They were all really tasty and there were no leftovers :) My personal favourite was the one with Wagyu salami...

Wagyu salami, shredded ham off the bone, mushroom, capsicum, olives and anchovies

Spanish chorizo (cooked before added to pizza), mushroom, capsicum
Spanish onion and paprika

Fresh tomato, roasted pumpkin, spinach, fetta and olives

Mushroom, Italian sausage and onion (the sausage and onion
was cooked before added to pizza)