bumbu bali nasi campur

Gedang mekuah - Rp 70,000

Gedang mekuah is a bowl of spicy green papaya and seafood soup. It was my appetiser when I went for lunch at this restaurant called Bumbu Bali.

a story of bali & a review of bebek betutu pak man

Ayam Betutu - Rp 20,000 per piece

Bali, the island of the Gods, or better known to you and you as that place where Elizabeth Gilbert (picture Julia Roberts) found the Love part (in the form of dreamy Javier Bardem) in the book/movie/extravaganza that is Eat, Pray, Love. I haven't actually read the book, but I did watch the movie because everyone else was talking about is so much.

neua pat bai grapao

David Thompson is one of the most respected chef in Australia. He made his name by getting the backing of the Thai government to re-establish authentic Thai food in Thailand, to fight the onslaught of fusion food in the country. He has a comprehensive Thai recipe book called Arharn Thai, but I was totally intimidated by it, so I never got around to buying it. So, when his new book Thai Street Food was published, I said to myself I definitely have to get that book.

My first thought was that surely street food would be easier than full-on Thai food to cook. I was sort of right, I think. Some recipes were totally do-able, like the neua pat bai grapao. But, there are quite a few pretty complicated recipes in there with a lot of ingredients. I was intimidated for about a minute, but I thought, it's totally time for me to get a bit of a challenge. To get me started, I picked this pretty straightforward recipe, with manageable amounts of ingredients.

xmas lunch 2010

Let me ask you a question, are you a pineapple snob? Do you always tut-tut your friends when they put pineapple in their savoury foods, like pizza? Well, you might as well close this blog post and read my other posts, because I’m about to commit a cardinal sin with this one.

The day before Christmas, my older sister and I have made a date for us to have Christmas lunch together. What could be more perfect for an Australian Christmas to have prawns for lunch, so I went to the local supermarket and bought myself a kilo and a half of prawns (Australian this time, not foreign). I also bought a pineapple and some garlic to go with the prawns.

bamboo-shoot-hearts-prawns

One of the reasons why I heart this dish is because I can cook it whenever I want to. The bamboo shoots are canned and I usually have some frozen prawns in the freezer. I love it for the texture of the bamboo shoots combined with the sweetness of the prawns, the spiciness of the chillies and the saltiness of the soy sauce.

This dish is perfect as a side dish, I wouldn't serve it as the main dish as it is not substantial enough. It goes very well with milder dishes like my i-feel-better-already chicken porridge or my hearty tofu & pork.

balinese beef stew

The first time I made the Balinese beef stew (bali daging), I put in too much tamarind and chilli that it just tasted very sour and spicy. I made a few adjustments and the second time was definitely milder, more balanced. I am quite proud of it actually, it's not as good as how the cook used to make it, but I do have time to keep perfecting it.

chop-chop fried noodles

Continuing on my speedy recipe series, today I will introduce you to my chop-chop fried noodles. What I sometimes do when I can`t be bothered cooking is buy a whole roast chicken from Coles. I eat the thighs & drumsticks with rice. But I hate eating the breast meat, so I usually let someone else eat it. More often than not, though, I ended up making it into my chop-chop fried noodles.

1. Wokka thin egg style noodle
2. Whole roast chicken
3. You choy
4. Chop-chop fried noodles

assam fish

This recipe is another keeper from Food Safari (google: SBS food safari). I got a chance to do this one because the cleaner at my work just came back from a fishing trip and she gave me two steak chunks of mackerel from the fish that she caught herself. Thanks Flossy, you're tops!

I kinda butchered this recipe, because I couldn't find a mortar and pestle to grind the rempah to a fine paste. So I used a blender which couldn't make the rempah into a fine paste. Added to that, silly me, I tried to stir the rempah with a chopstick while the blender was still on. Can you believe it? So I had to throw away that chewed up chopstick and start over. In the end, I think I did an OK job. Maybe that'll teach me next time to stick to the instructions to a tee.