Christmas Past

Happy New Year, kittens! It was a few weeks ago, but here are some photos from Christmas, when all I did was eat a lot and have marathon sessions of movie-and-TV-show-watching. 

A rather unfortunate gingerbread man fell into my coffee. 

We had homemade gingerbread biscuits for breakfast on Christmas morning, made with the recipe from The Hummingbird Bakery Cookbook. I like my gingerbread really spicy, so I always add twice as much ginger to the recipe when making. 

Seven Seeds

One of the good things about going back to Melbourne was that my sister was also in town - and she's got a driving license and knows how to use it! She drove us up to Carlton one Sunday morning for this wholesome-looking brunch you see here. 

Seven Seeds is named for the seven coffee seeds Brother Baba Budan smuggled out of Yemen in the 17th century - read more about it here. Housed in an ever-so-hip warehouse with industrial fittings, their clientale is a mix of uni students and slightly older coffeefiends, all of whom look healthy and full of beans. I felt incredibly grubby in comparison, in my stained blouse and unwashed shorts. I also lacked the necessary accessory - a bicycle helmet. 

The big thing here was obviously the coffee - Melbourne people in general are all a bit mad about their coffee, I think. There was a constant queue at the counter, and we had to wait about 10 minutes to get a table. It was all good though. 

Cold-brewed  single origin coffee

We went for the cold-brewed, single origin (Kenya Kiangi - according to the cards) coffee, which our waitress took pride in telling us involved a 12-16 hour process. All very well, as long as I didn't actually have to wait that long for my coffee.

Have you had cold-brewed coffee before? I certainly hadn't, and I think I was expecting it to just be an iced coffee. While it did come with some ice cubes in the glass, the taste was very different from other iced coffees I'd had before. It was a lot more complex - not as bitter, and slightly sour (in a good way). I think I'm a convert. Also, cold-brewed coffee makers seem to look rather fantastic and should go some way towards impressing your friends. 

Eggs Benedict topped with bacon

Salmon tartare with courgette salad and toasted sourdough

Ricotta hotcakes with bananas, strawberries and blueberries

The food was pretty yummy too, although, to be honest, not as memorable as the coffee. The bacon was sliced thickly and cooked nicely, while my salmon tartare was made with beautifully fresh sashimi-grade salmon. I loved the pairing of beetroot and salmon, it's something that I'll be trying at home. Oh, oh, my sister's ricotta hotcakes came with a tasty banana cream, which I may also try to replicate at home. 

So, good coffee, tasty food, and a nice-looking place, what's not to like? 

Seven Seeds

114 Berkeley St, Carlton

VIC 3053

Australia

Wild Honey

December involved quite a bit of eating out - which is fine by me because it means I leave the washing up to others. Manbacon and I decided to head for a restorative meal at Wild Honey instead of battling other elbows at the post-Christmas sales. The dining room, hidden behind a set of billowing (and slightly confusing) red velvet drapes, was satisfyingly calm. 

I don't drink much alcohol, but since it was the holidays, I decided to go a wild and order a cocktail. I know, how crazy. I don't remember what it was called, but it had peach nectar and a rosemary spring in it, and was rather refreshing. 

Starter  - steak tartare

To keep things simple (and because I take an age to decide on what to order), we both went for the Working Lunch set - a really good deal at £27 for 3 courses. We were also given a choice of bread and a pat of butter to tide us over before the food came. Our starter of steak tartare was just the right size and served with a lovely, unctuous orange egg yolk. I love a good egg yolk...

Salmon with broccoli  and sea lettuce (I think?)

The salmon came served on a hefty, earthy, pottery plate which I was very tempted to try and ferret away with me. You can never have too many nice plates (even if you have to keep some of them under the bed because there isn't any more space on your kitchen shelves). The fish itself was perfectly cooked - so tender and succulent that I didn't even need a knife. One of my chief gripes with salmon is that so many people and places tend to cook it to death - really, there's no need to stick a tiny piece like that in the oven for 20 minutes, that's just over the top! Anyway, this was cooked exactly the way I would have wished, and the veggies on the side helped provide a lovely crunchy element. Manbacon made a wisecrack about the foamy bit being 'saliva' (haha, hilarious...) but it was rather tasty and surprisingly rich. And not at saliva at all.

Classic custard tart

You get to choose between a cheese course or a dessert. The cheese that day was Comte, which, although tasty, wasn't the most exciting choice, so we both went for the custard tart. I had already unfairly dismissed it as a boring, stodgy pudding, but I am a bit of an idiot sometimes. It was amazing!  I don't know how they kept the custardy bit so light and soft, yet managed such a sharp, neat cut. The custard was smooth and almost runny, yet kept it's shape perfectly. I'm going to have to make a bunch of custard tarts in the near future so I can try to replicate it. Who wants to be a taster?

Wild Honey

12 St. George Street

London, W1S 2 FB

English's Of Brighton

A visit to Brighton isn't complete without some seafood, and we certainly indulged in our fair share while there. Manbacon and I had made a reservation for a table at English's of Brighton, but on a wintry Sunday night, there was more than enough space. We were one of only four couples dining at the restaurant that night (and the only ones under 35!). 

The cosy dining room has a lovely fin de siecle feel to it, with it's many mirrors and Toulouse-Lautrec-style paintings on the walls. It gets much narrower at the back, with red velvet banquettes lining the walls, and narrow little tables in front. The space is so tiny that guests have to sit side-by-side instead of facing each other. It was comfortable enough while we were there, with one other couple sitting diagonally across us (the table on the left in the photo above). However, I imagine it would get terribly claustrophobic on busy days, and you'd be trying to eat with someone else's elbow wedged into your shoulder.

Starter of brown bread, butter and mackerel pate

We started with a small basket of brown bread accompanied by butter and mackerel pate. It was tasty but not particularly memorable. The pate wasn't very mackerel-y tasting, just sort of a smoothly blended lump of fish paste.

Seafood platter - two levels of oysters, clams, mussels, prawns, crab and lobster

As you can see, we decided to splurge on the cold seafood platter - a massive two tiers of boiled prawns, mussels, clams, dressed crab, potted shrimp, lobster and raw oysters, as well as some smoked salmon on toast. The platter was accompanied by several lemon wedges, as well as a little ramekin of mayonnaise. 

Smoked salmon on bread, part of the seafood platter

Cthulhu arises from the deep

The platters are fairly expensive, but then again, you get a LOT of food. Most of the shellfish was wonderfully fresh and succulent, and the oysters were generously sized. My only (very slight) gripe was that the prawns were fairly dry and overcooked. The potted shrimps were encased in loads of butter, so much so that even butter-loving Manbacon had to give up after a couple of bites. We should have used the toast supporting our smoked salmon as a base for the potted shrimps, but we're always so much wiser in hindsight, arent' we? 

Dressed crab, partially undressed

Panna cotta on spiced fruit compote

There was no stomach space left for dessert at the end (in fact, Manbacon insisted he didn't want any - foolish human) but I managed to conjure up a second stomach to fit it in. I opted for the panna cotta, served with a spiced fruit compote, and suddenly Manbacon decided he could find some space for dessert, after all. It was a lovely, light end to the meal - the creamy treat slipped down very easily, and managed to leave me feeling refreshed for the short walk back to our hotel.

English's of Brighton

29-31 East Street

Brighton

BN1 1HL

Homemade Gravlax

If you've had it before, you'll probably agree that the taste of grav lax is easily leaps and bounds above the often one-note saltiness of most smoked salmon. It's usually subtly salty, with hints of sugar and dill. Unlike it's smoked brethen, this lovely cured item is can be hard to find in supermarkets or on the menus most eateries. However, with a few simple ingredients and some patience, these delicious salmon slices can be easily created at home. 

You'll need to get a hefty hunk of salmon fillet - we had about 1 kg of fillet, sliced in two. Go ask the Google Gods for a tasty recipe - there are many out there. Manbacon cleverly combined a few recipes to come up with our own very tasty version. Most will include plenty of dill, salt and sugar, as well as two days or more of curing time. It really takes hardly any effort at all. 

Be patient, because once the salmon is cured,  you'll be rewarded with your very own, immensely tasty slices of grav lax. Enjoy them with plenty of crusty sourdough and creamy butter, or just be indulgent and pop whole slices into your mouth.