New Years Eve Party

For New Years eve I decided to throw a little get together with some of my closest friends.

I've never gone wrong with Not Quite Nigella's recipes, so most of these are from her wonderful site.

This dessert was a last minute decision, I had all the ingredients already and just needed coconut and it just looked so darn good. It was incredible. If it wasn't for the tedious nature of making coconut butter, I'd be making this all. the. time. I've actually made coconut butter before and it took even longer than this, mainly because 1) I was using shredded coconut and 2) I wasn't adding much water to help it along. The water really is so necessary.

I did the same thing as NQN except for a few modifications, click here for the recipe. I blended 2.5 cups of desiccated coconut as last time in making coconut butter I didn't think I used enough. It starts as a flour consistency, then it lumps together and finally forms a butter like texture. Hallelujah. It only takes forever though considering you need to scrape down the sides and stop the processor ever so often to prevent overheating. Mine actually overheated awhile ago and once it gets too hot it just stops on its own. It's one from target and cost $20, I love it.

Then I added about 4 tablespoons of water, used a ripe banana, 2 tablespoons of raw honey, 1 tsp of a good quality vanilla extract, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon. Then after that was done, I added in a cup of frozen blueberries (cut in half). I also then lined a takeaway container and put it in the freezer overnight.

It has a mild coconut flavour and slightly sweet with a bit of texture from the coconut

Another dessert I made was a mango and blueberry vegan cheesecake inspired by this that is a fair bit cheaper.

The last time I made a vegan cheesecake I used a cake tin that was 8 inches in diameter that was far too big, resulting in a very thin cake. This time, I made the base and saw that a 6 inch cake tin would be better, even though the original recipe uses an 8inch.

Fo the base: I just got a packet of raw mixed nuts and separated them
1 cup almonds
1/2 cup hazlenuts (not enough almonds in the original packet).
3 cups of cut up pitted dates (woolworths brand, only $2 and tastes like medjool dates but slightly less sticky and sweet). I poured hot water over them, removed the hard skin and cut them up.

For the middle:
I used 2 cups of soaked cashew nuts (soaked overnight).
2 frozen overripe bananas (sliced)
1/3 cup of maple syrup
1/3 cup lite coconut milk
1 teaspoon cinnamon

For the top:
1 cup frozen blueberries
1 cup mango
1 frozen sliced banana
1 teaspoon of cinnamon

To make:
1. Blend almonds and hazelnuts until chopped then add in chopped dates until sticky. Press into cake tin and put in freezer.
2. Blend all the ingredients in the middle layer until smooth. Pour 3/4 into cake tin (use 1/4 for top layer) Put back in freezer. One thing I did wrong was I put all my bananas in one bowl to freeze. Then put them all in the middle layer instead of reserving one for the top layer.
3. For the top layer, I blended the 1/4 left from the middle, mango, banana, blueberries and cinnamon. I left out the maple syrup and dates as it was already quite sweet from the mango. I put this back in the fridge and then blended it again. Poured it into the cake tin and I put it back in the freezer.

I think this would work if you switched up the fruits too, so maybe use a berry and another fruit that's in season. Pitted dates and frozen fruits do work though.

I found the base was way too sweet for me but I enjoyed the other layers, it has quite an overwhelming banana taste though. Next time I would reduce the number of dates in the base to 2 cups and also reduce the amount of maple syrup in the middle to 1/4 cup.

Some other desserts present included: coconut and pandan cake and rocky road. The coconut and pandan cake was extremely light and moist, not oily at all, not overly sweet and had a very mild coconut and pandan flavour. Similar texture to an airier sponge cake.

For snacks:
I also made 2 dips, both served with toasted lebanese bread.

One was NQN's tuna dip which I followed exactly. The flavours marry well together, it's perfectly balanced and reminds me of a pate (but with tuna). It has a vinegary taste which is offset by the creaminess from the residual oil (from the tuna) and the mayo. It was a huge hit

I also made this hummus recipe with some additions.

Basically blended a can of chickpeas (skin removed), save 1/4 liquid, a crushed clove of garlic and 2 tablespoons of hulled tahini. Then added 3/4 juice of a lemon, cumin, tiniest bit of chill powder, salt, 1/4 reserved liquid. I like that it doesn't have a ton of olive oil like a lot of other recipes and it's quick.

I removed the skin beforehand to make it creamier, crushed the garlic clove. My favourite hummus is still the Aldi one and an Obela brand pine nut one.

For main:

I made NQN's Singaporean noodles which was really good. I also added in quite a lot of water towards the end because I prefer wetter noodles and stirred it quite a bit to break up the noodles. I also reduced the curry powder to 3 tablespoons

I also made a watermelon, feta and mint salad. I used 1/4 of a watermelon, 50g of feta and a few torn up mint leaves. I didn't mind it but I wouldn't make it again, it was refreshing though.

Some other mains included potato puffs and these chicken bites (which had garlic butter inside)

I hope you all have a very happy new year!

Restaurant Reviews

So sorry it's been such a long time since my last post. Here's a few places I've been to recently.

Element 6 in Ryde: 

Very cute and cozy cafe with lots of whimsical elements. Seating is a little small, 2 outdoor tables and chairs. If you go through the back, theres a verandah type area where you can find the toilets, I think there may be seating there too. Place is easy to get to from Ryde station.

I ordered the baked eggs, quite a standard order for me. This one was pretty average in terms of flavour, predominantly tomato but wished it tasted more moroccan. One egg and one piece of haloumi bulked it up a bit as did the chickpeas, it didn't taste too rich, which made it differ a bit from some of the other baked eggs I've had. The tomato mixture was also a little liquidy. I wished the poached egg was a little runnier, appreciated the herbs and nuts, which really lifted it. All in all, a fairly average dish that lacked a little in flavour.

The naan bread it came with was house made, it was delicious - very soft and perfectly dense. Really liked it especially to mop up the liquid after.

Friend had the pulled pork burger, said it was very tender and flavoursome.

Cute cafe, with more menu items on the blackboard as seen in picture below, near entrance.

The best meal of the week has to be at the Glenmore at the Rocks. It was for our work xmas party.

No bookings so we got there a little earlier to get a seat at the rooftop. It wasn't too busy at 11:40 when we got there on a Wednesday but quickly filled by 1. Excellent location with views of the bridge.

We ordered a few sides: salt and pepper squat, hot wings, wedges and fish cakes, all excellent. The salt and pepper squid was delicious. Very well cooked, not at all rubbery, still very juicy, very light batter and perfectly seasoned, incredibly addictive! The fish cakes were also great, not at all oily, great flavours, inside isn't as dense as some that I've had but actually preferred it that way.

I got the salmon. Probably the best salmon I've ever ordered and I normally order salmon. This one was just perfectly cooked, very juicy and still slightly pink on the inside. Very tender. The skin was crispy, a little hard to cut into and most of the saltiness came from that. The quinoa salad was nice, a little plain and lotus root chips were good too but the salmon was the star.

On a more disappointing note, I went to Vrindivan Indian at Pyrmont. It was quite expensive and a little quite for my liking inside, a lot of seats though.

One friend got a rose lassi, it was my first taste of lassi. It tasted like a thick yogurt, mildly sweet and a little like cheese. I didn't mind it but it seemed a little rich to have too much of in one go.

We ordered a naan basket, the naan was very soft and perfectly dense. The basket included a cheese naan, garlic and buttered naan. We also got some free roti which tasted healthier - it was thinner, drier and didn't have as soft or chewy a flavour. We also ordered a side of white rice to go with the curries, of the 3, we preferred the naan to heap our curries onto.

I actually enjoyed this dish, it was eggplants and tomato with indian spices. The vegetables were soft, a little oily but not overly so and worked with the naan and rice and you could taste the spices.

I also chose this goan fish curry, a traditional dish from Goa I believe. It wasn't as coconut-ty as I'd liked but menu did say it was made with coconut extract and not coconut milk so that may have contributed. The fish was soft, around 6-8 bite sized pieces. We were surprised by the serving dishes, relatively small but still very filling. I don't really like the taste of butter at all and this tasted like butter chicken but the fish version so I wasn't overwhelmed by it.

3 williams has also been on my list of places to visit, after popping up on numerous blogs and instagrams this year.

Easy place to get to, located a few minutes walk from Redfern and Central station. However, it's hard to find. You need to look for 3 dots and a w placed underneath the dots on the side of the entrance. We went at 11 on Saturday and there was a 20 minute line.

I ordered the apple, carrot and ginger juice, which I liked. It has a strong hit of ginger and the sweetness from the fruits counterbalanced it perfectly. It was blended well and a little frothy. A bit expensive from memory though, I think $7.

I ordered the chicken salad. I didn't care much for it to be honest. I liked the chicken which was tender and the red pepper which was soft and sweet but the ratio of them to the abundance of kale was a little disappointing. There were also 2 big pieces of pumpkin, which wasn't really a nice pumpkin, quite watery and I would've preferred smaller pieces. The dressing was a garlic yogurt one, it was ok and worked with the chicken but didn't love it. The kale was exactly that. The brown bits in the picture are sourdough croutons, they added a crunch to the dish but all in all, sadly, quite average.

I'm pretty sure they are known for their brioche french toast and my friend enjoyed this one with bananas and chocolate.

My other mate got this mushroom dish with ricotta and sourdough and added a poached egg.