Tag Archives: australian foodbloggers

  • Singapore Takeout / Iggy’s Pop Up Dinner, Sydney

    I’ve visited the lovely island country of Singapore at least a half dozen times over the years and have always considered it to be a foodie’s paradise. After all, Singapore boasts a wonderful mix of Singaporean, Malaysian, Chinese and Indian food, remarkably good food courts and colourful open-air hawker centres.

    I’ve never thought of Singapore as a fine dining destination, however, so I was a little intrigued when an invitation to Singapore Takeout in Sydney popped into my inbox a few weeks ago.

    While I always enjoy visting Singapore, die-hard travellers have been known to dismiss it as a safe but boring place – they say it’s hot, it’s humid, it has great hawker stalls and lots of shopping malls but that’s about it. It’s a perception that Singapore Tourism is determined to change with their provocative, new ‘Get Lost’ campaign, which targets both new and returning visitors:

    Working in conjunction with ‘Get Lost’, Singapore Takeout is a travelling pop up food event, aimed to show a select audience a different, more sophisticated side to dining in Singapore.

    Singapore Takeout has showcased the work of some of Singapore’s top chefs to leading media, food bloggers and competition winners in London, New York, Dehli, Paris, Moscow, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Dubai and, most recently, Sydney (12-14 March). The take-away message is clear: Singapore  has evolved. It’s way more interesting and sophisticated than you may think.

    At the Sydney event I attended, two dozen Aussie food bloggers were treated to a five course degustation by Ignatius Chan and Head Chef Akmal Anuar from Iggy’s, ranked 27th in The San Pellegrino World’s 50 Best Restaurants 2011 and listed 1st in The Miele Guide 2011/2012 Asia’s Top 20 restaurants.

    Simon from Simon Food Favourites has made a fantastic video of the night, which pretty much sums it up. Nice work, Simon! You can spot me in the front row in the aqua dress and white jacket.

    For those that prefer old-school blogging, first up was nasi lemak, the classic Malaysian hawker dish. Iggy’s version was a nod to the authentic flavours of the dish (coconut milk, pandan, fish, peanuts, tamarind etc) while reinterpreting it in a completely modern and playful way. I actually liked this a lot although I really felt the lack of the usual sambal kick.

    Next came sushi, Iggy’s style. Beautifully fresh fish was wrapped around a soy meringue base topped with wasabi paste – an intriguing concept that actually worked very well.

    The next dish, cold capalleni, was a delightful dish inspired by the Chinese New Year dish, yu sheng (raw fish salad). It pleased on many fronts: the presentation was lovely, the flavours (sesame oil, yuzu and horseradish) were wonderfully pure and the ponzu granita and deep-fried quinoa added  welcome textural and sensory contrasts.

    The next dish, the slow-cooked beef cheek marinated in Bass Phillip pinot noir for 40 hours, was outstanding. The meat was melt-in-your -mouth tender, falling apart with a mere nudge of my knife, and presented on a gorgeous wedge of white radish. Top marks, team.

    The final dish was a fantastic fusion of East and West. A funked up version of kaya toast (kaya is a coconut, egg and pandan jam) was accompanied by Teh Tarik (‘pulled’ tea with condensed milk) flavoured ice cream and deep-fried tea leaves. It was so good Penny from Jeroxie and I are going to attempt to make our own versions at home.

    During the dinner the friendly bloggers at my table – Simon from The Heart of FoodThe Food Pornographer, Thang from Noodlies, and Penny from Jeroxie – reminisced about our favourite Singaporean hawker dishes. Many expressed regret that dishes like Haianese Chicken Rice, Curry Laksa and Har Mee (prawn noodles) were not on the menu that night.

    So after the Singapore Takeout dinner a bunch of us – my whole table plus Helen from Grab Your Fork, Susan from Chocolate Suze, Thanh from I Eat Therefore I Am, and Tina from Food Booze Shoes – went to Mamak, a Malaysian restaurant in Chinatown. We ordered way too much – namely, sweet and savoury rotis, satays, fried chicken, Teh Tarik, and Ais Kachang (red bean, coconut milk sweet corn and rosehip syrup on crushed ice) – and then proceeded to eat it all.

    Afterwards, uncomfortably full and unable to sleep, I pondered. When I am next in Singapore would I do something similar? Could I imagine treating myself to a a fine dining experience and then following it up with a late-night supper at a hawker centre?

    Of course I could.

    Bloated belly aside, that’s having one’s cake  – or kaya toast – and eating it, too.

    Christina Soong-Kroeger visited Sydney as a guest of Singapore Takeout, part of the Singapore International Culinary Exchange (SPICE), a joint initiative of the International Enterprise (IE) Singapore, Singapore Tourism Board (STB), and SPRING Singapore. Thanks to Laura Barette at Frank PR for organising my flights and accommodation. 

    For more information about Singapore check out:

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    By the way, a huge thank you to the anonymous person who nominated me for a Best Australian Blogs 2012 award. I’m truly touched and very grateful.


  • Sweet Adventures Death by Chocolate: Chocolate Mousse

    There are times when a little restraint is called for. After all, too much of a good thing can get you into all kinds of trouble.

    Happily, this is not one of those times. For too much of a very good thing – in this case, chocolate – is what this Sweet Adventures Death by Chocolate bloghop is all about.

    Sweet Adventures is a group of Australian food bloggers – myself,  84th & 3rdThe Capers of the Kitchen CrusaderDelicieux, and Dining With a Stud – who host a monthly, dessert-themed blog hop.

    Our inaugural event, The Great Australian Pavlova Blog Hop, attracted 34 entries in November 2011, while our second event, the Festive Favourites Blog Hop, attracted 38 entries last month. Click on the above links to drool over all the entries.

    It was my turn to host this month and as I scanned our lengthy list of theme ideas I realised there was one glaring omission: Death by Chocolate.

    Why Death by Chocolate? Well, if you’re going to indulge in chocolate you might as well go all out, right? There’s no point in the single square of chocolate, the lone chocolate truffle, the tiny chocolate brownie, the mini chocolate biscuit or the slender piece of chocolate cake. Worst still, are diet versions: I’d rather go without than eat some kind of ‘lite’ chocolate abomination.

    So for my Death by Chocolate entry, I wanted complete chocolate decadence. I wanted creamy pillows of velvety chocolate-ness. I wanted a dessert that would have me swooning over its richness.

    I trialled a multi-layered chocolate cake, which fell well short of expectations, before deciding to make a classic chocolate mousse instead.

    I’ve always been a pushover for chocolate mousse made with top quality chocolate. I love its intense chocolate flavour, silky texture and the way it melts away into sublime nothingness in your mouth. It’s an incredibly sexy dessert and perfect for a romantic supper but you could also serve it in shot glasses for a cocktail party or hen’s night.

    This chocolate mousse is made with standard pantry ingredients, and in under 20 minutes, but tastes like a dessert that you’d enjoy in a fine dining establishment (with the addition of a few ‘dirt’ crumbs and flowers sprinkled artistically around the plate, natch).

    Is chocolate mousse a dessert to die for? No, it’s better than that: it’s a dessert to live for.

    INGREDIENTS

    350 grams top quality chocolate (I used a mixture of dark and white this time but would ordinarily use only dark)
    175 grams unsalted butter
    7 large, room-temperature, free-range eggs, separated
    100 grams raw caster sugar
    1 tablespoon vanilla essence
    Pinch of salt

    METHOD

    Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler and then let it cool down off the stove.

    In a large bowl, beat the egg yolks and sugar until thick and creamy, like home-made mayonnaise. Stir in the vanilla and salt and then the cooled chocolate mixture.

    Beat the egg whites in another large bowl until soft peaks form. Add one spoonful of egg whites to the chocolate mixture and briskly stir it in – this lightens it – before gently folding the rest of the egg whites in. Try not to bash all the air out of the egg whites.

    Use a ladle to pour the mixture into glasses and chill in the fridge for a couple of hours or until required.

    Remove from the fridge 10 minutes before serving and decorate with raspberries – their beautiful red tones are the perfect visual contrast while their tartness cuts through the richness of the mousse.

    Makes 10 glasses.

    Don’t forget to scroll to the end of this post to check out all the delicious
    Death by Chocolate entries

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    Sweet Adventures Blog Hop: Death by Chocolate

    If you blog about food we’d love you to join this hop. Simply follow the steps below and join the fun!

    1. Publish your Death by Chocolate post on your blog sometime between 16th January 2012 (9am Sydney time [AEST]) and 23rd January ( 11:59pm Sydney time [AEST]). Entries are linked in order of submission so try to get your entry in on or as close to the 16th as possible. Only new posts featuring chocolate are eligible.
    2. Click here for the Link Code. Copy the code and add it to the bottom of your Death by Chocolate post (you will need to do this in HTML view). Adding the code will create the thumbnail gallery of all the other entries and let visitors hop from other blogs to your blog and vice versa. If you are on wordpress.com (i.e. not self hosted) the list will not show on your blog so please create a text link back to this post instead.
    3. Grab the SABH Death by Chocolate badge and add it to your post. Just right click on the image, ‘save as’, upload to your site and add it to your Death by Chocolate post. Link the badge or a line of text to this page so that others can view the instructions on how to join.
    4. Click here to Enter the HopThis is the really important bit! The badge and thumbnail list are on your post so make sure to enter the hop so that you appear in the list. For question 1: add the URL of your Death by Chocolate Post, not your homepage. For question 2: for caption/title add the name of your dessert. For question 3: for ‘your name’ please enter your blog name. For question 4: your entry is automatically submitted when you click ‘crop’.
    5. Your linked post WILL NOT appear straight away in the blog hop thumbnail list. To combat spam this is a moderated hop. Your post will be visible in the list after approval.
    6. Hop around to all the other entries in the blog hop, sharing the comment love.
    7. If you are on Twitter use the #SABH to tell the world about your Death by Chocolate post. Follow us @SweetAdvBlogHop for new hop announcements and general deliciousness.

    If you aren’t sure how to do something please leave a comment or get in touch.

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