Tag Archives: australian writers centre

Redesigning a blog is like renovating a house. Or getting elective plastic surgery.

You start off thinking that you’re just going to make a few minor cosmetic changes and you end up with a house (or body) that is almost unrecognisable. The thing is, once you’ve made one part look good everything around it starts to look a little tired.

The Hungry Australian redesign you are now looking at has been a long time in the making. While I really liked my old blog design, over time I began wishing that I could add some new elements and functionality to it. The trouble is, once I started I realised that making a few minor changes would be unsatisfying and that nothing less than a complete redesign would serve.

Because my blog is such a personal thing and I’m a bit of a control freak, finding a designer to work with me on the redesign was quite tricky. So I’m thrilled with the design that Joseph and I came up with. Thanks for all your (late-night) work getting the new site up and running, Joseph.

This new design includes a visual recipe index, which is something I’ve been wanting ever since I started blogging and my photos actually started resembling food. You can search by type of dish or dietary requirement: if you want to search by ingredient simply enter the ingredient into the search box on the top right of the screen.

A few things to note.

Firstly, the new post column is significantly wider than the old one so photos in old posts won’t be completely sharp when viewed on a computer screen. I may get around to replacing all of these images with new ones at the current width one day.

Secondly, I’m still re-categorising my recipes so there are actually more recipes in most of the sections. For example, the sugar-free category currently only contains a few recipes but there are actually a lot more sugar-free recipes in the archives. I’ll finish this off by the end of the month.

Thirdly, old comments haven’t been imported yet. This will hopefully happen in the next day or so but you can still comment in the meantime.

Lastly, we’re still working on it so you may find the occasional glitch. Thanks for your patience and understanding.

Now regular readers will know that I’ve been blogging a lot less than usual lately due to firstly a killer flu and then work and family commitments. When you get out of practise with something it can become harder and harder to get back into it. But working on this blog makeover has made me fall in love with blogging all over again.

So with this redesign almost complete, I’m feeling re-inspired and re-invigorated as I set off on a much awaited trip with Trafalgar: tonight I’m off to Abu Dhabi where I’ll be staying for a day or so before I fly to Turkey for a week’s famil/media trip followed by a two-day extension to central Turkey by myself.

The week in Turkey was one of the prizes I received as overall winner of the Australian Writers’ Centre’s Best Australian Blogs 2014 competition. Many thanks to the team at the AWC for their support, and to Trafalgar for this amazing prize and for also hosting my add-ons to Abu Dhabi (partnering with Creative Holidays) and Cappadocia.

I will be blogging a number of current and recent food and travel stories while I’m on the road. If you want to see what I’m up to in real-time you can follow me at Instagram, Twitter or Facebook.

Christina xx

Summer Pudding

I’ve always been intrigued by the idea of Summer Pudding, a simple pudding made with stewed berries and bread. So when I had a glut of berries in the house yesterday I decided to give it a go.

This is not a hard dessert to make and it’s a very light and pleasant one to eat, too. My daughter is notoriously picky when it comes to cakes and she ate four slices last night. How many can you eat?

5.0 from 3 reviews

Summer pudding

 

Author: Christina Soong

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: Australian

Prep time:  25 mins

Cook time:  10 mins

Total time:  35 mins

Print

A light, Summery dessert

Ingredients

• 1kg grams mixed berries, fresh or frozen
• ½ cup sugar
• 45 mls water (3 tablespoons)
• Fresh bread (crusts removed) to cover the inside of a 1 kilogram pudding basin, about 8 regular slices or 500 grams gluten free bread (gluten free bread is generally baked in smaller loaves so you have to use more as you lose more of it when you cut off the crusts).

Instructions

1. Place 800 grams berries, sugar and water in a medium saucepan and cook until juices run (about 3-4 minutes for fresh and 8-10 minutes if frozen).
2. Meanwhile, line pudding basin with bread ensuring that there are no gaps (cut to fit).
3. Remove approximately ⅓ cup juice from saucepan and then spoon remaining berries and juice into bread-line pudding basin.
4. Cover berries with remaining bread and then gently spoon over a few tablespoons of the reserve juice so that the bread is all red in colour. Cover the remaining juice and store in the fridge.
5. Cover pudding with a clean saucer that fits just inside the pudding basin and then put a heavy weight on top (e.g. a can or heavy plate).
6. Refrigerate the pudding overnight or for at least four hours.
7. To serve, remove pudding from fridge and discard saucer.
8. Place a serving plate over the pudding base and carefully invert the pudding onto the plate.
9. If there are any white spots on the bread, cover these up with the reserved juice.
10. Decorate with reserved fresh berries and serve with cream or custard.

Notes

SUBSTITUTIONS
Gluten-free: gluten-free bread can be used.
Refined sugar-free: stevia, honey, rice malt vinegar or agave syrup can be used instead of sugar.
Dairy-free: serve with dairy-free ice cream or whipped coconut cream instead of whipped cream.

3.2.2802

A few weeks ago I decided to throw an afternoon tea. Between work and family commitments I’ve been a neglectful friend lately so I thought it was a good way to catch up with a whole lot of girlfriends at once.

In the week leading up to my afternoon tea I was chuffed to learn that I was a finalist in the Best Australian Blogs 2013 competition. Later, I was amazed to hear that I’d won the Outstanding Use of Photography award for my post on Dubai’s markets and souks. Thank you Australian Writers’ Centre – I’m really feeling the love.

So the afternoon tea today felt like an impromptu celebration.

Let’s have a look at all the dishes one by one, shall we? We’ll start with savoury.

Cheese Board

A Cheese Platter with Tasmanian Heritage Double Brie, King Island Cheddar, Gorgonzola Dolce, wafers and a fig and almond paste.  Click here for tips on putting together a cheese board.

Cold Meat Platter

Here I’ve chosen four different cold meats — Hamwurst, Mortadella, Paprika Lyoner and Bierschinken with Pistachio Nuts — from Standom.

Beetroot Hummus

This gorgeous looking dip was made by Nicola who blended chickpeas, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, olive oil, beetroot and salt together. The beetroot gives the hummus a sweet flavour while the cucumber adds some refreshing crunch.

Vietnamese King Prawn Cold Rolls

My mum and our friend Ruta came over a bit earlier to help out and ending up making my plate of rolls for me – thank you! I’ll blog Vietnamese Cold Rolls properly at some point but for this dish you need King prawns split length-wise, cold vermicelli rice noodles, cucumber, carrot, mint, coriander, basil and rice paper wrappers. I made the sauce with a mixture of satay sauce, hoisin sauce, sweet chilli sauce, rice wine vinegar and lime juice.

Vietnamese Pork Rolls

I’ve blogged a Vietnamese Pork Bun recipe before so head over there if you want to know how to make my cocktail party version of Vietnamese Pork Rolls.

Smoked Salmon Dip & Corn Relish Dip

This Smoked Salmon Dip is super easy and so much better than the stuff you buy in tubs. Simply blend 100 grams smoked salmon, 200 grams softened cream cheese, juice of half a lemon, 2 tablespoons water and 1/2 teaspoon drained capers. The Corn Relish Dip is even simpler than the salmon. Simply blend a jar of corn relish with a block of softened cream cheese. Easy, right?

Sweet & Salty Popcorn

This stuff is like crack. Once you start eating it you don’t ever want to stop.

Cherry Cake

This Cherry Cake was made by Ruta. Sadly I didn’t get to try it but I’ve eaten Ruta’s food countless times over the years and she’s an excellent cook so I’m sure it was delicious.

Cream Puffs

When my mum asked me what she should make for today I said, “cream puffs. Make a tower of cream puffs with toffee like you did for my birthday when I was little.”

My mother laughed. “I bought that cake. Oh Christina, you’re so naive.”

Thanks mum – another childhood illusion shattered. These cream puffs she did make were awfully nice though.

Friands

My lovely sister in law made these delicious friands. They were such a great size – perfect for an afternoon tea party.

Lemon Slice

This gluten-free, no-bake lemon slice was made by Kate. It was so good that I have told Kate she has to blog it soon or there will be trouble.

UPATED: Kate has blogged the lemon slice recipe. Thanks Kate!

Mini Pavlovas

Celeste made these pink and white beauties. Well, technically, she assembled them but she’s put them together very nicely. Hey, I’ve just realised that the garnish is parsley not mint – Celeste, what kind of crazy fusion food game are you playing?

Chocolate Guinness Cupcakes & Raspberry Cupcakes

Tash is a fantastic baker who is currently studying patisserie at Tafe and food studies at University. She brought along these fantastic Chocolate Guinness cupcakes, Raspberry Cupcakes and Gluten Free Orange Cupcakes. Thanks Tash!

All three cupcakes were topped with a celestial vanilla bean cream cheese icing.

To accompany the food, we drank delicious Strawberry Champagne Cocktails made by Megan, sangria and champagne. Megan’s cocktail was so good I’m going to blog it separately.

There was so much food left at the end of the day that I sent everyone home with a plate of food.

Life usually rushes by at a frantic pace so it was a lovely to spend a few hours eating, drinking and talking with friends. I need to do this more often.

Thanks for a lovely afternoon, chums xx

Hello! Sorry it’s been so quiet here this past week – I was working on a few different client projects and then I developed some kind of low-grade virus that made me want to sleep all day. Anyway, it’s been a while since I did these monthly favourite posts but I’m re-introducing them as of now. So here’s the list of things making me happy this month.

1) Custard apples

I shot four dessert recipes for the 2013 Australian Custards Apples campaign last week (two of my recipes plus two recipes by MasterChef winner and all-round nice guy Adam Liaw) so my house was full of this gorgeous tropical fruit (see above). If you’ve never eaten custard apples before now is the time to get your hands on some.

2) Heated hair rollers

I went out to dinner the other night with Shai and Celeste and when I walked into the restaurant they said I looked very “va va voom.” Admittedly, I had a rather nice dress on but it was actually my new sexy curls that were attracting all the attention. Ladies, if you have mid-long hair and don’t have a set of heated rollers, run to the shops and buy some now. You won’t regret it.

3) Kale

I have this weird aversion to trendy things. I read the first Harry Potter two years after it came out and it took me even longer to read the Twilight novels (I think you need to be under 17 to really appreciate them). I still haven’t read Fifty Shades of Grey but I’ve heard the writing is fairly atrocious so I’m in no rush. Anyway, to get to the point of this paragraph, I cooked kale for the first time a few weekends ago and I loved it’s strong, slightly bitter taste and thickly layered texture. I feel like Thelma in Thelma and Louise when she says, “now I understand what all the fuss is about!” after spending a night with J. D. (Brad Pitt). I cooked a warm purple kale salad with chorizo and almonds for Amazing Almonds the other day and a chorizo, chicken, white bean and green kale soup for our dinner.

4) Fantastic Mr Fox

The other night I watched a film about a fox (George Clooney) who wants to pull off one last robbery behind the back of his trusting wife (Meryl Streep). Based on the book by Roald Dahl, it’s so beautifully animated and so clever – I laughed out loud several times. It’s not really a movie for small kids as there are some scary bits but older kids will love its black humour. Check it out.

5) Divine Vegan Desserts

If you read my recent J’s Chocolate Banana Cake post you’d know that my son was recently diagnosed with an intolerance to dairy and egg. Well, it turns out my daughter also has this problem, too, which means a massive re-think of our diet. Luckily, Wakefield Press recently sent me Lisa Fabry’s Divine Vegan Desserts and it’s full of helpful hints and interesting recipes to try.

6) Denim shirt

I haven’t worn denim on my upper body since the mid 90s but I freaking love this slim-cut shirt and have been living in it lately. I wear it with my black J Brand skinny jeans and ballet flats for running around or my hot pink Diane Von Furstenberg skirt and heels when I’m going out.

7) Crepe pan by Profiline

I make pancakes at least once a week in my regular frypan so when Profiline offered to send me a crepe pan I was keen to see if it made any difference. The Profiline crepe pan is very well-made and incredibly light and thin. It produced beautiful crepes for me so it’s well worth a look if you make crepes or pancakes regularly.

8) Manfretto Tripod

I’ve used tripods in the past when shooting but they were flimsy, awkward devices and I soon gave up, reverting to only hand-held photography. Then a few weeks ago I bought a Manfretto 190X ProB, an incredibly well made and rock-solid tripod. Now I set up a complete scene and use the viewfinder on my tripod mounted camera to check that everything is in the best position before I start shooting. I then use the tripod to take both portrait and landscape shots of the scene before unclipping my camera (a Nikon D600) and shooting the rest hand-held. It’s like having an extra pair of hands in the studio and I can’t imagine shooting without it now.

9) Family

It’s been a challenging month on the personal front but my family have humbled me once again by the way they’ve pulled together and gone above and beyond to help out. You guys are my heroes and I love you to bits.

EDIT:

A Most Unexpected Surprise

My original post ended there. But yesterday I found out that The Hungry Australian is one of 25 finalists in the Best Australian Blogs 2013 competition run by the Australian Writers’ Centre. Yep, this humble little blog is one of five finalists in the lifestyle/hobby section, which covers travel, food and beverages, health, fashion, craft and interior design.

Wow. *pinches self*

Of all the amazing things that have happened since I started this blog this would have to be the most unbelievable. THANK YOU! *happy dance*

According to the Random House website, 1,122 blogs entered in this year’s competition and five finalists were announced in each of the competition categories: Lifestyle (408 entries), Personal/Parenting (350 entries), Business (84 entries), Commentary (119 entries) and Words/Writing (161 entries). Head over to the Australian Writers’ Centre website to learn more about the judging process.

When I began blogging in mid 2011 I saw it as a way of flexing my writing muscle, which had gotten stiff and clumsy out of disuse. Since then I’ve spent countless hours writing and blogging, all the time wondering if my words will have any impact at all. Now I still have a long way to go with The Hungry Australian but this nomination feel like recognition that I’m heading in the right direction at least. So I’m off to celebrate with a large bowl of noodles now!

Thank you for reading. You guys inspire me every day.

Christina xx