Tofu Nuggets

This Jessica Seinfeld recipe makes me wonder who did the photography in her book "Deceptively delicious". Deceptive is right - for the cooker AND the eater.

In the recipe these look like deep fried, golden nuggets, with not trace of what is concealed beneath the breadcrumbs. In these photos the secret vegetable is no secret. Cubes of firm tofu are dipped in a mixture of beaten egg and pureed spinach, then in breadcrumbs. These are sprayed with oil, then fried. While they tasted OK, I don't think these would fool anyone.

2 ways with cheesecake

The first is a baked "raspberry and ricotta tart" from Table magazine. The key ingredient ricotta was not in stock, so a combination of cottage cheese and quark were used instead. This gave the tart more flavour than ricotta alone, which can taste bland. The tart was well recieved at a lunch for 15 people, serving more than the eight advised by the recipe.

The second is a "Quick cherry cheesecake" from FamilyFun kids' cookbook. The base is crumbled chocolate marie biscuits mixed with melted butter and pressed into the baking dish. The second layer is cream cheese, caster sugar and lemon zest beaten with an electric mixer. The last layer involved opening a can of cherry pie filling over the top. Popping it into the fridge for a hour and "hey presto!"

The last degustion post

Deep fried pea and mint fritters with black vinegar caramel and spring onions rounded out the savoury menu. The crispy little fritters were cooked perfectly. A crunchy crumb on the outside, meltingly soft on the inside. I couldn't taste any mint in the fritters, but there were roughly torn mint leaves in the salad. The black vinegar caramel was sweet and made a nice dipping sauce for the fritters.

Before dessert was served, a palate cleanser arrived in a little shot glass. This contained coconut panna cotta at its base, a thin layer of lemongrass jelly followed, topped off with pineapple granita. I was pretty sure I wouldn't be able to pack anything else in after that, but somehow I managed.

Dessert took the form of a chilled rhubarb and mango crumble with vanilla bean ice cream and meringue sticks. Decorating the mottled square glass plate were dabs of a sweet red syrup and tiny cubes of strawberry. The dessert was delicious. A perfect way to cap off the night.

Part 3 (it was a long night)

Eggplant and Chinese greens with fragrant rice and yellow curry dressing was the highlight of the night. Served as a tower, it began with rice, topped with sweet roasted eggplant, a hidden roasted cherry tomato and garlic clove. Lightly sauteed baby pak choy, baby rocket, red onion and crispy fried shallot complete the tower. On being brought to the table, the wonderfully sweet, yet not to rice yellow curry dressing is poured into the bowl and adds a hint of coconut to the dish. Brilliant!

Roasted beetroot cubes are topped with rhubarb, orange, Spanish onion, Persian fetta and salsa verde. Although I tried all the elements to this dish, I prefered the simple pairing of roasted beetroot with melty fetta.

Degustation Part 2

Course three comprised of a crispy tempura fried zucchini flower stuffed with goat's cheese, which melted slightly during it's flash frying. The filling had a slight hummus flavour, which turned out to be babagnoush. The flower was placed atop some pureed zucchini which had a spicy edge to it. The square white plate was drizzled with pomegranate molasses and grenadine. This was topped with a salad of pickled red onion, baby rocket and lemon.

I thought the grenadine was too sweet for this dish. I also would have prefered no babagnoush in the filling as it was a distraction from the simple mild flavour od the cheese and zucchini.

Course four featured a spicy corn puree, drizzled with a zigzag of what could have been a balsamic reduction. This was topped with roasted red capsicum littered with shredded mint. Sweet potato chips completed the dish. These were not chips in the traditional sense, rather grated and deep fried. The plate was drizzled with chermoula oil to finish. I liked this course the least. I'm not a big fan of mint and it was a difficult job picking out the tiny slivers. The chermoula oil tasted bitter. With the removal of these two elements, it could have been a great dish.

Degustation Part 1

There has been a lot written about degustation menus lately so I decided to go with my sister to try out the vegetarian degustation menu at ezard in Flinders Lane. We went to this restaurant for my birthday a couple of years ago, so we already knew it was a place with great food, ambience and service.

The degustation menu had eight official courses, though two extra dishes were thrown in somehow. The table was set with a dish of olive oil blended with rosemary and parmesan, and a dish with three herb blends. The first was a dried nori blend which had a slight fishy sea-like taste to it. The second was sweet at first but had a spicy aftertaste. That was my favourite. The third was distinctly unmemorable.

The starter to our degustation was a tofu shooter. Served in a shot glass, this contained sake and mirin which was flambeed to remove the alcohol, making it intensely sweet. Then wasabi and ginger were added to cut through the sweetness, followed by the addition of cube of silken tofu. This was served with a delicious nori roll chaser. I must admit I didn't down it all at once as I was savouring the flavour of the shot liquid. Yum.

The first course was served on the same tray as the starter in a little tea cup which held red miso soup, tiny cubes of tofu, spring onion and sesame. While it was good miso soup, it was nothing special. The second course started with an asian inspired gazpacho at the base, followed by avocado tempura, shaved picked fennel (tasting faintly of saurkraut) and a quinelle of cooling cucumber creme fraiche. The flavours in the gazpacho came through beautifully, as did the subtle cucumber flavour in the creme fraiche. The avocado was creamy, not losing any of its natural flavour in the short cooking time. I didn't particularly enjoy the fennel as it has a aniseed flavour that often overwhelms the tastebuds, but it gave a nice contrast to this dish.

Stay tuned for Degustation part 2!

Devilled Eggs

These are my first go at devilled eggs, from Jessica Seinfeld's much debated cookbook "Deceptively Delicious". The book's catch is that within every recipe is a hidden vegetable or fruit puree. These eggs are smuggling half a cup of pureed cauliflower in addition to 6 hard boiled egg yolks, mayonnaise, paprika and salt. Given that it is a cookbooked aimed at a child's palate I found the recipe bland and needed to add several dashes of cayenne to get it going.

As with most recipes where a filling goes into small packages, there was lots of egg mixture left over. This made a tasty lunch spread the next day with toasted bagel and sliced tomato.