Thursday 29 April 2010

KOREAN feVer!!: Beef Rib Bulgogi




Yea man. One of those cuisines which we have not tried experimenting at home is Korean!!!.. I am quite unfamilliar with korean food other than bulgogi, bibimbap and maybe Pa Jeon. Dosen't help that there is only one Korean restaurant in the whole of Scotland. Fortunately its quite a decent one!!!.

Anyway, I've been starting to watch some korean dramas lately lol. Quite different from Jap dramas. ATM, I still prefer the Japanese language and actors better but there's just something really intriguing about the Korean drama plot. Still trying to grasp various elements of it. So in keeping with the korean drama fever, we shall have Korean food.

The great thing about staying with Aa and C is that Aa is great chef and C has this endless supply of Asian spice mix. If you thought my Ben and Jerry collection was insane, wait till you see her stock of sauce mix. Enough to feed the whole of korea la !!! lol





Asia Gourmet is one of the best brands that I have tried. The taste is definately good enough for home consumption. Very good I would say and if you use good quality beef which Aa loves, then u get a match made in heaven. All we need now is a sizzling hot plate. lol


맛있는 !!!!!


Wednesday 28 April 2010

Beef Rendang




Aa made beef rendang using BEEF RIBSSS !!!!!

No wonder it was so exquisitely tender




Monday 26 April 2010

I LOVE Ben & Jerry’s !!!

In anticipation of the big Ben and Jerry Free (Fair) Cone day, I shall be blogging about my love for ice cream and in particularly BEN AND JERRY'S !!!!... Hopefully, this shall be the post that will answer most of the questions related to my Ben and Jerry's Conquest !!!




"ermm.. do I love ice cream?"


Prior to my journey to UK, my ice cream cravings were usually settled by the humble potong ice cream or magnolia ice cream with wafers sold the road side uncles. Occasionally, I'll get the earthquake treat from my uncle at Swenson's. Haagen Daaz was a luxury I was unwilling to pay for and B and J was a totally foreign concept at that time.

Fast forward to 2004 and here I am on British Soil. One very fine day as I was doing my groceries, I stumbled upon this big offer --> Ben and Jerry's 2 for 4 pounds !!!..... WAHH!!!.. Of course, at that time the conversion was still close to 3 pounds per Sing which made each tub 6 dollars but thats still way cheaper than 10 sing dollars back home. Gleefully, I took home 4 tubs: Peace of Cake, Pfish Food and Cookie Dough. It was love at first taste and I bought 8 tubs the moment I finished the last 4 lol, which didn't take long.

Somehow, I decided to start collecting the ice cream tubs (which btw is a nightmare when I have to transport them when I move houses). Lots of tubs have been collected, close to a hundred maybe? Well... thanks to friends who like to buy B and J when they come over for dinner and flatmates who are also keen on ice cream.




"There's more in the fridge"


So to help with your ice cream selection tomorrow!... Here's a quick MY REVIEW of the ice cream that I have sampled and a wee snippet of interesting facts (funny how I remember random facts but not medical knowledge lol) behind each ice cream tub !!!...




Peace of Cake 5*****


Yup.. not a piece of cake but a PEACE of goodness. This was amongst the first tubs that I bought. Delightful strawberry cheesecake flavoured ice cream with good chunks of strawberry and swirls of cookie. Yum yum yum . Always a WINNER!

I kinda tricked Mich who didn't like cream nor cheese into eating it. She took one spoon and knew there was something she didn't like. lol Sorrie Mich LOL!.

Also I skipped dinner and ate one tub of this instead in my 2nd year freezer flat ... Fell sick the next day lol.... Lesson LEARNT.




Cookie Dough 4.5****


One of the legendary 4 that I bought. Yumm yumm. Vanilla ice cream was a wee bit sweet but I like it !!!.. Cookie dough was amazing. I probably won't eat it alone but definately works well with the ice cream.

This tub has no interesting facts !!!. How boring !! LOL!... At least it taste goood!!!...




Chocolate fudge brownie 3.5***


3.5 stars only?.... yeah... I think the brownie pieces damaged the overall texture of the ice cream. Haha.. they always end up being the last few tubs remaining in the freezer.




Phish Food 5*****

Chocolate! Marshmallows ! Caramel !! choclaety CHunks!!.. WOWOW. Its basically having your favourite ice cream and toppings all ready in one tub. That's Impressive! This tub's the last of the legendary 4. Probably have the most tubs of this flavour.!




Minter Wonderland 4****


MInt Icecream !!! I doubt you'll be finding this ice cream at the store tomorrow. Its a limited edition seen only during winter times. I've only got 3 tubs of this. The first one was from Ash's Christmas potluck in 1st year. The 2nd tub was bought from Tesco (which seems to be the only place that sells it). Can't remember where the last tub came from.

Flavour wise. Pretty much similar to vanilla but with a hint of MInt.

Also!.. its 40% larger than the average B and J tub. Really?




Cherry Garcia 3***


Nope... I am not a fan of this flavour. Cherry and dark chocolate dosen't do it for me. Similarly I am not a fan of black forest cakes.
The only reason why I bought it was becos I am a B and J fan lol and I needed to try all the flavours lol!




Half Baked 4****


This is such a playful flavour combination. Put chocolate fudge brownie and cookie dough together and what you get is HALF BAKED!!! I gave it 4 stars since I gave 4.5 for one and 3.5 stars for the other.

It was WY who bought this tub back in 1st year when he cooked Malaysian CHicken curry for me. Think it was the first time I sampled his cooking too.






New York Super Fudge 4****



The other tub which WY bought for the dinner. Its like a topping overloaded Pfish food but with nuts instead. Nuts are good!!!. Anaphylactics be WARNNED!.




Oh my! Apple Pie! 3.5***


Oh my oh my !!!.. Taste just like apple pie but COLD!!!.. I love apple pies but as a ice cream just din work for me... NO wonder it ended up in the B and J graveyard lOL! (Oh NO!!!. I just found out that peace of cake RIP in 2010 .... Sianness)

ANyway, this was the cheapest tub I've ever bought. 1 freaking POUND!!!!. I bought 6 at a go LOL!... and the place to find it ..... FARMFOODS!!!. Can't imagine man. Thanks to Aa who found out about it.




Chocolate Therapy 5*****


One of the BEST Chocolate ice creams I've eaten. Thick luscious and none of that icey business which u get with low quality ice cream. I've only got 2 tubs and 1 tub has gone missing. The reason why there's so few tubs is because it never goes on offer...




Phish Food 3***


One of the flavours that made it into the frozen yogurt series. Its meant to be low fat isn't it. Sorry B and J I don like yogurt. I tried...A and C likes this !!!




Bohemian Raspberyy 4.5****


This is good!!!. Taste like a blueberry cheesekcake!.. I doubt everyone will agree with me on the taste of this one. Suprisingly the chocolate brownies made this tub work quite well. U guys puzzle me.




Baked Alaska 4****



This is C's favourite flavour. I like it too because it bears a opposite similarity to Phish Food. The flavours are totally reversed. Check out the cool bear and yea it does have polar bear chocolate bits in it. I CHECKED LOL!




Cheesecake Brownie 3.5***


B and J does alot of charity stuff and one of their latest moves was to go all free trade. MOOOO!.. This tub does not strike an impression with me at all. I only remember it being a bit sourish probably because of the cheesecake and BROWNIES LOL which I don really like in ice cream.



Fossil Fuel 4****


Chocolate and loads of them!!!. comes with chocolate cookies as well.. There are actually bits of chocolate dinosaurs in there as well. Try finding some T-rex and Stegosaurus. I would say this is one of those safe bet ice creams that is unlikely to go wrong with your guest.

Chocolate Macadamia 3.5***


Macademian nuts!! .. Anyone like them? I find it a little oily though. Not one of my favourite tubs but if you are a big macademian nut fan then this is the ice cream for you.




Vanilla Toffe Crunch 4.5****


This is nice!!!. The best part of eating this ice cream is to savour each piece of chocolate toffee crunch. There’s a nice saltiness to the toffee which works extremely well with the chocolate. I finish off each piece by having a nice dallop of vanilla ice cream to cleanse my palatte

Mango berry swirl. 3***

I had so much hope for this ice cream but it disappointed me. Read my other post on it. Basically it didn’t taste like the other mango sorbets that I have tasted previously. The mix berry swirl that went into it tasted somewhat artificial too. Definitely NOT having this tomorrow




Cookie Dough again?.. haha. yup.. Well I don't have intersting fact about its bigger brother but this tub here is actually a single serving from the States!. YR brought it back for me when she was there in 2nd year. Cool eh!. Comes with a spoon as well.




Here's a comparison of the 3 different sizes that I have. Minter wonderland doesnt look like its 40% bigger rite? lol.. oh well I am sure it is somehow.

Ok. So what flavour ice cream are you going to have tomorrow?. Will there be flavours offered that I have not sampled before? Will I go for my favourite PEACE OF CAKE? lol....! See ya there tomorrow.


Ben & Jerry's
------------------------
North Atrium
Buchanan Galleries
Glasgow GF1 2FF






"Love....... in a Tub"


Saturday 24 April 2010

Lunch @ China BlUe!: 2nd Serving

My second serving post in a week does suggest that there ain't many places in Glasgow for Chinese food, which is kinda true. So all those take away uncles and aunties please do consider setting up more restaurants like this cos we hungry and desperate asian students will definately patronise them.





Met up with V and HnnH for lunch after my nights. haha Pretty tired but the food will keep me going. V decided to go for fried carrot cake after a long consideration. I quite like it. It pretty much was a char kway teow but substituted with carrot cake. PLus points for the prawns !!~ Definately a better sharing dish than a main.





HnnH had Ban Mien. After sampling this dish 2 times, I think we have come to the conclusion that it ain't as good as Qiu Lian ban mien back home. Don't worry, still can order.





I had Fish Head Vermicillin, it was so good but msg loaded. THe amount of salted cabbage used was appropriate and I believe I tasted some sour plum as well. THe fish was amazing as well. Deep fried and then immersed in the broth to mask the oily texture hahaha. I wonder if all that collagen will be good for my skin hahahaha.





Sadly, I din't leave the best for last. The dry version of yong tau hu in a bean sauce can't match the broth version. Must be the sauce. Tasted abit sourish. Something savoury would have probably been better.




China Blue
-----------------------------
96 Renfield Street
Glasgow G2 1NH
0141 333 1881
Opening Times: Noon only.


Friday 23 April 2010

Chocolate Tart!




As mentioned before, I was going to make one of these little wee chocolate tarts. It wasn't because I was craving for one but I just thought it would be fun to see what's it like to make one.





So here's what you need
---------------------------------

Bar of milk chocolate 200g + 20g of dark chocolate for the colour
Whipping cream 300ml
all butter tarts (managed to find some mini ones in M and S)
Pod of Vanilla





Chop up the chocolate. Sprinkle in the vanilla. Heat up the whipping cream till just it is about to boil. POur over and stir it into a nice thick chocolate sauce.





Pour into the wee tartlets and refrigerate overnight. Microwave it just before serving.


Hope you like it.


P.s: you can turn the remaining chocolate sauce into whipping cream !!!



Thursday 22 April 2010

BundaBerg 2 for 1 at Peckhams




Peckhams on Byres Road is doing an offer on Bundaberg Peach Soda. 2 bottles for 1.49pds.





Time for some peach soda float !!!



P.s: Going on nights...... lol!!!


Dinner at 4 Seasons 2nd Serving.

We had dinner at 4 Seasons again.. In fact... my 4th time here now... lol... Forgotten to bring my camera the last 2 times to take pictures.





Sweet and Sour Pork. One of the best ones in Glasgow. Authentic enough according to our resident SASP expert.





Braised Fish with tofu in hot pot.





Stir fry bean sprouts with Beancurd





Deep Fried Salt and pepper squid.





Roasted duck with enoki Mushroom. wAh SoLiD man!!!


The food's good once again. I really really wish they were larger portions though. 5 dishes for 5 people was just just enough only.




Four Seasons
------------------------
Cambridge Street
Next to Subway Eat Fresh

Tuesday 20 April 2010

Lunch @ See Woo




Char Siew Su. I m not super into these but I really like the ones here.





OO.... Yummy Fatty roasted duck noodles. Super good man..!!





Aa's giant plate of beef, taukee stew over crispy noodles. Quite heavy for lunch no? lol




P.s: Been busy at work... so the posts will be coming in slower. TC all!

Saturday 17 April 2010

Persian Food with Big G



Photo Credits: Big G


The last time I was at the west end cafe, I was chowing down on a mix grill platter of lamb, chicken and steak. Fast Forward 7 months and its changed from West End grill to West End Cafe: a Taste of Persia. Persia by the way is also the name of Iran from 600 BC until 1935

As I sat down waiting for Big G's arrival, the friendly boss came over and chatted with me. To my amusement, she said she had recognised me from before. I was hesistant to agree but I nodded away politely (afterall, all Chinese looking people look the same right lol). True enough, I was misrecognised as one of the folks from YG's social outing. HAHA its ok. It made up for a good laugh and more interesting conversations.

Turns out that this wee cafe has seen its menu undergo a transition from French to Grill to its current Persian Menu. The boss explains that the previous menus were too extensive and the kitchen was unable to manage the different combination of orders. Sure sounds like something I see in Kitchen Nightmares. Well... the current chef is from Iran and is reputed to whip up some marvellous Persian dishes. Can't wait to check it out!!!

Finally, Big G found his way. Two starving man makes for two huge appetites and we ended up with well.. you can say 4 Main dishes and an appetiser.. O_o !!!





The boss was quick to recommend to us a dish called Kashke(whey) Bademjam, an aubergine puree with walnuts, onions,mixed herbs and spices. haha my eyes literally stared at it for 2 secs while my olfactory senses savour the tantalizing aroma. We took it with some pita bread and wow.. oily goodness. It was a taste not found in my dictionary but related most to garlic oil.





She then suggested the prawn biryani. I love this. Never thought that a combination of prawn and biryani could taste so good. There was a generous portion of huge prawns but definately lacking the heat for my taste buds. Basmati rice was plentiful as we had ordered 3 more main dishes on top of the biryani.





Okra curry. This was probably my least favourite of the night. A wee bit too sour from the tomato base and the okra was overstewed. Its just my personal preference of liking slightly crunchy okra and sambal chilli that added the biasness lol.





You can't skip BBQ skewers can you when you eat persian food. So... We had a spicy joojeh (chicken marinated in Olive Oil, mustard and Lemon Juice) and tender baby lamb fillets. I must say the meat was absolutely moist. PLUS points for the chargrilled tomato. If only there was a chargrill green chilli ;)





The chef presented everything together on a plate since we were going to share the food. See that powdery mixture there. Its meant to be sprinkled over the meat and rice and adds abit of acidity to the food. Think of it like a lemon substitute. I wish I could tell you what went into it. Forest berries ?





Some Persian Tea on the boss to Finish off the meal.


West End Cafe: Taste of Persia
-----------------------------------------------
526 Great Western Road
Glasgow
G12 8EL
Tel: 0141 334 3262
http://westendcafe.net/

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