Dim Sim

you can get package mix from the Asian super market, or you can make them from scratch, I have a recipe somewhere, if you are interested, I will try to dig it out.From memory it contains ammonia, I was told that is what gives it that lacy interior. Oh, by the way I like your churros comparison, whatever you do just don't sprinkle any icing sugar on it I have to have it with congee.

That's it, anyone has recipe for it ? or how to prepare it ?

Crispy Duck with Taro Paste Stuffing ?????, been Googling around try to find the mandarin name for it, this is as close as i got to ( my mandarin typing skill is pretty bad )

no , hzrt8w it is not a clay pot dish, I suspect the duck is steam first, than debone, and somehow coax into a rectangular shape and stick some taro paste underneath and deep fry the lot, and cut into chop stick bite size and serve with some thickened duck flavoured jus/sauce. might give the dish that you mentioned a try though, I will eat anything with taro in it.

I have been searching this duck recipe for quite a few years, but with no result, I only even came across this dish in 3 restaurants, all in Melbourne , it is flat and boneless crispy duck and with taro paste underneath (much like the 'Wok Guk' pastry and all cut up like you would with red bean pancake ) with a corn starch thickened duck flavour sauce, it is fatty, crispy, and I just can't have enough, now I want to make it myself. anyone know the dish I am talking about ? ( I believe in some places they refer taro as yam, )

Been going to this little tucked away place in Tivoli Arcade, just off Bourke street between Swanston and Russell Street, called ChatterBox. Decent laksa lemak, dirt cheap too . They have bak ku teh on the menu too. Chilli Padi, Melbourne Central, entrance through a lane just opposite St. Francis church, very good laksa. There seems to be someone who cares a great deal about food that comes out of the kitchen here. I always feel that I can't order anything wrong here, I am sure whatever I order would be nice. bak ku teh on the menu too. Laksa King ( Racecourse Rd, Flemington, in a Arcade , in the main shopping strip , sorry PCL for being so Vague about the direction ) this is my local hawker food place, if I don't feel like hopping in a car, this is the place I can walk to, I have had very good to quite bad food here ( like the mushy Rendang, and overboiled laksa) but most of the time they are really good, they have Ipoh combination Hor fun, nasi lemak, roti canai with rendang or chicken curry, thick dark luscious Hokkien mee. and of course , changi nasi lemak, and the place in Grattan Street, in carlton that PCL has mentioned, and Raffles, and Penang House from Shin (btw Penang House has closed the old premises and moving up the road a bit, away from the cbd) I was just emailing my brother the other day, mentioning how different it is now for the homesick Malaysian overseas students. just remember when we were here in the early 1980s. the cbd was a ghost town after 5.oopm and there were only a handful of Malaysian restaurants. Malaya is one of them, just opposite what is now Becco, and later on Little Malaysia in liverpool lane on the top of bourke st. my brother and I have lots of memories of this place, lost count of those endless balacan kang kong, laksa and char kueh tuey , the owner there Eric used to look after us really well. Nyonya in market lane just opposite Flower Drum ( that was when they used to do yumcha, no trolly though waitress used to carry tray of goodies, true Flower Drum style). And I still remember having my first bowl of laksa (at Malaya restaurant) after being deprived for a few years and how lucky these new OS students are nowaday, most living in apartments in the CBD, have hundreds of eating places to choose from.

Sarawak laska ( my stock of laksa paste in running alarmingly low), kopi O ban (icy cold black coffee with sugar, served in a tall glass with ice ), roti canai with a small side dish of curry gravy (we get roti canai here (Melbourne) but it is not the same) "bee lin" that is how we called it in my hometown in sarawak, it is a type of edible fern tip.we have it stired fried with balacan, and oh, and mum's cooking.

and Glenn McGrath and Masterfoods, How could you ? in that heat ? did your bbq melt to the ground ?

Ohh... Shal , you 've done it again.

Hi PCL, have you try the Laksa at Chilli Padi, in Melbourne Central, (at the corner of a lane and Little Lonsdale St .) the people there (I was told) used to operate Chilli Padi on Bridge Rd. Richmond, which I used to frequent about 10 years ago. I enjoyed the Laksa there. Sorry, I know this is meant to be about Sydney, over and out.

Your menu sounds lovely Shal, I wish I am up in sydney so I can invite myself, in Melbourne we are having another hot one, I was told it is going to be in the 40Cs , last night in the balmy backyard we had garlic prawns , Mussels cooked in a chilli tomato and salami sauce with potato, a green salad with cos, avcocado, and white peach, and a simple dressing of vino cotto and Mt zero organic evvo ( it is the only Australian evoo I like) a nice crusty baguette to dip in those lovely garlic prawn flavoured oil. and a few bottles of Australian sparkling whites, oh and a few james boag Tassie premium largers , and fruit to finish. Today, Australia Day, it will be too hot to cook, I might do something with a smoked trout I have in the fridge, may be a salad with horseredish cream, or a sandwish, or a pasta , I don't think there will be many people doing the good O' Australia Day BBQ in Melbourne. Let us know how you lunch go, and do post some picts, love your cooking class post in the other forum.

might have to get someone to take me there soon , the food you described sounds just what I would like to eat, that Huia is one of my favourites too. Birthday is coming up. I hope all my friends are reading this. PCL, the place you mentioned , it couldn't be Ying Thai, could it ? that is one my my favourite thai place, I like it when they don't scale down the chilli to suit mild palate ( we counted 10 birdeye chillies in the bottom of the soup bowl once after my friend finished his bowl of tom yum ), I like the pork Larb and the deep fried fish with chilli jam, there is another one in Lygon Street too.

Kim D, that looks delicious, I just returned my copy back to the library I think I will get my own copy down the line, it is such a good book to have, I am sure I will keep going back to it in the future. I was wondering how the Maloufs are perceived in the US, are they well known for their middle eastern food writing ? Here is what I made last week from the book , barazek, they are Mooooorish this one is for you, Shin. By the way, how did your thinner batch go ?

I was there(at Excell meats) last weeks, and bought some veal for vitello tonnato and cotechino sausages for my dinner partyboth were exceptionally good, it is hard to come across veal , and they always stock it. if you scroll down the Australia and NZ thread you will find some discussions about bread flour, I got my in 25 kg bag from the Gertrude Organic bakery just before they closed, there is a store in the organic section at the QV market that sell organic baker flour, I find the best one is the one bakeries use, I am using Laucke organic baker flour at the moment and quite happy with it, if you are nice to your local baker, he or she might sell you some, in my opinion, there is almost nothing you can buy retail that could rival the stuff most bakeries use.

Hi shin, I had a whole day of baking yesterday, made a loaf of sourdough, some scones for the street christmas, I thought I might squeeze in the sesame and pisstchio biscuits. I did a double batch, I have to baked them in 2 ovenloads, the first ones were nice and short, a bit brown on the edges on some of them (non convection oven ) , I baked the second load at a slightly shorter time, and took them out and removed them onto a cooling rack and back in the cooling oven to dry out the centre a bit, I am happy to say with good result. I don't know what the people in Sydney Rd. does to the biscuits, they are nicer. more crisp and more flavour, I suppose they make theirs thinner, therefore the nut to biscuit ratio is greater. overall I am happy with the result.

My Canadian sister in law and her family were here (Melbourne, Australia) and they raved on about how good the fish and chips was, I haven't yet tasted the Canadian counterpart ( apart from the poutine). I would use a fresh fillet of fish, generally speaking not too thick, white flesh ( don't ask, it just seems to work better ) the way I make my beer batter, plain ( all-purpose) flour in a deep bowl , a pinch of salt, and thin it down it cold beer ( icy, think tempura) till you get a light crepe mixture , dust the fillet with flour , dip in batter, and deep fried till golden, not too long , I find when the oil started to spilt ( when the fish releases liquid, the fish is cooked) , 2 things though the oil has to be hot , at least 180 C ( the oil has to mantain that temperature ) I have to agree fat is better, I use canola oil because I have to watch my health, and if you don't have a powerful burner, don't crowd the pot, if you have to do it in batches, warm up your oven , but it won't be as good though. In Victoria, Australia. we also slice some thick slices of potato and dip n batter and deep fry, we call it potato cake

Thanks Jason, I just use rock salt to cure my salmon, I have never seen kosher salt for sale in Melbourne, all the salt flakes here are very expensive (think Maldon sea salt) anyone can offer alternative salt type, or crushing rock salt to smaller granule, would that do the trick ?

Been waiting for my copy of Charcuterie to arrive, and it is finally here, very informative book, just what I needed. Right now I've got a piece of Atlantic Salmon curing in the fridge, can't wait. Just one quuestion though, would what you guys refer to as kosher salt the same as what we (Australian) refer to as rock salt, or are they totally different ? anyone?

Like Shin said earlier, Tea House does comfort food really well. To be honest, their drunken squab is one of the best I've had outside of the Far East. ← Been meaning to go there , after hearing nice reports here and from some friends, just don't get to that side of Melbourne much for dinner , is there a 'much have' dish, (and don't say Shark fin soup or sea cucumber ) and pricewise ? what about the one in Cohen PL, in the CBD, is the food the same ? and the menu ?

Gosh, it has been a few years since I have one of those, if I remember it correctly it was in a place in Waratah Lane ( I think) called Tai Shanghai restaurant, where Nam Loong No. 2 is now, The prop. used to kick a fuss about parking right outside the front door, must be the 'fon shui' thing, it was a really really good little restaurant, good ma po tafu and red bean pancake and the drunken squab, yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

or the white cut chicken.

Hi everyone, it is nice to see the gumbo thread is still going strong. I am as puzzled as fifi about a film of oil on top, I am thinking parallel to making curry, I have often came across a recipe about frying spices in the beginning of most curry recipes, the recipes often states 'fry till the oil seperate from the spice' and also often in the later stage of curry making, so you end up with a film of oil on top, I have notice this more often when I use coconut milk in the recipe, it seems like there is a stage of simmering, that once you go past it , the whole liquid mess would break down, I wonder if it is the same as gumbo making in that the roux just break its suspension power and release the oil that was lock in. Fifi , I was wondering if your resulting gumbo was thinner , as compare to the pot without a film of oil on top ? I think it is time to make another batch soon

Totally agree with you Shin, we have seen Elizabeth David's book which combined travelling and recipe journals (without photos), I tend to treat them like reading a story book with their easy to handle size. With Saha, a stunning book by the way, is like a big heavy chunky coffee table book with beautiful sensuous black and white and colour photos, full of recipes that make me want to head straight to the kitchen to try. can't wait to try the barazak, been buying a lot of these short sesame and pistachio biscuits from Sydney Road, totally addictive.

Heard lots of wonderful things about Healesville Hotel there is a produce store next to it which is very good selling lots of local produce, like bread from Fruition bakery(woodfired), Yarra Valley Pasta (very very good and interesting filled pasta, their own pasta shop just down the road a bit. I am not too sure if they open on weekend). Come to think of it there are some crafty shops selling aromatic , aromatherapy thingy you might be able to find candles there, lots of wineries , Chateau Yering is beautiful and has a well known restaurant, I am not too sure if this link will still work but worth a try www.yarravalleyfood.com.au . cheers.