Duvel

La Vie en Rose ...

Lazy dinner: Sliced steak with caramelized onions, dijonnaise, cheddar and pickled carrots on a baguette. 10 min to make, 5 min to eat. More time to watch "The little mermaid" with someone much smaller ...

Thanks, sounds straightforward... Will bring some rennet from my next trip to Germany and then start production!

Homemade "chevre" - care to share how you do that ?

Thanks to @AnnaN 's recent triple: Caldo Verde ...

Oven-roasted pumpkin pureed with sharp cheddar, cream, nutmeg and salt. Mixed with macaroni and topped with fried lardons. Simple and satisfying ...

Think chemical. Use bleach on anything that looks organic. Get those electronic dispensers for pyrethroids and install them everywhere. Put vases filled with distilled vinegar and two tablespoons of marmelade everywhere. Go to a Japanese store and get these little fumigations sets for Tatami mats (used to develop HCN, but now are based on formaldehyde afaik). Hit them hard, hit them early. This is not a battle you want to loose ! (yes, I had a rough afternoon ...)

Lunch at Maxim's City Hall, an HK institution in a great banquet hall just next to my office. We were there early at 11.30h and it was packed. It reminded me why we don't go there more often ... We had: Peppers stuffed with shrimp paste Deep-fried won ton Fried tentacles Baked char siu bao Sui mai Deep-fried taro fritters with chicken pieces Steamed beef ribs with black pepper Har gow Xiao long bao When the bill arrived, it reminded me of the second reason why we don't go there too often (its not expensive per se, but for everyday lunch slightly out of budget). After a nice lunch break finally finishing with a walk back to the office and a nice view across Victoria Harbor ...

There is nothing like coming home after a busy monday knowing that there are only left-over veggies waiting. After discovering that neither the carrots nor the eggplant made it over the weekend menu options suddenly simplified with only a cabbage left. So, Okonomiyaki - one of the best things that an old cabbage can hope to become ...

Groundhog day: again still full from previous meals, again leftover pizza. Same dough as yesterday (plus 24h cold rise in the fridge). First one with smoked bacon and mushrooms, second one with onions, tuna and green olives. All accompanied by an off-dry Riesling from the Palatinate and hopefully later something herbal to support the gastrointestinal system after an overloaded weekend ...

Headed out today to 208 on Hollywood road, an osteria with a nice brunch buffet (and a kid's playroom for a relaxed morning*). Buffet was good, a lot of seafood (crabs, octopus salad, home-cured salmon, ...) and salads. Extensive antipasti section as well. The offer comes with a main as well and I opted for Eggs Benedict. It was just ok. Bit then again, even a mediocre Eggs Benedict is still very satisfying ... * all the guys attending made fun that it would be an even more relaxed morning if we would take the free flow of wine & beer offer as well. Strangely, none of the ladies attending made any attempt to agree ...

Still pretty full from lunch, but the little one has to eat (what a convenient excuse ...). Quick pizza: 10h room temperature poolish started this morning, topped up with same amount of flour, some water and salt. 30 min fermentation, rolled out and put whatever was in the fridge (in this case passata, brown champignons, olives and lardons). 8 min @ 250 oC, directly on the bottom of the oven. Sharp cheddar and mozzarella added at 5 min. Panorama & crumb shot ... (after the little one ate half of a 1/8th slice, I had to finish the rest, right ?)

@BonVivant Great choices ! Have you ever tried "Salsa Espinaler" with the clams ... it takes even the cheaper ones to a whole new level !

Ok, then lets close in: Shoots at all ? Ginger/Galangal/Ginseng/Turmeric ?

Today was our semiannual IKEA run. There are three IKEAs in Hong Kong, and contrary to any I have seen prior coming to HK they are located in either two upper floors or two basements in different shopping centers. We opted for the one in Sha Tin, because next to it is Snoopy World, a (small) free Snoopy-themed amusement park for the little one. I vowed to myself not be lured in by the Køttbullar, and managed to avoid the restaurant altogether. As a reward I found a Din Tai Fung in the adjacent shopping mall. We had: Xiao Long Bao, house appetizer (tofu, kelp, vinegar) and pork trotter jelly Stir fried pea shoots and Bao Zi Wild mushroom and mustard greens dumplings Pork & shrimp steamed dumplings Dan Chao Fan for the little one Won Ton soup (technically also for the little one, but he just drinks the soup). Everyone happy !

Lemongrass shoots ?

Dinner was simple: half a bottle of Schneider Riesling No.1, some whipped together Schupfnudeln with caramelized onions and smoked ham shavings and a piece of Chaource for good measure. Life is good!

Yesterday, my annual order of wine arrived. Being an expat in HK, I am quite lucky that my German mother company takes well care of their delegates, at least as alcohol is concerned. Once a year, we can order (at German prices) wine from the company, which is an excellent deal in both price and quality. In order to celebrate, we had some Brazilian friends over for semi-dry Riesling from Deidesheim (Palatinate), Flammkuchen and - because for our friends the needs to be some meat involved - Lahmacun, Turkish lamb mince pizza. Didn't get minced lamb at the local supermarket, so I simmered minced pork with an Oxo lamb stock cube. Worked like a charm ...

Last night we had BBQ dinner with some friends and colleagues. "HK style" BBQ takes usually place on beaches or rented properties as usually no one ever has a space big enough to put even the grill, let alone host more that half a dozen people. The food is straight forward: Marinated skirt steaks, turkey wings, pork cheeks, all types of interesting "fish" balls and frankfurts, veggies and garlic bread. All grilled over fairly high heat and at the end basted with "BBQ honey", a golden syrup that just caramelizes on the surface. It sounds weird, but somewhat works. On top, the place provided us with two (professionally roasted) suckling pigs. I got both snouts! As the place we rented only serves beer it did not charge corkage for wine, so we had an eclectic range of German wines (just arrived the same day, my annual order), Sake and Baiju. Needless to say it was good fun, very filling and only caused the tiniest of headaches this morning ...

Lunch at a rather new Izakaya-style restaurant at the midlevels, Etsuya. Sampling set lunch, all in all for 150 HKD, a steal.

I did not manage to visit a Japanese curry house last week in Tokyo, so clearly there was a distinct craving lingering in my head for a couple of days. Fixed it today with spicy Tonkatsu pork curry with udon at Shirokuma ("Polar bear"), Shun Tak branch. It's not the most glorious, but it hit the spot ... Oishii !

Well, I would have access to a GC (actually to quite some machines) and one of the largest compound spectra databases. Care to send me a bottle ?

Lunch at small, somewhat run down Sichuan restaurant in Causeway Bay, HK, called "Yu". Marinated eggplant, Husband & wife lung slices (albeit with beef shank instead), Dan Dan mian and Dumplings in special broth (very thick chicken broth, a house specialty). Delicious and filling. My mouth is still tingling from the Sichuan pepper ...

Regular item on German dinner tables: Thickly sliced sourdough rye, buttered, spiced pork tartare ("Mett") and raw onions. Heaven ...

One of the (very few) spoils of a long business trip is that you might have a "free" weekend to enjoy Tokyo. It has been 13 years since I studied in Japan and in my free day I have to first pay homage to my spiritual home Kyoto and have a Kansai institution: Tenkaippin's Kotteri Ramen. An ultrathick chicken broth with extra-chewy noodles and all the works. And two draft beers at 2 in the afternoon. God, how I have missed this ...