Please sir, can I have more duck?

Tonight was duck take 2 - tonight's effort was chinese 5 spice duck with buk choy and corn polenta. Once again, totally delish but preferred the duck with mandarin - maybe it was the sweetness.

On the other hand, totally hated the polenta and threw out the packet as a result. Last time I had it it was lovely, but this time - blah, yuck, gone!

Tonight's cooking method was roasting. A bit less time then the frying and this one was probably a little over cooked but still quite moist. Although not sure about the stringy-ness of the meat. I'm thinking I might try the same recipes with chicken!

But overall duck result on the FFF scale - 8 out of 10!

Delicous duck

Tonight's dinner was the totally amazing roasted duck with caramelised onions, buk choy, brown rice and mandarin sauce. All I can say is OH MY GOD and HELLO HEAVEN. I tried to remove the fat before cooking it but failed miserably so just had to man up and eat it. Oh well! As a result I made sure I enjoyed every mouthful and I did!



The secret ingredient was a bit of apricot jam mixed in with the madarin sauce which balanced out the acidity of the mandarin. The recipe called for star anise and I only put in a half, but next time I don't think I will. It made the sauce a little strong with that aniseedy taste and I think the freshness of the mandarin would have been just fine as itself.

Could be a new favourite!

Beef Bourguignon - oui oui!

I have my cooking class tomorrow night which happens to be a french theme. I didn't think we could do a french night without this french classic. Of course this particular dish has been given some famous treatment of late, featuring in the Julie/Julia movie.

I started freaking out at the different recipes I had. All subtley different from each other - with some using stock, some not, some using tomato paste, some not. In the end, I decided to stay as true as I could to the frecnch tradition, even using french wine!

My one issue was after the first hour of cooking, it was tasting too "floury". After consultation with my friend Helen and my father, I added equal portions of stock and wine and to my amazement, it was fabulous!

Very saucy, very rich, and total delicious. As I told my Facebook friends - "It tasted so bloody good I want to marry myself"!

Friday night = Pizza night

Ahh, Friday night. A chance to sit down, celebrate the end of the week with a nice glass of wine, and have a low key dinner. Typically, it's take out night. When the general public head to Pizza Hut or the local Chinese for a totally sub-standard, yet easy meal.

Now, I concede I am no different. By the time Friday comes along, I too long for a nice easy meal. But I'm not one to sacrifice taste for ease and no Pizza Hut or Dominos will contaminate these taste buds!


But, with a little imagination, one can do wonderous things. To some, this looks like a basic, boring and plain pizza base. To me, this screams satay chicken pizza with snow peas, cashews and mango chutney!

Apparantly my cooking is worthy of an audience. I wonder if I could sell tickets??

Hard I hear you say! Too much effort I hear you say! Well lets see - place pizza base in the oven, cook 1 chicken breast, place spinach leaves, tomatoes, chicken, satay sauce and cheese on the pizza. Cook in oven. Add snow peas, cashews and chutney.

Result = EAT, LOVE and release a loud MMMMM!