Category: Food and drink

Posted on by Caesar
Piazza D'oro logo

Piazza D’Oro L’OR EspressO Sublime range review

The Nespresso system is certainly divisive if nothing else. If you’re talking about value for money, the fans say how it’s cheaper than spending much less than the $3 – 4 each day for a decent cup of coffee, and the haters say how much more expensive the pre-packaged system is compared to DIY methods (and we’ll all just ignore that instant even exists…) In the convenience stakes though, it’s a clear winner. Well, at least until you find yourself without any pods. Nespresso only sell the pods directly, in their boutique stores or online, so if you need a […]

Posted on by Caesar
Seafood hors d'ouvre

Super-quick Seafood Hors d’Ouvre

Got friends dropping by for afternoon tea and don’t have anything to serve? Well here’s a recipe for seafood hor d’ouvres that takes literally seconds to make, but looks like you put loads of effort into it. Ingredients Seafood highlighter/crab stick (whatever you call it) Smoked salmon Mayonnaise Parsley Mini toast Method: Don’t mind too much about the portions, just don’t overdo it with the mayo – the point is to be quick and measuring takes too much time. Throw everything into a food processor and whizz for a few seconds until you get a roughly chopped mixture. It should […]

Posted on by Caesar
KFC fried chicken drumsticks

Pull a fast one on fast food

This is probably a very silly post, but I’m in a silly mood. I had KFC for lunch yesterday (maybe that’s why), and was struck by how insidious the menu is at the Carlingford branch – if you actually want to have their chicken and not a burger, you can either choose from the ~$3 snack options, or else you have to order a ~$10 combo box that could easily feed 2-3 people. I couldn’t see any other “in between” options (nor most of the other options listed on their Web site menu). I would’ve been happy with a piece […]

Posted on by Caesar
Best before date

Giving food its dues

An interesting piece of trivia: what is the only food that doesn’t spoil? Answer: Honey. The reason for this is the high sugar and low moisture content, which means that organisms (which depend on moisture) cannot survive and multiply. Hence, stored under the right conditions – i.e. sealed away from moisture – honey will last indefinitely. An often cited example is the honey that was found in sealed jars in Egyptian tombs, which were found to be edible. Unfortunately, other foods are less hardy. Regardless of how sophisticated the packaging, most of the packaged food that you’ll come across will […]

Posted on by Caesar
Tomato and egg fried rice

Recipe: tomato and egg fried rice

When it comes to cooking, I mainly look to fill my stomach in the quickest time possible – I ain’t getting all pro and fancy like some people :-) Especially when I come home after work tired and hungry, I prefer it quick and easy, like this recipe for tomato and egg fried rice. The good thing about this one is that instead of using tomato sauce like the version you’ll find in restaurants, this one uses real tomatoes, which helps in my quest to keep processed food out of my diet. Ingredients: 2 eggs, beaten 3 cups cooked rice […]

Posted on by Caesar
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Heat a frozen pie in the microwave

There’s really no help for it. A pie is definitely much nicer cooked in an oven than in a microwave, but sometimes – like at work – there’s isn’t any alternative. When I’m too lazy to pack lunch I’ll just take a frozen pie to work, and through several months of crappy pies I’ve come up this simple method to make sure that the delicious bundle of meat sauce wrapped in pastry is both heated through, and at least a little bit crisp and not totally soggy. What you’ll need: A frozen pie. I haven’t tried this with a defrosted […]

Posted on by Caesar
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Eating less is more

If your eating habits are anything like mine, then you’ll understand how it’s only after you’ve had one too many of whatever it is you’re eating, that you probably should’ve stopped. The point is, our bodies weren’t designed to cope with the sheer convenience that we have today of getting food, and it requires conscious effort to stop eating as if the next meal wasn’t a sure thing. At any rate, here are a few things to think about during your next meal: Red meat red alert: It pains me greatly to say this, but according to this Time Magazine […]

Posted on by Caesar
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Do not eat (but don’t throw them away!)

Jenny and I have been trying to eat more fresh fruit and vegies lately, even though it does mean shopping more regularly as produce spoils quickly (hence why it’s gotta be fresh!) Because there’s only two of us, this often leads to a lot of waste as we’re forced to throw out things that we can’t finish in time before it goes off. For example, we might only get through a couple of stalks of shallots before the moisture gets to them. In light of this, we recently “discovered” a great little food-saving tip – one of those things which, […]

Posted on by Caesar
A delicious korean rabokki

Rabbokki (korean bubble-and-squeak)

Korean food is notoriously difficult to make. If it isn’t some rare and exotic ingredient it’s a long and convoluted cooking process, which is a shame ‘coz Korean food is so darned tasty! I recently discovered a recipe for rabbokki (라볶이), which is kinda like a Korean version of bubble-and-squeak in that you can pretty much chuck whatever you like in there as long as you’ve got the basics (i.e. rice cake and chilli paste). It’s very easy to make, and uses ingredients that aren’t too exotic – although some of the items you’d still have to get from a […]

Posted on by Caesar
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4 Ingredients on the iPhone

A quick addendum to my earlier post on thrifty cooking: yesterday I noticed that the “4 ingredients” book also has an iPhone App that you can buy for A$4.99. The advantage that the App has over the dead tree version is that you can search for recipes by scrolling through an alphabetical list of ingredients (and although it’s called “ingredients” the list also includes categories too, such as “Breakfast”). It’s also a funny co-incidence is that the App is “rated 4+” (as in the age classification, not the customer ratings). Buy now from