Recipe: French Toast with Honey & Lemon

Posted by ~RnR~ in Cooking Class, Desserts and Snacks

4 comments

French toast with honey & lemon

 by Celeste

The entire process is pretty standardized, as French toast is extremely common. The special part is just the honey and lemon, which gives a very different taste to the toast.

A friend of mine pretty much soaks her toast in honey/syrup. People who love sweet stuff could probably try that. (Something I haven’t done, as I don’t like my food too sweet.)

Ingredients:

-          3 eggs

-          ¼ cup milk

-          1 tsp sugar

-          Honey

-          Pinch salt

-          7 slices bread

-          Lemon

Procedures:

      1. Beat the eggs, add in milk, sugar, 1 tbsp honey and pinch salt. Mix well.

This is not much different from the ordinary French toast, except for the added honey in the mixture. It brings a different taste and also adds crisp to the toast.

     2. Pour oil into pan over medium heat.

     3. Cut bread into half to make triangular slices.

     4. Dip bread into the mixture, make sure all parts of the bread is covered. Put the bread into the oil to fry.

     5. Remove from pan when brown.

     6. Drizzle with more honey and lemon juice to serve. Add butter if desired.

 ~Rondoletto~

Recipe: Swan Choux Pastry

Posted by ~RnR~ in Cooking Class, Desserts and Snacks

3 comments

Swan Choux Pastry

by Lisa

Equipments:

Whisk

Piping bag

Wooden spoon

2 Pots

Baking trays

Oil spray/ greaseproof paper

Spatula

Strainer

Ingredients:

*Choux paste

240 ml water

80 gm butter cubed

160 gm flour

4-5 eggs

*Cream filling (Cream Chantilly)

100 ml thickened cream

1 tsp vanilla essence

2 tbs sugar

few drops of brandy (optional)

Making filling:

Put cream, vanilla essence, sugar in a bowl and whisk until stiff peak

Put in piping bag, put in fridge

Making Choux Paste :

1. Heat up water and butter in a pot, bring to boil

2. Once it’s boiling put the flour at once and stir with wooden spoon, lower the heat

3. Stir continuously until it’s combined well

4. Take off from the stove and continue stirring until cooling down à set aside

5. Beat the eggs, put gradually into the pot ( the paste), pour the egg a little bit by a little bit until it’s mixed well ( stir continuously in fast speed otherwise it will split)

6. Check the consistency, not too runny but not too thick

7. Divide into 2 part ( ¾ and ¼ )

8. For the body : use the ¾ part put in the piping bag with star nozzle

9. For the head : use the ¼ part put in the piping bag with small round nozzle

10. Spray baking tray with oil or put the greaseproof paper to prevent sticking

11. Pipe the choux paste

12. Reheat the oven into 220°C, it must be reheated before to make sure the temperature is high

13. Put in oven at 220°C for 10 minutes, don’t open the oven for the first 10 minutes because it’s very important that the mixture is raising up perfectly, must be double in size. ( it could take more than 10 minutes for raising up, depends on the oven and the temperature, therefore always keep an eye on the oven!)

14. Then, lower the temperature to 170°C and continue baking until it’s golden brown evenly in colour about 5-10 minutes.

15. Take out from the oven, let it rest.

16. Cut the choux pastry as shown below

17. Pipe the Chantilly cream

18. Follow the steps as shown by the pictures below

19. Garnish with icing sugar and it's done!!!

-Rondoletti-

Recipe: Baked Lemon Cheesecake

Posted by ~RnR~ in Cooking Class, Desserts and Snacks

0 comments

Baked Lemon Cheesecake

by Celeste

Ingredients:

           1 pack cream cheese

-          1/3 cup milk

-          2 egg yolks

-          2 tbsp lemon juice

-          1 tbsp lemon zest

-          1/3 tsp vanilla essence

-          1/3 cup white sugar

-          3 tbsp self-raising flour

-          1 ½ tsp corn starch

-          2 egg whites

-          1/3 tsp cream of tartar

Procedures:

      1. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees.

     2.Warm the cream cheese and milk in a saucepan over medium-low heat. Set  aside.

     3. Beat egg yolks with half the sugar. Add in lemon juice, zest and vanilla essence.

     4. Fold the cream cheese into the yolk mixture.

     5. Sift in flour and corn starch. Stir until blended.

    6. In another bowl, whip the egg whites with cream of tartar. Sprinkle in the rest of the sugar.

     7. Fold the egg white mixture into the cream cheese.

     8. Pour the blended mixture into a baking tin.

     9. Pour water in the baking sheet until half full.

    10. Bake for 20 minutes. Reduce temperature to 150 degrees and bake for another 15 minutes.

Sorry the picture doesn’t look very appealing! Was a little in a hurry to get the cake done before the potluck started! Could have done some garnishing.

I personally prefer to have the cake warm, when it first comes out of the oven. I’ve found out that most people like it chilled though.

~Rondoletto~

Recipe: Cantonese Beef Fried Rice Noodles (Hor Fun)

Posted by ~RnR~ in Cooking Class, Mains

2 comments

Cantonese Beef Fried Rice Noodles (Hor Fun) 

 by Chef Jo

Ingredients:

Sliced Beef

Garlic

Chives

Spring Onions

Ginger

Bean Sprout

Rice Noodles (Hor Fun)

Preparation:

 1.     Marinate the Sliced Beef with Dark Soya Sauce, Soya Sauce, Sesame Oil and Chinese Wine.

 2.    Chop the garlic. Slice the spring onions, chives and ginger. 

 3.    When you first bought the rice noodle in a packet, all of them are  overlapping each other. Therefore, you will need to separate them as shown in the picture. Patience is required for this step.

Cooking:

1.     Heat the frying pan with oil.

2.    Stir fry the marinated beef first then remove it from the pan.

3.    Clean the frying pan and heat with oil again.

4.    Add in the garlic, chives, ginger and spring onion. Stir fry them until the spring onions are soften.

5.    Add in the rice noodles and spread the dark soya sauce over them.

6.    Keep frying and you will notice the importance of step 3 in preparation which required you to separate the rice noodle so that they won’t stick to each other.

7.    When the rice noodles are soften and turned slightly transparent, you are allowed to add in the pre-fried marinated beef.

8.    Add in the bean sprout and continue frying.

9.    Finally, its done!

  

I'm sorry that I don't have pictures for all the steps. :(

~Rondoletto~

Review: Oriental Tea House

Posted by ~RnR~ in $21-$30, Restaurant

2 comments

Oriental Tea House Review

First of all, big thanks to JS for the treat at Oriental Tea House. I've heard that Oriental Tea House serves really good dumplings, but expensive at the same time.... 

Oriental Tea House also sells varieties of tea, which I've yet to try. Unfortunately, this was the only shot I could get inside the restaurant as taking photos of the restaurant was not allowed :( 

To start with was the prawn toast. Crispy and you can taste the prawn... yummm =D 

This was the fried prawn dumplings. Indeed, they've got really good dumplings. And the mayonnaise gave perfect kick to it.... 

Next was the chinese broccoli with oyster sauce. The chinese broccoli was cooked well. A simple yet delicious dish. And also this dish was way better than the one at New Kum Den 

I was a bit disappointed with their Xiao Long Bao. It was too dry!! That's the only problem, I guess. For the meat: it was tasty =D

A definitely must have dish when you're having yum cha. Their siu mai was awesome!!!! It was full of flavor... Just by looking at it, makes me hungry =P

I'm not sure whether I have to upload this one or not. But I have something to say about their steamed rice. This was too little!!!! and it was too expensive for a bowl of steamed rice ( $ 3 as far as I remember) :(

This was the best!!!! This was Crispy shredded steak. It was beef in sweet sour and chili sauce  with capsicum... A great dish and definitely a must-try. 

Nothing impressive with their pan-fried dumplings. Still a great dish too!! =D

And the last one was fried chocolate dumplings. A great dessert!!! but I thought that the chocolate fillings were too little... other than that, Perfect!!! =D

Overall, the food at Oriental Tea House was great. But the biggest problem was the price. It was too expensive and the portion was small also. Take for example the siu mai. 3 pcs of siu mai was priced at AUD 6. It was over-priced, I guess. Will I come back? Probably yes, but just for high tea as I need to eat a lot for lunch or dinner =P

In conclusion:

Price: 4/10

Food: 9/10

Service: 8.5/10

Ambience: 9/10

Estimated price per person: $ 30

_____________________________________________________________________

Shop F015 Chadstone Shopping Centre

Melbourne VIC 3145

Website: www.orientalteahouse.com

-Rondoletti-

Review: Han Guuk Guan

Posted by ~RnR~ in $10-$20

2 comments

Han Guuk Guan Review

Looking for a good Korean restaurant in CBD?

Han Guuk Guan is one of the best Korean restaurant around. :D

They serve a wide variety of Korean food including Korean BBQ.

What's more is that they have a 50% off for BBQ every monday.

I've tried their Korean BBQ once, but they limit the choice of the BBQ that is on promotion. I ordered beef bulgogi, spicy squid and lastly spicy chicken. They were quite impressive.

The beef bulgogi was pretty juicy and yummy~

The spicy squid was rather disappointing since I had a high expectation for this one. It's not so bad but the squid was a bit tasteless.

Spicy chicken? It's a good choice too. Not really that good but not so bad either.

I'm sorry that I don't have pictures for the BBQ. :(

Well, let's move on.

 

 

As some of you might have known this dish, it is called Jjajangmyun or Korean Black Bean Paste Noodles. So far I think this is the best Jjajangmyun that I've found in Melbourne. The flavour of the black bean sauce was just right. Moreover, it's not as sweet as some other restaurants might serve it. The hand made noodle was chewy too. If you like Korean dishes, I recommend this dish to you. :D

 

 

 

"Isn't this dish the same as the previous one?"

Well, it's similar but this one is the variety of Jjajangmyun which is known as Samsun Jjajangmyun or Seafood Black Bean Noodles. Personally, I prefer this one rather than the usual Jjajangmyun. I might be biased since I love seafood. :P

I found that the paste of this dish is thicker than the usual Jjajangmyun which made it more delicious. The seafood inside that I could notice, was just prawns and slices of octopus. There was a bit of spicy sensation in Samsun Jjajangmyun which would help to increase your appetite and also gave more variety to its taste.

 

 

This dish is known as the highlight of Han Guuk Guan. Spicy and Sweet Chicken. I believe that you will not be disappointed by this dish. Its sweetness and spiciness will pamper your palate and make you crave for it even more. The serving was large too. I shared this dish with 3 other friends. 

 

Well, this one is actually ordered by Celeste. I'm not really sure about the name of the dish. Basically, it's just short ribs cooked with eggs and noodles in beef broth. There is nothing special with this dish. The beef broth is a bit bland. I don't really recommend this dish.

 

 

As usual, there are always side dishes accompanying your meal in every Korean Restaurant. I don't know why but I really like the kimchi here. :p

Overall,

Price: 7/10

Food: 8.5/10

Service: 7.25/10

Ambience: 6/10

Estimated price/person: $18

________________________________________________________

 

 

CBD

13A Victoria St
Melbourne, 3000

Website: none

~Rondoletto~