Family Christmas

Merry Christmas, Everyone. Hope you are having a lovely and relaxing time during this holiday period and have had a wonderful Christmas dinner!

For this Christmas, the older daughter, Emily, and her fiancé Craig, have hosted 2013 Christmas Dinner for everyone for the first time at their new home.  It was a real family affair - there were Emily and Craig, the hosts, Craig's mum and dad, Christine and Tom, and Craig's grandpa David. There were Emily and Maria's dad, Frankie and his partner Eileen and then us, my husband Peter, myself and Maria, the younger daughter.  Unfortunately Maria's boyfriend Dale could not join as he broke his foot and not mobile and Craig's sister Gillian was working, poor souls... working on Christmas Day however helping people for good cause!  Oh, and we must not forget Emily and Craig's cat Bailey who was getting separate cat's version turkey for Christmas dinner!

So, back to the real deal, the Food! Emily is a Civil Engineer and is currently in a project team that is working on a very big and well-known project here, so as one may expect, she has executed everything in a military precision, in line with her own project management of Christmas Dinner plan. The resulting footage was the meat-eaters' culinary delight of traditional Christmas dinner with everything on a plate.

I must say that although I do not eat meat, what was on her plate looked really delicious.

For my husband and me who are non-meaters, Emily served us lobster thermidor with a little help from dear M&S.  It was delicious.

There were so much food for Christmas at Cremily's.  The menu for the day was as follows:

Prawn Cocktail

Chicken Liver Pate

Sushi Platter

*****

Frank's Home Made Lentil & Vegetable Soup

*****

Turkey Breast with stuffing & Roast Ham

Lobster Thermidor

*****

Side Dishes

Roasted Potatoes

Potato Croquettes

Roasted Parsnips with Honey & Mustard Glaze

Julienne of Carrots

Brussels Sprouts

Pigs in Blanket 

Yorkshire Pudding

*****

Apple Crumble Cheese Cake

Christmas Cracker Chocolate Mouse

Cheese Platter and Crackers

So, for starters, some people had pate (sorry, I forgot to take photo!) and some had prawn cocktails.

I made Sushi Platter earlier in the morning for Emily as appetisers so that people could nibble too.  I know it was rather random and eclectic, but hey, why not "East meets West"?

Emily's dad Frankie made a pot of Lentil and Vegetable soup, which was very tasty. He normally makes this using ham hock however as my husband and I don't eat meat, he made the soup using vegetable sock cubes. 

After the main course, we were so full we could not eat desserts right away. I also realised that we missed the Queen's speech but no one seemed to have minded. Some of us then played the board game, Articulate. This game is a bit similar to Taboo. We know it's only a game but it was so funny to see people being so animated, getting so panicked or being under pressure whilst the clock ticking, trying to come up with answers and ended up saying wrong thing (which I am not going to repeat here). Emily told me that I was so hyper that at one point I was shouting in mixture of English and Japanese! I did not realise that at all!  

I enjoyed that game and wanted to play again but unfortunately we had to go home when the game finished. It was almost 9pm and we had to rush home to feed our cat Yuki who would be starving and wondering where we were.

The next day, my husband and I were invited back to Emily & Craig for afternoon tea, well actually I invited ourselves to theirs, ha ha ha, to eat the dessert we missed the previous night and pick up wine glasses we forgot.  We had Christmas cracker shape chocolate mouse, which was not too sweet and light but very delicious. I really enjoyed this one!

Emily was eating cheese platter so I also tried some of the cheese with crackers - pickled onion flavour and smoked cheese.  She bought these a week ago at Christmas market in Glasgow. I liked the pickled onion's one, which can be quite addictive!  Just looking at the photo makes me want to eat it again!

Pickled onion cheese (front) and smoked cheese (yellow one in the back),
both by Snowdonia Cheese Company.

Emily and Craig's Christmas Dinner was a huge success!  Being an engineer, Emily had to have a plan. She did a lot of prep work a night before and earlier in the morning and in the afternoon, she switched on her oven and followed her plan. You must give her credit as she was on schedule in line with her plan below, without much of sweat from any pressure from cooking for everyone other than the heat from the oven.

She said that the dinner starts at 3.30pm. Yap, the starters were served at 3.30pm and she put parsnips into the oven!  She reheated Frankie's soup at 3.45pm, which was served at 3.50pm.

We must remember also that behind the great project management there is delegation and great team work going on.  Craig was busy doing dishes between the courses (as they don't have dish washer so he had to wash plates and cutleries and dried them straight away for the next courses!), so well done to Craig-san too!.

Emily was really looking forward to the Christmas and she decorated their living room with lovely Christmas tree.

Well, we all enjoyed the dinner, the company and the evening with lots of fun (especially Articulate game and what people uttered as answers to the questions under pressure would be something we would keep talking about as funny memories in many many years!).

I wonder if Emily and Craig would host another dinner next year. I would not mind salmon next year, hint hint...

Merry Christmas to you all and that's all forks!

Upstairs and Downstairs - Cafe Rogano in Glasgow

So, after having pigged ourselves at upstairs of Rogano Restaurant this summer, we returned to downstairs, Cafe Rogano in late September as daughters got us online voucher deal to dine that included a bottle of wine.

Although it is meant to be more informal, I kind of like the relaxing but calm atmosphere of the downstair restaurant with some coziness.

So, for starters, we ordered Chilli Squid with line and coriander mayonnaise, and Fish Cake with Cucumber pickles to share between us.  I love squid and am very particular about how squid could be prepared, especially if fried; they must be cooked but still soft to bite and be able to taste the sweetness of them AND never ever be tough like chewing rubber! (OMG, I still can't forget my horrible experience of fried calamari I had at that restaurant in Lisbon. I am not a food expert or critique but that fried squid was a food crime - see my earlier blog about Lisbon). Anyhow, of course, being a seafood specialist, Cafe Rogano executed our start chilli squid perfectly.  Fish cakes were also lovely and I also liked refreshing cucumber pickles that came as garnish.

For main course, I had grilled sea bass with salmon fishcake, saffron mussel broth and pickled vegetable. It was really delicious. The salmon fish cake was really big though - almost the size of a baseball or a bath bomb from Lush.

My husband had fish of the day, but I am very very sorry, the name of the fish he had ordered totally escaped me! Could that have been Gurnard? The dish came with fried polenta cakes. My husband said he enjoyed them all and finished so they must have been very good.

We did not have desserts as we were really full, so we ordered coffee to finish off our meals.

Another satisfying meal at Rogano. Thank you, girls for the dinner!

That's all forks!

Upstairs and Downstairs - Rogano Restaurant in Glasgow

I know it's a good few months ago but I thought I just talk about Rogano (http://www.roganoglasgow.com), one of Glasgow's culinary institutions. It has Rogano Restaurant, formal dinning on the ground floor, and Cafe Rogano, informal dining downstairs. The restaurant was refitted in the same Art Deco style of the great Cunard line 'Queen Mary' in 1935

We went the main restaurant Rogano on the ground floor this summer for our wedding anniversary. I like their lemon sole meuniere so I already made up my mind that this was what I was going to have.

Our dinner started with two amuse-bouche - first, scallop mouse canapé with caviar, followed by seafood bisque (unfortunately my memory totally escaped me if it was scallop or lobster bisque...).

We then had Rogano Fish Soup with rouille and parmesan croutons for starter.

Rouille is, according to internet, a sauce made of olive oil with breadcrumbs, garlic, saffron and chilli peppers and is served as a garnish with fish soup. So I float a crouton with rouille and sprinkled shaved parmesan on my fish soup. The soup was lovely but also very very rich and I could only have half of the bowl. I remember having thought of what the calorie of this soup might be and wished that I had something different for starter to try, after having seafood bisque for amuse-bouche earlier.

Still, I had never had rouille before so it was an quite interesting experience, and we did really enjoy the soup.

For main course, my husband had Lobster Termidor with shoestring fries and I had my favourite Lemon Sole meuniere. We also ordered panaches of vegetables.

I must admit that I did not expect to see so much Lemon Sole Meuniere on my plate - it could easily feed two people. I could not eat everything and this is being a posh restaurant, I did not even have an audacity to ask for a doggy bag so I had to give up half way through the dish.  Oh, by the way, I was wondering what 'panache' of vegetable means. This simply means mixed vegetable. Anyway, vegetables were perfectly prepared, and especially baby carrots were really tasty.

It always amazes me how much one can eat at one setting. Everyone around us at other tables seemed to have no problem at all to consume everything presented to them on plates one course after another. And here we were already full half way through the main course....

Yet there is always some space for dessert, surprise, surprise!  I had Creme Brûlée with ginger shortbread and my husband had a trio of rhubarb desserts - a sampler of rhubarb creme brûlée, rhubarb crumble and a rhubarb crackle parfait.  They were really delicious.

Having finished our desserts, I looked around the restaurant. It was Friday evening, very busy with bustling atmosphere. There were families with children, there were couples, there were business people, there were groups of friends dining out etc.  I always remembered Rogano being opulent and elegant but this time I felt like it being a posh family restaurant. I am not saying it's bad, just felt odd as that's now how I have always felt, not that we dine here often. The same decor, the same menu for many years but somehow the restaurant feels different. Is this a sign of my old age, maybe....

We then ordered coffees. The restaurant was so busy the waiting staff must have forgotten to bring them to our table. We waited for well more than 30 minutes before our coffees arrived. Not that we were in a hurry. We were chilled so not a problem.  Coffees came with petit fours, which were really tasty.  We asked for a bill. The waiting staff told us that coffees were on the house for having kept us waiting for so long, which was a lovely gesture.

We really enjoyed our meal. Would we go back again?  Probably yes but not for a long time as it is an expensive restaurant (although you could go for a set menu rather than a la carte menu) and would need to wait till next time I feel like having another courses of Rogano's famous Fish Soup and Lemon Sole Meuniere again!

Well that's what we thought until our daughters got us a voucher for Cafe Rogano for present, so we went back again but to downstairs this time. To be continued....

Pukka at Ashoka

My husband and I went to local Ashoka Brasserie restaurant recently. It was one Monday lunchtime, looking for somewhere different to try. Ashoka is doing midweek two course lunch menu for £5.95 (it's even better if weekends as it's £4.95!).

We were seated at a nice cosy booth. The menu has very good selection, catering non-meaters like ourselves without any problem (http://ashokabrasserie.com/v1/wp-content/uploads/midweekLunch.jpg).

We both ordered Vegetable Pakora for starter. Pakoras were freshly made and very tasty.

For main course, I ordered Prawn Spicy Tikka Masala. The menu informed us that the sauce is a true Brasserie favourite, a mouth-watering blend with a rich exotic marinade and hot spices cooked with peppers, onions and fresh coriander. My husband ordered Prawn Bhoona, a rich flavoursome condensed sauce with ginger, garlic and tomatoes. These were served with rice for me and naan bread for him which we shared. Well, the dishes were really mouth-watering and flavoursome indeed.
Portion was quite good but we could barely finish all. And it was only £5.95 for all these! It was definitely V4M! What a pukka at Ashoka!

I shall look for more V4M lunchtime deal and let you know.

That's all forks!

How do you like your bagel?

I used to love eating bagel with smoked salmon and cream cheese, sprinkled with black pepper and lemon juice, until one day my daughters Emily and Maria told me how they eat their bagels....

You need to have an onion bagel, cream cheese and salt & vinegar crisps, but to take a notch higher, you should have Walkers' Extra Crunchy salt & malt vinegar crisps, an red onion & chive bagel and original full fat soft Philadelphia (definitely not one of those 'light' half fat nonsense!!!).

Toast a bagel brown, spread the cream cheese ....

...and don't be stingy with the cheese ...

And place crunchy salt & malt vinegar crisps on top!

Definitely not healthy but it's really yummy and soooo addictive!  You get the extra crunchiness of crisps, combinations of flavours from salt & vinegar, onions, chives and full fat cream cheese, married all into one. Textures of softness of cream cheese, toasted bagel, crunchy crisps and the smells of salt & vinegar, toasted bits of red onions and chives, married all into one.  A bit weird? Maybe but you should try this and you know how addictive this can be.... 

So, how do you like your bagel?

That's all forks.

You gotta eat seafood in Lisbon

If you are fish or seafood lover, you must go to Lisbon, where you can eat fresh fish or seafood, often available at affordable price and from so many selections or varieties to choose from. What I love about Lisbon is that you can find so many restaurants that serve fish or seafood cooked simply but perfectly to retain the freshness and tastes of the sea.

Anyway, one night we were looking for somewhere different to try but not too far from our hotel. We saw this eaterie with menus in different languages on windows, clearly catering for tourists but somehow appealing to us because of blue and white azulejo tiles on the walls depicting some Portuguese agricultural scenes from the past. The restaurant was nothing fancy and foods on the menu seemed cheaper compared to other restaurants near-by. We thought, 'Surely they would not serve anything bad, after all this is Lisbon and this place is in area full of restaurants where lots of tourists come and go.'

We went in, sat down at a table and ordered beer. My husband ordered a bacalhau (dried salt cod) stew type of dish while I ordered calamari with rice. When the foods arrived, my face fell. They looked like school dinner. My husband bacalhau was full of fish bones although he said that it tasted fine while my calamari was tough and dry. "How can Lisbon go wrong with these!" I thought any restaurants in Lisbon serve fresh seafood and I just could not understand the logic of my calamari. I even started feeling sorry for this restaurant that served this quality of food, the chef who cooked it and the waiter who served this to us. My husband asked if I wanted coffee after the meal.  I just wanted to leave this place as soon as we could. ... Ok, it was cheap after all so maybe I should not have expected too much but how could any restaurant go wrong with calamari! Well, in the end we were the one to blame as we wanted to try this restaurant. The problem I have is that if I had something that I did not enjoy, that would ruin my whole day.

So, the next day, we decided to splash out and upgraded a restaurant. The restaurant was Ribadouro on Avda da Liberdade 155, Lisbon. This place is often listed in many guidebooks and seems very popular with tourists ordering lots of fancy looking seafood as well as locals standing by the bar ordering beer with quick bite to eat. Surely it can't go wrong this time.

Well, we ordered grilled tiger prawns between us. It was really extravagant but so as the bill! Still, it was our last night in Lisbon after all, and we had cheap but bad, bad meal the previous night, so that would justify it. And justified indeed. Our tiger prawns were really good. They were like mini-lobster, rather rich but very tasty.

Our grilled tiger prawns came with garlic butter sauce.

Close up - Mmmmmm, it was a seafood lover heaven!

Before cooking. Look at the sizes of tiger prawns!

They bring you fresh seafood to show you before they cook. Well, our tiger prawns were really big. We did not expect the platter to be so big so we also ordered clams cooked with olive oil, coriander and garlic for starter.  They were really good, perhaps a bit salty and lots of chopped garlic that could ward off vampires, however it was tasty and we mopped up the clam juice with lovely bread.

We also ordered a bottle of local vinho verde ('green wine') wine. I did not know what was the difference between normal white wine and green white wine at first, only to discover, after we came back from Lisbon, that it is a slightly sparkling wine, lowish in alcohol (from 8.5%), made from immature grapes, hence being called 'green'. I should have read the guidebook properly before we went to Lisbon.

Anyway, the same guidebook also informs me that if a bottled vinho verde (apparently many are not bottled!) says Alvarinho anywhere on the label, it will be a good one to try. Well, having checked my holiday photo now, it does say 'Alvarinho' so we chose the good one after all. I don't remember it was hugely expensive neither.

Vinho Verde that we had to go with food!

Well, after all these foods, our stomachs were really satisfied and we also had uma bica coffee, a small cup of strong coffee like an espresso. I was never a fan of espresso much but during our trip to Lisbon I became very fond of this Portuguese strong coffee and I also developed my fondness of adding sugar in it. Strong coffee and sugar were never my thing before. Now I am drinking espresso with sugar, alas, it's just not the same - I do miss uma bica in Lisbon....

Damn fine cup of coffee... (without a cherry pie)

I can forget about and forgive calamari disaster in Lisbon as I got so many delightful memories of food we had in Lisboa!

That's all forks.

Emily's Kitchen

My husband and I were invited to daughter Emily and her fiancé, Craig's new house for dinner last Friday. Actually I invited ourselves, hahaha. They were off work whole week past week decorating their house and I just said half-jokingly to Emily, "Oh, you could invite us for dinner." Emily had no choice but say no....

Emily had a challenge as she needed to think what she could make to cater everyone as Craig does not eat fish or seafood while my husband and I don't eat meat. Anyway, Emily did a great job, prepared and served us wonderful dinner and both my husband and I came home with happy stomach.

For starter, she made butternut squash and potato soup with hint of chilli, with sour cream and drizzle of olive oil. It was really delicious.

Emily's home made butternut squash and potato soup

For main course, Emily made home-made beef burger for Craig and herself whilst home made tuna burger for my husband and myself. She put tuna steaks in the blender to mince, added soy sauce, chopped spring onion, onions, minced garlic, ginger, chilli, salt and pepper. The burger came with either smoky tomato and paprika sauce or mayonnaise with garlic and spring onions.

Emily's tuna burger with chips and salad.

For dessert, Emily did some experiments in making chocolate casings, having seen some recipe on Pinterest.  Basically she melt chocolate to coat the bottom of balloons and once chocolates were cooled and hardened, carefully deflate the balloons so that she could then remove the balloons off the chocolate casings.  If the temperature of chocolate is too hot, it would burst the balloons so she had to be careful with this operations, albeit looking easy and fun ....

Another use for balloons..... 

She then put vanilla ice-cream, decorated with strawberries. Knowing how she made the chocolate casing, it was even more tastier, not to mention 'interesting'!

During the dinner, we talked about our recent trip to Lisbon. Poor Emily and Craig as they had to endure having to look at more than 1,000 holiday photos we had taken.

We all really enjoyed the dinner. We even came home with take-away tuna burgers, that became our next day's dinner at our house!

I was about to blog about another food we had in Lisbon today but I had to blog about Emily's food as they were really delicious and she put so much thoughts and efforts to it, so well done to Emily.

That's all forks.

You gotta eat fish in Lisbon

We went to Lisbon 4 years ago for the first time and really enjoyed then so we have recently returned there for holiday. It was the last week in August but the weather was gorgeous, 30 - 34 degrees every day but very dry and you get lovely sea-breeze everywhere. Up in the sky it is so blue and beautiful, contrasting wonderfully against Lisbon's light red coloured roofs tiles and white walls of buildings below whilst old-fashined trams running through the labyrinth of streets of Lisbon. It's just wonderful.

Anyway we went back to one of our favourite restaurant, Solar dos Presuntos (http://www.solardospresuntos.com). The restaurant first opened in October 1974. Inside of the restaurant the walls are covered with photographs and drawings of celebrities and foreign dignitaries who ate there, adding an unique atmosphere.

Anyway,  we ordered our favourite item from the menu - salt baked sea bass, yes literally the whole 1kg of fish is covered by rock salt mound and baked to perfection whilst retaining softness, moisture and "ocean" flavours!  It takes for a while to get the fish cooked but it's worth waiting for.

Our salt-baked sea bass - it was around 1.1 kg in weight before cooking

This was our sea bass - before being covered in salt mound for baking.
Sorry, Fish... but if any consolation, you were really delicious and well appreciated!

Once baked, they will then crack the salt-mound open, scraped the salt off the fish, de-boned, filleted and serve on plates.  Yummy.... My husband took a video on this but unfortunately I could not upload on this blog, pity that you could not see this. You just have to see what was on my plate!

Perfectly baked fish served with spinach and garlic flavoured potatoes. 

Oh, while we were waiting for our fish to be ready, we had some starter - this one was marinated octopus. It was really delicious, octopus being really lovely and tender.

Marinated octopus.

There was so much fish to eat, I did not have any room left for dessert but my husband managed to have egg custard and really enjoyed it too.

The restaurant has this following quote displayed up on the wall from Jean Moliere (1622 - 1673), French playwright and actor.

"With my stomach satisfied, my soul may rest at ease."

Need no say more.

That's all forks!

Grilled Sardines in Lisbon

We are in Lisbon right now, leaving younger daughter Maria cat & house-sitting. The first thing we notice is that there are none of our pet cat, Yuki's hair that we have to brush off our cloths, keyboards on my laptop or between pages in a book or magazine we are reading. Back home we feel like using lint rollers to catch Yuki's hair day and night, dusk to dawn, all day every day. Here, staying in a hotel, there is none of that, it's even odd that we don't have to do that.  In fact, we don't even see any cats at all since we have arrived in Lisbon. Not even a stray. Very strange, considering there are so much fish in Lisbon.

Ever since we arrived on Sunday morning, we have been eating fish, every day for lunch and dinner. We fear we may turn into a fish, may start growing scales and fins! However, fish and shellfish are really good here - it's seafood lover's heaven. You get really fresh seafood, cooked simply to respect natural tastes of ingredients.

A lots of restaurants seems to be closed on Sunday but we managed to find a fish restaurant named, Restaurant Pessoa at Rua Dos Duradores 190, Lisbon 1100. This is not necessarily a cheap restaurant, considering you could find many restaurants that offer reasonably priced food in Lisbon however not exceptionally expensive neither.

Since we are in Lisbon, we got to eat famous grilled sardines. It was not on the menu but we asked for it anyway. "12 Euro per person, it is ok?" the waiter asked. We had no idea how much a plate of grilled sardines would cost but we just ordered it anyway.

Those who know me well must be able to picture me clapping my hands with excitement when the large dish full of grilled sardines arrived at our table. Each sardine was already fair size and there must have been 14 or so on the plate, along with boiled potatoes and some salad. We were hungry so of course we ate all up without any problem. It was really delicious with lots of rock salt.

Before ....

and After .....

We also ordered a half bottle of dry white local wine. We were about to order house white but the waiter to us "not that with the dish" and brought this wine. It was only about 6 euro and not bad at all.

Inside of the restaurant is decorated with white wall and typical azulejo tiles. My guidebook informs me that azulwjos takes their name from either julej, the Persian word for 'blue' or az-zuleyha, Arabic for 'polished stone'. There is no paper table cloths and napkin nonsense - they use real line serviette here.

We thought we were the only customers but by the time we finished eating, people started arriving. Most of them seemed to be local people coming for family Sunday lunches. I wonder what they would be ordering...

The place does not look that appealing, in fact it's rather shabby and run-down looking however most of restaurants are in Lisbon; looks can be deceiving, in fact.

This is the beginning of our 'peixe' in the city, here in Lisbon.  I am afraid you will see more seafood blog from me for a while.

That's all forks!

Papa's Tapas

Last Saturday, my older daughter Emily and her friend Jennifer were invited to their friend Kat's parents' house for dinner. This was not however an ordinary dinner. Kat's father, Pete, is an accomplished cook, enjoys cooking and his invitation for Spanish Tapas was also extended to me! Bravo!

Kat kindly came to pick us all up from our houses by her car. Kat's mum, Liz, welcomed us with lovely smile to their beautiful home, making sure we were all comfortable and happy and everyone's glasses were full. They also have a lovely dog named Dexter who entertained us all with his charm.

Pete had been very busy all day since the morning, getting fresh ingredients from shops in the morning, preparing and cooking all day for this special Tapas evening. As I don't eat meat, and Kat and her mum do not eat seafood, he had to think of menu that would cater for everyone.

The resulting creation by Pete was an excellent culinary delight for everyone.

Kat's Papa's Tapas!!!

Pete made 4 Tapas dishes - Tapas style fish and chips in tempura batter, summer pea risotto, patatas bravas and Spanish omelette.  Pete's home-made tempura batter perfectly enveloped chunky fish, accompanied with fries. Summer pea risotto was really refreshing in taste, with flavoursome runner beans that were harvested from Pete's & Liz's back garden. My favourite Pete's dish was patatas bravas, which was really savoury and delicious.

Pete also made Spanish omelette with roasted red peppers and potatoes. The omelette was a perfect shape - tasty eggs holding all vegetables together in a harmonious manner. It was a Zen of  Tortilla Espanola!

Pete's signature dish...?

Everything was so delicious.... and what made Pete's tapas so special was that there were a lots of thoughts in making these dishes, resulting in such a special deliciousness that you just can't get anywhere else. My real favourite must be his patatas bravas - so flavoursome with sweet and sour of tomato sauce with lovely potatoes.

Pete's Patatas Bravas, Tapas Bravos!

Cheers to the chef!

We all enjoyed the evening, and we all went home with happy stomach. I would also like to say special thanks to Pete, Liz and Kat for inviting me to such a wonderful evening.

That's all forks!