Whenever I miss the hawker style food I love from my days in  Singapore or Malaysia, I always text my Dad and tempt him with one simple word – “Laksa?”

My family has been going to Spencer Village, in Thornlie, for years! It’s a long way from the city (nestled deep in the southern suburbs), but it’s still one of the best places in Perth to get my fix of favourite dishes.

I do believe it is the most Hawker-Food-Centerish food court in Perth. It is always packed full of Asian faces, and it has that “it’s all about the food, not the presentation” style of cuisine. It’s fast, simple, and great value!

This is my ABSOLUTE favourite. Coconut laksa with prawns, fish cake, chicken, tofu, mixed noodles, and a big wedge of lemon (I would actually prefer it with lime though).

This is my children’s favourite, Char Kway Teow. Flat rice noodles fried in a dark soy sauce, with fish cakes, chicken, prawns, bean sprouts and vegetables.

Personally, it’s a bit too healthy for me. I like mine with cockles and deep fried lard, the way I have had it in Singapore. (But I do prefer them to eat healthier!)

My husband tried something different today. Singaporean Indian style Briyani – which was fricking yum!

And a large jug of sweetened soy bean milk, to wash everything down.

*Full tummy happiness*

The other day, I woke up at 5am to go for a 5:30am cycle.

It sounds a bit hard core, but my reason is that I feel that I’m such a cycling newbie, that I prefer to go when there are less cars, less pedestrians and fewer other cyclists on the cycle paths!

Not to mention, watching the sun rise is a just beautiful.

I rode 25km in 1.5 hours. Including a 5 minute stop.

Before I left, I ate a bowl of muesli + cereal and yoghurt.

During the ride I ate one strawberry muesli bar for fuel.

And when I came home at 7am, I made myself this.

Slow cooked omelette, with mushroom, tomatoes, basil and garlic butter. It was soooo delicious.

(Yes I did cook the eggs a bit more after I took this photo!)

Later at 10am, I packed all 3 of my kids and took them to the beach.

I also packed my inflatable boat. I love my boat. We take him everywhere now. He’s like our big sleepy animal, who sits permanently and obediently in our front seat. We perk him up once we hit the beach and he delivers hours of fun for the big kids (and me).

We play paddling games, pirate ships games, diving for treasure games, bump-a-boat games, hanging-on games, general kicking and splashing and just plain lazing around in the surf.

It is so, so much fun.

(My legs look soooo long in this photo, but they are not. My legs and the boat are both short!)

We also make sand castles. Lots of them.

Then we head home by 2pm, and every one is ready for an afternoon nap.

Especially me!

I have been on a bit of a health kick recently.

In addition to all my cycling, I’ve been trying to eat better in efforts to tone up my body.

One of the things I’m doing is cutting down on the amount of carbohydrates I eat. In particular, high carb foods with high gluten and low nutrition, like white rice, bread, noodles and pasta.

So instead of eating 1 serve of cooked white rice with my meal (like curry), I’ll only eat 1/3 of serve of rice and fill up on salad.

As a result, and not to mention my biggest surprise, was that my digestion has improved and I feel less bloated and “heavy”, and my whole body feels much “lighter” (in a digestion sense). I haven’t lost any actual weight, I’ve just been feeling great. I didn’t realise I had a problem with gluten, but it seems that my body is loving less of it.

The downside to eating less carbs, is that I’m freaking hungry all the time. Like crazy hungry.

So I eat a lot of snacks in between meals. And I mean a LOT! Roasted almonds, cashews, chickpeas, bananas, pears, dried fruit, broccoli (I like snacking on broccoli ok!), carrots, and dip – I LOVE dip! OMG I eat so much dip!

I still cook rice, bread and pasta for the rest of my family, I just make extra salad for myself.

I managed to take a few snaps of my meals, and these are the more presentable ones.

I call this my power breakfast.

One half-boiled egg smashed over a pile of steamed spinach, snowpea sprouts, alfalfa sprouts, lentil sprouts, and cherry tomatoes… with a drizzle of soy sauce.

If I’m at home, lunch would be something like this. Pan-fried or grilled chicken / fish / tofu with more veges.

The other night we had lamb chops, garlic bread and 2 kinds of salads (I make 2 salads, because my kids don’t like balsamic vinegar) and some roasted cauliflower (not pictured).

And every night for dessert, when the kids are in bed, I eat a bowl of chocolate ice cream :)

My husband and I go out for a “no kids” date night on a weekly basis, and usually we try to do something a little different every week.

This evening, we went to test the legendary reputation of Sparrow Indonesian Takeaway, in Highgate. It was originally located in Northbridge for many, many years, and is still run by the same owners.

We decided to eat there because so many people recommended it to us, and it is constantly listed in Perth’s Top Meals under $20 or something like that.

But, a lot of women in my family make damn fine Indonesian/Malay style food, so I have pretty demanding standards.

As you can see, it is a little “cheap and cheerful” establishment, with only 8 small tables inside. The big, generic, red and green letters on the glass, and the security mesh, really say it all. This place seems to spend very little on presentation.

Inside, the impression of low-glamour functionality was reinforced. But it was super clean and the place was almost full of people on a Wednesday night.

The owner met us with a huge Indonesian smile and showed us to a plastic table with an excellent view of the opened fuse box for the power supply. There was a steady stream of locals getting takeaway – a good sign.

So this is what we ordered. 1 Beef rendang, 1 Balinese chicken curry, 2 plates of yellow rice = all for $17.10.

Yes, that’s right…seventeen dollars. For TWO mains AND two serves of rice.

And my verdict?

This is the smile of total satisfaction + embarrassment + resignation. (Note the fuse box in the background!)

It was really, reeeeeally yummy. The curries were saturated with flavour, the meats were both so tender and juicy and fell apart at the poke of a fork, the rice was perfect and fragrant, and my tummy was very satisfied indeed.

*Very happy Karen*

I strongly, strongly recommend it.

Sparrow Indonesian Restaurant
301 Lord St, Highgate,
Western Australia 6003
(08)9228 2238

A few weeks ago I did a fun little interview about my workout routine, and it appeared in The West Newspaper last week.

The journalist did a great job condensing all my waffling into a couple of paragraphs. It makes me sound really active and sporty! Haha!

If you’d like to read the article as published, click on the image, I have it uploaded in my Facebook albums (you might have to Like My Karen Cheng Page first?).

But since this is my blog, you have the pleasure of reading all my un-edited waffling!

How do you keep in shape? How often do you try to exercise?

I eat really well – lots of vegetables, grains, pulses, fish and lean meats. I am pretty good at restricting sugar, carbs, fatty and oily foods. I snack a lot (on fruit, nuts, popcorn) so I don’t tend to over eat during meal times.

I try to do something active everyday. Most of the time I walk or cycle. I try to do muscle workouts and stretches in the evening.

What are your favourite ways to exercise?

I love cycling. I love the rush, the speed, the cardio workout, the muscle toning and the satisfying feeling after a long ride!

You’re a mother of three little boys and work, blogging and other commitments also keep you busy – how do you manage to find time to exercise?

My days are pretty busy, and I don’t have large blocks of regular time to go to a gym. Basically I have to make time to get little blocks of exercise done throughout the day.

I also try to get extra exercise through other daily activities when I’m with my children. Such as, walking to our primary school, playing soccer in the park after school, playing tennis on the street.

A child seat for my bicycle has been my best exercise investment. My 2 year old accompanies me for most of my weekly cycling!

How do you like to de-stress?

I have lots of favourite ways to de-stress – shopping, reading, catching up with friends, walking along the beach. I also find gardening, baking and cooking to be very therapeutic.

Why is health and looking after yourself important to you?

As a mother of 3 young children, I want to look after my health and well being first. I can’t be a happy mother, or a loving wife, or a caring friend… if my health is poor or if I’m feel tired and cranky all the time.

Exercising, eating well, getting some me-time, having date nights with my husband, keeping up with my girl friends, exploring my interests… are all part of me trying to maintain a balanced and fulfilling life.

Also my husband was diagnosed with cancer some years ago, and thankfully he is all clear now. After that, we both decided to live a healthy lifestyle and make choices to reduce the stress in our lives.

What are your favourite places in Perth to exercise and why?

I love being around the South Perth river foreshore. Perth has such a pretty skyline and river. I also love Cottesloe Beach.

Do you prefer to exercise on your own or with a friend (and why?)

Admittedly, I prefer to exercise on my own. I like to be focused on what I’m doing, and enjoy the feeling of exercising. I also like the quiet time it gives me. It’s a kind of meditation.

For the last of my posts celebrating Malaysian food, courtesy of Malaysian Kitchen, I decided to eat at a more “upmarket” restaurant.

I have never been to Ria Authentic Malaysian Food, in Leederville. They have been open for quite a few years now, and I have heard a lot of good reviews and things about them.

They say they specialise in “authentic home style Malaysian cooking” so I was very curious to try it out.

I went with my husband and 2 other friends. Thankfully I booked a table a few day in advanced, because we arrived to a restaurant that was packed full of people. It was very, very popular.

We ordered two entrees. The Ria Pork Rib Nibbles in caramelised chilli sauce ($16.50). They were a very tasty. I love pork ribs… especially crispy, salty, tangy, sweet, pork ribs!

We also ordered Grilled Squid Skewers with acar (pickle) and chilli jam ($18). The squid was lovely, and even better when mixed with the flavours of the pickle and jam.

For our first main, we ordered Mum’s Loh Ak (Braised caramelised duck) ($25). The sauce was deep, sweet and salty and it was very yummy. Not to mention the duck meat was lovely, soft and it fell off the bone easily.

We also ordered a Lamb Kari (not pictured) ($23.50) which was Malay-style lamb curry from Johor with potatoes.

And my favourite of the lot was the Nyonya Chicken Curry ($22) which completely surprised me, because it tasted almost exactly like how my aunties make their chicken curries.

So the restaurant certainly receives a big tick for authenticity!

We ate it with Roti ($3 each), white rice ($2.50 each) and 4 beers.

In the end, the cost of the meal was $155, which turned out to be about $38 per person.

The ambiance was nice, the service was excellent, the food was great. It was a very good dining experience, I recommend it.

Ria Authentic Malaysian Food
106 Oxford St
Leederville, 6007
(08) 9328 2998

These last few weeks, I’ve been working with Malaysian Kitchen – a global initiative of the Malaysian Government celebrating Malaysian cuisine around the world.

For my blog, I wanted to feature some classic and typical Malaysian dishes, in particular the “cheap and cheerful” dishes sold at hawker food stalls.

I don’t claim to be an expert, however after a bit of asking around and research… this is what I ate over a few weeks!

First up, I had a classic Malaysian breakfast – kaya toast, soft-boiled eggs and teh tarik.

Kaya is a sweet coconut egg jam that is spread on toast.

The soft-boiled egg, as I discovered, is quite a favourite amongst Malaysians. When I asked people about it, most of them come over with this starry, distant look in their eyes and they tell me that it was their favourite as a kid.

Teh Tarik is a strong, sweet tea (a mixture of black tea and sweetened condensed milk) that has been poured in a special way as to mix and froth the drink.

I was also keen to try roti canai, another popular Malaysia breakfast, but there’s only so much I can eat in one sitting.

This is Nasi Lemak, a fragrant coconut milk rice served with chilli anchovy sambal. I was told by some, that this is the “National Dish of Malaysia”.

In this serve, I also ordered it with fried chicken, which is not very typical, but they were really tasty!

I was recommended this place by several people, and am more than happy to share the address. They also do a very yummy Chicken Feet Dry Noodles.

The Rice Noodle House
4/114 Barbican St
Shelley, 6148
(08) 9259 5532

Penang Assam Laksa is a noodle dish with a hot, spicy and sour soup. There is seafood, mint, pineapple, fish broth and other goodies all mixed together. It is an explosion of flavours and I really love it!

I actually took this picture a few months ago, and I’m using it now, because the more recent time I went to eat this, I forgot to take my camera. Some blogger I am!

I totally recommend the place:

Espresso Seven Seas Cafe
Shop 7/3 Kearns Crescent
Applecross, 6153

Fish Head Noodle Soup

I was told by several friends that I just *had* to try this dish – deep fried fish heads (and wings), eaten with a bowl of rice noodles and soup…. and it was indeed very good.

My friend brought me to this very popular shop, which was quite famous, just because of this dish.

It was nestled in the quite suburban streets, and it was FULL of people. There were probably 10 tables crammed together, with 4 people on each table, and every single person was eating this dish. There were fish head bones all over the tables, people were talking loudly, it was a great atmosphere!
Bateman Chinese Malaysian Restaurant
6/22 Parry Avenue
Bateman WA 6150
(08) 9332 0838

Char kway teow is a fried flat noodle dish, cooked in a dark soy sauce, chili, various seafoods and meats, and bean sprouts. There are lots of variations.

When I worked in Singapore, I ate this dish twice a week. But where I ate it, there were bits of lard (yes crispy, solid bits of pig fat!) and cockles and definitely no green stuff in it! This particular serve was rather “healthy”.

Spencer Village Food Court
200 Spencer Rd,
Thornlie, WA, 6108

It was very interesting that almost  all the “recommended” hawker food places were south of the river!

There were a lot of other dishes that I wanted to try. And a lot of very popular Malaysian eateries that I wanted to go to… but I ran out of time.

So these are some other places in Perth that were recommended to me.

Hawker’s Cuisine
17/68 Roe St
Northbridge, 6003
(08) 9328 9668

Old Cathay
59 Albany Hwy
Victoria Park, 6100
(08) 9361 1881

Rasa Nyonya Penang Restaraunt
Shop 6&7 1019 Albany Highway
East Victoria Park, 6102
(08) 9470 3847

Bull Creek Hawker
118 Parry Ave
Bull Creek, 6149
(08) 9312 3888

Bamboo
113 Collins Rd Shop 51
Willetton, 6155
(08) 9354 4888

For my next post, I’ll be eating at a more “upmarket” dining establishment of Malaysian cuisine!

The other day, we went to a friend’s place for a dinner party. Before dinner began, my friend revealed that TODAY was the perfect evening for him to open a bottle of wine that he had been keeping in his wine cellar for so long.

He was going to share it among the 6 guests. This meant that we would only get one small glass each – which suited me fine, since I can only tolerate very small amounts of alcohol.

There was lots of ooohing and ahhhing over the French wine bottle. It was so old that it had literally gathered dust. It’s not every day that you get to drink an 11 year old bottle of French wine (well not for me anyway).

When the wine bottle was opened, there was great relief when the cork came out cleanly. My friend explained that the bottle had been stored upside down, and the wine kept the cork moist -  so it would not crumble.

Dinner took some time to prepare, so we were all in quite a state of anticipation when we finally sat down to eat – and drink.

But then a funny thing happened. My wine loving friend ate two mouthfuls of the pasta, and a tiny sip of the wine, and then he said “Everyone stop drinking! This is not the right dish to go with this wine.”

At first, I thought he was joking, but then I realised he was absolutely serious. The pasta sauce was “too robust” for the wine’s “character”.

And since it was his wine, we all ate the rest of our meals with our wine glasses untouched.

Talk about fussy wine-drinkers!

About fifteen minutes after dinner, we allowed to resume appreciating the wine.

There was lots of discussion about how subtle the flavours were. How the wine had matured in “complex” ways.  And how French wines were far more sophisticated than Australian wines, which typically have “bolder” flavours.

I thought the wine was just okay, and to be honest, I really enjoy wine with stand-out flavours. You know, tough enough to take over your mouth and say “I’m here!!!”

So, I’m afraid that the wine was wasted on my “uneducated” taste.

(I can only hope that my friend does not read my blog!)

These last few weeks, I’ve been working on a project with Malaysian Kitchen – a global initiative of the Malaysian Government celebrating Malaysian cuisine around the world.

So to celebrate Malaysian food, firstly, I decided to cook my favourite Malaysian dish – beef rendang.

(Actually, it’s my husband’s favourite dish. I’m just a very good wife.)

I used the recipe from the Two Asian Kitchens Cookbook by Australian Masterchef Winner Adam Liaw.

And let me tell you, it was really simple. So simple that my 6 year old son helped me.

I followed the recipe exactly too!

These are just some of the ingredients in the recipe.

I even bought an actual, fresh coconut – to grate, roast and pound. Ha how authentic is that!

That vulgar looking root at the front is a turmeric root. I’ve never seen one before! It stained my chopping board!

I thought I’d have a problem finding all the ingredients, but to my delight, my local fruit and vegetable shop stocked everything.

I chopped and sliced everything up, while my 6 year old son threw it into a food processor.

Ok I admit working with a fresh coconut was a bit time consuming and overrated in the end. Adam suggests that using desiccated coconut is just as good. And I’ll be doing that next time.

Using the fresh ingredients was absolutely worth it. The smell was already incredible and we hadn’t even cooked anything yet.

We threw the processed stuff into a pot.

Added meat, coconut milk, lime leaves, lemongrass.

Slow cooked it for 2 hours.

And look at that!

Absolutely, mouth-wateringly brilliant.

Everyone knows that brown meat curry doesn’t look good when photographed, so I left the pieces of lime leaves mixed with the meat to add a bit of visual interest. YUMMMM!!!

We fed a dinner party of 6 people, and they were all very, very happy indeed. I felt like such a culinary rockstar :)

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Adam Liaw’s Malaysian Beef Rendang

Serves 4-6
Preparation: 30 minutes
Cooking: About 2 hours

Ingredients

1 tablespoon of oil
1kg of chuck steak, cut into 3cm cubes
3 stalks of lemongrass, white part only, bruised with a pestle
3 kaffir lime leaves shredded
2 teaspoons sugar
400 ml coconut cream
100g grated fresh coconut (or 130g desiccated coconut)

Base Paste
8 eschalots
6 red birds-eye chillies
6 garlic cloves
3cm piece of galangal (peeled and thickly sliced)
3cm of ginger (peeled and thickly sliced)
3cm of turmeric (peeled and thickly sliced)
2 teaspoon sea salt flakes

1. Base paste – Put all the ingredients in a food processor (or mortar) and grind to a fairly smooth paste.

2. Heat oil in a large saucepan and fry the paste, stirring often over medium heat for 5 minutes until fragrant.

3. Add beef, lemongrass, kaffir leaves and sugar and toss to coat in the paste.

4. Add coconut cream and 250mL of water and bring to low simmer. Cover and cook for 30 minutes, then uncover and cook for 1 hour.

5. Meanwhile, dry-fry the coconut in a frying pan until golden brown. Transfer to a mortar and grind to a paste.

6. Add the ground coconut and cook for 30 minutes, stirring often. Taste and adjust the seasoning. Serve with hot jasmine rice (or coconut rice).

I hope you enjoy it as much as we did!

Our orange tree is producing a lot of good looking fruit!

There are probably 6 more loads like this still hanging on the tree.

As for their taste, they are a quite sour with a hint of sweetness. And unfortunately they’re not nice enough to eat or give away.

So the kids helped me juice them up. We squeezed them until the skin on our hands turned funny.

Served with a bit of sugar, mint and ice… they turned out very yummy!

Now, a couple of years ago, this would have made my inner girl scream out “EWWW!”

But, living with three little boys (and one big boy) has toughened me up a lot.

So now, when I find A BIG GREEN CATERPILLAR crawling out of the broccoli that I was just about to steam for dinner…

…I just think of it as an opportunity to show the boys something really cool.

Which is easy, because they think almost anything gross or dangerous is cool.

I guess it proves that the vegetables from the “fresh market” are in fact both fresh, and not covered in pesticides – just like they promised.

A little extra protein with your veggies, anyone?

(No caterpillers were harmed in the making of this blog post. It was released back to the wild.)

I am very excited at the moment. I have a new cook book and I have been inspired to BAKE!

With Easter coming up, the bakery sells hot cross buns for $6.50 for a bag of 6. Now I LOOOOOVE hot cross buns. I can eat about 3 in one sitting. And my kids could probably eat 2, maybe 3 each. Which means I would have to buy 2 bags for $13, which ain’t happening.

So I was inspired to try and make some myself.

The recipe looked super easy, and it was.

I tried out the recipe 3 times (in one week!). In the end I halved the original portion, to make 16 small buns, because the original amount of yeast made the dough grow so large that I didn’t have a bowl big enough to fit all the dough! It was spilling out over the sides!

Anyway, I thought I’d share a slightly modified Chocolate Chip version on my blog (if you want the original version with sultanas and currants, I guess you’ll have to buy the book!).

These are so fricking amazing. The smell, the texture, the light sweetness, the glaze, the bits of chocolate… they are absolutely delicious.

Chocolate Chip Hot Cross Buns

10g yeast
150ml warm water
45g caster sugar
275g plain flour
1 egg
1/4 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
50g butter, softened
70g of chocolate chips

Flour Paste
45g plain flour
15g castor sugar
45ml water

Syrup Glaze
15g caster sugar
15ml of water

1. Stir yeast and water in a large bowl. Let it sit for a few minutes while you get the rest of your ingredients together.

2. Add flour, sugar, cinnamon, egg and butter (make sure it’s soft!).

3. Mix very well for 3 minutes with a spoon. Add chocolate chips and then give it another good stir for 2 minutes.

4. Cover the bowl with cling wrap, and leave the bowl in a warm place for 1- 2 hours. (I like to make it just after breakfast, before I drop my kids off at school.)

5. Preheat the oven to 170C.

6. The dough should have doubled in size. Knock back the dough with the spoon, and transfer onto a well floured surface. The dough is pretty sticky and soft, not like pizza or bread dough! I rolled them about and cut them up with a spatula and a spoon, I didn’t actually touch the dough with my fingers.

7. Divide the dough into 16 portions, lightly roll each of them into a small ball, and place the balls onto a lined baking tray. You’re supposed to place them 5cms apart, but I just put them 3cm apart.

8. You’re supposed to wait 1 hour for the balls to rise slightly, but I just waited 15 minutes.

9. Flour paste - Mix the flour, sugar and water in a small ball. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag – I use a plastic zip lock bag, and snip the end off one corner.

10. Pipe crosses across the buns.

11. Bake the buns for 25 minutes, until the tops are nice and dark golden colour. The darker the better!

12. Syrup Glaze - Lightly boil sugar and water in a small saucepan.

13. Once the buns come out of the oven, brush the tops with the glaze.

14. Best eaten hot!

This is the cook book the recipe came from, Bake by Alison Thompson. Full of easy-to-bake classic baking recipes. Can’t wait to try out more.

In my home town is a very famous seafood restaurant/takeaway called Cicerellos. It’s right by the water, inside Fisherman’s Harbour in Fremantle. One day a few weeks ago, I was there for lunch with some girlfriends, and I had my toddler Liam with me.

Cicerellos is great because it is so much in the theme of seafood. Not only do they have old nets and floats and pictures of old fishing boats on the walls, they have really impressive aquariums for you and your kids to look at.

Although Cicerellos is an Italian family business, the way they prepare food is heavily influenced by the British tradition of “Fish and Chips”. The fish is deep fried in batter, and the chips are thick, short wedges of potato, also deep fried. Traditionally, both the fish and the chips were served wrapped up in several layers of old newspaper, because it was cheap, it absorbed the grease, and also kept the food warm.

Nowadays, you can still get it wrapped in paper for take-away, but the paper is nice and new and clean! But you can also get it served on a plate, if you want to eat-in.

Not many people know this, but almost all of the fish that is eaten in “Fish and Chips” is actually SHARK – because it is much cheaper. And whenever I order Fish and Chips at Cicerellos, I think of sharks in a different way.

Summer time in Australia always brings news reports of giant sharks appearing near popular swimming beaches, and beaches are often closed for hours at a time. And serious incidents DO happen. About ten years ago, a man was tragically killed by a huge Great White shark (in waist deep water) at Cottesloe, Perth’s most famous beach. And a couple of years after that, two men in a surf kayak were attacked at the same beach. The shark bit the kayak literally in half between where the two men were sitting!

Presumably because the shark didn’t like the taste of fibreglass, it just swam away. And the two men lived to tell the tale. No wonder they are smiling in the picture.

Cicerellos now have the bitten-in-half kayak mounted on their wall for everyone to see.

My picture doesn’t really do justice to it. When you are there, you look at the size of the bite mark, and you really think twice about swimming in the ocean ever again. It’s like a cartoon.

But this is REAL. And it happened at my FAVOURITE beach. Where I take my KIDS!

So at Cicerellos, you can sit and eat your shark, while you think about a shark eating you.

Liam and I ordered Calamari and Chips on a plate (out of respect for the sharks).

Yum!

Whenever I make my own pizzas, I have always used bought, pre-made pizza bases or used wholemeal pita breads.

But after I learned how to make a professional pizza, I’ve decided it was so easy to make my own bases, that I was converted.

This is a nice simple pizza dough recipe I found and modified.

Pizza Dough Recipe
Makes 2 medium pizzas

8g of yeast (or 2 teaspoons)
1 teaspoon of caster sugar
½ teaspoon of salt
2 cups of plain flour
2 tablespoons of olive oil
180ml (or ¾ cups) of warm water

1. Mix the warm water, yeast, sugar and salt into a bowl. Stir well with a fork. Cover with plastic wrap and set aside for 5 minutes, preferably in a warm place.

2. Sift flour into the same bowl. Add oil and mix well with a spoon to form a dough. Knead the dough on a floured surface for 7 – 10 or so minutes.

3. Place the ball of dough into an oiled bowl (if you’re lazy like me, just oil the same bowl). Cover with plastic wrap again and cover again with a tea towel. Put the bowl in a warm place and leave for 30 minutes.

4. Uncover the bowl, the ball off dough should be doubled in size. Give the dough a punch, and knead on a lightly floured surface.

5. Halve the ball of dough, and roll out to make 2 pizza bases.

6. Spread tomato paste on the base, making sure you leave a 1.5cm clean edge.

7. Cook in a 200°C oven for 10 – 15 minutes, until crust is golden brown.

Right now, in Australia, fruit is so plentiful that it is really, really cheap – including mango!
This is one of my favourite meals to serve on a summer evening. Each member of our family receives their own bowl and we sit outside in the garden to eat. It’s bliss.

Moroccan Chicken
1 onion
2 garlic cloves
2 tbs fresh lemon juice
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground turmeric
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
1/4 cup chopped fresh coriander
1kg skinless chicken thigh fillets

Throw the ingredients into a food processor (except chicken). Rub all over the chicken. Place in an airtight container and put in the fridge for 1 hour. Then grill the chicken until cooked. (Or fry on a grill pan.)

Mango Salsa (I made this one up!)
1/8 of small red onion, diced finely
1 mango, diced
handful of cherry tomatoes
handful of roasted cashew nuts, chopped
a sprinkle of chives, chopped
splash of balsamic vinegar

Mix all ingredients into a bowl and toss.

Serve it all with rice and greens.

Enjoy (outside or inside).

I have a very bad habit – I drink tea. And lots of it.

What makes this better (or worse), is that I have a group of friends who are also connoisseurs of tea. We’ll sit down in a leafy courtyard on a sunny afternoon, and like old ladies, brew shockingly-expensive, double-decaffeinated, superior organic herbal teas and sip them from pretentious, fine China, vintage floral tea cups.

We’ll talk about leaf blends, regions of China, the latest range of dried fruit mixes, subtle distinction between variations of the same tea… it’s all riveting stuff.

How much do I drink? If I’m at home all day, I’ll have black tea in the morning. Lemon grass and ginger tea in the mid morning. Followed by 2 cups of green tea in the afternoon. Then peppermint tea in the evening.

If I don’t get my herbal teas, I feel a bit unsettled. If I don’t get my caffeine hit twice a day from the black and green tea, I get a cracking headache that makes me want to cry and smash things up.

Well, these last few months, life has been very busy. I seem to always be ON THE GO. There’s always never enough time. I’m always rushing here and rushing there.

So yes, over the last few months, I have slowly developed a new bad habit.

I have been FORGETTING to have my cup of teas.

Which means I often – unintentionally – find myself to be VERY GRUMPY FOR SOME REASON.

How this happens is that basically, I make myself a cup of tea in the morning and then I forget drink it.

I’ll run past the still-full cup sitting on the kitchen counter, an hour later, as I head out the door and shout – CRAP I FORGOT TO HAVE MY TEA! Then I’ll grab the cup of tea and down it.

Yes that’s right, I have now developed the highly acquired taste for lukewarm tea.

It makes my husband wretch, but , it’s kinda growing on me. I like it now.

People drink iced tea right?

So I’m thinking, maybe I need to instill another new habit, based on this new bad habit.

I tried this for a few weeks – Whenever I need to rush out the door in 15 minutes, I will quickly make myself a 3/4 cup of hot tea (with milk) and then pour cold water straight into the cup to make it LUKEWARM.

It worked for a while. I really liked the idea of slamming down my drug hit for the day in 2 minutes flat. It gives me more time to do all the other stuff I need to do.

But the TEA CONNOISSEUR in me, lifted her nose up in sheer disgust and disappointment. I decided that it would not do. It was completely unacceptable and disgraceful.

My solution to this?

I bought myself one of those re-usable, environmentally-friendly, takeaway cafe cups, with a lid. Brilliant!

I could now make a cup of tea in a takeaway cup.. and take it away with me!

But that didn’t work either. Even though it had one of those spill-covers, it would still swirl and splash in the car. I have had to mop up the car three times already. And off-milk does NOT smell nice.

SO NOW I’ve bought a flask. A bright purple beauty, with air tight silicone seals. It’s brilliant!

We’ll see how it goes!

(And shh, just don’t tell my tea drinking friends ok??)

Nigella Lawson, in case you don’t know, is a British Food Goddess.

Last week, I tried Nigella’s Banana Chocolate Muffin recipe. The muffins turned out to be lovely and moist, with a light texture, which was not too rich or overly sweet.

However, I found the banana flavour was pretty strong in this recipe, and it over-powered the chocolate. Maybe Australian bannanas are more flavour-some than British ones?

So I made it again and changed the recipe – less one banana and added chopped dark chocolate chips instead of the cocoa powder.

The result had the same delicious, light, moist texture, but more of a chocolatey taste with a hint of banana flavour.

Plus I used dark chocolate, so it had that deep, rich and slightly bitter taste to it. DIVINE!!!

Nigella Lawson’s Banana Chocolate Muffins (slightly modified by me!)

My changes are bolded!

2 very ripe or overripe bananas (not 3)
125ml vegetable oil
2 eggs
100g soft light brown sugar
225g plain flour
3 x 15ml tablespoons best-quality cocoa powder, sifted
60g of grated dark chocolate (in addition to the  cocoa powder)
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1 x 12-bun muffin tin

1. Preheat the oven to 190°C and line a muffin tin with papers. Don’t worry about getting special papers: regular muffin cases will do the job.

2. Mash the bananas by hand or with an electric mixer. Still beating and mashing, add the oil followed by the eggs and sugar.

3. Mix the flour, cocoa powder, grated chocolate and bicarb together and add this mixture, beating gently, to the banana mixture, then spoon it into the prepared papers.

4. Bake in the preheated oven for 15–20 minutes, by which time the muffins should be dark, rounded and peeking proudly out of their cases. Allow to cool slightly in their tin before removing to a wire rack.

Serves: Makes 12

The un-Karen-Cheng-ified Original Banana Chocolate Muffin Recipe is HERE, along with a whole lot of  other excellent recipies.

I’ve got a couple of things I want to share with you.

Firstly…

I went to a very fun charity event on Wednesday night, called “Celebrate the Sun”. The whole event was put together by the local fashion industry, and was in support of “Beyond Blue”, which is about raising awareness of the symptoms and effects of depression.

I can honestly say that it has already worked, because this event has given me an excuse to make a deeply personal confession.

I have been facing the challenge of depression (mild, but long term) for about 5 years, ever since the birth of my second child.

And the two major problems I’ve had in dealing with feeling blue have been: recognising the symptoms, and then to even admit to myself that I feel that way.

I’m afraid to say that I’ve been guilty of denial, but I’m just about ready to talk about it now. Maybe. Soon. Maybe Later. But Definitely Eventually.

Celebrate the Sun was held at The Bird, one of Perth’s uber-cool inner city bars, on William Street, Northbridge. The main feature of the evening was an informal parade of designer guys and girls outfits, ranging from stand-out amazing, to cool sophistication.

The Bird is a small, cozy venue, and the parade was so relaxed that the models were cracking jokes with the audience. It was funny, warm, and intimate. You could see how feel-good it was, because the models were smiling. That’s right – this event had the power to make fashion models smile. If you weren’t there, you missed out.

However, all the outfits are now available for auction on Facebook, so do go on over and check out the high res pictures.  The deal is that you are not just bidding on a single garment – you get everything you see in the picture! (except the model and the shoes).

Some of these combinations are worth $500, some are from collections yet to be released, and all the bidding starts at ZERO. No reserve price!

100% of all proceeds go to BeyondBlue Research.

Thanks to Matt Jelonek photography for the images.

Secondly…

Another fashion industry created charity event is Lomovember, and I am going to the opening party on Friday night, the 19th November. Lomovember is an annual event, and each year runs an exhibition of lomo-photos (arty photos taken with a very simple type of film camera, which produces these really cool images).

Images by Rikki Burns and Hannah McGrath

All the funds raised go to support “Movember” – an international campaign to fund research for men’s health issues, particularly prostate health.

Now, I vaguely understand that a prostate is part of a man’s man-bits, but I have no idea what it actually does. I don’t actually WANT to know, but I’m sure it’s important enough for me to go to a party.

Even though women’s health issues get a lot of attention in the media, and I tend to think of the men in my life as indestructible, it turns out that they are all soft and squishy inside, just like women. So, they need help too.

The whole event is organised by the team at Pigeonhole, a chain of indie fashion and homewares boutiques. Thank you!

The opening party is open to the public, with live music and the $5 entry fee goes to the cause. I’ll be there early, and if you see me, please do walk right up and say “Hi!”.

Launch Party
19 November 2010, 7pm
“The LoMovember Gallery”
104B Murray St
Perth

The exhibition runs at The LoMovember Gallery till the 21st November, from 11 – 5 each day.

I was invited to attend a marketing event for a new pizza franchise – called Crust – which has recently opened in the Subiaco district of my home town of Perth.

It was a chance to see the Head Chef of the franchise make pizza.

I often cook pizza at home, and I was quite keen to see how it is done professionally. But of course, I was also expecting to pig out on a lot of free gourmet pizza. I couldn’t lose.

So I rocked up, and was pretty impressed with the pizza bar. Brand new, excellent interior design, a giant kitchen behind glass. Maybe 50 different ingredients all waiting to be made into gourmet pizza while you wait. There was a crew of highly trained pizza technicians in identical uniforms, ready to leap into action, like a Formula One pit crew. All good!

I met the marketing person, Carrie, and then met the other guests.

Which is when I had the first of several shocks.

First, I discovered that I was in the company of several other bloggers – but I was the only one who was NOT a food blogger.

I mention this because, while I enjoy experimenting with recipes at home, my audience is my kids and my husband, who don’t have the most demanding of culinary needs. But food bloggers are critics with the passion of religious extremists. I love food, but for these guys, food is their WHOLE life.

I was waaaaay out of my depth in this company. The foodies were Conor, Lori, Carven and Devan.

Second shock of the evening – I was ridiculously over dressed for the occasion. When I was getting ready to go out, I must have sub-consciously thought I was going to a fashion event. So, instead of looking street-chic smart-casual, I looked like I had gotten lost on the way to a cocktail party in an expensive bar. Damn!

So there I was, in a pizza bar – a really new, shiny one, but a pizza bar nonetheless, with hungry food bloggers who were wearing jeans and sneakers, and I was in high heels and too much make-up. So I had even less credibility now. Great.

The bloggers sat down, and Peter the Head Chef explained to us all the cool things about the way “Crust” do pizza.

As he made the pizzas, including the dough, he explained how they have to put the toppings on in an exact certain way to stop the pizzas messing up the ovens, how the topping (if there are more than three) have to go on in a certain pattern to stop them mushing up, how the cheese has to be tactically deployed for structural stability, how they have gluten free pizzas, and how they have several pizzas so healthy that they have the National Heart Foundation “tick of approval”. They even have square pizzas, and deep dish pizzas. Very interesting!

And then my third shock of the evening came.

Peter divided the bloggers into teams of two, and each team was going to have to invent a pizza (including naming it) and then one of the team members would actually make the pizza – in the fully operating pizza bar! Right here. Right NOW!

Bah. I just wanted to EAT pizza. I cook at home everyday. I go out so I can get SOMEONE ELSE TO COOK FOR ME!

I was paired with Devan. There were 3 other bloggers in the room, all of whom were experts in food and cooking, and none of whom were wearing high heels. So poor guy, just his luck, he got me as his buddy.

We got to work, with 10 minutes to brainstorm our concept for a unique pizza.

We both love Thai food – and Devan is half Thai – so we decide to capture the essence of Thai culinary culture on a single pizza. But we wanted to put a creative spin on it, and instead of going with stereotypical Thai foods (like tom yum and pad thai), we went more for street Thai flavours. And so we called the pizza “The Streets of Bangkok”. I loved the name!

Behold the amazing creative chemistry between Devan and I. Poor guy!

So despite the awesome pizza name, it all went down hill after that.

Devan “suggested” that I be the chef. And I agreed.

But inside I was thinking OMG what have I got myself into! I am SO NOT dressed to make pizza! I can’t cook with a TIME LIMIT, in an industrial kitchen, in full view of the PUBLIC!! CRAP!

I put on a brave face and off we went, assembling our competing pizzas as best we could.

As we worked, I kept looking over at the other blogger’s pizzas, and they looked great.

The foodies seemed completely un-intimidated by the hovering presence of Head Chef Peter. But I just kept thinking that my shoes alone contravened a million health and safety rules, and I kept flicking my big hair around my head to try and keep it out of the pizza. I could have taken out someone’s eye with it. Head Chef Peter must have thought I was such a ditz.

Do these gloves go with my outfit?

I did my best, but “The Streets of Bangkok” looked more like “Little Lumps of Dog Poo in the Streets of Bangkok, with Vegetable Scraps Thrown on Top”.

Apparently I was being too stingy with the cheese.

Peter tried to help me with some advice, but I still wasn’t getting it right, so then he just sort of (politely) pushed me out of the way, and did it himself. I don’t blame him. I was not worthy of his kitchen.

Fortunately, the time came for the three pizza creations to go into the oven.

When they came out, this one was judged by the pizza bar staff to be the best.

A visual delight, with subtle hints of seafood, and named “Paella”. Just what you would expect food bloggers to come up with. To my great relief, nobody mentioned “The Streets of Bangkok” ever again, and Devan and I avoided eye contact for the rest of the evening. (Only kidding!)

With the winner chosen, we were finally treated to an orgy of pizzas made by the staff at Crust. And it was sooooooo goooooood! Happy Karen! (and I even had coffee with the food bloggers later, and they were all really nice people.)

I won’t need to eat again this month.

My review of the pizza? I liked it a lot. Good value for first rate gourmet pizza.

Crust is on 502 Hay Street in Subiaco, just down from the Regal theatre, towards the train station.

My dad is in the habit of shopping in fresh fruit and vegetable markets, and he loves bargains. When things are cheap, he buys LOTS, like boxes of the stuff – for everyone in his whole family.

I came home to find a huge box of strawberries on the doorstep. As I was washing them, I realised they had already passed their best moment, and that they had to be eaten TODAY!

And so it was Muffin-Making Time!

Strawberry and Lemon Muffins Recipe

2 cups self-raising flour
1/3 cup of castor sugar
2 teaspoons of grated lemon rind
1 1/2 cup of diced strawberries
60g melted butter
1 egg lightly beaten
1 cup of milk

Makes about 8-10 muffins.

1. Sift flour into a large bowl.
2. Mix in lemon rind, sugar then egg, butter and milk.
3. Then stir in berries.
4. Spoon mixture into greased muffin pans.
5. Bake in 180C oven for 25 minutes until golden.
6. Drizzle with lemon icing glaze on muffins while hot.

Lemon icing glaze
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
icing sugar

Notes: Perhaps I went overboard with the strawberries, and maybe just 1 cup was enough. But I love my muffins packed with fresh fruit!