Beef Will Moreland

Do you like roasts? I love roasts, as it reminds me of being ten years old. Every Sunday, my brother and I would go to Sunday School (initiated by me because I wanted to sing the cool songs and be in the church plays). When we came home, there would be Barbara Woodhouse on TV (as I wanted to be a vet specialising in dogs!), followed by Sunday roast. Mum usually made roast chicken, probably because this is what we liked the most, served with roast potatoes and gravy. It was a very comforting routine, and as a chubby, greedy ten year old, one that I adored.


Fast forward to today, and I still like a good roast. However, with my interest in exploring food, I like to branch out a little from the usual salt and pepper seasoned roast. I had a lovely piece of beef fillet living in my freezer for about a month, and flicked through my cookbooks to find something interesting to do with it. In the end, I settled on Beef Will Moreland from Sunday Roast by Clarissa Dickson Wright and Johnny Scott. Clarissa apparently once worked with Will, a talented violinist, and he gave her the recipe, which was originally meant for topside, but which Clarissa upgraded to beef fillet.


The flavours of Beef Will Moreland are Thai-inspired - coconut milk, chilli, ginger, lemongrass and coriander. Clarissa says that you can strain the sauce and reduce it, but she doesn't bother - and nor did I. I liked the chunky pieces in the sauce - it added texture and colour to the dish. You can find the recipe for Beef Will Moreland here.





Don't be put off by my rubbish photos. If you enjoy Thai-inspired dishes, I can highly recommend this dish.

Birthday fun - Cake & Assaggi Italiani

It was my birthday recently, and I had the most fantastic day. I am definitely not talking about the weather - it was very cold, with a biting wind and rain. No, it was a fantastic day because I spent the entire day (literally) in the company of friends.

In the morning, I went to Preston Market with my friend, Elisa, to shop for lunch. Erm ... and I might have picked up a few things here and there - for instance, I had to try a Baby Ruth bar, purely for research purposes, of course - ummm, and a truckload of dried fruit for Christmas cake and puddings, and err, some cake decorating supplies, because you can never have enough of those and ....

Back at Elisa's, closely supervised by her two pooches, Coops and Porter, Elisa made us delicious veggie tarts using the spoils from our market trip.

Next came dessert - hooray! Elisa made me a birthday cake - this is the second year in a row that someone has made me a cake, and I am as pleased as punch. The cake, pictured at the top of this post, is a White Wings white chocolate and raspberry cake, to which Elisa had added marshmallows (knowing my obsession with them).

Here's me blowing out the candles:

And here's a slice of cake - look at the lovely colour on the inside:

The afternoon comprised of chatting and watching Edward Scissorhands (which, shamefully, I had never seen from beginning to end before).

A short train trip and a quick change later, I was off to dinner at Assaggi, an Italian restaurant in Malvern. Assaggi is run by an Italian family, and the food is excellent. (Matt Preston reviewed it here.) There is a wood-fired pizza oven in the front kitchen that you walk past on the way in. The friendly staff ushered us promptly to our upstairs table (I was a little late because of my trip back from the north), and remained friendly and upbeat throughout. Tap water is available on request, provided in large bottles, and is replaced without prompting throughout the meal. The restaurant is both BYO and licensed, so you have the best of both worlds. Corkage is $7 a bottle.

I had been to Assaggi once before with my friend Veronica, and I knew that the pizzas at Assaggi were devine. Accordingly, I knew I was going to order pizza. Here is my choice - the Delicioza, which has a crispy, thin, light as a feather crust topped with bocconcini, speck, gorgonzola and pear slices:

Although the pizza fills the plate, its light crust makes it easy for one person to tackle as a main meal.

Everyone else enjoyed their selections too - James ordered an enormous whole flounder served with beetroots which looked very impressive, the girls both ordered the gnocchi, Christian had the linguine carbonara and Tim had another type of pizza.



Despite being full, of course we ordered dessert. I ordered the berry semifreddo, which tastes every bit as good as it looks:

Assaggi has a warm, friendly atmosphere, with staff who make you feel welcome. Its authentic Italian food is wonderful, and everything on the menu sounded appealing.

Overall, it was a fun birthday. Thanks to my friends who made it that way.

Assaggi Italiani
99 Glenferrie Rd
Malvern 3143
Ph: (03) 9500 1624

TWD - Coffee-break muffins

This week's Tuesday with Dorie was hosted by Rhiani of Chocoholic Anonymous. She chose Dorie's Coffee-Break muffins.

These muffins are little coffee-flavoured morsels that are definitely not sweet, designed to go with your coffee or to be toasted for breakfast. In Australia, we generally don't toast sweet muffins (only the English kind), so I am always intrigued when this practice is mentioned.

I wanted to love these (especially as I was keeping them for my lunch), but I only found them OK. This means that they probably won't feature in my recipe rotation. However, a lot of other TWD members did love these - you can check out their take on these muffins at the TWD blogroll. Thanks to Rhiani for hosting us this week - she will have the recipe.

Vegie Bar, Brunswick

Vegie Bar is a Melbourne institution that needs no introduction. Situated in Brunswick Street, Fitzroy, its bustling, cosy interior lifts the spirits immediately on entry. Vegie Bar's philosphy is to provide healthy, affordable vegetarian food in a fun environment, and they certainly deliver on that promise.

I visited Vegie Bar for a friend's birthday recently. Because Vegie Bar is so popular, on entry, you put your name down on a table list, take an "animal" (in my case, a Zebra), and go out the back to a cosy bar area to wait until your table is called.

Our party of five didn't have to wait long before being seated. The tables are packed in pretty closely, but because the vibe of the place is so upbeat, everyone is good natured about it and take it in their stride. The wait staff are friendly and efficient, and our meals come out quickly.

I ordered a vegetarian Moroccan tagine with cous cous, pictured at the top of this post. The serving was huge, and the flavour of the dish was fabulous - just the right level of spiciness. Everyone else at our table was happy with their picks as well.

My downfall came in ordering dessert. I was already quite full after my meal, but as these things happen, someone suggested dessert. I had been eyeing off the bread and butter pudding in the cakes cabinet since we came in, so I needed no persuading to order a dessert. Now this was no ordinary bread and butter pudding:

It was cake-like in its elegance and stature, and as well as berries inside, it was accompanied by a cacophony of berries on the plate. Some were still a little frozen, but no matter - nothing could detract from the glory of this pudding. Unfortunately, this mammoth and glorious dessert tipped my capacity over the edge (that must surprise some of you after seeing my recent Sydney post!), and I was uncomfortably full for the next day or so. Let that be a warning to you - order a dessert to share (but don't skip it, because it is devine!).

If you are looking for a fun, casual, affordable place to dine in Melbourne, Vegie Bar certainly fits the bill.

Vegie Bar

380 Brunswick St

Fitzroy VIC 3065

(03) 9417 6935

Jamie's Tray Baked Chicken Maryland

Cooking for one can sometimes be a drag. I usually prefer dishes that are quick and easy to prepare, as I figure that if I am the only one I have to please it doesn't matter so much.

On Saturday evening, I was in a place where I knew I wanted to eat dinner sooner rather than later, and I didn't want to make anything that was too fussy, but at the same time, I wanted something tasty and different to my usual "anything goes" stir fries. On spec, I took Jamie's Dinners off the shelf, and I found a great tray baked chicken Maryland dish. You can find the recipe here.

This dish has only a small number of ingredients, the trickiest being white wine (as I don't drink at home and wasn't sure if I had any in the cupboard). The remaining flavours for the chicken come from sweet corn (I used tinned), cannellini beans (didn't have any so I used chick peas!), cream (or in my case, the more waistline friendly evaporated milk), streaky bacon and - wait for it - banana. Now I don't know about you, but the thought of chicken and banana together doesn't sound appealing. However, ignore all inherent repulsion that you might feel about this combination - after baking, the banana just melds into the dish and gives it a lovely sweet flavour that works well with the salty bacon.

This dish also wins ticks for being really fast - you mostly just pop everything into the baking tray together, then let it look after itself for 40 minutes or so.

I simply served this with cooked frozen veges (I am a heathen and microwave them), which I used to soak up the extra sauce on the plate and give them flavour as well.

If you are looking for a quick but crowd-pleasing and tasty dish for dinner, you could do a lot worse than trying this dish from Jamie. I highly recommend it!

TWD - Pineapple Upside Downer

Do you remember when upside down cakes were the height of sophistication as dinner party fare? They always fascinated me as a child, because the glossy fruit on top looked so good, and I wondered how they "glued" it on.

Fast forward to the present, and upside down cakes are still good value, although dismissed by some as passe. Sabrina of Superfluous is our host for this week's Tuesday with Dorie, and she chose Dorie's Cranberry Upside-Downer.

Now cranberries are not an easy thing to procure in Australia, whether fresh or frozen - the only way to really get them is dried. A cake with dried cranberries on top didn't do it for me, so I harked back to the grandmother of upside down cakes, the pineapple upside down cake, to make a Pineapple Upside-Downer. I also inserted a frozen raspberry into the centre of each pineapple ring to make it pretty and resemble the glace cherry versions of my youth.

This cake is light and spongy and delicious. I ate mine warm, but didn't get to try it cold because I forgot to save myself a piece. Oh well, that's the way it goes.

You can check out the recipe at Sabrina's site or in Dorie's book, and to see more variations on the Cranberry Upside-Downer, visit the TWD blogroll.

Delicious Death® - Agatha Christie's 120th anniversary cake

On 15 September 2010, it is the 120th anniversary of Agatha Christie's birth. Agatha Christie needs no introduction - she is the best-selling author of all time, with her crime novels selling over 2 billion copies, and translated into 45 languages.


To celebrate Christie's 120th anniversary, Jane Asher, actress and cake maker extraordinaire, was asked to create a cake recipe. Jane was inspired by a passage in Christie's A Murder Announced, a Miss Marple novel, to create the recipe for Delicious Death®. You can find the relevant passage, the recipe for the cake and more background information here and here.


Delicious Death® is a rich flourless chocolate cake, filled with brandied fruits, and enrobed in rich chocolate ganache.


The Agatha Christie website has invited everyone to join in the celebrations by making Delicious Death® and posting a photograph of their creation to their Facebook page created for the occasion.

This was too good an opportunity to pass up - the cake looks scrumptious, I love a historic occasion, and I am a fan of the Miss Marple and Hercule Poirot TV series (although I will confess to never having read an Agatha Christie novel).

Here are my fruits being cooked in brandy:




Next step is to make the cake:



I substituted half of the almond meal for ground pecans (because I didn't have quite enough almonds).

Once the cake is cooled, it is split in half, and filled with the brandied fruits:



The two halves of the cake are then joined back together, and the cake is smothered in a rich, decadent chocolate ganache. Finally, it is decorated with scroll rows of ganache, crystallised violets, crystallised rose petals and gold leaf (or in my case, one row of scrolling, crystallised violets, silver cachous and pink hearts). I also piped "Good Wishes" across the cake, as in the passage of the novel which inspired this cake, the cake baker says that she would do that:





Finally, slice and enjoy!!



Doesn't this look fabulous? And it was - perhaps not worth dying for, but very, very good.