Ajisen

Okay, I know they have location restaurants in both San Fran and NYC so if you are fan of ramen or you’ve never tasted the gloriousness that is a piping hot bowl of delicious noodles and live in either cities- you need to go there.

Pablo and I ate ramen like 5 or 6 times while he was in Sydney. I miss Japan (although technically ramen comes from China) and I miss Ajisen Noodle House!! Can someone PLEASE find me a good ramen house in Atlanta before we get home?!?

Spicy ramen, oh how I miss thee …

violet crumble

L told us we needed to try it and thank goodness she did!  I loved the light airy honeycomb and could have actually done without the chocolate.  I’m going to be on a mission to find golden syrup when I return to the States so I can start making this…

shrimp-dog

Not exactly corn dog batter, but I like the idea of these fried shrimp on a skewer. Perfect  for a party since you get easy pickup instead of greasy hands on my sofa…

it wasn’t me (this time)

While in Melbourne Jules decided to give kangaroo another shot and went with a kanga-burger at the Portland Hotel restaurant and microbrewery…

Kangaroo reminds me a lot of venison.  It’s gamey and very lean.  Many Aussies have told us it has no fat at all. 

I went with my new favorite fish, barramundi…

At this point I’m fish and chipped out, but couldn’t resist getting it since I had a rich and nutty porter from their microbrewery to go with it…

It was almost like being back in Ireland.  Almost.

Hunter Valley

We’ve been big fans of the Australian Shiraz for a while and can’t get enough of the New Zealand’s Marlborough region’s Sauvignon Blanc. Needless to say we were pretty excited about our trip up to the Hunter Valley wine region.

The Hunter Valley is home to only a couple of large wineries but dozens and dozens of small boutique wineries selling almost exclusively from their own cellars. It was great tasting all these little treasures that you can’t get anywhere else in the world (or really anywhere else in Oz for that matter)…

I love visiting wineries for two reasons- 1. drinking your way through the day is always a good time and 2. I love all the great things you learn from the wine makers. I always come away knowing a little bit more about what I’m drinking, why I like it and how to enjoy it more with food.

The wineries in Hunter Valley have some insanely knowledgeable staff members that really made the day just that much more enjoyable for me.

I came away with a new love for Semillon both the dry and sweet versions, but not the overtly citrusy ones.

I learned that our palates put together the flavor of wine like pieces of a puzzle and each sip allows us to taste it more completely. Hello- that is why the first sip is never that great and the wine seems to get better and better. It is actually tasting better and not, as one of our sassier hosts said, “ just because your getting pissed”.

Best of all I learned a new pairing secret- spicy food + sweet whites = heaven!

simple math

Being near the coast = seafood meals

We grabbed some fish and chips in a little town on our way down the Great Ocean Road…

Super fresh = super yummy.

let’s go outback tonight…

While in Ayers Rock we had some real outback steaks…

We even cooked them up on the “barbie” ourselves…

Which I have to say is a great little concept. They provided a salad bar, baked potatoes and corn on the cob- also known as the quintessential accompaniments to a steak dinner.

It was pretty good, fun to do and much less expensive than the $60 per head buffet. We ended up doing it both nights we were in Ayers Rock and I’m sure our steaks were better than what they were serving up anyway.

The Wife has not lost her touch with the grill.

hopping bambi

So in all honesty, we've been eating in the hotel lounge. A lot. Australia is, to put it mildly, insanely expensive. Our weekend trips are putting us in the hole and we're trying to squirrel away what we can to make up for them.

This means we haven't been delving too deeply into Australian fare. We did plunge in one night in Cairns at a seafood place on the harbor with the fave Aussie fish, the barramundi...

We actually had it again the next day in a restaurant in the rainforest that was much better because it was fresh instead of farmed. It's a clean, white flaky fish, you can see why Aussie's love it. Oh and those sweet potatoes underneath were pure heaven, especially when you've given up sweets for Lent.

We also ate some other true Aussie dishes...

Yes. We ate emu. We ate crocodile. We ate kangaroo. Please bear in mind this was actually before I had even seen a kangaroo and obviously before I fell in love with their gentle little selves. This may be worse than when I ate puffin. At least I didn't hand feed those little guys.

I will say that our guide on Saturday told us that kangaroo was the most humane animal we could eat in Australia since they aren't farmed. They live in the wild, are only hunted to keep their populations in check and it's strictly regulated. So, (justification coming in 3...2...1...) that's like our deer population and deer are pretty cute and I don't feel bad about eating those.

Sometimes it's tough being at the top of the food chain.

'Nawlins

On our first trip to the Big Easy with the international peeps we tried to expose them to as much of the food culture that we could. After some pretty heated discussions regarding the frying of oysters and drinking vodka with breakfast, we finally got them to try some of the staples of New Orlean's cuisine...jambalaya, oysters poboys, shrimp etoufee, catfish, Bloody Mary's, etc.

Of course they all loved it, even the fried oysters.

This year the returnees knew their faves and partook with gusto.

I finally got my beignet, although I ate it too quickly to grab a photo. Actually, I was a little lazy (read: drunk) about taking food photos at all. Which stinks because we had some great food.

Apparently, I only got a pic of my jambalaya lunch...




and some soup...

I dream of Genie this cake.

My Granny-in-law was kind enough to bake my favorite cake for my birthday this year. It's what Southerners refer to as a "lemon cheese cake"...



It isn't a cheesecake in any sense. It is a cheese (space) cake. I have zero idea why they call it that because it is her regular sour cream pound cake layers (aka- pure heaven) iced with homemade lemon curd.

I've been trying to replicate her cakes for almost 9 years to no avail. Like I use the exact same ingredient brands she uses and have even had Julie time how long she does stuff kind of attempts. I've almost got the layers down, but her icings require more skill than I apparently possess. For those who don't know me- I'm pretty freaking skilled in the baking department, meaning her skill level is through the roof.

I've made this cake once and it was pretty close except I screwed up with the cooking temp a little and had minuscule bits of the cooked egg in the icing. It still tasted good, but it wasn't the glassy perfection of curd that she cranks out like it was nothing.

I'm happy to bow down to her superiority though and even more happy that she cares enough to bake me a cake, my very favorite of her insanely delicious repertoire.

I gave up desserts and sweets for Lent. This cake is seriously haunting me right now.