Archive for April, 2012

Heirloom tomato

Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012

Truth be known that I am in a bit of a gardening/heirloom vegetable phase, and finally – the heirloom tomato I grew was large enough and ripe enough to pick!

I have to admi, the yield was small – the one large heirloom tomato and two small roma ones, plus a few basil leaves the caterpillars rejected:

But each one super tasty, lovingly tended, and absolutely beautiful. Here’s the yellow one served with the basil and some caramelised balsamic and olive oil.   Amazing.

Whole Suckling Pig, Sky Phoenix

Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012

This little piggy went to market, this little piggy stayed home, this little piggy went wee wee wee all the way to my plate!   It was pigs galore at my friends Ed and Elsie’s wedding banquet at Sky Phoenix!  Usually an 8 course banquet starts off with a suckling pig entree, but this is suckling pig WHOLE entree – served one per table!!!  There were approx 16 tables at the wedding – hence 16 pigs were paraded by their waiters all the way to the front stage for all to applaud the spectacle and to commence salivating.  What made it even more unique was the pigs’ eyes were filled with a light so that they glowed!!!

Each pig was pre-cut into squares of crackling, kinda like peking duck – but with pig!  Each guest then got 2 squares, served atop a pancake with hoisin sauce and two slivers of pickled cucumber.  A bit messy to eat, but it was fantastic.

Looking at the poor piggy – it was then taken to the kitchen to be chopped up and their stir fried for a second course.  there was ssoooo much skin left I would have loved a second plate!! hehehe.

Another unique aspect of Sky Phoenix wedding reception banquets is the dessert. No sweet red bean soup here!  They give you two mango pudding carp per table!! How unique! :)  It’s so rare that chinese restaurants innovate so this was a very good surprise from the usual banquet fare :)

Maple Syrup

Tuesday, April 3rd, 2012

Ever wondered why a bottle of real maple syrup costs around $10 whilst maple “flavoured” syrup costs $3.50? Well – it’s harvested from the sap of maple trees – New York Times quotes that it takes approx 162L of sap in order to produce 3.5L of syrup! The sap has only 4% sugar. Yikes. That makes a bottle sound rather cheap then! :P