Christmas 2012 Greetings

Merry Christmas everyone! As you enjoy the food, the fellowship and the chill out, let us remember that today is Jesus' birthday!

Image sourced from Dryicons

Hope you have fun times, and may the new year be one of many positives.

God bless.

Cindy :)

Early Christmas Lunch 2012

This year, EF's side of her family is hosting the lunch. As it is the year that the lunch is to be on a non Christmas Day, it was decided that the lunch would be held in early mid December.

We all congregated at L and P's lovely home. A long, long table was already prepared at the patio. I have been to their home before, it was 2 years ago but that time it was on Christmas Day itself.

We started with a cheese platter which comprised of a French brie (Fromager D'Affinois), a New Zealand mature cheddar and Cambozola. The cheese went down quite well, good sign!

Then we eventually adjourned to sit down for the spread. There were salads, beautifully cooked ham, sausages on the barbie (very Aussie indeed!), and bread rolls. There were also lots of conversation going on with the annual catch up with other family members.

Jackie M Malaysian Cuisine

I read about a rather good Malaysian restaurant called Jackie M located in Concord. I recall it was in an article in the Sydney Morning Herald, about a year ago. It piqued my interest and has been on my mental 'to dine' list since then.

Well, I finally got there. Firstly I must say how surprised I am at how busy Majors Bay Road is in Concord. Wow, I couldn't believe how many restaurants there were and how many people were out there having a good evening. Sorry if this sounds slightly pompous, but it just shows me how little I know about the suburbs that I don't frequent. How much more is there for me to explore in this diverse city!!!

I was excited to be at Jackie M. The thought of getting a chance to meet the renowned Jackie M herself was quite exciting plus I have heard good things about her cooking and how busy her restaurant gets during the weekend.

During the recent Night Noodle Markets in Sydney, I was one of those queuing up at Jackie M's stall and that night I had the very delicious Nasi Lemak Istimewa. The beef rending was tender and oh so delicious.

This time we ordered Roti Canai with chicken curry, Char Koay Teow, Wan Tan Hor Fun with seafood combination, Otak Otak, Hainanese Chicken Rice, Chai Tao Koay and finished off with a large bowl of Ais Campur (or known as ice kachang) and a bowl of Cendol.

Otak otak

Char Koay Teow

What a feast! We thoroughly enjoyed every dish and if there was room in our tummies, we would have ordered more.

Hainanese chicken rice

Roti canai with curry - yummy!

Next time I will ask for more chilli in the Char Koay Teow but even without the kick of the chilli, the dish was well cooked. Loved the smokiness of the noodles or as the Cantonese say 'wok hei'. Jackie's roti is really good, there was a meatiness to the roti that I find lacking in other venues. This was the same comment from CW.

Brendan Dewar Patisserie - Take 2

Okay, I am back at Brendan Dewar Patisserie in St Ives. This time it was to pick up a White Chocolate Cheesecake I had pre-ordered for a double birthday celebration.

Brendan Dewar himself!

A few days before the pick up, when I placed the order over the phone, Brendan was the one who took my order. After I identified who I was speaking to, I expressed my desire to meet him.

When I arrived, I asked to speak to Brendan. It was lovely to finally meet him. I expressed my thanks to him as someone from his patisserie had put my initial blog post link  (Brendan Dewar Patisserie May 2012) on the Brendan Dewar Patisserie Facebook page back in June this year. My first post was in May and I started to notice how popular the post was. After a bit of googling, I finally figured out that the source of most of the traffic was from their Facebook page. I was chuffed!

Oki Oki

Sometimes when a friend wants to meet up in a suburb that I am not too familiar with, I start scrambling for ideas on where to meet for a meal. I also take it as an opportunity to check out local treasures and blog about them. Such fun, oh such fun!!!!

Well, this time it was to meet for lunch in Hornsby. The only thing I know about in Hornsby is the Westfield Shopping Centre. So I 'googled' and found a Japanese restaurant which caught my interest. It is called Oki Oki.

What a lovely find. It is located right across from the Hornsby Railway Station, a block away from the railway entrance. I met my friend LG at Westfield and we took a walk to Oki Oki.

We were both pleasantly surprised at the food. There was a very good range of Japanese food on the menu and I found it difficult to choose as there were so many dishes I wanted to try out!

So we settled with:

A small set of sashimi which had 12 pieces of a variety of fish. There was salmon, tuna, kingfish and another fish I failed to identify. It was fresh, light and just delicious!

Lunch box with spicy BBQ fish. The lunch box included a main, rice, miso soup, salad, deep fried spring rolls and dumpling, and sushi rolls.

Lunch box with chicken karaage.