Share a recipe or food thought - General Discussion.

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#2764917 22-Aug-2021 16:47

networkn:
I have to give a shout out to a few restaurants that are among the few in NZ to consistently deliver a fantastic dining experience. One of my bugbears, is the fact you'll go to a restaurant a few times, and get a completely (often worse the subsequent times which is weird) different experience.

My awards for the most consistent dining experiences in Auckland across a few years:

These are in no particular order:

1) Depot.

2) Honolulu LuLu. (for the best Poké and some of the best burgers you can get in NZ)

3) Sidart.

4) One Tree Grill.

6) Prego (Food and service is always to a high standard), but the experience can differ based on the crowd there at the time. Noise can be a real issue.

Takeaways are the worst, we rarely get consistently good experiences. Dumplings are about the best of it. Mr Zhou's on Mt Eden Road are always good.

Pizza - Al Volo, 27 Mt Eden Rd. The best in Auckland & quite probably NZ. Nobody else even gets close.

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SirHumphreyAppleby

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#2764920 22-Aug-2021 16:52

1024kb: Pizza - Al Volo, 27 Mt Eden Rd. The best in Auckland & quite probably NZ. Nobody else even gets close.

Not sure about the best, but certainly up there. I find the pizza bases not quite to my liking, but the food and service is otherwise very good. They even lent us an umbrella, which of course meant going again for dinner on another night to return it.

networkn

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#2764994 22-Aug-2021 17:40

1024kb:

Pizza - Al Volo, 27 Mt Eden Rd. The best in Auckland & quite probably NZ. Nobody else even gets close.

Crikey, that's a big call. Italian style or any? What other places have you tried?

I mean, it's up there, very good, excellent even, but best is bold ;)

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#2765294 23-Aug-2021 10:53

So, we Sous-Vide the 1.5"-2" thick steaks. Seared then in a cast iron pan with a reasonable amount of oil finished, with a knob of butter. They were really good.

From around 3KG of meat originally, we got around 9 steaks. I trimmed fairly heavily, and on the whole I thought it was an interesting thing to do, though I don't think 30 days is enough of a difference for what we yielded, the time and effort expended.

I may do another in a month or two and try for either 45 or 60 days. Overall though, I don't see us doing a lot of dry-aging, we quite like it without.

networkn

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#2766658 25-Aug-2021 20:04

I decided to post some photos.

Sorry, if they aren't that interesting :)

Eva888

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#2766716 25-Aug-2021 21:07

Mouth was watering at the last shot. You can get a similar effect by buying the meat vacuum packed and leaving for a month or more in the fridge. Smells awful when you open the bag and needs a good wipe, but really tender.

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#2768517 29-Aug-2021 20:47

It's been a decent food weekend here in Casa Networkn.

Blueberry Jam was made from Frozen berries from the year prior, looks to have turned out really well, if not a little sweet. The recipe called for 400grams of sugar for 600 grams of berries, but I couldn't do it, so I picked 45% and it's still wicked sweet.

Oven-baked ribs with smash potatoes, roasted in the oven some cheese and heavily minted peas went down a treat tonight. Last night I put a chicken on the weber charcoal rotisserie which I think was wicked overpriced, but some of the best money I've spent on cooking stuff ever.

Photos:

In case anyone is interested, I dried the chicken very well, put oil over each inch of the outside, then salted it generously. I threw some butter, thyme and some lemon chunks in the cavity with some salt and tied the legs together...

We have been using the Hello Fresh boxes this last couple of weeks. We had 3 the first week of lockdown and 5 last week. Mostly, they are excellent and I am really enjoying them, lots of variety and things we wouldn't usually try.

Of the boxes and delivery services, they are the best in my opinion.

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#2768521 29-Aug-2021 20:58

Oh, and I finally got around to getting my Mushroom farm up and operational. I bought a kit from Mushroomsbythesea.co.nz about 4 months ago. Surprisingly they said it would be fine.

It's funny, as a kid I hated Mushrooms, now they are one of my favourite things.

SirHumphreyAppleby

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#2768953 30-Aug-2021 18:53

This thread seems to mostly be about meat, so hopefully someone can point me in the right direction.

Does anyone know of a domestic meat flattening machine?

I mostly eat chicken breast and would like to flatten them before freezing. I'm not looking for a 'meat tenderiser' as chicken isn't a robust meat. Cheap roller-based tenderisers poke large holes in the meat and would probably just make a mess. I've found some commercial units for making schnitzels, but I'm not looking to spend thousands.

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#2772895 6-Sep-2021 12:51

Duck was on the menu this weekend. I decided to Smoke it on the Traeger Pellet Grill.

I dry brined (but only decided to do that on the same day so it didn't do it's full job sadly).

In the BBQ at 275F and it took around 2 and a half hours. I used a Maple, Dark Soy and Chinese 5 Spice mix to glaze the outside.

It was delicious but sadly the skin was not crispy. Next time I'd dry brine for a lot longer. I think I did it only for around 6 hours.

I also made a side which consisted of sliced charred (I used red and yellow) Capsicum (you expose it to high heat until the skin goes black, then put in a plastic bag for 10 minutes tightly sealed and the black just peels off, garlic, red wine vinegar, oil, pinenuts, basil leaves, and Feta Cheese (I used Mint Flavoured). It was absolutely fantastic.

blackjack17

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#2772902 6-Sep-2021 13:05

SirHumphreyAppleby:

This thread seems to mostly be about meat, so hopefully someone can point me in the right direction.

Does anyone know of a domestic meat flattening machine?

I mostly eat chicken breast and would like to flatten them before freezing. I'm not looking for a 'meat tenderiser' as chicken isn't a robust meat. Cheap roller-based tenderisers poke large holes in the meat and would probably just make a mess. I've found some commercial units for making schnitzels, but I'm not looking to spend thousands.

Probably not what you are after but I use one of these and place the breasts between two plastic chopping boards

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#2772903 6-Sep-2021 13:07

blackjack17:

Probably not what you are after but I use one of these and place the breasts between two plastic chopping boards

I am trying to work out what the knife and tomato are used for ;)

SirHumphreyAppleby

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#2773014 6-Sep-2021 15:32

blackjack17:

Probably not what you are after but I use one of these and place the breasts between two plastic chopping boards

I think my grandmother had one of those. I hadn't thought of squeezing chicken between boards. Might be a bit more consistent than beating the meat.

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#2773018 6-Sep-2021 15:36

SirHumphreyAppleby:

I think my grandmother had one of those. I hadn't thought of squeezing chicken between boards. Might be a bit more consistent than beating the meat.

So long as you aren't beating the mad butchers meat! (that won't mean much outside of Auckland potentially).

Handle9

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#2773019 6-Sep-2021 15:38

networkn:

SirHumphreyAppleby:

I think my grandmother had one of those. I hadn't thought of squeezing chicken between boards. Might be a bit more consistent than beating the meat.

So long as you aren't beating the mad butchers meat! (that won't mean much outside of Auckland potentially).

This thread is rapidly going off the rails.

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