Wanderings along Sydney Road

As promised yesterday, today decided to venture down Sydney Road and try out a few new places. See below where I visited today:

El Fayha - 648 Sydney Road Anstey

Remember reading somewhere that the best sweets (Lebanese ones) are a tossup between Balha and El Fayha. As I was yet to try El Fayha, I decided to pay a visit today. The shop front is much simpler than Balha (on top but check out the website as you can get a 360 view).

Also Balha seems to offer some western alternatives such as creamy cakes etc.

I decided to do my usual purchase and bought an assortment of pastries just to try everything. See below:

After tasting, A1's, Balha's and El Fayha's I can say that El Fayha's is not as sweet which is a good thing and the filo was crunchy which suited more to my tastebuds.

Although in the future, I might just decide where to get pastries on a spur of the moment decision...lol...

Lunch at Tabet's - 601 Sydney Road Anstey

When it comes to Lebanese pizzas many debate over Tabet's and A1. Today I had an olive pizza which I ate before taking any photos because I was very hungry...lol...

But compared to A1's, this time the pizza dough was chewier and seemed to have less oil although the cheese felt like it was more fattening...which wasn't exactly good for my waistline...lol...

Although at the end when I remember that I should take a photo, all I had left was the paper bag...

So now I have just had a scrumptious afternoon tea of Lebanese pastries and a very strong coffee and no sugar...mom tastes so good. But maybe not so good for the waistline. lol...although been craving for this kind of food all week now. So FINALLY cravings satisfied

Cooking on a rainy/cloudy Thursday

Had a bit of time to spare this arvo and with some spare ingredients lying around the house I decided to do some cooking.

My attempt at meringue
Was looking at different food recipe websites and came across an almond and cornflake meringue recipe which a decided to try. Although I did not follow it fully and decided to substitute some of the ingredients since I didn't have any almonds on hand.

I used:

• egg whites
  
• special K cereal
  
• desiccated coconut
  
• caster sugar
  

The funny part was I couldn't find the whisk anywhere so getting the eggs whites whipped was a lot of fun. Had to use the old blades of a broken down beater...lol....

See my results below:



Doesn't look too bad??
Although I was too lazy to go upstairs and check the recipe and I didn't put in enough dry ingredients and thus the meringues were too soft and not crispy... but I know what to do better next time. :D

My attempt at apple/sultana cupcakes
Still have leftover apples from when mum bought a massive box of this. Being Fuji apples they are already quite sweet so not as much sugar is required. Basic ingredients as follows:

• Butter
  
• Sugar
  
• Chopped apples
  
• self raising flour
  
• soy milk (only because again I had some leftover)
  

I had a mini cupcake tin so used that and made some in patty cases as well. See below:

They were quite tasty actually! So I was quite happy and decided to cook dinner as well (although I usually do cook dinner).

Red Wine Mushroom pasta bake thingy:

Bought mushrooms on sale and lots of it so decided to use it as my main ingredient. Cooked the pasta and the sauce and added some baby spinach to the bottom and out cheese on top and baked it until the cheese melted a bit...

Mum and dad said it was nice and I thought so too. Red wine in general goes well with mushroom....

TOMORROW
I think I will go for a walk around Sydney road wanting to check out a few places and get some baklava like sweets. Have had cravings all week... Will see how that goes. :D

Kaya and orange cake

I was introduced to kaya by my Malaysian uni friends not so long ago after them telling me that is was the best thing ever to spread over toasted bread and butter. For those that do not know what kaya is....

It is basically coconut jam!!!

I had some kaya on hand and some other ingredients including oranges so I decided to make an orange and kaya cake. In this recipe I can't remember exactly what I used but consisted of the following:

• desiccated coconut
  
• self raising flour
  
• milk
  
• kaya (instead of sugar)
  
• orange zest
  
• butter
  

The idea was to combine the ingredients and make a slice/cake thingy...and it turned out very nice!!!

Although the idea of kaya and orange together might sound s bit weird and my Malaysian friends thought I was crazy...but overall I was happy... :D
Sometimes it is just good to see what you have in the pantry and try to make use out of it! :D

My recent obsessions

Over the last couple of weeks I have developed this extreme fondness of sweet food including:

• Baklavas - and most of all the Turkish kind
  
• Vanilla slices
  
• Chocolate!!! of course
  

Will check out a few places in the coming weeks and see if I can upload some of my photos