Sunday, December 13, 2015

Red Kidney Bean Aquafaba Meringues

My dad was, and probably still is, the very opposite of wasteful. He had a bucket in the shower to collect the cold water before you got in, and used it later for flushing the toilet. He'd put on more clothes, rather than turning on the heater. Food scraps would be eaten where possible, or else taken out to compost.

It pains me just as much to throw food away, which is why I have experimented with eating carrot tops, and cooking with sourdough starter which no longer smelt right. The other night, I made a chili using tinned red kidney beans, and suddenly recalled reading about a recent discovery involving the bean liquid: named aquafaba, it turns out the thick and frothy brine can be whipped up just like egg whites!

While chickpea water has the most neutral flavour, I decided to try making meringues with the red kidney bean liquid I had on hand. What started out as a reddish-brown gloop became paler as it aerated in the food processor.

Red kidney bean liquid before whipping.

The original recipe from Goose Wohlt only calls for 1/2 cup sugar and the liquid from one can of beans, but I didn't seem to be able to get the ingredients to form stiff peaks, so I added cream of tartar and vanilla as well, based on the recipe from Kids with Food Allergies. It took me half an hour to realise I had left the food processor blades in, before switching to the whisk attachment.

Mixture became pale and thick after whipping.

Using the egg whisk gave a much fluffier result, but I still couldn't get the mixture to form stiff peaks, and my food processor was getting hot. I went ahead and spooned the whipped concoction onto baking paper and put it in the oven anyway.

Any peaks disappeared quickly.

Depending on which recipe you pick, you are supposed to bake the meringues at 100C/200F for 1.5 hours120C/250F for 40 minutes, or use a mix of temperatures. I baked mine at 100C for 1 hour, then turned off the oven and left them inside overnight.

Baking the aquafaba meringues.

Because I didn't put my meringues into an airtight container in a timely manner, I baked them again the next day to dry them out properly. You need to wait for them to cool first, not just to avoid the moisture being trapped in the storage box, but also because they are soft and sticky while warm—I tried pulling one off the baking paper straight away and the bottom stuck, but those which I removed after cooling slid off effortlessly.

Aquafaba meringue stuck to baking paper while warm.

I'm not sure why the surface of my meringues seemed to have little circles on them, but the result was light and crunchy. Overall, I think they were actually closer to hokey pokey than meringues, because they stuck to your teeth when you ate them, and there seemed to be a bit of malt or caramel flavour.

The aquafaba meringues were light and crunchy.

Breaking the crunchy bits over fresh strawberries and coconut yoghurt greatly reduced the teeth-sticking, and made a tasty vegan and gluten free dessert.

Aquafaba meringues with strawberries and coconut yoghurt.

Apparently, aquafaba can be used to make a variety of different (vegan) dishes, such as:

You can also use it as an egg substitute (including as egg wash) by replacing each egg in many recipes with 3 Tbsp aquafaba.

I was pleased with how my meringues turned out, and amazed by their transformation from a slimy liquid into light and crunchy pillows. I would be tempted to retry these with chickpea brine, and see how aquafaba works in savoury recipes as well. No more tipping bean liquid down the drain—my dad would be pleased!



This post is part of Our Growing Edge, a monthly blogging event aimed at inspiring us to try new things. This month, it is hosted by Jazzmine from Dash of Jazz, with a theme of Nostalgia.

Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Auckland Diner's Diary: November 2015

Inner City Eats


City Fringe Openings


A Little Further


Shore Things


New in New Lynn

The new Brickworks dining lane in New Lynn has a bunch of new restaurants:
[Added 2 March 2016: Also Elegance Chinese Restaurant opened near the train station.]

Other


Coming


Closed

The block of shops on Wellesley Street containing Saika and Homeworld BBQ has been forced to close as cracks have been found in the building.


Events


Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Auckland Diner's Diary: October 2015

Food Trucks Galore


Central City Eats


A Facelift in Town


City Fringe Openings


Savouring Sandringham

  • Saattveek - vegetarian store offering food from Maharashtra and Gujarat, part of where Jai Jalaram Khaman used to be
  • Eggs & More - Indian style egg and paneer dishes, including "Indian road side delicacies", in the other half of where Jai Jalaram Khaman used to be

Cafe Culture

Sweet Treats and Bready Delights


A Drink or Two


Coming soon 


Events

Saturday, October 31, 2015

Homemade Sourdough Pita Bread

It's funny how one thing leads to another. I was looking for recipes to use up the excess thyme we have in the garden, and came across Bint Rhoda's za'atar bread. From there, it was only a link away from khubiz arabi cooked in a cast iron pan, which inspired me to compare it to pita bread.

My homemade sourdough pita bread.

Susan's pita bread on her Wild Yeast blog looked amazing, seemed pretty simple to make, and used up a lot of sourdough starter, so I decided to go with her recipe. I generally try to follow the instructions carefully, the first time I make something, but I discovered I didn't have quite as much starter as I thought, which meant I ended up only using 320g of it rather than her rather exact 376g.

It became too late for baking, so I put the dough into the fridge, where it sat for 2 days before I had time to do anything with it. To bring it back to the right temperature, I transferred it, in its covered bowl, into a warm water bath in the kitchen sink. Unfortunately, some water got into the bowl, and I hastily patted the dough dry with a paper towel. Fortunately, that was the last of the mishaps I encountered.

I divided the dough into balls, flattened each one to a few millimetres thick, put two or three of them onto a baking sheet, and slid everything onto a pre-heated pizza stone in the oven. It didn't take long before the bread started puffing up!

Dough rolled out into flat rounds.

Starting to puff up.

Bigger bubbles.

Conjoined bubbles.

It was a lot of fun watching the dough rise in the oven, sometimes with multiple bubbles joining up into a giant air pocket. I was worried that it may not be fully cooked through, so left the bread in the oven for a few extra minutes, which made the pitas a little dry.

I used to wonder how bakers got the holes into pita bread. Who knew it would be so simple? You can and should experience the magic too, whether you choose to use supermarket yeast or a sourdough starter!

A pita pocket.


This post is part of Our Growing Edge, a monthly blogging event aimed at inspiring us to try new things. This month, it is hosted by Kerene from The Dream Baker.

Saturday, October 24, 2015

Farro Foodkits

The week we ordered WOOP meals in, it was reassuring to know we could have dinner after work in no more than 20 minutes. On the other hand, it felt like we chose a bad week compared to other bloggers, and we would not have picked some the meals we received if we had been given a choice.

For the sake of comparison, we decided to give another meal kit delivery service a go. Farro Foodkits is actually quite different in that it's not based on a weekly subscription. Launched in March, the company lets you choose the meals you want, and buy just one or many of the packs.

Picking the Foodkits

I was initially excited that I could look through the different meal kits and pick the ones that would work best for us. They were sorted into a number of different categories, and it was great to see one called "Express".

Many categories of foodkits.

The home page also had a section showcasing featured foodkits, which have not only been designed by Masterchef judge Ray McVinnie, but also looked delicious and very affordable, at around $10 per portion.

Featured foodkits for the week.

It was only after I clicked through to the foodkit listings that I realised those options would take quite a long time for a midweek meal, with a prep time of 20 minutes and a cooking time of 30-35 minutes.

I then navigated to the Express category, which had 10 items on offer. They didn't really seem all that quick to make though, ranging from 25 minutes for Ray's Steak and Guacamole Wraps to 45 minutes for Ray's Meatball Pizza. Some meals from other categories take about the same amount of time, while other ones need you to cook the dish for an hour, on top of a 20 minute prep time.

Foodkit listing from the Healthy Eating category.

To be honest, I found the meal selection process to be quite draining. I wanted an ingredient delivery service to save me time, and here I was wasting plenty of it, browsing through the options. It wouldn't have been so bad if there were a way of sorting the foodkits by time required, or if I could have had an overview of what's available across all the categories instead of having to click through into each one (or I guess, if I weren't trying to optimise my choices). I started to wonder if I would be better off picking a quick recipe from the internet, and ordering the ingredients from the supermarket.

In the end, I decided to go with:



Ordering the Foodkits

Once you've decided what you want to eat, you choose a delivery date and suburb. A great advantage of Farro Foodkits is that you can order for the next day, if it's between Tuesday and Saturday. You could be tempted into going overboard and ordering a pack to be delivered each day, but a $10 delivery fee shown in your shopping cart would remind you to be more reasonable.

Shopping cart showing delivery fees.

Another thing I liked about Farro Foodkits is that you can add sides (various salads and carbs) to your meal, along with drinks (wine) and other extras you might need (such as milk, butter, eggs, bacon, and olive oil). This means you can make sure you eat plenty of greens, as well as save a trip to the supermarket for simple grocery items.

Some of the sides on offer.

Foodkit Delivery

I realised after I ordered that we would be out on the night we were getting the food delivered, but the company was happy to put extra ice in the box for us. We took everything out when we got home and it was all still safely chilled.

The meat (and icepack) was in a completely sealed silver bag, which we needed scissors to open. The rest of the ingredients were in Farro Fresh shopping bags, grouped by meal. A plastic sleeve contained a thank you letter, the recipe instructions for each food kit, and an ingredients checklist. It was then that I discovered the Balti chicken curry did not come with rice, though it wasn't an issue as we have plenty of rice on hand anyway.

Contents of box delivered.

Meal #1: Ray's Thai Fish with Cucumber and Peanut Salad

We decided to start with the fish meal on the assumption that it wouldn't last as long, even though it was intended for 4 people and we would end up needing several days to finish it. There was a very generous portion of fish supplied, and we were surprised that the rice was raw, given the foodkit was in the Express category. The first instruction on the recipe was, of course, to cook the rice (we cheated and used a rice cooker, which took us around 40 minutes—supposedly it takes only 25 minutes on the stovetop).

Ingredients for Thai fish meal.

The other thing that took a long time was preparing the cucumber for the salad. After scooping out the seeds and dicing the flesh, you let the cucumber sit in salt for 15 minutes before squeezing it dry. I had plenty to do while waiting for it though: chopping the coriander and garlic for the fish marinade, separating and cleaning the leaves of cos lettuce, chopping the peanuts, picking the mint leaves and slicing the tomatoes and limes.

Chopped coriander and garlic on the fish fillets, before marinating.

The only thing that was different from what you might buy yourself from the supermarket was the liquid mix, which the recipe sheet told us contained sweet chilli sauce, fish sauce and lime juice. The coriander did not come attached to the root (we got this our WOOP meal kit), so some leaves were a bit yellow, speckled and wilting, though in general, the ingredients felt fresh.

Preparing the salad.

We disobeyed the recipe on more than one occasion, refusing to cook the fish without salt or additional oil. We sliced the lime into wedges, rather than serving half a lime on each plate. There was so much fish we needed to cook it in three batches, and we left one batch marinating overnight for pan-frying the next day.

Our rendition of Ray's Thai fish with cucumber and peanut salad.

The end result? We loved the salad, which was savoury, spicy and crunchy. The fish needed salt for flavour, and I'm not sure that all the work chopping coriander and garlic improved it that much, though it does look impressive. We would prefer the fish meal we had from WOOP for its quick preparation time and beautiful tamarind flavour, but this cucumber salad is something we would definitely make again.

Meal #2: Ray's Balti Chicken Curry

We didn't get to Ray's Balti Chicken Curry for several days, because there was enough fish for 5 - 6 people in the previous meal, though only about the right amount of vegetables for 3 - 4. The letter accompanying the food told us to cook our meals within 3 - 4 days, so I was dismayed to discover that the free range chicken had a "best before" date only two days from the delivery date, and we were two days past it already. We decided to cook it anyway, since it smelt fine and we hate food waste.

Ingredients for balti chicken curry.

I'm not sure why the yoghurt came in two separate containers. I mention this because I found them difficult to open, and while trying to prise the lid off at the same time as cooking our curry, I actually made my thumb bleed (I also found it annoying I needed scissors to open the coriander and spice packets, but that's another matter). The ginger came in two pieces as well, and they looked so different (one piece was sprouting) that I thought for a moment they were different ingredients.

Again, everything was pretty much as you would buy it from the supermarket, apart from the spice mix, which combined cardamom pods, chilli flakes, cinnamon and turmeric for you.

Chopped ingredients for the curry.

Once you've chopped the vegetables (onion, garlic, ginger, green chilli, tomato, coriander, lemon zest) and chicken thighs, the cooking part was pretty straightforward: fry the aromatics, add the chicken, then the tomato, then the yoghurt. It was fun and fascinating watching the contents of the pan change in colour, and it smelt mouth-watering too.

Cooking chopped chicken thighs with vegetables and spices.

The finished curry was fragrant, with the flavour of the spices brought out by the fresh ginger. We managed to get 3 meals out of the $20 kit so it was not expensive either—a great option if you have the time to prepare it.

Ray's balti chicken curry.

Comparison with Supermarket Shopping

What if, for argument's sake, I already had Ray's recipes, and decided to get the ingredients from the supermarket myself?

I plugged the items for the Thai style fish into Countdown's online shopping website and the total came to $75.94, including a delivery fee of $15.75. Excluding delivery, it was $60.19. The fish foodkit only cost $45, so it compares very favourably. Of course, you would end up with leftovers when you buy from the supermarket. For instance, you only need one tablespoon of fish sauce, not a whole bottle.

I tried again, this time assuming you already have the sauces and garlic at home, and grow your own limes, mint and coriander. This reduced shopping cart would cost you less than the Farro Foodkit, but not by that much if you include delivery for both.

Minimal shopping from supermarket for Thai style fish meal.

Entering the ingredients for the chicken curry gave me a similar result, even though Countdown didn't have a free range option for the boneless chicken thigh, so I had to substitute a cheaper item.

Conclusion

Farro Foodkits produce high-quality, inexpensive and delicious meals, but you are essentially cooking from scratch, so you need more time to prepare them than the previously reviewed WOOP dinners. If your chopping skills are not honed and sharpened, you are likely take longer than the recipe suggests too, unless you have a helper in the kitchen.

The service offers more flexibility with delivery dates than I have seen elsewhere, and there is no minimum order or ongoing subscription. You do, however, need to spend time choosing what meal(s) you want, and take note of whether extra ingredients are required (e.g. rice for curry).

I liked the fact that you can purchase additional salads or grocery items such as bread and milk, even though it adds extra steps to the ordering process. Also, you can reuse the recipes, because even when ingredients have been premixed, you are told how much of each component went into it.

Overall, Farro Foodkits are great if you want a tasty and healthy home-cooked meal, and can spare the time and energy to prepare it. It can be cheaper and more convenient than buying ingredients from the supermarket, and you can be pretty sure the result will be good. You will have fun in the kitchen and maybe learn some things too. If only we weren't always so tired and hungry when we get home from work!


Saturday, October 10, 2015

A Meal in Brief: Indochine Kitchen

We came here because the newly opened Beirut restaurant was packed at dinner time, and Lucky Buddha down the road was fully booked out, though we thought we spied some free tables.

Large painting on one wall.

The menu was not too long and not too short, with tempting Vietnamese tapas dishes, many cooked on a charcoal BBQ. There was also a $25 prix fixe menu with several choices for three courses (including a vegetarian/vegan one for each), but we chose to order a la carte.

The setting was dim, casual and aesthetically pleasing. On the night we went, there was a person dining alone, as well as a work group of around 30 people. Stay away from the toilets if you can though, as you have to go outside and down a long corridor a couple of doors down, to use the facilities shared with neighbouring restaurants.

Hanging lights and small picture frames on another wall.

The service was warm, particularly from the bartender, who always seemed to notice even if you didn't manage to catch the attention of one of the waitresses. We were also given complimentary spiced peanuts to munch on while we looked through the menu.

What we ate included:
  • Uncle Ho cocktail ($12) - although not food, I thought I would mention this as we really enjoyed this drink made with white rum, coconut milk, lychee, pineapple, ginger infused syrup and kaffir lime
Uncle Ho cocktail (right).

  • Tôm nướng ($7) - a pair of charcoal grilled Black Tiger king prawns, seasoned with lime, coriander and chilli, split open for easy access. Nicely cooked and a great start to the meal.
Black Tiger king prawns.

  • Nem rán ($8) - these crispy fried springs rolls (with prawn, pork, vermicelli and vegetables) were still tongue-burningly hot when they arrived at the table. Thoughtfully sliced in half to reveal the contents, this also helped to scoop up the warm vinegary dipping sauce they were served with. Pretty good value considering the quality and quantity of these rolls (I think we already ate a piece or two before I took the photo below).
Beautiful spring rolls.

  • Bún chả ($15 for three serves) - I looked around for a vessel of fish sauce to pour over the charcoal BBQ pork belly and pork mince on rice noodles, but it turns out the condiment was already sitting at the bottom of the bowls, of which there were strangely three. I guess it makes for easy sharing and a more artistic presentation. We would have liked more herbs (there was only a small piece of perilla and a couple of coriander leaves in each bowl), but overall a tasty rendition of one of our favourite Vietnamese dishes.
A single serve of bún chả.

  • Rau Hấp ($10) - the steamed Asian greens with sesame and organic soya sauce included snowpeas, green beans, a leafy vegetable that I would guess was gai lan, and pea sprouts. Mostly blanched, I liked the generous portion size and variety of vegetables. We didn't notice until afterwards that there was fish sauce on the table—we would probably have added a bit of that to add another dimension to the flavour.
Asian greens - nice helping of vegetables.

  • Xôi xoài ($12) - the coconut sticky rice and fresh mango pudding was the weakest part of our meal, even though it was the only dessert option on the a la carte menu. It was not very sweet, which is how I like my desserts, but it just seemed a bit bland, if you can say that about a pudding. I was also surprised the sticky rice was at room temperature, neither hot nor cold.

Coconut sticky rice and fresh mango pudding.

Overall, Indochine Kitchen is a small but stylish modern venue with some well executed little dishes, great whether you only want something light, or a more substantial meal.

Restaurant Details

Indochine Kitchen
42 Fort Street, Auckland Central
(09) 974 2895

Opening hours:
Mondays 11am - 3pm
Tuesdays to Fridays 11am - 3pm. 5pm - late
Saturdays to Sundays 5pm - late

Thursday, October 8, 2015

WTF is with this Foodie Question?

A few months ago, the only WTF joke I had seen was this:

T-shirt design from SnorgTees.

So I thought it was pretty clever when I came across this printed on a menu at a cafe in Amstedam:

Part of the menu at Ted's.

Imagine my surprise when I came home, and saw this plastered across multiple buses around town!

Bus advertising for Zomato.

And this when I went to check out the newly opened Fokker Bros in the Viaduct!

WTF at Fokker Bros.

WTF is going on? Why is everyone making the same joke now, since it seems this acronym has been used since at least 2011 and 2012?

Good thing I found something to calm myself down with...

Doormat from Coco Mats 'n' More.

Well, that's fabulous. Wasn't That Funny?

Saturday, October 3, 2015

Auckland Diner's Diary: September 2015

Central City Street Food

  • Fat J's - you might have seen them at various night markets, but since the end of August their sliders have a spot opposite the Central City Library, and they facilitate random acts of kindness with their #PayChipsForward idea
  • Viet Sandwich - originally just a market stall, this banh mi vendor has opened up a second home on Elliott Street
  • Bing&Go - this container store, on Elliott Street as well as opposite the Central City Library, reinvents the Chinese jianbing as an Asian burrito

Downtown Delights


More City Eats


Life on the Fringe - Mount Eden, Kingsland, Eden Terrace


Life on the Fringe - Newmarket


Life on the Fringe - Ponsonby, Parnell


Other


Coming Soon


Events

Free October cheese classes at Farro Fresh.

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