Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a Joyous, Peaceful, Safe and Fulfilling New Year!

Thank you for being such great supporters of TheWayItCrumbles since it first opened in the middle of the year. You have all encouraged us to write more, improve my photography, eat more (^^!) and actually learn to cook. To the foodblogging community of Sydney, thankyou for making us feel welcome, and for introducing us to Adriano Zumbo, and a host of other places which we have/will visit and definitely enjoy/ed.

In case you haven’t noticed yet, we have a new site which is undergoing renovations at the moment. Please take a gander over at http://blogs.thewayitcrumbles.com, and do try to duck if the walls fall down – We promise we’ll fix them soon! (…okay too many feathered puns in that ^^;;;;). Update your links, we’ll be back to regular posting very soon, and hopefully have a few treats for you all in the next couple months =)

Take care, and enjoy the rest of the Joyous Season.

See you soon!

Love,

Tim & Chris

P.S. Tora wants ‘in’ too! He’s eyeing the Pocky we just posted over here!

Worst yet, my last ‘post’ was a fraud, perpetrated by Chris, so I shall betray now the fact that I don’t actually have the technical skills to get a photo into a post since WordPress was upgraded… xD

But don’t let that stop you from visiting http://blogs.thewayitcrumbles.com – if you think it looks a bit familiar, then you’re probably right.  Change your bookmarks, invite yourselves in and make yourselves at home – the hostess herself will be there shortly.

Shio Butter Ramen, with extra Pork

Tim’s bowl – he had apparently been on the previous Saturday (without telling me, or taking photos!), and had ordered the Shio Ramen, in case I scolded him for the added butter. Naturally, I demanded he get it this time, so I could try some xD. The extra pork was needed – as you can see from the bowl below, the bowls ordinarily come with just one piece of pork, which is so not enough, given the size of the bowl. Extra pork (4 slices) will cost you though, but is worth sharing. The butter added a touch of decadence to the fairly good bowl of soup, a little more depth, and went particularly well with the sweet corn. Tim wasn’t sure it was worth the extra $1.50 though, compared to the original Shio Ramen.

Very Hot Ramen

B hasn’t been on one of our foodie trips before, and looked slightly bemused as I whipped out a camera and took a shot of his bowl before he had even picked up his chopsticks. He said that the ‘Very Hot’ ramen, was indeed, very hot, and finished it, soup and all.

Karaage Ramen

Mine! I haven’t had ramen for a while, and this was very much one of the better examples I’ve tried. The soup was savoury and unami-laden, and noodles deliciously slurpable. The karaage chicken was so-so – nice and crisp before soaking up the soup and tender on the inside, but could so totally be jazzed up a little. I didn’t get as much corn, or any beansprouts as Tim, which made me ‘sadface’, but stealing some from him made my meal feel a little more balanced.

In general, it’s a good eat, and I can see why it’s popular. I can’t help but feel distinctly ripped off though, particularly with the cost of toppings (or lack thereof). One of my major complaints about a popular Vietnamese Pho Restaurant is its exuberant pricing on extras, and Ichi-Ban Boshi has a little of the same feel, although the serving sizes themselves are quite reasonable. Other than that, look at paying between $10 to $14 for a bowl of ramen. Not quite uni-student fare, but otherwise very much passable.

The Lindt Cafe is a haven in a city of bustle and business. Not as ‘cozy’ as Max Brenners or San Churros, but polished and well matched to the suits which cue up for coffee and hot chocolates, it is a place we frequent often. My trip with Ms Music was the first time I sampled any of the cakes on display, though truffles, delices and drinks have all found a happy home with me. 

Passion – A dark chocolate caramel mousse & a zesty passion fruit mousse layered with chocolate sponge that has been soaked in passion fruit puree. $11.00

My pick. I love this particular flavour combination, and would love to try to recreate it. I was disappointed with the chocolate shards around though, too obviously refrigerated and flavourless compared to what I expect of Lindt chocolate, and the value…well…definitely to be a rare treat, I think.

Celebration du Chocolat – Layers of dark chocolate cake & fine milk chocolate mousse, encased by a chocolate ganache and ribbons of milk and dark chocolate. $11.50

Ms. Music’s pick. Apparently surprisingly light and un-rich, she seemed quite pleased with this pick. 

Level 1, 53 Martin Place 
Sydney, NSW, 2000.

Phone (02) 8257 1600

I’m not having a particularly good run of cooking recently. Perhaps it is the maternal figure continually nagging me to go learn how to do things properly, or the numerous ‘I told you you should have done this’ (and not from my own head, I’ve long learned to block that out).

Anyway, this sad attempt looks pretty, and the strawberries were awesome – heady scents, and sweet, straight from the farm. On the downside, the genoise was dense, with large rough crumbs and eggy, while the mousseline…well…where to begin with the mousseline.

My first attempt at making the pastry cream flopped. It resulted in a pastry cream so bouncy and thick, I could imagine it talking back. Yes, it had that much attitude. I tried salvaging it by adding milk a little at a time, and it eventually smoothed out again. Which made for a decent pastry cream, but didn’t come together as a mousseline upon adding butter the next day.

The second attempt looked reasonable, but was possibly undercooked, and ended up too runny, and not setting. So, it went into the freezer so I could get a reasonable shot, but someone tilted it before it had frozen, so that the surface wasn’t smooth anymore.

Once out of the freezer, it melted really quickly, and was too sweet for my liking (which says a lot, seeing what a sweet tooth I have).

I don’t want to give up, it’s such a beautiful cake, so I’m putting a call out – Any suggestions, recipes, tips and hints to make this work?

30.11.08
This is a road to somewhere. We’ll never really know where. But we can dream. And we can travel onwards, together.

But what’s a foodblog without food? More chocolates from the Adriano Zumbo Chocolate Cafe.

Vanilla Ganache.

Rotten Egg – blood orange jelly, milk chocolate and rice crispy crunchy bits.

Chocolate Ganache Truffle

Raspberry and Cream

Chocolate Caramel Nut Meringue…thing. I don’t remember what.

The sky will be blue as we drive along. We’ll watch clouds swirling playfully, pushed and tugged by the strength of our imagination. We’ll have time, just to ourselves, to be ourselves. To be us.

Guess where we went for dinner?

Sydney Tower Seafood Buffet

Beautiful surroundings.

So-so food. The Sheraton on the Park has a better selection. The seafood isn’t as fresh as it could be (the ladies behind us complained the Balmain bugs were raw!), and everything else was somewhat dry.

 Lemon-lime bitters – Our favourite mildly (barely) alcoholic drink.

We sit and watch as the world revolves around us, as the skies change and the stars rise…

Just a message?

We visited the new Regent Shopping Centre behind the KFC at Town Hall, and spent over an hour and a half in the grocery store!

All shiny and glossy and new-ish

 Tee! These are the mascot of SSB, and to our dismay, not for sale ><

Custard Filled Mascot – But these were! These are part of the reason we spent so long looking in-store, we were watching how they were made.

Fascinating, no?

Brown Sugar Mochi w Red Bean Filling

Yoghurt Mochi w Mango Mousse Filling

 Chocolate Truffle Mochi

Everything looks better in daylight, as you can see… one of these days, I’ll get myself a lightbox. And a DSLR.

Tasting Notes – Deux

Finger Bun Macaron – I actually haven’t tasted a finger bun before, so I’m not sure how true it is to the original. It was very sweet, filled with sultanas and rolled in coconut. The textures were very pleasant, but I’m noticing that this macaron collection tends to soften very quickly, probably because of the additional fillings.

Pineapple and Ginger Macaron – The pineapple lent a subtle sweetness to the filling, but the predominant taste was the warming effect of the ginger. I quite liked the candied ginger touch. Then I got back to work, since I ate and photographed them during my morning tea break xD

Chilli and Yoghurt Macaron – This was certainly one of the more unusual flavours I’ve tried. I know that yoghurt is very good for cooling down  after eating chilli and spicy foods (eg mango lassi style drinks), but together was kinda cool. The chilli had some bite to it, but the yoghurt was mellow, almost a little sour in taste. Very interesting.

Dubbed ‘Pointy’ by Belle of Ooh Look

The apple cider fetched up all translucent in the light – so pretty! From the bottom up, I loved the pistachio base and vanilla creme chantilly with the chopped apples – the contrasting textures worked nicely. The green apple mousse and apple cider didn’t quite do it for me though – it lacked a green freshness in taste that i associate with apple and spring/summer, a little more autumn in flavour, and I wasn’t sure about the textures. It’s nice, but not entirely what I expected.

One more cake from the haul to post, but it deserves a post all on its own.

“So…start talking.”

I have never worked with yeast before. Ever since taking up my food blog stalking reading habits however, I’ve grown more and more ambitious, ever tempted by crunchy looking crusts, and tender, air-pocket strewn crumbs. And so, I tried. Using the pizza dough recipe from Peter Reinhart’s Bread Baker’s Apprentice, which was used by the Daring Bakers a few months ago.

Lessons learned before going into the oven:

a) No matter how good someone is at maths, make them take out a set of scales and actually *weigh* the flour.

b) Double check amount of flour in the recipe before dumping it into the bowl.

c) Even if a recipe says the dough will be sticky, it should still not be pourable. See a) for why it is pourable.

d) Trust the weather forecast. Have something that will warm the area enough for the yeast to rise on standby.

e) A table lamp is probably not adequate for anything more than interrogation.

f) Flour is your best friend, when the dough seems to be binding itself at a molecular level to anything it comes in contact with.

g) Don’t go out the day you try to make pizza for dinner, when you’ve never done it from scratch in your life.

 Leaving the dough to rest and rise…

Garlic pizza – before…

…and after.

Spicy Supreme

Chicken Supreme – before…

and after.

Mine and unnamed.

Lessons learnt after putting them in the oven:

a) Make sure your oven and pizza stone are screamingly hot for best results.

b) Less is more, in terms of topping. Failure to heed this may result in soggy bases that are too thin to slide onto or off the pizza stone

c) Leftover toppings can be made into delicious oven-baked rolls the next day. 

Tasting Notes

Green Apple Macaron – This feels so Spring-like, sweet, slightly soft for a macaron, but that’s probably because the filling has chunks of apple in it, yum! I love the colour, and the macaron tastes a little of apple candy.

Rice Pudding Eclair – I cannot begin to tell you how good this is. If you loved the rice pudding macaron, you’ll love this, guaranteed. If you don’t, you can give it to me The dusting of cinnamon just makes the whole thing so fragrant, and the rice grains in the creme patisserie screams rice pudding.

Adriano Zumbo’s new collection was released yesterday, so we made a quick(ish) trip to Balmain to check it out. The haul was quite extensive, with ‘lunch’ at the Cafe being an extra splurge.

Instore Goodies:

We managed to get a list of most of the goodies that will be appearing at the counter this season, but these are so new that most of them don’t even have names or labels yet! The staff were very helpful in describing them to us. 

Chocolate dacquoise, chocolate sabayon with salted caramel debris (!!!), chocolate caramel creameaux, caramel mousse

Tim: The guy finished describing it, and I looked at Chris, standing there with big wide eyes, staring adoringly at it, and I knew my place in her life had just been usurped. Well, it made one choice definite…  

Pate a choux, rice pudding creme patisserie, cinnamon dusted fondant.

Chris: First thought? Suze, you’ll love this. Second one? Mine! xD

Pistachio dacquoise, apple cider jelly, vanilla creme chantilly, calvados cooked apples, green apple mousse

Chris: I think that’s what it is, it’s hard matching up descriptions to the picture before actually tasting it. Sounds yummy and perfect for spring though.

Pate au sucree, lemon jelly, citron creme, something creme, italian meringue

Chris: Description is to be updated when it is officially described, this is what we tasted tonight – the newest reincarnation of the beautiful Storm Cloud of last collection, this is refreshing and deliciously tangy. The meringue topping it balances out the sourness of the jelly, and makes this feel like a greatly elaborated lemon meringue pie – never a bad thing.

Tim: I was deceived, I thought it was a citron tart, but there was much more. Still couldn’t identify what it was though.

Yoghurt and Chilli Macaron

Finger Bun Macaron

Green Apple Macaron 

Pineapple and Ginger Macaron 

We’ll let you know how tasting all these goes.

Chocolate Cafe

It’s Not a Hamburger (It’s a macaron) – Chocolate macaron with dulce de leche icecream, on banana caramel rice pudding, topped with chocolate soil

Tim: It’s yum yum yum nice. The dulce de leche was beautiful…

Chris: We had been coveting this dessert since our first visit to the cafe. The presentation since then seems to  have improved, resembling a hamburger much more now. Tim wasn’t a big fan of the banana caramel rice pudding – admittedly, I’m not a huge fan of banana either, but it was a good combination overall. I’m not sure about the chocolate being used in the creations at the cafe – something slightly strange about it that I can’t pin down. It’s not a ‘pure’ chocolate taste…

Chris:The Hot Chocolate was velvety and full of chocolate goodness.

Tim: The Hot Chocolate left me speechless. Just look and see!

Well, more like the hidden depths of Glebe. The last stop on our day at the Glebe Street Fair, by this time, we were full, tired, and sore. But there’s always room for chocolate, and we felt the need to do our foodie duties…;)

The interior is a little similar to Max Brenners, albeit with a distinctly aged Spanish theme – warm and comforting, padded seats (bliss!), wooden furniture and dimmed lighting. Didn’t quite have the polish of the Lindt cafes, but welcoming none the less.

Chocolate display – they look yummy.

Desserts.

But these are what San Churro is famous for - dough piped out into hot oil and fried until the outside is crisp and golden, to be dipped in melted chocolate or dulce de leche. The churros were warm and tender on the inside, with their grooves and ridges being the perfect vehicle for the chocolate. I personally thought the batter was a little too plain, but with the icing sugar and milk chocolate, it was balanced in the end. 

Having reluctantly turned down the dulce de leche dipping sauce for the churros, I wouldn’t let Tim say no to the caramel pods in the display cabinet. The cutest little bites of sweet caramel in tiny cups of dark chocolate. My camera was doing strange things to me today, most likely because of the dim lighting, but the effect was rather cool in this picture – almost heart-shaped, don’t you think?

I licked my one clean, and abandoned the dark chocolate – rather sugar’ed out by this time.

The couple across from us left about 4 full churros on their table! It was a travesty! Once again, camera was playing up, but I like the focus black&white touch the editing left on this one. I call it “The Wasted”, in honour of a friend from my highschool Visual Arts class.

We’ve been TAGGED by Teresa at eatshowandtell! We are to say 6 random things about ourselves…

The Rules of the Game:

• Link to the person who tagged you
• Post the rules on the blog
• Write six random things about yourself
• Tag six people at the end of your post
• Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog
• Let the tagger know when your entry is up

1. Tim = Monopoly. And can play it remotely, via mobile to his disbelieving friends. And win…

2. Tim lives next-door to a person who is a member of the Le Cordon Bleu Academy – the absolute closest we’ll ever get to it

3. Tim doesn’t think it’s strange to go visit Lindt to buy 10kg of chocolate in the very near future. Tee! This is news to me ^^!

4. Chris has an absolute obsession with paper. In fact, she’ll happily spend $10 on it on a whim, on a daily basis, and to the extreme confusion of some of her friends. (Tim: “that’s news to me too…”)

5. Chris rarely, if ever, sits at her desk. She is currently sitting on her bed, typing this up.

6. Chris doesn’t like using an umbrella. In fact, if it weren’t for the fact that she carries notes and textbooks, she’d probably be splashing through puddles, while Tim chases after her with the umbrella she abandoned.

Tag. You’re It!

Y @ lemonpi

Belle @ oohlook

Jen @ jenius

Raging Yoghurt @ ragingyoghurt

Christie @ fig&cherry

Jen @ milkandcookies