Written by lainie at 02:37 AM on July 5, 2009 in melbourne, Daily Life, Stupid, but fun..

The 4th of July is, as a day that occurs only once a year, a very special date indeed. So special.

I started the day groggy and grumpy, but a trip to popular DeGraves Street, and one latte later from Cafe Andiamo, I was one of god's loving creatures again.

Next item to tick off the list: groceries shopping with Gazel and Tommy.

 
(and everyone else was chirpy too)

I was quite upbeat about the idea of going to Victoria Market again. I love the deli section; and maybe it's my budding inner homemaker, but I generally love being in a good, or obnoxiously large, market.

Inka Marka was busking outside Queen Vic market. Some of you may have heard their "music from the Andes" at the 2007 Rainforest Music Festival. If you want to hear them, I took a lil video the first time around.

The kid thought I was staring at her. I was actually having a mental litany of complaints against children wearing shoes bad for their spines.

 I like the idea of choosing your own chicken eggs (Gazel taught me I have to check the prepackaged ones in the supermarket — true enough, many of them contained cracked eggs). Wheeee! Eggs!

We were looking for fresh mackerel for tonight's dinner, but we didn't manage to find any (puh-lenty of tuna and salmon though).

We got there later than we'd planned to, so a lot of discounts were being thrown around. This guy was trying to sell lots of rib eye steaks, and finally jumped onto his own counter to bellow out his prices.

Very entertaining and showy, but I'd rather get my steaks from the butcher who doesn't stand on his counter, thanks.

I love mushrooms. So, so much. I usually buy some of these, but this time around I got some flat mushrooms.

This particular stall owner is veeeeeery tetchy if you try to bag your own mushrooms. You'd think when the next five shops sell the same product, at the same price, that he'd try to sound less like a jerk, but no. He snapped at quite a few customers.

I bagged my own mushrooms at another stall.

Punnets of strawberries going for $1 each. Gazel lifted up one to check, and saw that moisture had gathered at the bottom = not good/fresh/yummy. I'm slowly learning more about buying groceries.

Plonk is also readily available at Queen Vic. Rewine — taking responsible drinking up a notch by allowing you to reuse wine bottles (and, you pay less for your wine).

 This was at giant bear stencilled outside some children's shop near Queen Vic. Stare into its beautiful, hauntingly paedophiliac eyes. This is going to give me creepy nightmares, what the hell were they thinking? -_-".

It's almost as bad as those "Azn girl poses" or whatever the hell they're called, where Asian girls try to stare cutely into cameras. Stop doing that. You look like weird Korean remakes of Children of the Corn. You look like that fuckery the stall thinks is a bear up there.

Speaking of Children of the Corn...we left Queen Vic to hit a bunch of shops/supermarkets in Footscray area. Seagulls. I haitz. Look at all the poo on the floor. They pooed on our car too.

There were drivers who inched their way out of the carpark because these seagulls were everywhere. Just drive la, they're seagulls. Your little car is not getting rid of them .

 

We made a very late pit stop for lunch: Vietnamese pork rolls! Behold, hostile glare from person who hates cameras.

Vietnamese pork rolls are addictive lil buggers. A baguette. Rich layer of pate, lots of butter*, different kinds of pork slices, all topped with crunchy and sweet pickled vegetables, coriander, and some Maggi seasoning (or some other sauce, depending on where you go).

*Some sites describe the Viet pork roll as "healthy". As I know it, the "butter spread" is an euphemism for either lard and eggs, or egg butter. Not to mention the pate, and that if you leave the ingredients out for too long you risk getting salmonella.

I don't have pics from the bakery I went to today, but that soft, yellow, mayo-like goo in the picture above is the butter spread, next to the pate, from Nhu Lan Bakery.

Yummy goodness. Maybe they mean "healthy for the soul", because damn, these things make me happy.

This came from a corner bakery near Little Saigon Supermarket, just two doors down from Nhu Lan Bakery on Hopkins St, in Footscray. All pork rolls are awesome, but if you must choose between the two, I recommend Nhu Lan.

After our late lunch, it was on to more serious things. The craziness of Little Saigon supermarket — where the produce is fresh, cheap, and hawked off by very loud stall runners sometimes intentionally shouting gibberish (face it, you can't hear their discounts anyway). Everything reduces into a constant stream of noise here.

I'd been having bpoo kem (Thai salted small crabs) cravings lately, so I suggested to Tommy we buy some small crabs to cook for tonight.

Behold, big orange crabs at the back, and small crabs (smaller than my palm) in front. All live and staring at me with their beady, resentful eyes — I don't appreciate my food forming opinions about me, this should only go one way, you judgey crustacean.

I realised I don't know what ingredients go with Thai small crabs, hence change of plans. But I will be back, little ones. In the meantime, I visited the deli section of Little Saigon for another solution.

Vietnamese deli produce (but, as the sign says, made in Aust)! We ended up getting these pha chê tai đây, made with ba khía (three-striped crabs, in season now!).

You'll find some right friendly chaps in charge of the stall. It's the second time I've pestered them with questions, and they're always very patient, helpful and cheery. So if there's anything you want to try, don't hesitate to ask.

In this case, they suggested using the crabs for a salad, with a bit of the sauce for dressing. Throw in some green mango/papaya, a bit of lemon juice to take away the extreme saltiness of the sauce. Maybe some mint leaves, whatever we'd like.

So we settled for baby spinach and lemon, and this is the end result for dinner:

I tried to think of a tactful way to say "I tossed a salad with crabs" (....), but the options were limited. So, behold, our salad, which I rather liked the taste of. The crabs were too salty for Gazel, but I was fine with it. I think basil or coriander will be a good addition to this.

I also did another set of starters for our dinner, ingredients purchased from Little Saigon:

First, we picked up some balut, which are basically duck eggs (most of you should know where this is going). I wanted Gazel and Tommy to give this dish a go.

Behold again, I successfully boiled five duck eggs (slightly under 15 minutes, water with some salt in it).

[ If you're gonna try this...Don't fret too much about boiling time, you can also soft boil the eggs. 5-15 minutes are both alright. They just take longer to boil than chicken eggs. I mean, chill out. ]

A brief how-to guide on eating balut. First, crack open the top (which is the darker end of the egg — the whiter side's the tough, thicker end of calcified shell), drop a tiiiiny pinch of salt in. Some vinegar, if you'd like.

If you see a thin membrane holding back the juices, remove it (pinches off easily). Drink up, like a musky, slurpy shot.

Peel away the rest of the shell. It's basically like eating a hardboiled chicken egg, except it's a duck egg and there's a foetus inside.

I think some people call this "warm, aborted duck foetus / fetus", but it's really just....a boiled egg. See the yolk, see the egg white, see the duck that would have been.

For your viewing purposes (and to gross out the weak-stomached), I parted the bird. The bones are very soft, the feathers so wet, slick and mushed into the flesh, it's just eating soft flesh, really. From some angles, it is curled up very much like a duck foetus.

[ If you purchase eggs older than what I got, the foetues will be more developed: the more developed, the crunchier the bones. ]

I made a dip for the egg: garlic, salt, olive oil. Before this, I made it with some chillies and vinegar too.

But I figure, it's up to you what you want to add into the dip — essentially, what do you like with your hardboiled eggs? I figured I didn't want vinegar since we already had the pha chê tai đây salad earlier.

Gazel: All your hippie friends okay with you eating balut meh?
Lainie: They know I eat eggs, and they know I eat ducks. This is just in between.

Which, I suppose, is the reason I don't see the taboo behind eating duck eggs.

Pic above is Tommy, about to eat a duck foetus. He had two, which means the first balut session couldn't be too bad . I also bought some regular duck eggs to cook over the week (god knows what kind of certification these eggs come with, I'm not thinking about it).

Again, Gazel wasn't too fond of my starter.

So, that was balut. I'd go for it again, I prefer a softer boil. I'm pretty sure my cholesterol will skyrocket if I keep this up though.

[ May all my vegetarian/vegan/raw food/non-meat eating/weak-stomached/etc friends one day look me in the eye again. ]

As for dinner:

Gazel made assam laksa. We ended up cooking it with salmon, since we couldn't get mackerel. It worked anyhow.

I never knew assam laksa had so much blended onion in it. We tried searching the Asian supermarkets and grocery stores for the kind of sweet, dark prawn/shrimp paste that goes with Assam laksa, but we kept finding other varieties. So we made do without.

That was my first moment of true disorientation in Melbourne, by the way.

True, I wail for Han Chon delivery when Liy tells me she's getting some; I miss my food outings with Kat; threatened to burst out the waterworks when Nish teased me about KL food (she backed off like, immediately, hehe); and it's been a while since I clubbed in Loft then ended up at my favourite loh shu fun (bless Joyce, Meesh and Sarah for taking me there towards my last few days in KL)....but I could always look for substitutes.

But.....being in a supermarket that caters to Asians...and not being able to find that one item I wanted...

Gazel's assam laksa. I haven't had assam laksa in yonks (mihun, because she prefers it to fat laksa noodles).

I used to eat it a lot back in Ipoh, because there was a really good lil stall near my mother's hairdresser. All the salty/spicy food really got to me, so it was good to end the night with some soft Turkish Delight that Tommy got. I think I really needed it for my palate by then.

So that was it, one of my first meals at home over a weekend (unless my memory fails me, which is very possible).

I end this update with a recent sad discovery. I have a lot of white hair T_T.

I've never really tried to yank them out before, but this came about when I noticed ONE strand while I was watching anime. I sorted through some of my hair, kept finding more strands of white, and now I refuse to continue because.....because.....

*cry* T_T

That's all for the 4th of July. Independence wha-? Who? Until my anime subtitles be rid of the dreadful spellings, I am not talking to you, Land-of-the-youknowwhos.

[ Fuck, what a ridiculously long entry. I refuse to check for anything. And if you're reading this on anywhere other than Tabulas (ie: Facebook), words will sometimes glue together likethisokay. I don't know why. ]

Written by lainie at 02:23 PM on July 16, 2009.

I'm headed to New Zealand next week, for a weekend trip. I actually want to be there a tad longer, but I am rather terrible at arranging my own schedule. Will be starting off in Christchurch. Anyone knows which interesting spots I should hit there?

I'm giving the Couchsurfing thing a go. Waiting for someone to get back to me now. Gahhhh, someone please house me.

Had a host who seemed really nice agree to my staying there, then the surfer before me nearly burnt their apartment down; now they no longer welcome random strangers with potential to set off pyros around their collection of musical instruments :|

If it doesn't work out, I'll just backpack. Grahs.

Announcement: I didn't think I'd see Rhapsody, the duo that is Nicole and Ywenna, perform again...Oh hang on, I still can't, since I'm in Melbs. But you might be able to.

They'll be performing tonight at Laundry Bar, The Curve, for Junk Lo-fideo x Moonshine. Event begins at 10pm. Oh hey, just noticed The Wongs will be performing too.

It's got no cover charge, so why not, ei? I also suggest you sit near the stage, otherwise the sound will be crap, especially if you're sitting outside watching people.

Written by lainie at 01:46 AM on July 24, 2009 in Stupid, but fun..

Anyone seeking cheap food in Melbourne has probably at some point ended up in Shanghai Dumpling, Chinatown. And why not? The food's pretty good, and any quality lacking in taste they certainly make up for with some of the lowest prices around the CBD.

You will not get refined, dainty Shanghainese cuisine here. You will, however, go get your own complimentary Chinese tea, and little bowls for sauces, to go with the basic service.

Like so! Here we are, waiting for our food, two bowls each; one for noodles, one for dipping sauce. We've practised this bit of preparation a few times now.

Shanghai Dumplings (perhaps more accurately, "Dodgy Dumplings"), is always very crowded, and noisy. According to Gazel, their "dan dan noodles" is the version they keep coming back to in the city.

I like it too, a wee bit spicy, very generous with the meat, big serving. We get this everytime we come here.

Here's a lil secret about Shanghai Dumpling that may go unnoticed. If you ever dine in the inner section upstairs, where you can see the kitchen, you may see the staff of Shanghai Dumplings have a certain habit.

They eat the food, before they serve it to you. Mostly finger food like the spring rolls. Sometimes the dumplings. Just a quick pop into their mouths, before bringing the plate over to your table.

I mentioned this on twitter, and quite a few people were grossed out — personally, I thought it was reassuring that the staff was willing to eat the food. Kitchen conditions can't be that bad?

Even if you can't watch them doing it, you can do this. Count your food — the menu states how many dumplings you're ordering.

In our case, we ordered 15 steamed pork dumplings:

We got 14, the snacking bastards. We sent it back to the kitchen, and had to wait another ten minutes (and suffer a rather grouchy waitress), to get all fifteen:

Yeap, all there. Thank you, Shanghai Dumpling! God knows what was added to our plate besides that one errant dumpling now. Those are the perils of standing up for your dumpling.

We also got some mushroom vegetable dumplings, which I rather liked:

(in case you're wondering, we got all 20 we were supposed to).

Dumplings don't always go missing on us. We've checked three times, and found missing dumplings on two occasions. I intend to make it our caveat to count them each time, at least out of principle (and also because it's kinda fun).

And since all dumplings kinda look the same:

One of them split open, so I took a picture of the filling. The dough is quite thick in all the dumplings (considered a no-no when it comes to dumplings).

Here's another pork-y noodle we got an earlier time, which was also quite yummy:

And we've never had to wait very long for our table, but here's the crowd one of those nights, waiting in the cold to get into the restaurant:

Perhaps they too, seek elusive dumplings. Shanghai Dumpling, ftw!

[ But seriously, we're probably one of the very, very, very very very few customers who count the dumplings ]

I have.....never.....in my life...typed "dumplings" this many times within a few minutes before.