Stomachs on legs are proud to present

is possibly my favourite Indonesian dish



It's a complete and healthy meal in one. This one had boiled egg, blanched kangkong and bean sprouts, rice cakes, potato, crispy green beans, tempeh, tofu and a lightly kaffir flavoured peanut sauce. Other Indonesian dishes tend to rely heavily on the presence of tasty sambals to "beef" up the flavour. And while I love sambals, if the sambals on offer are not good your whole meal is jeopardised. Of course you can also add sambal to this.

Malt, hops and cocoa nibs: now on sale from the Sapporo Brewery online store. It's like a Belgian nightmare.

What happens when two of Siem Reap's sexiest and hospitable French expats join forces to open a restaurant and bar?

Owners and very good friends of ours, Renaud Fichet (front of house) and Pascal Schmit (chef) are famous in our books for their great wine, excellent food (especially the foie gras), and great service. Most locals and tourists agree.

Menu


Well priced French wines


Amuse Chilled Potato Soup with Salmon Caviar


Foie Gras


My Fresh Sea Bass with vegetable risotto and spinach


yup Siem Reap has come a long way from the days when you couldn't even get fresh cream

Hock's extremely large t-bone steak

note: not all portions are this big Pascal was trying to show off

Le Cheque


After dinner wander over to the garden bar, say hello to Oscar the friendly dog/wolf and have a drink at the bar. Hang around long enough and you'll usually get lots of inside temple tips, generous pours and maybe even a good night kiss.

Abacus
Garden Restaurant and Bar
BP 93108, Route 6 to the Airport
1st Turn after Angkor Hotel (near western union sign)
Siem Reap, Cambodia
Phone 012644 286
cafeabacus.com

People have now asked me several times what was the best thing I ate in New York....

And although we ate plenty of great meals, the thing that was a complete revelation to me had to be the pickles...

I've eaten pickles before of course, but the pickles of New York take pickles to a whole other level of pickle goodness



They are crunchy and briny and flavourful, they come free at most Jewish delis

I have since realised that all other pickles I have eaten are but a poor imitation of New York pickles

The best pickle of all was the pickles at 2nd Ave Deli (ups KJ)





Accompanied by a white fish salad and a pastrami sandwich





This is a pretty pricey deli these days, the decor inside is great, but my advice order light and make pickles the focus

...is what I wandered around Shinjuku saying to perplexed looking Japanese policemen....(something about my squashed kiwi vowels just doesn't translate well in Japanese)

We were looking for a Japanese restaurant that specialises in crab done several ways. Ever since our last trip to Japan where I spotted several of these restaurants (they are a chain) but never managed to indulge my crab fetish its been on the list of "to eats"

Although we wandered around for nearly an hour looking for it, it wasn't until I decided to go into Zara to check out clothing that we spotted that it was in the same building, 4th floor.

Giant Mechanical Crab


From the moment you enter this place it is made perfectly clear that they are serious about crab

Live Crabs






We choose a set menu which appeared to be huge and plenty for two, plus a cloudy sake.....purely through a series of pointing at photos and elaborate hand gestures an flailing of hands. God I love the freedom of being a tourist for four days, not having to learn the language and reverting back to universals such as pointing and nodding. Communication was a success and a series of trays began to arrive at our table.

Place setting including crab scrapper


Crab egg pate


Steamed crab


Crab Sashimi


This was unbelievable, fresh, sweet and almost creamy

Table top charcoal grilled crab


Simple and gave off that irresistible smell of seafood shells being roasted

Crab Nabe (Hotpot)




Rice Soup






Green Tea Icecream


Mildly helpful link in Japanese

So we ate breakfast 3 times on Saturday. No actually make that 4.

Awoke at 4 am.....ahhhh jet lag and lay in bed until I decided to eat some granola I had bought from the store downstairs....organic too, with hemp seeds.....oooooooo, yes so very fuckin' UES, apparently, to which I added organic vanilla soy milk. Yes I admit it, for all my rantings I'm just as much of a namby pamby organic loving girly blouse as everyone else who writes a food blog.

Organic granola aside, we felt the need for a more "balanced" diet, so we headed downtown to Bleecker St and headed directly to Russ and Daughters for their famed bagel and lox.








The place was bustlin with people collecting the necessary ingredients for brunch. I had to overcome my meek kiwi/ asian tendencies and bustle and push.....



we got mini bagels with capers and onions......it was in my view the most perfect bagel



The minis left room for us to head to Katz's right next door. We had no idea that the two Institutions were so close together. Hock thought I wouldn't be interested in eating a pastrami sandwich straight after a bagel....he of little faith.



We ordered a classic pastrami on rye to share, a kinish and two coffees (the lovely watery filter coffee, call me a philistine but I love American style coffee)........The sandwich came with more exquisite pickles. I had forgotten how good a good pickle can be and their pickles are great. In fact New York really has to be pickle capital of the world.






I also got a unique compliment from one of the staff members who told me I was "lookin good baby" and that he "liked a little sauce with his white bread". I've never quite thought of my sexual appeal in sandwich terms but I guess if you work at Katz this is, in fact, how you may view a lot of things.

So, yaadaa yaadaa yaadaa.....we thought we were full and we were until we stumbled across Cafe Habana at about 11.30 and decided while we were there we should also eat the corn there, because the last time I was in New York, the corn was a revelation to me.




So we ate a piece of corn. Corn still good. Check.



And then we walked miles and miles, and we continue to walk miles and miles for atonement.

I'm realistic that I probably won't loose any weight while I'm here, I'm hopeful that with the walking I won't gain any either. But my legs ache and my belly feels like it is going to explode. In short, I'm transforming into my nemisis....a frog.

Well now that the Olympics are over people will no doubt be talking about the London ones in four years time. It seems a long way off and a bit premature to be pondering upon, but it seems the London Olympics is already causing the destruction and disruption of local ways of life and cooking in ye olde London town.

This recipe is from a book about the food from inner city allotment gardens which were cultivated by many different ethnic groups but have now been bulldozed to make way for Olympic infrastructure, Moro East. It was a birthday present I received this year and I have been trying a number of the recipes. But I liked this one in particular. It is rich and buttery but not overly so, combining eggs, eggplant, spinach with the earthy musky flavour of saffron and spiked with currents and fresh herbs and nuts. I served it with a pearl barley tabouleh. I felt exotic.




Recipe Kuku Iranian Saffron Omelette
Feeling: Exotic
Taste: Buttery/ Nutty

Whole large eggplant diced (lightly salted for 15 mins then rinsed)
Large bunch of spinach, fresh or frozen (they say fresh)
6 - 8 beaten eggs
Mint - bunch chopped
Dill - bunch chopped
Current or dried fruit (I used craisins) - 2 big handful
Pine nuts - big handful
spring onion bunch
big pinch saffron
Butter - knob
Olive Oil - gulp

Heat large skillet basted with olive oil with deep sides in the oven. Dice eggplant and sprinkle with salt and leave for a while to remove bitterness and then rinse and sautee in butter with spring onions and then add spinach until it has wilted. Mix with herbs with one handful of currents, pinenuts and the rest of the ingredients. Salt and Pepper. Place saffron in small amount of warm water to release colour and add. When your ready to make the omelette, stir in the egg and then pour the whole mixture into the heated skillet. Cook for around 20 mins or until firmish...it's nice if it's not too firm. Sprinkle with more currents and dill and serve.

Well seems as its all about weddings and celebrations this week, I thought I'd post our celebratory food

Me and Hock's birthdays, and wedding anniversary all fall with a two week radius of each other

So we celebrate by eating yummy things

Wedding/ Birthday dinner at AOI in Bangkok...for the Kaiseki meal (2000 bht per person, or around $60 USD)



in a private tatami room with views of the queen sirikit park...replete with cool horse bell



And the meal began with a lovely place setting a cute grape/ sake pink iced drink


Cream cheese tofu, chilled grated sticky potato??? and grilled fish salad


masterfully cut sashimi course


wagyu beef



sushi course



grilled fish and daikon


home made udon nabe


The evening before my birthday Hock also surprised me with a box of Hokkaido uni and Hokkaido scallops



The uni I had last year for my birthday, but the scallops were a new addition this year. They were beautiful dense large scallops that were a bit like juicy seafood steaks


unlike other scallops that are often pumped full of water to look plump, hokkaido scallops and just all fleshy sweetness and they crisp up in the pan...a trick not likely with ordinary scallops


i put the uni on top of the scallops, drizzled it with really good quality olive oil, a little lemon and pepper and then nearly died and went to heaven


the following morning I was greeted with baked eggs in two different styles, one with chorizo and the other with zucchini and marscapone


Yesterday I spent two hours at the gym, 70 minutes of cardio and 50 mins weights, stretches and sit ups