Yum Cha = Dim Sum

Now, just to let you know, I am a huge fan of Yum Cha (or Dim Sum is what they call it over here!). I have been brought up eating the stuff since I was a little tyke and its almost a family tradition with the cousins and grandparents squished into a crowded Chinese restaurant gorging on as much dumplings and spring rolls as we can manage. I now, however, have gone four months without having this delicious midday meal so last weekend after a night out Adam and I decided it was time to indulge...

Adam had been reccommended a place about 15 minutes walk from our house which is ideal as we do not have to catch a tube to get there. So there we were strolling down Fulham Road to get to the Royal China restaurant where we waiting in the line for about 8 minutes and were then finally served and told that as we did not have a booking we were required to wait half an hour. Now as we had not eaten since 7pm the preivious eve, and the time now was 1230, you could say we were pretty hungry and decided to hit the pavement for another Dim Sum location.

 

Note to self: Remember you are now in London. In London there lives 7 million, eight hundred and twenty five, and one hundred people approximately. You are used to being in Wellington where there are three hundred and eighty nine thousand and seven hundred people approximately. This means you can no longer expect to turn up at a restaurant and get seated immediately. One must book in advance.

 

Strolling around Fulham we noticed the Dim Sum options were rather scarce. Time now to pull out the ole iPhone and look Dim Sum locations up, and this is how we ended up at Mai Thai in Parsons Green, after a good 45 minute stroll (should have waited at the other place!)  We had a quick glimpse at the menu as we were walking in but with no time to spare we were seated at a table, kitted out with cloth napkins, and three sets of cutlery (bizarre considering we were at a Chinese restaurant and no chopsticks were to be seen!) After taking in the modern un-Chinese surroundings we started to peruse the menu. Our eyes fixated on two things, one that they had dumplings, and two the price; £18.50 for Dim Sum basket of 10 pieces. This sounded like a great idea at the time - one way to get an assortment of dim sum! We also settled on Peking Duck spring rolls and pork and ginger dumplings, a Chinese Jasmine tea (all the way from Canton apparently according to the menu) and an orange juice for the gent.

 

The Dim Sum basket was nicely presented and had lemongrass and a type of vinegar soya sauce to accompany it. The basket consisted of a mix of steamed pork and prawn dumplings none of which I really recognised except for the siu mai (steamed pork dim sum) which was pretty standard compared to others in NZ that I have tasted.

 

The pork and ginger dumplings and Peking Duck spring rolls were probably the best tastes of the meal. However the highlight for me was definitely the Jasmine Tea. This arrived in a tall water glass, filled with hot water and with a ping pong sized ball of what looked like a dark green straw decoration.  This ball was actually a dried jasmin flower, which continued to expand to produce a beautiful bright red colour in the middle as it settled at the bottom of the glass. The jasmine flower gave the tea a very light infused taste and which was refreshing compared to the tea normally served at a Yum Cha restaurant back home. So it was a welcomed modern change to the traditional tea - although I am partial to both!

 

The one word that comes to mind when thinking of this meal is: expensive. The food was fresh but not overally traditional and I did miss the whole authentic experience where the waiters walk around carrying the Yum Cha on plates and you choose whatever you like the look of. This experience was more of a fine dining cusine version of Yum Cha and not one that we would be fast to repeat again. It was expensive, had a limited range of Yum Cha items on the menu and we were still left feeling hungry. I was impressed with the modern and more European take on the Chinese restuarant and I would be tempted to go there for a fine dining Chinese meal if we felt we could splurge one night. However with so many Chinese restaurants and take aways on offer in London we could probably find a better option more in our price range!
 

Chinatown - your up next!!!

A Breakfast Fit for Scots!

On the recent long weekend a group of us embarked on a journey to Edinburgh, Scotland. Now being the long weekend, Edinburgh was particularly busy, not to mention the Edinburgh Tattoo was on as well as the final weekend of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival! So laughs were had all round! However despite Edinburgh being a most beautiful and warm city and also my first Scottish experience, the highlight was trying my first (and not last) home-made Scottish breaky!

We were lucky to have a Scottish lass with us on our trip (well it's because of her that we embarked on the journey to begin with!) the lovely Joanna, who braved the early morning crisp after a rather large Friday night out to collect the ingredients for our morning feast.  Being in the hungover state we were our ingredients were purchased via a supermarket as cooking from scratch was definitely not an option!

Stomachs were churning in excitement and some in apprehensiveness at what was yet to come.... black pudding, square sausage, haggis, pork sausages, bacon, eggs, toast, a tattie scone and some American / Kiwi influence of good ole tomato sauce!

 

(Click the diagram to get a better view)

A break down of said Scottish ingredients:

Black pudding:  Comes in a mini dog sausage like roll and needed to be cut into 1cm slices, then grilled or fried. For those who are squeamish stop reading now: the ingredients in Black Pudding actually consists of cooking blood, or dried blood with a filler until it is thick enough to congeal when cooled. Despite this unappealing main ingredient Black Pudding is actually rather tasty!  But it is definitely an acquired taste... it is one of those many foods that you either like or don't like. But it is definitely worth a try!  And as Joanna points out - Great for those who are anemic!!!

Square Sausage or Lorne Sausage (what is traditionally known as): Now this one item in the Scottish Breakfast I hadn't actually heard of before but it is just that. Pretty much sausage meat, patted down into a square. Voila! Square sausage!

Haggis: A grainy, stuffing type texture that is browny/grey in colour, and which crumbles when cooked. Warning - another squeamish moment ahead: Haggis is traditionally made from sheep's heart, livers and mixed with onion, herbs, spices and stock and then traditionally cooked in a sheep's intestine, although the version we had was pre-cut in circular slices and not cooked in a sheep's intestine (phew!).

Tattie Scone: A type of potato pancake that is beaten and flattened and either toasted, grilled or fried. The potato texture is kind of lost in this Scottish speciality but it is a good alternative and probably more healthy to the hash brown.

At first glance, the Scottish Breakfast appears to be one meat feast! Much to the boys delight.

When complied together the Scottish Breakfast comes across quite heavy, and rather dry, especially when one is used to the traditional English Cooked Breakfast (bar the baked beans for us Kiwi's!). I would say this is mainly due to the amount of meat in the Scottish version. I found the flavours of each ingredient, complimented each other nicely in the Scottish breaky especially the crumbled haggis, combined with egg and bacon provided a nice nutty flavour and texture. The black pudding also provided a strong flavour in itself so I would recommend eating with tomato sauce or combining with the other ingredients.  Unless you are an avid fan and I am told this is eaten often by itself! I surprisingly was intrigued to try black pudding and put my pre-requistions behind me and blocked the ingredients from my mind and  found I actually rather enjoyed it.

The Scottish Breakfast is definitely nice for a change to its English counterpart. The combination of different meats and flavours provides a heartier version and the different textures of the haggis and tattie scone was a welcomed change. If I was going to create this masterpiece again in my own kitchen I would probably forget the toast and replace with the tattie scone, and maybe add a grilled tomato to lighten the flavours and provide some juice to the grilled meats, to soften the dryness, although good ole tomato sauce does do the trick nicely. 
The Scottish Breakfast is definitely a feast and a meal to reconcile with but one I don't think I could handle every weekend!

Thanks to Jo for sharing her countries traditional goodness with us, and I look forward to our future feasts!!

LoveBites: The Recipe Collection

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Please follow the link below or the logo on the left hand side of the page to take you to LoveBites, my very own recipe collection. I will upload recipes I have created myself, every now and again to tantalise your taste buds and in hope that you can re-create these at home. Some you may recognise, as I do gather inspiration from the classics but always amend them to make them my own. A little bit here, a little bit there and there you have my LoveBites!

I enjoy getting creative in the kitchen and as my mother always taught me its all about colour!
My LoveBites are based on creating visual deliciousness in presentation and of course physical deliciousness in the food!

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Welcome my friends to LoveBites: The Recipe Collection.

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