Elbow Room Espresso

Oh my god, hang on to your lens-less glasses frames people – Chatswood’s gone hipster!

Serving 5 Senses coffee as well as pastries and organic sourdough from Luxe Bakery, alongside housemade muffins and other treats, Elbow Room is a recent addition to Chatswood’s (to-date, very ordinary) café scene located close to one of Westfield’s entrances. Run by friendly Korean staff, iced water automatically appears on your table and the coffee menu refreshingly offers choices of different blends versus the usual different styles of macchiato, flat white, caffe latte, etc.

St Malo Bakery & Bean Drinking

You know you’re in love with a place when you keep going back again and again. You tell your friends about it. You even make a time to take them there so you’re certain they get to try all that you’ve been raving about. And where's the joy in good food if it isn’t shared around?

Oliver Brown, Chatswood

Chatswood has long lacked late night dining and dessert options. When Mamak opened a year ago there were high hopes that it would keep similar hours to its Chinatown original, but sadly that has still yet to become reality.

Epicure Recipe Card #24: Banana Pancakes with Golden Syrup

You may be forgiven for thinking that these Epicure recipe cards contain only fast midweek meal ideas. It’s an easy assumption to make going on my past posts but – guess what? - there are sweet ideas in there. For the first one I have gone with the very safe option of banana pancakes. The husband loves bananas in desserts so there’s no going wrong here. The unusual thing about these pancakes is that they actually contain sliced banana hidden in the batter. Paired with a grilled banana on top (excuse my horrible grey-ish looking one in the photo below – either I left it in the pan too long or the banana was a bit too ripe to start with), there is plenty of banana-ness in, atop and around the pancakes to satisfy even the most die-hard banana fan.

I used walnuts instead of macadamias as that’s what I had in the freezer (apparently the oils contained in nuts keeps better there) but I would imagine macadamias would be lovely with their buttery taste and texture. Someone make it with these and let me know please?

Banana Pancakes with Maple Syrup (makes 3 medium pancakes)

(adapted from The Age – Epicure 50 Best Recipe Cards, recipe by Jill Dupleix)

Ingredients:

·         ½ cup plain flour

·         ½ tsp baking powder

·         tiny pinch of salt

·         1 egg, separated

·         ½ tbs caster sugar

·         125mL milk

·         ½ tsp vegetable oil

·         1 banana, peeled & sliced

·         oil and butter for cooking

·         50g macadamia nuts or walnuts, toasted

·         grilled banana, maple/golden syrup and ice-cream, to serve (optional)

Method:

1. Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl. Make a well in the centre.
2. In another bowl, whisk egg yolk, sugar, milk and oil together. Pour into the dry ingredients in the first bowl and whisk until smooth but avoid over-mixing. Rest in fridge for 30 minutes.
3. Stir sliced banana into the batter. Beat eggwhite until soft peaks form and gently fold into the batter.
4. Heat a small amount of oil and an equal amount of butter in a non-stick frying pan over medium heat until the butter starts to froth. Add a third of the batter to the pan and cook until bubbles appear on the surface before flipping to cook on the other side. Cook the remaining batter in 2 batches, adding more oil and butter to the pan if required.
5. Serve pancakes topped with grilled banana, ice cream, nuts and maple/golden syrup if desired. 

happy cooking!

Ripples Milsons Point, 30 Dec 2009

It can be difficult getting together with the people that matter to you these days. Coffee dates with a friend can be easy to arrange but when more people are thrown into the mix then there are just too many scheduling factors to contend with. Add to that the busy period of the year known as Christmas/New Year and you will end up with a lot of phone calls, SMS messages and emails flying every way possible and not a single confirmed date or time where everyone can attend.

This is how Wifey, Mistress and I ended up lunching at Ripples at Milsons Point together. Batman was unable to join us as she wasn’t feeling well and it was a bit of a strange overcast day to say the least. It did fine up later on to a baking, humid sort of heat replete with glary sunshine but none of this was to dampen our spirits as it had been too long between gatherings.

We arrive at around 10:30am and join the queue of patrons waiting for tables as we’ve been told no reservations are taken for their breakfast session. However we’re soon offered a seat along the stone edging and are protected from any glare by the plastic shade sheets. I order a skim flat white as per usual and although it tastes fine, the milk foam on top is artless which is most unusual in Sydney these days. Mistress goes for a sweet breakfast option of ‘Apple hotcakes with rhubarb compote and cinnamon crème fraîche’. The hotcakes are light and fluffy and the cinnamon crème fraîche is a most fragrant addition.

Wifey and I pretty much order the same thing with she having the ‘Salmon Benedict’ and I the ‘Eggs Benedict’. The only difference between the two is that hers comes with smoked salmon and mine comes with the traditional ham. Each of these breakfasts features beautifully poached eggs and lusciously thick Hollandaise on toasted English muffins. Wifey and Mistress both comment that they detect a watery taste about the eggs whereas I don’t, even after taste-testing both plates.

Attracting the waitstaff’s attention for service was a little difficult but once orders were taken the kitchen was efficient with the food. Presumably waitstaff were a bit distracted as there appeared to be a lunch function for which they were preparing, and we overheard a manager-type person turning people away for lunch service a little later on.

Ripples Milsons Point

Olympic Drive (cnr Alfred St South), Milsons Point NSW

Tel: (02) 9929 7722

Opening Hours:  Mon-Fri  8am-11am (breakfast)

                                    12pm-3pm (lunch)

                                    6pm-9:30pm (dinner)

                        Sat & Sun  7:30am-11am (breakfast)

                                        12pm-4pm (lunch)

                                        6pm-9:30pm (dinner)

happy eating!

Lazy Pancake Brunch

Happy New Year, everyone! Like most people, I stayed up way too late last night and slept in just that little bit too long this morning. So what better way to indulge in extended laziness than by enjoying a cooked breakfast, especially one that is served long after midday has passed!

My love of breakfast/brunch food has been well documented by this blog thus far and it may come as a shock that I chose a sweet option today instead of my usual savoury. As often occurs with home cooking, it is not always necessarily a case of what you want to eat or what you feel like cooking, but more of a matter of what you have on hand and the time available to you. (Yes, I pretty much always have bacon in the freezer but, no, I don’t always have the time to defrost it.)

So after a bit of bleary-eyed peering into the fridge and pantry, pancakes it was. I made mine with a Pink Lady apple because that’s what I had in the fruit crisper, however I probably would have preferred the tartness of a Granny Smith. You will notice the recipe below doesn’t stipulate any sugar, so the pancakes themselves aren’t sweet, so you’ll need to serve them topped with maple syrup, cinnamon sugar, icing sugar, fruit compote… or whatever it is that takes your fancy!

Sour Cream Apple Pancakes (makes approx 7 pancakes)

(adapted from Not Quite Nigella)

Ingredients:

·         1 medium apple

·         1½ cups self-raising flour

·         pinch of salt

·         1 tsp cinnamon

·         1 cup milk

·         1 egg

·         ½ cup light sour cream

·         dash of vanilla essence

·         2 tbs butter plus 2 tbs oil, for cooking

Method:

1. Quarter and core the apple then coarsely grate. Set aside.
2. Place flour, salt and cinnamon into a large bowl and stir with a handheld whisk until evenly mixed. Set aside.
3. Measure out milk in a large jug, crack in the egg and mix with a fork to combine. Add sour cream and mix roughly to retain some lumps.
4. Make a well in the centre of the flour mixture and gradually pour in milk mixture whilst whisking. Continue to whisk until the batter is combined and there are no lumps. Add vanilla and fold apple through the batter.
5. Place a flat-bottomed frypan over medium-low heat and melt 1 tbs butter with 1 tbs oil. When the butter starts to froth, cook ladlefuls of batter until bubbles appear on the surface before flipping to cook on the other side. Melt remaining butter and oil together for cooking when required. 

happy new year & happy cooking!