With season 2 of MasterChef on its way, Crikey staffers, who last year became obsessed with the show and ridiculously obsessed with Matt Preston, have been talking about the signature dish they’d prepare to audition for George, Gary and Matt.
Mick the sub’s signature dish is Matt Preston himself — “plenty to go around” — though this is presumably a meal that can only be cooked so many times.
First Dog on the Moon even put his recipe in four squares of delicious.
It made me think about my own key dishes and my, gasp, food legacy. Growing up, mum’s signature dishes for dinner parties were brandy snap baskets filled with raspberries and ice-cream, chocolate roulade and lamb cooked in a pool of butter worthy of Julia Child. Each dish was a defining childhood moment.
But me, I’m stuck in a food rut. Even if apple, strawberry and rhubarb crumble is a perennial winner, I can’t keep serving it until I’m 60. Hey, I haven’t even graduated to semi-dried tomatoes yet and that’s a food trend so outdated it’s probably about to come back into fashion. It’s time to get acquainted with some new ingredients.
If you’re similarly afflicted, why not branch out with something completely new tonight. And no, spag bol shouldn’t be your special dish past the age of 25 and student housing (unless it is REALLY fancy).
Looking for the spark of inspiration? Head online for a feeding frenzy of fantastic food blogs and recipe sites.
The details: Times Online‘s article, “50 of the world’s best food blogs”, is a great starter. I’ve also asked around the Crikey table and quizzed friends for sites of inspiration. Here are just a smattering:
- Taste.com.au — a really good entry point with 17,000+ recipes collated (and reader-rated) from publications like delicious, Vogue Entertaining &Travel and Good Taste.
- Sunday Suppers — Amber, resident foodie, suggests this as a personal fave. Their Vanilla Pudding with Candied Cumquats (only the second decent recipe ever made from the backyard fruit) looks amazing.
- Photograzing — Ruth, another resident foodie, whose raw choc brownies are a regular office special, suggested this “unabashed food porn” site. I am particularly taken by a variation on Kir Royale and the strawberry avocado salsa!
- How to shuck an oyster — a blog for people who love to cook food, as well as read about it
- Chocolate & Zucchini — this blog’s been around for yonks, and sometimes its recipes are intimidatingly chi-chi, but you can’t argue with Pecan Mudslide Cookies
- The Pioneer Woman Cooks — for those who like their food hearty and homely. Apple Cake in an Iron Skillet is a typical example, complete with lush photography.
- The Food Section — the place to keep up with food news and trends
Let us know how you go.
I’m fond of Foodwishes ( http://foodwishes.blogspot.com/ ) – videos of all the recipes, which include some interesting ones, like a great pasta sauce with vodka. Some are over-the-top American calorie fests, and some are downright bewildering, like ‘Chicken Fried Cube Beef’, but its fun.
A wonderful blog for those interested in Italian specifically Sicilian food and cooking from an Australian-Italian, Marisa Wilkins, is http://www.allthingssicilianandmore.blogspot.com.
Marisa is based in Melbourne and is one of those wonderful self-taught instinctive cooks whose great cooking starts with her love and passion for great ingredients. “Local” and “sustainable” are key to her eating and cooking philosophy.
There are still people who, amazingly enough, cook without ever using achovies.
We buy ours in big jars at a Norton Str. Sydney Deli. It takes a 350 km journey there and back, but so what, combined with a movie, it’s worth it.
Here my pasta recipe for anchovie novices:
Fry a few chopped up anchovies with garlic and diced bacon in a very hot cast iron sauce-pan with half a cup of good olive oil. Add a chopped onion with vine grown diced tomatoes into the fried mixture.
Now boil a good quality of fresh pasta, preferably hand made and bought from a good delicatessen. After the pasta has cooked add the achovie, garlic, bacon etc sauce and eat and eat.
This one reason why our grandkids make regular visits to our farm. It’s nothing but anchovie love!
http://oosterman.wordpress.com/
epicurious.com is good too – similar to Taste.