Restaurant Review – Suminoya, Sydney

Suminoya is the sister restaurant of Rengaya (North Sydney) and Koh Ya (now in Randwick) that serves Japanese yakiniku, either buffet style or ala carte. It is located at a little alley way near Martin Place, which may not be easy to find if you haven’t looked it up on map beforehand. I reckon they are almost always busy, so booking ahead is definitely recommended. When I made the booking for dinner buffet option over the phone, I was offered two slots of time: 5.30 pm (when they just open) or 7.30 pm, which of course we chose the earliest 🙂

They offered two options of yakiniku buffet: Gourmet Buffet and Premium Buffet. Gourmet buffet is priced at $45 pp, whereas Premium buffet is priced at $55 pp. As seen on their menu, there are more options to choose from the Premium Buffet option, such as sashimi, wagyu beef loin, pork loin, and many more. Also on the Premium Buffet option, you can get unlimited order of beef tongue which was limited to one per person on the Gourmet option. I think their beef tongue is best, thin, tender and just lightly seasoned.

On our first time visit, we opted for the Premium Buffet, which was not disappointing at all. The salmon sashimi are delicious and very fresh, of course we ordered heaps of those beef tongue, beef harami, wagyu beef loin, beef ribs, marinated chicken pieces, salad, soup, edamame, eel rice, garlic prawn, and many more. Indeed as many people said, the 90 minutes just went by really quick; nevertheless we left the restaurant with super full tummies 😀 But sadly they don’t have gyoza on the menu, we love the gyoza at Koh Ya when in was still located in Double Bay area.

Without further ado, here are some pictures we “remembered” to take on our dining trip to Suminoya. A lot of the time, we were just way into the bbq-ing and forgot to take pictures as the ordered were delivered or as we cooked them.

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The entrance and shop front

 

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Various meat on bbq, seaweed salad, garlic butter prawn, eel rice, mashed potato, and green tea-black sesame ice cream

Suminoya Japanese Restaurant

1 Hosking Pl, Sydney NSW 2000

Phone: (02) 9231 2177

www.yakiniku.com.au/

 

 

 

Milk Bread Loaf with Peanut Butter&Choco

Courtesy of hubby, we welcome a new “toy” in our kitchen last week, a kitchen aid mixer. It was a highlight of 2016 so far, apart from me getting older 🙂 I love making and eating bread, and I have shared few recipes that worked for me over few posts here. So, of course we made bread using the tangzhong method that is well-known to produce milky soft bread. Previously, I kneaded the dough by hands and it took a while to achieve the smooth elastic consistency mainly because the recipe calls for slightly more liquid ingredient (in this case, milk) than other bread recipes which makes the dough very sticky. But, the end result really pays off those hard work and it is incredibly satisfying when your house smells like bakery ლ(´ڡ`ლ) The milk bread recipe is very versatile, you can bake it plain or with filling.  And this time, we made the milk bread loaf with peanut butter and chocolate rices – delicious!

Continue reading “Milk Bread Loaf with Peanut Butter&Choco”

Restaurant Review – Tan Thai, Campsie NSW

We went to Campsie last weekend to replenish our stash of Indonesian condiments and seasonings. That was the first time we had to since we came back from our Indonesia trip, September last year and mainly due to we finally run out of Sambal ABC Ekstra Pedas 😀 We bought back like three refill packs of those chili sauce from Bali and it finally ran out after about three months and here goes time to replenish our stash again. So, while we were in the area, we decided to have lunch there and try something new. The first option was Cinta Ria but sadly they were still closed for new year holiday and we walked along the street then saw this Tan Thai restaurant. If you followed my blog posts, you’d know we love Thai food – we agreed to try the food there.

Looking briefly from the outside, the restaurant looks small with mainly dark color interior with few tables and chairs and a see-through glass wall to separate the dining area with kitchen area. Then there is a curved archway at the back leading to more seating with a water feature in the middle. The seating at this area is mostly of wooden materials and kind of dim lighting. Then another small seating area with mostly white walls at the far back of the restaurant (see the picture below) with brighter lighting.

Tan Thai

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The menu on offer are mainly Thai dishes consists of stir fries, noodles, rice, curry, and the usual entrees options. For our lunch, we tried their Duck Red Curry and Crispy Soft Shell Crab Salad with rice.

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Duck Red Curry $15.90
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Crispy Soft Shell Crab Salad $15.90

We think the red curry is more of sweet tone than our favorite at Green Peppercorn also the duck itself is not as tender. But the crispy soft shell crab salad is awesome, pack with flavors and the soft shell crab was truly crispy and huge! We love the sauce on the salad, just a nice balance of sweet, salty, sour, spicy and generous coriander-mint on top. Overall we had a nice meal at Tan Thai and may come back again for the soft shell crab salad (っ˘ڡ˘ς)

Tan Thai

148 Beamish St, Campsie NSW 2194

Phone: (02) 9789 0003

www.tanthai.com.au

CP Soaping Supplies

I have made few batches of CP soap so far and have thoroughly enjoyed the each process of making them as much as the soap itself. As such I am still a beginner at this CP soap making, my soaping supplies are still very limited so far and would very much like to add more to the list 🙂 But here are all the items I keep in my cp soap box:

  • Base Oils and Butters

These are the oils that are gone through the saponification process to create a soap bar. I have only very few base oils, namely olive oil, extra virgin coconut oil, coconut oil, rice bran oil, castor oil, and sweet almond oil. Palm oil is another base oil that is very common used to make cp soap, but since my soap are all palm oil free, I have never bought any. I just simply tweak the recipe that contains palm oil and replace with other base oils that have similar properties, such as cocoa butter or shea butter. Butters are also packed with vitamins that helps to nourish our skin, I have cocoa butter and shea butter which I normally use just either one in a single soap recipe.

  • Lye

The other most important ingredient for cp soap is of course lye or caustic soda or sodium hydroxide. This is what trigger the saponification process when mixed with base oils. It is harsh when comes in contact to skin, hence you need protecting clothing when making cp soap, to ensure no splash of this lye mixture will be come in contact to your skin/eyes.

  • Essential and fragrant oils

These oils are the contributor to how your soap smell like. The difference between those two are essential oils are natural, whereas fragrant oils are synthetic. Being non-natural does not necessarily means fragrant oils are not good, there are many good qualities fragrant oils that have tested  for safe to skin. And we can not extract natural oils from every plants/fruits, for example strawberries, pears, and many others, which we can have now with fragrance oils. I only have a very small collection of essential/fragrance oils: coffee, oat and honey, jasmine, rose, lemongrass and ginger. I have just placed an order for couple with citrusy notes which are yet to be delivered.

  • Clay

Clay are additions to your soap, which not only acts as natural colorants but also produce soap bars that have good properties to your skin. To my knowledge there are white, pink, red, green, bentonite, beige and black clay. Each color has different purpose on the skin; for example white clay is very gentle for sensitive and dry skin, pink clay helps to firm and tone the skin, red clay for dehydrated and matured skin, green for detoxification and acne prone skin, bentonite for tissue repair, beige clay for detoxifying, and lastly the black clay known for its oxygenating properties nourishes the skin. Some people also added clay to help the fragrant to stick to the cp soap better. I have just ordered white, pink, beige and bentonite clay which are also yet to come.

  • Ground coffee, oats, honey

These are just other additions I add to the soap for color, fragrance, or simply for the goodness it brings to the soap.

  • Soap molds

If you read my first posts on cp soap making here and here, I used cleaned soy milk carton as soap mold. I only used a real soap silicone log mold when I made these soap bars. I am actually thinking of getting some other models, but haven’t decided yet.

  • Other equipment, such as stick blender, spatula, plastic spoons, several containers, measuring jug, digital weight, and knife for cutting up the soaps.

Where do I get my supplies from?

Some of the oils, lye and the last mentioned additives (coffee, oats and honey) are from local supermarkets. The other ingredients are mostly from Australian online soap supplies shops. I tend to get them from those located in NSW mainly due to shipping cost consideration 🙂 As for the soap molds, I bought my silicone log mold from eBay. The equipment came from various shops from hot dollar shops to Daiso to Kmart.

Hope this information might be of help to you who just starting on CP soap making and happy soaping! ^̮^

Healthy Green Salad

December is usually a month where most of us tend to indulge too much (in term of food), or at least I do! 😀 There are always a catch-up dinner, office functions, then all those festivities celebrations, it is just too hard to resist the temptations. But now that we are in the new year already, I truly think my body is in need of a simple green salad to cleanse out toxins from all the “naughty” eating and drinking.

These are the goodies that I put in my salad bowl:

  • Butter lettuce, also known as butter head. This soft leaves lettuce have very subtle buttery sweet flavor and naturally low in calories/fat/sugar.
  • Iceberg lettuce, these are great addition to salad for it has high water content and sodium then other lettuce families. It also gives a nice crisp texture to the salad, something different to the butter lettuce leaves.
  • Green apple. We all know how apple is great fruit, loaded with dietary fibers and vitamins(especially vitamin C) thus the saying “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” 🙂 I used green apple in the salad for extra tangy, sweetness, and crunch.
  • Cherry tomatoes. Apart from giving the bright red color in the green salad, they are also loaded with vitamin C and lycopene, an antioxidant that lowers your risk of certain diseases caused by cellular damage.
  • Cucumber, which is a well-known for its antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer benefits. They are naturally low in calories, carbohydrates, sodium, fat and cholesterol. Because of their high water content, cucumbers can help supports hydration, especially during summer months.
  • Avocado. Another food that is loaded with vitamins and minerals, also high “heart-healthy fat” content as well as dietary fibers. On top of that, avocado contains even higher level of potassium than bananas, which help to support healthy blood pressure level.
  • Lemon juice and olive oil dressing. A very simple salad dressing that is not just tastes great, but also good for your body.
  • Cracked black pepper to taste

And last but not least, a mug of green tea to wash it all down!

green salad