Pimento made this
Amazing arcade table
He’s a genius
Oh but wait there’s more
He also made sausage rolls
Ladies, he’s single
Yeah that’s right bitches
Braised pork belly in a bun
Jealous? You should be
Mr Gif chipped in
Made him chop all the chillies
Because I’m a wimp
Although, looking back
Wasn’t the best idea
That stuff really burns
Guys, I had a great weekend. Granted, most of today was spent trying to sleep off the greatness of yesterday, but even a level 7 hangover can’t dampen my spirits. Unless I puke on it (and I didn’t, hurrah for me!).
My good friends May and Cam hosted an Arty Party on Saturday as a belated housewarming. Our gorgeous hosts supplied the canvasses, oil and acrylic paints (some salvaged from Cam’s bludging fine arts days in uni) and paintbrushes while everyone else brought with them alcohol and imagination. Everyone really got into it – the room was silent as creative juices churned from brain to paper, broken only by the occasional “Who’s got the Burnt Umber?”
Of course, creativity has to be well-fed. May’s mum generously contributed baked goods for us starving artists:
Best apple pie ever, fat with chunks of spiced apple and sultanas. May said that her mum only learned how to bake recently. “Unpossible!” I said through a giant mouthful pie, clumsily spraying bits of buttery flaky crust everywhere.
May’s mum also made a zingy, creamy lemon tart. May served it with some lemon sorbet.
I’m a bit hesitant about putting everyone’s art up because I forgot to ask if it’s OK, but here’s my finished masterpiece: Read the rest of this entry »
It’s my good friend Pimento‘s birthday today! To celebrate him not looking a day over 27, 7 of us went to Efendy for brunch. None of us have actually been there before but we were all pleasantly surprised.
Efendy is placed away from the main Darling St strip (it’s more on the border between Balmain and Rozelle), so the surroundings are a bit more quiet, but the place was busy when we arrived. There is a nice courtyard area at the front but the majority voted for sitting inside because it was too hot.
My SO and I both ordered tea – he had the apple tea. It comes with a stick of cinnamon. I absolutely loved it and secretly wished I ordered it instead. It was pretty sweet, but the cinnamon helps to mellow out the sweetness so that it’s not too sickly. I had Turkish tea, which tasted like black tea. Idk if it’s supposed to just be black tea, but it comes in a cool glass so whatever.
Oh man. Guys you gotta get your arses down here for the breakfast, it was pretty damn amazing. These were our choices:
My SO and Rachel ordered the Kiymali – “village style” minced lamb stew with eggs and tomatoes. This was absolutely delicious. I’m a huge fan of lamb, and the combination of spices and eggs made for a rich, satisfying breakfast. The serving plate they have is… interesting. It’s like a huge dinner plate with a bowl in the middle. When you first get it you’re like uh, that’s a pretty small serving innit, then you dig your fork in and the bowl goes on FOREVER. What I’m saying is, don’t worry about your serving looking small cos it isn’t.
Cam and Andrew ordered, uh, this. The menu on the Efendy website is a bit out of date so it doesn’t have a couple of the new dishes on it (and prices – everything is probably a couple of dollars more expensive that is stated on the old website menu), but this was a dish of poached eggs on top of buttered Turkish bread with haloumi, asparagus and tomato.
May and Pimento ordered the Kallavi or big breakfast – two fried eggs with grilled sucuk, merguez sausages, mushrooms and pastirma. Pimento opted for no tomatoes because he’s weird.
This was my pick, the Menemen – spiced scrambled eggs with banana peppers and tomatoes, plus a side of haloumi for an extra $6. This was delicious. It’s pretty much just eggs and vegetables but it’s very more-ish. It’s slightly spicy, the type of heat that just tickles the tastebuds so that everything tastes more intense. I thought that $6 for a side of haloumi was pretty expensive but they do give you generous slices of it and they’re fried perfectly.
Check out the giant platter of buttered Turkish bread in the middle of the table. I love this place and will be back to try out their dinner menu one day.
Because it was just after noon when we finished eating, the girls opted for alcohol for their second round of drinks. A birthday is not complete without some, even though the birthday boy didn’t have any.
Rachel and I got a delicious cocktail called Narosa – sparkling wine, pomegranate liqueur and bits of pomegranate. Not only are the pomegranate seeds delicious but they also provide the sort of entertainment devised by people with way too much time (and sparkling wine) on their hands, as we tried to get the seeds to float via the powers of bubbles in the wine. May ordered a Bloody Ayshe – vodka, tomato juice, Turkish tomato ezme (idk) and “spices”. It came with a pickled chilli on the rim. I didn’t try any of it cos I hate tomato juice, but it got a thumbs up from May.
Then we went back to my place where I surprised Pimento with a chilli chocolate orange cake (recipe from here). I need to get myself to a cake decorating class or some shit because this looks like ass, but I can guarantee that this recipe is tops – it was very fudgey and rich and the chilli in it packs just the slightest hint of heat that pairs very well with the chocolate. My mistake was to leave it in the fridge until we got home. Ideally you’d want it to be out of the fridge for an hour or so before eating, as it’s a bit dry when it’s cold.
Among a couple other things, I got Pimento this as a gag gift:
It’s gluten free, low sodium vegetarian bacon salt. It’s actually as disgusting as it sounds. It doesn’t taste like any sort of bacon I know. It tastes more like dried, ground up cocktail weiners. Blerrrghhh. I don’t recommend getting it for people you like.
Efendy
79 Elliott St. (corner of Darling St.), Balmain
(02) 9810 5466
ETA: I just realised I’m using my old watermark with a www in front of the URL. FML I’m not redoing the pictures
ETA II: Heads up for food bloggers: head over to Simon’s blog to win a chance to be a guest at Efendy’s food blogger’s event! There’s going to be free samples of authentic (and I’m sure) v. tasty Turkish food.
Newtown Festival was on at the Camperdown Memorial Rest Park on the 8th of November. It was a day full of food, music, shopping and hipsters. I didn’t take many photos when I arrived (with the SO and Pimento in tow) because I stupidly left my camera memory card in my computer. I had to wait for my friend Cam (and gf May) and poach his camera off him for a bit.
A band that didn’t suck.
One of the few purveyors of food products. This was OK but a bit too healthy tasting if you know what I mean. I bought a spicy capsicum chilli relish from relish this and am very keen to try it out.
“Flavours of Brasil” stall with many delicious Portuguese snacks.
I got the beef empanada which had egg and olives along with tasty beef mince.
This dinner party was inspired by a wine company called Barwang. Look, I never claimed to be very mature. My idea was this: the Sexual Innuendo Dinner Party is a potluck dinner where the dishes present some sort of sexual innuendo – either in the ingredient, name or appearance. My friends are awesome enough to indulge, so after tossing the idea around back and forth, we made it happen.
Ironically our local bottle shop didn’t have any Barwang the night we had our dinner. Rob and Ross got these instead:
For the record, I really liked the Skuttlebutt. I forget what sort of white it was, because when you’re busy giggling like a 5-year old you don’t tend to pay attention to detail.
For entrées we had:
Ross’ famous homos. He kindly toned down the garlic for the rest of us wimps.
Cocktail wieners. After being pescaterian for the last few weeks, I was shocked to find that I loved these (must be a childhood memory thing). These were a big hit with the rest of the guests too.
My Desperate Tarts – tarts with zucchini.
Our mains were:
Cam and May’s amazing balls. I’m eternally pissed with myself for not having any really good photos of them. I can assure you though that these are some of the best balls I’ve ever had, and I’ve had a few (oo-er).
My fish tacos, seen here with their accompaniments – green salad, kind-of-but-not-really pico de gallo and sour cream. The wieners look pretty sinister in this photo.
Things took turn for the worse over dinner:
For dessert, we had:
Make-your-own banana split, courtesy of Cam and May.
(Trouser) Snakes, courtesy of Ross.
Continuing with the theme of the night, we had cocktails and an innuendo-filled game of Apples to Apples.
The dinner was amazing, mostly due to some of the most brilliant (and tolerant) friends anyone can hope to have. I’m already planning for a bigger (oo-er) Sexual Innuendo soon!
17 May 2009
My good friend Jenny is an amazing cook. She kindly let a bunch of us riff-raffs into her home to eat her food and watch the Eurovision finals.
Beautifully presented entrees
Banana flower salad – one serving garnished with dried beef
Deep fried soft shell crabs. I nearly wet my pants eating these, they’re so fucking good.
Pho accompaniments
Best pho I’ve ever had, and that’s saying a lot.
Dessert. Clockwise from top – black sticky rice with coconut cream, glutinous rice ball and black sesame ice cream.