Saturday, September 29, 2012

Weekend Cooking: At the Show

This past week has been very busy!

Last Sunday I went to a wedding. The wedding and the reception were a great mix of Greek and Australian traditions, and I left not feeling lonely and depressed which is a pretty good sign of a good night! One of the highlights of the food at the reception was a seafood platter to start with. This was especially good news seeing as there were only a couple of us at the table who were eating from the platter! Lucky, lucky me!

Tuesday was the little chef's birthday, so we had a birthday excursion, birthday pizza and my wonderfully talented sister made him an awesome cake which perfectly reflects his current interest slash addiction slash obsession!


What I really wanted to post about though was a trip to the Royal Melbourne Show on Wednesday with the little chef, my sister and brother in law and my two nephews! It was a gorgeous day and I think everyone enjoyed themselves immensely.

Here are a few photos of the day:




Devonshire Tea at the CWA Cafeteria - perfect scones!

Apple slinky


One of the things that we did do was attend a cooking demonstration in the Paddock to Table pavilion. The two presenters called themselves the Butcher and the Chef because one was a butcher, and yes, the other was a chef. They demonstrated the following recipe for Vietnamese Lamb and I have to say, it smelt absolutely delicious!

As part of the demonstration, the butcher started off with a leg of lamb  that he then used to show where the rump steaks would come from and then got rid of most of the fat from the piece of meat and then cut that into steaks.

The chef then took over, demonstrating how to make this recipe which I have to say looks pretty easy as long as you have all the ingredients and have enough time to marinate the meat for the hour or two that was recommended.


Vietnamese Lamb Rump

 4 x 120g lamb rump steaks
The Butcher and the Chef
1 tablespoon ginger puree
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon turmeric powder
2 tablespoons caster sugar
1/3 cup (80ml) Chinese rice wine or dry sherry
2 tablespoons fish sauce
2 limes, juiced
1/4 long red chilli, finely chopped
2 tablespoons sunflower oil
1 medium brown onion, finely sliced
1 butter lettuce
1 cup each coriander and mint leaves




1. For the marinade, combine ginger, one clove of chopped garlic, turmeric, one tablespoon of sugar and rice wine. Trim any excess fat off the lamb and rub in marinade.

2. Sweet chilli dressing; whisk together the remaining sugar and two tablespoons of water, add the fish sauce and lime juice and stir to dissolve sugar completely. Add the remaining garlic and chilli.

3. Heat the oil in a large frying pan on a medium heat. Drain the lamb from the marinade and add to the frying pan. Cook for eight minutes, turning occasionally on all sides. Remove from the frying pan, add onion and cook for one minute or until just softened.

4. To serve, slice lamb and distribute along with onion in lettuce cups and pour on dressing. Add coriander and mint and top with chilli if you desire.

We collected a couple of recipe booklets and there are some delicious recipes included. You can see the lamb booklet here



Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. For more information, see the welcome post.  

29 comments:

  1. That is one seriously fantastic and original birthday cake! I've only been to the show in Perth once: it was a total disappointment after the Ekka in Brisbane. I'm glad you all had a great time.

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    1. My sister is very talented, and let's face it, much more motivated than I would ever be! To be honest, I was surprised by how much smaller Melbourne show seemed compared to Adelaide show, but seeing as I haven't been to that for nearly 20 years I could be remembering it a lot different to the actual reality!

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  2. Those scones have me drooling...and the two chefs look pretty hot, too. :) God, I'm hopeless. What is with me these days?

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  3. Replies
    1. They were lovely and light. One day I will try and make some and see if I can get them light or if they will end up being the hard as a rock version of scones.

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  4. That cake is totally awesome. Wow!

    Looks like a great show -- complete with fun rides (for someone; I don't generally do rides).

    The lamb sounds delicious. And thanks for sharing the lamb booklet. We have lamb ribs in the freezer, and I never know what to do with them. I'll have to try the recipe in the booklet.

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    1. I don't do rides anymore either, so I was on babysitting duties while everyone else went!

      Will be interested to hear how you get on with the lamb ribs.

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  5. Looks like a really fun time for all! The lamb sounds so good. Happy birthday to the Little Chef, that is one awesome cake!

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  6. Oh yum, those scones... and that cake looks fantastic, very well made :)

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  7. Lamb is not the most popular meat here, but I live it...wonder if I can get my hands on some rump steaks.

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    1. I love lamb, but don't cook it all that often because it tends to be a bit expensive.

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  8. The CWA scones are my first port of call at the show! (And that gamer cake is incredible)

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    1. The CWA cafeteria was definitely the best value food place that I saw at the show.

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  9. What a fun day! And I love the cake your sister made- so very clever.

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  10. The scones do look perfect. That cut of lamb steaks has never shown up at my grocery, but there is no reason chops could not be substituted. Some of the lamb for sale here is imported from Australia and tends to be expensive. The combo of herbs and spices in this dish sounds appealing.

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    1. Given that you end up slicing the meat anyway I am sure that you could substitute something else.

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  11. The cake is amazing! Kudos to your sister

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    1. Thanks Peggy Ann. I thought it was amazing too!

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  12. Lovely lamb recipe. As it happens my next week's Food on Friday is on lamb so I do hope you pop by to link in! Have a lovely day.

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  13. Three things ... amaaazing cake, cool tipsy shot of the Ferris wheel, and yummy recipe ... busy week for you!

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    1. Thanks Susan! It's been a good week. It will be hard to go back to work tomorrow!

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  14. The cake looks like real! My Snapshot is http://goo.gl/DncFP

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  15. I'm not a big fan of lamb, but the scones look amazing!

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  16. We had apple slinkies at the show too! They were really fun, good way to eat an apple.

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