Weekly pasta

I'm getting better at this homemade pasta thing. The dough freezes quite well too so I made a large batch, portioned it out and froze it. I still makes a mess rolling it out but I'm starting to get the handle on it and it's getting better. The pasta has so much more flavor than dried or even the "fresh" pasta sold in stores. I made a pretty good ricotta gnocchi a while back and I'm thinking about adapting that to use as a filling for some ravioli.

Home Cookin'

I've haven't had much to write about lately. Works been keeping me pretty busy and the weather hasn't been great to want to be outside. So, in some of this down time, I've been doing a bit more home cooking.

The greatest revelation I've had is that homemade pasta us so much better than dried or even the frozen fresh at the grocery store. It definitely takes a bit more effort but it is so worth it. I'm by no means a pro but what's great is that it seems like homemade pasta is pretty forgiving. My last few attempts have been a but wet on the dough but working through adding a bit more flour seems to come out. I think I'd have ether luck if there were two other people helping me roll the pasta out, but doing smaller sheets and making sure the machine is well floured seems to work ok.

Then it's a scant two to three minutes in boiling salted water and directly into the pan with the sauce and you're set. It seems like a 3 to 2 ratio of flor to egg seems to work with a well floured surface.

I need to work a bit on the presentation, but it tasted pretty good with a slow wet roasted lamb ragu and a Tasmanian Pinot.



I think I'll be eating the ragu for a while (I still don't know how to cook a proper portion for one person) so I threw some in top of a creamy polenta. Which worked out quite well.



Plus, cooking at home allows me to dig into my growing wine collection I've picked up through my travels.

It's been a while

I haven't had many reasons to post lately but I thought I'd put a few of the pictures from the past few weeks up. A few weeks ago I spent the day on the harbour cruising around to three or four eastern suburbs beaches. We drove around and when got tired of a beach, moved on to the next. It was a great day and now I want to buy a 37 foot boat.





































I was pretty glad I made it to the dock because that was the result if a fantastic steak and wine. The wine was so good I got online that night ad bought a few, direct from the vineyard.






This was a good Austrian Riesling because it was the Summer of Riesling, after all. And for those who don't drink Riesling, try it. It doesn't have to be sweet. In fact the crap wines are sweet but the good ones are fantastically acidic and they taste of the soil.












Here's the menu at Fix St James. Go there now!!!!!'






Here's the end of the t-bone when the chef let me sign the expediting bar (ignore the phallic look to it):






Sydney then had both the QE2 and QM2 meet in the harbour. The two largest cruise ships in the world met at the opera house. While they were massive, I still don't see the appeal.


















And the perspective shot of the largest cruise ship in the world.






I have just about all the wine I've acquired since being in Oz. I have one more case to bring home, but now it's the fun part. Time to drink.






We then hit a few wines. The winner was the '91 Cullen Reserve Cabernet Merlot.







Some other wines in this time were:













Just finished dinner at FIX again. Great food and spectacular wine. Had a 2006 d'meure Tassie Pinot. This was a wine not on the menu. The restaurant had an allotment of 3. The owner had 1 to make sure it was good, the second bottle went to the wine director if Australia and this bottle was offered to us. Unbelievable. Great softness but monster flavour.





I really wanted the T-bone again until Stu brought out the 48 hour braised lamb shoulder. Yes, 48 hours.






He paired this with a locally made Sangiovese. An unusual grape for Oz but that's the crazy, wacky wines that this list offers. As the owner said, he doesn't run the restaurant for the money. It's so he can drink the wines he wants. If that's the case, I want in.

And now, on to my 30s.