Saturday Pig Out

No matter how depressed I'm feeling, food is always a faithful friend. So my self-prescribed therapy involves alot of cooking and eating (I would add baking if my freaking oven wasn't out of order).

Saturday started out quite nicely. I woke up early (though later than I intended) at 7.00am to prepare some Sambal Stuffing, Assam Pedas sauce, and a potato stuffing for Stuffed Squid for the BBQ later in the evening. I cut up and pounded (I must add Food Processor into my TO BUY list) all the ingredients and fried the 3 different dishes till fragrant.

Then it was off to Paddington's Pancakes to meet up with Spot & Snowie, Geekchic and Box, my favourite bloggers who happen to live within a reasonable distance. At least when Geekchic is in town from up north anyway.

So we stuffed our faces with yummy pancakes and coffee. I had Classic Buckleberry - buckwheat pancakes with blueberries in it, served with maple syrup, beef bacon, a dollop of cream cheese and scrambled egg with mushrooms. A yummy combo of savoury and sweet, but I found the pancakes not as 'buckwheaty' as I thought it should be.



I can't remember what the rest had apart from the Full Montys Box and Geek ordered (pancakes with chipolatas, bacon, beans and a sexy wobbly whole fried egg).



But here are the pictures (thanks to Geek's camera).



Hmmm. THIS one looks kinda... er... nevermind.



Anyway, they went on to have tea and cake at Winter Warmers, but I had to scoot to my godsister's baby's full moon party. They had some yummy Indian food catered. The mutton curry was sublime! No pictures though, cos I forgot my camera.

Then it was home to pack up the sauces, stuffing and other ingredients. After which JK and I collected the seafood, bought the ice and prepared the grub at YKK's place. YKK had a brilliant idea - he left the still frozen dory on a tray under the fan. Sure enough, it thawed in no time at all! No need to soak in water!



It was also my first time cleaning squid. Such a messy affair and boy, were they BIG. I was hoping for smaller ones I could stuff whole. So I cut them in half, and some pieces the girls had to skewer both ends to keep the stuffing in.



The thawed dory was then marinated in olive oil and lemon juice for abit, then divided between the assam pedas and lemon butter & dill parcels.



Next, the Selar Fish. Gosh, the fins were so sharp I have tiny little cuts all over my hands now from rubbing salt and turmeric over their bodies. I vengefully snipped them off (the fins, not my hands) with kitchen scissors as I gutted the fish, bless that invention! After stuffing them with Sambal and pre-frying them, they were wrapped in banana leaves and foil.



As we went along, we enjoyed some Single Malt that YL brought over. Soon all the fish parcels were ready and the prawns' sharp bits were lovingly snipped off by JK.



The seafood was fresh and the prawns were amazingly huge and juicy. The dory was a little bland with the lemon butter & dill though. I guess frozen fish like dory needs a more flavourful sauce such as the assam pedas (which turned out pretty yummy, YAY!). I shall use the lemon butter & dill sauce on fresh fish next time.



YL prepared this yummy garlic oil to go with her BBQ veges - simple broccoli, Japanese sweet potatoes, cherry tomatoes, oyster mushrooms, and WHOLE meaty portabello mushrooms. It was so good.





She also made a new potato salad with mustard, lemon juice and chives. But it was left in the fridge and we forgot to take it out! Aaarrggh! I got a taste of it when we were cleaning up though. And gosh, it was SO GOOD I would've eaten more if I wasn't already so stuffed.

So what's a birthday without the birthday cake? Something simple and un-jelak like La Manila's butter pound cake was the perfect dessert. Light, fluffy and delicious. We continued our chit-chat munching on cut fruits and sipping our beer and white wine. We kept it a very small, intimate party of SW's closest friends so we could have decent conversation. It's always much nicer this way.

For recipes to the above (the BBQ stuff anyway, I don't think I'll attempt a buckleberry pancake just yet, heh), hop over to my foodie blog. Sigh, and I'm wondering why I'm putting on weight.