Tag: Food

Duck Noodle Bowl, Noodle Inn, London Dim Sum at Noodle Inn, London

Noodle Inn
25 Oxford Street,
London,
W1D 2DW
020 7287 5953
www.innnoodle.co.uk
Tube: Tottenham Court Road

The Cost & Date: Tuesday December 16th 2008 for lunch :: £20.90 for 2.

Food & Drink: For appetizers, we had steamed pork & chive dumplings (you get four, we had eaten two in the photo). I had a duck la-mian soup (above), and my friend had a pork/chai siu la-mian soup. We also had some tea.

Setting: Small, relatively clean. Small toilet though.

Service: Straightforward, not bad.

Story: Another connection through my flatmate, but this restaurant is fairly well known and popular due to its central location. My flatmate actually met one of the cooks that actually does make its specialty, handmade la-mian. Whenever you pass by the window on Oxford Street, it’s all steamed up due to the hot food and the noodle making. It’s nice, warm, and cozy. A good respite from the insanity of Oxford Street. I liked the noodles. You can tell it is handmade and not from a premade package. It’s not too salty either. The dim sum was not bad at all.

Overall: I’d definitely come back, but it can be a bit busy on the weekends and later weekdays. It’s not too expensive, but I think it’s more or less a good deal considering London restaurants. Better than some Chinatown establishments.

Magic Hot Fudge Pudding Cake

This is a staple for one of my friends. She’s a domestic goddess and excellent at baking. I’ve had this cake before and I did mess up on my own versions only because I realised my dish is too small. This is a cake that requires no solid chocolate which is good if you all you have on hand is cocoa powder and you don’t want to chop up chocolate or can find mass quantities of chocolate chips (why is it that I can only buy it in 100 grams bags here?). I think this is a pretty inventive cake probably from an old vintage cookbook of my friend’s mum. It was a hit at the birthday I baked this for. As usual, I cut out a lot of sugar, and while I usually use brown sugar in my recipes, I followed the recipe and used white for this one.

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March 19th, 2012: This entry was an unfinished draft from December 2008. It is mostly complete so I decided to post it anyway just for my own records.

This week in food: fudge, chicken soup with tofu and mushroom, chicken, fishball and chinese vermicelli soup with mushrooms and celery,

Monday, December 15th, 2008

  • Breakfast: Cereal with yogurt
  • I made Fudge.
  • Lunch: Leftover rice and lemony chickpea stir fry
  • Snack/Early Dinner: Flatmate made noodles and stir fried beef with beans and zuchini
  • Dinner: Chicken soup with tofu and mushroom: I boiled and simmered two pieces of dark chicken meat in white pepper, salt, and ginger for about 25 minutes, added mushrooms, then green ions, and then silken tofu. I ate it with rice.

Tuesday, December 16th, 2008

  • Breakfast: Oatmeal with honey, raisins. Baked apple slices in the microwave with brown sugar and butter. Banana.
  • Lunch at Noodle Inn: Roasted Duck Ramee
  • Snack: blueberry cheesecake on Regent Street
  • Dinner: I made dinner by baking chicken (rinsed, dried, rubbed in olive oil, salt & pepper, in oven for 400’F for 30 then an additional 10 min at 350 until thigh temperature at 185) and making cauliflower and bean soup.

Wednesday, December 17th, 2008

  • Breakfast: Leftovers
  • Lunch: Out
  • Dinner: Cafe Opium in Oxford

Thursday, December 18th 2008

  • Snack: Cookie and Cafe Latte from Starbucks
  • Dinner: Rice. Hardboiled egg. Golden

Friday, December 19th 2008

  • Snack:
  • Dinner: Soup with chicken boiled and simmered in ginger, white pepper, and salt, then I added Chinese vermicelli (brean thread), fishballs, mushrooms, celery and green onions

March 19th, 2012: This entry was an unfinished draft from December 2008. It is mostly complete so I decided to post it anyway just for my own records.

Highlights this week: Magic Pudding Cake, Dense Hot Chocolate, and stir fried lemony chickpeas. Continue reading →

Highlights include blondies, baked potatoes, and lots more cheese.

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Project 267/365 - Blondies

Lots of lovely dark brown sugar make this baked good. Chocolate chips made this extra gooey. The top skin was lovely. As usual, I cut a lot of sugar and some oil. I used a mix of margarine and sunflower and grapeseed oil because I did not have canola on hand at the time. They were chewy and sweet. Nice and decadent, but not as much as brownies, but the chocolate really adds a great touch. As I am not someone with a sweet tooth (funny since I bake so much), I would definitely cut the sugar down further.

Blondies
adapted from Simply Recipes

  • 1/3 cup of butter, margarine or oil (melted)
  • 3/4 cup of tightly packed dark brown sugar
  • 1 egg, lightly beaten
  • 1 teaspoon of vanilla
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/8 teaspoon of baking soda
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1 cup of all-purpose flour
  • 1/3 cup of chocolate chips (optional or whatever chips you want to add)

1 Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly butter and flour an 8X8 pan. Whisk together the melted butter and sugar in a bowl.

2 Add the egg and vanilla extract and whisk.

3 Add the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt, mix it all together. Add the butterscotch chips or other mix-ins.

4 Pour into the pan and spread evenly. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool. Cut into squares and serve.

Makes 9 blondies.

Highlights this week include roasted new potatoes with red onion, lots of egg fried rice, and homemade tomato sauce.

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Highlights for this week include mashed sweet potatoes, grilled cheese sandwiches (cheddar and goat cheese versions), spinach, tomato and egg stir fried together.

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Project 252/365 - My Old Place Chinese Restaurant

My Old Place: Authentic Northern Chinese
88 Middlesex Street
London, E1 7EZ
020 7247 2200
Tube: Liverpool Street Station, Aldgate

The Cost & Date: Thursday 20th November 2008 :: £65 for 5.

Food & Drink: We had soup, lamb on skewers, pig’s feet, fried crab, celery- mushroom- shrimp stir fry, this other dish I can’t remember and white rice of course. We had aloe vera for a drink.

Setting: Laid back Chinese style. No place mats, mandarin speaking staff, and 80% of customers were young Chinese. Apparently there’s a big basement with karaoke too. Type of place that is busy most nights with regular customers.

Service: Busy, but food came quick and fast. Card machine was broken. Good to bring cash to restaurants like this which are more on the laid back and unpretentious.

Story: One of my flatmates has been in London for five years and invited me and a few others to this place. She first went to this restaurant’s other location in Bethnal Green, but apparently that place is very small. I like this place, and the portion sizes are bigger than what you would pay for in Chinatown. The grilled lamb on skewers was really good; I definitely recommend it. The pig’s feet weren’t bad, but I’ve had better (at home and in China). We were all stuffed though and it is honestly a very good deal compared to some other places. We had leftovers and it was on the spicy side too which is nice.

Overall: Recommended for Northern Chinese food. Bring cash, and call ahead if you’re more than four any time and probably good to call ahead in general. People often line up for this place.

Project 244/365 - Roasted Sweet Potatoes Project 247/365 - Chocolate Truffles Project 243/365 - Las Iguanas

Highlights this week include baked apples, truffles, and dinner out at a latin restaurant.

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Stealing the idea from The GirlAlive British Food Experience, here is the first list of “British” foods that I’ve tried and my thoughts on them. You can get a lot of them in North America and elsewhere, but they are probably not as readily or popular as they are here.

Digestives: While most of the foods in this list will not carry over when I move out of the UK, digestives are not one of them. I liked them before coming here. I had the McVittie’s Dark Chocolate digestives the first couple weeks here, and I love them. Pricey at around £1.20 (and regular ones just below that), but I had them on sale at the time. Like many people, I dunk mine in tea, but I also like them plain. Great with Earl Grey (which I will always think of Jean-Luc Picard and now, living in the UK).

Cadbury Chocolate: It deserves it’s own line because it’s ubquitous and different from NA Cadbury. In Canada, I never really ate store bought chocolate bars because I prefer dark chocolate and those were always too sugary. The chocolate here is sweet, but just a bit more richer. I think there is more milk content in these. I prefer these to NA chocolate bars if I had to choose. I don’t have them regularly, but I like Buttons and the Milk Chocolate line.

Chocolate Hazelnut Spread: Specifically the one made by Green & Blacks (fairtrade chocolate brand now owned by Cadbury). If I am going to have so much sugar on my bread, might as well be organic sugar. I opted for this instead of Nutella which I never bought back in Canada since it was so sugary/I was indifferent. G&B’s spread does have its first ingedient as sugar, but it is lot better than I remember Nutella being. I have spooned it out of the jar when I had cravings for chocolate or sugary. It is that good! I am trying to make my jar last though. I would continue to buy the G&B when I leave here if I could, but not chocolate hazelnut spread in general.

Mince Pies: My first time with these were the Sainsbury variety. Then I recently had the Starbucks version; the latter were actually just a bit better since they had icing sugar on top. They are good, but not required for my Christmas enjoyment. Maybe if it gets more festive and I try some more expensive ones.

Flapjacks: 2 for £1 at the convenience store. While these were sweet, I am very eager to try to bake my own as I like this concept of chewy, sweet oaty goodness. More later as I am going to use honey instead of golden syrup.

Banoffee Pie: An English dessert cake of toffee, bananas, and chocolate. I had this in a restaurant drizzled with ginger caramel. It was excellent. I need to store this at the back of my brain so I can remake it for myself one day. Otherwise, I just had a really good version in the restaurant

Crumpets: Less than £1 for six. Very nice, soft and buttery when toasted. I am a girl who likes carbs after all. Probably not as good for you as whole wheat bread or pita, but I like the texture and the crunchy underside.

Project 243/365 - Las Iguanas

Las Iguanas
36-38 Dean Street
Soho
London W1D 4PS
www.iguanas.co.uk
0207 494 4716
Tube: Tottenham Court Road, Leicester Square, Picadilly Circus

The Cost & Date: Tuesday, 11 November 2008 Dinner. £44.10 (with 12.5% service charge) for two, me and my friend M.

Food & Drink: We just made right as happy hour ends which meant we had two Caipirhnas for the price of one. Rioja Chorizo for a starter; we each ordered the paella and followed it with a chocolate banoffie pie. M also had tea.

Setting: This is a chain restaurant. Vintage meets modern explosion? It’s a big space, comfortable tables and warm atmosphere. It’s dark, but offers intimacy. Not crowded on a tuesday night which is typical, but not dead either.

Service: Pretty decent, but not outstanding.

Story: M and I were here for hours since we had not seen each other for months, and now she’s in Paris and I’m in London. We could afford to splurge, and I know £50 for two is not splurging in this town, but it is where we come from. We stayed for hours, and the best part of the meal was the drinks which were like mojitos, minty, limey and cool and the banoffie pie which was drizzled with really good caramel (and I’m, not even a big fan of caramel). The chorizo was a tad oily, but we were hunrgy and we both liked chorizo. The paella had two mussels, some chicken, some squid, and one big shrimp. It was not stellar, but not bad. I’d try something else if I were ever to come here again.

Overall: Really not that bad for a chain. Not as awful as Garfunkels (so bleh that I won’t even review that). Recommended for drinks (Happy hour 1700 to 1900), and they had a tapas special between 1600-1800.