All things ginger

My weekend begun at 7am Saturday; I baked a Sour Cream and Ginger cake from the Kylie Kwong recipe book, for my brother in law who recently lost his mother after a long illness.

It's a simple, unassuming looking cake.  Golden and rustic-looking, sunken in the middle.

But cutting into it reveals the delicious and unusual little secret - an inside layer of sour cream.  I'm never sure what the ethics of reproducing other people's recipes in my blog are - particularly when I can't find it published anywhere online.  So let's just say this: before baking, the cake batter itself is quite thick.  You make an indent in the top of the batter after you've spread it into the cake pan, and pour in some light sour cream, which then bakes through the whole cake, making it moist and slightly savoury on the inside - a little like having a cheesecake centre.  On the top, raw sugar is sprinkled so that it forms a sweet crust above the sour cream.  It's a nice combo of sweet + ginger + savoury + tart flavours, as well as several different textures; cakey + soft + a gentle crunch on top.

Sunday I took a friend to Gingerboy for her birthday, for the Sunday Hawker lunch.  A whopping FOURTEEN courses consisting mostly of different types of dumplings, along with some obligatory chinese broccoli and sticky rice.  Some favourites:  spicy fried calamari, chicken satay dumplings, oxtail potsticker dumplings, salt and pepper tofu, and the apple & cinnamon dumpling at the end.  Oh, and the Cherry Gimlet cocktails were a lovely tangy accompaniment to the flavours on the degustation menu.

Where are the photos of the actual food?  Sorry, it simply wasn't on the agenda today, I was too busy enjoying the flavours to worry about the visuals.

Billy Kwong

I had wanted to dine at Kylie Kwong's restaurant in Surry Hills ever since I chanced across an episode of her Simply Magic series some years ago.  I was blown away by her passion and love of Chinese food and culture, and shortly afterwards I ate my first Shanghai dumpling - beginning a love affair of my own with Chinese cooking.  And I've since had the pleasure to meet several friends who have lived in China, all of them only too happy to educate my palate.

The guiding philosophy behind Billy Kwong restaurant is:  "to leave as small and light an environmental footprint as possible, to give back to the community whenever and wherever we can, and to think globally and act locally".  Ahhh - be still my beating heart.

Under the red moody glow of a huge Chinese silk lantern in the small dining area, we ordered Sung Choi Bao, Kylie's signature Crispy Skin duck, fried rice, steamed Chinese greens - and the night's special, yabbies with thinly sliced vegetables and a chilli sauce.

The Sung Choi Bao was earthy and delicious, and served with a magnificent chilli sambal - which I put aside to have with the main course - it was also fantastic drizzled over the rice.  The yabbies came served in half shells, the meat pulled out first by our forks, until we got more confident and lost our manners - poking indexes in and pulling the meat free, shoving it in our mouths and licking the juice from our fingers.  But the highlight for me was the duck.  The portions were very generous - it may have been almost the whole bird - the skin not only crispy but also disintegrated  and gave way upon biting into it, and the meat so succulent and juicy it was hard not to race back to the plate for more.  The sauce it was swimming in was perfect - robust and sweet, with orange segments and cinnamon quills scattered about.  And the fragrance, incredible. 

Billy Kwong's does not accept bookings so we were left to chance getting a table - as it turned out we had to share a large table with another couple, who were enjoying a vegetarian degustation.  I did feel a little sorry for them, sharing with us ravenous duck-loving Melburnians- who made a disgraceful mess of our side of the table, adding to the general ambiance with our meat aromas, slurping and vocalising our delight at each mouthful.  We felt so comfortable there and were surrounded by many fellow food lovers who also didn't bother too much about table manners.  It was very refreshing - not only in terms of the food, but also the overall atmosphere - it felt good to be eating there on so many levels.

The evening was topped off by a simple dessert of poached pears with an almond praline and yogurt sauce.  It cleaned the palate well and was a perfect full stop behind succinct sentences of spice, sweet, crunch, salt, sour and succulence.  I couldn't resist purchasing a signed copy of Kylie's book "It Tastes Better" -  my husband joked that maybe their signature duck dish recipe would be in there and we shared a laugh.  Until I opened the book to discover that, yes - the duck dish was indeed included in the book.  Generous as her servings, Kylie Kwong is also willing to share recipes which some other high profile chefs would - justifiably - rather keep to themselves.