Asian Banquet, food from my travels

Asian Banquet.

Wow this feels like so long ago!! Twas only 3 weeks but so much as happened since then, hence the lack of and delay in bloggin!

I think i ended up doing about 12 courses as many were little bites of fun, such as the momos from Tibet/north India which we served with a vegetable broth. When we were staying in the Himalayas this was what we ate and the family we were living with taught us how to make them. Simple little dumplings but oh so much fun! A community of farmers and preservers, they were an amazing bunch up there, blocked off from the rest of India by snow for the majority of the year, we were on a 60 hour bus journey there as got caught behind a landslide..... anyway I digress.

I made little Char Sui pork buns which I've wanted to make for so long as I absolutely love them! I used some of the belly to BBQ, well, first marinate overnight and then roast n baste which produced an incredibly moreish pork that I ate much of and used the rest the stuff some very simple dough which we then steamed. Delish.

The bread was sourdough of course and was laced with Kim Chi, which resulted in a super tangy and mind twitching bread. There were lots of demands for more, even after we ran out!!

We filleted and cured some trout which we then gently smoked to produce a rather delightful component to go on our betel leaves Thai street food style, mixed with peanuts, chillies, palm sugar, shrimp paste and a whole other array of goodies, frickin love this things!!

Malaysian inspired chicken skewers were awesome. Chicken thighs marinated over night in cumin, paprika, coriander, tumeric, curry powder and sugar, onto the skewers just before service and then grilled. I had to get the blow torch out to finish them off as the grill was weak. Plus I love getting the blow torch out. I'd wanted to set up a BBQ out front and do this course proper street style but figured some drunk passerby may start messing with it, I know I would!!!

We did a course of oyster po-boys which consisted of a deep fried oyster on a siracha laced lettuce leaf on sourdough baguette, a reference to the poor mans sandwich, apparently. Big thumbs up for this!


We made a really tangy sour orange curry using chillies and tamarind which we poached some pollack in and served with morning glory (a type of plant) and some long beans. Cleansing and happiness giving.

One of my favourite dishes of all time. This makes me smile from the inside out and really tickles me. Pork belly with holy basil and chillies. A really balanced sauce with palm sugar, a touch of fish sauce, ginger, garlic, chillies and lastly holy basil. With crisp belly pork I just melt, seriously.

The Vietnamese beef short rib was cooked overnight in coconut water and was melting by the time we served it. The accompanying salad of carrot, cabbage and onion with lemon juice, sugar and fish sauce served to cut through this rich dense deep piece of meat that was so good!!

The dessert always a favourite of mine was a spiced chocolate pudding with a lime marshmallow, peanut brittle and a raspberry foam. I thoroughly enjoyed making and serving this, balancing sweet with sharp and bitter whilst also playing with textures, joy!

I had a few puddings left so I ate one for breakfast the next day, bit of yoghurt and granola, yum!

I did actually eat two after dinner on the same day, sounds unbelievable but its incredibly and unfortunately true. Shame on me, sort of!!