The Japanese know how to do a packed lunch. Bento begins from childhood, where mothers all around Japan make adorable boxes of food for their children to bring as a school lunch. But for the rest of us who aren’t as lucky, packing a visually appealing bento can be difficult. After all, where do you start?
Well I’ve got just the guide for you: this is what I’ve learnt about how to pack a bento!
Yakitori is one of the simplest dishes in Japanese cuisine, and yet so commonly maligned. Literally translated into “grilled chicken” (yaki=grilled, tori=chicken), these chicken skewers are a favourite of the Japanese especially after a late night drinking, and are served up at various street stands shrouded in smoke emanating from hot coals. And making them at home can really be as simple as threading on some cubed chicken, and firing up that barbecue.
The secret to this amazing dish? Read More
Valentine’s Day is around the corner, and the shops are filled with all sorts of cakes and sweets that you can buy to impress your significant other. Well sometimes a girl can get too darned lazy to bake and assemble a cake, so what do you do? Enter the Stuffed Pancake Cake.
I remember when I first heard about New York’s Katz’s Deli and their towering beauties of Reubens. Thin slices of salt beef are layered like a puff pastry put together with brute force and New York grunt, and the whole sandwich (can you even call it that anymore?) stands proud, dripping with juices from all the meat and steam. And naturally, after that, I had to assuage the empty reuben shaped hole in my heart…perhaps Reuben and Moore can help me out?
2 bite sliders (3 for $15)
Pork shoulder: pulled pork, smoked chilli, Apple and fennel coleslaw
Wagyu salt beef: chipotle mayo, sauerkraut, shaved pickles
Chicken and charred corn: pulled chicken, BBQ sauce, carrot and coriander coleslaw
Reuben wagyu cheese burger ($14)
Wagyu beef burger, Swiss cheese, pastrami, lettuce and chipotle mayo
Okay, so this time we decided to get a bit, uh, creative. I’ve long decided that if the Reubens at Reuben and Moore were the “best Reubens in Sydney”, then maybe Reubens aren’t really my thing after all – I always find the bread is too hard, which throws the ratio off, and I just end up wanting the salt beef with no distractions. Which is usually what I get, sometimes with a bit of ham.
This time though, we were in a burger mood, with three wee sliders (for sharing, because calories don’t count when you share), and a Reuben Wagyu Cheese Burger, which just sounds like a sandwich and a burger had a love child. And I’m down with a good crossover, as long as it’s delicious.
2 bite sliders (3 for $15)
The sliders were just the right size for a person with as short a food attention span as…hey there are dumplings over there! Filled to the brim with lush, juicy ingredients, every bite was full of flavour, even though in isolation, the elements were pretty average. The Wagyu Salt Beef was my favourite, but that could also be because I couldn’t actually tell the difference between the Chicken and the Pork because there was so much sweet sweet sauce. Blessing or a curse: that one’s up to you.
Reuben wagyu cheese burger ($14)
It may just be my order, but the execution of the burgers just don’t seem to scale in quite the same way. The Reuben Wagyu Beef Burger was a bit lacklustre in the seasoning department – no mean feat considering that there was pastrami, cheese AND mayo in it. The bun ate a little stale to me, and it hinted at the Reuben themed burger it had the potential to be, but left you disappointed.
Much like my hopes and dreams for my life.
Food: 0.5/1
The service here has always been pretty consistent, thank goodness. They are always polite and professional, and on the customer-facing end, incredibly efficient. Sure it’s a little impersonal – once in a while you get the feeling that they would rather be anywhere but there, though they’re never rude to your face – but hey, it’s not marketing itself to be a high flutin’ fine dining restaurant, right?
Service: 0.5/1
At $14 ish for a burger, I’m not sure that I would necessarily call this value for money. Size wise, I guess it’s okay, but when you have playas like Josh in the game, I’m not sure that charging that for a below average burger really makes the cut anymore.
Value for money: 0.5/1
Reuben and Moore has always branded itself in-between the classy and the casual: i.e. not quite subway, but it still IS a sandwich joint. I wouldn’t blink twice at walking in with flip-flops and a singlet, but it’s not quite filled to the brim with after-school teenagers. A happy medium, even if it’s not bursting with vitality.
Vibe: 0.5/1
I used to visit Reuben and Moore way more often when I worked in the area – I always ordered the Salt Beef Plate with Pickles – but since I work somewhere else now, I don’t quite see the need to make dedicated trip back for the food or experience. Give it a shot if you have a serious hankering for salt beef.
Otherwise, I’m sure there are other options out there too.
Bonus points: 0/1
It took me 20 years to pin down my mother’s Singapore Chilli Crab recipe – I spent years watching her in the kitchen, but never knew the actual quantities to anything until this week, when I pinned down the recipe for my weekly Periscope! It was a great time hanging out with my mum and learning a bit more about our national dish, and even getting exact instructions on how to quickly kill a live crab (because that’s the best freshness seal!).
So you love eating, and better yet, you love making your own food. But authentic ethnic foods can be really hard to get right, especially when they have a big culture of home cooking. Korean foods, for example, can often be intimidating to the people outside looking in – after all, how do you really know if a recipe you find is authentic? Well, it’s easier than you think to go from lost and confused, to your very own Korean food party! Just follow these 10 steps:
Read More
If you think I’m crazy for going to eat ramen in the middle of summer – heck, even I think I’m nuts – then I must be certifiably insane. But good food does wonders, and, as my second afternoon in a summer at Manpuku will attest, really good air-conditioning.
Yeah, 40C heat ain’t got nuthin’ on that air conditioning.
Kono Deaini Kanshashite Aijou To Jonetsu Konete Isshoukenmei Tsukutta Uchirano Icchan Sukina Manpuku Shiawase Ramen, $14.90 (with extra ni tamago)
Soy based pork and chicken soup. Pork belly, bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, shallots, seaweed sheet with wavy noodles.
Tsukemen, $15.90 (with chashu instead of softened pork rib)
Soy based tokotsu sour dipping soup. Softened pork rib, bamboo shoot, eggs, ultra seaweed sheet and shallots with wavy noodles.
Hiyashi Chuka, $13.50
Cold noodle with chicken soy based sour soup. Comes with ham, cucumber, bean sprouts, egg, tomato, seaweed, snow sprout.
When a ramen place has three different types of noodles for their different ramen, you can bet that the choices they make is deliberate, and not much is left to fate.
Chef Suzuki – who got head hunted from another ramen restaurant for those skillz- tells me that Manpuku works with a noodle master, who suggests the best noodle type for that particular soup. A tonkotsu, for example, works best with a dried noodle that provides the best al dente texture that will stand up to such rich broth.
Kono Deaini Kanshashite Aijou To Jonetsu Konete Isshoukenmei Tsukutta Uchirano Icchan Sukina Manpuku Shiawase Ramen, $14.90 (pictured with added egg)
Our first bowl of ramen was the Kono Deaini Kanshashite Aijou To Jonetsu Konete Isshoukenmei Tsukutta Uchirano Icchan Sukina Manpuku Shiawase Ramen, also affectionately known as the Long Name Ramen. And you know what, the name was not the only thing that was a mouthful. (Heh? Geddit? Ramen joke) The soup was a great middle ground between the pork and the chicken, rich without being unctuous, with plenty of delicate flavour throughout. And if, like me, you yearn for something a bit less delicate, then I would suggest adding the garlic paste for bonus points. Fresh garlic is blended with drinking sake to mellow it out slightly, and it brings an amazing Victoria-Secret level body to the soup.
Hiyashi Chuka, $13.50
The Hiyashi Chuka, on the other hand, was very much my speed. Springy cold noodles get topped with finely sliced ham, egg, cucumber, seaweed, tomato and bean sprouts, and tossed in a chicken stock/soy/mustard dressing. I swear, if this is a typical salad, no one would ever complain about eat salad ever again. It was tangy, refreshing, and just so SO moreish. Chef Suzuki says that the sourness means that he never gets tired of eating this noodle, and I’m inclined to agree. It felt so light on the stomach, and my palate was partying with such a riot of flavours that I just kept eating till well beyond the point that I was full. Shame that it’s only here for the summer season, though. Personally, I’d find a reason to eat this all year round!
Tsukemen, $15.90
We also tried the new and improved Tsukemen, with a less salty gravy/broth for you to dip your noodles into. This time, we also had the chashu (sliced rolled pork) instead of the softened pork rib like the last time, but I must say, if I had to do all over, it’ll be the pork rib again…and again, and again. There’s nothing like a first love, huh.
Chef Suzuki (left) and his team
I know it’s not the fairest thing to say, since I was invited as a guest, but if you can, have a chat to Chef Suzuki, because that just augmented my experience and made me hyper aware of every element of love that went into the deceptively simple bowl (bowls!) sitting in front of me. Knowing that the soup, for example, takes at least six hours of simmering to perfect, or that the noodles are rolled thrice with a $100,000 machine to give you that body and texture, just makes me thankful for all the labor that goes into creating the ramen experience at Manpuku.
He even told me that he tried pressure cooking the stock to speed up the process, but that created a “brown” smell (from the Maillard reaction) that he wasn’t after. How cool is that?!
Otherwise, I like the efficiency of service still, much like the last time. Ramen still came out at lightning speeds, and the staff were polite and lovely across the board. Nothing out of the ordinary, but super pleasant, like the last time we were there. ?
We always knew that the ramen here isn’t the cheapest around, have you seen the portions?! It’s huge! I know you can probably get a cheaper lunch elsewhere in Chatswood, but for the portions that you’re getting and the quality, I think it’s a pretty good bang for your buck.
Also, I only just realised how many items there actually are on the menu, so there’s lots of variety and something for everyone! Score.
It’s still super chill, and the the vibe is still really relaxed. Maybe it’s the 40C day that we rocked up on, but it’s totally the place that you rock up in shorts and flip flops, and have a casual bowl of noodles.
And they still yell random things whilst cooking your ramen. Tee hee. How’s that for atmosphere?
I’ve always known that ramen broth takes forever and that there are different noodle types for your soup, so in that sense, Manpuku isn’t reinventing the wheel here. But I’m sure there are plenty of ramen shops that don’t spend the time, and for that I’m grateful still.
It’s also really interesting that Chef Suzuki, like Chef Haru of Ramen Ikkyu, has a fine dining background. It gives him a different understanding of how to balance flavours, and brings a new perspective to a very traditional art form. To quote him, there is no right or wrong ramen: it is an art form, and his experiences allow him to express the art in different ways.
Oh and if you’re wondering what a chef who is around ramen all day every day eats?
Cereal. Chocopops, to be exact!
