Cook show & tell #1 – Spain
This month’s theme is Spain.
Last month, we decided to get the es&t crew together once a month and try our hand at cooking different types of cuisines. Our first attempt was a random brunch, which turned into a dinner … or a lunchinner. Atleast this month, we had a theme to stick to which was Spanish.
As usual we cooked too much food, but as they say it is always better to have too much food than not enough food.
Say hi to Randy
Each of us takes turns to host a cook up, with the exception of Minh because her kitchen is about the size of a portaloo. Thanks to Teresa this month for offering her kitchen, I hope we didn’t make too much of a mess. Randy seemed to enjoy our company too. It’s the only dog I know which jumps with it’s two paws in the air when you say ” Pray Randy, Pray!”
To get things started ..
Parmesan sticks with spanish prosciutto
With all the cooking going on we needed a snack or two to tie us down until the main meal. This is simple but did the trick. Parmesan and garlic bread sticks served with spanish prosciutto and cream cheese. Not good for the diet conscious but it sure was tasty.
Finally we get to eat
The feast
It only took us 2 hours to cook everything and it was pretty hard having 8 people running around trying to steal a stove for their dish. We could have planned it better and prepared things at home before hand, but the truth of the matter is that all our plans never work anyway!
Truffle infused egg custards w/ crispy spanish prosciutto
This was my contribution for the feast and was adapted from a Thomas Keller recipe in The French Laundry Cookbook which I first saw on Whiteonricecouple’s blog. It is a rather simple recipe of an egg custard. I didn’t have actual truffle oil on me, so I used the oil from a jar of Tetsuya’s black truffle salsa which seemed to do the trick. The hardest part was probably cutting the eggs so I could serve the custard in them, it wasn’t neccessary but it was the novelty of it that made me cut out 8 eggs. I grilled cooked the prosciutto in a fry pan for a few minutes and then chucked them in the oven so they would get dry and crispy.
Seafood paella
Linda is on a bit of hiatus on the blog recently but she still gets really involved with cooking. She whipped up this seafood paella with plenty of fresh mussels, prawns, squid, and chorizo. She couldn’t find any short grain rice and had to use medium grain which seemed to work rather well anyway. Paella is perfect for winter, great comfort food.
Spanish meatballs in tomato sauce
Squishies and Abercrombie made sure we had some spanish meatballs as they are one of my favourite spanish dishes despite it’s simplicity. The sauce was rich, thick, sweet and chunky and complimented the tender beef meatballs perfectly.
Fish balls stuffed with brie cheese
Anything stuffed with cheese has me sold. Squishies and Abercrombie filled the fish balls with brie cheese and they were definately a little explosion of surprises. The brie was melted perfectly as well.
Sangria
Teresa whipped up three dishes including this wonderful sangria. There was enough alchohol in it to leave one of the eight diners a little tipsy, poor form on her behalf!
Spanish Garlic mushrooms (champiñones al ajillo)
These mushrooms were sauteed with garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, fresh parsley and garnished with some cracked pepper.
Spanish sardines
These were perfect when eaten with freshly our baked baguettes. As a kid I use to eat canned tomato sardines on toast and this dish reminded me of the good old days.
Stuffed squids
Another one of Teresa’s creations. I can’t remember exactly what was in these but they definately contained onions, tomato and mushrooms. These were a hit as the squid was cooked perfectly to ensure it wasn’t too chewy wheras the stuffing created a hearty sauce with all it’s juices.
Prawn crocquettes (Croquetas de gambas)
Bui made these and served them with some home made mayonnaise. The crocquettes were filled with sweet and fresh prawns and are great when eaten piping hot.
Spanish style mussels
A Spanish feast wouldn’t be complete without Minh’s Spanish style mussels. Fresh mussels were cooked mainly with tomato, onions and chorizo. The sauce was lapped up constantly with the fresh baguettes.
Dessert
Cinammon rice pudding
Helena has carved herself the dessert niche after her stellar effort last month with the coconut ice cream w/ saffron. This month she whipped up a cinammon rice pudding and Fresh Oranges with Spiced Red Wine Syrup (below). The pudding was great as it wasn’t too sweet nor tasteless.
Fresh Oranges with Spiced Red Wine Syrup
This was definately a hit, it had me begging for seconds and thirds. For the wine, she used a full bodied shiraz but any fruity/spicy equivelent will suffice. She pretty much followed the recipe but added in a peel of orange rind to give extra flavour and removed it when the wine was reduced to 1 cup but left the cinnamon stick in the wine so it could continue to add flavour when sitting in the fridge overnight. It’s such a simple recipe but the flavours were amazing.
Next month’s theme : French
As usual we had too much food but it was a pretty good effort as it was the first time for many of us cooking Spanish food. I’m loving these monthly cook-ups as it gives me the chance to try out a few things I wouldn’t have done at home , not to mention I am a beginner when it comes to cooking so this is a good opportunity to learn a few things too.
Next month’s theme is French which is going to be a real challenge. Stay tuned until next month!
Author
By Howard
We started eatshowandtell in 2008, it was meant to be just a journal of where we ate. The first thing I usually do when I'm looking for a restaurant is check out eatability and the restaurant website. But what is usually missing is pictures of the food, how do I know I'm getting what I expect? This blog hopefully plugs that gap.
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This article was written on 19 May 2009, and is filed under cookshowandtell, Spanish.
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Awesome! I love Spanish food! And they all looked soooo good.
I’m loving your dinner get togethers – what a good idea for the EST crew! If you ever have a few spare seats…*hint hint*
Karen’s last blog post..Carman’s Muesli Rounds
Your egg custards in the carton also remind me of the mushroom foam eggs at Bistro Vue – very nice. In fact, all of the food looks fantastic. Like what Karen said, you should sell seats to your next event – I’d like a ticket, please!
Belle’s last blog post..Yum cha at Zilver, a new favourite
Yum yum, and what a great idea
Well done on the eggshell cutting too.
Helen’s last blog post..Etch Dining, Sydney
Wow! Drooling over all that food! YUM. You cut those eggs pretty perfectly
Betty’s last blog post..Cho Dumpling King
Awesome boys and girls !
Me! Me! I want to come look and eat!
Reemski’s last blog post..Cooking and Eating
Hi Randy! Haha that is awesome that Randy does that when you tell him to pray. How did you manage to cut the eggs without smashing them? They look fantastic. I’m totally sold on the brie filled fish balls too!
Steph’s last blog post..Dontack, Crows Nest
What a feast! Everything looks so tasty. And how cute is Randy!!
Y’s last blog post..What to make for a friend who has good news and bad news
yum!!! i just finished dinner and i’m drooling looking at pics ..
Oh Yummmy feast!! Love the eggy custard presentation
Needed some zombie faces drawn on them though 
Hee hee the mushrooms are quite precariously balanced on the railing..
Seriously, 8 person blog team? So didn’t expect it to be that large.
I’ve done the one kitchen with one dish cooked by each attendee before and it can somewhat be a logistic hassle to deal with, and we only had 3! It’s great that you were able to produce these results with 8.
Did any of the food end up getting colder than how it should have been, considering the coordination required to get everything ready together?
Wow, they all look yummy esp the egg custards and fish balls…yum yum!
pigpigscorner’s last blog post..Daikon Radish Soup
Wow! What a spread!
Looking forward to the French menu!!
Amrita’s last blog post..Routine and Saturday Morning Chicken
Karen : Spare seats only if you bring one of your cakes!
Belle : Mushroom foam eggs sounds interesting, will have to try next time I’m in Melb.
Helen : Cheers! Thomas Keller has to make everything so difficult, but it’s worth it.
Betty : Spanish food is very drool worthy, especially tapas.
David : I’m gonna do more cooking now that my season might be over.
Reemski : I think we need a food bloggers cook up!
Steph : I had to cut them on a kitchen towel. I made a slit on one side and then used a small spoon to wedge the shell out to get the egg white and yolk it. It was tricky!
Y : We snuck a few treats for Randy under the table, she’s a top dog.
Suzie : You should have what we call, 2nd dinner
FFichiban : I was scared the mushrooms would fall, it was quite windy!
Simon : No not 8 people, there’s only 4 of us but 8 of us were eating. Funny you mention about the cold food because the egg custards didn’t taste as good as they should as they started to dry.
Pigscorner : Funnily enough, they were the least related to authentic spanish food. Says something about our spanish cooking skills!
Amrita : Thanks for dropping by, make sure you come back for the french post!
Woah – so impressive and the egg custard looks so tasty! Although, I imagine any Keller recipe would be good. I’ve got to start convincing some of my friends to do more cooking!
Forager’s last blog post..Worried about swine flu? Do as I do and develop a porcine obsession
Woohoo done! You keep my seat warm…I’ll warm up the oven LOL
Karen’s last blog post..The Power of Zumbo – and this is just foreplay!
[...] was Howard’s truffle infused custard, which he made a couple of months back at one of our EST cook up. Once again, this was a crowd pleaser. The crunchy salty prosciutto worked well with the creamy [...]