Riverside Restaurant, Cambridge

Lent term is over and Spring has arrived, so it's time for lunch.

In our research group, it seems to be a tradition to visit the Riverside Restaurant at the end of Lent term for group lunch. Situated in the University Centre, the Riverside serves as the official posh restaurant for the university as a whole.

I imagine that people on official university business would take their guests here, and the place lives up to its billing, with a tasteful and well organised interior combined with picturesque views of the punts on the Cam.

The restaurant serves what they term to be "modern British" cuisine, which is a surprisingly accurate and far more concise description than what I could come up with ("several-courses-involving-small-amounts-of-fancy-food-artistically-displayed-on-large-plates-using-local-ingredients").

Left: Rather tall and skinny glasses ; Top Right: You know you're at a fancy place when... ;
Bottom Right: Olive and raisin bread - addictively sweet and salty.

They offer a seasonal lunch menu with the choice of two courses (£19.45) or three courses and a glass of wine (£23.95), although this wasn't much of a choice as we naturally all went for the full three courses.

Seared scallops, chicory, pomegranate finished with pomegranate reduction.

Winner for the Most Popular Entree award was the seared scallops, expertly browned on top. Whilst the beads of pomegranate and reduction sauce were rather pretty, the consensus from Electric Frye and G'mma was that they were somewhat superfluous. Not quite the plump juicy scallops I had at Midsummer House, but then again you'd pay double there.

Warm salad of pig cheeks, black pudding croutons, roasted apples, cam valley cider reduction.

I went for the warm salad of pig cheeks because I was intrigued by a) pig cheeks, b) black pudding croutons, and c) cam valley cider. OK so that's the whole thing basically. The pig cheeks were meltingly tender, a perfect match with the amazing roasted apples. My favourite part however was the little deep fried cubes of black pudding - whoever came up with the idea deserves a medal.

Goats cheese and red onion tart, toasted walnut and pear compote, mixed cress salad.

Lined with a generous amount of pear compote, the goats cheese tart was met with murmurs of definite approval from FS (I can't think of a pseudonym for you), who was too busy enjoying it to give me any adjectives to work with...

After such fantastic entrees, the mains were no disappointment either!

Sea bream, baked with fennel and tomatoes, tarragon butter sauce.

The sea bream was an excellent lunch main - satisfying but not too heavy. I actually enjoyed the vegetables the most. Check out the char marks on that spring onion!

Roast partridge breast, slow braised leg, partridge and redcurrant stuffing, casserole of baby vegetable.

The most interesting presentation of the day belonged to the roast partridge breast, almost deconstructed, with two parts of the partridge prepared differently, plus the stuffing on the side. Mmm stuffing.
 

Pan fried fillet of beef, chateau potato, buttered kale, parsnip purée, parsnip crisps.

Parsnips are the perhaps the best food thing I have discovered in the UK. Roast parsnips with honey are so good. Anyway, the pan fried fillet of beef doubled down on the parsnip quota, with some seriously awesome looking crisps (damn British and their incessant use of the word crisps) and a puree. G'mma kindly informs me that the green is kale, which is apparently in fashion at the moment.

Vanilla pannacotta, tuile biscuit.

Desserts! YST opts for the pannacotta. Note the mint leaf and chocolate decoration. We'll see that again soon.

Cardamom parfait, brandy snap basket.

When I chose the parfait, I was expecting a layered dessert with cream and other delicious things, so what arrived was a pleasant surprise. The cream/ice-cream thing was strangely delicious - it really was like ice cream but not cold. Bizarre. Plus, you can't go wrong with a brandy snap basket! Note again, mint leaf.

Chocolate and orange torte, cointreau cream.

Did anybody mention mint leaves? Anyway, FS and G'mma won the dessert competition decisively by ordering the chocolate and orange torte. Needless to say I was jealous.
"Like Terry's Chocolate Orange but 100 times better."  Enough said.

Carnage. And it's not even 2pm yet.

We all thoroughly enjoyed our lunch at Riverside, although this may have been because the boss was shouting (not literally), and quite possibly due to the amount of alcohol we demolished.
No smoke and mirrors to be seen here, just good quality food. I think the entrees and mains were a notch above the desserts. All in all, a definite recommendation when feeling like a little splurge!

Riverside Restaurant
University Centre, Granta Place
Mill Lane, Cambridge CB2 1RU
Tel: +44 (0) 1223 337759


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QED: Chicken and Vegetable Clear Soup

OK so this is not particularly glamorous, but for me it's comfort food because its warm, fully of chunky goodness and it's home cooking in a sense (except that Mum is much better than me). Plus it's really healthy.

If there are any organic chemists out there, this soup is awesome because:
- It's a one pot reaction
- Done in aqueous solvent
- On kilogram scale
- No workup or purification needed.

Ingredients:
5 chicken thighs or drumsticks 10 potatoes 10 carrots light soy sauce	6 tomatoes 3 onions generous handful of dried wolfberries

Procedure:
1. Trim the fat off the chicken. Immerse in half a pot of cold water. Add wolfberries (you can find these at most Asian stores)

2. Bring to a very low simmer and skim off the oil and foamy stuff that floats to the surface.

3. Whilst the chicken is simmering, chop vegetables into relatively large chunks. Add first the potatoes and carrots. Keep skimming if oil/foam accumulates. Simmer on low for a while (~30 min) then add halved or whole tomatoes and onions. Add a dash of soy sauce.

4. Put a lid on it and go do something else for an hour or two. I went to the graduate BA rooms to watch the latter 2/3 of Hot Fuzz. Good movie.

5. Add salt/pepper/soy sauce to taste.

That's pretty much it. Dinner for the next 4 days...

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On other things, you should all check out this fantastic food blog also from Trinity! Plus this food blog just mentioned a cafe in Cambridge that does lamingtons - now added to my wishlist =P

Little Seoul, Cambridge

Saturday evening in the lab... Bibimbap anyone?

As far as I know, Little Seoul is the only Korean restaurant in Cambridge - a far cry from the endless supply of Korean places in Sydney's Chinatown. It's already 7:30 pm when our group's token computational guy YST and I head out for dinner. Luckily the restaurant is just around the corner.

(Edit: I've recently been told about another place on Mill Rd called Bibimbap House... read the review here)

It all feels a little strange. The restaurant is situated underground, so you have to walk down a flight of stairs to get in. The inside itself is rather bare, with no-frills plain beige walls. However, the most bizarre part is the layout, with far too many walls segmenting the building into several mid-sized rooms. Reminds me of dodgy karaoke places in Chinatown... except without the smoke-filled aroma, severe lack of ventilation and generally low visibility level. OK perhaps that isn't a fair comparison.

Anyway forget the decor, we're here to eat.

Dolsot bibimbap (£8.50)

We have bibimbap on the brain, so YST opts for the hot stonebowl dolsot bibimbap version whilst I go for the regular which is cheaper by £1. Oh yes. My ingenious money saving scheme is unfortunately more than offset by my inability to resist Korean seafood pancake.

Seafood pancake (£5.70 I think?)

I'm slightly disappointed that my beloved banchan or unlimited-free-refill-side-dishes aren't on offer here, as they are one of the best things about going to Korean restaurants! There is the option to purchase sides like kimchi and namul however.

The pancake is a little softer than I'd hoped and lacking seafood despite its name, but I still scoff it down in a hurry. The dipping sauce does seem a little strong on the soy hence slightly too salty.

As for the bibimbaps... well honestly you can't really go wrong with a mishmash of rice and random ingredients smushed together with dollops of chilli sauce. Yum. Or maybe I've watched Full House too many times (not the US sitcom).

Verdict? Hard to say having only really eaten a couple of things, although the menu choice is not so large. I get the feeling it's pretty solid Korean for what they do offer, minus the free side dishes, but wait... did I hear lunch special?

They do a main and a free side-dish at lunch for cheaper, so I'm pretty sure I'll be back sometime soon!

Little Seoul
108 Regent St, Cambridge, CB2 1DP
Tel: +44 (0) 12233 308681
http://www.littleseoul.co.uk/ 


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SMBC #4 - Pseudo-pancakes Part 1 - Okonomiyaki!

Shrove Tuesday aka Pancake Day was this week, so we thought we'd do a pseudo-pancake themed SMBC! Here's Part 1 about Okonomiyaki, with Part 2 about Kaiserschmarrn coming soon =)

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How do you describe okonomiyaki (お好み焼き) to the uninitiated? It's like a pizza, but the toppings are inside? A pancake which is savoury? Does it even matter?

Okonomiyaki is often literally translated from Japanese to mean grilled (yaki) as you like it (okonomi), and its home is Osaka as one of the many delicious creations from the Kansai region. The Hiroshima region also has its own style of okonomiyaki which is layered and has soba noodles in it. Yum.

Given the incredibly sorry state of Japanese food in Cambridge *cough cough Teri-aki cough Wagamama*, there was no chance I'd be able to satisfy my okonomiyaki cravings dining out, so the only thing to do was to make it!

There are a million recipes for okonomiyaki which have pretty much the same basic ingredients but in widely varying proportions. We decided to very loosely follow this recipe by Maki from Just Hungry (my favourite Japanese food website!)

Ingredients:	Optional Fillings and Toppings:
70 g grated Japanese yam** 4 medium eggs 1 to 1 1/2 cups plain flour some dashi stock** 1/3 of a Chinese cabbage pinch of baking powder a stem of spring onion	thin strips of pork belly** kimchi Kewpie mayonnaise** Okonomiyaki sauce** Dried bonito shavings**

There are lots of ** stars! I'll try to explain stuff as we go through =P

About the ingredients:
I'm going to go through this relatively briefly... you can read all about it in detail at Just Hungry.

Grated Japanese yam... it's known by several different names in Japan: tororo, nagaimo, yamaimo, it's all the right stuff, but it's not the same as regular yam. I had a hard time finding it in shops, so all I could manage was this frozen yam already grated from Seoul Plaza on Mill Rd.
There are lots of recipes without yam, but according to Maki the yam is critical for the wonderful moist bitey texture. I've yet to do the control experiment without the yam to see if this is true, but I'll believe it for now.

*Update*: I tried the recipe again replacing the yam with cornflour and it turned out way too heavy and dense. Conclusion - grated yam is definitely necessary for a good okonomiyaki.

Dashi stock is the basis of so much Japanese cuisine. It's usually made by soaking and heating dried kelp (konbu) and bonito shavings (katsuobushi) in water. Full of umami. Problem is, bonito shavings are really expensive outside of Japan, so I only used kelp, which is totally not the same but whatever. You can also buy instant stock powder, although I have an irrational disliking for it.

Okonomiyaki sauce tastes kinda like BBQ sauce or brown sauce or HP sauce, but not exactly. Japanese mayo is thicker and sweeter than regular mayo, and once again Maki has a recipe for it =) I'll try it one day.

As I mentioned before, bonito shavings are expensive. Usually you top okonomiyaki with the shavings and the rising steam makes the shavings "dance". We decided just to substitute it for furikake which is used as a rice flavouring/topping in Japanese cuisine. This one contains dried seaweed, fish flakes, sesame seeds and other goodies.

Kimchi is Korean pickled cabbage. Delicious. I hear it's very hard to make it right yourself though, and can go rotten and stinky if you try.

Top Left: Cheapo dashi stock ; Top Right: Regular batter ; Bottom: Kimchi batter

Procedure:

0. Make dashi stock. Usually you'd soak kelp and bonito shavings in water for a while (30 mins at least) then just bring to the boil and strain out the shavings and kelp. My poor man's stock was just kelp soaking in hot water for 5 minutes...

1. Combine grated yam, eggs, flour, baking powder in a bowl and splash in enough dashi stock to get a nice not-too-runny consistency. We only ended up using maybe 20 mL it seems. If it's too watery, add more flour. If it doesn't bind, add another egg...
Protip: You can make impromptu miso soup with the remaining dashi stock by simply adding miso paste. You could go all out with some tofu cubes and spring onion too.

2. Slice the cabbage into small strips and add as much as you like provided there's enough batter still to combine everything. Add chopped spring onion.

3. Mix in any fillings you like except raw meats. We made a plain one, and a kimchi one. Mochi works really well. Fried batter bits called tenkasu are awesome. Really, anything goes here.

4. Add a small amount of oil to frying pan over medium heat and add the batter and flatten out. Layer pork belly slices on top. We couldn't find any decent pork belly slices so we resorted to pancetta which is really too fatty and strongly flavouring. Oh well, still tastes awesome.

5. Check when golden brown and flip! Put a lid over it to let it cook through for a few minutes, then it's ready to be sauced up.

6. Top with okonomiyaki sauce and mayonnaise, followed by bonito shavings or some furikake.

This seriously tastes like what you get in Japan... just crisp on the outside but still with enough gooey bite on the inside. So so good. Must do this again.

Here's a preview of Part 2... something so delicious that people are coming through our window to eat it??

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On a serious note, our thoughts are with everyone in Japan dealing with the aftermath of the earthquake a few days ago. Please give them your support in whatever way you can.

SMBC #3: Greek Week

Welcome back to the third edition of SMBC. This belated post (we had this for lunch Saturday before last) documents our exciting venture into Greek cuisine. We were helped by our Greek friend, Chef K, who came armed with several recipes in her native tongue. And while they were all Greek to us, under her instruction, our kitchen was transformed into the very definition of efficiency (or a close approximation of).

A quick google search of Greek Cuisine revealed the following interesting fact: The Greeks did not only give us Pythagoras, Archimedes, Euclid, Socrates, and Plato, but also Archestratos - the author of the very first cookbook! So we will now follow in Archestratos' footsteps and write down what we did.

We made a quartet of Mezes (Greek for appetiser/starter) and finished it off with a traditional Greek dessert of yoghurt, honey, and walnuts. The four mezes that we made were:

• Meze for drunk people*
• Kolokythokeftedes**
• Halloumi wrapped in red pepper with lemon & chilli
• Greek salad

*I assure you that none of us were drunk whilst making this.
** We had great fun trying to pronounce this word!

These were the ingredients that we started with:

Mezze for Drunk People:	Kolokythokeftedes:	Halloumi in red pepper:
450g diced pork half a mug of red wine 1 mug of creamed tomatoes 1 teaspoon of mustard ginger garlic oregano allspice	500g of courgettes 1 onion 150g feta cheese 200g melba toast 2 cloves of garlic mint salt pepper flour olive oil for frying	Red pepper 100g block halloumi cheese 1 red chilli olives oregano half a lemon

Greek Salad:

Dessert:

cucumber tomatoes capers feta cheese

Greek yoghurt, honey, and walnuts!

Meze for Drunk People

• Put the 450g of diced pork into a large bowl. Mix in a teaspoon of mustard and add some sliced ginger and crushed garlic (to taste).
• Fry the pork, adding the red wine a little at a time and allowing it to evaporate.
• Finally add the mug of creamed tomatoes and flavour with oregano and allspice.
  

Kolokythokeftedes
This roughly translates into Courgettes/Zucchini "Meatballs". Here's what we did:

• Grate 500g of courgettes and then drain the juice from them.
• Add one chopped onion and two cloves of garlic (crushed) to the courgettes.
• Crumble in 150g of feta cheese.
• Crush 200g of melba toast into a (relatively) fine powder and add it to the mixture. (With our limited kitchen facilities, we crushed the melba toast using a glass and several plastic bags)
• Crumble in some dried mint. Add salt and pepper to taste as well as 4-5 teaspoons of olive oil.
• Use the mixture to make many small balls. Cover them with flour then fry in olive oil.

Halloumi in red pepper

• First, roast the red peppers until they are fairly soft. (We used our microwave to do this - apparently it has an oven setting!) Make a long cut down the side of each pepper and open them out. Trim around the tops and bottoms so that you get one flat piece.
• Slice the halloumi into several thick pieces.
• Juice half a lemon, chop some chilli and olives.

• Place a slice of halloumi in the centre of each piece of red pepper. Sprinkle the lemon juice, the chilli and the olives over the cheese. Add oregano to taste.
• Roll the red pepper around the cheese and secure it in place with a cocktail stick.
• Finally, grill the peppers for about 5 minutes on both sides until the cheese starts to soften. (Apparently our microwave has a grill setting too!)

Greek Salad

• Basically just throw chopped cucumber, tomatoes, and olives into a bowl, add cubes of feta cheese, capers and you're done! (Add salt and pepper and dress with olive oil too if you like)
  

And here we have our four mezes all together!

Dessert

• Greek yoghurt + walnuts +honey =

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Hope you enjoyed The Shok's debut on Hungry the Ate. Have a good recipe idea for SMBC? Let us know!

Seriously Foolproof Brownies

I'd always been under the impression that brownies were relatively easy to make. But not this easy... I found the same awesome recipe here, here, here, here, here and here. This many people can't be wrong.

This was made for the poorly-equipped student: no electric mixer, no beating of eggs, no double-boiler. Just a saucepan, a spoon, a baking tray and an oven.

And they taste amazing. But hey, you can't go wrong with tons of butter, sugar and cocoa.

Ingredients:	Optional Extras:
150 g unsalted butter 225 g sugar 80 g cocoa powder 2 eggs 75 g plain flour pinch of salt	an orange (for a bit of zest and juice) a few oreos white chocolate chips chopped walnuts

0. Preheat oven to 160 deg C.

1. Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat. When melted, add sugar and stir. Then add cocoa and stir until mixed properly.

2. Add salt and eggs and mix to get a lovely smooth chocolatey velvety mixture. Resist the temptation to eat it.

3. Add flour and gently fold in until just combined - don't overmix. At this stage, add whatever extra flavourings you like. Be creative!

4.  Transfer mixture into a baking tray (~24 x 12 cm). Probably easiest if it's lined with baking paper so it doesn't stick. We didn't have any but it worked fine anyway. Bake for about 50 mins (very roughly). The top/edges should start to dry out, and when you stick a skewer in, it should come out moist but not covered in chocolate goo.

5. Cool and cut. Dust with icing sugar. Decorate. Devour until you and your friends feel guilty. Repeat.