The Cocoanut

Books are perhaps only second to furniture in terms of weight to carry, and I was forced to reflect if it would’ve been sensible - and less painful for the back -to simply stick with 3 or 4 cookbooks.

The truth is, 3 or 4 would be severely inadequate, even if I’ve only really attempted about a quarter of the recipes in my cookbook collection. Blame it on today’s culture of instant gratification and sense of entitlement for the trend of buying so many cookbooks. The I-want-it-NOW! Philosophy completely validates buying that Spanish cookbook just because you feel like trying out a Paella recipe for dinner.

In the interest of frugality, we could make do with just a couple of books and rein in on conspicuous consumption by assuming the role of the anti-capitalist crusader, but then would we really want to rebel against something as delicious as paella?

A cookbook is not merely a repository of recipes, a manual on nourishment. If it was that utilitarian, I and many others would not be so haplessly addicted that we can’t seem to stop ourselves from buying another one.

No, like their illegal pharmaceutical counterparts, cookbooks are pleasurable. They act as kitchen tomes that preserve and celebrate the hundreds of years of experiments and experience in the mixing and mingling of ingredients and flavours.

The primal sensations of chopping and slicing and cutting, of stirring and banging and kneading and squashing, and the ultimate reward of eating, sucking, licking, tasting, all begin their embryonic development with a flick of a page through a favourite cookbook.

I’ve seen similar recipes that call themselves banana bread, but I think that is taking the self-deceit concept a little too far. The ratio of sugar, banana and flour in this, and those recipes, gives the finished product a moist, faintly sweet taste that is not at all bread and closer to being a cake. However, if you, like me, are obsessed with proper classification, then perhaps a more suitable description would be ‘tea bread’.

I personally enjoy this cake, oops, tea bread on its own, although if you feel like a devil you could always intrude on its purity by tainting the cake with honey and butter to spread. You could even create a twisted cake version of the good ol’ banana split and have it with ice cream and choc sundae sauce. That would be profane. But it could be good.

Moist Banana Cake
Makes 1 loaf

200 g plain flour
2 ¼ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
75g butter, at room temperature
115g caster sugar
3 ripe bananas, mashed
2 eggs, beaten to mix
poppy seeds (optional)

1. Preheat a 350ºF/180ºC oven. Grease a loaf tin (21 x 11 cm).
2. Sift the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon into a bowl.
3. In another bowl, combine the butter with the sugar. Beat until the mixture is light and fluffy.
4. Add the mashed bananas and eggs and mix well. The degree of mashing depends on your personal taste.
5. Add the dry ingredients and blend quickly and evenly. At this point I like to fold in the poppy seeds, a reasonable amount to give a slight crunch to the texture of the cake.
6. Spoon into the prepared loaf tin and bake for 50-60 minutes.
7. Cool in the pan for about 5 minutes, then turn out on to a wire rack to cool completely.

Unsurprisingly, the happiest recollections revolve around the kitchen, which fulfils its dual role as a place of private reflection, when I’m cooking on my own, and a social space when friends come over and cook together the feast to come.

Food nourishes the soul not just by satiating one’s hunger, but also through the opportunity of connecting with friends and family over the meal that we’ve cooked together.

Most of the food featured on this blog was prepared in this kitchen, and although I will miss it dearly, I look forward to happy times in my new home.

During Ramadan, after a whole day of fasting, I like something a bit more substantial. Recently I discovered one of the stalls at Queen Victoria Market stocks challah from Glick’s, a famous Melbourne Jewish bakery renowned for its bagels. I’ve always wanted to try this sweet bread, after a friend went on and on about how good his challah toast went with butter. If plain toast can arouse so much excitement in one person, that toast has got to be good. So I bought one to try myself, as an appetizer to break the fast with.

Challah is a bit like the French brioche, except that it’s not as rich and dairy-free. It’s usually shaped into a braid, although there are also round challahs. Personally, I prefer the braided challahs because they’re easier to cut into toasts. Soft and faintly sweet, it’s good enough to eat on its own, but when lightly toasted and slathered with butter, you have a completely different treat altogether. The slight crunch of the toasted layer gives way to a soft interior that’s stretchy and rich, without being overwhelming. It really is a good way to end a day of resisting temptations.

So it was only a matter of time before I dabbled in another famous Turkish dish, patlican karniyarik or eggplant ‘belly’, which is in fact eggplant halves stuffed with mince meat. Eggplant features heavily in Turkish cuisine, which is just as well because I love the thing. These purple veggies are notorious for their sponge-like ability to absorb oil, but really, there’s no better way to treat eggplant other than to deep-fry them. I’ve tried steaming, pan frying and grilling, and even though each method has its own merits, eggplants and deep frying is like a match made in heaven.

There are ways to minimize the absorption of oil into the eggplants, after all, you want an eggplant that is moist, not drowning in oil. Rubbing salt on the flesh and letting it sit in a colander for about half an hour will help prevent the eggplant from soaking oil during cooking, as is using really hot oil.

This dish is best eaten with rice, where the oily sauce mixes with the rice and you get this almost perfect and healthy combo of grains, veggies and meat, if only there wasn’t that oil to begin with.

The recipe below acts only as a rough guide, not a rigid recipe. If you feel that there’s something not quite right, i.e. the measurements seem a bit too much or too little, feel free to alter it. Recipes by nature have to be versatile because there are so many variables in play, such as the equipment, personal taste and the like.

Eggplant karniyarik (serves 3-4)

2 medium eggplant
oil for deep-frying
200 g mincemeat
oil for cooking mincemeat
1 medium onion, chopped finely
2 garlic cloves, chopped or crushed
a handful of parsley (I just used a tiny bit of dried ones)
tomato paste
salt
1 tomato

1. Preheat oven to about 180 degrees Celsius. Cut the eggplants in half, and peel the skin vertically in alternate strips. Rub the flesh with salt and leave in a colander for about half an hour.
2. Wash the salt off the eggplant and pat dry. Deep-fry in oil until soft and lightly browned. Place in a plate lined with kitchen towel to absorb excess oil. I sometimes press the eggplants a little to extract more oil out of it.
3. In a pan, pour a few tablespoons of oil and cook the onion and garlic until lightly golden, then add the mincemeat. Fry until the liquid has boiled off, add the tomato paste to your liking (i.e. enough to flavour the mincemeat), and season with salt and pepper and parsley.
4. Place the eggplants in a baking tray. Cut an incision across the eggplant halves, making sure they stay in shape. Press the flesh with the back of a spoon to create an indentation, and place some mincemeat on the flesh. Top with slices of tomato.
5. Pour some water onto the tray, just enough to make a small puddle surrounding the eggplants, and bake in the oven for about 10-15 minutes, covered with foil.

*In the photo above, I didn’t include the tomato slices because I didn’t have any at the time. Also, there should be less mincemeat on the eggplants, unless of course you like mincemeat, as I do.

I saw an episode on Ready Steady Cook where the chef makes an Asian-style omelette by swirling the egg continuously on the wok. I tried imitating her movements but the egg didn’t quite swirl around the curving edges as shown on TV. In any case, I managed to get myself a flat piece of omelette, on whose centre I placed some leftover coral lettuce and rolled it up nicely. On top of the omelette I put a dollop of pesto, just to see if pesto goes with egg. It doesn’t.

My judgement? It was very refreshing to have omelettes as a roll. Now all I have to do is think of a way to make the omelettes sturdy enough to be able to eat it on the go, like all the great modern rolls of our time.

For the sake of being unpredictable I chose to forgo the hot cocoa and instead opt for gelato, that classically summertime treat that is somehow absolutely appropriate even in the harshest of winters.

Melbourne is without a doubt the gelato capital of Australia. So enthusiastically have Melburnians licked their gelati that it is now part and parcel of the city, in much the same way curry is now the national dish of Great Britain.

I admit to being one of those unadventurous, conservative customers who are so content with just one or two flavours that I end up eating the same thing at every visit to the gelato bar. At Lygon Street’s Il Dolce Freddo, the generous selection of mango, tiramisu, Snickers, strawberry and cookies n creme are gone to waste as I tread the safe path and choose my all-time favourite gelato combo : hazelnut roche, pandan coconut and frutti di bosco. The hazelnut roche is as indulgent as its namesake, with massive chunks of roche bits scattered throughout the gelato. The pandan coconut exudes the subtle, fragrant aroma of pandan that marries well with coconut, while the frutti di bosco combines the sweetness of berries with the rich comforting tang of yoghurt.

Melbourne’s gelato scene reflects the diverse make-up of its citizens. The gelato here is not confined to traditional Italian flavours like baci and lemon sorbet, treating eager lickers with quintessentially Aussie concoctions like Violet Rumble, Ice Vovo and sesame caramel, made famous by the Trampoline chain of gelato bars. Asian flavours get a resounding nod, with green tea, durian and lychee & lime sorbet famous with both locals and international residents alike. Whoever says multiculturalism is not good for Australia obviously hasn’t had a lick of her best-tasting gelati.

There has been this snobbery over dried herbs where they’re treated like some outcast creation of the industrial age. Dried herbs have actually been around for ages, to either give a different dimension to the dish, or as a substitute ingredient for the lazy cook such as myself. I’m quite happy to substitute dried parsley for its fresh variant, on those days when I have neither the time nor the inclination to visit the supermarket solely for the pursuit of fresh parsley.

In any case, my favourite herb is the lemongrass. This beautiful herb usually works behind the scenes, adding gently its subtle floral essence in braised dishes or dry curries. Southeast Asian dishes tend to include a whole multitude of ingredients, and at times I often wonder if some of the herbs or spices are redundant. But lemongrass is one of those herbs whose presence can seem to be missing amidst all the different flavours, but whose absence is definitely felt when it’s removed from the recipe.

There are many ways to enjoy lemongrass. It can be blended with onions and other aromatics into a paste, or sliced thinly and scattered over meat. I extract the greatest pleasure by bruising the stalks and throwing it into the pot, letting it simmer and slowly release its beautiful notes of citrus in the background.

The tom yam fish prepared in the photo involves steaming a whole fish (I think it was barramundi that day, but any fresh white fish will suffice). While steam is happily puffing away gently cooking the fish and turning its flesh from its translucent shine into soft tender white, I make the sauce by frying sliced onions, too much garlic, oyster sauce, tom yam paste and the bruised lemongrass stalks.

When all the meat has been consumed, some people enjoy sucking the bones of the fish. I much prefer to suck on my bruised lemongrass, extracting the essence for all its worth.

A mainstay in any Malay feast, the chicken rendang manages to assume both a regal distinction and a common presence in the culinary landscape of Malaysia. It is as pedestrian as nasi lemak, readily sold in makeshift stalls along the roadside, yet it also occupies the ornate pages of celebrated cookbooks, passed down as family heirlooms to be shared with the masses.

Unfortunately, as can be seen in the photo, the rendang, together with deep fried fish braised in soy sauce with fried chilli and toasted coconut, share a most unfortunate feature of Malay food, the ‘brown gravy syndrome’, where virtually all dishes end up as a pile of indistinguishable meat pieces bathed in a puddle of brownish gravy. But what they lack in aesthetic appeal they more than make up in the indulgently heady, rich spicy taste and lingering aroma that fills the room.

Stir fry veggies, deviating from the pure ideals of vegetarianism through the addition of ikan bilis (dried anchovies) and tiger prawns, provided a safe, classic option for everyone. I personally would have preferred kangkung belacan or steamed eggplant sambal, but then I have very little say among the elders.

Vegetables are an integral part of Southeast Asian cooking, featuring heavily in rice, noodles and even meat-based dishes. This is probably why the concept of vegetarianism in Asia is not treated like a kind of subversive, almost heretical movement in some of the meat-obsessed European cultures, where pompous chefs take pride in treating vegetarians even worse than the animals they butcher.

During one of our discussions about this, with a bowl of MnMs to pass around, a friend claimed that we use up more calories when we’re studying than during exercise, which accounts for the sense of starvation. We later found out this wasn’t true, and even if it was, I would much prefer to work out, because even exercise is easier than engineering.

The thing about hunger pangs caused by study sessions is that they are very particular about the types of food that satisfies them. Surprisingly enough, they discriminate against healthy, wholesome food. The starvation cannot simply be countered with a piece of apple, or grapefruit that’s rich in antioxidants. No, I have yet to see a student take a breather from their cramming session with a bowl of salad.

When I’ve exhausted my brain cells, I don’t even want good food. No satisfying bowl of noodle, not even a fresh piece of fish properly pan fried in frothy butter and oil.

I want only the saltiest crispest potato chips, the ones that cause mouth ulcers if you eat too much of them too quickly. Not for me a good velvety piece of dark chocolate. Where’s a sugar-coated, cheap caramelly milk chocolate bar when you need one?

It’s dodgy industrial food like these, the ones that make you feel dirty and ashamed of yourself afterwards, that provide precious fuel to lubricate the exhausted university undergraduate’s brain.