Minipost: Loving our local's new menu at The Precinct, Victoria Park
Posted by | Categories: Bars, Modern Australian, Perth, Pub, Restaurants, Vegetarian, Wine Bar
The Precinct is one of my favourite locals; it only takes us about fifteen minutes to walk there from our house, it has an ever changing and interesting wine list and most importantly they are very gluten free and vegetarian focused. Whilst I have already written two full posts on our Precinct dining experiences, our recent visit to try their new menu warrants at least a little photographic mention on the blog. Please note this was eaten over two nights….;-)
Zucchini fritters, pickled beetroot, house made labne ($17, GF & vego)
Tomato medley, Italian buffalo mozzarella, basil ($18, GF & vego)
Their new summer menu has moved away from the traditional structure of entrées and mains onto the more modern way of dining; share plates. More than half the menu is gluten free and there are over half a dozen vegetarian options that branch out well beyond the common offerings.
Baked risotto, beetroot, mint, Meredith goats cheese ($16, GF & Vego)
Tasmanian salmon, Spanish white anchovies, caper berries, herbs ($27, GF)
Whey blanched broccoli, sugar snap peas, kale, green beans ($14, GF & vego)
Every dish was a winner in our opinion but the best dish of all came as a nice surprise; the roasted garlic and mustard mushrooms using a combination of King oyster, Shiitake, Oyster, Swiss Browns. We ordered this dish on each visit as it was too good to miss out a second time round.
Roasted garlic and mustard mushrooms (King oyster, Shiitake, Oyster, Swiss Brown) ($25, GF & vego)
Roasted garlic and mustard mushrooms (King oyster, Shiitake, Oyster, Swiss Brown) ($25, GF & vego)
Marinated Fremantle sardines, haricot beans, chilli, capsicum, dill ($20, GF)
Amelia Park lamb ribs, walnut spice yoghurt ($17, GF)
Their gluten free dessert options have had a total make over for which I am extremely grateful. Previously The Precinct’s gluten free desserts haven’t been anything I would rave about. Things have certainly changed for the better and upon reading the menu we struggled to choose one so we ordered both.
Orange and vanilla pannacotta, strawberry, rhubarb ($14, GF)
Orange and vanilla pannacotta, strawberry, rhubarb ($14, GF)
I would have been happy with either but we were both keen to share. My pavlova crumble was a pretty as a flower garden and I look forward to enjoying eating this on a regular basis!
Pavlova crumble, raspberry sorbet, fresh berries ($14, GF)
Three cheese platter: Blue de brabis, Delice de cremiries, Queso manchego ($33, GF on request)
Please note this was NOT a sponsored post. I just felt the urge to show off their new menu of my own accord!
The Precinct 834 Albany Highway, East Victoria Park 6101 | (08) 9355 2880 | www.theprecinctvicpark.com.au
Eating my way around a Gluten Free Barcelona
Posted by | Categories: Barcelona, Bars, Featured, Restaurants, Spain, Tapas Bar, Travel
Some people shop until they drop. Me? I just eat until I drop. gluten free Barcelona
Surely, by far and by large the best part of travelling to another country is being able to taste their local cuisine. When the Boy and I travel together we will always share our dishes so that we can try as many different things as possible. Recently I travelled to Barcelona without my lovely husband to attend the International Society of Feline Medicine’s World Feline Veterinary Conference. This was a new experience travelling solo and it presented me with a problem; I no longer had a buddy to share food my food with. Now logically one would think that there is an easy solution to this problem. Just order less food. But no, this solution was never going to work as moderation has never been my forte. I take the concept of “all or nothing” very seriously.
For most of my restaurant meals that I devoured in Barcelona I will write (or have already written) an individual blog post about the experience. But as I wandered through the cobbled streets of this wonderful city I found that it was so easy finding a gluten free Barcelona to enjoy so in addition to my more elaborate meals I wanted to share these extra snippets and snacks with you.
If you head out toward the coast of Barcelona you will find a quaint neighbourhood called La Barceloneta. It is a triangular shaped district that cuts into the sea and is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea, Port Vell and the trendy El Born neighbourhood. Filled with cute little narrow streets you can smell the fresh taint of sea in the air. Strolling through the cobbled lane ways I found loads of busy tapas bars and restaurants serving wonderful cheap Catalan food.
On my first day in Barcelona I wanted to familiarise myself with some key foodie spots so I took a small personalised tapas tour with a German man named Dirk Engelhart. One of the places he took us to was a bustling little joint called La Bombeta who specialise in a Catalan dish called “bombas”. Bombas are deep-fried balls of fluffy mashed potato with a minced meat centre and they are served with a spicy brava sauce. They are not gluten free unfortunately so I didn’t try them. As I looked around the cramped bar I noticed it was filled with a combination of both locals and tourists. Always a good sign.
Grilled sardines
Tortilla and those crunchy prawns
Bombas are not the only thing on La Bombeta’s menu and there were plenty of gluten free options for me. I ordered of bowl of piping hot steamed mussels, a plate of grilled sardines and some fresh prawns. The service was quick and the vibe was noisy but fun. The prawns were so fresh and crunchy with a strong, rich flavour; these were ones that were good enough to suck the juices out of their heads. Not wanting to miss the opportunity to enjoy such a delicacy, I shamelessly sucked every one noisily while the remaining two tour members in our group looked on in horror.
Art market in the Gothic quarter
Passionfruit coulis, chocolate genoise, orange cream (3.50 €)
Dirk also took us to a small little dessert bar called Sweet Dreams, which is located in the heart of the winding streets of the Gothic Quarter. I was ecstatic to see quite a number of gluten free mini-cakes that looked very different from the usual boring, bog standard offerings. I tried their chocolate genoise cake with orange cream and passionfruit coulis. Fairy light sponge was topped with uplifting cream and embellished with tangy coulis. This was an assault on my senses that I could happily endure again and again.
The conference spanned over one week and the majority of it was fully catered for with meals provided by the hotel; Hotel Fira Palace. But honestly, when you are staying in such a fabulous gastronomic country like Spain who wants to eat hum drum catered food? Intermittently I found myself sneaking out of lectures into the sunshine to grab myself a quick bite of something more local. Surprisingly I found that most of the places that I visited had a good understanding of what is gluten free provided that I asked them the correct magic words:
“Por favor, Sin gluten?”
Plaça Nova
Strangely, the remarkably similar words of “no gluten” or “gluten free’ appeared to be much harder for the locals to understand and consequently I earned the nickname of “Dr Sin Gluten” by a group of four lovely foodie friends that I meet on the first day of the conference.
The wonderful thing about travelling to an international conference is that you can meet like-minded people from all around the world. The five of us spanned across the globe; one from Yorkshire in the United Kingdom, one from West Virginia, a couple from Austin, Texas and then of course there was myself from Perth, Australia. We all instantly seemed to click with each other and proceeded to spend the rest of the week wining, dining, laughing and sharing stories together until the wee hours of each morning. I look forward to the next time that we can all gather together again! Hopefully it will be soon!
Prior to meeting my posse, one of the first places I tried was Conessa, a little sandwich store in Plaça Sant Jaume situated in the heart of the Gothic Quarter. Conessa specialise in making gluten free baguettes and they have a huge range to choose from and an English menu. My eating habits had already started to escalate out of control so I sensibly wanted to just try something light. I chose one of their vegetarian options which contained my absolute favourite Spanish cheese manchego along with fresh tomato, fried pepper and oregano. The bread was very fluffy and did not crumble apart as many gluten free breads are prone to doing. The bread had a slight sweet taste that reminded me of brioche both with its texture and its flavour.
Northern Spain is the origin of pintxos and Barcelona has numerous pintxos bars dotted all about their streets. Since Bar de Halcyon recently opened in Perth many of us are now educated to appreciate what pintxos are but for those who are not in the know, they are are basically small snacks that are speared by a wooden stick and served on a bar where you go up and choose for yourself. Once you have eaten your full, the waiter will come over to your table and count how many sticks you have which determines your bill. Like many sushi bars who use coloured plates, some pintxos bars will use different colour sticks to indicate varying prices.
Traditionally pintxos are served on a slice of crusty bread meaning that most of them are not gluten free. Bilbao Berria is a popular pintxos bar in Plaça Nova and their bar is filled with all sorts of amazing Catalan tapas. Unfortunately, whilst the wait staff are friendly and efficient they weren’t overly helpful in assisting me to choose gluten free options. So I decided to take matters into my own hands and made a not so educated guess what was suitable.
Everything looked far too tempting and I wanted to try them all! To maximise how many pintxos I could eat I stupidly talked myself into believing that I would be FINE pulling the toppings off the bread and just eating those without eating the bread. Of course I was totally wrong and the gluten contamination proved enough for me to have a reaction that evening. It’s my own stupid fault for being so brazen. Or greedy. Nevertheless, despite my own self-inflicted gluten ingestion, I was still impressed with the variety and quality of pintxos on offer at Bilbao Berria and for those people blessed with no gluten intolerance I highly recommend a visit.
When we hit the mid-week mark, there was a lecture free afternoon to allow delegates time to explore the city. Our posse of five headed out together with basic ambitions to catch rays of sunshine, eat some food and do a spot of shopping. Off we headed down Avenue Parallel and before long we had worked up a bit of an appetite and agreed to stop and eat. We sat down outside at a fairly nondescript tapas bar situated along the Avenue however I didn’t catch their name. What I do remember is that despite speaking very poor English they were extremely helpful and enthusiastic in advising me what was “sin gluten” on their simple and inexpensive tapas menu.
Marinated octopus
For those of you who follow this blog regularly, you may have already been reading about my obsession for marinated octopus that started whilst I was over in Spain. Back home in Perth I commonly find octopus to be quite chewy. Not so in Barcelona. The Spaniards obviously take much greater care preparing these creatures and every time I ate it over there I was repeatedly astounded how soft and delicate it can actually be.
Tomato bread (not GF) & tortilla
My fellow companions also ordered their favourite; tomato bread or pan con tomate. This is one of the simplest, well-loved, widely eaten and famous dishes from Cataluña. Many tapas bars will have a bowl of tomatoes and garlic sitting on the table with a bottle of olive oil so you can make the bread yourself. It is so easy to make but unfortunately not many bars have gluten free bread! Consequently upon my return to Perth I was inspired to make my own gluten free pan con tomate. See my recipe here.
Before I left Perth for Barcelona, I asked around on Twitter for advice on where to eat. I was told by one blogger to just “Eat everything!” There is some merit in this comment because for my whole week in Barcelona, I didn’t have one meal that failed to impress me. Whether it was a planned and highly researched degustation extravaganza like at Nectari and Ria de Gallacia, or just a spontaneous, unplanned stop-in at Restaurant L’Amfora as we were walking past; all the food I ate was amazing. More importantly I found that a gluten free Barcelona really does exist leaving me champing at the bit to return to this amazing city!
It is no wonder that I managed to become a fatty boombaladi so rapidly and although I cannot wait to return to Spain, I have some hard work at the gym first!
Travelling to Barcelona or Spain? Be sure to checkout the Lonely Planet Barcelona City Guide and the Lonely Planet Discover Spain Travel Guide before you go!
La Bombeta Calle de la Maquinista 3, La Barceloneta, 08003 Barcelona, Spain | +34 (0) 933 199 445 | (Tapas 4.50-14 €) Sweet Dreams Carrer Regomir 4 bis, Barric Gótico, 08002 Barcelona, Spain | +34 (0) 671 430 115 Bilbao Berria Plaça Nova 3, Barcelona & c/Argenteria 6, Barcelona | +34 (0) 933 170 124 Conessa Barri Gòtic: Llibreteria 1(Plaça Sant Jaume), 08002 Barcelona | +34 (0) 933 101 394 Hostafrancs-Montjuic: Creu Coberta 80, 08014 Barcelona
La Boqueria Market - Mercat de la Boqueria; Barcelona
Posted by | Categories: Attractions, Barcelona, Featured, Markets, Spain
The Boqueria Markets in Barcelona date all the way back to the 1400s when a pig market existed on the same site where the markets exist today. It wasn’t until hundreds of years later in 1826 that these markets were legally recognised and shortly later an official undercover structure was built. Unlikely most things in Spain, the Boqueria markets get well under way by mid-morning and so I advise you to get there well before 12 pm. I made the mistake of fueling up at my hotel’s breakfast buffet and arrived at the markets with a full belly. Definite fail. Next time I am in Barcelona, I will be sure to arrive at Boqueria Markets hungry. Very hungry.
These markets are filled will all sorts of fresh local produce and if your accommodation has kitchen facilities I suggest you do your food shopping here! Or better still grab yourself some provisions and head to Park Guell for a picnic in the Spanish sunshine.
I spent several hours wandering the market aisles taking it all in; sights, smells and bustling atmosphere. Here’s a taste of the excitement.
La Boqueria is located just off La Ramblas and is open from 8am until 8.30 pm Monday to Saturday.
Planning our Wedding Invitations at Elixir Coffee, Nedlands
Posted by | Categories: Breakfast/Brunch, Coffee, Perth, Restaurants, Wedding
I like to be organised. Being surrounded by a world of order gives me a great feeling of peace and tranquillity. To avoid any confusion or lack of clarity for our wedding guests I ensured to keep them well-informed. Save the Date Cards were mailed out a year in advance and the Boy and I designed a detailed wedding website that is packed full of information about Phuket, Kamala and our chosen resort Andara.
This is not to say that a formal wedding invitation will be overlooked. In a similar vein to my early wedding dress shopping days, I found out that I know very little about such matters and was relieved to be invited to a Wedding Upmarket Expo by my friend Tara. Tara is an expert in all things wedding and quickly steered me on the right track helping me obtain the beginning of a vision of what I would like. We came upon a stall for Annie P Paperie. I have driven past their store in Nedlands numerous times and was always curious as to their individual style. We flipped through a few of their portfolios and my curiosity heightened to keen interest.
I made plans to meet the Bestie out at Elixir Coffee one Monday morning to fuel our creativity with caffeine before heading to Annie P’s to start the exciting process of invitation design. Elixir Coffee call themselves coffee specialists and they certainly do take their coffee very seriously. They source single origin unroasted beans direct from traders to promote fair trade and to ensure they only buy beans that are in season and fresh. All beans are roasted on site at Elixir.
El Salvador coffee “Finca La Fany” (left) and the house blend
I chose the El Salvador coffee “Finca La Fany” served as my usual short macchiato; it was quite sweet and nearly honey-like in flavour with hints of citrus. The Bestie chose one of the house blends which consisted of three beans: El Salvador “Talapo”, El Salvador “Miravalle” and Guatemala “Santa Clara Antigua” which she had served as her usual latte. We ended up both going back for seconds. And thirds. No wonder I felt so hyped for the rest of the day!
Pollastrini sardines on gluten free toast with added fried egg
For a bite to eat I ordered the Pollastrini sardines on toast. It was served with some fresh fennel, capers, tomato and parsley. I requested a fried egg on top which I was told I could have “only this once”. I figured they must get very busy and don’t do any menu alterations normally. Pollastrini sardines are not like your standard supermarket variety. They may cost $7 a can at Scutti our local green grocers, but you definitely get what you pay for. There is no overpowering fishy odour and the meat is chunky. Cantina 663 often has them on their menu. The thinly sliced fennel was wonderfully crunchy and the addition of the egg gave some gooeyness to tie it all together.
Granola clusters
The Bestie chose the house made granola clusters with berries and yoghurt. Initially she was a little disappointed in the small number of clusters however once she started eating she could not stop raving about how fabulous it was. She was amazed at the juicy bursts of tart flavour and was thankful the only sweetness was natural.
Soursop tea and cake
At this point we had overdosed on coffee and needed something a little more refreshing to the palate before we headed over to Annie P’s. The Bestie chose a pot of soursop tea for us to share with a slice of flourless orange cake. The tea wasn’t sour at all and had a tropical fruit flavour a bit like a combination of pineapple and pear. It was immensely revitalising and just what we needed. The flourless orange cake was fairly standard; reliably delicious but certainly nothing out of the ordinary.
Flourless orange cake
Excited albeit a tad jittery we left with full tummies guided by Google maps in the direction of the Paperie. It was a gorgeously balmy day and so we both decided to walk but after about 15 minutes of walking I started to get the feeling we were heading in the wrong direction. I couldn’t understand how Google could be wrong. Google couldn’t be wrong could they?!
After a few more minutes as we walked past each landmark my feeling grew much stronger until we eventually agreed we were on the wrong track. By this point in time we were running extremely late for our appointment with the graphic designer so we turned around and sprinted for the car! No more walking in the sunshine! Hot and sweaty we both piled into our cars and I plugged the address into my Tom Tom which confirmed my suspicions that Google was totally wrong! A quick few minutes hurtling through the back streets of Nedlands and we arrived all flustered but pumped for action!
Elixir Coffee 45a/145 Stirling Highway, Nedlands 6009 | (08) 9389 9333 | www.elixircoffeespecialists.com Price: $ Under $15 /meal, cash only, free WIFI Food: 3/5 (small selection of dishes, gluten free bread available) Service: 3/5 (quick and efficient but don’t ask for alterations!) Ambience: 3/5 (alfresco, café or living room style areas to choose from) Drinks: 5/5 (the coffee is out of this world – I will be back if anything just for the coffee) Total: 14/20
