June 1992
For an introduction to what these Menu Diary posts are about, please click here.
Friday 29 May 1992. A date which will live in infamy. Our good friend Helen invited us to her pace for dinner with her and her then husband, David. I fell asleep at the table. Big Whoops! Helen and David were good about it….
Tuesday 2 June. I see we had flathead fillets and really enjoyed them. Looking ahead at the next few Menu Diaries there are other times we had flathead and enjoyed it. I mention it because I can’t remember the last time I ate flathead (maybe 20 years ago??) I’m going to put it back on the menu!
Thursday 4 June. Chicken in Black Bean Sauce and Fried Rice. I suspect I made this, as before I met Trenna I did a Chinese food cooking course, and these are two of the dishes I learnt. Thanks to Gene Wong, the instructor.
Friday 5 and Saturday 6 June. “Soooo Good” was the verdict on the seedy mustard and rosemary roast lamb. I don’t specifically remember this one BUT in more recent years I did a seedy mustard and rosmary lamb rack which I now think is an evolution of this dish from 1992. It was a hit every time I made it.
Sunday 7 June. Colin and Christine hosted the Sunday session and it looks like we must have eaten enough of their nibbles not to need a meal when we got home.
Wednesday 10 June. “Yuk”. I think that was one of the very few times we had brown rice.
Friday 12 June and the next 2 days. Trenna cooked a superb moussaka (as she did on many other occasions). It included both eggplants and potato but was extremely labour intensive. In 1992 she would have had the energy and eyesight to do it, but it would have taken her almost all day. In later years she made it with me sharing the load, then eventually it fell just to me. I have to admit that I was discouraging of me doing it sometimes because of the sheer amount of work, but boy, was that a good moussaka!
Fetta in Oil Recipe
I see that on the Friday we had it with a Greek salad with “fetta in our oil brew”.
Fetta in Oil Recipe
Chop a block of fetta cheese into cubes about 1-2 cm each.
Collect a whole red chilli; about 10 black peppercorns;
a few sprigs of thyme; and about 20 or more fresh basil leaves.
Put everything into a jar with Extra Virgin Olive Oil.
Preferably give it a day or two for the favour to permeate.
Label and store in the fridge.
Once all the fetta is consumed, strain the oil and use it
to make a salad dressing.
Saturday 20 June. We went to the fairly expensive and well regarded “Windows Restaurant” at the Burswood casino. The verdict “over rated”. I don’t think there was a special occasion we just wanted to try the restaurant.
Sunday 21 June. HJ’s (again!) after Glenda and Adrian’s session.
Monday 22 June. The Chilli Spag recipe is very quick and simple but very nice. We used it for many years.
Friday 26 and Sunday 28 June. Tacos. You can see from Trenna’s comments that she is always looking to improve our meals. A lot of people probably think Tacos are a quick easy meal for the weekend that you make with a sauce from a jar. Not Tren! She was always trying to do a bit better – especially when it came to food.
Saturday 27 June. This one warrants some explanation. “Bachelors Col & Chris”. In full that would read “A ‘Bachelors Dinner’ at Colin and Christine’s house”. Some time before this period our friend Colin (or maybe it was Colin and Christine) came up with the idea of these occasional dinners.
Bachelors Dinners
Their reasoning was that otherwise people like our friend Evo, or our friend Eggs might go a long time between having good home cooked meals – because of their lifestyle. I think the original group was: Colin & Chris, Trenna & me, Evo, Eggs and his girlfriend Karen, and Anne.
We would take turns at hosting the bachelor’s dinner, and they were always very convivial – and some very nice meals were had.
There was the paella of this particular night; Anne did a beautiful lamb roast (I think the lamb came from her family’s farm); Eggs did a meal, I remember excellent garlic prawns, but don’t remember much else; and I think Evo did something that didn’t just involve a can.
One of the times that it was my turn, and I say “my” because I think Trenna gave me a free rein, I did several dishes from the lessons I did with Mr Wong, as mentioned earlier. I did steamed pork buns, chicken and corn soup and at least 2 or 3 other dishes.
However, I hadn’t really thought through the work flow very well and I think I ended up serving the main course at about 11 pm. About 3 or 4 hours later than planned.
2 replies on “The Menu Diaries No. 4”
I can’t remember you falling asleep at our dinner Greg but do remember good conversation
You and Tren certainly ate well over the years and a lot of attention was put into planning 😃
No wonder you were so gracious about it Helen!!
I absolutely did, although it was only momentary – a few times! I’m sorry. Trenna definitely noticed – there wasn’t much that she missed!
I do remember it being a good night.
In my defence there had been something going on at work I think that had meant I had been working long hours, including at home at night.
You are right about us eating well. Trenna put a lot of importance on menu planning and execution. The details and variety were important to her. You’ll notice that (apart from having the left overs on a second night, which just makes sense) we pretty well never had the same protein two menu items in a row eg a beef dish followed by a different beef dish etc. Plates were always warmed before serving, and we had cloth napkins à la Craig House.
Thanks for reading the post, and for commenting.