These peppers are lovely little delights that are randomly ‘hot or not’. The story goes that nine in ten are deliciously sweet, and one in ten is seriously hot. I found that the ratio was much closer to about one in four being hot enough to make me dizzy.

Nonetheless, the pimientos were such a hit that I ordered a second batch in mid-January. Richard at Midyim Eco Resort, who grows the pimientos, very kindly sent me a complimentary bag of a different pepper that he was trialling, called the ‘Gernika’.

The Gernikas are about twice the size of the little Padróns. I cooked them in the same way – by frying them in a little pan and then sprinkling them with olive oil and sea salt. The prognosis? They were equally as subtly sweet as the mild Padróns, with none of the heat. This made them safer for chilli-phobes, but somehow less exciting.

Is this another life lesson that can be learned from food? Danger = exciting…

Which potato reigns supreme? (I love Iron Chef)  

My friend S is quite the roast potato expert. While we were in Queensland over December and January (enjoying lovely meals here, here and here) S lamented the quality of the oven in our apartment. As we tucked into some pretty darn good roast potatoes she commented that these were nothing on her Melbourne potatoes, the quote being “if my Melbourne potatoes are a 10, these are a 5″. I decided I needed to try the “10″ potatoes as soon as possible.  

S decided to make a night of the roast potato taste test and also allowed us to do some carbo-loading, with three types of roast potato on offer -  whole potatoes in duck fat, whole potatoes in olive oil and potatoes cut into segments with olive oil, garlic and rosemary.  

Some notes on S’s roast potatoes:  

• S’s preferred potatoes for roasting are desiree although she also likes ’boutique’ variety Dobson’s. Sadly she was unable to source any Dobson’s for the taste test, so she used desiree instead.
• S always parboils her potatoes before roasting, to ensure maximum fluffiness. She also parboils the potatoes whole, this means parboiling takes longer than if they are pre-cut, but the potatoes don’t absorb as much water this way, so the end result is crispier.
• When roasting whole potatoes, S will peel them before parboiling. The segmented potatoes are left with the skin on.
• When roasting whole potatoes, S will put the peeled, drained, parboiled potatoes back in the saucepan (with no oil or water), with the lid on, over low heat and ‘bash them around’. Just keep the lid on and shake the saucepan to keep the potatoes moving for a minute or so. This dries them out further and also the fluffy edges will crisp up beautifully. 
• S douses the potatoes in a fair bit of olive oil or duck fat, but not too much as they can sweat rather than crisp. You can always start with a bit of oil and add more later if it is too dry in the pan.
• Potatoes should also not be crowded in the pan – when there are too many in the pan they won’t crisp up as much.
• S allows 30-40 minutes for the potatoes to cook in the oven  (at 180 degrees) and will usually ‘blast’ them (putting the temperature up to 200 degrees) at the 20 minute mark if they aren’t crisping enough.

Another roast potato tip (from Delia) is to heat up your oil or fat in the oven. After the potatoes have been parboiled and bashed around, douse them in the boiling oil and pop them in the oven. I have tried this technique and to be honest, the difference in the potatoes was marginal and did not make up for the fear I had of tipping hot oil all over myself (yes I am uncoordinated).  

So here are the three types of potatoes ready to go in the oven:  

Potato segments with olive oil, rosemary and garlic

Olive oil

Duck fat

All the potatoes went into a pre-heated 180 degree oven for about 30 to 40 minutes. Here are the contenders:  

Olive oil

Duck fat

Garlic and rosemary

We had seven taste testers and the winning potato, with 5 of 7 votes was the garlic and rosemary. The tasters enjoyed the crispness of the small chunks of potato, as well as the generous amount of rosemary and garlic.  

Second place went to the duck fat potatoes with 2 votes. These were both fluffy and crispy and very very rich. It was discussed that these are probably more your ‘event’ potato rather than the everyday, given their fattiness.  

Last place was the whole potatoes with olive oil, with zero votes. This isn’t to say they weren’t delicious, these potatoes were also fluffy and crispy. They just didn’t have the wow factor of the duck fat.  

Thanks to S for her tireless efforts and the taste testers for ingesting so many carbs!

A little while ago, I wrote about my love for Gentle Annie’s Berry Garden and Tearooms and of course, their jam. I usually refer to GA’s strawberry jam as my favourite and I faithfully buy more of the stuff every time I am in Lorne. However,  the other day I started thinking about this and realised that I have never really objectively tested my love for GA, and so the idea of the taste test was born.

Since I was a child I have always had a soft spot for jam, I love a good whack of it, slathered on hot toast with plenty of butter. I actually enjoy every type of jam (but not marmalade) although strawberry is my favourite. My dad (the other huge jam fiend in my life) prefers raspberry over strawberry, so he is constantly getting gifts of obscure raspberry jam from me.

I picked up a few boutique-style jams while I was in Lorne – “Cunliffe Waters” (which is actually from the Yarra Valley) and aptly named “Bread & Jam” from the Geelong hinterland. When we were in Red Hill enjoying a lovely lunch at Ten Minutes by Tractor we popped in to Merricks General Store and bought a few wines as well as the General Store’s Jam. I thought these three would be a good taste test against my beloved GA, but later decided I should throw some supermarket jams in the mix, who knows, maybe generic jam is an undiscovered gem? I went to my local Woolworths and picked up IXL, Cottee’s and Woolworths Home Brand strawberry jam to round out the taste test.

The "gourmet" jams

Supermarket jams

Decanting the jams into little bowls, it was interesting to see the visual differences between them. Some were thin (GA), others very chunky with fruit (Cunliffe Waters, Merricks), others oddly jelly like (Cottees, Home Brand) light in colour (Cunliffe Waters, Home Brand) and dark in colour (GA and Merricks):

Jams: back row (l-r) Gentle Annie, Cunliff Waters, Bread & Jam, Merricks General Store. Front row (l-r) Home Brand, Cottee's, IXL

The taste test

We set up the taste test – each jam was on half a piece of toast with butter:

Gentle Annie

First-up, our beloved Gentle Annie ($6, 350g).
Contains strawberries, sugar and lemon juice.

Tasting notes:

• quite a thin jam;
• dark coloured;
• dense with pips;
• fruity;
• slight lemon flavour;
• not as sweet as others tested.

An old favourite: 8/10

Cunliffe Waters

Cunliffe Waters ($10, 290g).
Contains strawberries (50%), sugar, lemon and pectin.

Tasting notes:

• thick jam with large pieces of visible fruit – whole strawberries;
• very lightly coloured;
• dense with pips;
• chunky;
• rounder flavour;
• quite sweet.

Chunky, sweet and delicious: 8/10

Bread and jam

Bread and jam ($9.90, 350g)
Contains strawberries (50%), sugar, water, pectin and citric acid.

Tasting notes:

• thick jam with visible fruit;
• mid-range in colour;
• rounder flavour;
• citrus flavour;
• not as sweet as others tested.

My favourite of the day (sorry GA!)

Surprisingly great, big, tasty jam: 9/10

Merricks general store

Merricks General Store ($10, 500g)
Contains strawberries and sugar.

Tasting notes:

• thin jam with chunks of fruit;
• dark coloured;
• dense with fruit;
• light flavour;
• sweet;
• unlike any other jam tested.

This jam divided the taste testers, Mr M thought it was the pick of the bunch, I really liked it, but its quite different to the other jams. Mr M commented that the jam is “like a wine”, a bit complex and different and not everyone would like it. Its an equal first place.

“Tastes home made”: 9/10

Woolworths homebrand

Woolworths Home Brand ($1.55, 500g)
Contains strawberries (45%), sugar, glucose-fructose syrup (ie. wheat – oops!), food acid and vegetable gum

Tasting notes:

• thick, jelly-like consistency;
• very lightly coloured;
• no visible fruit;
• some visible pips;
• inoffensive;
• super sweet;
• the cheapest jam by an absolute mile

Awful consistency, jam is okay and could be worse, 3.5 /10

Cottee's

Cottee’s ($3.46, 500g)
Contains sugar, strawberries (44%), glucose syrup, gelling agent, food acid, mineral salt.

Tasting notes:

• freakishly jelly-like consistency;
• light in colour;
• still some fruit chunks, although Mr M had a chunk which he said was disgusting;
• has an odd product claim on the side – 99% fat-free, now jam isn’t fatty but it is damn sugary, and what is the 1% fat?!?
• so sickly sweet we couldn’t finish it.

The worst of the bunch, 2/10

IXL

IXL ($2.50, 250g)
Sugar, strawberries (40%), gelling agent, food acid

Tasting notes:

• a few fruit chunks;
• jelly-like consistency (though not as much as Home Brand or Cottee’s);
• fairly light in colour;
• super sweet.

Best supermarket jam, 5.5/10

The verdict

• Equal first place went to Merricks and Bread & Jam.
• Cheapest jam of the bunch was Home Brand (.31c per 100g), most expensive was Cunliffe Waters ($3.45 per 100g).
• Best value (price as well as quality) was our old friend GA, at a cost of $1.71 per 100g, but still 8/10 rating.
• Taking into account cost, the worst was probably Cottee’s which was fairly cheap but quite disgusting and we left it unfinished, as the picture below shows:

Leftover Cottee's jam...

We will definitely enjoy making our way through the remainder of the “gourmet” jams, which fared very well on the taste test. However, now that I have 7 jars of jam on the go, I would appreciate if anyone has some good jam-utilising recipes!

This week there was a little note on the first page about fish sauce. Not just any fish sauce – it was about the David Thompson endorsed brand, Megachef. Apparently, Mr. Thompson, Thai-food extraordinaire, is ‘truly addicted to the taste and quality’ of the sauce and insists that it ‘gives depth and dimension to every dish’. (I strongly suspected these words came straight from a press release and a google search revealed that  I was not wrong.)

Anyway, yesterday, at the Prahran Market (on a flying visit to buy some green mangoes for mum), I spied a large bottle of the Megachef sitting right there on the counter at the Asian grocer. It was enticing me to purchase it, so I did.

“This one was in the paper!” I said to the man at the register, as I seized the bottle. “Have lots of people been asking for it?”

“Indeed, they have,” responded the man. This must have been why it was sitting right there. His canny marketing exercise worked on me, which I’m ok with.

I was very pleased with my new fish sauce, so I took it home and decided to do a taste test comparison with the other fish sauce in the pantry (one not endorsed by any famous chefs). Was DT right? Could Megachef really be that much better than the Three Crabs brand that had, until now, happily been part of many a Thai-style dipping sauce?

I got Three Crabs out of the pantry, tipped some on a spoon, stuck it in my mouth, swished it around thoughtfully…and….

Three Crabs vs. Megachef

GAAAAAGGG! Oh, it was bad. Real bad. It tasted like…umm…how to describe? Like concentrated and extra salty anchovies, left to ferment in the South-East Asian tropical sun for months and months!

I thought I better push on and taste some Megachef too. Would DT’s endorsed brand any better?

Prognosis: No. Fish sauce is gagworthy when taken on a teaspoon, whether premium or non-premium. I think the Megachef was slightly smoother, and a little less salty, but it was difficult to think about taste when my eyes were watering.

Lesson learned: Fish sauce needs friends to achieve its great and true potential. Fish sauce alone is horrifying.