Mantra on King William

We have been aiming to head to Mantra on King William for years literally since it opened in 2007.

Tonight we are celebrating,

You enter mantra through an over-sized front door, it adds to the grandiose oldie world atmosphere created inside.

The dark wood antique tables are set with beautifully shining glassware calling out for wine.

The menu is a hand written backboard, beautiful handwriting. Unfortunately the Sous Vide Lamb Backstrap was unavailable.

We chose Patrocinio Zinio Tempranillo Graciano Doca Rioja from Spain ($44)

Herb bread with Oil - the oil contained seaweed, salty, moreish, perfectly matched with the rosemary flavored bread.

A wonderful Cauliflower velouté with green pea and chive garnishing, It was very creamy and had a nice Parmesan taste unfortunately the chive garnish was a little overpowering and detracted from the overall flavor

Red Braised Pork Hock with Roasted Green Lobster and crisp Hen's Egg ($36)
The boy had been considering the Sous Vide Lamb however that was unavailable he went the pork hock instead. The egg was poached then coated in polenta and fried. whilst the inside of the egg was still runny the polenta on the outside was very rough, not a favorite. The cucumber was a refreshing break to the fatty pork hock although with only 4 slices it hardly counted as a main ingredient. This dish is served with a stock poured over at the table, this was a nice touch and a very nice stock.

Grass Fed Fillet of Beef with Chevre filled Zucchini Flower and truffled potato puree ($35)
I ordered medium rare, perhaps I should have ordered rare as the beef was very tough. I loved the chevre filed zucchini flower I didn't realise the flower continued to be attached to the zucchini as it grew, the zucchini was really crunchy and the flavors contrasted well with the beef. The Truffled mash came across as quite nutty and was very creamy. The surprise delight was the little roasted potatoes at first I thought they were scallops (perhaps I had had too much wine) and was delighted how they added texture to the whole dish.

Steamed Broccoli with anchovy Cream ($9) and Roasted New Potatoes with Dijon Cream ($9)
The sides were a big disappointment.
The broccoli itself was delicious served in a little butter perfect the anchovy cream not so much.
The potatoes would have been much better on their own, the Dijon Cream coated the skin and didn't really add anything to the flavor, something was need to cut through the grease a light roast potato with herbs and sea salt would have been a much better match. Not even the tiny tongs could make these sides work.


The overall ambiance of Mantra has been well designed, The waitress was lovely and took time to discuss the menu with us. We went on a Wednesday night and there were 3 other tables booked. I believe there are some changes going on in the kitchen at the moment and hopefully things will pick up. We had a nice evening but ultimately the food did not live up to expectations and with so much tasty competition just down the road it's not worth the price


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Mantra on King William
36 King William Rd
GOODWOOD SA
Tel. 08 8377 7201
e-mail: ben.warren@mantraonkingwilliam.com

Opening Hours: Tue-Fri: Lunch & Dinner
Sat: Dinner
Sun: Breakfast

Geoffreys Next Day Beef Curry

I phoned my brother Geoffrey to get his curry recipe, he traded for our fish pie recipe. He kept telling me that it would taste best after it had been in the fridge for 24 hours and he was right!
When it was cooked it was a bit bland with a spicy kick, nice flavour but not a strong curry. I thought I hadn't added enough spices at the beginning and Geoffreys advice was that once you had added everything else THAT'S IT you can't add any more spice. Then when I had it for my lunch it had transformed into this big tasty curry! So next time I will perhaps manage to avoid the temptation and put it all into the fridge for the next day!!!


I just have to say how much better the meat from the butcher was, it might have been that the supermarket stuff was frozen and defrosted but WOW! I don't think I've cooked with both types at the same time before, the butcher meat was nice big chunks with no fat at all, nicer colour and generally nicer in every way. The supermarket heart smart was scrawny, stringy, little bits. but it was all cooked together and in the end it all tasted the same.

Ingredients
500g Heart Smart Beef cubes (from the Supermarket then frozen and defrosted)
500g diced Beef (from the butcher across the street)
1 can coconut milk
2 large potatoes
1 large carrot
1 red onion, chopped
quarter of a pumpkin
quarter head of cauliflower
2 hand fulls of green beans
1 green capsicum
1 handful of sultanas
2 heaped teaspoons Chili powder
2 heaped teaspoons Cumin
lots of shakes turmeric probably about 1 heaped teaspoon.
tip of teaspoon fenugreek powder
2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 teaspoon ground cardamon
1 teaspoon Keen's mild Indian curry powder (Because I found it in the cupboard when I was hunting for spices)
2 teaspoons Garam Marsala

Chop vegetables into good size chunks
Brown meat off in frying pan in small batches and set aside.
Fry off onion and try to scrape up meat brownings.
Put all spices, except Garam masala, into fry pan, if it looks too dry, add more cooking oil (I added oil twice) until it forms a paste.
Cook up spices for about 5 minutes.
Stir meat through paste, add hard vegetables like potato and carrot stir through paste.
Put into slowcooker with onion
Pour coconut milk into fry pan, bring to boil while scraping brown bits off bottom of pan. Pour over meat and hard veg.
Cover and cook on high for about and hour, then add soft Veg.

I wasn't sure the pumpkin would cook fast enough so I steamed the pumpkin and Cauliflower till starting to soften and then added them.
When I added the soft Veg I sprinkled the Garam Masala powder over the top and stirred it all through.

While that was cooking I made Turmeric Rice in the Rice cooker and Dhall in the blender and wondered at how I ever got along without all these appliances!

After another hour the rice was done and the potato was still a bit hard so I left the ricecooker on warm and let the curry cook for another hour (or till I had done all the dishes)


Potato now soft so we served up with Dhall, naan and mango chutney!

Dhall
this sort of follows the recipe in Curries from the sultan's kitchen a wonderful old book we picked up at a booksale

Tin of lentils
2 cloves of garlic
salt
pepper
lemon juice
milk
pinch of chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon turmeric

Blend lentils in blender,
Fry off garlic.
Add spices and fry for a few minutes
add lentil paste and fry for 15 minutes adding milk to thin
squeeze lemon and season to taste.

This came put really well will defiantly make again

Roast beef in Slow cooker

Happy Australia Day!!

Today is a public holiday here in Australia, so yesterday I went to the supermarket to pick up some salad stuff and all the meat was half price as the supermarket is closed today!

I got a roast silverside of beef and had no idea what to do with it so I did what all good cooks do and phoned my Mum!
She said cook it SLOWLY and it will come out lovely and tender she usually just salt and peppers it and puts in in the oven for 1 hour on high then 2 hours on low. I asked if I could add slivers of garlic like you do with a roast lamb and she said "It can only make it tastier"

Ingredients

1.5kg Roast Silverside of beef
3 large potatos
4 small carrots
3 small parsnip
5 small garlic cloves of garlic
half a leek, chopped
half a red onion, chopped
half a stock cube worth of stock (about 300ml)
good slug of red wine (about a glass and a half)


So I linned my slowcooker pot with thick slices of potato about 1cm thick.

I cut little holes in my roast and poked 2 cloves of garlic slivers into the holes.
Covered roast with ground black pepper. (I decided to leave the salting till later as I read somewhere that salting meat in slowcooking can make it dry out.)

Then browned off my roast on the stove top until all sides were sealed and set the garlic slivered peppered roast on the potato.

In the pot on the stove I fried the leek, onion and remaining garlic and added to the slow cooker, along with the carrot, big chunks, and parsnip, quartered.

I now put the stock and wine in the pot on the stove and brought it to the boil scraping all the meat brownings back into the liquid and poured this over the meat and veg in the pot.

cooked on high for 3hours turned and cooked for another hour.


Then it looked something like this!

I removed the meat and let it rest for 10 minutes while we made the gravy (I say we!! the boy made the gravy)


To make the gravy we scooped some juices from the pot and boiled up in a frypan we added BISTO!!! (british gravy powder that after hunting everywhere for we discoved it in the convienience store across the road from our house)

so anyway added 2 teaspoons of bisto straight into the pan juice mix and brought to the boil whist stirring to thicken.

This is the best gravy I've had in Australia.


The finished meal was compleated with frozen peas and cauliflour cheese. no roast puddings this time, the oven wasn't on just the grill to brown the top of the cauliflour cheese so the house stayed nice and cool.

The meat was so tender it was hard to carve without it crumbling. we left it cooking for so long as after 3 hours cooking we remembered the cauliflour cheese stilll had to be made so gave it an extra hour cooking time.

It was very very tasty. The parsnips were slightly soggy and lost there flavour but everything else was delish.

Will definatly do this again!!

Slow cooker

On Sunday we bought a slow cooker in the January sales.
I was very excited as I've wanted one for ages.
Its a Ronson 6 Litre which is huge! but it means when we cook something there is plenty left for the freezer.
I decided to start with Chilli con Carne from the Hot food cookbook I borrowed from the local library and modified for the slow cooker.
It came out well but a little sloppy I halved the liquid but I guess because it was mince it needed hardly any stock.
Looking forward to roasting a chicken and making stews once the wether is cooler, at 33 degrees it's not really soup and stew weather.
still very happy with my first attempt.

Chilli con carne

4 tsp grd cumin
1 tsp grd allspice
2 tsp chilli powder
2 tsp paprika
1 tbs veg oil
1 large onion, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, crushed
4 small red chillis, deseeded and finely chopped
1kg beef mince
2 tins of whole tomatoes
2 tbs tomato paste
tin kidney beans, drained and rinsed
500ml beef stock
1 tbs oregano chopped
1 tsp sugar

I dry fried the spices until fragrant and then threw everything in the slowcooker, gave it a good stir and went to bed (as I'm working night shift).

I woke up 8hrs later stired again. Tasted and decided it neaded salt, pepper, paprika and more garlic and less liquid. scooped 2 cups of liquid off and left for another hour.

served with tortillas, salad, guacamole and sour cream

very tasty! beans stayed whole, tomatoes still in big chunks, mince had turned to mush! next time less liquid and maybe slightly less cooking time.
All in all not bad for a first attempt.