Truffle Ramen coming soon!

トリュフのタペナードを練りこんだ平打ち麺、スープには一際香り高いイタリア産白トリュフオイルを効かせ、さらにフランスから空輸した生黒トリュフをスライスしトッピングします。世界三大珍味の一つを旬な内に召し上がってください！現在鋭意試作中、来週中には仕上げる予定です。

Phuc Deli Viet @ Indooroopilly

This is a Vietnamese noodle shop in the Indooroopilly shopping centre food court situated adjacent to Pig and Whistle.

http://www.pignwhistle.com.au/content/pnw-standard.asp?name=Indooroopilly_PhucDeli

The owners are a friend of a friend and thanks to the kind hook up arranged by my friend, I was given the chance to interview them while Taro’s Ramen was still in its feasibility stage.

When i met them, they strongly urged me to stay in the resources industry and that hospitality was not an industry for a person like me (with young family no experience) to venture into. When they heard my plan of noodle shop they raised this shop as a relatively successful outlet but that it requires a perfectly efficient management to make it successful and it was impossible for them to suggest an inexperienced middle aged man could replicate from scratch. If I was so adamant, they told me to first of all get into the actual battlefield and see for myself and that I should get sick of it and give up on my stupid idea of opening up a noodle shop. I guess it is my nature not to listen once I’ve decided… Being a totally over confident arrogant bum, i completely ignored their advice and it was just last Sunday after 2.5 years of receiving their advice I went to see this shop.

Massively popular when I visited there was a cue of about ten people in front of me. Price is 15.90 for a pho or 16.90 for a laksa or curry.

I ordered and watched in fascination as the two cooks assembled the incoming orders. I had gone through enough hardship to realize how sensible their advice was but I appreciated first hand the operation that was described as “perfectly efficient”. Not a second of idling. Efficient to the max. Everything is prepped beforehand and the cook pops the noodles and veggies into the big cooking pot using the noodle baskets. No timers or scales are used just the cooks experience. He does one order in about 30 seconds as fast as the girl at the counter serves a new customer. I just watched in awe as he processed the orders one after another and didn’t even notice my own order being finished when i heard a number about 5 orders after mine was being called.

My wife pointed out that this was normal service and Taro’s is still too slow. I pondered on this point. Our focus at taro’s is consistent quality. noodles are weighed, cooking times are timed by the second and we keep the soup and seasoning sauce separate till the last moment so the taste doesn’t deteriorate. As a result our processing time is slower so there are physical limitations on getting our speed up on par with Phuc Deli Viet but I did get inspired by how efficient they run their operation and customers appreciating the quick turnaround. And this leading to a positive effect of customers returning knowin that they won have to wait long if they come here. I will see if we can apply any of their efficiencies to our procedures to better my turnaround time.

And in relation to the advice given to me 2 years ago, was it a sensible advice? Most definitely. I would do the same if I was in their shoes. Do I regret ignoring it? Course not!!!

Seikyo Junmai Ginjo

Received a sample of this beautiful junmai ginjo from our supplier Daiwa food. It can be purchased at ichibajunction.com.au

This one uses a type of rice called “omachi”.

Nihonshu grade is +3 so very close to my liking ranking around the same as suishin. However with an evident ginjo aroma it also has class. The Hiroshima area is a very high class sake brewing area.

Balanced acidity umami and sweetness, it is a medium bodied sake with uplifting ginjo aroma. Nice and smooth very nice cold, room temp or even warmed up.

お土産ラーメン 昼顔 gift take home ramen “hirugao”

My friend M brought me a pack of take home ramen from Japan. This is a collaboration product made by a noodle company under license from a famous ramen shop. This one is called Hirugao. There is a famous shoyu ramen shop in Tokyo called Setagaya and they open up during lunch hour under the name Hirugao serving shio ramen only. Interesting concept to open two distinctly different concept businesses in one shop front.

The taste. It is a quite mild mellow taste probably stewing tonkotsu at intentionally lower temperature and length to not get the emulsification of the usual tonkotsu. This lighter tonkotsu based stock matches well with the string bonito second soup. However can taste really strong MSG and the smell of alcohol preservative and kansui is too pungent. This is why I use sodium carbonate kansui instead of potassium carbonate Kansui for my delicate shio. The strong MSG is sadly a sign of japanese norm so I realize again that this is the reason for many people criticizing my ramen as bland or punchless. I am glad we have enough customers supporting the all natural umami of taro’s. it was a good bowl though, there is rarely a bowl I don’t enjoy and it taught me that shio can be a fully satisfying bowl depending on the recipe an relative position in the menu. (at our shop it is the alternative light healthy choice, at Hirugao it is the only and main star on stage).

Anyway thank you M for your kind thought and also for the good luck “omamori”!

東京の有名店でせたが屋という醤油ラーメンの店がある。この店が昼限定で「ひるがお」として塩ラーメンを提供するらしい。こういう1店でテーマを変えて営業するのは何だか粋だなと思う。まだやってるかわからないが確か中村屋も夜はフレンチ風のコース料理を出している。

商社時代の後輩からお土産でひるがおのラーメンをいただいた。こういう手のラーメンは製麺メーカーが有名店とコラボして出来上がるので有名店の味そのままとは行かないが敬意を表して丁寧に作る。丼もスープの素も温めお湯の量もしっかり計り茹で時間も計測。

麺は日持ちする様半生になっている。そのせいかもちもち感も腰も物足りない。

スープは結構トンコツのコクが効いており魚介の風味とマッチしている。化学調味料がかなり強く改めて日本の大衆食文化の化学調味料漬けぶりが分かる。なるほどこれに慣れているとうちの味がパンチがないと感じる人が多いのもうなずける。

食べているうちにカンスイと茹で切った時に抜けきってないアルコール保存料の味がスープに溶けだしてきて匂いが気になる。やはり塩ラーメンはごまかしが効かない。うちではこれを気にして塩ラーメンの麺には炭酸カリウムを抑え炭酸ナトリウムのカンスイを使用している。

塩といえばあっさりだがこういう塩一筋の店ではトンコツ強めのコクがある塩もありだな、というか素直に塩もコクを出せば贅沢感のある一品にしあがるんだと参考になった。

M君、ご馳走様！参考になったよ。御守りもわざわざありがとう！その気持ちもあわせていちばんの御守りになるわ！

メキシカンつけ麺 Mexican tsukemen

Tried making tsukemen with avocado and salsa. My staff were in doubt but what do ya know, it ain’t half bad amigo!

遊びでつくってみました。

アボカドとサルサが入った漬けダレで頂きます。

けっこういける！

Cam Ranh @ Darra

This is the first restaurant in Darra inala area I had been introduced to. I became instantly addicted to the tropical Asian atmosphere. It’s like you’re in Ho chi min. Also the unbelievably cheap mud crab! Eat a crab in a fancy seafood restaurant in the city you’re bound to pay 100 bucks straight up. Here, it’s 53 per kilo. I was used to paying around 40 a kilo but seems prices have inflated a bit. The owner must have changed 5 times since my first visit and they now take eftpos. Crab tasted ok. But not wonderfully fresh. The brains taste really sweet when it’s fresh but this time I found it to be slightly bitter. The noodles for the chow mein also slightly too crunchy, not absorbing the gravy enough.

I actually travelled over to addiction restaurant next to the Ipswich highway but was burned down… Must have served unfresh crab to the wrong man.

Agedashi tofu

Found a tofu that was past use by date. It had not gone off so I put starch on, fried it and poured over thickened dashi along with ginger radish and shallots. Had for dinner with kimchi and rice. Healthier option than tonkotsu ramen. can’t give into the craving every time!

New stock pot

New stock pot arrived from Japan. My wife brought this back and it was a big job involving fighting with the jetstar ground staff at check in. It is made by a Japanese company called Nakao Aluminium. Interesting to see that the aluminum is manufactured by Kobe steel. A long time customer that I used to handle as a coal trader. So this means that there are a lot of local Qld bauxite and coal involved to make this pot. Happy to use Aussie resource Japanese manufactured pot for my ramen!

Typical home cooking

Breakfast
Zenzai – sweet red bean soup with mochi

Lunch
Soba salad – soba with tomato chives olive oil and mentsuyu.
Cucumber w peanut butter miso mayo dip.

Dinner
Omelette rice – soft omelette and demi glacé sauce over seasoned rice.
Gobo (burdock) and carrot salad
Cabbage and Hijiki seaweed marinated w chives dashi and sesame oil.

I did binge on chocolates and full bags of potato chips or Doritos most of the nights but eating 3 healthy meals a day and playing in the pool everyday I lost almost 2kg during the holidays.

Fish and Chips

My theme during the Long break has been to cook healthy food at home. Pictured is snapper and roasted potatoes w olive oil salt and rosemary. We got the fish whole at Sammies Girl at Hamilton and roasted the head simply with salt and bones cooked with rice. Tai (snapper) is a fish that is often eaten during celebrations such as weddings and of course new years. The kids loved the roasted head more than the BBQ and I was impressed with their japaneseness.