Bangalow Sweet Pork Site Visit

I can not emphasize the importance of good produce and shout out to the producers that provide us with our top quality produce.

It’s been a while since my last visit to Bangalow Sweet Pork (link for my previous blog post) so I drove down to the Northern Rivers to pay them a visit.

Founder, the late Joe Byrne told me his motto was “Old Fashioned, the way pork should taste”.  Since then, new owner Damien Dougherty has taken over in 2011 and has been following Joe’s strict quality control regime.  We have been blessed with a wonderful partnership with them and exclusively supplied pork bones for our soup and collarbutt for our charsiu.  And that has been arguably the one of the most important fortune that Taro’s Ramen has had.

Whilst Bangalow Sweet Pork has established a reputation for their succulent pork, their sustainable farming practices and Damien’s philosophy is not given enough credit.  They use the Eco Shelter system to establish a hygienic and comfortable environment for the pigs whilst keeping a controlled waste management process to minimize the environmental footprint.  Their solar energy generation capacity has made them self sufficient for daytime electricity requirements and Damien’s vision is to achieve a carbon neutral business in the future.  With his innovative ideas of harnessing emerging technologies such as biomass generation I think he is not too far off.

My site visit is summarized in this Taro’s Bangalow Sweet Pork Site Visit Youtube (video clip). 

Thank you so much Damien!

 

Blackstar Coffee

As I wrote earlier, I have been trying to up the quality of our coffee.

Out with our previous supplier and in with Blackstar!

One of my personal favorite Cafes in Brisbane has always been Blackstar in Westend. So I just started talking to them naturally and ever since, they have been helping us with the supply of coffee and getting our coffee up to a good level.

We are now proudly offering their Revolution blend for the espresso range and also stock their legendary Cold pressed coffee range.

The coffee extraction technique of Blackstar is simple. The beans are selected from organic fair trade farmers and roasted behind their shopfront in small batches in their cute little roaster, medium-light not to kill the good qualities of the green beans. Then upon extraction, put in heaps more beans and extract with less water, means double sweet intense coffee flavor, less milk or water to dilute the flavors. Coffee is naturally a sweet thing, so even if you don’t add sugar, a latte made with Blackstar beans and method is sweet yet full bodied.

The CPC not only tastes great, it really is a inspiring drink. The stylish design, organic ingredients, cold pressed for a mild full flavor, and they don’t use sugar. They use organic blue agave nectar which I am pretty sure will soon start to become a common term among foodies and healthies. It is a cactus like plant and produces a syrup that is heaps sweeter than sugar so less usage and the GI is much lower than sugar so healthy and less guilt.

Drinking Blackstar also means you are supporting ethical practices, organic farming and a local Brisbane business.

Go on guys, try it, get hooked. Enjoy it and be the missionary to spread the word on this awesome drink!

Visit by Choya Rep

A visit by a well dressed Choya Representative from Japan. Choya is probably the largest manufacturer of plum wine. Good discussion on the topic. shocked to learn that the current Choya plum wine is actually not the same as the one they sell in Japan. It is blended with fruit wine made from kiwi etc to adjust to tariff regulations in US etc. they introduced us a one shot size bottle with a whole plum in each serving made properly with sugar and shochu. Come to think of it, it should not be called plum wine when it is in fact a shochu based liquer so they have aptly named the current product “plum wine”. Can definitely tell the difference in aroma so please have a try of the premium plum liquer if you like plum wine!

出汁、Dashi

Our dried fish stock shipment arrived from Japan.

Did you know that our shoyu and shio stock contains bonito (hon karebushi), mackerel (Sababushi), sardine (urumebushi), squid (surume), kelp (dounan makonbu), shrimp, scallops, shiitake.

Bangalow Sweet Pork

Damien Dougherty from Bangalow Sweet Pork dropped by for a visit the other day.

We really are happy to testify how superb their pork is. There’s 3 types of pork. Really smelly pork with ammonia odour, normal fresh odour less pork such as the ones available at Asian butchers, and then there is the succulent odorless and tender and good tasting pork. You can really tell the difference when you have Sweet Pork. It’s most evident when you have our Bangalow Sweet Pork belly shabu shabu hot pot.

Read my visit to Bangalow Sweet Pork in my post two years ago.

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.

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!

Nori

Due to the earthquake, our organic nori (seaweed) supplier, the Hoshi family in Shichigahama, Japan has lost all of his nori harvesting boat & equipment on top of his rice paddies being devastated.  They fortunately seem to have some stock that is safe but are not in a situation to organize deliveries at the moment.  In response to this emergency event, we have flown in dried nori (not organic kan-nori) for our tonkotsu ramen from Ariake, Japan and we ask your understanding in that regard.  We still have stock of organic roasted nori (yakinori) for sushi and shoyu ramen but may have to switch to Ariake nori should supplies be short. With your understanding, I will also like to donate 30% of your kind donations directly to the Hoshi family who are suffering so much from this tragic event. 

Taro

Tea Master Class with Mr. Taninaka at Midori-En

Coffee

We use 100% Arabica beans with medium roast supplied from Grinders.  It is a very middle of the road type taste for a broad audience and forgiving as well as being suitable to many applications. 

Pictured is a latte with a picture of the most famous Japanese anime character of all time.  By the way this doraemon latte is not on the menu but might be available when our talented barista Miss T is on the roster!