First of all I would like to wish you all a HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! May all your wishes come true, health, wealth and success.

Now that we got that out of the way I can tell you the new exciting things that are happening in my life.

Last week Steven Gargano, my General Manager, sat down with me to discuss where we would like to take the restaurant in 2010. We had a few ideas, but the best one, and I admit that it wasn’t mine, was to give our guests this old Retro style, that will include new decorations for the restaurant and bar, new menus, and hopefully new uniforms.

We also decided that everything will be in a cinemaish influence.

Stuff like James Bond’s beef Wellington, and Steve McQueen’s beer batter fish will be on our menu. A Casablanca’s giant Oreo cookie and ice cream sandwich and Robert Redford’s bomb Alaska and much more of that yummy stuff. And all wrapped up in a retro art deco and a smiley wait staff. If I wasn’t scared from an OHS lawsuit, I would buy all our waiters skate shoes to even get you more in the mood.

Getting Retro pictures wasn’t an easy task. God, sometime I wish I had a personal assistant to take care of these things. I was sitting down next to my computer for maybe 4 hours choosing the right pictures that we would like to have, the right pictures that as soon as you’ll see them you’ll go “wow I remember this movie… haha I loved that guy…” and when you see the menu you’ll have flashbacks from your childhood when your mum promised you that if you do your homework, and you are well behaved when the uncles and aunties are coming, you’ll get that Delusions cookie sandwich. Mmm.

Yes, I was only born in late 70’s, but in Israel I guess the retro was a bit late, and the cookie sandwich was popular all through the 80’s. Kind of thinking of it, it still is. And on a hot day on the Mediterranean beach, you will hear a distant voice from a guy that must be burned already from the sun, walking with a white foam box hanging off his shoulder, yelling‘’…Ice cream sandwich…’’, or how we call it, Cookilida.

Oh I miss the Mediterranean beaches. Yes, the Australian beaches are good and pretty, but on the Mediterranean, it’s a whoooole different story. The water temperature is perfect, there are bars on the beach, and I mean on the beach, like on the sand. Playing chillout music during the day and as soon as the sun goes down it will switch to electronic music, in some places. PARTY ON!!!!

Smoking hot girls, playing Matkot, which is one of the most popular games in Israel. Using a wooden racket and a rubber ball we play something that will remind you of tennis.

Anyway, sorry I got a bit carried away with some old good memories.

Back to Retro, IT IS HAPPANING. Our successful Cabaret nights are also getting a retro theme, with new costumes and new shows, I welcome you all to jump in to the Cambridge time machine, feel free to dress accordingly, but just make sure that if you’re planning on wearing an afro wig, you might get complains from guests that are behind you and cannot see the funny show, cause these things are HUGE!!!!

I think I will leave you with a great recipe for a cookie and ice cream sandwich.

Hopefully it will bring some good memories and will make you come back for some more.

For the cookies, to make 20 of them.

• 125g butter, chopped
• 200g dark chocolate, roughly chopped
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 3 eggs, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 3/4 cup plain flour
• 3/4 cup self-raising flour
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1 cup walnuts, roughly chopped

Method

1. Place butter and chocolate in a saucepan over low heat. Stir constantly until melted. Remove from heat and transfer immediately to a bowl.
2. Add sugar, eggs and vanilla. Mix well. Sift flours and cocoa over mixture. Stir to combine. Refrigerate for 1 hour or until firm enough to roll.
3. Preheat oven to 180°C. Roll heaped tablespoonfuls of mixture into balls and place 3cm apart on lined baking trays. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, swapping trays after 8 minutes, or until biscuits are cracked on top. (Cookies will firm when you’ll cool them but will stay fudgy and yummy inside.)
4. Cool on trays for 5 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

For the sandwich, just layer good vanilla ice cream in between two cookies, maybe 3-4cm wide, wrap with clean foil and shoot straight into the freezer.

I’ll recommend you to wrap each one individually, so it will not get the flavors from your fridge, and can be served individually to your kids, of course only if they behave.

Bye for now, and hope that you’ll join us for a spin in the Cambridge time machine.

Itzhak.

My mum in Sydney

Living in a foreign country by yourself, it’s not easy.

Lonely, isolated, neglected and abandoned are just some of the feelings that you might experience if you’re planning on doing what I did 5 years ago. Five years of constantly looking for somebody to replace your family that you’ve left back home.

“Mum, why you never come visiting me?” I kept asking her, and she always had the same disappointing answer, “I can’t come now… I’m very busy… I don’t have money now…” or even sometimes she gave me a glance of light and said “Soon my dear, soon…”

And then it happened, my mum called me and told me that she booked a ticket for the land down under, the land where the animals are weird and the beer never runs out. The landwhere the water goes in the other direction down the drain, and where criminals and gold diggers came two centuries ago searching for a new opportunity. The land that I love so much… Australia.

WOOHOO!!!!!!!!!! Finally!!!! There are so many things I would like to show her, my college, the Harbour Bridge, fish market, botanic gardens and so so SO much more.

After a few days to let my mum readjust her jetlag (mind you that it takes you about 30 hours to get here from Israel)  and getting over the fact that she is actually here, I decided to take her first to the Sydney’s fish market to try everything that we can put our hands on.

Getting to the fish market is quite easy and parking is always available for a relative cheap fare. Only $3 an hr.

As soon as we walked in, we ran to Christie’s seafood, which personally I think has the best seafood in the fish market. The owner Wayne I know from long time ago while I was working for the Mercure hotel and always provides me with the best quality treasures from the ocean.

Huge king crabs, amazingly bright red lobsters, marrons, abalones, and some angry mud crabs. You know, I was never able to pick up those crabs with my bare hands. It doesn’t matter that their claws are tied, and they are really tired from the journey that they just went through, still those dodgy pink rubber bands around their claws and the ANGRY look in their eyes intimidate me and I keep my distance.

My mum mostly liked the prawns. She tasted a bit of calamari as well but other than that, anything that looks back at her before she bites or belongs to the mollusks family does not go in her mouth. As for me, the more the merrier.

The only thing I really wanted her to try is the soft shell crab, and if you never tried these ones, then consider this as a MUST!

Soft shell crabs are normally blue crabs coming from the USA or mangrove crabs coming from Asia. Teose crabs are caught just when they are molting their shells, which leaves us with nothing crunchy or hard to bite on. Even the powerful claws are soft as butter. Absolutely divine, with the right touch and species, which as you can guess I will tell you very shortly.

Back to my mum, after feasting her stomach with 3 half dozen BBQ prawns she felt that it’s enough, and does not need any more protein for next year.

So we bought a few huge pacific oysters for the road and left the market happy and full.

Now back to the Soft shell crab, and best way to cook. Deep frying is the most common way, in a good batter or even just dusted with flour, served with a fresh salad or even as a condiment for a main dish.

So here is my recipe for it:

Ingredients:

1 soft shell crab. You can buy it frozen in the fish market.

100 g flour

20 g flour for dusting the crab before dipping in the batter

50 g corn flour

Soda water

1 whole egg.

Pinch of sumac

For the salad dressing:

2 limes

70 ml extra virgin olive oil

20 g of raw sugar, grounded.

Salt and pepper.

Now, to cook the soft shell crab you better have a deep fryer at home, but if you don’t, its ok, a deep pan with lots of oil will do the job just as good.

Mix the flours together. Now slowly add the soda water while you are whisking it in, until its forms a thick batter that coats your finger but does not stay on in.Tthen add the sumac and the egg and whisk till smooth. Rest in the fridge for about 10-15min.

In the meantime, you can make the dressing. Now just squeeze the lime and mix well with all the rest of the ingredients. Make sure you taste it to see that it is not too sweet or too sour. It should be balanced perfectly.

The crab is very easy to be cleaned. All you need to do is gently remove the gills that are located under the head. The side of the head is open upwards and there you will see a grayish fiber and rough gills. Just remove it and gently wash it under cold water.

Cut the crab in to 4 and dust with flour. Then dip in the batter and BAM>> into the hot oil. The best way to know when the crab is cooked is when it floats on top of the oil.

When it’s ready, just take it out of the oil the dry on a tray. Then mix your salad and top it up with the crab. Dress generously, but NOT TOO MUCH. With over dressing, the crab will lose his beautiful crunchiness and won’t be as nice.

This will be the perfect lunch munchies on a sunny Sunday afternoon with a glass of sauvignon Blanc.

Enjoy the fruits of the sea.

Itzhak.

Things get hot in the kitchen...

Working in a kitchen is like fighting in a battle field.

Imagine the Diggers, back in World War I and World War II, running in the battle zone, dodging bullets, avoiding mines in the ground. Protecting their brothers-in-arms lives by putting them self in the front. Against the heat, the dirt, sweating, yelling, shouting charge >> and quickly as possible, before the enemy will catch them.

Well of course the kitchen is not the Gallipoli battle zone, and yes, our guests are not the enemy, but the kitchen is a dangerous place that involves extreme heat, very dangerous equipment, knives, hot oil, and a lot of pressure!!!

Imagine trying to prepare, cook and serve 100 people in 1.5 hrs, at the same time you have 50 guests up in their function room waiting for their fabulous canapés, and if you’re really ‘lucky’, then you have another function dinner for 30 guests in a different function room, and all you got is your brothers-in-arms, your colleagues, your mates in the kitchen, that are helping each other and defending our kingdom, The Kitchen.

Every move that you make will be judged by the guests, is it salty enough, is cooked enough, would he like the flavours of the dish, cooking temperature for steaks, Rare, medium rare, medium, medium well, well done and for some of our clients, even VERY well done >> and it keeps going…

Imagine that you’re seated in front of 100 people and every single one of them got something to say about you. And you, you have to impress every single one of them and make sure they get the best of the best of your abilities.

If your platoon is well trained, and set up for the upcoming battle, then it’s 99.9% chance that you’ll win the battle. But unfortunately it’s not always the case.

And then it happens, busy service, the restaurant is FULL!! Most of the orders already came through the docket machine. The kitchen hand is running around between the two washing sections, scrubbing pots, and loading the dishwasher. Your feet are screaming at you to sit down and unload that weight off them for 5 minutes. But the team is working as one. Depending on each other, coordinating like a school of sardines in the ocean.

The door opens and one of the waiters is coming with a plate half full and carefully approaches you…The head chef.

Excuse me chef?! You hear a soft voice in the background. You turn around towards them and ask what the problem is? “The guest asked for a medium steak and we served him a medium well. He is not happy”… the waiter answers while he take a few steps backwards, afraid that you might shout at him, or yell like some other chefs that they bumped into through their career as waiters.

BOOM!!!!!!! Your heart is crushed. You feel embarrassed. How did that happen? What are you going to do now? In one second, your whole service is over. No more joking, turning the music off, putting your tail between your legs, like a wounded dog. And if the floor was made out of sand, you’ll become an ostrich and stick your head way down in it.

You lost your fortress, your kingdom. You have lost the battle.

So after taking all that pressure, the heat in the kitchen, especially in these summer days, while everybody is in their offices cooling down with their brand new air conditioners looking at their computer screens, and making jokes on what they have watched last night on the television, mind you that as a chef you don’t get to see all of these shows, cause by the time you get home all there is on the telly is the horrible adult commercials that we all are sick of already. But don’t forget it is for unlimited time only… as they like to say.

So what if sometimes we yell or release some pressure on a poor waitress that by mistake came across your way. DEAL WITH IT.

We deal with it every day.

I leave you with a great recipe for Chimichurri sauce, which will go great on your steaks, no matter if it’s rare, medium or even well done.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup olive oil
1-2 green chilies depend how spicy you like it. Make sure you deseeded it.

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 bunch fresh parsley
1 bunch coriander

1/3 bunch basil

¼ bunch mint

3 clove garlic
2 shallots
1 tomato deseeded and small diced. (The professional term is Concase.
Salt and pepper to taste

In a food processor bled oil, herbs, garlic, onion, chili and lemon juice, until it forms a paste.

Then add the tomato and season to taste.

Chill for at list 2 hrs before using.

Itzhak

We all know the saying that All chefs are using drugs, and later on, having sex with the waitresses in the cool room. Even in the book/TV series ‘Kitchen Confidential’ it’s mention. Actually if I’m not mistaking, it was mention more then once.

Anyway, let me tell you a story about sex, drugs, and cooking.

I was working as a Sous chef for a big hotel. At the same time I broke up with my girlfriend, and moved in with a flat mate that likes to ***Par-tAy***

Even though I had nothing against people that consume light drugs, and even tried it a few times, still I wasn’t ready for that.

It was one month after we moved in and immediately we talked about having a house warming party/ my flat mate b-day party. We invite almost everyone we knew, and notify the neighbors about upcoming party.

Everybody was invited for Friday after noon.

On that day I was trying to finish my shift as early as possible.

8pm. And we’re heading to my place with my convertible sports car that I loved so much. Summer night, with the roof top down, surrounded by beautiful women.

Living the dream.

As we got home, the party was already started. From educational reasons I can not mention who did what and what did who… but what I can tell you that during early Sunday morning, I met my future, and now current girlfriend and the love of my life.

At first I wasn’t very impress by her performance, but the more I looked at her, the more I wanted… and as I told you guys before, with my motivation and irresistible smile there is nothing I can’t have.

It took me one month to get her and her friend. (For dinner I mean you cheeky buggers)

Her friend was celebrating her birthday and nothing is more tempting then a 3 course dinner at my penthouse, that over looking at the airplanes right towards the landing strip.

Romantic>>

I polished the whole house, shmiked the kitchen and designed the perfect menu to impress her with my culinary skills. Hopefully, she would come for seconds… hahaha.

Sneaky but perfect.

I went to the butchery that I was very familiar with from my previous work place, and knew exactly what the quality of the meat was. Remember, it is VERY important to get really good ingredients when you are cooking. Especially when you are trying to impress. Like what one of my teachers at the Le Cordon Blue used to say, ‘’it is always about the quality of your fresh produce.’’

Ok, Messieurs et Mesdames (Ladies and Gentlemen), the menu:

Entrée

Rack of lamb, stuffed with goat cheese, accompanied by dried fruit and nuts spring roll, topped with bean sprouts and pistachio dressing.

Main

Beef fillet wrapped in crispy prosciutto, on a bed of polenta cake, topped with wild mushroom sauce.

And for dessert I let my flat mate buy a birthday cake for her friend.

Success!!!!!!

She loved it, and could not stop raving about the lamb.

Anyway from here to there, and a little bit of this and little bit of that; it’s been almost 2 wonderful years with Zoe, and plenty more to come.

So yes, I did not mention any sweaty cool room sex, or a drug consumption that would encourage you to call the cops on me, but for now, this is my story about sex, drugs and cooking.

(Or is it?) hahaha.

Now to make you lucky with the ladies/ men, ill give you the winner recipe for the dried fruits and nuts spring roll. Try it, and you would not regret. Sweet sensation.

Ingredients for 4 spring rolls:

50 g Hazelnuts

50 g Sunflower seeds

50 g Macadamia

20 g Dried apricot

20 g Dried cranberry

20 g Dried apple

20 g Dates.

50 g Butter

Baking paper

1 packet of frozen spring roll pastry (can be found in all supermarkets)

Method:

Roughly chop all nuts and fruits in a food processor. Add butter.

Place in a deep pot and feel up with water until it covers the mix.

Then cover with baking paper, and cook on low heat for about 35 minutes. Be careful for not burning the bottom. The sugar from the fruits can be burn very quickly. Make sure you stir every 5-10 minutes.

Then pot the spring roll paper on an angel so one corner is pointing you. Take 2 spoons of the mix and lire in the bottom center of it. Brush all corners with egg wash

First you fold the side to the same line of you nuts mix. Make sure you fold it in straight line. Then hold from the pointy corner and roll tight.

Deep fry.

That it…easy as. But delicious as delicious meant to be.

Good luck and hope it will bring some love to you too. And most important,

Stay off the Drugs.

Love and a wink,

Itzhak.

12^th of January 2005, the time is 6:45 in the morning.

I have just landed in Sydney airport. I remember the fresh air, and the warm sun, that would soon be considered hot and dangerous, hitting my face. All I had is a backpack full of clothes and a business card of a local hostel in Glebe, which I had no idea where it was.

My friend Mark (who had joined me on my new Australian adventure) and I jumped in a taxi and handed the driver the business card with the hostel address, hoping that they could accommodate us.

Guess what?? They couldn’t.

So here I am, 3 hours in Sydney, mid January, 35 degrees in the shade, with a 30 kg backpack, lost in Glebe, and the only shoulder I could cry on is my mate Mark, who by the way suffers from diabetes, which means that he needs to eat a balanced, healthy meal soon, and cannot be walking around searching for a hotel that could spare our lives and give us a room.

I left Mark in a ‘safe zone’ under a tree with all the luggage and proceeded on my adventure.

I remember walking in the streets thinking to myself, OH MY GOD!!! What have I done?? How did I copy paste my whole life in to this foreign country with these MASSIVE ugly mo@#$$ F#@#$$ spiders?? (Yes, that was the first time I was introduced to your unusual wildlife that you have here in Australia). Don’t get me wrong; we also have some weird animals in Israel, but spiders like that, and in the middle of the streets, in their massive webs, I have never seen.

I found a room, and we are “safe” now.

A week after, me and Mark rented our first place in Sydney. A two bedroom apartment in Pyrmont, partly furnished. We did not know that Pyrmont is considered one of the “good” suburbs in Sydney, but was just luck, and the 501 bus that will take us to college for the next 9 months is passing just under our front door.

Days go by, and so a couple of months, and I’m running out of money very quickly.

Mark, I need to get a job. “But how?” he asks. “We don’t know anyone, we just a fresh basic cuisine student that English is just a faded memory from watching Seinfeld on TV back home. Who is going to give you a job??”

I’ll be ok, I got my motivation and irresistible smile that could get me any job I want. (So I thought…)

I improvised a decent CV and walked off to Darling Harbour, on a mission. Like a hungry lion, that has no choice, in the African savanna, using his survival skills to hunt his prey, I was hunting for a job.

After not long, I got in to Cockle bay Wharf, and met my future Head chef, having his five minutes break, like all chefs, sucking on a cigarette, and trying to forget the long day that just started for him.

“Hey, my name is Ezy, I’m a Le Cordon Blue student and I’m looking for a casual job. Can you help?”   Using the irresistible smile of mine. By the way, I named my self Ezy, since my real name is Itzhak, and I assumed that it will be too hard for the English palette to pronounce, and might come against me in my job hunt. So Ezy, can’t get easier than that.  And guess what? I got the job. Weekend Casual chef that will work on the cold larder section.

I was pumped!!! Can’t get better then that. Working in a real kitchen, huge restaurant that can seats up to 250 people at once, surrounded by the amazing views of Darling Harbour.

Yap!! I nailed it.

One of the dishes I had to cook in my section was a beautiful, delicious baby squid marinated in lots of herbs and olive oil, topped with a Mediterranean pine nut dressing.

Want to know how it’s done?

Let me tell you.

Ingredients for 4 serves:

4 baby squids cleaned and cut in to rings.

1 bunch of Parsley.

1 bunch of coriander

3 garlic cloves chopped.

One small onion diced.

2 red chilies chopped.

400ml of olive oil.

For the dressing:

100 g of roast pine nuts.

1 Lebanese cucumber deseeded and diced finely.

1 Roma tomato deseeded and diced finely.

1 small spinach onion diced finely.

100 ml of olive oil.

30 ml of balsamic vinegar.

Ok, let’s start.

In a food processor blend all squid marinating ingredients – except the squid, obviously – until it forms a paste.

Mix in the squid and chill in the fridge for at least 2 hours.

In the meantime, mix all dressing condiments and season.

Tick tock, 2 hours passed.

Heat a pan, prefer a non stick, with a bit of oil. Wait until the pan is smoking hot.

Quickly pour the squid in to the pan and toss repeatedly. Be careful not to over cook. The squid will be hard as a shoe soul if you do. It should take you about 3-4 minutes.

Remove from the pan, and dress. I guarantee you that on a sunny day, with a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc, there will be no competitors on the family BBQ.

Hope you’ll find this recipe helpful in the coming summer.

Enjoy.