It's been a while since I have written my last decent post. Not without reason; I was travelling South Korea and Australia for 7 weeks! There was either no decent wifi connection or just no time to write about all the great food that came along. But I'm back now, for quite a while since I don't have many holiday hours left, and can't wait to share my foodie travel tips.
We are home now for a bit more than a week and I still feel like I have a bit of Australia in me.
Feeling relaxed and an appetite for summer salads and Vegemite on toast ;-)
Unfortunately I could not bring home a bit of the warm, Australian summer sun. But I found out that the most iconic Australian food is very easy to make at home, plus also perfect to eat during cold Dutch winter days ;-)
I'm talking about the Aussie meatpies! As with a lot of things down under the Aussie meatpie is heavily influenced by Great Britain where they have the steak pie.
Hand-sized they are often eaten as a takeaway food snack but are also extremely popular while watching a rugby or football game.
We ordered them for lunch several times and were very enthusiastic about the meatpies at Trappers Bakery in Goulburn. If you ever happen to be in the neighbourhood (driving from Canberra to Sydney); it's really close to the Goulburn exit on the highway and next to a big sheep. You can't miss it! And I'm glad we didn't thanks to tip from one of the great new friends we met along this trip.
We also really loved the meatpies from Hamlets, close to Manly wharf & beach in Sydney. Our foodie friend SarahKate (from the Mi Casa Su Casa supper club) told us to go there and off course we couldn't resist after a morning on the beach. We ordered several flavours like; pepper steak (with lots of pepper!), pumpkin/feta/coriander, steak & cheese and our favourite: Thai Chicken (meat) pie. Absolutely delicious and we were very happy to get a few more for lunch on my birthday the next day.
 |
| Hamlets meatpies in shop |
A week after we arrived back home it was Sunday 26th of January and the celebration of Australia day.
I thought it was the perfect opportunity to try and make some typical Australian food in my own kitchen.
Because of the big temperature difference I felt like making a beef stew with dark beer. I used a Dutch recipe from the MissFromage blog which also contained pieces of carrot, mushroom,onion and bacon.
Half of this recipe was enough to fill 6 little muffin cases. It was only after reading this lovely post about Aussie meat pies from the Eat Little Bird blog that I realised it is a perfect idea to us a muffin tray instead of pie tins. First of all; you get lovely two-bite size little meatpies. And second, maybe even more important, I don't possess any pie tins ;-)
Because it is difficult to buy shortcrust pastry in Dutch supermarkets, and I didn't feel like making my own, I only used puff pastry. It worked out great; blind bake them for about 10 minutes. Then the filling inside and the pastry lids on top. Some egg wash on top of each pie and sprinkled with sesame seeds.
I totally forgot the dollop of Heinz tomato sauce on top, but it was tasty enough anyway.
The perfect meal to remember a perfect holiday!
