Located just off Cavill Avenue on Orchard way you can find this simple honest little bistro.  From the outset it appears neat and tidy, a good trade of people and no need to book just try a walk up, and we did this with a group of 9 people, a mix of adults and teenagers ranging from 14 to 48. Our group had a couple of special requirements 1 vegetarian and one glutton free dinner, this will test many menus as we travel around Surfers Paradise.

We tried a few entrées:

Seared scallops on the shell with simple burnt butter sauce and fresh garnish of Italian styled vegetables ($13.95). This was light and fresh the scallops seared on the shell topped with a herb and burnt butter sauce, scallops where small and slightly over cooked but a nice dish.

Vegetarian spring rolls with a sweet chilli dipping sauce ($6.95). As we expected fresh and crispy, the dipping sauce was quite spicy but overall a nice starter.

Thirdly chicken satay skewers ($8.50). The serving was good and the flavour not too spicy would suite most eaters.

Mains:

Garlic prawn entre as a main ($12.50) is a classic dish for any restaurant, and the Captains Table did not disappoint. The dish is presented with the prawns in a light sauces and a cone mould of saffron rice. This dish was balanced and light on garlic, and oil a clean dish that does not repeat for many hours after.

The  vegetarian dish was a Spinach and Ricotta Ravioli, this comes dressed in a tomato sauce and julienned vegetables ($15.95). The flavours of oregano and garlic came through the dish, the pasta itself was flavoursome and cooked andante, not a bad choice for a vegetarian and even of you just like pasta.

Then there was the Catch of the Day ($14.95). This was expected to be a great dish, freshly caught fish on the Gold Coast, but when asked the staff did not really know what the fish was in the dish. The fish came battered in what we think was a light beer batter, which unfortunately was well over cooked bordering upon burnt. I would have to say not the best dish of the dinner.

Since we are on the coast we looked and saw the whole Lobster Mornay (snap frozen onboard the ship when caught) ($45.00). This dish was good value the Mornay either had wasabi or horse radish in it, which added a bit of heat which I liked the meat was a little overcooked but I put that down to frozen seafood.

Tasmanian Kangaroo ($25.95). This came out swimming in a sauce, but the meal was well balanced and cooked to perfection, even one of our teenage dinners enjoyed the dish. The appearance did not do the dish justice.

And now for the chicken dish, Camembert Chicken ($17.95). This dish was a real winner great value for money, nicely cooked chicken fillet with a camembert cheese sauce and filled with camembert and avocado. The dish presented well and tasted great, a real winner.

Now the contentious meal of the night the gluten free meal Seafood Platter for 2 ($75.00). When ordering we where very specific that this meal was to come with no wheat flour, breadcrumbs or other gluten products, but upon arrival all of the calamari and fried fish came out with breadcrumbs and had been served on top of the chips. The rest of the dish was great, good flavours and fresh. There where Morton Bay Bugs, Oysters, Mussels, Prawns and fresh fruit. This dish was a good size for 2 people and they enjoyed it.

Just to try most things we also gave one of the deserts a try, the macadamia and mango cheesecake with ice-cream (shop bought ice-cream) the cheesecake was fantastic fresh and light what a great desert.

All in all this was a restaurant that would suit most families or a couple, when on holiday this will be reasonable value they are located just off Cavill Avenue right in the centre of the action. Word of warning they are located just down from the adult entertainment clubs.

Phone: 07 5531 5766

Fax: 07 553 0274

Email: captainstable@bigpond.com.au

Address: 17 Orchid Avenue, Surfers Paradise. Qld 4217

Well Munchbrother is back on the Gold Coast (Queensland) again it’s 2010 and he has already been spotted trying to eat dinner.

Will have to wait and see if he can review any meals without being spotted…

Can anyone refuse this week’s cracker of a meal at our place?

Well the winters cold is nipping at our ears, snow is falling on the near by hills and Slow-cooked lamb shanks served on a bed of creamy mashed potatoes is all I can think of.

Here’s one of my new favourites, us in Sun-dried tomatoes and Pesto along with capsicums and Spanish onion. Well strap in as I go and give the new cast iron cooker a tryout….

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About:

Diabetic, Egg free, Heart friendly, Low Carb, Low GI, Nut free, Gluten Free

Easy to cook

Prep time: 30 Minutes

Cook time: 3 ½ Hours

Ingredients (serves 6)

• 3-4 tbs  first pressing Extra Virgin olive oil
• 6 Frenched lamb shanks
• 2 red onions, sliced
• 2 red capsicum, seeds removed, thickly sliced
• 2 yellow capsicum, seeds removed, thickly sliced
• 6 garlic cloves, crushed
• 300ml white wine (preserved the rest to have with dinner)
• 3 tbs sun-dried tomato pesto
• 2 cups (500ml) lamb or beef stock ( I prefer Beef Consumme’)
• 10 vine-ripened tomatoes, quartered
• Leaves of 1 long sprig rosemary
• 2 tbs chopped flat-leaf parsley
• Creamy mashed potato, to serve

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C. (fan forced or conventional)
2. Heat the oil in a cast iron cooker (pot) over high heat and brown lamb shanks in batches to seal on all sides. Remove and set aside. (be careful as the hot oil really burns)
3. Reduce heat to medium and add onion, capsicum and garlic to the casserole. Cook, stirring, for about 5 minutes until vegetables start to soften (the onions will become translucent).
4. Add wine, pesto and stock, and then return shanks to pan.
5. Add tomato and rosemary and season with salt and pepper. Bring to the boil, cover, and roast in oven for 2 1/2 hours.
6. Remove lid and cook for a further hour. Stir in parsley, reserving a little to garnish.
7. To serve, dollop mash on good size plates, sit a shank on top and spoon around some sauce and vegetables.
8. Garnish with parsley (optional).

Note: I make a special potato bake which I use as the base for the meal and place fresh beans on the side drizzled with a good olive oil and sea salt

Well again it’s winter but really this is a dish that is just as good in spring or summer, slow cooked leg of lamb (7 hours) and I am going to try a new slow cooker (Kambrook 6 litre)

About:

Diabetic, Egg free, Heart friendly, Low Carb, Low GI, Nut free, Gluten Free

Easy to cook

Ingredients

• 4 anchovy fillets, patted dry
• 3 large garlic cloves, peeled and quartered
• 1 leg of lamb 1.8 to 2 kg leg of lamb (must be able to fit into pot)
• 1 x 200 g piece of pork rind with 5mm fat attached (optional but really nice)
• salt and freshly ground pepper
• 1 tsb. olive oil
• 2 bouquets garnis (thyme, bay leaf, parsley stalk, celery)
• Kitchen string
• 250 ml dry white wine
• 250 ml chicken stock

If you have a cast iron cooking pot then you also need:

• bit of flour around ½ a cup
• water

Preparation

The important thing here is the pot or in my case the slow cooker. I have a new 6lt slow cooker which so far has been great. But if you are fortunate to have a good quality heavy cast iron oval ovenproof dish with a tight-fitting lid that will hold everything snugly.

Follow the pre-cooking instructions for your specific electric slow cooker or if you are using a cast iron pot then preheat the oven to 120ºC/250ºF.

Cut the anchovy fillets into 12 pieces

¼ the garlic cloves into 12 pieces

Make 12 incisions into the lamb and insert a piece of anchovy and a piece of garlic into each. (Hint: I use a boning or filleting knife if you have one)

Grind pepper over lamb and rub with salt.

Heat the olive oil in a heavy fry-pan and brown the lamb on all sides. (if you are using the cast iron pot use it here instead)

Now prep your bouquet garnis. Pretty straight forward cut the celery stalk into pieces about 15 – 20 cm, if you have fresh bay leaf bruise it by crushing in your hand tightly wrap the thyme stalks and bay leaf inside the celery stalks and wrap te kitchen string around until firm (HINT: lay the kitchen string out on the chopping board this will allow you to place the bouquet garnis onto the string)

Now this is where the recipe can go 1 of 2 ways if you have an electric slow cooker then:

• Remove the browned meat and bacon rind from the backing dish or pan you used to brown the meat in an place into the slow cooker

• Put the pork rind into the pan you browned the meat in, fat side down
• Once it has rendered, deglaze the fry-pan with the stock and pour over the lamb

• Add the wine and the bouquets garnis to the lamb and stock.

• Put on the lid and wait

If you are using a cast iron pot then there is an additional step:

Seal the pot before it goes into the pre-heated oven

• Mix up a paste from the flour and water. Use the paste to glue the lid to the dish.
• Stand the dish on a baking tray to catch any drips, and put it in the oven. Forget about it for 7 hours.
• After it’s done, remove the dish from the oven and break the seal. Prepare to be overwhelmed with a most excellent aroma

Gravy:

Collect the juices to serve as gravy. Add corn flour and if you feel naughty cream and stir into a thick rich decadent gray.

I would normally serve this in winter with creamy mashed potatoes and green beans.

I am interested in others opinions and I will be visiting this restaurant in the coming months.

Yeah, I made myself a Valentine’s Day breakfast a week early. What of it?

There’s something amazing about waking up early on the weekends. I don’t think I’m a real college student. How many college kids say that?
I really hate sleeping in. During the week, I don’t bound out of bed at 6:00 to go to work, but it’s not a problem, either. On the weekends, however, I’ll gladly wake up at 6 or 7, and just leisurely go about starting my day. And I love doing something a little different for breakfast on the weekends!

So maybe this Almond Butter & Banana Stuffed French Toast isn’t that unique to most, I’ve never had stuffed French Toast before. And mind you, yesterday was my first grilled almond butter and banana experience.
And oh, this was delicious. I realize now that my food presentation needs work but hey – I do what I can. It’s sort of sad to think about myself making such a love-themed breakfast for myself, but again. Oh well. haha. At least my mom came back from her haircut in time to give me a funny look. She’s not a “breakfast person,” so unfortunately I can never treat her to breakfast…

But! Just because I am a relatively sad excuse for a college student, doesn’t mean you are – and maybe you want to treat your honey to a heart-healthy shmalentine’s day brekkie?
Because I think you should.
Of course you all know how to make French Toast. I won’t go into those details. But here’s just some added fun-stuff I did!

For the Stuffed French Toast
2 slices of this amazing Organic Spelt bread by the Vermont Bread Company [okay, okay. you can use any bread. But this is GOOD Spelt bread!]
1 T. All-Natural Almond Butter
1 Banana
2 Eggs [if you are an egg-beaters user...PLEASE use at least one real egg white! I like egg beaters and all - but when it comes to French Toast, it's just not the same!]
3 T. Almond Milk
1/8 t. Cinnamon
1/8 t. Nutmeg
Dash ground cloves
1 t. Vanilla
1/2 t. Wheat Germ
1/2 t. Chia Seeds

Spread 1 teaspoon almond butter on one side of each piece of bread (if you’re going to make a pretty heart shape, do that first of course) and arrange your banana slices on one side – I used half on the sandwich, half to garnish. Sandwich together and poke outsides a couple times with a fork.

Whisk together eggs, milk, spices, vanilla, and wheat germ. Place sandwich in mixture and begin preheating a non-stick, sprayed pan. Allow sandwich to soak a minute before flipping, poking both sides again with your fork.

Sprinkle Chia seeds over outside of bread and cook until golden on both sides.

For the Pumpkin “Sauce”
1/4 c. Plain Greek Yogurt
1/8 c. Pure Pumpkin Puree
1/8 t. cinnamon
1/8 t. nutmeg
2 t. Maple Syrup
1 t. Chia Seeds

Stir together and plate with French Toast, along with remaining banana and almond butter, and cute little apple heart! [p.s. apple = amazing dipped in this.]

Reference:

but how good will th coffee be and at what cost?

To operate, first you need to manually pump the gadget until it reaches the green zone in its pressure gauge. You then fill the small water tank with boiling water and put ground coffee into the even smaller filter,

which can be messy. Screw on the lid, turn the machine over and press the release button, and pressurised air drives the water through the coffee and into your cup.

The idea behind this on the go gadget is great, but unfortunately it fails to deliver good quality coffee. The espresso is very weak, with little crème and large air bubbles released towards the end of the operation. The water in the tank doesn’t maintain the desirable 87°C-93°C long enough. As a result, the temperature of the coffee in the cup is lower than ideal, resulting in under extracted coffee. Additionally you will need access to boiling water when travelling or camping
Our verdict on the Handpresso
Given the Handpresso’s high price tag along with a lack of coffee quality, we really couldn’t recommend it unless you just really want the latest toy.Hanpresso Demo
Price $199
Contact or

We decided to look at the easy to use machines and the stand out is the Nespresso, this little machine came with a sepperate milk frother and heater but you could have simply used the centrifical self frothing jug option.

The first and foremost thing people tend to dwell upon is the price, granted that is usually the deciding key when making a luxury purchase. But when it comes to coffee or food I really believe that quality should be considered as you are spending on a luxury item that you want to not only last but give you the best results consistently.

With that as the brief I went on to test a couple of coffee machines and for the most part was disappointed with either the quality or the time it took to make a coffee. One of the machines which retails of upwards of (AU) $1200.00 + took 2 minutes to make a single cup and when you used the make 2 at a time method they crème was poor and it still took over 3 minutes.

So the time and quantity are also keys for me because if I am hosting a party or function at home and need to make 6 or more coffees I will want to bring them all out at once and at least have most if not all drinkable. So lets get to the machine that I believe meets my requirements, the “Nespresso Gemini CS 100 Pro” now this is really easy to operate, the model we tested had a separate milk heating unit and frother [it really was suited for larger groups or a small office] but with that in mind there was also an option to use a jug that heats and froths the milk if you so desire froth, and this all happened very quickly.

But as I said the unit that was made available to use was pretty good. Now my testing and ranking:

• Must be easy to use
• Must be quick
• Must make a great coffee

Well that was it and so the testing began.
First I wanted to make one of each of the 3 sizes of coffees, a short black, a long black and a cappuccino or flat white or latte.

Short Black
Well the heated cup holder worked a dream the small cup is very warm not burning but good temperature, there is a button that represents a small or short cup so I put the coffee satchel in, place the cup under the outlet and press the button. Well it all happened within a few second water flows and it was all over the satchel has been automatically placed into a waste hopper and the short black looked impressive the crème is golden and thick sticking to the sides when I tilt the cup. How does it taste, well to my surprise very good, the temperature is good as well hot but not scalding the thermometer I used said about 82 degrees Celsius (179.6 Fahrenheit) this is a good short black.

Long Black
Again I removed cup from the top of the system but this time a large mug, it too was about the same temperature as the small cup. I repeated the process using the same coloured coffee satchel and yes it took a few second longer than the short black but that is too be expected. Now the crème, it too looks golden and thick it passed the same test as the short black but how does it taste. Wow it is almost identical and the temperature is 81.5 degrees Celsius ((178.7 Fahrenheit) pretty good possibly a bit lower as there is more volume and I took a little longer setting the thermometer. This is a good long black.

Cappuccino
Well time to have a play with the milk machine, for this test I used full cream milk but you can use low fat or even Soya if you must. I proceeded as I did with the long black and used a mug, once I had this the mug was placed under the milk station and I added heated milk and finally froth. Wow this worked really well and it’s easy, the cup looked a bit naked so I shook some drinking chocolate powder over the top. The result looked the part but I needed to taste it, and it did not disappoint the coffee was hotter than the long black 84 degrees Celsius (183.2 Fahrenheit) no burnt taste just very drinkable good strong coffee.

Tea and Hot Chocolate
Well you thought that this is just a coffee machine well it also has an outlet that you can have boiling water or steam come out, this worked well with the English Breakfast teabags and drinking chocolate we tested. The milk station made the hot chocolates smooth and hot and well if you must put milk in you tea I suggest cold from the fridge.

Well it passed the test making 1 cup of each type of coffee, but how does this unit handle volume will the quality drop? So to test this we made 10 short blacks, 10 long black in a row. As the cup holder could not accommodate 20 cups I cheated a bit and placed the cups in a sink of clean hot water for about 5 minutes before starting.

The test
Off we went we had the twenty satchels at the ready and the cups as well, it took just over 7 minutes to make all the cups which surprised me as this was quicker than I had expected. But how did they end up? The thermometer showed all where above 81 degrees Celsius (177.8 Fahrenheit) which is good but how did they taste this meant sipping each cup and the first 12 are good but as I get further along I noticed a metalic second aftertaste. My host recommended that we redo the test but this time fill the Gemini CS 100 with distilled water as the tap water possibly contained large traces of metals this sounds feasible.

So the unit was emptied and flushed with distilled water then filled with distilled water and again we made the 10 short blacks and 10 long blacks. The temperature and crème all looked good, but what about the taste? I again had a small sip of each cup and too my surprise they all passed the metallic aftertaste was not there.

Conclusion
Well the Nespresso Gemini CS 100 Pro with its accompanying milk unit passed the test with flying colours the coffee it produces is of a high standard and is consistent. But what about the cost as some of the other units we looked at the coffee came out at about (AU) $2 – 3 per cup. Well if you apparently subscribe to the free membership from the suppliers website after purchasing a Nespresso you get the satchels at a substantially cheaper rate and the cost per cup ranges from (AU)$1.50 to (AU)$2.00 which for the convenience and quality is pretty good.

Now there is as I said earlier a trade off for quality and that’s cost, the unit that we tested with the milk system comes in at about (AU) $1400.00 which is pretty hefty, you would save about (AU) $500.00 + if you just use the magic milk jug instead of the milk heating system we tested with, but I personally would get the full kit because it just made it easy and the results great.

Many of the machines we tried either did not produce a good coffee or reproduce a good coffee every time, some you needed a astrophysics degree to operate and even then the results did not meet the expectation based on the price and lets face it even when it comes to something so reveered as a good coffee price does matter.

For those interested the technical details are here:
Dimensions: 20,8 x 44,1 x 35,3 cm (WxDxH)
Weight: 9 kg
Power: 240 Volts 50 Hz 1300 Watts
2 year warrantee

* Semi-automatic insertion and ejection capsule system
* 3 programmable cup sizes Ristretto (regular), Espresso (short black) and Lungo (long black)
* Multi language digital display
* High speed hot water
* Capacity for 35 used capsules
* Cup warming plate
* 3 litre removable water reservoir

All in all I would give this a 8.5 out of 10