Champions Bistro, Clayton

Had the incredible fortune of dinning at Champions Bistro in suburbia Clayton. Hidden in this bistro is chef Clinton McIver, an accomplished chef, who has to-date twelve years working experience in some of the world's best restaurants, including Vue Du Monde, one of the very best restaurants in Melbourne. 

Here are a few of shots from the degustation menu (4 courses out of 6) on the night. It was an amazing feast for the eyes, taste buds and at great value! Book a evening at Champions Bistro. You won't regret it. Be warned, there is understandably a long waiting list. (And no, I don't get commission for my comments here.)

Pickled beef, cranberry, wasabi, salad burnett

Lamb sweet bread, leek, tatsoy, mussel, grape

Pynegana Cheddar, nashi, macadamia, salt bush

Apple, sunflower, condensed milk

Fair@Square Kitchen & Play

Here is a re-cap of Fair@Square - Kitchen! Well done Moral Fairground!

The first chef is famous Ian Curley. If you look carefully, you would notice a big bruise on his left eyebrow. He was injured the day just the day before. But that doesn't stop him, a true professional.

Food & Wine Festival - The Afghan Spice Banquet

Before I begin, sorry for the lack of updates lately. The bad news is that this page has getting really aged. On the other hand, the good news is that I have been really busy with photo shoots and has embarked on a new line of photo shoot recently as well. Without further ado, lets begin.

I realised just how shallow and ignorant I am about Afghanistan. All I knew was from the news and totally about wars and terrors in the poor country. This Afghan Sprice Banquet, held in the recently completed Dandenong Market was incredible, packaged with people and really helped me to get a taste of the rich Afghan culture - the sbeautiful costumes, amazing foods, flamboyant dancing, traditional and modern music and henna (hand) painting and more. There were also three camels to entertain the public on the outside. The camels had names and are dearly loved by her owners - Liz & Kerry. You can contact them by email or phone (03)-5266 1415. Here is Kerry in the picture. I do not derive any financial gain from this. Just thought they were lovely people and really loved their boys (that's how they call their camels).


The market hall looks somewhat crude but the decorations, table cloth and stage in the middle transformed the warehouse looking hall into an amazing looking and classy eat out.





I have never seen henna painting. Boy, do they look great and I never thought the paint is so thick! Wonder how it taste like.. chocolate? :P

As you can imagine, the henna painting was a big hit with the kids, so many queued up to have their hands painted, both boys and girls. I wish I could have mine done as well!!

Very impressed with their traditional music instruments and music also as well as their dancing and costumes with heavily wavved coats and dresses with lots of colours and adorned with lots of beads and what looks like mirrors. Very pretty indeed.

One of the council staff let her hair down and got a first taste of it herself, dancing in the market to the music by a modern Afghan pop group in front of shoppers in the market. Good on you!

I wish I did try the food. Mmmm, mouth watering just looking at the pics... :P

Fried Rice on Steroid

A simple home meal - fried rice wrapped with eggs, a ripper of a dish wife made for dinner tonight. Taste fantastic, looks amazing, especially to me because I love eggs!

In my opinion, it is fried rice on steroid! *_*!

OK, I will throw this one in for free. It is (hot) banana pancake topped with syrup, a beautiful cold winter afternoon snack... :D

Cookies! Cookies! Cookies!

We were grounded at home on the weekend (don't ask!)... Thank God that my wife is a fantastic cook, she made some green tea, black sesame, and chocolate shortbread cookies. Yep, black sesame, not mould! While most of them have gone to the stomachs of her colleagues today, I did have a couple of them when they were fresh (hot) out of the oven.. (Yum!) and found a wonderful subject to practise my food photography skills! :D

She didn't just make confectionery but also a great grilled chicken spiced with lots of wonderful herbs, just the way I like it! Decorated with corinander which does not only look great, it tastes even better!

Cooking with Love

Haven't posted my wife's cooking for quite a while. It's because wife has been very busy at work and had little time for this "leisurely" activity.

From the top:

1. Cassava Cake,
2. Assam Prawns,
3. Pumpkin Cake and
4. Radish Cake

Cassava Cake is my favorite! Esp when it is hot and fresh out of the oven! :)

Despite I really like Assam like Assam Laksa, Assam Prawns is my least favorite.

The problem is me, 100% me - I am too lazy to de-shell prawns. Thank God that my wife de-shells them for me. I am so lucky!

Like the Cassava Cake, I love the Pumpkin Cakes when they are really hot out of the fry pan. Shame that I had a cough when they were made so I couldn't shove them down my throat without constraints..

The Pumpkin Cakes are filled with red bean paste inside. Yum!! There is also a steamed version, you can read about it here.

The Radish Cake is not as "smooth" as what you might find in a restaurant. However, that is because it is packed with radish, not flour. It is therefore heavy in radish flavour. I love the spring onions topping also. It is not over-whelmed with pepper.. no need for that because it is the genuine article!

As said, the Cassava Cake is my favorite. Wonder when my wife will make more for me?! :P

For more information, please visit here.

Melbourne Open House

MOH was a fantastic event!

One day in the year, 32 buildings in the CBD open to the public for free, most accompanied with guided tours. More than 50,000 people turned up for the event and God was kind and gave us amazing sunny weather on the day.

I love architecture so I wasn't going to miss this!


Yes, the queues were very long... But, my wife and her girlfriend later joined me which certainly made the day even more pleasurable. They saved a good two hours as well. To top it off, we had a fab lunch after that. Although it was kind of small. Loved the risotto and the company. I am hungry just thinking about it... :O...

This is the roof top view from MU.


I was lazy or perhaps just being realistic on the day... left my tripod at home... was going to bring it... it went as far as the door. Sorry tripod...

Tripod could have been useful at the St. Paul Cathedral. Anyway, had to do with handheld on the day. A wider angle lens would be nice too. I do love this cathedral, a wonderful house of God.



This is CH2. CH2 is the first purpose-built office building in Australia to achieve the six Green Star certified rating. A truly fasinating and innovative building albeit it took a long wait to get in also.

Love those infamous wooden louvers, yellow roof top turbines (also called wind crowls) and cooling through heat absorption into the concrete, etc... Magnificant!

After a long day of walking, met up with friends at Shanghai Village for dinner. The chicken dish was so nice! We are definitely going back again. Good choice Rumi/Yoshi. :)

A Sydney-sider told me buildings are even prettier in Sydney. Oh, I certainly love the Sydney Habour Bridge, the Opera House and I like The Circular Quay also. But this Melbourian is more than happy with what Melbourne has to offer.

Melbourne Melbourne Melbourne! =3=

Penang Foods

Thank you mum and Linda for taking us around to sooo many places to spoil our taste buds.

All the hawker food Penang has to offer - char koay teow, nasi lamak, laksa, rojak, hokkien mee, popiah (actually I prefer the Singaporean version), chicken rice, loh bak, chu cheung fun, curry mee, nyonya dishes and many others I can't remember how to call them... Memory is a wonderful thing. I can "taste" them just trying to recall them in my mind.. :P

What about deserts, drinks, durian and mangosteen (photographed below)... Oh, desert?! What about desert?! I felt cheated by the desert. Don't laugh Linda. What they dished out looked nothing like the picture in the menu... Compare this pink soup with the picture immmediately next to it on its left.

Photographs are supposed to convey truth. People believe it when they see it in a photo.

That said, this is my only whinge out of many dozens of great food we had. It is kind of like the train that was late in one of our legs to Mt Fuji. Our short memory meant we have forgotten how not punctual or un-punctual the train system can be back home (in Melbourne), we have become accustomed to the 100% punctual trains in Japan. But on this cold morning, waiting outside at this train platform. This train was late by 3 minutes, all of us were cold (perhaps except James who was armed with his Canadian water...) and not very happy that the train was late. That said, Japan has the most amazing train system still just like Penang food are still excellent (and cheap)! :)

Oh yes, before I forget, we had Japanese, Western as well as German food also, the last of which was really good. We had lamb shanks and it was great, at a very cheap price also! It is called Ingolf’s Kneipe German Bar and Restaurant. It is situated at Jalan Sungai Kelian, off the main Jalan Tanjong Bungah. For more information and pics, check this out! I don't get no commission for this.

Simple things in life

My wife is a great cook. We were in a rush this evening. But that is no challenge to my wife. Albeit having very limited ingredients in the fridge, she whipped together a simple but fantastic dinner.

Teriyaki Chicken wings and drumsticks, rocket leaves amongst other leaves, baby tomato, sweet corn infused with a secret sauce. All made in less than 30 minutes and I gobbled everything down in a flash. It (my manners) was not a pretty sight and wife doesn't think I can fully enjoy it at that speed. However, hours later, the taste and fragrance still lingers in my mouth and nostrils. Yum!

BTW, this is the new ice-cream we tried out today - Connoisseur Chocolate Brownie Temptation. I like my ice-cream rock hard hence the frost on the container. It is rich dark chocolate with chunks of chocolate brownie nestled throughout. To top it off, it was on discount at Coles supermarket! :)

Wicked Chocolate

Fräus Crêpes & Chocolat

Had breakfast with wife and a much loved friend of ours, Esther, at Fräus Crêpes & Chocolat, North Melbourne.

It has an extensive collection of sweet and savoury crepes, cakes, drinks and wine; including a range of gluten-free galettes.

We had a Vegie Galette, Chocolate Strawberry and Banana Crepe, and a Chocolate Pear Crepe. They were all delicious, especially the Vegie Galette! Chocolate (drink) was very rich, too. Felt somewhat guilty for having so much chocolate for breakfast... but it was really yummy!

We chose to dine at the court yard at the back. The weather was just nice and there are a few old vines which made the place very homey, warm and beautiful.

Highly recommended! A++++ (looks like ebay feedback. LOL. :D)

Friendship & Generosity

Thank you so much Andrew and Dharshi for the lovely quiche and baked pasta. They are both pleasing to the eyes as they are to the stomach. Well done for your achievements to date. All the best to your plans. Thank you for your love. We love you too and wish every good thing for you. So wonderful to have good caring friends around.

Proverbs 11:24 "One man gives freely, yet gains even more; another withholds unduly, but comes to poverty. A generous man will prosper; he who refreshes others will himself be refreshed."

OK, below are the quiche and the baked pasta. I love the cheese on the baked pasta and the herbs on top of that. The sauce is so tasty. So yummy! Only pinched a little of the quiche so far... need to give it a proper test run tomorrow over lunch. I can't wait! :O...

~ Baked Pasta ~

~ Quiche ~

[2009-03-05] OK, been eating both the quiche and the baked pasta through the week. They are fantastic! Love the pepper on top and the pastry of the quiche is so nice and crunchy, even when I put it in the microwave. Hey Andrew, you are talented! I will blame you if I put on weight! Thank you very much bro.