Danderma's Blog, page 11

Book Review: and the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini

I had been fortunate enough to have the chance to reserve and collect this book pre-release back in 2013. However, I always kept it on my shelves as a treat for when I was really down and needed something really good to read, for I knew that whatever is penned by Khaled Hosseini must be worth reading. Last week I realise my stack of good books to read next is dangerously depleted so I’ve decided it was time to read The Mountains Echoed. From the first chapter, from the first page, from the first paragraph, I was hooked.

Sadly my enjoyment while reading this book was short lived and definitely diminished by the time I finished Nabi’s prolonged letter. Afterwards, the story seemed to disintegrate into smaller stories to the point of seeming not one book but a collection of books. I have to say I began skimming the pages, particularly the part with the Greek Surgeon’s story. The ending, ma tenable, was the downfall of this book but I suspect the author had to had it that way otherwise it would come off as some script for a cheesy Bollywood oldie.

Now there are missing chunks, and important ones, such as the long awaited Pari returning to Kabul, visiting her old village. Just having the surgeon describe it breezily in conversation wasn’t enough. What about the father? What did he do with the money he got in exchange for tearing up his family? Why wasn’t that enough? What about the stepmother? Who longed for the father and finally married him? Why wasn’t that story elaborated on? The most interesting story lines in the book are the ones who dwindled and went out without much flair and that’s why, mainly, I didn’t care much for the book. Now, this is a living proof on how one spoiled and deranged one can forecast her entire misery on a family and all generations to come.

My Personalised Ring

I sat on my dining room table, looking at a beautiful acrylic box with my blog’s name on it surrounded by red and white hearts. The box arrived to me as a gift from a local new business, @Special_2you, who specialise in personalising jewellery and gift boxes with your name or whatever phrase you feel like. Inside the box, personalised with my blog name, was the actual gift…

 Beneath the acrylic lid I found the gift was a ring, rose gold and states in beautiful Arabian calligraphy two words: Nada and Abdulaziz. Now Nada is me and Abdulaziz is my husband Aziz, therefore the two entertwined names would wrap around my finger and I would wear them lovingly, proudly.

The finishing of the ring is very neat and it isn’t heavy nor pointy, you can wear it comfortably and loosen or widen it as you please, free for all size wise but very special when personalised. It would make the perfect gift for two newly weds.

You can also have a personalised bracelet to go with the ring, which can be made in rose gold, yellow gold, or white gold. You can personalise it with whatever name you like (your first and last name, your mothers name, a best friend forever kind of ring) or you can write a sentence from two words, whatever you fancy. I am however quite happy and content with my very own ring. I have seen baby bracelets with baby names that are really cute and would make any new mother happy for sure. Thank you Special 2 you for the lovely gift

For more information you can contact Special_2you via their instagram account (@Special_2you) or contact them via whatsapp +(965)-94994098. They deliver within Kuwait only for the time being.

Recipe: Baked Eggs in Chapati Bread Cups

Let me tell you the story of how this recipe came to me: I was watching the Food Network on TV, this amazing South African Chef Siba Mtongana was on cooking brunch for friends and decided to serve something called “Cape Town Tarts”. She lined a muffin tin with slices of parma ham and topped them with cheese and veggies then added eggs, baked them, et voila she had little cups of baked eggs to serve for brunch! It looked so easy breezy, a wonderful way to cook eggs especially for people who didn’t know – like myself- and I thought I could recreate the recipe for my husband using turkey slices instead of parma ham. Then I wished I was able to eat baked eggs like that with chopped mushrooms and coloured capsicums. Then I decided some sort of bread instead of Turkey might work just fan, perhaps some filo pastry, and I got up to the kitchen to experiment.

The first time I tried the recipe was for lunch and I had used two slices of white toast, pounded them down and stretched them out with the dough pin, then stuffed them inside the muffin tin. They worked fine but the egg mix had soaked up the toast a tad too much for my liking and it didn’t feel much like a cup, more like eggy toast. I loved the consistency of the eggs though, they felt like scrambled ones but a tad too firm and not burned so I’ve decided to find something else as a cup. I almost went with filo pastry, but my husband was nagging that he wanted a version of the Kuwaiti eggs and tomatoes (baith o tomat) and then I knew I wanted my eggs -and his- to reside in chapati bread cups.

All I had to do was go to the nearby chapati and samboosa shop and get me some, there is one in the local co-op in every area and each chapati cost about 50 fils each. Now an Indian friend of mine on instagram pointed out that these are called Parantha and not chapati but to everyone else in Kuwait this is what they mean by a chapati hence why I’m going with the Kuwaiti name. Anyways, the chapatis I got were a tad too big so I trimmed the edges and jammed them in the muffin tin.

Two egg chapati cups each, for myself and my husband. Perhaps they don’t look like the tidiest thing but they sure smelled delicious and I knew they would taste good. Now for the fillings, I had my cups filled with cheddar cheese and red and green capsicum, chopped finely. Each cup can’t handle a lot of fillings btw so be careful, a tea spoon of each filling would be more than enough.

My husband wanted one plain cup to be filled with eggs and two drops of white truffle oil and another with chopped tomatoes and cheese. The Kuwaiti style ones usually call for onions but since we were just experimenting we didn’t bother.

Now all we had to do is break up the eggs one by one into a measuring cup. Two eggs total, whisked with salt , freshly ground pepper, and a dash of low fat milk -you could use cream if you prefer-. Whisk them all finely for a few moments and just pour into the prepared cups. How easy it that?

Sprinkle over some more cheese if you like, whatever you fancy. All I had in the fridge was cheddar and mozzarella and they worked fine to me. Place in the middle rack of a pre-heated oven on 180C and bake for exactly 15 minutes. The dishes were washed and the karak tea was prepared in those minutes I waited.

When you take out your baked eggs from the oven you will notice their tops have risen up, like a crown or a soufflé. Then tend to go down quickly though, perhaps its all the air bubbles from the whisking. You don’t even have to wait afterwards, take out the cups immediately and serve! 

The karak tea is the perfect accompanying drink to this delicious dish. If you are still not familiar with is, its tea leaves cooked in condensed milk and a bit more of fresh milk with lots of spices: ground cardamom, cinnamon, ginger, star anise, and sugar. Now the good thing about choosing the chapatis is that they hold their ground and didn’t get soaked by the eggs the way toast did.

However, while the outer edges of the toast were crunchy and delicious, the edges of the chapatis were too sharp and crunchy to provide any flavour. Next time I should trim the edges as close to the surface of the tin as possible.

Another good thing about this method of preparing eggs is the no runny surprise part. For a person who doesn’t like the yolk and  would be horrified to consume yolk in liquid form, I’m always tentatively digging through scrambled eggs looking for that piece of yolk that wasn’t cooked still. However, you can crack open this good old cup and find nothing but fluffy scrambled-like eggs inside, no surprise yolky liquid running anywhere.

This is a great way to prepare eggs for people who hate to cook and know nothing about cooking, crack whisk and beak and that’s about it. If you struggle with eggs yet you crave them every now and then, try this one out. If you do not mind having turkey or whatever meat slice you consume, perhaps bacon, then it will be even easier and faster. Imagine a baked egg in a bacon cup, topped with a spoonful of Nutella -apparently bacon and Nutella is a big combo thing in Kuwait-. The sky is your limit, and you can rest assured that whatever comes out of that oven, it will be fluffy and most importantly, edible.

James St. Chocolate Cooking Class, Brisbane

The very last activity in Brisbane on day 6 of our #Room753 Bloggers Trip to Queensland itinerary was to go to a desserts cooking class! Its no secret that I’m a fan of cooking, chocolate, sugar, desserts, and everything related to food that is and a chocolate desserts cooking class would, to me, be one of my ideas of having a good and relaxing time.  We do have cooking schools who give out cooking classes in Kuwait but its different when you are abroad. I remember a coffee preparation class I’ve wanted to go to in Dubai but never had the time, and when in the UK I’m always a bit intimidated and would chicken out at the last minute.

Was the Brisbane chocolate desserts class my very first cooking class, ever? I believe it must be! At least, the first official full fledged and not home economics school class. I was to make my way via Taxi to James Street Cooking School at 6:30 and spend the evening in class until 9:30. We arrived to a place with modern buildings surrounding a parking lot, a very interesting looking James St. Market was there and I so wanted to spend an hour or so browsing the aisles there, have I not shown you what I found in Australian supermarkets? I should do so soon in another post. Anyways, next to the market there was another building with a “cooking school” written on it and I knew it was where I needed to go.

I was among the first students to arrive that day for the evening chocolate desserts class. When you first enter the class room you are met with a long steel table with chairs surrounded by shelves stocked with interesting products that you could purchase. Then there were the cooking stations, each with its very own colourful mixer, flame top knives, utensils, the works.

Two chefs where already there waiting and bustling around the room making sure everything was ready. I headed up to Chef Jo, introduced myself, and she was asked me find and choose my name tag and wear it throughout the class. I was with my husband who insisted on accompanying me because it was an evening activity in a entire new continent and we asked if it was possible he could sit through the class and take some pictures on my behalf for the blog. The instructors were very welcoming and even chatted with him, friendly Australians as always. I have to say his English did improve rapidly when we were in Australia, by the last week I couldn’t get him to stop talking away to everyone he met. Taxi rides took twice as long because he wouldn’t stop chatting with the drivers all the way to our destinations.

After putting on my name tag I went ahead to a cooking station and waited for the rest of the students to arrive. On each station the ingredients needed for the class were packed neatly, ready for us to use. Also present was a folded James St. apron folded neatly on a chopping board, a sharp knife lay waiting nearby.

The class commenced when all the students where aproned and ready. Everyone was friendly and welcoming, didn’t mind all my picture taking at all, and we had a blast! I made my first meringue ever and when I held the mixing bowl over my head and the meringue stayed put and didn’t fall over my head -thankfully- everyone clapped and its been so long since someone clapped for me, I believe it must been back in school or perhaps university or something equally ancient. Hello *waving*.

Now what did we cook? Well, the sheets we had on our cooking stations included detailed recipes for gluten-free brownies, passionfruit chocolate truffles, chocolate ganache, orange & white chocolate mousse on a nest of kataifi pastry topped with raspberry coulis, and chocolate and amaretto tart made with sweet pastry that’s made from scratch. Sounds guiltily delicious, no?

We started first with the gluten-free brownie that was made, to my surprise, with lots and lots of dates. Good old dates that’s been laying around every corner of everyone’s house in Kuwait, along with egg whites, and pistachios, and some delicious chocolate, and you do have excellent brownies that are quite different and really good!

Perhaps they don’t look the part but when cut into squares and served, the taste is out of this world! I could totally bake batches of these and sell them in local farmers markets as “paleo friendly brownies” and they will be a hit, I know they will be. Maybe next year…

Next came the truffles, and I enjoyed making those truffles so very, very much! Why? Well, look at the pictures, won’t you? On my farmers markets booth menu I might include those truffles, who knows :p

Next was the chocolate & amaretto tart, which involved pushing and kneading and flattening of the sweet pastry then placing it in the tart moulds. Not an easy task, and I can tell you that I didn’t much care for the effort that goes to make pastry basis especially since I personally tend to discard the tart bases and consume the toppings only. I doubt I’d be trying that recipe anytime soon but it was quite an experience.

Sadly because it was a chocolate and Amaretto tart which means alcohol is used to make the filling I didn’t make it nor taste it afterwards, muslims aren’t supposed to handle alcohol even, but they sure did look delicious and turned out quite fine in the end. I might very well remake this recipe with ready made tart shells and the same filling recipe by substituting Amaretto with apple juice if I’m not mistake, just like in Tiramisu. Or was it orange juice? I’d have to look that up one day.

The last dessert of the night was the orange & white chocolate mousse on a nest of kataifi pastry topped with raspberry coulis. The raspberry coulis was sitting in a big pot on the stove waiting to be used, the chocolate mousse was easy and fun to make. The kataifi pastry is actually vermicelli that was made into nests that reminded me very much of kanafa.

Once the vermicelli was baked all we had to do was scoop a dollop of the mousse on top of each then drench it with the couli, how good does that look?

The end result was really tempting, with slices of blood oranges arranged on the side. However, the vermicelli were mixed on the spot with grand mariner which meant I couldn’t shape them nor taste the dessert afterwards. I must be making this dessert soon at home, what do you use to substitute grand mariner? I will have to look it up as well and if the recipe is a success I might be adding it to my booth’s menu :p

Once all the cooking was over there was a spread ready for the participants on the long steel table at the entrance. You know how when you watch a European cooking show they’d be preparing a few dishes for their guests and then they’d serve it up for everyone while they sat around the table talking and laughing and enjoying their food? It felt exactly like that, with bowls of crisp green salad, excellent potato salad that I would have seconds and thirds and tenths of if I could, and a grilled chicken with the meat so white and the skin so crisp I wished for a second that I liked chicken so I could take a bite and enjoy it.

What was passed around for the diners? A platter of those cocoa-dusted bombs! Unbelievably good, I’m actually quite hungry now myself.

Once the class and dinner was over, everyone packed up their own made desserts to take them home with them. There was a lot of calories scarified on the altar of sugar that night.

I had a blast with my chocolate class in James St. Cooking School! Very fun, learned a lot, had delicious food, and interacted with locals who were very friendly and welcoming. Even though I was thousands of miles away from home, I felt like I belonged to my team and that I wasn’t much of a stranger, that felt good, very good indeed. Thanks to my two instructors for sharing their knowledge with us, patiently, and for letting my husband stay that night, the next time I’m in Brisbane I will make sure to take another class for sure.

For more information regarding cooking classes in James St. Cooking School you can check their website (link), follow them on instagram ().

Dinner at Mado Turkish Restaurant, Brisbane

Our very first dinner in Australia while on the #Room753 Bloggers Trip to Queensland was in the Turkish restaurant Mado. I’ve heard a lot about Mado and remembered clearly that when I looked the restaurant up it did state they had a branch in Brisbane, Australia so we knew we wanted to dine there.

Though I was told by friends and followers that this Mado wasn’t the Mado everyone was raving about it didn’t matter to us for we were hungry and in proper need of a good heartwarming meal and the tea estekana I was longing for after flying forever and being a really long way away from home! plus Australian reviews did state it was indeed the best Turkish restaurant in Brisbane so we decided to dine there. We took the train, or the metro, from our hotel to the south bank where the restaurant is located between a long strip of modern buildings dotted with different restaurants and happy diners.

Australians tend to dine and sleep early and after 9 P.M. restaurants tend to close down. We arrived relatively late, perhaps at 8 or so therefore the restaurant wasn’t very crowded and we got to sit outside in a the garden, enjoying the evening breeze while flipping hungrily through the menu.

Turkish bread seems to be a big hit in Australia, wherever we went even in bakeries and supermarkets there always was a big display of flat thick hot Turkish bread, not the simet another one that was a cross between a pita and a focaccia and as we sat down a basket of hot Turkish bread wedges was placed on our table by a very friendly young waitress.

It didn’t take long for us to decide on the food, we were famished and we practically ordered half the menu. Thankfully their friendly service was efficient and quite quick as well, for our table was laden with plenty of dishes in no time. Our drinks arrived first, frothy ayran buttermilk drink for my husband and a fruity Turkish soft drink for myself.

For appetisers we decided to share a platter of different dips with the Turkish bread, hummus and yoghurt and the likes.

We also ordered a kind of filo pastry stuffed with cheese which I had intended to be my main dish. Though I was hungry I didn’t order much for I had other plans come dessert time.

My husband’s main dish was skewers of kebab on a bed of rice and peas. He loved every bite and said it was really good while I had spoonfuls of the rice and peas that I had quite enjoyed myself. The food at Mado was tasty indeed.

What I really was craving at that point was a type of dessert I usually see my fellow Kuwaitis consume when in Turkey: baklava sheets that are stuffed with rich Turkish ice cream, aka as Dondurma and yes my blog name is a variation of the very word. While they didn’t have that particular dessert on the menu, they did cater for dondurma and baklava so we one order of each and proceeded to mix the dessert up as we wanted. It was goooood….

Needless to say that I had several orders of the Turkish tea cups, or tea estekanas as we call them in Kuwait, plus one bubbling hot cup of good strong Turkish coffee.

It was quite a memorable first dinner in Brisbane, Australia. Real Mado or not, the Mado restaurant and cafe in Brisbane hit all the right spots with delicious food, excellent service, and great location. If you are hungry for something familiar when visiting Australia you should dine at Mado, I know I will when I go back for sure.

Mado restaurant and cafe in Brisbane, Australia is located in the south bank. for more information and directions you can check their website (link).

Book Review: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt

To be frank I’ve only picked up this book when I knew it was the winner of the Pulitzer Prize for fiction 2014. I don’t usually enjoy crime and mystery and when I read the description on the back, with the word “underworld crime scene”, I almost put it back into the shelf but I had to see what made that novel Pulitzer Prize worthy. Since I’ve imposed the rule of giving up on a book after finishing and not liking the first chapter I consoled myself by my very own rule, only one chapter and if I don’t like it I will put it down. 

I couldn’t have been more wrong.

The story is sprawled across 800+ pages, the novel is quite thick but it didn’t matter for the writing is so delicious, it literally is! Leafing through the pages, hungrily gobbling up the words and sentences, is like opening a box of decadent chocolate truffles and promising yourself that this piece is the only piece and before you know it the box is empty and you are floating in a cloud of cocoa-dusted euphoria! The plot doesn’t stall, or pause, or drag on. From page your you are plunged back into young Theo’s life and journeying up through his catastrophic years filled with unfortunate twists and turns until the moment that leads you back to his predicament on the first page. You feel for Theo, you want to reach into him and hold him tight and tell him that everything will be OK when he was a lost young teenager. You want to meet his bubbly character of a mother, see for yourself how someone can be that unique and attractive. You want to shake some sense into him and tell him off when he becomes rowdy and acts up, you want to sit in the kitchen with Hobie -who is my favourite character ever- and have tea while discussing life. When you are fast forwarded in time line of the story, well I don’t know what to think. I’m truly disappointed in Theo but I am making up excuses for him all the time, the boy didn’t have it easy growing up and having Boris as a companion didn’t help things either.

Please be warned that this book got a lot of “I hate it can’t understand how people plow through so much details etc.” Reviews. Personally, I don’t understand the amount of details they are complaining about, if you’ve read Harry Potter books over and over then I suppose any amount of details will be minuscule in comparison although the last chapter I could have done without, it just went on and on like it was summarising he entire novel. I

Disputed amount of details and underworld crime scene or not, this novel is one of the finest I’ve come across in a long time and I can totally see why it was a Pulitzer Prize winner! The Goldfinch is one of those books where you either are pulled in or kept out and if you are one of the lucky ones who gets pulled in, then you are in for a treat most of the way.

Breakfast at Cafe Bazza – Soon in Dubai

In 2011 a new cafe by the name of Bazza opened up in Kuwait, serving traditional Kuwaiti dishes in a modernised yet still time-time-honored setting and atmosphere. I was a fan of Cafe Bazza from the very start, the attention to detail is evident in everything: the menu, the story on the menu, the sound track, the selection of dishes on the menu, even

Visiting Di Bella’s Coffee Factory, Brisbane

Australia is simply heaven for coffee-holics and chocoholics and Australians take their coffee pretty seriously and the coffee they have on offer is really good. If you are like me, a person whose backbone of a diet heavily relies on caffeine, then you will never go hungry when visiting Australia. Shaky? Sure by overdosing on caffeine but definitely not hungry. Thankfully, in recognition of the coffee-loving culture of Brisbane, the 6th day of my #Room753 Bloggers Trip to Queensland itinerary started with an early morning visit to Di Bella, a local coffee roasting factory and cafe.

Di Bella’s roasting warehouse is only fifteen minutes away by taxi from Sofitel Brisbane where I was staying. At 8:30 A.M. I was standing at the reception of Di Bella asking for our guide Mr. Michael Hunter, a friendly guy who greeted us warmly and started our tour by taking us to an adjacent drive-thru Di Bella cafe for a morning cup of freshly brewed coffee that we sipped while chatting and watching a long snaking queue of cars waiting on the drive thru for their coffee fix. We need more coffee drive thrus in Kuwait, it will make the daily morning commute to work a much happier occasion.

After the coffee and the introduction we headed towards the warehouse. While walking to we passed by normal looking trees with red berries growing innocently beside the pavement and then I was told those are actually coffee bean trees! The very first coffee trees I’ve even seen in my life!

Mr. Hunter even searched for a small shrub that I can take back home with me to plant -I was squealing a bit too shrilly in excitement at that point- but sadly it wasn’t meant to be, I’m not even sure we are allowed to bring in live plants to Kuwait by plane. I’m still on the look out btw if anyone knows where to get one of those. I want to grow and brew my own coffee, and alphonso mangoes. Yes I want my own coffee tree.

See those red berry thing? Inside each one there are two coffee pods and as they are growing still they are white and a tad slimy. They wait for them to dry up first before they are harvested and then sent off for roasting. Also, although Di Bella are a coffee roasting business they import their beans and do not use these beans to make their coffee, just felt like clarifying, although I was scheduled to visit a coffee plantation up in Tamborine Mountain later in my trip but lets keep that for another post.

Now for the real deal, going inside the factory where the magic of coffee happens! Do we have similar coffee roasting and packing facilities in Kuwait? Perhaps one day I will have my very own one, I will give you a tour if I ever do.

The coffee beans arrive in sacks from all over the world, those below are from Brazil. The beans are taken out of the sacks, mixed in various ways then roasted in big machines.

Once the coffee beans are roasted they are poured in this machine that combs through the beans and extracts any weird items that might have found their way into the mounds of beans shipped from all over the world.

Items extracted from the brewed beans are kept in a jar, as souvenirs! Look at those.

In a quiet corner surrounded by all the roasting and mixing machines there was a small makeshift desk with several coffee cups and a sheet of coffee beans detailing something, quality assurance station I was told. Now that is quite a fun job in my opinion!

Afterwards we went to a room where the roasted beans are packaged and boxed, ready to be shipped off to all other coffee shops in the area. Walking around Queensland I’ve seen many cafe’s sporting the “proudly brewing Di Bella coffee” signs and here I am at the very heart of Di Bella’s coffee place.

Moving on, Di Bella’s coffee also stock everything coffee related, from espresso cups and saucers to different gadgets you could use to brew your coffee whatever way you fancy, the possibilities are endless.

We also passed a barista training room where you could start training for a career in coffee making or bring in your own coffee machine and have a coffee expert from Di Bella teach you how to make most of your machine capabilities and brew the best cup of coffee possible in the comfort of your own home. Then there was our last -and favourite- stop of the tour: the coffee making room.

We got to see -and drink- different shots of espresso made by different coffee methods. We also got to meet the Victoria Arduino. Who is she, you might ask?

The Victoria Arduino is, as described by Mr. Hunter, the Rolls Royce of all coffee machines and she is a beauty indeed.

In the coffee making room I got to tamp and brew my own espressos, though we weren’t allowed to touch the Victoria Arduino. One day I’m going to brew a cup of espresso from beans that I’ve grown using my very own Victoria, I seem to have accumulated a good amount of future dreams during those 45 minutes of touring the coffee factory. Oh well.

Will you look at my very own tamped and brewed shot of espresso with that thick honey-like layer of creme on top? Yes, my very own brew :p Accompanied by my favourite biscuits: almond and orange peel dusted with sugar powder, also known as Italian kisses!

In case you began craving those biscuits, which in my opinion are the perfect companions for a bitter shot of espresso, Breadz Kuwait make pretty decent ones and yes they do deliver.

We could tell we had a few coffees too many when I began shaking slightly and it began to effect my photo taking capabilities. Oh well, can you blame me? Look at that gorgeous cappuccino! And a lotus biscuit as well, they are also popular in Australia I see!

When the tour was over we headed for the actual coffee shop, crazy busy, see people lining up to get a brew, or choose their beans from a big ice cream freezer-like display, or simply purchase whatever is needed to make your own cup of joy at home. Yes joy and not joe, pun intended.

I got me this one which I’ve been eyeing for quite a while. It makes a decent cup of coffee albeit not the smoothest but you get the most out of the flavours out of the brewed beans with minimal effort albeit with a hint of patience. Good to take work plus it won’t break on the plane trip back to Kuwait.

At the end of the tour I was presented with a big heavy bag of Di Bella’s coffee goodies! The Di Bella’s founder’s book, a pure espresso and sugar energy drink, natural instant coffee liquid, coffee beans to grind back home and di Bella’s very own Nespresso coffee pods that I was waiting until the day I publish this post to consume -I only have two after all!-

We had an excellent last morning in Brisbane touring the Di Bella factory, inhaling, touching, tasting, and watching coffee from bean to cup! I wonder why we don’t have something similar in the region, the word coffee did originate from the Arabic word gahwa after all. Thank you Mr. Hunter for a great and memorable tour.

Di Bella’s coffee factory is located at 82 Abbotsford Road, Bowen Hills, Brisbane Australia. For more information you can contact them by calling Tel: 07 3225 4512 or by checking their website (link).

The Chocolate Bar’s Fondue To Go

If you live in Kuwait, or have visited in Kuwait, then surely you must know The Chocolate Bar! Open for a decade now and still is the destination for chocoholics -in case you didn’t know already that is-, they have have some of their famous dishes like the pink pasta and the hot chocolate available for online to go orders. Remember when I posted once about the Chocolate Bar hot chocolate and cookies that are delivered right to your step? I recall that I wished for the chocolate fondue to be available for delivery as well and, seems like this is the month were many of my wishes did materialise for the Chocolate Bar did indeed introduce their very own chocolate fondue to go by ordering it online!

The Chocolate Bar to go is available online on 965flowers.com and they only have two open delivery periods. I wanted to have the fondue delivered to a gathering at my friend’s PinkGirl place directly and we were supposed to be there at 6 while the delivery period said between 6-10 P.M. Because we were starting with a BBQ dinner I thought that there wouldn’t be any harm ordering and waiting for the fondue, even if it arrived at 9 or 10, for we wouldn’t be having desserts until then so I placed my order. To my surprise, the chocolate fondues arrived at 6 P.M. on the dot, even before myself! Excellent delivery service!

After dinner, and plenty of fries and burgers for the girls, I had to restrain myself from finishing the mounds of fries on the table because I really, really wanted to indulge in the chocolate fondue. There are two types of fondue that are available for order: the classic with 3 types of chocolate (milk, dark, and white) and the candy bar fondue with one with melted toblerone chocolate, nutella spread, and caramel crunch chocolate.

Each type of fondue came in a compact carton box, when you lift up the lid you will find four packets of utensils with napkins and a card with instructions on how to prepare the fondue. The card said to heat up the chocolate bowls in the microwave but the chocolates were already in liquid form and we didn’t mind having them at room temperature so we skipped that step. Not that I had any say in the matter you see, the moment the boxes were open and the familiar Chocolate Bar aroma wafted at us all you could see was a flurry of movements that involved popping open all the plastic lids and dunking stuff in liquid chocolate pots.

With each box there were three chocolate pots along with strawberries, chopped chocolate chip cookies, marshmallows, cubes of pound cake, oatmeal cookies, and cubes of chocolate brownies! There are no banana slices though, because usually bananas tend to turn black and sticky once cut, but no matter we got a banana from a nearby fruit bowl and chopped it up. By the time my camera was ready there were liquid chocolate spots all over the boxes!

Who needs to stand in line to get their names on a waiting list and sit upright well dressed and well behaved to have a taste of Chocolate Bar’s fondue? You can have those in wearing your pyjamas, dunking your fingers, slurping the liquid chocolate in one gulp, hogging the entire thing to yourself and no one would know -except your metabolism who might protest but then the army of endorphins released will take care of it at once-.  Would you look at that?

Oh and that’s the chocolate crunch pot…

And this is how the night had unfolded, with tea and chocolate drenched fruits and cake. I have to say I don’t recall ever having Chocolate Bar’s brownies or dunk any in the chocolate fondue before but it is officially my absolute favourite ingredient, hands down!

All I can say afterwards is, thank god for the wet napkins! I actually have an embarrassing picture of myself with liquid chocolate all over my face, highlighting the goofy ear-to-ear smile I was sporting but I think its too embarrassing to share here. Maybe one day.

If you love the Chocolate Bar fondue then you must, must, MUST try and order it at home especially if you are feeling down and need a pick me up or if you have a gathering. Do keep in mind that each box might be enough for two to three sharing people, four max. Also, you must wear protective gear and if you are planning on having people eat it in a civilised manner you might want to arrange it on the table nicely before the guests lay eyes on it otherwise there can be shoving and dunking and dripping and hogging. You can order it from here (link).

Thank you Chocolate Bar for this amazing product! You truly made our day the other day! Now is it possible to have the Tuna Salad without Tuna available for takeaway as well? And your fries? and the sandwiches? and the Maltesers and Turkish Coffee shakes? And add the different flavours of hot chocolate as an option, like the Spanish one for people who love it? I know its a long list of demands but one can only hope y3ni, pretty please?

The First Beach Picnic Back

The time of the good weather in Kuwait is here and that means one thing: its picnic time! Well, picnic and BBQ’s and dining outdoors and all other outdoorsy activities we put on hold during the scorching summer months but what I look forward the most these days are picnics! The first picnic of fall 2014 was an impromptu beach one thrown by my lovely friend PinkGirl and the spot she chose was overlooking Kuwait towers at sunset time.

Beautiful location, sensational time of day, cool wind and few picnicking families scattered here and there, the sound of the beach waves gently crashing against the sandy shore. Pink had used the services of “Picnic Planner”, a new kind of home business popping around Kuwait where they take care of whatever you need to enjoy a day out in a park or on the beach: a spread, a few seats and cushions, tables, flowers -real or not it depends-, a few decorative peaces, sources of light, etc. The last time we went on one of these was last March in a park and it was so much fun.

All we had to do as guests was bring in some dish to share, potluck style. My contribution was bagfuls of chapatis with different stuffings and two flasks of Karak tea from Karak Gholam which I have to say were quite popular with the picnic-ees… is that what they call people who go on picnics together?

Though its been about ten days already, I can still feel the cool breeze ruffling my clothes, the small Karak  tea cup warming my palms, and the sky changing colours rapidly as the sun is setting, casting a faint yet sharp glow around everything in sight. You could also clearly make out the lights dotting the buildings that makeup Kuwait City and Salmiya’s sky line, twinkling faintly along the shore.

We also had a great view of Al Hamra tower, one of the tallest skyscrapers in the region, all lit up in pink in support of Pink October Cancer Awareness campaign.

And because the beach wasn’t that crowded, the sound of the waves was soothing and strong, overcome only by the sound of our laughter, both sounds quite therapeutic. I think, despite the sand getting everywhere, I prefer beach picnics over all other picnics, there is nothing like a sea view! Yes, I believe I do.

We had the best time on the beach picnic that day! Thank you my dear Pink for inviting us along :* As for my dear readers, what are you waiting for? Why don’t you go on a beach picnic in this glorious weather? Do bring good strong lights with you as it can get quite dark after nightfall and please, please, do not litter!