All posts tagged: lunch

Smoked salmon sushi bowl

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A bowl of yum For those who don’t know what a sushi bowl is, it’s just a bunch of chopped sushi and salad ingredients served on a bowl of rice. You have a mouthful of this, a mouthful of that and in the end, it pretty much tastes like sushi in your mouth. This recipe is great for either lunch and dinner. I should know, I’ve eaten this for lunch and dinner this week. Thanks to Sealord, I’ve got a summer prize pack to give away. The pack includes a Sealord chilly bag, a stainless steel lunch box, a picnic blanket and Sealord’s Manuka Hot Smoked Salmon vouchers. To enter, fill in the form at the bottom of the giveaway post here. Sealord recently won the Supreme Award at the New Zealand Food Awards for their Manuka Hot Smoked Salmon. The flavours in their Manuka Hot Smoked Salmon range: Natural, Peri Peri (bird’s eye chili) and Tuscan. Au Natural I usually buy unflavoured smoked salmon. I find it to be more versatile and I enjoy adding my own flavourings …

Grilled Chi Sandwich

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Right by my work at the top of Mt Eden Road is the hilariously named “Wang Mart” – a Korean grocery shop selling mostly Korean goods. Within the shop is a counter where a lady makes kim-chi all day and sells a small selection of fresh vegetables. A kilo tub of her kim-chi will set you back a measly $8NZ. I’m no kim-chi expert, but I know a bargain when I see one. 

Make Onigiri

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This post is part of Our Growing Edge, a monthly blogging event to encourage us to try new food related things. Louise from Crumbs and Corkscrews is the host for this month’s event. If you have a blog and you are eating or cooking something new this month, click below to join. Yesterday, I re-watched the movie Spirited Away at Silo Cinema. Silo Cinema is a free, weekly open-air-cinema in downtown Auckland at Silo Park. Right on the water’s edge looking across the harbour bridge, with the moon in view, movies are projected onto a big unused silo. Aucklanders bring blankets, snacks, tipple, friends or family for a cheap night out. Magic. I’m a huge fan of Hayao Miyazaki/Studio Ghibli (pronounced jee-blee or ji-bu-ri). His animations are rich in imagination, characters, colour and often sumptuous food scenes. Watching Spirited Away  reminded me once again why I put onigiri on my foodie bucket list. Onigiri or rice balls are portable, cheap, filling and can be thought of as Japanese soul food. Unlike sushi, which are made by highly trained sushi chefs, rice …

Monday Bunday: Lunch boxes

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I’m bringing lunch to work more these days. Sandwiches at the start of the week (with roast meat left over from Sunday), leftovers and a hodgepodge of assembled lunches on other days. If I was busy at work, I would treat myself to a nice lunch out. It was an excuse to get out of the office, see some daylight, go for a walk and sample some delicious local cuisine. If I buy lunch, I usually spend an average of $7NZ which soon adds up. I used to buy lunch most days, but Last week I brought a home made lunch every single day and the last few weeks before, I’ve been buying only once a week. I’m always recycling plastic take-out containers, but if I had an adorable lunch box I would be more enthusiastic about bringing lunch. Here is a round up of a few bunny lunch boxes from around the web. I particularly like the ones wit partitions and multi-storey compartments. Links starting from top: Rectangle black and red, Rectangle purple Box …

Halong Bay: The Beauty & The Eats

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On our second day in Vietnam, we spend the morning on a bus to Halong Bay. We didn’t think were would go to Halong Bay as we only had 2 and half free days in Hanoi, but after 1 full day in The Old Quarter, we decided we’d had enough of the hustle and bustle and booked ourselves onto a Halong Bay tour. Halong translates to Descending Dragon and thousands of limestone peaks jut out from the green sea in an area of about 1500km2. Two million years in the tropical climate have created these unique formations. It is a tourist destination, but for good reason: it really is beautiful. Pick up from our hotel is early and every seat on the bus is accounted for. They have those aisle seats that fold down so that when all bums are on seats, there are no aisles at all. If someone in the back row needs to get out, all 4 aisle row seats need to get up, fold their chair up and get out in order …

Delicious Vietnam: Eating In The Old Quarter, Hanoi

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Before our epic SE Asia holiday, I had read a few  blogs to inspire my appetite. One of the best was A Food Lover’s Journey by Ahn in Melbourne. Mouthwatering and easily relatable, Ahn is a Vietnamese expat and reading her blog is enough to make anyone crave Vietnamese food. The monthly Delicious Vietnam blogging event conspired by A Food Lover’s Journey and Ravenous Couple was never something I thought I would participate in. When I saw their reminder this month, I realised that it was just about time I wrote about Vietnamese food and our time in Hanoi. Vietnamese food in Auckland There is a lack of Vietnamese restaurants in Auckland, but one of my favourites is Hansan Vietnamese Restaurant. One of those places with cheap, fresh and delicious food, but severely no frills service, my review can be found here. The other Vietnamese place worth mentioning in Auckland is Banh Mi. Who do great filled rolls and all the classic Vietnamese dishes as well. Anticipation “”Well,” said Pooh, “what I like best — ” …