Search Results for 'Malay cuisine'

Halloween is only a week away and every year this festival seems to be getting bigger and bigger. When I was growing up apples and nuts were the only foods associated with Halloween, but nowadays it is a big deal with pumpkins, squashes, and the like featuring on menus all over the county.

The Asian Tea House on Mary Street is a popular spot and for good reason. Connacht’s Best Restaurant at the RAI Irish Restaurant Awards 2011 still maintains the same high standard, certainly a cut above your average Chinese restaurant.

I had passed the sign for this restaurant a couple of times and wondered what exactly is a Mauritian Creole restaurant and also wondered about the significance of the bird on the signage that looked a bit like a fat turkey. First of all the Mauritian part of the title indicates that the owners and chef are from Mauritius and the Creole part of the name comes from the fact that the French created a huge plantation business in Mauritius during the 1700s and the language that developed among the slaves was a version of the French that was called creole. The slaves were from Africa, Madagascar and India, so as you can imagine the food has many influences. Finally the picture of the fat bird is a dodo, which became extinct in Mauritius around the end of the 1600s.

Lime and horseradish prawns with egg noodles, chilli and rocket

Exciting new Chinese restaurant Inniu Kung Fu on Church Street officially opened its doors last weekend, offering a fresh and healthy take on Chinese-style cuisine.

The Asian Tea House is a pan Asian restaurant centrally located on 15 Mary Street, Galway. I had heard several good things about the Asian Tea House over the past year from my eldest daughter, who loves the food there. The name for some reason did not lead me to expect the great variety and authenticity that is The Asian Tea House.

Thai cookery is in many ways unequalled in producing fine broth type dishes. The use of lime leaf, lemongrass, and coriander which are often enhanced with coconut milk and basil can produce broths with incredible depth and style. Another advantage of poaching foods in a broth is the healthy benefits of this cookery style. Although coconut milk has a high fat content it can easily be substituted by a low fat alternative. Another great thing about Thai food is that once you master the basics of how to balance the various Thai spices and flavours it is easy to alter a dish to include fish and vegetables. Aubergines work very well in Thai cookery. Thai fish sauce or nam pla is essential to achieving an authentic Thai flavour. Don’t be put off by this strong smelling condiment — when used correctly it can make a good dish great. Another handy point when using Thai curry paste — the green paste is the hot one and the red paste is the mild.

Curry is one of the most traditional English dishes dating back to the East India Trading Company. Curry may be delicious when made well, but Indian food it is not. Now the spices and their combinations used in curry are indeed very much Indian, but in India they tend to be fresh and far more fragrant than what we see in Ireland. The name curry originated from the word kari, which means spiced sauce. Curry powder was a British invention which allowed the spice combinations of the Indians to become far more user friendly, also transporting a powder is a lot simpler than moving complex varieties of foods across continents.