Risen spelt dough

I used that colomba technique I told you about a few years back - stretching the dough out with my fingertips and folding it over to create little pockets of air in the dough. Having less gluten than regular wheat flour, spelt flour dough isn't as stretchy so you won't get loads of big bubbles (see my previous pizza post!) - so it's up to you if you want to bother with this process, or simply roll it out with no folding and pressing.

Ball of dough

Here is the dough all pressed out...

Pressing it out

Folding it over...

The first fold

... and folding it closed.

Folded closed

From here you press it out once more and then fold over, before rolling it out into a big rectangle (or circle, or whatever shape your baking trays happen to be!)

Spelt dough

Mushroom topping

And there was cheese. Lots of cheese.

Mozzarella - Scamorza Bianca from Cuore Blu

Mushroom Pizza with Spelt Dough

Mushroom and Spelt Pizza
Dough adapted from Nigella's Pizza Casareccia (How to be a Domestic Goddess), topping adapted from Nigella's Linguine with Lemon, Garlic and Thyme Mushrooms (Nigella Express)

Ingredients
For the dough
150 grams wholegrain spelt flour
100 grams plain flour
1 heaped teaspoon dried yeast
1/2 teaspoon salt
150 millilitres warm water
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

For the topping
200 grams sliced mushrooms (button, chestnut, brown, or a mixture)
2 sprigs fresh thyme
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Zest of half a lemon
1 clove of garlic, crushed
150 grams mozzarella cheese, grated
50 grams Parmesan cheese, grated
Method
To make the dough, combine both flours, yeast and salt in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the dough hook. Add the water and olive oil and stir to combine. Once the dough has come together, knead for 3-5 minutes or until smooth. Cover with clingwrap and rest the dough in a warm spot for an hour or until it has doubled in size.
Preheat the oven to 220C.
For the topping, stir together all the ingredients apart from the cheese and set aside.
Punch the dough down to expel the air. Knead gently and divide into two pieces.
Starting with the first piece of dough, press out flat with your fingertips, so that it is covered in little indentations. Fold the dough over in thirds like a business letter, then press out again. Fold and press out one more time. Roll out thinly and place on a lined baking tray.
Repeat the pressing-and-folding process with the second piece of dough, roll out thinly and place on a second lined baking tray.
Sprinkle the dough with the grated mozzarella, grated Parmesan, and the mushrooms.
Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the dough is cooked through and the cheese is melted and golden. Swap the trays around halfway through if necessary.
Slice into chunky pieces to serve.
Serves 2 generously or 4 less so

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Prahran VIC 3181

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Last night I attended the launch event of Charlie Dumpling, a slick-looking new bar-slash-dumpling restaurant from Chef Dylan Roberts. A night of cocktails, and dumplings made by one of Ezard's ex-chefs? I was totally in.

The bar

The bar

The function room upstairs

Espresso Martini Station

Mr C Sheen - Gin, watermelon, lime, agave - $18

I don't normally like gin or watermelon, but these Mr C Sheen cocktails were super refreshing and totally hit the spot. As you can imagine, my favourite part was the shredded coconut!

Espresso Martinis

Espresso martinis

Espresso martinis are a favourite of mine (judge me if you will, I do not care) - not just for the taste, which I love, but also because the combo of coffee, vodka and Kahlua is the perfect pick-me-up after work and before going out. We really enjoyed these, and I especially liked the dash of cinnamon on the top.

Let's have a look at the food! We were served a good range of items from the menu, primarily focusing on the dumplings. We tried a lot of different items, so I won't go into great detail about each one, but what I will say is that the dumplings were all of high quality, and all tasted different. You know how sometimes you can go out and eat a whole bunch of different dumplings, but they all taste kinda the same? Not here - they all had different skins, different fillings, and each one was unique.

The menu is divided into "Small Bites", "Salads", "Dumplings" and "Desserts", so there don't seem to be a lot of big filling options, but rather a range of little snacky items to have with drinks. The dumplings are priced between $9.50 and $14, with four dumplings per serve. Whilst I really enjoyed the food and would recommend a visit - I would caution that if you want to have a full meal, and not just snacks with drinks, it could get very expensive very quickly.

Salmon Tartare, nori crackers, bonito custard, native lime

Tuna Sashimi, wakame, wasabi, green tea salt

Beef balls

Water spinach, squid, shrimp and curry leaf kewpie

I think these squid, shrimp and curry leaf kewpie dumplings were my favourite savoury ones of the night - the little fried curry leaves on top really made them stand out.

Steamed prawn and bamboo shoot har gow

There were big, chunky pieces of prawn in the har gao - yum.

Snapper, chilli, lime, black bean

Peking duck dumpling and spiced plum sauce

Angus beef, lemongrass, smashed peanut, coconut

Charlie’s Vegie dumpling

I'm sure now you can see how varied all the dumplings were - there were influences and flavours from Cantonese cuisine, Northern China, South East Asia, India and more.

Lemon tart mochi, salted almond

These little mochi were filled with a lemon ice-cream (which literally tasted like a lemon tart!) and topped with an addictive salted almond caramel.

Soft-centred chocolate donut

We saw the kitchen making these donuts - a frozen ball of chocolate filling was dipped into batter, and then deep fried so that the outside was crispy and the chocolate was molten and liquid. These were amazing! I could have easily polished off the whole plate. (But I didn't. Promise!)

Thanks to the Charlie Dumpling team for a really fun night and all the delicious food!

Sarah and Jimbo attended the launch of Charlie Dumpling as guests.