Cooking Down Under - The Blog

In Julia's kitchen

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 02:47:00 +0000

As last I’ve joined the rest of the food-writing world and seen Julie and Julia, an enjoyable two-hour journey that made me remember what an influence she had on my own cooking.

I first became acquainted with Julia Child in the 1970s when her TV programmes were shown in New Zealand. I’d been cooking enthusiastically for years, ever since I discovered Elizabeth David’s cookbooks and slowly widened my own gastronomic horizons.

Certainly one of the most glorious reasons to master French puff pastry is the Pithiviers

Alas, many of the ingredients in David’s books had not reached New Zealand shores. The “ethnic” food of the early 1960s was largely Cantonese fare that seemed more chicken skin and cabbage than even vaguely exotic. And our “curries” made with mince, curry powder, sultanas and rice, with an occasional side of sliced banana.

Gradually all this changed. In the late 60s I invested in the Cordon Bleu Cookery Course that came in weekly parts for about two years. I never missed an issue and I still have the complete set. I happily cooked my way through many recipes, from chicken Veronique to beef Stroganoff. I grappled with choux pastry, was introduced to avocados and made hamantaschen.

Then Robert Carrier became my new best friend and The Robert Carrier Cookbook and its companion Great Dishes of the World got me into serious cooking mode as those “foreign” ingredients became more readily available. The former continues as part of my cookbook library thanks only to the holding power of some seriously industrial black tape.

Folded down page corners (yes, I am a library vandal) chart my course in the kitchen as I travelled the world vicariously through Carrier’s recipes.

Then came Julia Child. I loved how this gangly woman lurched through her recipes, handing on her knowledge, passing off mistakes as experience – there was no re-shooting scenes then. In fact, her occasional onscreen mishaps made her all the more endearing. Her books though, as I soon discovered, were something else.

I bought both volumes of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, The French Chef Cookbook plus Julia Child and Company and Julia Child and More Company. But the book that really struck a chord with me was From Julia Child’s Kitchen.

This was first published in 1975 although my edition is the 1981 Penguin printing. This book didn’t waste time sitting round on the kitchen bookshelf. It was regularly out on the bench. By then I was married with two young sons and a mortgage. There wasn’t a lot of spare cash for going out wining and dining. My career was on hold while I stayed at home looking after babies and free-lancing for a few treats like new kitchen gadgets.

If we wanted to eat fancy meals, I had to make them, so I did most weekends. We also held quite a few dinner parties and many of the recipes were literally From Julia Child’s Kitchen.

The instructions were precise and unambiguous. She knew which bits an inexperienced cook might find tricky and a recipe could run over several pages. Photos and line drawings demystified procedures like disjointing chickens and making pastry.

Oh, the pastry!

There was one ambitious dinner I cooked for two well travelled artistic friends. We started with a frothy watercress soup, “misted with chives” as I had read in a novel. This was followed by carefully skinned and sliced avocado “leaves” with a “rose” fashioned out of thin smoked salmon slices. (This was the early 80s!)

Friends in the diplomatic corps had put me on to a very good butcher who had a nicely prepared veal rib roast ready for me when I called. By then I had mastered my microwave oven and produced twee little bundles of carrot matchsticks tied with chives. The béarnaise sauce was perfect. The broccoli with toasted pinenuts was bright and green. The pommes duchesse were works of art.

But then Julia and I pulled off the triumph of the night. I had decided I would make Le Pithiviers for dessert.

“Certainly one of the most glorious reasons to master French puff pastry is the Pithiviers, a rum-flavoured almond cream baked between that buttery wonder dough, pâte feuilletée, known variously as flaky pastry and thousand-leaf dough as well as French puff pastry,” Mrs Child said. I was enticed.

During the previous day I quietly worked my way through the pastry making exercise. All went to plan and it was looking good. Butter and dough were married together, turned, rolled and chilled, turned, rolled and chilled. Julia held my hand through five pages of instruction and made sure I had a perfect product. The four-page almond cream was made in between and next day I set to assembling Le Pithiviers.

“The usual pattern for a Pithiviers is a wheel of swirling spokes starting at the steam hole and curving gracefully out to the edge where they spread out 1/2in apart.” I managed that without mishap and the egg-glazed masterpiece was committed to the oven.

I could barely comprehend the absolute beauty of the dessert that emerged. Perfectly risen layers of the butteriest lightest pastry. What a shame we didn’t run round photographing all our food in those days!

From Julia Child’s Kitchen is now a book of many parts. The glue down the spine has crumbled with age. So has the sticky tape that was holding the cover on. Even robust insulating tape won’t rescue it.

Unfortunately pages 353-356 are missing. That was the recipe for Pate en croute – a free-form pate I made as the centrepiece for a Christmas party buffet three or four years later. Another triumph thanks to Julia.

I certainly didn’t cook every recipe in the book, but there are many smears and splodges of evidence that I cooked a good few. The $13.50 I paid for it was clearly a good investment. Maybe it’s time I bought a replacement. Ummm, maybe not – it’s currently listed on Amazon for up to $US450.

Fusion, profusion, confusion

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 06:56:00 +0000

Last weekend I had a very surreal food experience. So surreal I’m still wondering if it really happened.

A group of us were staying at Mercure’s Balgownie Estate Vineyard Resort in the Yarra Valley for the annual Opera in the Vineyards.

Friday night and it was time to dine. It was a long time since my modest fruit and yoghurt lunch and I was ready to enjoy a good meal at the resort’s restaurant, Rae’s.

The first item on the menu seemed a trifle strange – cream of peas and Granny Smith apple with candied beetroot and a smoked paprika twist. Was that a soup? Maybe. But I fancied prawns anyway.

They were listed as pan-fried in spicy sumac with creamy coriander polenta and a drizzle of red capsicum and coconut. That fusion of Middle Eastern, Italian, tropical and Asian flavours going on round the prawns should have sounded warning bells. However, I didn’t think I could tackle crispy scallop ravioli with cream of spinach, walnut, thyme and parmesan oil or a parfait of chicken livers cooked in kiwifruit wine with pear chutney. And the idea of lillypilly Chantilly mixing with the limes, capers and parsley oil on the cured trout sounded similarly odd.

Hey, I thought they said their food was simple. In fact the starters all looked fairly complicated. I know menu descriptions can sometimes look overly complicated and a couple of green dots on a plate can turn out to be the “broad bean puree” or the “capsicum reduction” on what initially looked like a shopping list. We ordered.

I could have done with more of the prawns and a lot less of the polenta.

One friend wasn’t paying attention and missed the “crispy” adjective in the ravioli and so was expecting regular ravioli, not fried ones.

Another’s air-dried wagyu fillet sat in infused orange and cracked pepper, crowned with witlof salad and hummus.

I’d chosen a ballottine of chicken breast for my main and was starting to get a bit nervous about the portobello mushroom and feta filling and the accompanying puree of cocoa beans and green tea. It arrived with additional garnishes not even mentioned on the menu. The sad thing was all this busyness was total overkill. The chicken itself was delightful but the other trimmings defeated me and confused my palate

The slow-cooked duck leg in pineapple next to me came on a bed of broad beans, onion jam and bergamot orange sauce. Too many things going on there spoiled what he said was a great piece of duck. And so on round the table – a reduction of coffee milk fought it out with celeriac mash, chorizo, baby tomatoes and marinated chickpeas round the lamb. A caramel and wasabi sauce finished the seared tuna with its muesli crust, carrots and cumin. The lottery of flavours left what was generally agreed was nicely cooked meat or fish struggling to assert itself.

The food, which should have been a highlight of the weekend, was very disappointing. Obviously a lot of work had gone into it but there was just too much happening on the plate. Perhaps the tapas and degustation culture has made us lean more towards savouring one taste sensation at a time.

I believe the restaurant has its own newly established vegetable garden. Hopefully the produce will be allowed to speak for itself in the future.

[Sorry about the quality of the photos. The restaurant was dimly lit and I dislike using a flash at the table.]

Kiwi accent sux (Oz 13)

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 06:19:00 +0000

I’ve lived in Australia now for four years and I’ve grown very fond of the place, particularly Melbourne.

I’m not a complete foreigner. My maternal grandfather was born in Footscray in 1891 and worked there as a butcher. He used to travel to New Zealand to work in the freezing works at Waitara, Taranaki during the local killing season. It was there he met and married my grandmother and stayed on. I ended up with relatives both sides of the Tasman.

Melbourne now feels like home, particularly since we recently bought a home here. OK. There are a few things I still find strange - sliced bread is too thick. Sandwich slice is what Kiwis call toast slice. And the zucchini are allowed to grow too large before being sent to market.

People are frequently surprised when we say we’re Kiwis. “You don’t sound like Kiwis,” they say. Only very occasionally will someone pick up on a phrase or word and ask where we’re from.

At college we had an ex-Thespian, Daphne Knight, who tried to teach the “gels” to speak prrrrroperly, rolling our rrrs and polishing our vowels. Perhaps I had been paying attention for once?

I doubt it. I can remember reciting T S Elliot ad nauseum “The Pekes and the Pollicles, everyone knows, are proud and implacable passionate foes…” long before Cats was written. But I think I left Miss Knight’s lessons in the classroom.

On recent trips back across the ditch I started listening closely to my countrymen to see if I could identify the Kiwi accent I apparently didn’t have.

Kiwis frequently have a rising inflection at the end of their sentences which makes them sound like they are posing a question or seeking affirmation or approval, rather than making a statement – “And then we’re going down to the shops? And we’re going to buy some groceries?”

Then I started noticing “halth” for health, alectricity, moolk for milk. My home city had become Wullington, And all this was from television reporters.

I was watching the food channel one night when I realised I was listing to a pure, unadulterated Kiwi accent. TV chef Richard Till was in full flight. “Chucken”, “fush”, “diluscious”,“rilly”, “muxer”, “trup”, “frutters”. Hooh!

Ah, but someone likes the Kiwi accent. It was recently rated the most attractive and prestigious form of English outside the UK, according to a BBC survey.

It was the sixth most socially attractive accent, placed above the Queen's English (seventh) and well ahead of Australian (13th) and American English (15th).

Seexth, would you beloyve! We’ve boyten Aussies at sometheeng at last. Darl!

The grass diet

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 06:47:00 +0000

When we moved recently to a townhouse with only a minute piece of land attached, our cat had to get used to being an indoor animal. While she has now grown accustomed to going out on the balconies and likes to have a roll on the paving and challenge the birds while I check the letterbox, her outdoor territory has shrunk considerably.

Fortunately she’s an adaptable cat and after four moves in six years, including a transTasman shift, she’s adept at settling in quickly. However, after a couple of months in the new home, it became clear she was missing something.

I found her sitting on the dining table one afternoon, nibbling away at a vase of flowers. I know cats will often eat grass for reasons best known to themselves. Some sources say it’s to help them cough up fur balls, others to assist digestion or to alleviate nausea, or perhaps to obtain a little folic acid. Our Lucy isn’t sharing her reasons, but when I grabbed a handful of grass from the berm and offered it to her, she chomped enthusiastically.

Can I have mayo with that?

A longer term plan seemed in order and I was quite surprised to find a cat grass kit at the local pet shop. Within a few days the grass seeds sprouted and I soon had a healthy crop which she made part of her diet. The grass dried off when we were away on holiday but I found a pot of healthy looking cat grass on sale at a local plant shop to tide me over till I grew a new crop. It’s definitely to her taste

I’ve now invested in a box of grass seed and some growing medium to ensure a steady supply.

Lunch at Coda

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 09:09:00 +0000

Fellow bloggers and tweeters have been enthusing about Coda of late so I was delighted when the family invited me there for lunch to celebrate my umpteenth birthday.

Chef Adam D’Sylva, The Age Good Food Guide's 2008 Young Chef of the Year, was formerly at Pearl and Longrain. He opened this venture in June with ex MoVida manager Mykal Bartholomew and Kate Calder, former floor manager at Taxi. Within weeks of serving his first dishes there, he picked up a hat in the recent GFG awards .

The menu is a diner-friendly one and one could happily graze through some of the 20 smaller dishes offered or take an entree and mains approach. The emphasis is Asian and the flavours are both fresh and nicely assertive.

I went for the spanner crab with galangal, roasted chilli and lime, prettily served on a betel leaf, and followed it up with a blackened quail half served with daikon and shiso salad. Elsewhere round the table there was a satisfied silence as others tried the citrus cured Hiramasa kingfish with fresh wasabi and minute balls of pickled radish, the San Daniele prosciutto with compressed melon and bread sticks and sugar cane prawn with a sweet chilli sauce.

Spanner crab

Blackened quail

Kingfish

Prosciutto

Sugar cane prawns

My main, or “bigger” dish, was sizzling prawns with roasted chilli, slices of king brown mushrooms, and Thai basil. Well flavoured, with the prawns still juicy. Two had the MacLeay Valley rabbit cassoulet – not a hearty cassoulet but a delicate, nicely understated one. Fish cooked in the bag was also a light, moist dish.

Sizzling prawns

Rabbit cassoulet

When it comes to desserts, I love chefs who offer a tasting plate so I went for that - baked lemon tart with yuzu marshmallow and a Valrhona chocolate custard pot with hazelnut brittle & pumpkin foam that had us scraping the bottom of the cute little pots. A nice contrast of sweet and citrus, crunch and softness. Equally impressive were the banana soufflés served with sherry to pour into the souffle and date ice cream.

Banana souffle

Chocolate custard pot and lemon tart

Happy customers!

I like a meal where the servings aren’t too large and taxing, where the flavours are well thought out and the presentation is a delight in itself. D’Sylva and his happy crew ticked all the boxes.

I want to go back and try more of the small dishes. Hopefully these will remain on the menu for a while yet. D’Sylva told us he’s not hurrying to change the line-up as people often come in to sample dishes they’ve heard about and he doesn’t want to disappoint them. Six bigger dishes are offered, along with eight sides, four desserts and a cheeseboard.

Service was excellent and the place was buzzing when we were there - a Saturday lunchtime. That speaks for itself.

Coda
141 Flinders Lane
Melbourne, VIC 3000
03 9650 3155

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Aladdin's cave

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 07:28:00 +0000

Omar Sidaoui has been breathing in the heady aroma of spice for so long that when he goes to work he doesn't smell the wonderful fragrances that immediately hit first-time visitors to NSM Food Wholesalers. Cumin, coriander, paprika, turmeric - the colourful display near the door is a visual as well as an olfactory delight.

The company's direct public outlet in Brunswick is an Aladdin's cave for the enthusiastic cook as well as a source of staples for local Somalians, Greeks, Turks and Middle Eastern cultural groups.

This week along with other members of the Food Media Club Australia I went on a virtual Middle Eastern souk tour of the outlet and managing director Omar soon had us comparing the intensely fragrant genuine cinnamon sticks with the often substituted cassia, nibbling on carob pods, checking out different varieties of cardamom, and tasting tiny sumac berries.

We learned ready-ground sumac was sometimes adulterated with citric acid "to give it that tangy flavour. When people don't know they go 'Wow, wow!' It's all citric acid."

While we sampled the sumac berries, Omar told us "To bring that in was an absolute nightmare." It was in quarantine for four months before being released.

Omar's father, Said Sadaoui, opened Melbourne's first Lebanese restaurant, Lebanese House in 1959. Its Arabian cuisine was greeted with enthusiasm, leading to the formation of the NSM business in 1962. It was an emporium of Middle Eastern spices and nuts, also making Middle Eastern sweets and food products. Here that Australia's first dry-roasted nuts were produced. Roasted nuts are very much a part of today's business which has expanded to include all herbs, beans and dried fruits as well as myriad imported lines.

Said Sadaoui is now 85 years old, but he still goes on buying trips for the business although things have radically changed from the days when imported herbs and spices were not subjected to fumigation, sterilisation, irradiation and the like.

Omar said some of the spices could be imported ready ground "a lot less headache, but it loses the flavour". NSM do their own spice grinding. "When you grind coriander, that you smell. The whole warehouse smells. It's really wonderful."

Omar's sister Helda said when it came to meat, their father always recommended buying from those butchers who came in to NSM to get their spices ground for their smallgoods as it was an indication of their commitment to producing a quality product.

Omar says they try to educate their customers. "Buy it. If you like, toast it. If you grind it yourself it will be a hundred times better."

MasterChef has had its reverberations in the business as well as in Australia's kitchens. One ingredient to suddenly rocket in popularity was mastic which featured in one of the MasterChef recipes. "You know, we sell ten packets a year. I think we sold a ton. Everyone wanted mastika."

NSM make some product lines themselves. We came away with samples to try at home - tahini, falafel mix and halva. And leaving behind the aroma of those freshly ground spices we headed off to Rumi Restaurant where owner/chef Joseph Abboud had a 15-course Middle Eastern tasting meal ready for us including:

labne with flat bread
crudites with almond taratoor
pastries filled with haloumi, feta and kasseri
Persian meatballs in tomato and saffron with labne
fried fish kofte with toum and lemon
beetroot and shankleesh
quail joojeh kebab with muhummara
rice pilaf with fresh herbs and crispy onions
spiced lamb shoulder slow roasted on the bone
Turkish delight

Have a look round NSM Food Wholesalers in the following slideshow...

Corny stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 08:33:00 +0000

The greatest drawback is the way in which it is necessary to eat it.....It looks awkward enough: but what is to be done? Surrendering such a vegetable from considerations of grace is not to be thought of.
Harriet Martineau, an Englishwomen, on corn on the cob (1835)

Shifting house has made me re-evaluate the number of kitchen gadgets that clutter the drawers. Occasionally I make a mistake and regret tossing an item. Last bad judgement call was the cherry/olive pitter, specially when I had a number of cherries to pit recently and remembered I was pitterless. However, I am satisfied the replacement one I bought subsequently is superior. Time will tell.

One thing I had no regrets about discarding was the collection of corn holders. I prefer to strip the cooked corn from the cob rather than gnaw it off. Mine were the bog standard yellow plastic corn holders with metal prongs that most of us grew up with. They took up space and often attacked me.

Corn holders come in many guises. These are 1937 models I came across recently. Little Billy there in his shirt and tie looks a trifle embarrassed by the whole business.

These heavy cast sterling silver holders have a nicely detailed kernel and cornsilk design and are probably more of a collector’s item these days. They were being advertised for $40.

Here’s another similar set in, also in sterling.

These crab ones are pewter.

There are plenty of cutesy ones too...

plump ladies and gents..

sausage dogs…

pigs and cows…

fish…

others with matching corn dishes…

some with a sporting themes

But holders aren’t the only gadgets for corn lovers. Here’s a butter spreader that theoretically should make the job cleaner and easier.

For those who prefer to cut the corn from the cob prior to eating it, there are a variety of wedge-shaped cutters to run down the cob and some more complicated looking ones.

There is some serious equipment round for those who like stripping corn off the cob prior to making their own creamed corn. Here the cob is impaled on a drill piece. The first tube removed the husks and silk while the second strips the kernels from the cob into a plastic bag. I think my preferred method using cook’s knife looks hassle-free by comparison. And imaging having to store all that stuff for occasional use.

Tweet, tweet, tweetie pies

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 03:48:00 +0000

Neal Foley (@podchef) farms on an island in Washington state. I came across him about four years ago when The Spouse bought me an iPod and I started listening to podcasts when I couldn't sleep.

Neal is squarely involved in the politics of what we eat and is also a passionate cook. He raises his own animals for food and grows his own fruit and vegetables. There's also Bridget the cow providing him with plenty of milk and cream and the makings for cheese and butter.

From time to time we swap ideas for recipes. Neal raises rabbits so when I bought some bunny at the South Melbourne Market, I picked Neal's brains for ideas. Springboarding from one of his suggestions, I ended up with rabbit braised in red wine with chorizo and fresh borlotti beans. It's amazing how "confited rabbit, sausage, beans" is enough to trigger the imagination.

Periodically Neal gets involved in catering activities. Last weekend he was off to cater a wedding on a remote island and happened to tweet and post some progress photos as he made a batch of pastry.

I asked what he was making the pastry for. "Veggie turnovers with Gorgonzola sauce."

Sounded good. In response to my request for the recipe, it came in three tweets.

VeggieTurnover Onion, Garlic-sweat. add dice of spud & carrot--sauté 5 min. Add zuch, shroom, chiff chard turn & cook 5 min TBC
Add red wine 2 cover, reduce until almost dry. Season w/salt, pepper, basil, thyme, parsley. TBC
Cool, portion & wrap in puff pastry Bake as per. Sauce: garlic, shallots sweat, white wine reduce add cream & gorg

I don't have a friendly cow providing me with butter so I bought the pastry, Careme's sour cream short crust.

The recipe expanded something like this with little in the way of change. I served ours with fresh, double-podded broad beans. This recipe made four round pies, about the size of saucers and a further four smaller triangular pies for freezing and cooking later.

My vegetables when the wine had cooked away and the silverbeet was added

The sauce after adding the Gorgonzola cheese

Vegetable Pies with Gorgonzola Sauce

1 small onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped
1/2 stick celery, diced
2 teaspoons oil
3 kipfler potatoes, peeled and diced
2 medium carrots, diced
1 small zucchini, diced
1/2 cup chopped mushrooms (I used some buttons and a King Brown)
2 silverbeet (Swiss chard) leaves, cut into chiffonade
1 cup red wine
seasoning
chopped herbs (I used marjoram and parsley)
short pastry

1 egg white whisked with a dash of water

Heat the oil and sauté the onions, garlic and celery over a low heat till soft. Add the potatoes and carrots and sauté a further 5 minutes. Add the zucchini, mushrooms and cook for 5 minutes. Pour over the red wine and simmer covered until almost dry. Add the seasoning, herbs and silverbeet. (I kept the silverbeet and added it last to maintain its colour for contrast.)

Set aside to cool. Roll out pastry and cut into squares (for turnovers or triangular pies) or rounds. I cut into rounds and used two for each pie. Neal folded the pastry round the filling then placed them seam side down, as far as I can see.

Place some of the cooled vegetable mix on each. Dampen the edges, press to close, trim and decorate using fork tines.

Glaze with the egg white/water.

Preheat oven 220C. Bake on a greased baking tray for 20 minutes. Cool for a couple of minutes then remove to a serving dish. Serve with the sauce.

Gorgonzola sauce

2 shallots, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed and chopped
1 teaspoon oil
1 cup white wine (nothing too dry)
1 cup thick cream
1/4 cup Gorgonzola cheese

Gently sauté the garlic and shallots until soft. Pour in the white wine and simmer to reduce to about 1/4 cup. Add the cream and cook, stirring from time to time, until reduced by half. Stir in the cheese and let it melt. Season if necessary.

Meanwhile, thousands of kilometres away, Neal's pies ready for baking at the wedding...

And ready to serve

Learning to be a young lady

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 08:18:00 +0000

Many moons ago I went to boarding school. During a recent shift I unearthed the little diary I kept at the time.

I used to keep it in my sponge bag, along with the occasional illicit bar of chocolate, because I figured if the nuns did a sweep of my belongings they probably wouldn’t look in the sponge bag.

However, I was also careful not to write anything in my diary that might get me into trouble if my innocent little observations fell into the wrong hands. Ironically, the diary itself was one put out by Dewar’s Whisky. Not very appropriate for a 12-year-old convent girl.

By day four I was starting to get a little homesick and, though I didn’t document my misdemeanours apart from “Late with sheets. In a hurry. Room done late”, by the second week I seemed to be running foul at least one of the nuns - “Sister still on warpath.”

I wish I could remember what prompted the entry "Crisis in boarding school. May have been Elizabeth T's imagination." But I do remember "Man on fire escape" and being told not to mention that little drama in our letters home.

Then there is a curious entry. “Learned to eat fruit.”

Ah, yes. The nuns’ mission was to turn us into “young ladies” and we were taught the finer points of table etiquette. Eating fruit involved using cutlery and we mastered the art of eating a banana with a knife and fork, topping, tailing, cutting the skin lengthwise, releasing the fruit from the peel and cutting it into segments. And so on through stone fruit, pip fruit, citrus.

We learned the bishop’s hat fold (of course) for our starched table napkins – a Sunday morning chore for a couple of girls. The remainder of the week our napkins were rolled up and contained in the engraved silver serviette rings we had to bring to boarding school with us. I still have mine.

We learned the correct way to set a table, how to place the cutlery and in which order. Most of us had learned this at home but there was the odd girl in need of a crash course.

Handling the cutlery was another lesson. No waving about of the knife and fork between mouthfuls. The cutlery had to be put back on the plate, in the 20 past 8 position, fork tines down, knife blade facing left, and our hands had to be in the lap while we chewed.

Woe betide the girl who turned her fork over to scoop up peas – unless she put her knife down and swapped the fork to her right hand first but really, that was barely tolerated. At the end of the meal the knife and fork had to be placed side by side, fork tines up to indicate one had finished eating.

The world was my oyster but I used the wrong fork - Oscar Wilde

Salt was not to be scattered over the food but poured in a little mound on the rim of the plate.

We were all knocked into shape fairly quickly. So successfully even now I feel guilty transgressing in case a nun's beady eyes are watching me. "You MUST push your soup spoon towards the back of the soup bowl to fill it - NEVER towards you. Sip the soup from the side of the spoon, NEVER the end. And tilt the bowl AWAY from you when taking the last of the soup."

Even today I feel horribly let down when a restaurant or host doesn’t offer a dessert fork along with the dessertspoon. “Always use the fork to put things on the spoon, NEVER your fingers!”

However, I wasn’t schooled in what to do when the man on my left started using my bread and butter plate at a formal dinner recently and tucked into my bread roll. I was genuinely surprised but I swear I heard a nun whisper in my ear, “NEVER criticise someone else’s manners.”

The hardest jobs kids face today is learning good manners without seeing any - Fred Astaire

The Age Good Food Guide awards

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 03:22:00 +0000

Melbourne’s chefs are a passionate bunch and last night was an emotional time for many of them at The Age Good Food Guide Restaurant Awards.

Arnaldo Terzini, 77, who collected the Professional Excellence Award with his son Maurice, 45, had to brush a tear from his cheek as Maurice acknowledged the honour.

Jacques Reymond, who has been awarded enough hats to make a milliner happy, and last night took away Vittoria Restaurant of the Year, spoke gently of the job that makes him happy every day he goes to work.

Chef of the Year, Andrew McConnell, who opened both Cumulus Inc and Best New Restaurant Cutler & Co in the past year, admitted sometimes it could all be “a pain in the arse”. Earlier he'd told Epicure “I’m tired, I’m wrecked, actually, but happy.”

A beaming Ryan Sessions and partner Kirstyn White were awarded Country Restaurant of the Year for their Merrijig Inn in Port Fairy while Nicolas Poelaert, Embrasse, was named Young Chef of the Year.

Greg Malouf of MoMo took the Dish of the Year Award with his veiled quail.

Frank Camorra saw MoVida Next Door take out the Donlevy Fitzpatrick Award and retained two hats for MoVida itself.

Some restaurants were awarded hats for the first time – others had them taken away. As one young one-hatter confessed before the awards were announced, losing a hat would be a totally devastating blow because of the amount of time and effort that went into achieving that standard. He was beaming happily for the rest of the night after the list was read out.

Restaurant of the Year: Jacques Reymond
Chef of the Year: Andrew McConnell, Cumulus Inc and Cutler & Co
The Age Young Chef of the Year: Nicolas Poelaert, Embrasse
Best New Restaurant: Cutler & Co
Country Restaurant of the Year: Merrijig (Port Fairy)
Best New Country Restaurant: Provenance (Beechworth)
Donlevy Fitzpatrick Award: MoVida Next Door
Wine List of the Year: Taxi Dining Room
Country Wine List of the Year: Royal Main Hotel (Dunkeld)
Best Short Wine List: Gills Diner
Wine Service Award: Lincoln Riley, Taxi Dining Room
Service Excellence Award: Chris Young, Jacques Reymond
Professional Excellence Award: Maurice Terzini, Arnaldo Terzini
Dish of the Year: Veiled quail at MoMo

City
Three Hats
Jacques Reymond, Vue de Monde

Two Hats
Attica, Cafe Di Stasio, Circa the Prince, Cutler & Co, Donovans, Ezard, Flower Drum, Grossi Florentino, Matteo’s, MoMo, MoVida, Pearl, Rockpool Bar & Grill, Taxi Dining Room, The Press Club, Verge.

One Hat
Abla’s, Bacash, Balzari, Becco, Bistro Guillaume, Botanical, The Brasserie by Philippe Mouchel, Canvas, Cecconi’s Cantina, Centonove, Church St Enoteca, Cicciolino, Coda, Comme Kitchen, The Court House, Cumulus Inc, David’s. The Deanery, Embrasse, Esposito, Estivo, Gilla Diner, Gingerboy, Giuseppe Arnaldo & Sons, Il Bacaro, The Italian, Kenzan, Koots Salle a Manger, Ladro, Longrain, Maha, Melbourne Wine Room, Mercer’s Restaurant, Ocha, The Point Albert Park, Sapore, Sarti, Shoya, Stokehouse, Syracuse, Tempura Hajime, Yu-u.

Country
Two Hats
Lake House(Daylesford), Merrijig Inn (Port Fairy), Royal Mail Hotel (Dunkeld), Simone’s Restaurant (Bright), Stefano’s (Mildura)

One Hat
Annie Smithers’ Bistrot (Kyneton), Athelstane House (Queenscliff), Bella Vedere (Coldstream), Eleonore’s (Yerring), Montalto (Red Hill South), Neilsons (Traralgon), The Outpost Retreat (Noojee), Pettavel Winery & Restaurant (Waurn Ponds), Provenance Restaurant (Beechworth), Royal George Hotel (Kyneton), Sourcedining (Albury), Sunnybrae (Birregura), Tea Rooms of Yarck (Yarck), Teller (Mooroopna), Warden’s Food & Wine (Beechworth).

A Taste of Melbourne

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 05:31:00 +0000

Melbourne tastes great. It’s sweet, savoury, spicy, mellow. It can be sipped, slurped, guzzled, gobbled, nibbled, gnawed, relished. Thousands tested that at the Taste Of Melbourne four-day event at the Royal Exhibition Building in Carlton over the weekend.

I went along for the opening session on Thursday but we barely scratched the surface so we returned for the finale on Sunday.

Fifteen restaurants tempted our tastebuds with array of small dishes and numerous producers showed their chutneys, cheeses, chocolates, puddings, wines, beers and countless other wonderful goodies. The food theme was also reflected in the appliances and kitchen wares.

The pop stars of the restaurant industry were surrounded by their fans as people flocked to be photographed with George Calombaris (The Press Club and Hellenic Republic) and Gary Mehigan (The Boathouse) who sprung onto our screens in MasterChef Australia earlier this year. Favourites like Frank Camorra (MoVida) and Jacques Reymond were also in demand for “me with” photos.

There were also plenty of opportunities to watch cooking demonstrations, listen to chefs chatting food, and to learn more about wine.

Join me as I wander round this beautiful venue and sample the fare >>

No smears, no liquid nitrogen... no worries

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 04:17:00 +0000

While the sky darkened, the temperature dropped and Melburnians were warned to go home early to avoid the forthcoming storm, I was bracing myself last night to face the elements and head across town for dinner. What’s a bit of wind to a Wellington girl, after all? I’ve leaned into plenty of the Kiwi capital’s southerly storms. No cobwebs on me.

Once the rains had watered the garden and flooded some streets and the wind had sorted out a few trees, it was relatively calm as we walked the block to catch our tram. We were off to Matteo’s in Fitzroy North, recently voted Victoria’s best modern Australian restaurant in Restaurant and Catering Victoria’s awards for excellence. We went to the two-hat restaurant for our wedding anniversary recently and when news of their forthcoming Portuguese night landed in my emailbox, I was on the phone to make a booking.

Owner Matteo Pignatelli has had innovative chef Raymond Capaldi doing guest turns in his kitchen of late. I last met Raymond when he starred in a dual turn with Rene Redzepi of Noma fame during the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. The brief from Matteo was simple: “No foams, no soils, no air or smoke, no deconstructions, no smears, no liquid nitrogen” and, hopefully, “no tantrums!” Clearly, in spite of a couple of transgressions, the affiliation worked out as Matteo extended Raymond’s European vacation with a further four dinners.

We started our journey with a shared taste – tender pickled octopus with potato, tomato and red wine. This was followed by three course set menu which began with Sopa de Pedra, stone soup which references the old Portuguese tale about a monk who came into town and set about making a soup with water and just a stone for flavouring. He persuaded the locals to provide a little seasoning to make his soup better and eventually as they all contributed, he had a cauldron of tasty soup to share.

Our stone soup featured tender ham hock, black chourico, white onion, coriander puree and a hearty red bean base. The black “stone” promised turned out to be a potato that had had a brush with squid ink. This course was matched with a 2007 Luis Pato Vinhas Velhas Brancho.

The Bife - after I'd added the potato and clam side dishes and completely destroyed
the elegant arrangement that left the kitchen

The main course was Bife a Lisbon – meltingly tender braised ox with garlic confit, sweet parsnip puree and coffee. On the side we had steamed clams with beef and pepper sauce, quite a spicy little number. While the clams were more decorative than anything, that pepper sauce was a perfect match for the beef. The squashed potato baked with piri piri seasoning had just the right amount of crustiness where the cut side had sat caramelising in the roasting pan. The 2007 Quinta da Craston Douro was an excellent match for such robust flavours.

Dates, figs, almonds and meringue "sighs"

The spirit was willing when dessert arrived but I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, specially at the end of such a substantial meal and I’m afraid I picked at the date, fig, meringue and almond dessert. Nor could I manage a Portuguese tart with my 2005 Serrat Late Harvest Viognier from the Yarra Valley. But I thought it might do nicely for breakfast.

It looked like chef’s night off at the next table – Shane Delia from Maha, Riccardo Momesso from Sarti and familiar TV face George Calombaris from The Press Club, and their wives, checked out Raymond@Matteo’s. All three received one hat in The Age Good Food Guide last year. We were invited to join them and Matteo for a nightcap and some industry chat. All well worth braving the elements for. Alas, I left my my Portuguese tart behind when I table-hopped.

Raymond Capaldi will be back at Matteo's on Tuesday September 8 for a UK night, on September 22 cooking Polish fare and on October 6 for German Oktoberfest. Follow the restaurant on Twitter @Matteos_Restrnt or sign up online for notifications of forthcoming events.

Boy, oh bouyiourdi

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 04:23:00 +0000

Bouyiourdi Take 1

Sometimes I come across a dish that definitely falls in the “must try this at home” and that was certainly the case with the bouyiourdi I had among the meze at a local Greek restaurant recently.

It’s a really simple dish but it has a lot going for it. It’s the sort of thing I like to throw together for myself when no one else is coming home for dinner and I fancy something tasty but don’t want to spend all night making it.

Bouyiourdi is basically a layered dish of sliced tomatoes and capsicums, chillies, feta, oregano and another Greek cheese, kasseri. Some recipes include olives. The restaurant one I sampled included some sliced mushrooms. Most recipes say you need at least two cheeses. I used feta, some Greek goat’s curd cheese and some gruyere. The idea is to have a melange of vegetables and cheese.

Bouyiourdi Take 2 with spicy sausage added

Second time round I needed something a little more substantial to share with The Spouse so I went cross-cultural and added some slices of spicy chorizo. And though it might be the middle of winter here, I did manage to get some quite tasty small vine tomatoes as my local market.

While a recipe is hardly necessary, here’s my version. I made them in some of those Spanish terracotta bowls that are ideal for tapas and meze dishes.

Bouyiourdi
Serves 2

200g feta cheese
4-6 well-flavoured tomatoes
1/2 red pepper
50g goat’s curd cheese
1 small chilli, deseeded and chopped
handful of Greek olives
2 tablespoons fresh oregano leaves
olive oil
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
some melty cheese such as gruyere

Preheat oven to 190C. Sprinkle a little olive oil in the bottom of an ovenproof dish. Layer in slices of feta, tomato and red pepper, adding the other ingredients as you go. Bake 20-25 minutes.

Gaze into my pies

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Thu, 13 Aug 2009 02:41:00 +0000

Picture this – you’re ushered to your restaurant table. The business of “still or sparkling?” — or indeed “eau de robinet” is dealt with. (Tap water sounds so much more sophisticated and interesting in French.) The table napkin is nudged onto your lap by the waiter, who takes a quick breath when you gently pat his hand.

The candle is lit, the wobbling table is fixed with a folded coaster from the bar. This is shaping up to be a good evening.

The waiter leans across and says he will fetch the menu.

“Was he winking at you?” asks your dinner companion.

“Don’t be silly!”

You sip your H2Eau and the waiter reappears with a little wooden box in hand. He places it on the table and presents you both with stereoptican viewers with built-in light sources.

This is the restaurant’s new “Viand Viewer”. Sir and madam can flip through a box of slides and actually see 3-D photos of the dishes that comprise the menu. No more wondering if the vegetables served with the duck breast are a generous gathering rather than a token gesture, more decorative than nutritional.

Decisions, decisions! And the oysters are getting cold

Oh, darling. The beef looks so... beefy!

Chances are you won’t come across one of these gadgets in 2009 but in the early 1950s they were demystifying the menu at Keens Chop House in New York. Keens, founded in 1885, was famous for its mutton chop and even James Beard was moved to comment in 1950, “Its essential muttony flavor puts everyday chops momentarily in the pale.”

More recently restaurant critic Frank Bruni enthused in the New York Times “Magnificent mutton chops” and earlier this year Anthony Bourdain was more basic: “Holy ****!”

These days the restaurant is called Keens Steakhouse but that chop (pictured top) is still on the menu for $US45 ($AUD54) along with a range of dry-aged steaks.`

The peep before you eat approach has been adopted with varying success over the years. We’re all familiar enough with the glossy pictures of meal deals at fast-food outlets, the plastic replicas of plates of food in some Asian restaurants, and photos in windows of little establishments attempting to lure diners inside. One restaurant I know has a computer slide show operating.

But as we know, the fast food pictures often overinflate the burgers and degrease the fries. The plastic replicas get dusty. And as for the other photos – check out this sad but true film clip of what can happen to food porn.

Playing with fast food

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Fri, 07 Aug 2009 04:19:00 +0000

Transformed - a Taco Bell burrito in a former life

Fast food has been getting a makeover. It’s now being tarted up to look like something from the pages of the food porn glossies. In fact, it’s starting to looking good enough to eat.

Not that the fast food kings are driving the revolution. No, it started out as one man’s journey. That man is Erik R Trinidad, a freelance travel writer who has a curiosity for food.

By some quirky mind twist, he decided to deconstruct various fast food meals and turn them into works of stylist art.

The component parts of a Taco Bell meal were remodelled into tortellini (Tacobellini) in sauce. A box of doughnuts was transformed into a fruit tart and a crème brulee.

Trinidad is exhorting others to join in the fun and turn those much-maligned meals into tastebud tempters. As he says on his website Fancy Fast Food, “Yeah, it’s still bad for you – but see how good it can look.”

Rules for contributions are short – no additional ingredients other than a simple garnish and no Photoshopping other than minor adjustments in sharpness or colour correction. And he’d like both before and after photos.

So good he had seconds

After all the pulverising, reshaping, sometimes further cooking, and gussying up, the food might be good looking but is it good enough to eat? He told a Radio New Zealand interviewer he tasted each creation. Most, while visibly altered, tasted much the same as the originals. One, however, tasted even better – a corn chowder he made out of a Kentucky Fried Chicken meal. He ate it, put the leftovers in the fridge and later had another serving.

Meanwhile, another man has been seriously deconstructing KFC meals and says he’s finally come up with a recipe identical to Colonel Sanders’ 11 herbs and spices.

Ron Douglas, who gave up his Wall Street job to work on his obsession, spent years experimenting with different techniques in an attempt to reproduce KFC's Original Recipe, a feat he says he has achieved at last.

Along the way he set up a website, Recipe Secrets, specialising in providing accurate clone recipes for popular restaurant dishes. Contributions have spawned several cookbooks and the latest includes the KFC recipe. He says why buy fast food when you can save money by making the recipes yourself at home?

Yeah, it’s still bad for you – but see how good it can look

Supermarket hip - it's for real!

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 12:28:00 +0000

In one of my maiden blogs I complained about errant supermarket trolleys. Another local suggested I try a newly opened supermarket in a neighbouring suburb where I could be sure of getting a good trolley for a while, at least.

Well, the honeymoon is definitely over and a couple of years down the track their trolleys are misbehaving, too.

The original supermarket replaced its fleet in recent times and even abandoned the coin-slot variety. But, apart from those trolleys with obviously wonky wheels, it’s hard to pick if a trolley is going to play up during the initial short trip from trolley rank to vegetable department when you might be able to organise another trolley.

If you have a light shopping load, the problem isn’t so severe. But once a trolley is full of cans, jars and bottles, it can get pretty heavy and trying to swing it around at the end of an aisle can put a fair amount of strain on ageing knee and hip joints, and backs. Yes, I am not as young as I used to be.

In fact in an article in the Journal of Arthroscopic and Related Surgery last year, Supermarket Hip: An Unusual Cause of Injury to the Hip Joint, Yamamoto, Villar and Papavasileiou said: “Shopping in a supermarket would not normally be regarded as an at-risk activity for the hip joint. Despite this, we report 3 separate cases of hip injury (2 labral tears, 1 partial avulsion of the ligamentum teres), each of which was sustained while shopping in a supermarket – an activity they suggested “may need to be reclassified as an at-risk activity for the hip joint”.

I wish supermarkets would pay more attention to trolley maintenance. Perhaps it would be a good idea for supermarket managers (or their mothers) to test drive a few loaded trolleys themselves. Might give them a surprise.

Another of my pet peeves are the checkout people who seem incapable of spreading a shopping load around the bags, particularly now so many of use take our own fabric bags along for our shopping. One lass blithely filled one of my bags recently with two 2-litre juice bottles, two bottles of mineral water and several cans of tomatoes, tuna, beans and chickpeas. She struggled to move the bag from the packing shelf to the space by my trolley. She had a “duh?” moment, then quickly transferred half the load to another bag.

I’m all for using green bags, but there’s a certain disincentive if they get overfilled and are hard to lift. At least the plastic bags can't be overloaded.

Black garlic

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 12:47:00 +0000

Well,” says mushroom guru Damian Pike, “What flavours do you think?”

I’m visiting the Prahran market with other Melbourne food bloggers to see what hidden treasures it holds, and our guide, marketing manager Henrietta Morgan introduces us to what she labels “the new culinary It” – fermented Korean black garlic. I take a piece of the clove Damian has just peeled.

The flesh is indeed black, soft, and with an enticing aroma. It reminds me of something else. I can’t quite decide.

It’s earthy, there’s a gentle acidic overtone, a mellowness. Certainly the harshness of raw garlic has been tempered by the 30-day fermentation process.

Ah, porcini mushrooms. With a hint of good balsamic vinegar. And what else?

“How about liquorice?” Damian asks. Yes. In fact it also has something of the texture of soft liquorice.

I’m curious. I want to take it home and play with it. Damian is going to use some that night. He’ll mix it with butter and place it under the breast skin of a chicken. Sounds good to me. I buy a head of it.

A black velvety clove of garlic

The next night my son is loitering in the kitchen looking for something to eat. I point him at the eggs, the bacon, the mushrooms and suggest he might like to make himself an omelet. I suddenly remember my black garlic and give him a taste. Love at first bite. He finely chops up a clove and stirs it into the eggs, which he’s already seasoned with a little cayenne.

The omelet is made and consumed before I get a chance to say “I’ll get the camera.”

He said it was a great combination. I might have to hide my stash.

While black garlic may have been around for many years in Asian cultures, it’s only recently reached Western kitchens and of course Ferran Adria has had his hands on it. It’s worth seeking out for experimentation, perhaps as an addition to a tapenade, in aioli, with mushrooms. It would be interesting in a tiny amuse bouche sorbet. With its hint of aniseed, it could be great chopped and included in a dressing for fennel salad...

One of those has my name on it

See a slide show of highlights from my trip round the market

Aussies love their pies

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 07:13:00 +0000

What’s Australia’s national dish? Two out of three Australians who have chipped in with their views on the AllofAus site, reckon it’s the meat pie.

The humble pie was closely followed by kangaroo, barbecued prawns and roast lamb, with some people even saying the great Aussie breakfast should get a vote.

Kristy from Melbourne notes the local culture of a pie “with plenty of sauce at the footy in winter”. Some nominated a meat pie with a beer, others emphasised the sauce component.

Certainly since coming to live in Australia and more specifically Melbourne, I couldn’t help but notice the big part footy plays in the lives of locals. Footy watching requires the expenditure of quite a few calories and a well-sauced pie and a beer provide fans with a serve of most of the food groups, I am told.

Of course, some of those having their say at AllofAus nominate other things like Lamingtons, Vegemite, roasts, fish and chips.
What do you think?

To add your voice, go to http://www.allofaus.com.au

The site is a Qantas initiative and it’s not just food that is being talked about there. Australians are being asked what Australian spirit means to them in 2009 and for their thoughts on what sets Australians apart from the rest of the world, and what makes Australia great.

A magazine summing up the Australian spirit for 2009 is being published on July 25.

Can't wait to try your own Aussie meat pie? You'll find the recipe for the one pictured above here >>

Tech stuff

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 02:30:00 +0000

8v2tnc9jhw Just claiming my blog on Technorati, folks. Normal transmission resuming shortly.

Outside the box

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:17:00 +0000

Don't forget to pack me!

People who have near-death experiences often remark that their whole life flashed before their eyes.

It’s a bit like that when you move house and have to confront all the impedimenta you’ve gathered in recent decades. Unfortunately I have had to face up to all my “stuff” five times in the past 10 years and it doesn’t get any easier in spite of a massive clearance programme on each occasion. I find things stowed at the back of shelves I thought had long since gone to the tip. I discard ruthlessly as I pack and I’m still left with an oversupply to cull further when I unpack.

This time round the Vinnies scored about 15 cartons of unwanted kitchenware, crockery, bedding, towels, ornaments, glassware – you name it. Masses more we hurled into the chasm at the rubbish station.

The lineup of boxes that enhanced the rear of the garage in our last place yielded more tip fodder. We’d got by without some of it for four years since shifting to Australia and hadn’t really missed any of it.

It’s the second big clear-out I’ve had to do in the past three months. My sister and I faced a similarly daunting challenge at our late mother’s place at Easter.

If I never see a packing carton again, it will be too soon.

However, now, after four years of the gipsy existence of leasing a property, we are back living in a home we own – in partnership with the bank, of course. We’ve made what we hope will be our last move.

And now back to breaking in a brand new kitchen, learning the ways of a shiny new oven and finding out if I was perhaps just a little ruthless in my cull of the kitchen gadgets…

The Hole in the Wall

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Sun, 31 May 2009 09:14:00 +0000

Melbourne suburbs hide some quaint little meeting spots and the Cricketers’ Arms in Port Melbourne’s Cruikshank Street is certainly one of them. The taxi driver didn’t know where it was. The Spouse offered to direct him but wasn’t much help either, thanks to a couple of one-way streets. However, a nice clear sign suddenly appeared in the headlights, pointing the way.

The place was fairly buzzing when we arrived to meet a friend around 6pm on Saturday night. It’s one of those places where you half expect to get a few meaningful looks if you dare take up a regular patron’s particular possie. However, one cheery drinker pointed out a free table.

We’ve been there before with friends and found it a convivial place. On Saturday a welcoming log fire was burning at one end of the bar and attention seemed to be focused on the racing channel. Just as quickly as the horses ran away with people’s money, many of the drinkers moved out to another area to eat.

The pub is known as “The Hole in the Wall”, a name that dates back to the suburb’s true port days when imbibing sailors would escape through a hole in the back wall to avoid MPs or the local constabulary when they raided the place.

These days, in addition to the public bar, the pub sports an attractive dining room with a couple of gas fireplaces, a lounge-like back bar with more dining tables, and a beer garden. I'm told this is also a great place for lunch.

The lounge dining was fully booked but we secured seats in the dining room and browsed the menu.

The menu cover - but they don't look like cricketers to me.

There are no pretensions about it but it’s well thought-out pub food. There are starters ranging from oysters through dips, antipasto plate, calamari, mussels, prawns, melts. There were also bowls of chips and assorted breads.

I managed to bag the last half dozen oysters in the house ($12) - yes, soldiering on in spite of last Monday's gluttonous oyster frenzy... The Spouse had the calamari ($16) and our friend dived into a succulent bowl of mussels ($16) and a chunk of bread. I often wonder how many sacks of salt are sacrificed daily to hold oysters in the shell.

When it came to a main course,we women couldn’t go past the pizzas and opted for the prawn option – a nice crisp base with garlic, a touch of chilli, red onion, tomato and cheese. And very modestly priced at $13. There were six other pizza options available. We all passed on the half dozen pasta/risotto options and The Spouse chose a steak and mushroom shepherd’s pie which came with salad and bread - $17.

Other mains included chicken Parmigiana, BLT, steak sandwich, burgers (rockling or chicken), fish and chips, porterhouse steak, eye fillet, chicken breast and kangaroo salad – several under $20 and the most expensive (the fillet) $32. All came with real sides includuded. There were also some individual salads on offer - Greek, Caesar, that sort of thing.

Fortunately there was still space left for my nicely boozy tiramisu and their warm apple crumbles ($12).

Unpretentious but all nicely presented. Our fellow diners included kids and parents but there was something for everyone on the menu and we certainly didn’t have any leftovers.

A nightcap at the bar while we watched his Richmond Tigers actually win a game for a change and we were well fortified for a leisurely stroll home through the crisp calm night. Curiously, the journey home was quite a bit shorter than the journey there. Funny, that…

Click on menu pages to enlarge

Oyster Frenzy

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Tue, 26 May 2009 08:34:00 +0000

There was a feeding frenzy in Melbourne last night. Around 150 of us packed into the bar at Botanical on Domain Road, grabbed our little cardboard containers and wooden mini forks and gleefully accepted the challenge – all the oysters we could eat in three hours.

For the first 30 minutes at least, there was no letting up in the pace as we queued for another half dozen of the briny beauties. Rock oysters, Pacific oysters, native oysters, wild oysters.

While oysters slide down pretty easily, there was champagne, white wine, beer or vodka cocktails to help them along.

I’m not sure how many oysters were consumed, but going on previous years, it was probably around 7000. And there were a dozen different kinds on offer, among them Barilla Bay, Coffin Bay, Pittwater, St Helen's.

I’ve become a big fan of Australian oysters since shifting to Melbourne. I was brought up on Bluff oysters in New Zealand, with the occasional Pacific oyster thrown in. Now, alas, Bluff oysters are around $NZ25 a dozen, but when I began my newspaper career they were fairly cheap.

In those days we junior reporters were often assigned to cover events on the cocktail circuit – national days and so on. One of the best bits of advice I ever got from my old chief reporter was to locate the oyster bowl and stand nearby for the speeches and toasts. Once the formalities were over and it was polite to start eating, I would be well positioned to attack. As I said “oyster bowl” – generally a large silver container full of luscious fat freshly shucked Bluff oysters was the centrepiece at many functions in those days.

But back to the Botanical’s $75 a head Oyster Frenzy. There were definitely some dedicated oyster fans out to get value for money. One man I spoke to was eating his 83rd oyster. He probably got to 100 before the night was out.

There was mignonette sauce, Tabasco and lemon slices on hand and it was interesting to try two or three different oyster varieties and compare their characteristics. Some were very salty, others had mineral overtones, others a sweet finish. And I did get one cooked oyster along the way – a succulent spinach and cheese concoction.

New Zealand’s Catalina Sounds sauvignon blanc and their Crowded House pinot gris were excellent wine matches for what Botanical describes as “our most debaucherous event”. Watch out for the next one…

Un beau repas

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Mon, 11 May 2009 01:55:00 +0000

Melbourne was full of them yesterday – Mums being taken out for lunch by sons, daughters, spouses. Me, too.

Our destination was The French Brasserie, tucked away in Malthouse Lane off Flinders Street. We were warmly welcomed by proprietor Hadj Sadk and soon sipping on Kir Royale cocktails while we pondered the small but well chosen Mother’s Day menu.

I am glad the sons didn’t acquire a taste for oysters until they left home or it might have made quite a hole in the housekeeping budget. Along with me, they couldn’t see past the natural oysters in the trio of entrees. The Spouse reported on an excellent Terrine de Canard which included brandy-soaked prunes and pistachio nuts with the duck along with a witlof salad and honey dressing. The third choice was an autumn vegetable salad with white anchovy and herb dressing.

I went for the Filet d’agneau – a beautifully cooked herb crusted lamb loin with a smooth creamy celeriac flan and shiraz sauce. One son picked the grilled salmon with gratin dauphinois, truss tomatoes and basil sauce. The other option was a twice cooked goat’s cheese soufflé.

The camera had to come out of the purse when the desserts arrived, they were so pretty.

There was Nougat glace aux pistaches et fruits confits, a lovely parfait with dried fruit salad along with a vanilla and apricot foam which vanished fairly quickly when it arrived in front of The Spouse.

I rarely eat dessert but this was the day to dive in and the sons and I chose the bitter chocolate tart with raspberry sorbet, the latter nicely balancing the richness of the tart. I could see the people at the next table equally enjoying a fine crème brulee.

I see from the restaurant’s website that starting this month chef Frederic Naud will prepare his own taste of France every Tuesday night. Focusing on a different region each month, the meal will include a three-course degustation menu for $55 per person. This month it’s Normandie.

The French Brasserie is also handily situated for pre-theatre dinners and offers these for $35 a head, for two courses and a glass of wine.

It’s definitely one I want to try again. It has a slick, edgy ambience and a smart, friendly staff and it was a great place to spend a leisurely Mother’s Day afternoon with the family.

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Thank you

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Wed, 06 May 2009 05:10:00 +0000

A few years back I received a letter from an old friend. It began “Still not rich and famous – how about you?” It looks the time has come for my 15 minutes of fame. I’d like to thank those fans who keep reading my blog and encouraging me – and whose votes enabled me to win entertaining section in the Chapeau Blog Awards.

As a longtime journalist, I felt the urge to widen the scope of my writing and the blog seemed an ideal forum. I’ve found it immensely enjoyable. No pay packet at the end of the week but then no editor telling me what to do either.

Some blogs almost write themselves. Others need to be set aside for a few hours then approached with fresh eyes and some critical self-editing.

The big reward is when people are kind enough to leave a comment that they’ve enjoyed reading a piece.

Maybe while my luck’s in, I should go out and buy a lottery ticket.

Clean bowled

noreply@blogger.com (Pat Churchill) — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 02:00:00 +0000

It was too miserable and cold to venture out from beside the heater yesterday so I did a quick inventory of the fridge and pantry then went in search of a recipe for my findings.

Fortunately I didn’t have far to go. I’d just received a copy of Bowl Food for review and there I found just the sort of recipe I was looking for – Moroccan vegetable stew with minty couscous.

It was easy to make, didn’t require a lot of preparation and tasted really good. In fact, I’m betting the leftovers will taste even better after giving the flavours a bit of time to develop.

The fact that it happened to be a vegetarian dish as well, makes it doubly handy because I like to serve meatless meals at least once a week. It would also make a great side dish for a larger gathering.

Incidentally Bowl Food is part of a relaunch of Murdoch Books' excellent Chunky Food series (details below).

Moroccan vegetable stew with minty couscous

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon dried chilli flakes
400 can diced tomatoes
400g can chickpeas, rinsed and drained
1/2 cup (80g) sultanas
400g butternut pumpkin, peeled and cut into 3cm cubes
2 large zucchini (250g) cut into 2cm pieces
2 carrots, cut into 2cm pieces
1 cup (185g) instant couscous
25g butter
4 tablespoons chopped fresh mint

Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the onion and cook for 3-5 minutes, or until translucent but not brown. Add the garlic, ginger, turmeric, cumin, cinnamon and chilli flakes, and cook for 1 minute. Add the tomato, chickpeas, sultanas and 1 cup (250ml) water. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes. Add the pumpkin, zucchini and carrot and cook for a further 20 minutes, or until the vegetables are tender. Season with salt and black pepper.
Place the couscous in a large heatproof bowl. Cover with 1 cup (250ml) boiling water and leave to stand for 5 minutes, or until all the water is absorbed. Fluff with a fork and stir in the butter and mint. Season with salt and ground black pepper, and serve with the stew. Serves 4.

Recipe ©Murdoch Books, photo ©Pat Churchill

Bowl Food
ISBN 978-1741964141
Murdoch Books
RRP $19.95