Not Quite NigellaThe cooking, eating and travel blog of a hungry blogger from Sydney, Australia featuring original recipes, interviews and articles on all things food @

The French Fork, Trelawney Farm & Mañana Tapas – Adventures in Mudgee

Not Quite Nigella — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 18:00:05 +0000

Sometimes when you tell people that you’re visiting a town, city or country they will say one of a few different things. “What are you going to see there?” Or in the case of one country I visited, “What on earth are going there for?” But when I told people that Mr NQN and I [...]

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The Rocky Road To Love!

Not Quite Nigella — Tue, 07 Feb 2012 18:00:14 +0000

Not everyone loves Valentine’s Day. In fact when I talk to some people about Valentines Day their reaction is to sneer at it and talk about “crass commercialism.” I’m not sure what to answer to that because of course it is quite true and I can only offer “But this is a day to eat more chocolate! [...]

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Restaurant Toshiya, Cremorne

Not Quite Nigella — Mon, 06 Feb 2012 18:00:31 +0000

It was Saturday afternoon and I was hunting for a place for Mr NQN and I to have dinner with Queen Viv and Miss America that evening. The latter is very easy going but Queen Viv always needs convincing so I texted Queen Viv ”How about Toshiya in Cremorne? They have sashimi tacos.” “That sounds interesting [...]

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Watermelon Rind Jam (I’m totally serious here)

Not Quite Nigella — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 18:00:33 +0000

Someone once left a karaoke microphone behind at our place (if I were to hazard a guess when it was probably one of our theme nights) but since it doesn’t connect to anything I use it to annoy Mr NQN by pretending to interview him and sing to him. I think he has hearing like [...]

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15 Fun Things To Do in Edmonton, Canada (Part 2)

Not Quite Nigella — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 18:00:10 +0000

Here is the second part of my list of fun things to do in Edmonton, Canada. Do a cooking class & market visit at Gail Hall and Seasoned Solutions “Julia Child is smiling down from heaven about the amount of butter we are using today” says chef Gail Hall as she is standing in her [...]

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Win 1 of 2 Ticket & Book Packs To Chef Jam At The Melbourne Food & Wine Festival!

Not Quite Nigella — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 18:00:02 +0000

Tickets from last year’s event Ever been curious about what Rene Redzepi (Noma), David Chang (Momofuku) and Massimo Bottura (Osteria Francescana) think is the future of food? How about a home grown opinion like that of Neil Perry or Peter Gilmore? At the upcoming Melbourne Food & Wine Festival, the Chef Jam event is an industry focused event [...]

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The Euro, Brisbane

Not Quite Nigella — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 18:00:27 +0000

There is one thing I never do when I eat out. It’s dine alone. Call it extreme self consciousness combined with the fact that the best meals to me are the ones shared with friends or in company. My mind automatically thinks that people will stare (and let’s face it they stare enough when the [...]

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Sticky Marmalade Ribs

Not Quite Nigella — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 18:00:38 +0000

Although my parents are usually quiet and relatively well behaved there are times when their eccentricities come out. Like when my father first interacted with Aura, Mr NQN’s new 14 month old niece. Whenever small children are around he generally pays them no attention (sometimes he does this with adults too) but he was faced [...]

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The Corner House, Bondi

Not Quite Nigella — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 18:00:35 +0000

I have to mentally prepare myself when entering hipster joints. I have to tell myself that they’re just hipsters and they mean well enough and that they don’t harm anyone really. For good measure I remember the quote from Seinfeld when they referred to Kramer as the “hipster doofus” and realise that being a hipster [...]

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Cross Stitch Cupcakes

Not Quite Nigella — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 18:00:42 +0000

There are certain things that you remember from childhood. Seeing your friend’s mother naked is one of them. I should explain. My parents were and are very conservative. Particularly on some topics although on others, they don’t really care. But getting naked was not something that we as a family did (unlike Mr NQN’s family [...]

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