Heather

Hi! Two of this board's hosts - Heather and Grahame from hgworld.com - will be in Tasmania for a month from mid-December through mid-January. We've got some exciting food-related experiences planned, but we're always looking to expand our feasting itinerary. We're particularly interested in off-the-beaten-path experiences - really, the more obscure the better. Any suggestions, or questions? Roger, we have read your book, of course (the excellent Food Lovers Guide to Tasmania - don't visit Australia's island state without it). What a resource! How much fun you must have had in the name of research. As well as answering questions here, we'll be posting Tasmania travelogues on our site, which eGullet community members can access via the eGullet Affiliate News board. You won't be able to access the travelogue updates directly from hgworld, as we're only making them available to friends and eGullet community members. We'll likely post edited versions of the travelogue for all to see after we return from our trip. (Edited by Heather at 10:59 pm on Dec. 12, 2001)

As I write, I'm savouring new season's organic cherries, to be followed by an organic white nectarine. Farm-fresh, seasonal organic produce is - like that olive oil - a revelation. My favourite organic greengrocer here in Melbourne (Vic Market Organics) has relationships with small growers, whose number-one priority is the way their produce tastes, rather than its shelf-life or ability to withstand transportation and constant handling. This incredible produce can be for sale at Vic Market Organics just hours after being picked. For me, eating fruit for dessert used to be a folorn experience - a sacrifice motivated by health concerns... and, to be honest, vanity. Since discovering the wonders of fresh organic produce, a fruit-only dessert - say, a baseball-sized heirloom white peach, whacked on a plate - seems like an indulgence. When I fancy rich over sweet, there's nothing like perfectly ripe organic avocado. Cut one in half, and spoon out the flesh. I fully understand Liza's infatuation with organic heirloom popcorn, since organic corn on the cob, simply steamed and left unadulterated, tastes buttery.

I second Steve's recommendation of Paramount Desserts. If you like to cook sweet things, it is an excellent book. As spectacularly as the desserts are presented, one doesn't need to be a chef to use the book. I'm not big on tricky, elaborate dishes. And, for health reasons, my home cooking is mostly "lite". So, to date, I haven't made a Paramount dessert in its entirety. But I still refer to the book constantly. The "frozen" section is my bible for fruity sorbets. From the other sections, I get ideas. Something may be too rich, or too tricky, but based on the inspired way in which the author combines flavours, I can come up with something more in line with my tastes and abilities.

Hi Roger I'm wondering if you've been to Calstock, near Deloraine, or heard reliable reports about it? We read about it in a food magazine - a rave of a write-up which coincided with the property opening. I've surmised that magazine's editor knows Calstock's managers, on account of the male half of the management team formerly working at Banc. The food magazine's editor is married to Banc proprietor. So, I'm not sure how much faith to place in that report. When we were last in Tasmania, we heard that the place is kind of uptight, the manager aloof. (Or maybe his French-ness just intimidates Tasmanians unaccustomed to dealing with it.) So, over to you. Is Calstock one of Tasmania's great gourmet travel experiences or a bit of an ordeal?

Most Aussie families in the 70s - when we were growing up - had a CWA cookbook (CWA as in Country Women's Association) and a thick Women's Weekly cookbook (Women's Weekly being Australia's most popular women's magazine). Women's Weekly no longer does its thick "everything" book, instead publishing less weighty titles devoted to specific subjects - Italian, Cooking Class, Simply Lite. Neither of the above are comparable to "Joy" or "James Beard", but the new Aussie classic may be. It's called "The Cook's Companion" by Stephanie Alexander. It's a massive 700-800 page bible on how to cook just about anything. Phenomenally popular here now, and the cookbook most likely to be given as a wedding present. Stephanie is a trained chef, used to operate a fine restaurant. But the recipes aren't the least bit "cheffy". Lots of classics, Aussie and international. The book - a massive orange brick - is available overseas, but is published under a different title. A search for "Stephanie Alexander" at Amazon should yield results.

I like bottarga spaghetti so much that I wonder if I'll ever eat anything else with spaghetti again. Had it a couple of times at Melbourne restaurant Sud, and we bought our first block of bottarga for DIY just last weekend. We've already had bottarga spag twice this week, it's that good. Grahame says the flavour of bottarga is hard to describe. Anchovy meets sea-urchin roe (uni), is the way I pitch it. Heather http://www.hgworld.com

I feel the need to vent... I'm aghast that The Age Good Food Guide awarded a hat to Walter's Wine Bar. I had the misfortune of eating there a couple of weeks ago, and the meal was a shocker. It's not a place I would have chosen to eat. I had to attend a celebration organised by a friend of a friend. Half of our party was running a little late, and on two occasions we were asked whether we'd like to order before everyone else arrived. The waiters' single-minded mission to turnover tables quickly was such a turn-off. When the rest of the party arrived, menus were presented, and suddenly staff were no longer in such a hurry. We were ignored for an hour - despite repeated attempts to attract attention. The menu itself was pretty #### scary. So heavy, stodgy, strange that I ordered an off-menu main of unadulterated steamed veggies. For which I was later charged ฤ!! Prior to the veggies, I'd picked at the one vaguely appealing entree that was part of a round of entrees ordered to share. Seared tuna on pickled Asian veg salad. That is, three smallish, wafer-thin tuna pieces with some kind of unappetizing spice crust on them, piled on a few pieces of salad weed that had been mixed with straight-from-the-packet pickled ginger. For which there was a charge of ภ. I'm still incensed about the steamed-veg charge. I wish I'd taken the issue up with management, at the time, but being in the company of some strangers, I thought it wiser not to. There, I've vented. I wish I could say I feel better now. But, CRIKEY! ฤ for steamed veggies, most of which were carrot batons?!? OK, those last two sentences were therapeutic. I do feel better. Heather http://www.hgworld.com

Hi to Aussie expat "Sydney" Thanks for posting. Great to hear from a fellow Aussie. Certainly, Aussie food has evolved over the past decade or so. But, as Roger rightly points out, probably 97 percent of Australians don't eat the way the food-obsessed 3 percent do. I think, for a lot of Aussies even now, a sandwich isn't a sandwich without lashings of Meadow Lea. When we're doing country roadtrips, we stop in at a small-town sandwich bars, and the sandwich-makers typically find it odd that I request no margarine. Re your sweet-and-sour memories: The big night out at the dodgy local Chinese restaurant is how we celebrated special occasions in our family, when we were kids. Forks all round, of course. I don't think I ate a great meal, ever, until I left for university. No, I lie. The one and only great meal of my small-town, suburban childhood was freshly caught red emperor, bbq'd on a beach in the Whitsunday Islands, during a sailing holiday. Previously, the only fish I'd eaten was deep-fried and part of the "Fisherman's Basket" special at the local pub. All those years of culinary deprivation goes a long way towards explaining why I'm so fine-food obsessed now. Heather http://www.hgworld.com

Hi Katherine Re your cookbooks query, there's topic about Aussie cookbooks in this forum. I recommend a few of my favourites, and give quite a bit of information. "Tetsuya" by legendary Aussie chef Tetsuya Wakada is my number-one top-shelf choice. Looks exquisite, contains recipes for all of his classic dishes - most of them light and delicate. To use this book successfully, you need to be reasonably handy in the kitchen and also have access to outstanding produce. For an Aussie cookbook that you'll likely use a couple of times each week, you can't go past "Sydney Food" by Bill Granger. Dishes are simple, mostly light, and always inspired. Breakfast, lunch and dinner recipes. We've cooked so many of them, and all have been outstanding. Photographs in book give you a real feel for Australia. I know "Tetsuya" is available in the US. But I'm not sure about "Sydney Food". The latter is worth tracking down, shipping in from Australia even. It's just so useful! Be sure to check out the cookbooks topic in this forum for more information about the above books, and a couple of others. Sincerely, Heather http://www.hgworld.com

I've made China Moon recipe as it appeared in heart doctor Dean Ornish's "Eat More, Weigh Less" cookbook - bought primarily because it contained recipes from lots of sexy American chefs. The recipe was some kind of infusion. Many ingredients, but not too hard. Fabulously tasty. I recommend you give one of her dishes a go.

Yvonne, I have to agree with you on your "maybe off the topic" point. Most of my favourite cookbooks are not written by chefs. Chef cookbooks - by uber-chefs - can be great for inspiration, and voyeurism. But "cooks" tend to write more useful cookbooks.

Of late, Australian chefs have been producing some excellent cookbooks. Not sure if all of the below are available internationally but, even if they aren't, they're worth tracking down. A few of my favourite Australian cookbooks: Tetsuya by Tetsuya Wakada The most beautiful cookbook I've ever seen, by one of Australia's greatest - and most modest - chefs. He reveals the recipes for his famous signature dishes. Tetsuya's Japanese influences mean the recipes are relatively simple, so the book isn't purely gastro porn. You look at some of the recipes and think - "Wow! I could do that." The dishes are mostly light, with an emphasis on seafood, so the book is a real find for health-conscious food enthusiasts. Noodle by Terry Durack If you cook Asian-style noodles at home, you need this book. It has two sections: "Noodle iD" and recipes. In the noodle identification section, each of about 20 different varieties of Asian noodle, gets a double page spread. Big photo, and information about origin, cooking method, appropriate uses. The recipe section is divided by cuisine. There are terrific, authentic recipes from Japan, Korea, China, Vietnam, Thailand and other south-east Asian nations. Author Terry Durack, an Aussie now living in London, is a tremendously entertaining writer. The guy can get a lengthy laugh-aloud column out of the "death" of his beloved kitchen timer. Sydney Food by Bill Granger The man behind Sydney cafes bills and bills 2 shares the simple but inspired recipes that have made him the city's breakfast king. While bills and bills 2 are most famous for their breakfasts, the book's lunch and dinner recipes are fabulous, too. Breakfast recipes include ricotta hotcakes with honeycomb butter; pan-toasted sanwiches with tomato and fontina; fresh bircher muesli with stone fruit; coconut bread; french toast stuffed with peaches; potato and feta pancakes; lemon souffle cakes; crumpets with blackberry butter; roast mushrooms with thyme and taleggio; and toasted coconut waffles with fresh mango and palm syrup. Lunch recipes include spring onion pancake with gravlax; spaghettini with crab, lime and chilli; chicken noodle soup with lemon; ricotto and tomato tart; Puy lentil soup with Parmesan toasts; smoked trout and potato salad; coconut and passionfruit slice; and ANZAC biscuits. Dinner recipes include skewered swordfish with crispy coleslaw; barbequed whole fish with fresh herb relish; prawn and chilli linguine; baked snapper with lemon roasted potatoes and chilli relish; poached salmon with green-bean salad and tomato and anchovy dressing; individual blackberry crumbles; Pavlova; and coconut rice pudding with papaya and lime. Most of the recipes are dead simple. Many are quite light and healthy, even if they do sound decadent and indulgent. I recently saw the author on TV, and he said that he'd tried to create a cookbook people could use every day. He succeeded. Sydney Food is as practical as it is exceptional. Another Aussie cookbook to look out for: A massive 700-page reference book by Stephanie Alexander, titled The Cook's Companion here (but perhaps something else internationally). It's the new Aussie classic. Chapters devoted to all manner of ingredients and how to prepare them. It's not the kind of book that you flick though and think - "Mmmm, I absolutely must make that for dinner." But when you're knocking about the kitchen and think "I rather fancy some (insert just about any dish here)", you'll find the recipe - or one for a similar dish - in Stephanie's book. The answer to just about any culinary question you may have is in there.

New Zealanders don't eat all that differently to Aussies, although South Pacific influences are more prevalent there than in Australia. There are no kangaroos in New Zealand and, to the best of my knowledge, kangaroo meat isn't widely consumed. I guess roo meat must become more exotic overseas, because it'd be expensive to ship, and therefore quite pricey. People wouldn't pay a premium for something they thought to be pedestrian. Glad you like our website, hgworld.com. We've tried very hard to make it interesting! I have Peter Gordon's Sugar Club cookbook. There are some great ideas in there. I'm particularly fond of his salmon and oyster laksa recipe - although I cheat by using a pre-prepared curry paste as a starter.

At our favourite sushi bar, Kenzan, in Melbourne, Australia there's a young and super-talented chef called Yoshiki, who treats his a la carte counter customers (especially those who bring him Pavlova) to some truly inspired nigiri toppings. Some favourites: Tuna, marinated in a mixture of soy and truffle oil Julienne squid or cuttlefish, with lemon and salt Flash-BBQ'd swordfish or salmon belly, with seasoned grated daikon Sea urchin, piled into battleship-style nigiri, wrapped with shaved cucumber instead of nori The chef at Orizuru, in Hobart, Tasmania, recently made me a strawberry nigiri for dessert - as a joke. It was, to my immense surprise, delicious. I think tataki strawberry, mixed with strawberry liqueur, and piled into battleship-style sushi, would be pretty special. Shige, of Orizuru, also makes battleships stuffed with seaweed salad that has been prepared from fresh local wakame, chilli and sesame oil. We had another memorable nigiri at Orizuru when Shige prepared - as a birthday treat for my husband - the "Big Nigiri". A massive expanse of salmon on a bed of rice. As long as a hotdog, though not as fat.

Roger, thanks for mentioning Sud. We went twice, more than a year ago now. We enjoyed the food, thought service was excellent, but on our second visit were trapped in a room thick with smokers. Now that the new laws have been passed, we really must go back. Reassuring to know those handsome boys are still doing good things there. So often favourite places change all too quickly. We visited Cumquat in Hobart two weeks ago, for the first time since January and were so disappointed. And now Kafe Kara is up for sale. Yikes! Simon, I'm wondering what restaurants you visited in Sydney to give you such an unfavourable impression of local cuisine. How long ago did you visit? You can't be so ardently critical of the city without being more specific! And where did you eat in Melbourne that has you so excited? On your next visit to Sydney, as you may have gathered from discussion above, you must try Sailors Thai Canteen and Tetsuya Wakada's restaurant. Mr Wakada's cookbook is awesome, too - many exciting low-carb dishes. (How is low-carb ####, by the way? Baked felafel recipe coming soon to Gereral Topics.) I'll make some more Sydney suggestions when I know where you've been already. At this point, I'm thinking - given your objections to Sydney's brashness - that you should maybe head straight from airport to the north shore and not venture beyond it.

I also get excited about Cheong Liew's food at The Grange, in Adelaide. He's a genius too. Like a Picasso to Tetsuya's Monet. I actually like David Thompson's Sailors Thai Canteen as much as I liked Darley Street - perhaps more, because I need less recovery time between sessions and so can eat there more frequently. Salmon curry and sticky rice with mango are my favourites. And squid with brown bean. Even though it is informal, I can't imagine anyone outside of Thailand doing Thai food so well. Who else would insist on making coconut cream from scratch and travel afar to urge growers to produce the requisite obscure species of lime? Reading eGullet's "negative reviews" board, I noticed that Nahm has received some ferocious criticism in the UK press. But I just can't imagine David Thompson making bad food. Have you been to Nahm, Roger? Or had word-of-mouth from reliable sources? I haven't been to Rockpool. The Neil Perry phenomenon irritates me. Not for any rational reason. Perhaps being photographed half naked for a coffee advertisement was his overactive publicist's (bad) idea. Maybe, too, that whiney feature in SMH where he bemoaned the loss of a "Chef's Hat", despite scarcely being in his kitchen all year. And the myriad fawning "Neil Perry at Home" puff pieces in lifestyle magazines. Perhaps if I ate just one meal at Rockpool, I'd immediately dismiss his acute overexposure as utterly inconsequential. But, with Sailors Thai Canteen being just across the road from Rockpool, I'm unlikely to be sampling Mr Perry's food anytime soon. In Melbourne, I love Flower Drum, too. Yu.u and Kenzan (too lazy to walk six blocks to Hanabishi) are great for cooked Japanese and sushi, respectively. And we have many el cheapo ethnic favourites. But I just can't get excited about non-ethnic restaurants in Melbourne. We've yet to find a non-ethnic place here that does seafood (we don't eat meat) so well that we're inclined to return for another meal. Some of the dishes have been nice, but nice just isn't enough. We can do nice, and then some, at home. Other dishes have been downright ordinary. Langtons was especially disappointing. I don't understand the rave reviews. Although the raves are usually about the likes of ox and lamb shanks. Maybe I'd enjoy Melbourne's allegedly better non-ethnic restaurants more if I ate meat. As it is, they seem vastly inferior to better restaurants in Sydney, which have a serious "Wow!" factor.

This is my favourite chick pea recipe. Now, usually I'm strongly opposed to canned food on the grounds that it tastes inferior. But canned chick peas are almost indistinguishable from soaked-overnight-and-cooked-for-hours chick peas - especially when you use them in dip. The secret is to throw the canned chick peas in a colander and wash them thoroughly under running water. OK, here's my recipe for hummus bi tahini - middle eastern chick pea dip: 1 425-gram can chick peas, drained and rinsed 5 tablespoons fresh lemon juice 2 tablespoons unhulled tahini (sesame paste) 1 tablespoon olive oil or water minced garlic, to taste sea salt, to taste (usually unnecessary, if your chick peas were canned in salted water) optional extra is cayenne pepper, if you like your food spicy Throw all of the above in a food processor or blender. Blend on high speed for about two minutes. That simple! Keeps a couple of days in the fridge, with flavour developing over time. Veggie crudites taste great with this. I particularly like carrot and Lebanese cucumber. Will track down my chick pea felafel recipe (baked not fried) and post it shortly.

Belatedly continuing my answer to the question "What IS Aussie food?" Visitors to Australia will inevitably encounter all manner of native-animal jerky at our international airports. Very few Aussies eat this stuff. It's produced primarily for wealthy Asian tourists, who lug it back to the orient by the Louis-Vuitton-suitcaseful. Fresh cuts of native animal, on the other hand, are an increasingly popular choice for Aussie chefs and home cooks. Crocodile meat - with a taste and texture somewhere between mild white fish and chicken - is not widely available and scarcely used by at-home cooks. You don't even encounter it that often in restaurants - except in Far North Queensland, where upscale Japanese restaurants, catering for Japanese tourists, typically offer crocodile teriyaki; and, where expensive "Aussie-style" steakhouses, with few Aussie patrons, offer crocodile steaks. Wallaby meat (wallabies are a lot like kangaroos, but smaller and cuter) has found favour at some exceptional restaurants in Tasmania and in Victorian capital Melbourne. It also seems to have found a market beyond avid food enthusiasts. I know some unadventurous meat-and-three-veg blokes who now BBQ wallaby a couple of times each week. They rave about it - and I've never known them to rave about anything before. Kangaroo meat isn't something you see a lot of at better restaurants. Not many people cook it at home. Tends to be most widely used as pet food. Possum meat is a rarity. I don't think it was used in a restaurant until the mid-90s when one of Australia's great chefs, Cheong Liew, shocked the nation by serving possum ragout. He's Malaysian-born, and he has that Malaysian resourcefulness when it comes to food. That is, the attitude that any living thing is edible. At an infamous degustation dinner, he served mystery courses. Only after dinner did he reveal that one of them involved deer penis. But more about Cheong Liew later.

How low in carbs is this low-carb diet of yours? Are you still able to eat low-glycemic index carbs - ie fibrous carbohydrate foods that don't cause fluctuations in blood sugar? Things like legumes, barley, slow-cooked oatmeal? Let me know, as I have lots of ideas and recipes for the likes of lentils and chickpeas. If you're off carbs completely, non-starchy veggies are your friend! Stir-fries, using exotic Asian vegetables, can be exciting. Add some tofu for protein, if you don't find it too objectionable. Or, you could oven-roast pieces of red capsicum, zucchini, leek, mushroom and fennel - whatever's in season. Simply toss veggie chunks in olive oil, add a little sea salt and fresh pepper, a favourite herb maybe. Spread the veggies in a single layer on a baking tray, and roast in an oven preheated to 200 degrees Celsius. Vietnamese rice paper rolls are a possibility. Wafer-thin sheets of rice paper wrapped around lots of fresh veggies and lean meat or seafood. There's instructions on eGullet's cooking boards, I think. Let me know what you think of these ideas, and I'll bear your opinions in mind when I post some more.

What IS Aussie food? I'm going to answer this question by describing the kinds of foods you might eat - or merely encounter - if you were to visit Australia. If you have Aussie friends, they'd most likely insist that you try Tim Tams - Australia's answer to Oreo cookies and our most-loved uniquely Australian product. A Tim Tam comprises two rectangular chocolate biscuits, wedged together with chocolate icing and dipped in chocolate. Your Aussie friends - if they're regular people, not rampant foodies - might also feel inclined to introduce you to the delights of Aussie-style burgers. That is, a regular burger with a couple of slices of canned beetroot added. If these same Aussie friends decided to cook you an Aussie meal, it'd most likely be a reef-n-beef / surf-n-turf backyard barbeque. That is, seafood and meat. There'd be a few self-serve salads, and maybe a Pavlova for dessert. A Pavlova is a meringue that is crunchy on the outside, marshmallowy on the inside, topped with cream and doused liberally with passionfruit pulp. But say you called in on these friends at short notice, and they said "stay for dinner". What would they be eating? An Asian-style stir-fry, perhaps. In a recent survey, 90 percent of respondents said they own a wok and make stirfry at least twice week... TO BE CONTINUED!

Hi! I'm an Aussie girl, wondering whether anyone has tried to make Aussie food at home. If you've given it a go, I'd love to hear about it. Or, if you'd like to try a classic Aussie dish, I'll happily part with my no-fail recipe for Pavlova.