Moving back to Melbourne

[Adam Balic]

After six years in Edinburgh I shall be moving back to Melbourne at the end of the year. I haven't been home since 2002, so I have a few food related questions.

What is the state of Mexican food supplies? Is it possible to buy chiles, fresh tomatilla etc?

Is it possible to get an American style indirect smoke BBQ here now?

What cuisines are popular now and what is off the radar, so to speak? Buying cookbooks looks to be much cheaper here, so I would like to stock up before I come back.

[fou de Bassan]

Adam,

I can answer 2 questions.

1. No chiles, nowhere to be found, at least not fresh. I thinkthere are some places selling seeds if you want to grow your own. And I've seen some dried at casa iberica.

2. Buy books there!!! Ship'em over here and read at leisure.

I can't answer to the food trends although I have been seeing an awful lot of offal lately.

An American -style indirect smoke barbecue? I'm American and I have no idea what this is. A smoker?

[Adam Balic]

Cheers for that. Damn will have to grow my own chiles.

You know, BBQ that allows you to do that slow cooking (whole brisket for exampe) thing with lots of smoke etc, rather then and Australian BBQ, which is by and large grilling.

[lamington]

I'm not sure exactly what sort of chillies you're after Adam, but you can certainly buy some types of fresh jalapeño, and habaneros are occasionally to be found. Other fresh chillies widely available are of course some of those used by various non-American cuisines.

[Adam Balic]

I was thinking about chiles from Mexico mostly, as I have become increasingly interested in the food from this region, but my memory from Melbourne was that the Mexican food was pretty vile and I can't remember seeing any ingredients to make it myself.

I found this site *Click*, good thing my parents have a farm I guess.

[fou de Bassan]

Adam,

Thanks for the link, they will soon recieve my order! I have seen Weber kettle grills here and you can buy smokers although to my mind they are overpriced. We use a Weber gas grill with a smoker box. (We brought this with us from the States)

[kangarool]

Have been meaning to reply to this post for a while, finally got it together. Welcome back to Melbourne Adam...

I haven't ever come across any fresh chiles here, but had incredible success (luck) with growing habaneros... dozens of little bright orange chiles all summer. I have found a good range of dried chiles (guajillo, serrano, ancho) at Aztec Products in Tullamarine, along with dried epazote, masa, etc. They have chipotle in adobo which i've seen elsewhere, and canned tomatillos -- I didn't buy any and don't know how they compare to fresh. I also have never seen any fresh epazote in Melb.

Which is why I just searched for, found, and purchased seeds for both epazote and tomatillo, from this person's store on ebay (in WA): here Cheap seeds and shipping, plus I didn't see any options from the Fireworks catalogue you posted. I have to get serious about my food gardening this year, so hopefully these will work out.

Good luck; I could go for a nice mole about now.

[Adam Balic]

Ah thanks very much. I am going to make an attempt at growing my own when I get back, so it is good to know that epazote seeds are availble as that is one item that I was thinking I would have to do without.

[Pat Churchill]

Currently living in a rented place while uprooted from NZ and I am desperately missing my herb garden. No point in planting one in a place we will be leaving in February. Sniff!

[PCL]

Adam, and all of you chile people out there... just go to your local nursery and check out what varieties they have on sale. Chillies grow really well in Melbourne and the nurseries are stocked full with ALL KINDS. I've been following the chillie threads for a while and for some stupid reason, never chimed in.

One good nursery to check out and I hate to say this due to my pre-disposed hatred of highway side mega stores... go to Gardenworld on Springvale Road. There is also the Art Nursery on Brunswick St Fitztory.

And for smokers, kettles... Weber's are available easily or just go to Mitre 10 or Home Hardware, buy the bits and pieces and make your own. You're back in Oz now, let your DIY juices flow.

[Adam Balic]

Have been here since December:

- BBQ sorted out now and in much use.

- Chillies: good supplies of dried chillies (and other central and south American products) for Mexican cooking at Casa Iberica in Fitzroy. Will have to grown my own to get fresh types. Tomatillo's of average quality sold at Vic market under name of "Chinese gooseberries".

- Excellent Middle-Eastern stores, butchers, bakeries etc on Sydney Rd.

- Ditto SE-Asian on Victoria St and Footscray.

- Not bad Malay food at Laksa King in Flemmington.

- Over all pretty happy with quality of fruit and veg (although variety is what is missing), very happy with the fish, not at all happy with the quality of the meat. Due to the drought there is a lot of cheap yearling beef about, but even accounting for this the meat is far too lean and not aged for any length of time. At the Prahran I actually watched a butcher cutting all the fat off a pile of rib roasts (and thereby making the end product pretty terrible). The irony is that beef marketed as 'wagyu' commands a large premium and it is heavily marbled. Will have to find a decent butcher that will produce the type of meat I want.

Still looking for a specialist Greek food store. Considering the large Greek population in Melbourne I am somewhat surprised about this.

[sandra]

Adam, in my short 2 weeks here, I have found that South Melbourne Market has more variety and sometimes better prices than Prahran...

I got some nice shrimp at Prahran for dinner tonight - hopefully they are as good as they look!

[Adam Balic]

I definately will miss having access to Scottish langoustine, but the ability to choose prawns other then frozen farmed tiger prawns is great.

Since there are so many varities caught in Australia waters, we have been doing some taste tests. So far it is the Brown Tiger Prawns (Penaeus esculentus) that comes out on top to my mind, although my wife finds them a little too rich.