Despatch #10 Friday for Lunch with Bev and Craig

Bev is my cousin and Craig is her husband. They took me to lunch on Friday out in the country down past Geelong on the Belarine Peninsula amongst the olive trees. The restaurant was called "Loam" and the menu was one I had never before seen. March was the title and it listed the foods that were in season and local. Below the list of food we read 2 courses, 4 courses and 7 and the prices; wine pairings optional. That's all, what an adventure, what anticipation. Of course we didn't know what was to come so how could we chose a wine? "We'll take the wine pairings too."

"Please look at the menu and let me know if there is anything you don't like or are allergic to" said our server. We looked and decided on the four courses.

And so we began:

AMUSE BOUCHE

Three perfectly steamed Blue Mussels served in a tin, with a pull tag!


FIRST COURSE

Inisfail Prawns served raw with rhubarb granita,a light cream sauce, grass oil and lemon verbena.

Served with a Pinot Gris from Lethbridge near Geelong


SECOND COURSE

Blue-eye Cod served with its fish-bone powder on a fish-bone mayonnaise, with wakame, celery leaves, roasted garlic puree, seaweed and a little circle-hat of white turnip.

Served with a Macon Villages (OK, this Chardonnay was from France and therefore a lean, mineral wine - but it was just the way I like it!)


MAIN COURSE

Now this was created by a visiting chef from Vue de Mont, a chi-chi restaurant in Melbourne.

Mandagery Creek Venison shank slow-braised overnight and therefore ever so slowly in an immersion cooker served with a malt vinaigrette, Bull's Blood Beetroot puree and thin discs of the same beetroot, toasted buckwheat scattered over it and garnished with, get this, watercress sprigs with the leaves snipped off!

Served with a Tempranilla (my earth) Pandalowie wine


SWEETS

Mmmmmm Wild Fennel pollen ice-cream on clove and ginger bread with crumbled Bellarine wild flower honeycomb on crushed pineapple. Hey, now that's what we're having for dessert next Christmas.

Served with St Germain Elderflower liqueur over ice.

Notice the plates. They are Japanese - very elegant.

All this with such delightful company. What a special lunch, perfect.
Thank you so much Bev and Craig.

Here is the center table spread with seasonal produce and little squares of slate holding salt from Pink Lake - a salt lake over near the South Australian border and twice-whipped butter. The second whipping includes beurre noisette. (The taste didn't work for me because it took away from the taste of the food but it was pretty.) The breads were sourdoughs from a local bakery.

For art, here is a single rusty bread spring hanging on the wall above the wine rack. I think it worked.

It was a very windy day and here is a photo with some diners in the foreground and gum leaves being blown sideways outside the window. Well, I liked it.

And the little gift shop underneath the restaurant too.

Despatch # 9 Tim and Cheryle and Food

Tim and Cheryle live in Bathurst. It is a country town west of Sydney and over the Blue Mountains. In the winter there are frosts that last for days and therefore they can grow tulips. There aren't many places in Oz you can do that. The three of us have been friends since the early 70s in Auckland and Melbourne.

Here we are having dinner on my last evening. Dinner was simple really, a warm salad of salmon, egg, garden fresh tomatoes, leaf lettuces and a basil vinaigrette. Tim served a delicious wine from a friend's vinyard - a Gartelmann Chardonnay. If you see this wine in a boutique outlet of the SAQ snap it up. The label is distinctive, it has a picture of a black and white magpie on it. Jorg and Jan Gartelmann make other wines all equally delicious.

T & C picked me up from Sydney airport on Saturday March 19th and we drove through the mountains stopping for lunch in Bilpin. Here the chef cooked lunch over a wood fire and baked my tandoori Yellowtail Kingfish in a wood-fired pizza oven. He served the Kingfish in a pappadum with a cherry tomato salsa, raita and chips.

With lunch we had a Redman Shiraz. Australians love Shiraz. We know this wine as a Syrrah.

On Sunday we had lunch in the next town, Orange, at a restaurant called Lolli Redini. Take a look at the pass.

Elegant, no?

For lunch I started with rotolo filled with pumpkin, feta and toasted pine nuts, a beurre noisette and sage leaves; my main was a ballontine of rabbit with blistered tomatoes and celeriac puree; and for dessert I had Afogato - vanilla ice cream, a shot of espresso, a shot of frangellico and a honey wafer. The sommelier paired the wines with the starter and main and the dessert wine was a Beerenauslese - delicious!!

Both in Bathurst and Orange there are many fine examples of heritage Federation (circa 1901) houses.

Tim and Cheryle live in a 1950 double brick home. Notice the sunny sky in March.

Thank you so very much, you are most gracious hosts. I love you both.

I'm off this afternoon on the train back to Sydney through the Blue Mountains and then on to Melbourne.

Despatch # 8 Annie's Place

Queensland with Annie

After arriving at Maroochydore airport north of Brisbane Annie and I drove up the coast to the Sunshine Coast Surf Club for lunch.

This is a picture of Annie's house in the Queensland hinterland. She lives in a modern Queenslander-style house that she designed. The land falls away behind where it is supported by stilts. Underneath the house is her studio complete with two glass kilns. Annie works in stained glass making plates and exquisite jewellery.

Annie has a pool behind her house. It is a magnesium and potassium chloride pool. The water is so soft and kind to the skin. It isn't harsh like chlorine or saltwater. So my skin wasn't dry nor did my eyes hurt. Magnesium is very good for us and is best absorbed transdermally.

There is a verandah along the back of the house. All the bedrooms and the living area have sliding glass doors that open onto the verandah and over look the pool. Annie has put in many stained glass windows. Her house is truly a gem.

There was a resident python (Mrs. Python moved on after an altercation with an opossum) that lived in a shrub near the back stairs. She kept the rats and mice populations in check. Also very large huntsman tarantula spiders live around and sometimes in Annie's house. I had to sleep with the sliding glass door closed in case the critters wanted to wander in during the night. The spiders manage to get in anyway. I awoke at 2:00 am one morning to one on the wall. It looked like this.
I left my spider alone. Annie presented hers to me at breakfast one morning. She found it in her bedroom.

We spent a night at her parents' unit in Noosa Heads which is a lovely resort town. There was a surfing festival on at the time. I have included a photo of a flowering gum from a neighbour's garden and a picture of the unit from the pool. (Ooops that photo didn't make it.)

Annie cooked a lovely meal for us on my last night. We had yellow snapper. I have had red snapper but never a yellow one. Here it is.

Thanks Annie. It won't be so long between visits next time, my love.

Despatch # 7 - The Twelve Apostles

This is another picture of those limestone stacks. There are twelve of them some in sight and some hidden in coves. One collapsed sometime in the past year. The surf erodes them at the bottom and they implode. They are so heavy that the stacks more or less sink into the sand at the bottom. Eventually the coast will be eroded back to the denser rock.

This is the entrance to the Great Ocean Road. We approached the beginning from about two thirds of the way along. The road was an infrastructure initiative by the government during the Great Depession. A 40 km stretch of the road was washed out by the recent flooding. Victoria had the wettest summer on record. Still the reservoirs are only about half full.

A huge de-salination plant is being built on the east coast of the state and will be on-line at the end of the year. Australians pay $250 a quarter for water and that is expected to rise about 50% over the next couple of years. Consumption is irrevelant; the rates are for the infrastructure.

Despatch from the front # 6

Loch Ard Gorge

Loch Ard was an emigrant ship that foundered here off the coast.  Sailing ships on The Australia Run from England to Australia - Launceston, Melbourne, Sydney or Brisbane had to pass this way.  "Threading the Needle" just off the coast here between Cape Otway and King Island demanded great skill from the ships' masters.  This was one of the most treacherous parts of the months-long journey.  Many ships were lost here.

I'm reading a book about the sailing ships both wooden and iron and the people who emigrated.  Many aspects of the Australian psyche had their genesis in the great migration from 1778 to 1880.  The most humble classes from England, Scotland and Wales made the journey into the great unknown and for most a better life.  They were able to earn a decent living and not be servants ever again.  As a matter of fact the gentle classes were advised against coming if they couldn't look after themselves.

These cliffs are limestone and as such are made up of sea creatures' skeletons.  The pounding surf erodes the cliffs creating these limestone stacks.  Impressive.

Despatch from the front # 5

Apollo Bay

Isn't the light fabulous?

This is the beach we came down to after driving across the grazing district and through the rain forest. The mist made it all look so pretty. Those folk on the beach are running in their wet suits after their swim in the ocean. If you look carefully you can see two ancient dogs running too. What a life! There were many grey-haired couples in their late 50s and early 60s with the biggest smiles on their faces.

After checking into our guest house we went to dinner.

Australians were not raised to be servants. “Yes, if you ask me nicely I’ll get you some bread", said our waiter at dinner, huh!?! Waiters are paid by the hour; tipping is not usual so they don’t seem to want to please that much. I had to move so our waiter could put down my plate and there were only two of us. Heaven forbid that she should step to my other side to put my plate down. There was the whole other side of the table. We were sitting on the foot path, oh well...... maybe we will have better luck tomorrow. For dinner I had a lovely Blue Eye (fish) with lots of crunchy greens. Edward had marinated kangaroo loin. It was too tough for me but not gamey at all. I wonder if it is wild. There are gazillions of ‘roos here. We saw a dead one on the side of the road and a very squashed echidna too. This evening outside our guest house room there were flocks of budgies and a parrot or two in the Warratah (flowering shrub). The birds are unbelievable.

Despatch from the front # 4

The Otway Ranges
This is a temperate rain forest. We did the tree top walk. This is a metal walk with a ramp up to mid height. On the floor of the forest are the huge tree ferns. You can see one close up in my previous blog. The mid range are, I can't remember, but the highest are these straight, straight gums. At one point we climbed a circular tower to stand above the tree tops. I was a bit wobbly because it was so high but never the less I managed. I do have a video clip but am having trouble loading it.