Spice finds a giant Perigord truffle. The whole of Australia is Perigord truffle crazy right now. In the past few weeks alone I’ve eaten some of the best and most aromatic truffle dishes that I have ever come across. Chefs report they have never seen so many from Australia and summer ones imported from France. Today, one hour out of Melbourne about ten minutes the other side of some McBungalows I was part of a group hunting for truffles led […]
Author: Ed
This chair must be stopped
Look around you. There is probably one similar near you right now. This is the New Zealand Oyster Bay Sauvignon Blanc ( the most popular and ubiqitous white wine in Australia) of cafe chairs. I keep tripping up over it everywhere. This picture was taken in Hamilton (worth avoiding). I’ve seen it in the Yarra Valley. It’s spread like a rash through my home suburb St Kilda – Mirka at Tolarno, Banff, Spuntino etc. Are we doomed to sit on […]
Hot hot heat
From SBS Food Chilli is an essential ingredient in many cuisines throughout the world, featuring in everything from from piping hot vindaloo to Portuguese piri piri sauce, but who started the fire? Ed Charles investigates. Christopher Columbus has a lot to answer for. He was the first European on record to find chillis, and now, together with the potato and the tomato, they are ubiquitous throughout the world, and for some reason prized for the burning sensation they produce. Historians […]
First glimpse at Andrew McConnell’s Cumulus Inc in Flinders Lane
If there’s one thing I’ve learnt writing about the opening of restaurants is that it rarely goes to plan. As a writer it is easy to be caught out. Openings can be delayed by months or even years. And so it was that on Thursday the 26th I rocked up to Cumulus Inc (45 Flinders Lane +61 3 9650 1445) for supper to find the chef (Andrew McConnell of Three, One , Two and formerly Circa The Prince) and architect, […]
Content on the move: the iPhone revolution
The Australian, Entrepreneur ONCE, the only way to find a business on the move was to call a directory on a mobile phone. But the arrival on July 11 of Apple iPhone — it is 3G, has WiFi and is GPS-enabled and integrated with Google Maps — is about to change the way people use mobile devices and find businesses through map-based online listings. The big difference is that, through Google Maps on an iPhone, users can search for a […]
First underground restaurants. Now underground biscuits
Perhaps it’s the different rules of society and etiquette in Japan but it is a very strange place when you need an introduction to eat at a restaurant. I suppose London has a similar thing happening with its traditional Gentlemen’s Clubs. Then there is the more modern Milk and Honey in New York, and now London (and opening the less exclusive Match Bar in QV fairly soon once a few liquor licensing problems are overcome). Anyway, last week I was […]
A new manifesto for meat eaters (and Bloggers meet version V)
Mark Bittman makes a lot of sense on the need not to give up meat but eat less. In the New York Times (via Lifehacker) he outlines a manifesto for eating less meat on which I’ve put my own spin below. It’s also worth checking out Bittman on the excellent TED Talks. Meanwhile, with Confessions of a Food Nazi we’re planning the vegan/vegetarian bloggers meet. I think we have six coming already. Where: Lentil as Anything Abbotsford Convent. Afterwards at […]
YouTube attracts a lot of business
The Australian, Entrepreneur MARKETING fads come and go but YouTube and the internet look as if they are here to stay. YouTube is about rich interesting content rather than rich video production companies that usually make expensive TV ads. And this makes it an ideal medium for the small to medium-sized business, according to Sydney-based Laurel Papworth, a social media consultant and evangelist. “One of the things I like about small business is that they don’t do traditional marketing with […]
GPS will put you on the map
The Australian, Entrepreneur AS was first the case with computers and mobile phones, it’s difficult to know where in the technology cycle to dive into global positioning systems. GPS has only become popular in Australia in the past two years, with the sales value of GPS devices now overstepping digital music players. There are about 1.5 million GPS devices in Australia. About 600,000 were sold in 2007, and over 1 million will be sold this year, says Adrian Tout, national […]