ED CHARLES dishes up the latest on Melbourne’s food, wine and bars CHEF SWAP Bigger portions and lighter, fresher food are promised by chef Richard Hooper at veg-aquarian concept restaurant SOS (Level 3, Melbourne Central). It’s the one hidden behind the strange entrance at the top of the escalator. Hooper replaces Riccardo Momesso, who fell out with the restaurant’s vegetarian owner Paul Mathis over cooking style and the joint’s unused wood-fired oven. The oven will soon be baking pizzas for […]
journalism
Ed Lines
TOP AUSSIE NOSH The revamped Royal Mail Hotel (519 Spencer St, West Melbourne) is flying in by light aircraft fresh produce from Flinders Island, including crays. Open under new owner Jen Matthews for seven weeks, and with a new chef, the pub also offers your basic $10-$12 mains and plenty of grub for the kids. Watch out for wallaby and smoky bacon sausages, roo burgers and other national emblems. VIN JONES Look for new twists in Thai-influenced modern Australian cooking […]
IN THE BLACK: In the trenches – March 2007
Here’s the problem: Australia is very good at digging stuff out of the ground, and it’s very good at planting loads of stuff in the ground and growing it. What the country isn’t so good at is making high-value products – whether they be minerals or food staples – out of those raw materials. According to the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE), the Australian food industry exports 95 per cent of food in bulk and in minimally […]
Bridging the family fortune generation gap
By Ed Charles THE question has been exercising the minds of the wealthy forever — how to ensure the kids don’t blow the family fortune. Private banks report that independent advice on investment strategies for the intergenerational transfer of wealth is one of the fastest growing areas of demand. This is especially so in the case of business owners considering retirement. Goldman Sachs JBWere private wealth management managing director Paul Heath says private banking clients are usually successful people who […]
AT YOUR SERVICE – HOW TO JOIN A PRIVATE BANK – YOUR BANK, EXCLUSIVELY
By Ed Charles COVER STORY Qualifying is half the battle to be a customer of a private bank, Ed Charles reports THE world of private banking consists of an exclusive club of retail bank clients and an elite club of global private bank clients. The level of personal service you get and what you pay will depend very much on how much money you have. At the very least for membership of this club you will need assets of about […]
Ed Lines
In the first of a new weekly column, ED CHARLES dishes up the latest on Melbourne’s food and bars HARD ROCK The Hard Rock Cafe (1 Bourke St, city) will close this year to be replaced by shops as part of a refurbishment of the Windsor Hotel. Rubbish bins in the next-door alley, Windsor Place, will be swapped with cafes and restaurants, making a new eat street. No fixed plans for Hard Rock Cafe yet. BAR HUMS The Red Hummingbird […]
For beautiful bread, historic oven proves old ways still best
THE CURIOUS COOK 
 IT’S 11pm at the Portarlington Bakehouse, on Victoria’s Bellarine Peninsula, and the wood-fired oven is still warm from the morning’s baking. I watch as Terry Christofi lights some pieces of newspaper stuffed between the old palings in the oven’s firebox; flames shoot out. Christofi taps on the antique brass temperature gauge, waiting for it to reach 800F on the old scale (almost 430C). The baker is making these preparations in the middle of the night because […]
Waging guerilla war
You can create a marketing buzz on a small budget, writes Ed Charles IT’S the classic business dilemma. You’re launching into a crowded market and the main competition has a marketing budget of tens of millions of dollars, whereas you have a few thousand. You can’t compete head-on. The only option is to use your wits and creativity to create a marketing buzz out of nothing. Welcome to the world of guerilla marketing. The term was coined by Jay Conrad […]
The new cards on the block: pre-paid or cash

They’re just the shot as a gift for travellers or for those who don’t have credit cards, Ed Charles reports THE pre-paid credit and cash-card market is barely nine months old, yet there are already more than six cards on the market, with more predicted to be launched this year. They can be used for internet transactions and telephone shopping by people who have traditionally shunned credit cards. “It is definitely an area of growth in the credit card market,” […]