The seductive thing is the doorway and a sign. There is no other indication of what lies at the top of the stairs in the Thy Thy (142 Victoria St, Richmond +61 3 9429 1104) Vietnamese restaurant. Perhaps restaurant is too strong a word. This isn’t a place I’d come to eat at night and apparently nor should you. But do drop in for an aromatic and filling bowl of sub $10 Pho and to enjoy Thy Thy’s retro chequerboard […]
Recent posts
Food for thought
From In The Black: In the trenches Achieving an effective level of management is a fairly universal story no matter what business you work in or run. Just look at the restaurant industry. It’s a microcosm of the business world, picky customers and tight deadlines. And the man who has highlighted it, warts and all, is internationally recognised chef and restaurant owner, Gordon Ramsay. His UK and US TV series Kitchen Nightmares has made his name as a straight-talking, business […]
Goodbye Curry in a Hurry
From SBS Food Five Indian restaurants have been awarded Michelin stars in the UK since 2001. Ed Charles investigates how the trend towards Indian fine diners is progressing Australia. When Chandra Kanodia opened the Phantom India restaurant in June 1979 on Swanston Street in Carlton, just outside the City of Melbourne, it claimed to be the first Tandoori Restaurant in Australia. He had chefs flown in from famous restaurants in India to make the best Indian food. Australians have always […]
Google targets small to medium-sized businesses
From The Australian, Entrepreneur JULIAN Persaud, the newly appointed online head at Google Australia, is a man with a big message for small and medium-sized companies. He wants to wake them up to the opportunities online presents for growing their businesses. “They are coming on board in increasing numbers,” he says. “About 40 per cent have a website and there’s about another 20 or 30 per cent who are currently building a website. There is a big opportunity. “The reason […]
The stress and sex of the kitchen
Gordon Ramsay caught in the lens in Melbourne…shortly after admiring the blouse of an Age writer… Apparently most chefs are at it not just Gordon Ramsay. The Times in London reports: “Close working relationships are formed in the intense kitchen environment, while partners are often neglected at home, unable to understand the stresses and strains of the job. This goes some way in explaining a Time Out survey of New York chefs published this month, in which 50 per cent […]
Finally over Ferran fatigue: your questions answered
I got Ferran Adria fatigue and can only now face answering those questions. It’s not as bad as my Gordon Ramsay fatigue. Anyway I’m over it now. My main task was to ask questions for other publications so not everything was answered in full. In case you missed it Adria was launching his book “A Day at elBulli” and gave a talk put on by the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. Here we go: Phil: Can I please have a […]
The recipe for a perfect Yorkshire Pudding (the scientific way)
When is a Yorkshire pudding not a Yorkshire pudding? Yorkshirefolk would say when it’s not made in Yorkshire. But according to one scientist it is when it’s less than 4 inches tall. That’s about 10.24 cm. But somehow Yorkshire puddings don’t seem right metric so let’s stick to a good old-fashioned 4 inches despite this definition coming a good old metric organisation The Royal Society of Chemistry. According to the RSC: “The judgement followed an enquiry from an Englishman living […]
Grinding a living in cafes
From The Australian, Entrepreneur THE cafe business is highly lucrative and has a lot in common with the game of Monopoly. There’s a vibrant trade in cafes — in Melbourne there are stories (perhaps exaggerated) of $50,000 a week businesses selling for $2 million. If you know what you’re doing you can pick up an ailing business — or start your own — build it up, sell, then move on to something bigger and start again. Nick Kutcher is one […]
Who is Ferran Adria?
From SBS Food As he hits Australia to promote his new book A Day at El Bulli, Ed Charles catches up with the man who is changing the way we relate to food. There is no easy way to explain the food of Ferran Adria at El Bulli, which has been unanimously voted, for the past three years, as the best restaurant in the world. You need to eat there and that’s difficult because his 50 seat restaurant, a two […]