Busy, busy, busy. What I need is a quick and easy recipe with both veggies and meat. One of my favourites is Gajar ka salad, a Gujerati carrot salad from my very stained and food stippled copy of Madjur Jaffrey’s Indian Cookery. It is an excellent candidate for Weekend Herb Blogging over at Kalyn’s Kitchen. There are only two humans in the house and a single old fashioned large-sized carrot is enough – as opposed to the overpriced spring or […]
Recent posts
My favourite gadget: a little ray of sunshine
The electric juicer hasn’t left the cupboard for over a year. It seemed like a good idea at the time but in reality it is simply a sugar machine. Far better I say to cut out the middle man – the juicer – and simply eat the whole fruit, with peel if possible. That gives me sugar, nutrients and, importantly, roughage. And that means I don’t have to lurk in a dark corner at the pharmacist buying Proctologist & Gamble’s […]
Five things to eat before you die
I’ve been tagged by Cucina Rebecca in Sydney to join the “Five things to eat before you die” meme. Devised by The Travellers Lunchbox, as I write this there are 103 entries, that’s 515 dishes. I know what I don’t want to eat and that’s hospital food. I’ve had this big plan just in case some dreadful disease decided to take me. It’s extreme ski-ing. Picking a steep couloir, with the big crevasse at the bottom, I would strap on […]
Bourdain on Ronnie di Stasio
Perhaps your way here from the food issue of The Age (Melbourne) Magazine . If you haven’t seen the mag, London-based Aussie food writer Terry Durack quotes Anthony Bourdain from an interview with Tomato from a year ago. You can check out my full Anthony Bourdain archive. He says this of Ronnie di Stasio in part 3: “He’s a fucking madman. And you have to be a fucking madman to be in the reastaurant business. There should be a statue […]
A high bar for small beers
There are small but determined new businesses brewing in the heady world of beer, writes Ed Charles Entrepreneur, The Australian, August 25, 2006 THERE’S no going back. Cameron Hines, joint founder of the Mountain Goat microbrewery in Melbourne, says: “Once you start enjoying and appreciating your beer, it’s almost impossible to go back and drink crap.” The founders of Australia’s latest crop of microbreweries became beer nuts while travelling abroad. Hines acquired a taste for boutique beers as he travelled […]
Wine guru Len Evans RIP
One of Australia’s best known wine gurus, Len Evans, has died suddenly at the age of 75. According to a report from AAP he had suffered from heart problems and died in the car park of Newcastle Hospital while collecting a relative. Acording to Wikipedia, Evans transformed blind tastings into a competition sport through his creating and developing the options game in which competitors attempt to identify each wines tasted. In 1962 he became the first regular wine columnist in […]
16 ways to spot a bad restaurant
1. There is a massive queueIn that case you are either in a motorway café or a reality TV show. 2. The room is emptyWhy is nobody here on a Thursday night? Just opened? Don’t kid me, I can see the look of desperation on the staff’s faces. 3. Spruikers try and drag you inObvious really. If they have to use the pressurised tactics of Benidorm timeshare spruikers… 4. Birds on tablesIf the birds (or rats for that matter) are […]
Basque slips
Do you ever get the sense that some restaurants are taking the piss? You know what happens, they begin serving quality cheap food, have friendly efficient service and a reasonaby priced wine list. Actually, coming to think of it the serviced has always been a bit hit and miss at Basque Tapas & Wine (159 Chapel St Windsor 3181 +61 3 9533 7044) but right now there’s a lot more missing that hitting. That’s a shame because I used to […]
Scooping up success
Freshness, production on site and good cheer are part of the successful recipe at a gelato outlet, writes Ed Charles FINDING and motivating the right staff is always a problem for business. Now Trampoline Gelato chain is looking to develop a gang of at least 40 small business entrepreneurs to grow its chain. Trampoline opened its first store on Brunswick Street in Melbourne’s fashionable Fitzroy on April 14, 2004. Trampoline general manager Richard Furphy had been given the task of […]