Hurray! Oysters are back in season, ahem, down under. Actually, it is difficult to tell when they are out as most fishmongers stocks them whatever, even during the hot summer months when they are awful. Obviously, Australian’s aren’t discerning about this bivalve as most people either buy them in bottles or preshucked, lying their dead for hours and without those sexy salty juices. The best in Australia are from the cold waters of Tasmania. the worst from the warm waters […]
Recent posts
What lurks inside
I have one update at the end here from Betel at Rustic Food, Ay Coregi, a crescent roll from Turkey. By now we all know the reasons for staging this monthly event. I need say no more. A crew of ten cheese sandwich munchers (plus myself) show what cooking at home is really about and how imaginative it can be. It’s about trying to find a use for the limp celery lying in some undetermined liquid in the bottom of […]
In The Black: Dirty money
From the March edition of In The Black. More on the mutual evaluation report on money laundering at FATF. Australia needs to clean up its act on the money laundering front. accountants are being drafted in to assist the cause.
The joy of heritage veggies
The hottest stall at the St Kilda Farmers’ Market? Organic heritage vegetables. It’s the one where people squeeze in shoulder-to-shoulder and queue three deep. Think unfeasibly long striped snaking cucumbers. Voluptuously rippled, erm, aubergine Aubergines. White and aubergine striped aubergines… At a time when organic has become commodotised and baby vegetables seem a little tired these are vegetables with that very old-fashioned concept of a unique selling proposition. And they look at taste great too. Ideal candidates for Kalyn’s Weekend […]
I’m not bitter, just delicate
There’s probably more than a few hangovers in Canberra today as the Prime Minister John Howard – a great friend of George Dubya) yesterday celebrated ten years in office. If we believe the PR, he was Australia’s great white hope (don’t mention multiculturalism) rescuing us from Labor, high interest rates, unemployment and almost certain doom. I’m not one of the big man’s cheerleaders. But I am feeling a tad delicate myself. Pat over at Gourmet Traveller reminded me of Fergus […]
Never mind the baking tins this is the bollocks
If a kitchen object were ever to feature in SEX, this would be it. I’m not talking about the hot sweaty act but the (in)famous shop on the Kings road in London. The one that was run by designer Vivienne Westwood and pop Svengali Malcolm McLaren about the same time he launched the Sex Pistols. I don’t suppose many readers would have visited Sex. As a teenager I was lucky enough to. I didn’t have the cash for bondage pants, […]
The Sheet: Big banks follow in Commsec’s wake
Also published in Crikey! as well as The Sheet. Commonwealth Bank’s stockbroking business Commsec may face a bigger challenge this year to its leadership of the online broking market as competitors Westpac and National Australia Bank market have upgraded online trading platforms. With listed company IWL buying Westpac’s online broking partner JDV last year, National and Westpac now both have the same company running the back end of their broking platforms. By 2007, Westpac and National will be operating on […]
In The Black: Space Invaders
Commercial property from the March edition. The insatiable demand for office space, especially in Perth and Brisbane, is completely out of step with supply. So expect steep rent hikes over the coming years.
Foxy meal: I want you
Sometimes the eating habits of us former country folk can be controversial. I appalled a local Aussie food writer with stories of road kill from the Essex countryside. We’d often hit pheasants/partridge/rabbit/hare or just find them in the road. We’d pick them up take them home and hang them – this would be during winter remember – and wait until the maggots dropped out. At this point I could slip them out of their skin by hand. The meat will […]