Bloggers Banquet 2. April 5

The "Mock 10" Signs of Blog Addiction

At Bloggers Anonymous—we normally frown upon spreading propaganda that minimizes the serious nature of our cause. However, in the name of education and awareness, we would like to point to the this juvenile “Top 10” list of “symptoms” which indicate you may be a addicted to blogging. We will not reveal the authors as to not credit them in any way. Please be aware that this ignorance is out there—and defeating the spirit of our cause.

10. You check your blog stats a LOT. You occasionally get up in the middle of the night and sneak a peak.

9. Your significant other suspects you are having an affair with your blog. Even when you’re alone with your special person, you do find yourself thinking what your blog might be doing right then…

8. You “mental blog” while driving or on the train, and sometimes even when you are alone in the shower.

7. You filter everything through your post-writing. You can’t watch a movie, see a play, read an article, or share a sweet moment with your child without thinking of whether it’s blog-worthy.

6. You suffer from “blog envy” when another blogger posts something juicy before you do. You suffer “comment envy” when said post gets 40-something comments – the jerk!

5. You “binge blog” 3 or 4 posts at once—only to feel guilty and empty afterward.

4. You ditched all your real friends for blog friends, because, well, “they understand.” You bypass Bowling Alone at the bookstore (who really cares?) while you reach for Naked Conversations.

3. You think, “I can stop at any time.”

2. Your lunch hour has become your “blog hour.” You keep a few posts tucked in your desk in case you need them during the day.

1. After 5 minutes of meeting someone really interesting you ask, “So - do you blog?”

It's time for another group hug. After the battering some of us copped about blogging at The Melbourne Food and wine Festival's Out of the Frying Pan, we could all do with another catch up and reaffirmation of why it's good to blog. In particular why it's good to write about food and wine.


Food Bloggers naturally are a passionate and boisterous bunch of Bon Viveurs. We know how to enjoy life to the fullest and we are not PC or shameful of it. Our last gathering began with butterflies to the stomach of most, but resulted in the building of bonds between like minded people. In a world where we increasingly find ourselves in a society lacking community spirit, our blogging bond has built the bridge to a new community of like minded people.


So Melbourne food and wine bloggers, regular readers/commenters, partners and friends, come on down to the next Bloggers Banquet on April 5 at Chez Fur de Mer, in Dromana under the auspices of the delectable Purple Goddess & the explosive Furry.


It's BYO everything as per the last event. A woodfired oven is again available to cook dishes to be shared. My last effort was Porcini Risotto with Roasted Garfield Barramundi and tomatoes. I'm leaning towards a goat tagine this time - or there's an outside chance of paella.


More information is at PG's Blog, please let her know if you have half an inclination to show up so she can give you the address or you can email me here via my profile.


Feel free to use the comments section here for an exchange on car pooling for the event - there's some talk going on at Cindy & Michael's Blog too.


Photo's from the last gig are on Flickr and you'll find some of the last round's post prandial posts on Google. There's also an event listing on facebook for those who roam around that piece of the Web 2.0 world - you can even match faces to blogs there.

I can't wait to see you all and to meet the people who missed out last time.

Locavore je t'adore

CHERRY TOMATOES
These are eaten with your fingers during cocktails, but with a knife and fork when served in a salad or another course at the table. Try to select one that's small enough to put in your mouth whole, because they squirt. Close your lips tightly before chewing.

Arthur Inch & Arlene Hirst.
Dinner is Served. A Butler's Guide to The Art of The Table

There is a political debate going on at my local farmers markets. The discussion seems to revolve around which producers may come in and which of the established ones now have to leave.

It breaks my heart to say goodbye to some of my favourite farmers. I miss their banter early on a Saturday morning. I miss their produce. I feel irked that they haven't been replaced by new farmers with a similar product, but by more cheese, relish and pasta vendors that I mostly do not buy from, but serve the curious day tripper style shopper who is scared to buy much else.

I see monopolies happening and I feel sad that something as healthy and good for the community as bringing the farm gate to the city is baring petty jealousies, without considering the desires of the shoppers.

I hear of harsh treatment of vendors by the person who runs this particular group of markets. There is schoolyard bitchiness between certain vendors, the bolder and more intelligent are said to hold more sway with the organisers than others. Their supporters whisper snidely that some of the more 'salt of the earth' types have now got too cocky. I feel the gush of the tomato squirting in their diatribe.

I have closed my mouth firmly and bitten my tongue, even though I was sent an email from one farmer who was sent into liquidation from being told that his family could no longer be vendors at the markets I attend. A more boutique set up was to be pushed up in the ranks instead. I don't like the pretentious boutique vendor. I don't like their much more expensive product. Their affectations irk me.

I chew it over with my mouth firmly shut. A farmer sets up a stall at a Farmers Market. They offer samples of their produce to the city folk milling around cautiously. The shoppers like what they try. Demand grows quickly, more product lines are developed, bank loans are taken and investments are made to service the demand. Over time a loyal core of about 1000 customers develops - who order in advance and collect their supplies at the designated markets.

Then the organisers of the market decide that the vendor has grown too big for the circuit and tell them that they are not to return. What does that farmer do when removed from their customers? In one case they have gone bust, have had to liquidate their assets and lay off staff at the farm. They have no other outlet for their product.

Perhaps I'm a soft touch, but once again I find myself questioning the qualifications of the people who make the decisions pertaining to the running of the markets. I like to think of myself as a person who tends towards being an Ethical Locavore - and perhaps that makes me a sap - but I personally renounce the supermarkets for the rough grist that they lay upon our farmers. Now, I see a similar ruthlessness emerging at my principal source of fresh produce and it breaks my heart. Truly.

If a Farmer provides good produce and builds a large following, does that substantiate removal from a market, or does it in fact bring more people in, to the benefit of all the other stall holders?


What quantifies 'too big', if the local demand for farmer direct produce is growing at a rapid pace? Why is a Farmer with solely a big following at the farmers markets considered bigger than another producer at the markets who also sells their product to shops and can be found in IGA supermarkets?


Are organisers and vendors aware of the long term trends? Or are they perhaps inflexibly focussed on their original smaller aims?

Pictured above: Purchased direct from local producers.

Mt Belleview Jack Horner Sausage, King Valley.

Murchison capsicum and tomatoes.

Sorrel, Basil, beetroot leaves and Dill from Glenloth

Bocconcini from Riverina Cheese, Albury.

Local doesn't mean boring.
Local means uncomplicated dishes that enhance the robust flavours of the produce:

1. North East Venison Girello, mango salsa (not local), local asparagus, Nicola potatoes, brassicas

2. Garfield Barramundi wings in 5 spice crust, Chinese Broccoli, Tofu with Szechuan sauce

3. Gipsy Pig Mandarin pork fillets, Wat Daan Chinese cabbage, rice cakes (not local)

4. Mt Bellevue Scotch fillet, chargrilled heirloom vegetables, Bison potato salad with homemade Mayonnaise & Bearnaise made with local eggs, homegrown herbs

Comfort Food 2. Chocolate Mousse

"If any man has drunk a little too deeply from the cup of physical pleasure; if he has spent too much time at his desk that should have been spent asleep; if his fine spirits have become temporarily dulled; if he finds the air too damp, the minutes too slow, and the atmosphere too heavy to withstand; if he is obsessed by a fixed idea which bars him from any freedom of thought: if he is any of these poor creatures, we say, let him be given a good pint of amber-flavored chocolate....and marvels will be performed."
Jean-Anthelme Brillat-Savarin (1755-1826)

In the seventies, Fondue parties were big. My parents had two fondue sets that were purchased in Switzerland, one for the cheese - served with lashings of schnapps - and one for the chocolate. They were popular dinner party hosts.

The hair was big, the textiles bold and the music cheesy, but I was intrigued by the whole process. My emotionally delicate mother would usually end up with a passive agressive pout and would retire early with a migraine, while dad - the raconteur - entertained the guests until exhausted. I would watch TV quietly in another room and clean up after them when the guests had left.

My mother was also well known for her classic Cantonese dishes and her Fusion food which pre-dated any restaurant fads. My father was venerated as a trained Patissier who only pottered with it for fun. When the Fondue craze passed and its kitsch sets were relegated to an unreachable cupboard, he invariably kept returning to two chocolate desserts by popular demand.

One was a mountain of Profiteroles - custard filled choux pastry balls drizzled with chocolate. The other was Chocolate Mousse. Neither stretched him creatively so after a time they became my domain - along with mixing and serving the pre-dinner drinks. Having licked many bowls and spatula's in the process, I feel as though I can make them blindfolded.

So, with another hot evening to be spent with the Custard Crusaders eating dishes made from Greg & Lucy Malouf's Turquoise, I resisted the temptation to turn on the oven to bake, as I had on New Year's Eve. Looking at a stash of Lindt Milk Chocolate - which doesn't turn me on - and some Bittersweet Lindt couverture - actually my cup of tea - languishing in the cupboard, I invoked my childhood memories to make what my father called in Ching-lish, 'Jiggle-it-Mousie'.

(Cantonese speakers tend to break words down phonetically in to monsyllabic phrases and add '-ie' to the ends of English words. The first word sounds like the Cantonese word for Chocolate.)


This recipe is also similar to my family's chocolate & cognac ice cream recipe, and is an excellent way to use up any Easter Eggs approaching their use-by-date. It is also Coeliac friendly - yes my friend, Gluten Free Gourmet, you can make this too.

Chocolate Mousse
(Serves eight shameless chocoholics)

350g Chocolate - the best you have

4 eggs Separated (if you're using fresh farmers eggs which are small, add in a duck egg or 2 more hen eggs)

2.5 tbsp Grand Marnier or Cointreau

1 tbsp Caster Sugar

250mls Thickened cream

In a bain-marie or a medium sized mixing bowl suspended over a pot of simmering water, melt chocolate until viscous. Remove from heat and add egg yolks, stirring with a spatula. Add Grand Marnier. Stir in.

In another bowl whisk egg whites until soft peaks form then add sugar, whisking until the thick and glossy, but not stiff in the manner of a meringue. Fold a large spoonful of the egg whites into the chocolate until well blended, then fold in the rest until combined.

Whisk cream until thickly whipped and then fold into the chocolate mixture. Spoon evenly into chilled vessels and cover with Glad Wrap. Chill for two hours in the fridge and garnish prior to serving with grated chocolate.

In my childhood it was doled out in ramekins and served with more whipped cream and in the eighties, cointreau drenched berries. Times change, I keep it simple now and use cone shaped bowls or martini glasses with a garnish of bitter chocolate or orange flavoured Iranian fairy Floss. If you want to go 'Molecular', add a white chocolate foam to the top and serve in Duralex glasses with a little Biscotti on the side.

Food For Trees

Restaurant luminaries unite
to fight climate change

Some of the biggest names in Melbourne’s restaurant business have joined forces to help reduce the environmental damage being done by carbon emissions.

Restaurant luminaries today gathered on Wednesday at the Bourke Street icon, Grossi Florentino Restaurant, to launch Food for Trees^TM – a carbon capture scheme that commits the restaurants to tree plantings in and around Melbourne.

The set-up of Food for Trees^TM has been funded by five of the most successful businesses in Victoria’s food and wine industry:

Food for Trees founding members:

Grossi Florentino Restaurant, City

De Bortoli Wines, Yarra Valley

Soul Mamas Restaurant, St Kilda

100 Mile Café, City

All Nations Hotel, Richmond

At Wednesday’s launch, the restaurateurs said they were motivated by a desire to do the right thing by the environment and by their customers.

Leanne De Bortoli – De Bortoli Wines:

“Consumers want and should be able to choose to minimise the environmental impact of everything they do, including eating and drinking. Food for Trees^TM gives customers the choice of environmentally-conscious dining.”

Guy Grossi – Grossi Florentino:

“Most of us in the restaurant industry like to get our hands dirty. Food for Trees^TM is a direct and practical way we can do our bit to reduce the impact of carbon emissions.”

Paul Mathis – 100 Mile Café:

“Many people in the restaurant industry are looking for a way to reduce their impact on the environment. We hope they will join Food for Trees^TM and help us achieve the goal of one million new trees within ten years.”

Trees planted by Food for Trees^TM will be overseen and managed by the Port Philip and Westernport Catchment Authority – a State government authority - ensuring that trees are planted where they will have the greatest environmental impact.

Food for Trees^TM is aiming to plant one million trees within the next 10 years, expecting to capture in the order of 250,000 tons of carbon emissions, as well as cleaning waterways and providing habitat for native wildlife in and around Melbourne.

To kick off the scheme, the founding Food for Trees^TM members are planting approximately three hectares in the Yarra Valley. As well as capturing harmful carbon emissions, the new trees will create a corridor of native habitat, providing homes for wildlife including the Helmeted Honeyeater which is on the brink of extinction. The Helmeted Honeyeater can only be found in Victoria and is the State’s bird emblem. Only 100 of the birds remain, mostly in the Yellingbo State Park near Yarra Junction.

Melbourne’s restaurant patrons will be able to identify Food for Trees^TM members by the Food for Trees^TM logo on restaurant doors and tables, or they can visit http://www.foodfortrees.com.au/ to find Food for Trees^TM members.

Charitable Acts and Ethical Marketing are emerging trends that will proliferate through Food Media over the next ten years. Thanks to our concerns about the changing nature of diets and the integrity of the food we provide our families, the hospitality industry will in many ways lead the charge on a grass roots level and in time consumers and retailers will follow suit.

On a global level, Marketing Moguls have been seeking out local causes for some time that will offset their much criticised consumerism by allocating ethical marketing budgets to be sunk into causes that have synergy with their businesses.

For many years now, Mars & Uncle Bens have been supporting Guide Dogs for the visually impaired. Cigarette Mega brand Phillip Morris has funded Meals on Wheels in some states of the USA and one of American Express' charitable funds supports food education programs for teenagers where they are teamed with local chefs and farmers, who volunteer their time to teach and give hands on experience in the hope of garnering a more positive future.

In last week's New York Times an article entitled Friends with Benefits espoused the generosity of restaurants to charity despite themselves running on 'razor thin margins'. In the best case scenarios this is played out within the local community or with neighbourhood charities.

In the cases of celebrity chefs as much as US$8million has been raised by one US chef's foundation over six years, while less notorious chefs have enjoyed the best success in fundraising when multiple restaurants band together. It also provides a social outlet for hospitality industry personnel faced with the daily pressure cooker environment of running their businesses. Naturally this also provides restaurants with the kind of publicity that 'money can't buy', but although potentially looked upon favourably by the taxman, it isn't always enough to get bums on seats.

The Food For Trees carbon capture program, sees Melbourne restaurants banding together to invest in a cause. This particular one has been initiated by Rob Patten, a Social Worker and Ethical Business Developer. In this scheme they are seeking to enlist other restaurants to join this Not for Profit Organisation by committing an investment to contribute to the planting of a million trees over the next ten years.

They ask nothing of punters than to support the venues involved, so they are asking that you choose to dine responsibly in the venues that support the cause. In return the community will benefit by the carbon offset of emissions created by the tree planting and the restoration of nature corridors that will assist in aiding the fight against climate change by restoring large tracts of bushlands where the original ecological benefits of forestry and wetlands can be restored.

The particular benefits of the Food for Trees scheme are that the plantings are not plantation plantings. They are permanent plantings that won’t be cut down in 10-20 years’ time. They are also plantings that do more than just capture carbon emissions. They will provide native habitats, clean waterways, repair landscapes, increase biodiversity and create a healthier environment for us all to live in. And that means a more sustainable environment for us to produce healthy produce and develop a more positive outlook for future generations.

Although I was overcommited and unable to attend this particular launch, I applaud the passion of the restaurants who have sunk money into getting this program off the ground. The idea that customers will differentiate between an environmentally responsible restaurant and one that is not, is debatable in the current market. I wholeheartedly believe however that there is a segment of the younger community who will embrace this, along with old punks like myself.

For the restaurants that participate there is the opportunity for ongoing PR, Marketing kits, media exposure, events, weblinks and staff planting events which should assist with morale and camaraderie in the workplace as well as capturing a wider audience. At an investment of $4 per tree, I would say that it is worth it, especially when tax considerations are accounted for.

Lets get behind it no matter on which side of the hospitality fence we sit. Food for Trees - Make a meal out of climate change.

For further information visit http://foodfortrees.com.au
Watch the ABC's video taken at the launch here

To measure your carbon footprint, go here.

The crystal ball that cracked.

Out of The Frying Pan, March 3, 2008
Session 2. Clarendon Room A. Langham Hotel.

Food Media Trends 2009-2012. What we will be reading and writing in the next five years?

From Trudi Jenkins
Editor in Chief, VOGUE (or should that be vague) Entertaining and Travel, Delicious

‘I don’t know. I wish I had a crystal ball. I really can’t tell you what we will be writing in the future.’‘

‘Readers trust our publications over things on the Internet. We are the brand custodians, which is why people trust us...

(Later) ....If they lose a magazine or give theirs to a friend, people can also get any of our recipes on our website (taste.com.au) and our readers have a funny little-thing there where they can ask each other questions, but I have no idea about the internet, I’m too old for all of that.’ (She appears to be younger than me)

‘I’m a bit sick of Coeliacs complaining that we don’t publish enough gluten free recipes. I mean really, a little bit of what’s bad won’t hurt you.’

From William Sitwell

Editor, Waitrose Food Illustrated & Editorial Director, Fresh Living.

‘Bloggers are half-wits who can’t write. I hate, hate, Bloggers.’

‘English Chefs are illiterate, can barely write, let alone talk.


From Trevor Eastment
Director of programming and production, The Lifestyle Channels.

‘The TV trend is to real recipes where the technique is fleshed out in real time because so many people don’t have basic cooking skills. TV shows will continue to have entertainment value but will be educational.’

‘Online will steal from Newspapers. Recipes are the most searched for item on the Internet after porn.’

‘Pick & Pay in South Africa are leading the way where you can click on a recipe that you download to your phone and have all the ingredients delivered to your home.’

Have you ever got so hot under the collar that your skin prickles and your heart pounds? I sat in session 2 of Monday’s Out of The Frying Pan feeling distressed and nauseous as my blood pressure rose.

I had naively thought that the panelists at this session of The Age sponsored Melbourne Food and Wine Festival food media event - who also included Julie Gibbs from the Penguin Group (Australia), Publishing Director for Lantern, Viking and Penguin – might actually have some insight into future trends. I thought they might have even prepared some relevent material for the event.

I was wrong.

I - as a Marketer and Advertising Professional - could in fact have offered significantly more insight on the subject that was not able to be discussed by anyone but Trevor Eastment; namely what we will be reading and writing in food media in the next five years.

I know that I was not the only one that was dissatisfied by the session. The lady from Sydney who sat beside me shared my symptoms and was muttering her dissent. We were not alone. Some statements drew muffled gasps from a very polite Melbourne audience of Epicureans.

I began to wonder, what exactly is the criteria for selecting speakers for panels at a Food Media conference?

Quite plainly if you are discussing trends then there should at least be one professional Trendspotter on the panel. Yes, they exist. They do mountains of research at the behest of companies developing new products and advertising. Their skill is to predict the zeitgeist. Thanks to them, I became ‘au fait’ with the current trends discussed in both sessions 1 and 2, more than ten years ago.

The trends cited at the event as new or emerging in both sessions have already been discussed at length online by Bloggers. The panelist’s 'new' was in fact old to those who live and breathe their epicurean passion in the real world, unfettered by the preconceptions brought on by jobs that target ‘Smart, affluent females who enjoy the Luxe Life’. The panelists and moderator obviously were unaware that the example of South African Web 2.0 shopping is already enjoyed in Tasmania on a smaller scale. That via YoMo you can have a discount voucher sent to your phone as you enter a shop.

The day’s events prompted me to wonder how certain people manage to hold senior positions in the media, unchecked by the kind of scrutiny that other professionals might garner within their industries? And yet, these same people have the audacity to pompously sneer at others - who write for their own entertainment online - for not checking their facts, for being ‘half-wits who can’t write’, for being self-important, ignorant and for being destructive, especially because no Editors are involved in the process.

My day job requires me to be significantly more accountable than the media representatives I witnessed - who blatantly thumbed their noses at the Internet and lifted the veil to display their own ignorance.

In instances where I manage a cross platform campaign - which inevitably includes a website and increasingly web 2.0 applications, along with print, press, radio, TV, outdoor advertising, Promotions, events and Direct Marketing – I am expected to have familiarised myself with all aspects of the media I am utilising. Obviously that is not the case at News Limited’s FPC magazines. Like some of them I also write, in addition to design, direct photographic crews, illustrators and TV crews.

My clients have become aware that even when dealing with the affluent, a pompous tone should not be taken. Increasingly these clients are turning their backs on food media publications that charge anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 for a single page ad placement, on top of production costs, because their core customers have stated that they do not trust the print media to be unbiased or correct.

With media circulation of glossy food magazines and newspaper supplements being low – Trudi cited 140,000 for Delicious, Roy Morgan Research puts it at 125,266 – they actually have less hits than some established bloggers do. All too often now people flick past TV ads too using Foxtel IQ and soon, TIVO. Not a problem for me, I know where to place media messages where the right target market will actually see them.

Trevor Eastment was right. Web 2.0 applications are set to usurp food publications. Magazines and Papers along with TV stations are dependent on advertising for their income. The number of articles that appear in a publication are determined by the amount of advertising space sold in that edition.

If advertisers stop placing ads in certain publications - as in the case of The Age’s Epicure, who have a small readership and target the AB Quintile (people who earn $100k+) - because they are of little relevance to a large number of the advertiser's customers, the number of articles published diminish. Ergo Journalists lose their usual income source.

The lesson here is that those in publishing who dismiss the Internet and the kind of content the general food reading public seek out there, are cutting their own throats. To look into the crystal ball of future trends for food media, one only has to explore what is taking shape on the internet.

Meanwhile, those who stubbornly harbour the 'Let them eat cake' mentality may one day find themselves entertaining Madame La Guillotine.

Ok, I've got it out of my system now. Go ahead, hate me.

Thank you Matt Preston for inviting me to join the fray.
I very much appreciate it. Should you need assistance with future events please email me.

L'Oustal. Restaurant Express Menu

The Age Good Food Guide Restaurant Express.
Friday 22 February - Saturday 8 March, 12pm or 1.30pm.

Jump on board The Age Good Food Guide Restaurant Express and head off on this year's foodie rite of passage. Acquire the flavours of Melbourne's monopoly board of restaurants at an unbelievably reasonable price.

Two express courses with a glass of Victorian wine for lunch -at only $30.00, you'll be tempted to stop all stations. Restaurants, cafes and gastro-pubs alike, they've all made it into the annals of The Age Good Food Guide. Board The Age Good Food Guide Restaurant Express and travel the taste-scape of Victoria. Live large in a lunch hour! Dining is available in two sittings at each metropolitan location. One service only at regional locations, times vary. Book your berth now!

Vegetarian options available at all restaurants.

DINE AND WIN!

Every time you lunch at a participating restaurant during The Age Good Food Guide Restaurant Express you can go into the draw to win a free lunch every week for a year at restaurants from the guide! Conditions apply. Details online. Drawn 1 April.

Download a complete list of participating restaurants here.

( UPDATE: This restaurant is no longer open )

Mr Stickyfingers and I enjoy The Melbourne Food & Wine Festival's annual Restaurant Express events. It allows us to try places on our doorstep that we have been procrastinating about and to revisit old favourites without the big ticket expense. Our lunches are a stolen moment in a busy working day, encapsulated in an hour long experience that somehow makes the day go faster and serves to put me in a better disposition for a corporate afternoon.

This week we had a pleasurable meal at L'Oustal in Albert Park. It's a snug, traditional looking brasserie environment in a busy village of left wing affluence by the sea. Seated by the window we watched the passing parade of SUV's disgorging 'Yummy-Mummies' and on the pavement strolling retirees stopped to chat to friends.

When dining out, my beloved and I always share our meals with each other, swapping dishes half way through so as to have the broadest possible experience. We tend to favour entree and main at lunchtime over dessert.

So, we began with an exceptional soup which manifested as more of a veloute in the traditional sense - not as a foam as many seem want to describe their frothy concoctions. It was described as Mussel Chowder and saffron potatoes. We declared it delicious. A velvety soup with a generous addition of saffron was rich with the flavour of mussels. A few in fact garnished the soup as well as dice of potato which seemed to have soaked up the flavour. So good was it that the generous serving of bread brought to the table, was used to wipe the bowl clean.

The terrine, described as Brawn and Sauce Gribiche exemplified simple classic French cookery using offal. The English do something similar, though perhaps a little less subtle, known as Head Cheese. This particular execution was quite dainty and the boiled egg coupled with herbs and capers of the Gribiche offset it well with a piquancy that cut through the richness of the aspic and pork.




The first main course was Fish of the day, crushed potatoes and Bouillabaisse reduction. What appeared to be standard bistro fare was set apart by the deeply flavoured crustacean based sauce. The fragrance of it perfumed the dish but did not overwhelm the fish, which turned out to be seared salmon. I loved the texture of the crushed potato with the flakes of fish, an inspired move when some other bistro’s would have predictably served it with a mash.

The second main course was an acceptable Cassoulet. Considering that it was a very handsome dish, we eagerly anticipated a traditionally rich and earthy bowl of wonder, but although tasty, it disappointingly fell a little short of our expectations. It seemed that the principle elements of beans, Sausage, duck confit and belly pork had been prepared separately but combined at the very end of the process. The taste was lighter than expected and lacked the complexity that the dish acquires when the elements are slow braised as an ensemble.

To our minds the Cassoulet at The French Corner in Highett and the now sadly defunct Vera were vastly superior. Mr Sticky also pointed out that the pork here was a little stringy when it should have relaxed to the point of being melt-in-the-mouth and the parsimonious amount of sausage on the plate, which was not Lyonnaise, could surely have been improved on.



The wines offered as part of the package were an acceptable Zilzie Sauvignon Blanc 2007 and Zilzie Cabernet Sauvignon 2006. I followed the meal with a perfect espresso, which was included in the $30.

As I dodged the SUV's and made my way back to work, I felt sated, refreshed and not overly bloated by our indulgence. The afternoon floated by and the morning stresses had washed away.

L'Oustal 166 Bridport St, Albert Park, Victoria, Australia.
Ph. +613 9699 8969

Food on display. Cafe Greco

"No where is the stomach of the traveller or visitor put in such constant peril as among the cake - inventive housewives and daughters of New England. Such is the universal attention paid to this particular branch of epicurism in these states, that I greatly suspect that some of the Pilgrim Fathers must have come over to the country with the Cookery book under one arm and the Bible under the other."

Charles Joseph Latrobe (1836)

Cafe Greco Crown Casino, Melbourne, Australia.