Showing posts with label Canberra. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Canberra. Show all posts
Wednesday, 6 April 2011
OMG, online at last!
The Canberra Times is finally posting selected food and wine content on line, including reviews. Here it is. I tremble in anticipation.
Saturday, 2 April 2011
Et tu, Flute?
I had to go out to Fyshwick to buy a new dishwasher hose, so of course I had to drop in at the Flute bakery. I got a lovely sourdough loaf, of course, and also picked up some of their Easter range - the hot cross brioche. This is cute, but I don't really recommend them. They're a nice enough little roll of rich dough, but sadly under-spiced to be a proper hot cross bun substitute. The fruit is just sultanas. No currants, and then there's the vexed issue of the mixed peel. Sadly, Flute have gone along with the recent trend to eliminate it. It's just not right having a hot cross bun without that little bitter citrus tang. For the first time, I am disappointed in Flute.
However, on a positive note, That Bagel Place is now making hot cross bagels! I queued up for them in the market this morning, and was not disappointed with them at all. Nicely spiced, and with the odd dot of peel. Yum! It was their "bagel of the week", so we can't count on a re-occurrence. But I do hope they continue baking these until Easter - that would make sense.
However, on a positive note, That Bagel Place is now making hot cross bagels! I queued up for them in the market this morning, and was not disappointed with them at all. Nicely spiced, and with the odd dot of peel. Yum! It was their "bagel of the week", so we can't count on a re-occurrence. But I do hope they continue baking these until Easter - that would make sense.
Sunday, 13 February 2011
Regional Goings On
We've just got back from Goulburn, where we saw some amazing acts at the annual Australian Blues Festival. Pugsley Buzzard is a fabulous pianist, with a voice of gravel. Sorta kinda like a cross between Louis Armstrong, Tom Waits, Fats Waller and Nick Cave; always worth seeing. And we saw the Lemon Squeezing Daddies with new front woman, Perle Noire, who looks and sounds like she's out of Chicago but is actually a Londoner. In the one paid show we went to, Doc Neeson (of the Angels) walked on stage looking oddly like Matt Preston, and delivered a solid blues-rock set, with guitarist Mal Eastwick. New finds from this time are the young Shaun Kirk, from Melbourne and Luna, who it turns out are from Canberra, even though I haven't seen them around here yet.
In food news, we ate at the Tatts one night, which is pretty standard pub grub. They do a decent burger and a cook your own steak; the scotch fillet I had was great, very tender. The salad bar was decent, with good fresh greens but I'd steer clear of the curry coleslaw if I were you. The other night we ate at the Goulburn Workers Club, which is pretty standard club grub. A decent salt and pepper squid, a slightly odd caesar salad with whole lettuce leaves and no egg, and a big slice of garlic bread instead of croutons. Also no anchovies, but I don't even expect anchovies in a Caesar these days.
Cafe Book is our first choice option for breakfast, with a fairly standard bacon and egg breakfast. The menu is nothing remarkable, but the food is all fresh and hot and well cooked. You get service with a smile, and a huge wall of second hand books for sale. And enormous smoothies. The bakery up the road near the Big Merino is not bad, either, and do a nice sourdough and a good cornbread. In both cases, it helps to order the coffee extra strong. What is it with country towns and weak coffee?
Meanwhile, back in Canberra, the Handmade Upmarket is back next weekend. This thing just keeps growing and growing. It's a market for regional craftspeople, and the goods for sale include a decent selection of food, as well as all the jewelery, clothes, bags and so on. It outgrew the Albert Hall, then the Yarralumla Woolshed and the Kamberra Wine centre, and have now moved to the National Convention Centre. Saturday 19th February, from 11am. They're also running a shop, on the Boulevard near the former Electric Shadows, but the range there is naturally much smaller. As well as the crafty stuff, they stock some good chockies from Lindsay & Edmunds and the Curious Chocolatier.
By the way, pARTy cakes will be there, and donating 25% of their profits to ovarian cancer research. So get in there and eat cake. I've bought cupcakes from them before; they are very good.
In food news, we ate at the Tatts one night, which is pretty standard pub grub. They do a decent burger and a cook your own steak; the scotch fillet I had was great, very tender. The salad bar was decent, with good fresh greens but I'd steer clear of the curry coleslaw if I were you. The other night we ate at the Goulburn Workers Club, which is pretty standard club grub. A decent salt and pepper squid, a slightly odd caesar salad with whole lettuce leaves and no egg, and a big slice of garlic bread instead of croutons. Also no anchovies, but I don't even expect anchovies in a Caesar these days.
Cafe Book is our first choice option for breakfast, with a fairly standard bacon and egg breakfast. The menu is nothing remarkable, but the food is all fresh and hot and well cooked. You get service with a smile, and a huge wall of second hand books for sale. And enormous smoothies. The bakery up the road near the Big Merino is not bad, either, and do a nice sourdough and a good cornbread. In both cases, it helps to order the coffee extra strong. What is it with country towns and weak coffee?
Meanwhile, back in Canberra, the Handmade Upmarket is back next weekend. This thing just keeps growing and growing. It's a market for regional craftspeople, and the goods for sale include a decent selection of food, as well as all the jewelery, clothes, bags and so on. It outgrew the Albert Hall, then the Yarralumla Woolshed and the Kamberra Wine centre, and have now moved to the National Convention Centre. Saturday 19th February, from 11am. They're also running a shop, on the Boulevard near the former Electric Shadows, but the range there is naturally much smaller. As well as the crafty stuff, they stock some good chockies from Lindsay & Edmunds and the Curious Chocolatier.
By the way, pARTy cakes will be there, and donating 25% of their profits to ovarian cancer research. So get in there and eat cake. I've bought cupcakes from them before; they are very good.
Sunday, 6 February 2011
Developments, mostly in Dickson
The non-Dickson developments are that I've given the blog a super-quick facelift with a standard blogger template. And I've taken up twittering. You can follow me at @CathCanCook if you feel so inclined. I'm not tweeting a lot, since my phone doesn't currently support it, but definitely more than I'm blogging at the moment!
Here's the few new points of note around Dickson.
An Asian supermarket, Asian Quay, has opened on Challis St, where MalAdjusted used to be. If you're worried by this news, do not fear! Mal's lovely bicycle shop has just moved around the corner. It's now in the square behind Zeffirellis. You'll also find a new cafe/bar here, by the name of Dzire, where the much lamented TurkOz used to be. I haven't tried this one out yet, but I will try to get there soon. They have a website at http://www.dzire.com.au but it's just a stub at the moment.
Asian Quay is a bit different from the other Asian grocers around the area. They seem to stock a lot more vegetarian ingredients than most - veggie versions of instant noodles, oyster sauce, and fake meats from TVP to soy "duck necks". There's also a wider range of sweets, especially icecreams and other frozen desserts. But the veggie section is very minimal; Saigon is still far and away the best for fruit and veg.
Finally, there is a new butcher, imaginatively titled "The Butcher Shop". It's near Woolworths, in the square in the corner. From Woollies, go past the chemist and jeweler, and look to the right, across from the Shiny Things Shop. (Not its real name.) They're in the new tradition of butchers, with house-made sausages and ready made kebabs and marinated ready-to-go roasts. They stock King Island beef. I haven't checked all the details about what's local and what's free range yet, but I can say that the sausages, silverside and lamb chops that I've had so far have all been top quality.
Here's the few new points of note around Dickson.
An Asian supermarket, Asian Quay, has opened on Challis St, where MalAdjusted used to be. If you're worried by this news, do not fear! Mal's lovely bicycle shop has just moved around the corner. It's now in the square behind Zeffirellis. You'll also find a new cafe/bar here, by the name of Dzire, where the much lamented TurkOz used to be. I haven't tried this one out yet, but I will try to get there soon. They have a website at http://www.dzire.com.au but it's just a stub at the moment.
Asian Quay is a bit different from the other Asian grocers around the area. They seem to stock a lot more vegetarian ingredients than most - veggie versions of instant noodles, oyster sauce, and fake meats from TVP to soy "duck necks". There's also a wider range of sweets, especially icecreams and other frozen desserts. But the veggie section is very minimal; Saigon is still far and away the best for fruit and veg.
Finally, there is a new butcher, imaginatively titled "The Butcher Shop". It's near Woolworths, in the square in the corner. From Woollies, go past the chemist and jeweler, and look to the right, across from the Shiny Things Shop. (Not its real name.) They're in the new tradition of butchers, with house-made sausages and ready made kebabs and marinated ready-to-go roasts. They stock King Island beef. I haven't checked all the details about what's local and what's free range yet, but I can say that the sausages, silverside and lamb chops that I've had so far have all been top quality.
Wednesday, 12 January 2011
Coo, lumme!
Coo is a little Japanese restaurant on East Row, up the London Circuit end. It's run by the same people as Iori, and they seem to have maintained their tradition of hiring sweet, friendly but vaguely confused Japanese students as staff. They also share a website - here is Coo's section.
The routine here at lunchtime is that you rock up to the front counter, order and pay. The menu is posted all over the wall, and there's a lot more to choose than is shown on their website's lunch menu. You can have your lunch to take away, or eat in with no price difference. If you choose to eat in, you then go through the curtain, clutching a card with your table number, and also any bits of your lunch that have come out of the cold storage at the front. Behind the curtain there's a lot of small tables, a licensed bar with sake and Japanese beer and some odd fruity slushy mocktails. There's also more menu items on the wall, and a TV playing bizarre Japanese shows - while we were there it was Tokyo shock boys, pretty autumn travelogues, and sumo wrestling.
The sushi and sashimi plate ($8.50) is the normal variety you'd get from many a takeaway place. Tuna, salmon, some white fish, a couple of cucumber rolls, a cooked prawn, a piece of California roll. It was all good, and to my surprise a small cup of light green tea and a styrofoam cup of white miso soup turned up to accompany it. My friend had a white pork noodle soup - there are many to choose from, with ramen, udon or soba and a bewildering variety of stocks and accompaniments. To add to the difficulty of choice, you can have combos - a half serve of soup and something else like a tonkatsu, tempura, or sushi selection. Large bento boxes, whether eat in or take away, run at about $12.
The food is very good, and the lunchtime service very quick. We will definitely be back for more. I'm pleased about this, as I love Japanese food. Last year, when they had recently opened, we had a bad evening with ridiculously slow service. We tried to grab a quick bite of sushi before a show, but nothing arrived for 45 minutes! I can now hope that this was just teething pains - this lunch experience bodes very well.
The routine here at lunchtime is that you rock up to the front counter, order and pay. The menu is posted all over the wall, and there's a lot more to choose than is shown on their website's lunch menu. You can have your lunch to take away, or eat in with no price difference. If you choose to eat in, you then go through the curtain, clutching a card with your table number, and also any bits of your lunch that have come out of the cold storage at the front. Behind the curtain there's a lot of small tables, a licensed bar with sake and Japanese beer and some odd fruity slushy mocktails. There's also more menu items on the wall, and a TV playing bizarre Japanese shows - while we were there it was Tokyo shock boys, pretty autumn travelogues, and sumo wrestling.
The sushi and sashimi plate ($8.50) is the normal variety you'd get from many a takeaway place. Tuna, salmon, some white fish, a couple of cucumber rolls, a cooked prawn, a piece of California roll. It was all good, and to my surprise a small cup of light green tea and a styrofoam cup of white miso soup turned up to accompany it. My friend had a white pork noodle soup - there are many to choose from, with ramen, udon or soba and a bewildering variety of stocks and accompaniments. To add to the difficulty of choice, you can have combos - a half serve of soup and something else like a tonkatsu, tempura, or sushi selection. Large bento boxes, whether eat in or take away, run at about $12.
The food is very good, and the lunchtime service very quick. We will definitely be back for more. I'm pleased about this, as I love Japanese food. Last year, when they had recently opened, we had a bad evening with ridiculously slow service. We tried to grab a quick bite of sushi before a show, but nothing arrived for 45 minutes! I can now hope that this was just teething pains - this lunch experience bodes very well.
Saturday, 20 November 2010
Ave atque Vale
Hail to the Spring! I got to the growers' market for the first time this season, and it's obviously spring. Fresh new asparagus, garlic, cheap new snow peas and sugar snaps, early heirloom tomatoes, broad beans, mulberries and blueberries - and the first of the stone fruits are in. I didn't queue for a tray of nectarines, but I did buy cherries and blueberries.
Today's breakfast: watermelon, rose petal and green almond jam (from Silo), on buttered sourdough, with a side of fresh cherries and a small fresh squeezed OJ. *bliss*
Farewell to winter. The last of the oranges were there in profusion, and a stall selling fresh squeezed juice. A young chap up the back of the stall was pouring it from the juicer into bottles for easy takeaway. Borenore still has lovely apples from the cold store; it will still be two months for the new season.
And while I haven't been blogging I've noticed a few good things pass. So I'll tip the hat in sorrowful farewell to them now. My favourite pho place, Huong Viet, is now long gone and replaced with a pizza place. The wonderful TurkOz of Dickson has gone, to my great sorrow - they did the best pide in town, possibly excepting Mawson which is a bit far for me to go regularly. And in Manuka, Ironbark has folded, so there's no more of their wonderful native Australian foods - if you want a boab shoot salad or a bunya nut felafel, you'll have to seek out the ingredients and make it yourself. I'm also sad about the departure of El Torogoz, with its authentic central American cuisine. Goodbye and good luck!
Today's breakfast: watermelon, rose petal and green almond jam (from Silo), on buttered sourdough, with a side of fresh cherries and a small fresh squeezed OJ. *bliss*
Farewell to winter. The last of the oranges were there in profusion, and a stall selling fresh squeezed juice. A young chap up the back of the stall was pouring it from the juicer into bottles for easy takeaway. Borenore still has lovely apples from the cold store; it will still be two months for the new season.
And while I haven't been blogging I've noticed a few good things pass. So I'll tip the hat in sorrowful farewell to them now. My favourite pho place, Huong Viet, is now long gone and replaced with a pizza place. The wonderful TurkOz of Dickson has gone, to my great sorrow - they did the best pide in town, possibly excepting Mawson which is a bit far for me to go regularly. And in Manuka, Ironbark has folded, so there's no more of their wonderful native Australian foods - if you want a boab shoot salad or a bunya nut felafel, you'll have to seek out the ingredients and make it yourself. I'm also sad about the departure of El Torogoz, with its authentic central American cuisine. Goodbye and good luck!
Sunday, 6 June 2010
Handmade Food
The handmade market was on yesterday. If you haven't discovered these already, you should check them out! I'm a huge fan. The market seems to have found a stable venue at the Kamberra Wine Centre, after outgrowing the Albert Hall and trying out the Yarralumla Woolshed. The next one will be 11th September - a great chance to start your Xmas shopping. But if you want to get in earlier, there's now also a shop in Civic which has a good selection of the various designers' wares.The philosophy of Handmade is that the stuff it sells is, well, handmade. It is to local arts and crafts people what the Growers' market is to to local farmers and small food producers. You'll find cards, books, quilts and quilt supplies, felted gear, handmade clothes, bags, teapots, jewelry, slippers and much more. This is the first time that I did not come home with a piece of jewelry by cardog. But I did get a new top by Wendy Leigh - it's made of stretch dark green rayon ribbed velvet, with a black knit cowl neck and a small black lacy sequinned feature.
And then there's the food! Well, here's the full list. Most of them will be familiar if you go to the EPIC and Kingston markets. There's a mix of people selling things to take home and things to eat there. The large area out the back had plenty of seating, an entertainer making balloon animals for the kids, and lots of yummy food for sale. Gourmet pizza and sausages and muffins and more. Also, for the grown-ups, there's Zierholz beer, and local wines and spirits. I wasn't entirely persuaded by the Grog Shed, run by Wombat Heights Liqueurs. I'm not a fan of fruit wines, but if you are, why not give it the walnut rum and cherry port a try.
And scattered through the front open air markets and the indoor stalls were many other food producers. The Curious Chocolatier was there, and I bought a bar of dark choc with walnuts and honey. She makes mostly bars rather than individual pieces, in some very unusual flavours. Coffee and fennel, anyone? Strawberry and Szechuan pepper? There was Lindsey and Edmunds, too, and the Lime Grove and Homeleigh Grove people, and some people making popcorn and caramelised nuts (not together, though I must ask why not?)
And cupcakes - there was not one but two cupcake makers. The ones illustrated are amazing pieces of fondant and buttercream art, from Liz Wright at pARTycakes. I had to buy some for arvo tea - a friend was making a flying visit to Canberra for lawyer and accountant reasons, and a good cup of tea and a cupcake was clearly needed. (And a martini, but that's The Bloke's specialty.) The cakes are not just decorative, but also good to eat. Thankfully, Wright's fondant isn't so sweet as to make you gag, as some are. The cakes themselves are on the solid mudcake side rather than fluffy sponge, good moist rich chocolate and caramel flavours. At $25 for six, these are special occasion cakes.
The other cupcake seller's wares were a little cheaper at $4 per cake, and less dramatically artistic in presentation. They were topped with simple buttercream swirls. But they are good cake - I had a passionfruit one, also quite dense and moist. These are made by A Moment on The Lips, who will deliver you a dozen cupcakes, as well as do more arty things. Check out the gorgeous cupcake bouquets on their website! And they had a very cute fondant sculpted baby dragon and egg cake on display.
The other stuff that I bought was from Crankypants - I know they're regulars at Kingston, but for some reason I don't make it there often enough. I got some proper piccalilli, lemon curd, and smoky caramelised onions. The onions were great topping homemade steak sangers last night. Lemon curd on crumpets for breakfast, and a cheese, tomato and piccalilli sandwich for lunch. Yum.
Wednesday, 10 February 2010
ONA Coffee
This has been popping up all over town recently, but the home site is in Belconnen, obscurely tucked into the Benjamin Offices, Aqua building level 3. It's open to the public and a walking ramp goes up there from the big carpark up the back. Ostensibly a normal Public Service lunch spot, this is actually something quite special. Great coffee! In Canberra!
They seem to have quite a big business going - apart from the cafe, there's roasting and distributing coffee complete with cafe fitout, and office lunch catering. The cafe has some flyers which are, sadly, very desperately in need of a good proof-read. Even their slogan "Pure Decadence" is spelt wrong. And who knew that a coffee company might need barristers? Their baristas have been winning awards, for espresso as well as for coffee art, but their barristers' achievements seem unsung. And don't get me started on the apostrophes and the cemicals and the ceaser salad.
Oh well, with coffee this good, what more do they need? Apparently, a curry chef! There's a curry of the day ($10) every weekday, and it's made in house from their own fresh ground spice blends. I had lunch there on Monday with infoaddict, who had a red beef curry - not a Thai red style, it was more rendang like. Thick, rich, spicy, with a nice chilli bite, it was terrific. I got her to pick me up a takeaway on Tuesday, which turned out to be a green Thai veggie curry - again rich, thick, and with enough chilli to bite back. Perfect to reheat for an instant dinner. Yum.
Monday, 8 February 2010
Internet blackout week is over
...and I'm going to pretend that's why I didn't post last week. Not that I was too busy playing games, or drinking too many martinis, or going to work, or too busy doing Canberra Times stuff or anything. Not at all. Lalalala internet blackout week.Last week's food highlight was that I finally managed to visit Ellacure. For a couple of years it's been a favourite of several people I know, and yet I never got there. But now it's just round the corner from me. I had lunch there with infoaddict last week, and this pic is my amazing green veggie risotto with pesto and spinach and asparagus ($18). It was very delicious, as long as you enjoy a light style - not so creamy and cheesy as risottos often are. But lots of good strongly flavoured bits and pieces.
Infoaddict had the open chicken BLT ($16), which came with some rather nice chips and a mustard aioli. We had coffees ($3.50), and they are also pretty good, especially by Canberra standards. It's not the cheapest place, but it's a nice spot, with quite a long winelist and a smart casual look. There are bigger meals up around $30, and fancy desserts around $14 - fine dining prices!
The Canberra Times last year mentioned it as being a spot to check out the AIS students. It is near the AIS, on Braybrooke & Battye Sts, Bruce. But I think the AIS crowd must be there on weekends, when they have a breakfast menu. On a Wednesday lunchtime, it was rather full of middle aged public servants, mostly female. Sadly no young lycra clad extra-fit chaps on show.
The service was good - quick enough for a work lunch, and when I didn't like my Virgin Mary they remade it for me without any fuss. Seriously, does this look like tomato juice to you? It's their house style, the waiter said - so the bartender must just absolutely LOVE Worcestershire sauce. I've never seen such a brown one before. Anyway, it was nice and I'll cheerfully go back for a moderately special lunch, like a birthday or something. Pizza, pasta and risottos all come in around $15-20. And the breakfasts seem quite appealling, though not overly different to the usual cafe. Free range eggs, bacon, haloumi, chorizo, banana bread, french toast, that sort of thing.
Wednesday, 27 January 2010
Revisiting
There's a few places that I've avoided for some time, not liking either their food or their attitude. But I revisited a couple of them last week, and was pleased to find improvements.
Carlo's at Watson is one of them. I had a very pleasant pre-rehearsal brunch there with B1, and enjoyed a mango & passionfruit frappe ($5) and a "half" breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon and tomato. The food arrived in good time. The radio in the kitchen wasn't set to deafening levels, and there wasn't even a powerful smell of cooking oil! Even more miraculous, the waitress was polite and helpful, and she even went and organised an off-menu side order for B1. Incredible!
I shall put Carlo's back on my list of possibles. OK, the breakfast was a tiny bit overdone - the scrambled eggs were a bit watery - but I like my bacon crisp and my tomatoes well done, so no great harm. Carlo's has usually had pretty good food - I like the buckwheat pancakes particularly - but in the past I've had such terrible service that I haven't gone back in 5 years. This was such a huge improvement on my previous experiences there, I'm quite delighted. They still won't split bills, though.
The other place I revisited was Taj Agra in Dickson. In their case, the service was never a problem, it was the food. I had a couple of very oily and bland curries,from them shortly after they opened. One also had very gristly meat. I was completely put off, and even a second try didn't improve it, so I crossed them off my list.
But last week the Bloke and I decided to give them another go for a quick post-rehearsal dinner, and they are now back on. We ordered a beef saag and an aloo cholay, with naan and raita, and it was very nice indeed. We asked for medium heat, and that was pleasant for us, but also the cholay (chickpeas) were interestingly spiced under the heat. The beef was lean and tender, if a little bit dry, and its spinach puree sauce was tasty. Neither sauce was at all greasy. I still think that Bollywood is nicer - a bit classier presentation, a bit better cooking. But they are also a bit more expensive, and often full.
Carlo's at Watson is one of them. I had a very pleasant pre-rehearsal brunch there with B1, and enjoyed a mango & passionfruit frappe ($5) and a "half" breakfast of scrambled eggs, bacon and tomato. The food arrived in good time. The radio in the kitchen wasn't set to deafening levels, and there wasn't even a powerful smell of cooking oil! Even more miraculous, the waitress was polite and helpful, and she even went and organised an off-menu side order for B1. Incredible!
I shall put Carlo's back on my list of possibles. OK, the breakfast was a tiny bit overdone - the scrambled eggs were a bit watery - but I like my bacon crisp and my tomatoes well done, so no great harm. Carlo's has usually had pretty good food - I like the buckwheat pancakes particularly - but in the past I've had such terrible service that I haven't gone back in 5 years. This was such a huge improvement on my previous experiences there, I'm quite delighted. They still won't split bills, though.
The other place I revisited was Taj Agra in Dickson. In their case, the service was never a problem, it was the food. I had a couple of very oily and bland curries,from them shortly after they opened. One also had very gristly meat. I was completely put off, and even a second try didn't improve it, so I crossed them off my list.
But last week the Bloke and I decided to give them another go for a quick post-rehearsal dinner, and they are now back on. We ordered a beef saag and an aloo cholay, with naan and raita, and it was very nice indeed. We asked for medium heat, and that was pleasant for us, but also the cholay (chickpeas) were interestingly spiced under the heat. The beef was lean and tender, if a little bit dry, and its spinach puree sauce was tasty. Neither sauce was at all greasy. I still think that Bollywood is nicer - a bit classier presentation, a bit better cooking. But they are also a bit more expensive, and often full.
Monday, 11 January 2010
Ramz at Dickson, and other things
On Saturday I was off at my favourite Asian grocer, Saigon, buying bean sprouts and gai lan and such. It's my favourite because they have great fresh veggies and fruit there (deliveries Friday and Tuesday arvos, IIRC). I got some weird looking pink fruits, that I think are Australian water-roseapples. And almost next door, there is a new grocery called Ramz Spice Mart.Ramz fills a gap in Dickson. We've got plenty of Vietnamese and Chinese grocers, and they tend to stock other south-east Asian goodies, but this new one is an Indian specialist. It's run by a Fijian Indian family, who are new to Canberra, and I wish them success.
They stock every kind of dahl you could want, several of them in flour form, too. And huge bags of rice and a great array of chutneys and pickles and spices galore, of course. And the odd things Fijians seem to want, like tinned corned mutton. There's also a freezer with Fijian reef fish and goat meat, as well as samosas and other snacks, and a good selection of frozen vegetables. There's drumsticks and mehti leaves and karela and other more common things. And paneer in the fridge. (See recipe at end.)
It's not a huge shop, like the supermarket in Belconnen, but they still have room for a few oddities. There's a small rack of shiny sequinned bags and sandals and clothes up the back; and some cosmetics and cookware on the shelves.
Speaking of Dickson, Woollies seems to have finally finished their "upgrades". I'm not thrilled. It's bigger since they've moved the grog shop out, but the aisles are narrower. And they've got those annoying self-checkouts replacing most of the old express queue. I would not mind those so much if I didn't have to get help every damn time I use them. I tend to commit sins like not putting my two mangoes down at exactly the same split second, or trying to use a non-standard bag. I find them very irritating. Also irritating is the change to coin-op trolleys. I've never stolen a trolley before, in fact I never even thought of it. But now I really really want to. I have no idea what I'd do with it, I'm just a contrary type.
Now we've got that out of the way, what do we do with paneer? Mattar paneer is a classic, and the paneer packet had a recipe on the label. But because I had spinach (half from Woollies and half from the garden) I made a mixed Mattar Saag Paneer. So there.
Recipe: Mattar Paneer with extra greens
250g Sharma's Kitchen Paneer (or any paneer)
2 medium onions
5 cloves garlic
large thumb sized knob of ginger
1 tblsp coriander seeds
2 green chillies
1 tin tomatoes, crushed
1 cup plain yoghurt
1 tsp cornflour
1 tsp turmeric
2 fresh green chillies, or chilli powder to taste
pinch salt
4 bay leaves
1 1/2 cups water
1/4 cup ghee or vegetable oil
250g frozen peas
4 cups fresh spinach, chopped
chopped coriander leaves
* Puree one onion, the fresh chillies (if using), garlic and ginger and the coriander seeds, with just a dash of water.
* Soak the paneer in hot water for a couple of minutes, then cube.
* Heat the oil and fry the paneer until golden.
* Remove paneer and drain.
* Add the second onion, chopped, to the pan with the bay leaves, and fry until golden.
* Add the puree and the turmeric and fry until oil starts to separate.
* Add yoghurt, tomato, cornflour, chilli powder (if using) and salt and stir very well.
* Stir constantly until it returns to a simmer.
* Add paneer and the water.
* Simmer gently for 20 minutes.
* Add peas and spinach, and return to a simmer for 5 minutes.
* Sprinkle with plenty of chopped fresh coriander to serve.
Notes: I wanted to link to the website, http://sharmaskitchen.com.au but they seem to be down right now.
Anyway, this isn't very much modified from the original. I added the extra greens, as I mentioned. Also, the cornflour is mine - it helps to stop the yoghurt curdling. And the option of chilli powder instead of fresh chilli. I also reduced the oil from 1/2 cup to 1/4 cup, and I'm not quite sure that was right - the paneer stuck to the pan a bit.
But it was yummy, and also very creamy despite the fact that I used low fat Greek yoghurt. Definitely worth doing again.
Friday, 8 January 2010
Back again
We've finished the first week back at work, and tonight we're celebrating with a G&T or two, a scratch dinner of leftovers, and Children of Earth just finished on the telly. An early night with a book to follow - the bloke has a Mike Carey and I have a Robert Harris. And a sleep-in tomorrow. It's been a hard Xmas, and parts of it were rather horrible, so I'm pretty glad it's over. Even if that does mean going back to work.
The week in cooking has been quite minimal - a curry from the freezer, a bolognese spaghetti sauce from the freezer, hot dogs with coleslaw, and a quick bite at Tien, a Vietnamese place in Dickson that opened late last year. The curry was very nice - I'll put more about that up for my next post.
Tien was rather good, too. I had the pancake stuffed with prawns and minced pork (about $14). Tasty food, the pancake is more eggy than a western style pancake, almost an omelet. It came with lots of fresh salad including some Vietnamese herbs that I don't know the names of. The Bloke had a chilli basil chicken stirfry - very fresh and light, with lots of crisp onion and carrot. We'll be going back there, for sure. In fact I have a cunning plan involving their steamboat...
I haven't managed to get myself moving very fast in the mornings yet, and I've been eating breakfast at my desk around 10am. Bring in some fruit and a peanut butter sandwich, and I'm set. Or failing sandwich making time, eat a muesli bar from the stash at work. But I exhausted that stash on Thursday, and I tried to restock at As Nature Intended at the Belco market.
I was out there having lunch with infoaddict at Beppe's - a favourite cafe of mine, they serve one of the best coffees in town. It's a drive rather than a walk for lunch, but Momo and Plunge are both closed this week. I picked up some good fruit from Wiffens, but the muesli bar shopping did not go well. The range at As Nature Intended is very small, probably because it's all organic. I bought one box from each brand, the Norganics blueberry and the Aribar raspberry.
Norganics is available widely in supermarkets, and I find them tolerable. A bit too sweet for me, but still it has chewy oats, dried blueberries and an appley tang, and it's made in Australia. I give it a credit grade. The Aribar, on the other hand... utter fail. The ingredients of wholegrain brown rice and raspberries sound fine. But I really should have checked more carefully. In the fine print, all is revealed. Norganics: 16.1g sugars/100g. Aribar: 32.8g/100g. Yes, it's unbearably sweet, and on top of that, it's made in Canada. Shipping right across the world, what a waste! Not that I'm a total local food purist; I am happy to buy imports of true specialties like real maple syrup. But there was no point to this import at all. I could easily have made a batch of chocolate crackles at home, to very much the same effect. And no, I wouldn't want them for breakfast, either.
The week in cooking has been quite minimal - a curry from the freezer, a bolognese spaghetti sauce from the freezer, hot dogs with coleslaw, and a quick bite at Tien, a Vietnamese place in Dickson that opened late last year. The curry was very nice - I'll put more about that up for my next post.
Tien was rather good, too. I had the pancake stuffed with prawns and minced pork (about $14). Tasty food, the pancake is more eggy than a western style pancake, almost an omelet. It came with lots of fresh salad including some Vietnamese herbs that I don't know the names of. The Bloke had a chilli basil chicken stirfry - very fresh and light, with lots of crisp onion and carrot. We'll be going back there, for sure. In fact I have a cunning plan involving their steamboat...
I haven't managed to get myself moving very fast in the mornings yet, and I've been eating breakfast at my desk around 10am. Bring in some fruit and a peanut butter sandwich, and I'm set. Or failing sandwich making time, eat a muesli bar from the stash at work. But I exhausted that stash on Thursday, and I tried to restock at As Nature Intended at the Belco market.
I was out there having lunch with infoaddict at Beppe's - a favourite cafe of mine, they serve one of the best coffees in town. It's a drive rather than a walk for lunch, but Momo and Plunge are both closed this week. I picked up some good fruit from Wiffens, but the muesli bar shopping did not go well. The range at As Nature Intended is very small, probably because it's all organic. I bought one box from each brand, the Norganics blueberry and the Aribar raspberry.
Norganics is available widely in supermarkets, and I find them tolerable. A bit too sweet for me, but still it has chewy oats, dried blueberries and an appley tang, and it's made in Australia. I give it a credit grade. The Aribar, on the other hand... utter fail. The ingredients of wholegrain brown rice and raspberries sound fine. But I really should have checked more carefully. In the fine print, all is revealed. Norganics: 16.1g sugars/100g. Aribar: 32.8g/100g. Yes, it's unbearably sweet, and on top of that, it's made in Canada. Shipping right across the world, what a waste! Not that I'm a total local food purist; I am happy to buy imports of true specialties like real maple syrup. But there was no point to this import at all. I could easily have made a batch of chocolate crackles at home, to very much the same effect. And no, I wouldn't want them for breakfast, either.
Sunday, 13 December 2009
Marketing again
I made it to the Growers' Market again yesterday. They now have flyers with the times. There are two markets left this year:
* Saturday 19th December 2009 8am to 11am; and
* Wednesday 23rd December 2009 Twilight Market 4pm to 7pm.
And then next year they resume on 16 Jan.
In stock at the moment, there is lot of stone fruit, especially cherries. Some early peaches and apricots are out. New season garlic is also in, with big braids of purple, white, Russian and elephant garlic featuring all over the place.
I stocked up on cherries, and bought a few plumcots. Otherwise, I mostly bought bread and meat and salad, as I have too many veggies in the crisper needing to be used up. A good veggie curry seems like the plan for that - and I bought some hoggett chops to make a meat one. I'm also planning a noodle stirfry with fresh beansprouts and the remains of last week's herbs, and I picked up some frozen ravioli. I've got the old tomatoes and a head of new garlic in the oven to roast for a sauce.
I'm intending to go to the Xmas twilight market for a big stock up on Xmas fruit and veg. Maybe flex off work a little early if I can manage it. (Ooh, the novelty of flex!) I'll have family in town by then, so I can take them along, and nonchalantly point out Lindsay and Edmunds, and Robin Rowe...
* Saturday 19th December 2009 8am to 11am; and
* Wednesday 23rd December 2009 Twilight Market 4pm to 7pm.
And then next year they resume on 16 Jan.
In stock at the moment, there is lot of stone fruit, especially cherries. Some early peaches and apricots are out. New season garlic is also in, with big braids of purple, white, Russian and elephant garlic featuring all over the place.
I stocked up on cherries, and bought a few plumcots. Otherwise, I mostly bought bread and meat and salad, as I have too many veggies in the crisper needing to be used up. A good veggie curry seems like the plan for that - and I bought some hoggett chops to make a meat one. I'm also planning a noodle stirfry with fresh beansprouts and the remains of last week's herbs, and I picked up some frozen ravioli. I've got the old tomatoes and a head of new garlic in the oven to roast for a sauce.
I'm intending to go to the Xmas twilight market for a big stock up on Xmas fruit and veg. Maybe flex off work a little early if I can manage it. (Ooh, the novelty of flex!) I'll have family in town by then, so I can take them along, and nonchalantly point out Lindsay and Edmunds, and Robin Rowe...
Friday, 25 September 2009
Rocksalt and freekeh
B1 has been sick for some time, but she's finally out of bed. To celebrate her recovery we had lunch at Rocksalt in the Hawker shops. It was terrifically good, and I'd recommend it highly. It's modern Australian fine dining, with a relaxed casual edge.
Actually, we've liked this place for a long time, and I've been a little puzzled by the occasional bad reviews online. Perhaps the service was erratic in the past, and we were always lucky. If you had a bad time before, do try it again - the management is new this year. Co-owner and maitre d' Geoff is a charming character. We chatted with him quite a bit yesterday - the lunch trade was very light, so he had time.
We started with light meals, to save room for dessert. B1 had a beetroot and kipfler potato salad ($18), B2 went for the crispy tofu with green salad. (Both $18 in small sizes, mains for $28 I think, I didn't record it.) I had a goat ragout with housemade gnocchi, last chance before the spring menu changes come in. I'm quite attracted to wintry food at the moment. I've been making baked puddings, for instance. It must be that "last chance for the year" effect.
We all enjoyed our mains very much. They were well-balanced and interestingly complex without fussiness. I had a lovely Tasmanian pinot noir with mine, and B1 and B2 split a glass of Innocent Bystander pink moscato - and yes, Geoff was happy to split a one glass serve into two glasses. He's quite the wine buff, and an enthusiast for the Canberra region wines. When we had dessert, he gave us a sample of a local sticky - and again I neglected to record what it was. Maybe the Lerida Estate Botrytis Pinot Gris? He's trying to find the best match for B2's dessert - a divine pannacotta with banana walnut bread and caramel sauce - and was keen to get our feedback.
It was a good match, and I thought it went pretty well with my hazelnut creme brulee, too. I was impressed with that - I love a good creme brulee, but I find that fancy flavoured ones can often be overdone. This was beautiful - a rich custard with a good clear unfussy hazelnut flavour. A sprinkle of hazelnut praline on side, and a house-made frangelico icecream were excellent complements.
While you may not get quite the same level of personal service when the place is busier, I'm sure it will be good with Geoff at the helm. And they make a very good coffee, too. Ah, coffee - there's one advantage to going out to lunch. I can't drink coffee at night, so I always miss it when I review. And the final note, a little melting moment petit four was delightfully melting and lemony.
Our gud wimminz day out to celebrate the rising of the near-dead continued after lunch, with a spot of shopping. We went to Jammo, where B1 bought some new skirts at Cassidy's and B2 picked up a few cheap plants from Aldi. And we toured a new food shop. Fresh Mart offers middle eastern foods, including fresh baked goods. The young man at the counter was the baker, and he gave us a sample cookie. I was a bit full to appreciate it properly, but it was light and lovely.
The grocery range includes the fresh baked middle eastern pastries and biscuits, and several breads - Afghan, Turkish, Lebanese. There's a hot box of roasted nuts and seeds, and interesting cheeses in the fridge. Plenty of pulses, both bagged and tinned, and syrups of rose, date, tamarind and more. It's not quite the Aladdin's cave that you get in Mawson at Cedars of Lebanon, but it's definitely worth a visit if you're a northsider.
I resisted the temptation of the baklava and almond shortbread and bought some novelties. A Lebanese honey of orange blossom and spring flowers from Jabal el Sheikh, and a box of freekeh from Jordan.
Freekeh? Wut? Well, I have seen this mentioned on the internet and SBS, but I have not until now seen it in real life. It's roasted green wheat, and can be used as a side dish like rice or couscous. The instructions on the box are in beautiful Engrish. The idea is that you wash it, pan-fry in butter for a few minutes, then add twice its volume in stock and cook on "calm fire" for half an hour. Then "serve the FREEK in rather big plate putting the meat or chicken on the top.Then throw roated almond or pine on the surface." Nom? We will see, sometime soonish.
Actually, we've liked this place for a long time, and I've been a little puzzled by the occasional bad reviews online. Perhaps the service was erratic in the past, and we were always lucky. If you had a bad time before, do try it again - the management is new this year. Co-owner and maitre d' Geoff is a charming character. We chatted with him quite a bit yesterday - the lunch trade was very light, so he had time.
We started with light meals, to save room for dessert. B1 had a beetroot and kipfler potato salad ($18), B2 went for the crispy tofu with green salad. (Both $18 in small sizes, mains for $28 I think, I didn't record it.) I had a goat ragout with housemade gnocchi, last chance before the spring menu changes come in. I'm quite attracted to wintry food at the moment. I've been making baked puddings, for instance. It must be that "last chance for the year" effect.
We all enjoyed our mains very much. They were well-balanced and interestingly complex without fussiness. I had a lovely Tasmanian pinot noir with mine, and B1 and B2 split a glass of Innocent Bystander pink moscato - and yes, Geoff was happy to split a one glass serve into two glasses. He's quite the wine buff, and an enthusiast for the Canberra region wines. When we had dessert, he gave us a sample of a local sticky - and again I neglected to record what it was. Maybe the Lerida Estate Botrytis Pinot Gris? He's trying to find the best match for B2's dessert - a divine pannacotta with banana walnut bread and caramel sauce - and was keen to get our feedback.
It was a good match, and I thought it went pretty well with my hazelnut creme brulee, too. I was impressed with that - I love a good creme brulee, but I find that fancy flavoured ones can often be overdone. This was beautiful - a rich custard with a good clear unfussy hazelnut flavour. A sprinkle of hazelnut praline on side, and a house-made frangelico icecream were excellent complements.
While you may not get quite the same level of personal service when the place is busier, I'm sure it will be good with Geoff at the helm. And they make a very good coffee, too. Ah, coffee - there's one advantage to going out to lunch. I can't drink coffee at night, so I always miss it when I review. And the final note, a little melting moment petit four was delightfully melting and lemony.
Our gud wimminz day out to celebrate the rising of the near-dead continued after lunch, with a spot of shopping. We went to Jammo, where B1 bought some new skirts at Cassidy's and B2 picked up a few cheap plants from Aldi. And we toured a new food shop. Fresh Mart offers middle eastern foods, including fresh baked goods. The young man at the counter was the baker, and he gave us a sample cookie. I was a bit full to appreciate it properly, but it was light and lovely.
The grocery range includes the fresh baked middle eastern pastries and biscuits, and several breads - Afghan, Turkish, Lebanese. There's a hot box of roasted nuts and seeds, and interesting cheeses in the fridge. Plenty of pulses, both bagged and tinned, and syrups of rose, date, tamarind and more. It's not quite the Aladdin's cave that you get in Mawson at Cedars of Lebanon, but it's definitely worth a visit if you're a northsider.
I resisted the temptation of the baklava and almond shortbread and bought some novelties. A Lebanese honey of orange blossom and spring flowers from Jabal el Sheikh, and a box of freekeh from Jordan.
Freekeh? Wut? Well, I have seen this mentioned on the internet and SBS, but I have not until now seen it in real life. It's roasted green wheat, and can be used as a side dish like rice or couscous. The instructions on the box are in beautiful Engrish. The idea is that you wash it, pan-fry in butter for a few minutes, then add twice its volume in stock and cook on "calm fire" for half an hour. Then "serve the FREEK in rather big plate putting the meat or chicken on the top.Then throw roated almond or pine on the surface." Nom? We will see, sometime soonish.
Monday, 21 September 2009
Hot Tip!
If you are a lover of L'Occitane products, pop in now. If you spend $75 including a rose product, you get a little gift box with a couple of extra rose items, and... drum roll.. a two ticket pass to see Julie & Julia! SQUEEEEE!!!!
If you're not familiar with L'Occitane, you can find their shop on level 1 of the Canberra centre. They are a French company, who sell handcreams and perfumes and shower gel and that kind of stuff. It's a bit pricy compared to supermarket brands, but they are very nice. I've been using their moisturisers, as they work well on my rather dodgy sensitive skin. And a few soaps and hand lotions are always handy for Xmas presents. (Speaking of which, eeek! It's nearly time to start the cake!)
Oh, and another tip - fresh raspberries, $5 a punnet, Woolworths. NOM.
If you're not familiar with L'Occitane, you can find their shop on level 1 of the Canberra centre. They are a French company, who sell handcreams and perfumes and shower gel and that kind of stuff. It's a bit pricy compared to supermarket brands, but they are very nice. I've been using their moisturisers, as they work well on my rather dodgy sensitive skin. And a few soaps and hand lotions are always handy for Xmas presents. (Speaking of which, eeek! It's nearly time to start the cake!)
Oh, and another tip - fresh raspberries, $5 a punnet, Woolworths. NOM.
Saturday, 12 September 2009
Market Report
The Handmade Upmarket, that is. And look - they had beer! So the bloke was happy. He and I have just got back, though with very little loot. Just another bit of food-themed bling from cardog, which I might designate as a birthday present if anyone gives me moneys, and some Crankypants pickled onions, and some Xmas cards. I almost bought some cute purple underwear, but the stallholder did not take cards and I was at the end of my cash.The market has moved to the Yarralumla Woolshed, and the food has increased hugely in variety. We got there a bit after 2pm, after running some errands in connection with the Bloke's new bike. (The old CBR1000 has now gone, after thirteen years of faithful service. The new one has yet to arrive.) As we approached the woolshed, there were cars parked out on the verges. It was huge! We were almost going to turn around and go home, until we spotted a lucky park.
We started with the food outside in the sunshine. The woodfired pizza place was closing up, but the Mountain Creek sausage inna bun folks were going strong. They were fabulous - a gourmet snag in a good substantial crusty white roll, with pumpkin and onion and relish and salad ($9). A Zierholz pils (middy $4) helped wash it down nicely. There was quite a queue at the Alchemy slushy place and the icecream by Ross, but I did get a little tub of Ross' rather good chocolate icecream ($4.50) a bit later, just before we left. Most flavours had sold out. No wattleseed, choc-chilli, black sesame or fig left.
Inside there was a Crankypants cafe - pie oven, hot food and so on, with tables and chairs - and again most was sold out. They had a stall for their jams and pickles and marmalades. I am resisting buying chutneys and pickles and sauces, as I have far too many that need using up, but some pickled onions seemed like a good idea. They're using plastic jars now, which seems a little odd but I suppose must be lighter to carry around. I see they've also just started a website, which is as yet not much use.
And there were local wineries, and coffee carts and cupcakes and chocolates and many more good things. Not to mention all the gorgeous scarves and jewelry and photography and pottery and clothes and handbags. I am so pleased that this market has taken off as it has. It's such a great thing to be able to support local craftspeople as well as the local growers. If you missed this one, don't worry - there's one more coming before Xmas. There will be a twilight market on Friday 20 November 6-9, and the main market Saturday 21 November 10-4pm.
Wednesday, 2 September 2009
N is for Narrabundah
It turns out that Narrabundah is absolutely packed with food choices. We have D'Browes and La Cantina for upscale dining. I have had La Cantina on my 'to review' list for some time but I fear that Bryan Martin may pip me to the post on that one. It's classy Italian, and looks totally gorgeous with white table linen and red brick walls. D'Browes is also supposed to be good, though I haven't tried it. Bryan got to that one a year and a half ago, and rated it 14 - which is a pretty good score, though not outstandingly brilliant.
There's also an Indian restaurant, the Kashmir House, with a fairly standard North Indian menu. There's also a nameless hamburger place, a coffee shop and a bar. The bar is Das Kapital, and I've been there a couple of times. They do OK bar snacks, nothing thrilling but not bad, either. I was going to grab a coffee at the Rouge Espresso Bar to check that out, but they are closed on Mondays.
In retail food, there is a medium sized IGA. They have no deli counter, but they stock refrigerated cold cuts and olives and so on, and they have nice things like free range chicken and Maggie Beer products. The fruit and veg section is small and limited in choice, but everything looked very nicely fresh.
There's also an old-fashioned bakery, Danny's, with a tattooed baker there selling pies, lamingtons and vanilla slices as well as an assortment of breads. They do sourdough bread, in white and multigrain, so I bought a couple of rolls to test. And a vanilla slice, which was your basic classic style, well done. I enjoyed it. The rolls were a little bit disappointing. They were lacking in that robust sourdough sourness and chew. Clearly not an artisanal sourdough, but a bit denser textured than your regular bread. They were rather nice, actually, as long as you weren't set on a Silo bread.
Sunday, 23 August 2009
Save the Fringe!
You may have heard that the Fringe Festival is being de-funded. In the goverment spin, this is presented as funding the National Folk Festival to host Fringe, and allowing the multicultural festival to focus more on our local cultural diversity. Yah, right. As long as it's very traditional cultural diversity and not postmodern gypsy punk eastern European storytelling, I guess.
I got this letter from a couple of people who have been involved as performers and organisers, and are very concerned about this direction. Please read and take what action you can.
You can also send a letter online at http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/letterstotheeditor/
I also suggest writing to Jon Stanhope, whose full contact details are at http://www.chiefminister.act.gov.au/page.php?v=28. Or his email is stanhope@act.gov.au
My take on it, as a regular of both festivals, is that the Folk Festival is too big, too focussed, and too isolated to do this well. Do you host it onsite at the National? It's already overcrowded out there, what venues will they use? And how much overlap in the audience will there be anyway? Fringe fans are not going to want to pay steep entry fees to the Folkie to see their shows. It's $85 a day if you buy at the gate. We usually buy season tickets early, which will be $166 this time.
And if you put it in town, that won't work well either. Folk fans from around Australia stay onsite in camp grounds - they won't go into town to watch their shows, especially not with our appalling public holiday bus schedules. How involved can the Folkie management possibly feel, in dealing with something offsite and well outside their usual audience's interests? They run on volunteer labour already; an extra job that few of their patrons care about is not likely to be done well!
And Easter is a bad time to attract audiences anyway. We all know that locals use the last warm long weekend of the season to go out of town. It was working well, but this is a mess. Why take a successful event and nobble it?
I got this letter from a couple of people who have been involved as performers and organisers, and are very concerned about this direction. Please read and take what action you can.
Dear Arts lovers,
As you may know by now the Fringe Festival in Canberra has been defunded with a small portion of the previous funding being re-allocated to the National Folk Festival to do something "fringey". The Canberra Times is taking a big interest in this so please take the time to write your opinions down in a letter to the editor.
Points to think about:
* $30,000 is a mere fraction of the amount of money required to put on the grand scale we've seen in the last few years
* The folk festival is expensive, not free like fringe was and attracts a limited demographic
* The folk festival is a music festival with very little focus on theatre and visual arts which the fringe has always promoted evenly
* Local artists have relied heavily on the fringe as an affordable way to produce art and reach the wider canberra audience that only comes out of the woodwork for large scale free events in the middle of the city
* The folk festival is not central
Letters to the editor must be 200 words or less and sent to letters.editor@canberratimes.com.au
You can also send a letter online at http://www.canberratimes.com.au/content/letterstotheeditor/
I also suggest writing to Jon Stanhope, whose full contact details are at http://www.chiefminister.act.gov.au/page.php?v=28. Or his email is stanhope@act.gov.au
My take on it, as a regular of both festivals, is that the Folk Festival is too big, too focussed, and too isolated to do this well. Do you host it onsite at the National? It's already overcrowded out there, what venues will they use? And how much overlap in the audience will there be anyway? Fringe fans are not going to want to pay steep entry fees to the Folkie to see their shows. It's $85 a day if you buy at the gate. We usually buy season tickets early, which will be $166 this time.
And if you put it in town, that won't work well either. Folk fans from around Australia stay onsite in camp grounds - they won't go into town to watch their shows, especially not with our appalling public holiday bus schedules. How involved can the Folkie management possibly feel, in dealing with something offsite and well outside their usual audience's interests? They run on volunteer labour already; an extra job that few of their patrons care about is not likely to be done well!
And Easter is a bad time to attract audiences anyway. We all know that locals use the last warm long weekend of the season to go out of town. It was working well, but this is a mess. Why take a successful event and nobble it?
Wednesday, 1 July 2009
Chocolate in Canberra
With the kitchen renovation dragging slowly on, here's another post that's not about cooking or food shopping. On that front, we do hope to have tiles by Saturday. At that point we can move most of our stuff back to the work area. Though I still want to keep things fairly clear for painting, so refilling the cookbook shelf still isn't on for a week or so. And the pantry shelves need extra reinforcement, so I'm not filling that yet either. Well. Anyway. Chocolate.
I finished my Easter box of Haigh's choccies about a month ago, and am considering buying some more on a Sydney trip. I especially love their strong fragrant cream fillings - rose, violet, lemon myrtle. And the shiraz truffles. B1 wants to go for a short trip, and I'll go along if the dates suit. I'm wondering if we can get to the Lindt cafe as well as Haigh's. Meanwhile, obviously I must restock in Canberra.
Now that's not such a terrible thing. We havefour three local chocolatiers, as well as all the major brands in specialty sweet shops and supermarkets, and the fair trade varieties at Oxfam and other locations. This is even spreading to supermarkets, especially since Green & Black were bought out by Cadbury-Schweppes. And none of our chocolatiers are outrageous marketing ripoff artists like the infamous Noka. You can expect to pay in the general vicinity of $100 per kilo for locally made chocolates - not cheap, to be sure, but there is a fair amount of work in it. If you do feel like making your own, you can get quality couverture from Essential Ingredient, and probably elsewhere.
Koko Black only just counts as local. This is a small chain, with several branches in Melbourne. Canberra is their first interstate location. But they do make their chocolates on site - you can look in the kitchen window and see it happening. They make good filled chocolates, but I find their bars too waxy in texture for my taste. I prefer a bit more melt-in-the-mouth texture to my choccie.
Bruno's Truffels is the oldest. First opened in Narrabundah in the 1980s, the shop is now run as a cafe in Mawson. Bruno is Swiss, and he makes the chocolates as well as doing the baking of a number of Swiss and German specialty breads, biscuits and pastry. Or possible supervising this - I do hope he's trained up a few good apprentices! His chocolates are excellently smooth in texture, though the base dark is a little bit too sweet for my ideal.
All Things Chocolate in Kingston is my current favourite. The selection varies with chocolatier Lindy Butcher's whim, but she does have a list of regulars. Fig & muscat pyramids are on that list, but two other favourites of mine aren't - the star anise licorice and the orange, pistachio & cardamom cream. The base chocolate is Belgian, and although it's not fair trade, she does support the RSPCA with a portion of sales.
UPDATE: Bad News. All Things Chocolate closed down last week. The lady in the bookshop across the way tells me Lindy Butcher has gone back to teaching for the moment. We can only hope that she goes back to doing market sales soon. I am very disappointed. No more orange, pistachio & cardamom creams for me.
Lindsay and Edmunds do not have a shopfront at Fairbairn, where they make their chocolates. You can buy these ones at Kingston markets, EPIC markets and a few other spots.
Their base chocolate is Belgian Belcolade, and for everything else they try to buy Australian and organic. The chocolate is an excellent bittersweet, strong and dark, and my only quibble is that all of their fillings are solid. Ginger, orange, dates and other dried fruit and nuts - it's all good, but there are no creams. I've had a prowl on the Belcolade website and I think it's the organic 72.5% variety. Probably not the fairtrade or rainforest alliance, which I'd like to see.
I finished my Easter box of Haigh's choccies about a month ago, and am considering buying some more on a Sydney trip. I especially love their strong fragrant cream fillings - rose, violet, lemon myrtle. And the shiraz truffles. B1 wants to go for a short trip, and I'll go along if the dates suit. I'm wondering if we can get to the Lindt cafe as well as Haigh's. Meanwhile, obviously I must restock in Canberra.
Now that's not such a terrible thing. We have
Koko Black only just counts as local. This is a small chain, with several branches in Melbourne. Canberra is their first interstate location. But they do make their chocolates on site - you can look in the kitchen window and see it happening. They make good filled chocolates, but I find their bars too waxy in texture for my taste. I prefer a bit more melt-in-the-mouth texture to my choccie.
Bruno's Truffels is the oldest. First opened in Narrabundah in the 1980s, the shop is now run as a cafe in Mawson. Bruno is Swiss, and he makes the chocolates as well as doing the baking of a number of Swiss and German specialty breads, biscuits and pastry. Or possible supervising this - I do hope he's trained up a few good apprentices! His chocolates are excellently smooth in texture, though the base dark is a little bit too sweet for my ideal.
All Things Chocolate in Kingston is my current favourite. The selection varies with chocolatier Lindy Butcher's whim, but she does have a list of regulars. Fig & muscat pyramids are on that list, but two other favourites of mine aren't - the star anise licorice and the orange, pistachio & cardamom cream. The base chocolate is Belgian, and although it's not fair trade, she does support the RSPCA with a portion of sales.
UPDATE: Bad News. All Things Chocolate closed down last week. The lady in the bookshop across the way tells me Lindy Butcher has gone back to teaching for the moment. We can only hope that she goes back to doing market sales soon. I am very disappointed. No more orange, pistachio & cardamom creams for me.
Lindsay and Edmunds do not have a shopfront at Fairbairn, where they make their chocolates. You can buy these ones at Kingston markets, EPIC markets and a few other spots.
Their base chocolate is Belgian Belcolade, and for everything else they try to buy Australian and organic. The chocolate is an excellent bittersweet, strong and dark, and my only quibble is that all of their fillings are solid. Ginger, orange, dates and other dried fruit and nuts - it's all good, but there are no creams. I've had a prowl on the Belcolade website and I think it's the organic 72.5% variety. Probably not the fairtrade or rainforest alliance, which I'd like to see.
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
Well, that was annoying
On Monday I went off to Mitchell to look for river pebbles for the garden, and wardrobe makers' showrooms to fix up our awful hall cupboards. I checked the yellow pages and made a list, but had very little success. One place had no pebbles, another didn't do retail at that site, two of the showrooms were closed... I finally went off to Stonehenge in Pialligo to look for pebbles and found that they also had none. And then I went to Braddon to get a leaking tire fixed - and found out that it was unfixable, we needed a new one for that, plus two more were badly worn. Three tires, $500. Bummer.
So grump, grump, grump, I walked into town and treated myself to a nice lunch. I went to Cream, which I like very much on weekdays when it's not so packed and noisy. The dislike of crowding is my taste, not their problem: they manage very well on the packed and noisy days. I've had some pretty good brunches there - though I think their blintzes are too sweet - and the service has mostly been good despite the crowds.
It's a big open space, high ceilinged and retro-outfitted, with a central coffee and cake service area and a big kitchen up the back. They serve modern Australian cafe food - the usual eclectic mixture of dozens of cultures. Indonesian, Chinese, Italian, French, and English all rub shoulders on the menu.
I had the Barbecued Atlantic Salmon Salad ($19), which is a nicoise-inspired dish
with green beans, potato, egg and olives. The salmon was warm from the grill and cooked nicely moist, the potatoes were kipflers, and the olives were good ones generously ladled out. It was delicious. The coffee was also good - rich, and with just enough bitterness for character. A good brew.
I finished off with an Italian custard doughnut. That was good too - it's nice to have a doughnut with a good solid yeasty chew, instead of over-sweetened insipid fluff. I think the patisserie is bought in, not house made, but it's well chosen. A good lunch, a good book (Iain M Banks), a good coffee - that definitely made the day better.
Also, while I was faffing around Mitchell not finding things, I stopped into Jindebah coffee and stocked up, so even that wasn't a dead loss.
So grump, grump, grump, I walked into town and treated myself to a nice lunch. I went to Cream, which I like very much on weekdays when it's not so packed and noisy. The dislike of crowding is my taste, not their problem: they manage very well on the packed and noisy days. I've had some pretty good brunches there - though I think their blintzes are too sweet - and the service has mostly been good despite the crowds.
It's a big open space, high ceilinged and retro-outfitted, with a central coffee and cake service area and a big kitchen up the back. They serve modern Australian cafe food - the usual eclectic mixture of dozens of cultures. Indonesian, Chinese, Italian, French, and English all rub shoulders on the menu.
I had the Barbecued Atlantic Salmon Salad ($19), which is a nicoise-inspired dish
with green beans, potato, egg and olives. The salmon was warm from the grill and cooked nicely moist, the potatoes were kipflers, and the olives were good ones generously ladled out. It was delicious. The coffee was also good - rich, and with just enough bitterness for character. A good brew.
I finished off with an Italian custard doughnut. That was good too - it's nice to have a doughnut with a good solid yeasty chew, instead of over-sweetened insipid fluff. I think the patisserie is bought in, not house made, but it's well chosen. A good lunch, a good book (Iain M Banks), a good coffee - that definitely made the day better.
Also, while I was faffing around Mitchell not finding things, I stopped into Jindebah coffee and stocked up, so even that wasn't a dead loss.
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