Soapbox:
- If you have an interest in Australian produce, please think about getting behind the plight of David Blackmore. Quite likely the most innovative Wagyu farmer in Australia, David and Julie have worked tirelessly to change the way we farm Wagyu (theirs is one of very few free-ranging Wagyu farms achieving such a high marble score, using supplement ration feeding but allowing the cows a life on grass, not in pens). This month David's request for an intensive farming application was denied, despite recommendations from his local planning department to the contrary. Apparently it is Alexandra's hobby farmers who don't like the machinery. His world class product speaks for itself, but more than that the changes he has made to the free-ranging nature of his herd are amazing. This is the kind of "intensive farming" we should be encouraging. Sign the petition. Please.
- I have also spent the week pondering the demise of the cookbook. I mentioned last week that Penguinwere closing their cookbook arm and Julie Gibbs is departing alongside it. Good cookbooks are not just a pic and a method, they are indicative of a country’s culinary culture. The experts that make this happen are fundamental to that (not just the writers but the editors, the academics, the visionaries who will take a leap of fate). Serious cookbooks like Stephanie’s Cook's Companion are fundamental to encouraging a better food culture. We need to do more talking up to people and less dumbing down. I fear this move will result in more of the latter and less of the former.
The week that was (16 July 2015)
From far flung corners:
- Lots of Gelinaz reports flying around this week with some cracking dishes created around the globe.Noma met Nahm, while David Thompson flew to Paris, Mehmet Gurs was at Orana, Zonfrillo went to Manresa, Shewry ended up at In De Wulf while Yoshihiro Narisawa took over the kitchen at Attica. Zonfrillo said: "the whole idea of this was to go to our host restaurants in our host countries and be inspired by the people, the kitchen team and the produce that we found when we got there, not recreate our own food or create that [regular] food of the restaurant we were visiting." Mission accomplished.
- For more on transposing cuisine, Grantourismo spoke to David Thompson about the challenges of cooking Thai in Thailand. "I’m not one who is here to please customers - my loyalty is to the cuisine ... coming back to Thailand things changed completely. The recipes I had that I thought worked well didn’t anymore so everything had to be re-tested. There was a culinary spring-cleaning which as a 50 year-old cook was irksome at the time, but in retrospect was good ..." Skip the intro, read his responses.
- Also this week, Huckstep penned his piece on Peter Gunn at the San Pell young chef love-in in Milan. If France is more your thing read this compilation of interviews about where to eat in Paris: Peter Doyle for the classics, Hanz Gueco for the enthusiasm, Mike Eggert for the chuckles and little Loz for the insider's point of view.
- Finally, David Chang hates our burgers. Thinks they're the worst in the world (except Mary's, his only exception to the rule). Read his burger manifesto (yes, really) here.
From the soapbox:
- The Shenhua mine approval has been all over the papers this week. Here's NSW Mining's take on the reports. But I'm still perplexed. Why mine near prime agricultural land, when the Liverpool Plains are some of Australia's best? Why place the aquifer under ANY risk? In the short term there is concern over the region's reliance on groundwater over rainwater (the aquifer being breached is stated as a low to negligible risk), but, perhaps most importantly, there are no long-term studies to know what the implications may truly be. And all this for a cheeky $1.2 bill?? Let's put that into perspective: the Bureau of Statistics estimate an annual revenue of $320 mill in ag from the region, that's a turn over of $1.2 bill every four years. Every four years. Unlike coal, agriculture can be a renewable resource. When the coal is gone we will rely on ag to keep the country afloat. But only if the soil is looked after. Wake. Up.
The week that was (2 July 2015)
Other stories:
- The Fin Rev are not yet done squeezing the life from their restaurant awards with their inaugural Food & Wine Magazine out last Friday. There was a piece about the Groovy Aussie chefs who don't need Masterchef (yes, they actually used groovy in the headline). They talked to Puskas and Parry about their success at Sixpenny, going on to talk to a gaggle of "groovy" chefs from restaurants around the country (Cafe Paci, Magill Estate, St Crispin, Moonpark, Africola and Urbane). The article boils the "new-breed chef" down to three s's: small, sustainable and social, but also warns their readers that "groovy" may also mean bearded, pierced and tattooed. I'm not sure who should be more scared of who?
- Gourmet Traveller's July issue is out. Richard Gunner's English longhorn cattle get the spotlight (the collaboration between Gunner and Jock Zonfrillo is a brilliant story, many years in the making, not to mention the 30 months to get the cows to maturity), Fergus tells his tales of imbibing in France,Transformer is reviewed in Melbs (vego in Fitzroy), Firedoor reviewed (again) in Sydney and there's a feature on the food scene in Byron (a deservedly hot topic at the moment).
- delicious. is out too and, as many gratuitous instagram pics have shown, it's their 150th issue. Two articles of note: Huckstep went to shoot roo with the people of Macro Meats. Not your standard gun-toting yarn, he quotes owner Ray Borda "They're not is a shed, pen or fenced in. They don't queue at an abattoir. They're free to roam in their natural social circles. It's about as ethical as it gets" and Matt Preston talking to Dan Barber in a great article delightfully void of Masterchef references.
- And last, but most certainly not least, are we being fed by a poison expert? Check out this little vid about Monsanto hosted on The Guardian.
The week that was (25 June 2015)
From further afield:
- In the UK: Jay Rainer wrote an editorial celebrating the rise of casual dining: "A rejection of formal service does not also mean a rejection of good food. Yes, occasionally a clunker opens, but if you can find the £90 it will probably buy two of you a much better meal than double that would have got you a decade ago. You just won’t get a tablecloth for your money. And for an awful lot less, you can explore the burgeoning and brilliant street food scene, where you won’t even get a table. But when the food is good, who really cares? It’s called progress."
- In the US: the Leopold Brothers (boutique brewers and distillers) have succeeded in making their own version of Campari. They are calling it Aperitivo (fun fact: the word aperitivo comes from the Latin "to open"). They have a lovely story. I have been waiting for some one to tackle the elusive Campari here. Does anyone know of anyone??
- In Denmark: yes, it's another article exploring Redzepi's influence on the food world and it ticks a lot of the familiar boxes: food in nature, food and social action, food with design. "Ferran Adrià handed chefs technical and conceptual tool kits to become instant auteurs. “René,” says Poli, “showed us that the tools are around us, in nature.”'
You've probably read it all before, but it's a good article and the way culinary culture develops fascinates me, so I was happy to read it all again.
- In Australia: Richard Cornish's column is a firm favourite. This week he explained essential oils in herbs and how to extract them, followed by a lovely tale of heated herbs and paella. He also gave kale a cheeky touch up, quoting John Seymour's The Complete Book of Self Sufficiency: "Leave kale until you really need it, that is after the Brussels sprouts have rotted, the cabbages are finished, the slugs have had the rest of the celery and the ground is two-feet deep in snow and only your kale plants above it like ship-wrecked schooners." I do not know this book, but it looks great and I now want one (not just because he's dissing kale).
- Wherever you are: if you're looking for entertainment, Mind of a Chef launched this week on AmazonInstant Video. It looks like you can download a free 30 day trial. For those still nursing a Serial hangover, you may like to check out some of the new food podcasts kicking about. According to The Guardian audio is having a resurgence and food is firmly on the menu.
The week that was (18 June 2015)
From the soap box:
- I break the Callan drought today with his article on the bizarre future of foods. The proposition is a future filled with cultured meat (of the lab varietal), 3D printed foodstuffs, Soylent (a horrific pouch of powder said to contain all the essential nutrients for the body), GM crops and, in the one nod to something natural, seaweed. It was a pretty depressing read:
On cultured meat: "Synthetic clothing is already universal and food is likely to follow ... Do you really know what's in your snack food today?" (quoting Australian science writer Julian Cribb)
On GM crops: "A major disadvantage is the way it has sucked research and development funding from areas of equal or greater importance such as soil microbiology, agronomy, traditional plant breeding, plant nutrition and biological pest control." (also Cribb)
On 3D printing and Soylent: well, I just can't even go there.
- What about encouraging more young farmers to the land as suggested in this NY Times article byBittman? The general gist is the government forgives student loans in exchange for time on the land (they already do this for many entering the public service). With the average age of farmers nudging 65, we could certainly do with more young blood (and young ideas).
- Or teaching people how to be more frugal with the food they have? This obituary for Marguerite Patten, a home economist who spent WWII teaching the British how to make something out of nothing, tells that story. The "queen of ration book cuisine" died last week. I wrote my honours thesis on rationing and advertising was the key then and probably still is now. Respecting rationing was a call to arms and the Brits came out of the war healthier, with the cultural shift paving the way for food writers likeElizabeth David. People seem to watch these days, but they don't do. This could be changed.
- And finally there's the old "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" attitude. This week Woolies announced theirCooking with Kylie meals: "a sell out or key step in the quest to balance convenience with sustainability?" The article notes all raw produce is Australian (by stipulation from Kylie), prawns are MSC certified and chicken RSPCA approved (but not necessarily free-range). These don't jump out as massive wins to me, however Kylie is one of the most adamant in the business and her restaurant has steadfastly walked this line, and so we wait ...
- The free-range egg debacle continues, as Mr Thomsen put it "In an impressive move, today they announced the same thing they announced 12 months ago." That is, that we will (one day) have a national standard for free range eggs. By way of re-cap: the CSIRO recommend 1,500 per hectare, last year QLD changed their definition from 1,500 to 10,000 birds per hectare, the same guidelines Coles and Woolies have in place.
- Finally, Huckstep took to the shores of Port Lincoln with some of Rockpool's finest to talk all things seafood. You can read all about it here, including thoughts on farming fish, the situation with Southern Bluefin Tuna and how to shave a mussel (apparently it's a little "lego meets Mousetrap").
The week that was (11 June 2015)
From the soap box:
- A century of French food trends, in a nutshell:
Escoffier (1890 - 1960ish): led the charge and really put the Frenchies on the culinary map creating the systems and ranks that make up a traditional kitchen brigade. On the plate it was all sauces, stocks, fat, method, execution and excess.
Nouvelle cuisine (1960 - 1990ish): less of everything: cooking times, sauces, courses on a menu; more seasonal ingredients and more regional influence. In Cuisine of the Sun Verge described his own style: " 'cuisine heureuse' is the antithesis of cooking to impress ... a light hearted, healthy and natural way of cooking which combines the products of the earth like a bouquet of wild flowers from the garden."
Neo-bistro: (2010 - now) a young chefs' take on the traditional Frenchie bistro. Flavours are slightly more refined, lighter, more delicate. The rooms tend to be simplified Parisian classics, raw materials, a little unfinished but with the amazing bones of Parisian architecture.
As a petit sidebar, one of the chefs who epitomised the neo-bistro movement, our very own James Henry, announced the end of his Parisian bistro Bones this week. The poster boy for Aussie's making good in Paris, he's been serving up some amazing food, with his resto much lauded by local and international press. He will serve his last Bones supper on the 7th August.
- I stumbled across Michael Mosley's doco The Truth About Meat on Monday night (SBS). Wow. Totally terrifying but totally fascinating. His observations in regards to the green footprint of intensively reared chickens and meat were eye-opening. Most shocking to note they may produce less greenhouse gas than a free-ranging model. Obviously this is all relative and there are many other issues to be taken into account (animal welfare, antibiotic usage, the health benefits of animals not raised on their natural diet etc). However, taking into account his suggestions that the world's demand for meat will double by 2050 (think of the crops that have to go with that too) it's a huge problem and a huge burden. You need to watch it (click the link above). You also need to know he ends up analysing a bio-dynamic/Polyface farming model ... and celebrating it. Phew.
The week that was (4 June 2015)
From the soap box:
- I have long resented the way in which so much of the produce in Australia is sent from farm to depot (generally in a capital city) and then back to the very region it was grown, often a turn around of days, sometimes even weeks. This crazy scheme is the reason we ended up breeding tomatoes to sit on trucks and supermarket shelves, at the absolute detriment of their flavour. Sprout, a not-for-profit in Tasmania, has come up with an idea to circumvent this system: "from the pitch fork to the table fork, faster and fresher". Check out their Fork2Fork Pozible campaign here and, if you can, donate (they're only $6k off their $27k goal with less than a week to go). I think this is the system we would all like to see more of.
- Laura Dalrymple of Feather and Bone, penned an article for the Oz about the issues with labelling and modern food production. Aside from the slightly odd picture of her holding her eggs close to her belly and Grant glaring down the camera with his big cleaver, the article tells an important story: "Using an arsenal of chemicals, genetic engineering and an elastic approach to ethics, this production model has been outrageously successful and most of the food we eat in the Western world, from corn to pork, is now grown on large-scale single-species factory farms. But there is mounting evidence that this success comes at a great cost."
The week that was (14 May 2015)
It’s not easy being a farmer:
- A bacteria is killing the olive trees in Italy’s heel. The bacterium, Xylella fastidiosa, has already wreaked havoc across olive groves in Costa Rica, also attacking citrus trees in Brazil and vineyards in California and is now attacking the olive groves of Racale. The Italian government have been criticized for not acting quickly enough, but their choices are few and far between. They are currently trying for an exclusion zone, with growers in the region facing the reality that this is a bacteria they may have to work with.
- Buena Vista Farm, in Gerringong, lost 102 one-month-old Sommerlad chickens this week. You may remember this chook as the very expensive, but very delicious, variety John Lethlean wrote about a few months back. A fox and failed electric fence are said to be responsible.
- In happier news consumption of margarine has taken a tumble (down 9%), while butter is on the rise (up 6%). Butter is now sitting above marge for the first time in years (the study looks at the past five) ... oh how the tables have churned (I stole that from some card at Roy Morgan).
- Chef’s Table has launched on Netflix. The six part series looks at the philosophies that drive some of the world’s most intriguing chefs (Bottura, Barber, Mallman, Nakayama, Shewry, Nilsson). It’s beautiful, thoughtful and well worth downloading the free month of Netflix to take a peek. Watch the trailer here.
I watched Dan Barber's ep last night: “What I have come to understand, and I have yet to find any example that flies in the face of this, is when you are chasing after the best flavour, you are chasing the best ingredients, and when you are chasing the best ingredients you are in search of great farming.” Amen to that.
The week that was (7 May 2015)
From a little further afield -
- Skye Gyngell was the main story in the SMH, but I’m not going to dwell there and suggest you read this instead. This month her collaboration with David Prior was all about food memories. This is the kind of thing that makes the hair on the back of my neck prick up, it’s the writing I want to read because it’s about food, but also because it’s well written.
- The James Beard Awards were held in New York this week. Batard was voted best new restaurant, Michael Anthony (Gramercy and Untitled) was awarded outstanding chef, Christina Tosi (Momo Milk Bar) was best pastry chef and Blue Hill at Stone Barns was awarded outstanding restaurant. All the results here.
- It appears the whole chefs-choosing-their-favourite-restaurant list is a global thing with The Observer Monthly running a list of the top 40 restaurants chosen by 40 chefs in the UK. If you're heading that way (or just plain curious) you can check out the list here. All the usual suspects (Lyle's, 40 Maltby, Clove Club etc) are in there.
The week that was (30 April 2015)
Soap box:
- From further afield, a little power from the people: Pepsi are pulling aspartame from their diet drink in the US (but replacing with sucralose) in what appears to be a marketing stunt to LOOK like they are making a change; Tyson, one of the largest poultry producers in the states, have pledged to remove antibiotics from chicken by 2017 (the allegation being large-scale farmers have been using antibiotics to keep chickens healthy in over-crowded, unsanitary conditions) ... could this be a gentle return to something that actually is 'natural'? Before answering that, check out this article by Michael Pollan looking at the lawsuits and misrepresentation of the word 'natural' across a number of industries: "any food product that feels compelled to tell you it’s natural in all likelihood is not." True that.
- And saving the very best for last, it was actually the best of last week (that I failed to report, so sorry) ... the New York International Olive Oil Competition was held on 19 April in New York. My beautiful friend Westerly and her father Robert came out of the awards with two Best in Class awards for their ALTO Extra Virgin Olive Oil (specifically for their Robust and Vividus). If you have not had this oil before you really must try it. Note that Cobram also won two best in class, meaning that Aussie oils walked away with 4 of the 18 best in class awards. Boom.