Aussie Bloggers

I’ve taken a fancy of late to cheese. Those of you who grew up on cheese and vegemite sandwiches will remember, as I do, the yellowish rindless, 8 oz. blocks of unprocessed (’natural’) cheddar in packets of pale blue. In the 1950s Kraft fed the entire country with these rectangular blocks of strangely bland and chewy cheddar. It was familiar, it was easy to make, and it stored and carried well. If you were a person of exotic taste or a recent European migrant or, very commonly, both, you could get yourself a bit of gouda if you persevered.

Now you can hardly turn a corner without bumping into another little deli full of gourmet cheese from boutique cheeseries. They spring up overnight, both the delicatessens and the cheese dairies.

Artisan cheese-makers are turning out surprising stuff, cheeses with names we’ve only read about and cheeses with names we’ve never heard before. Raclette, a cheese traditionally eaten hot, appenzell, leblachon, quark, mild paneer for Indian cooking, mutschli and the incredible sfogliata, a slab of soft cheese you fill with whatever you want and simply roll up! There’s cheese from sheep, cheese from goats, buffalo milk cheese and biodynamic, organic cheese from heritage-listed rainforest.

Plenty of these little artisan cheeseries introduce you to the delicious labours of the ancient craft of cheese-making, they take you round the dairy and the cheese rooms, through the creamery and they show you where they pack the pungent product. Make sure you get a taste along the way.

And then – the sheer enjoyment from a simple wedge of crumbly red cheddar or a sharp shaving of tart parmesan. Think of that tangy, salty feta, crumbly and rindless, and the pure bite of pecorino romano. Or the Tasmanian Heritage Traditional Camembert, organic Kervella goat cheese from Gidgegannup, the lemony taste of Manouri, the sweet Kasseri, velvety Gippsland Blue, King River Gold with its pink rind, the incredibly nutty Pyengana Cheddar, and the creamy Seal Bay Cheese, an extravagant, triple cream cheese made from fresh King Island milk, enriched with pure cream. (Goodbye waist).

How can life be bad when there is the anticipation of lunch — crusty bread, a handful of fat black olives and a creamy rich, buttery brie with its smooth, downy rind and that faint after-taste of earthy mushroom?

There’s a lot more to cheese than the homogenised supermarket variety. Fair dinkum.

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to spend a couple of days in the Great Ocean Road region of Victoria. Apart from the scenery which is truly exquisite, I was impressed with the quality of dining in the region.

We stayed and dined at Aire Valley Guest House in Horden Vale. It is located just west of Apollo Bay on the Great Ocean Road. The first thing that you notice about the food at Aire Valley Guest House is the freshness, which should really be no surprise as the majority of the vegetables, fruit and herbs are picked straight from the garden before cooking.

A cooked breakfast complete with eggs from the hens that roam freely on the property and tomato and spinach from the garden was delicious. They also support local producers with beautiful locally made jams and a range of Prickly Moses beers.

In the warmer months, dining can be had on the balcony as pictured above, but as it was still quite cool in the evenings we ate in the homely dining room.

Closer to Melbourne and slightly off the Great Ocean Road itself is Bellbrae Harvest (20 minutes inland from Torquay). The setting of this restaurant is quite serene. We had not booked so had to sit inside the restaurant as opposed to the lovely terraced area. This however still afforded beautiful views over the property, including the ducks and geese on the large pond.

Although not growing the produce it cooks on the property, Bellbrae does pride itslef from sourcing much of its food from the local region, for example butter from Warnambool, specialty bread from Geelong etc.

The service was excellent, professional but with friendliness and if one was so inclined they have an impressive wine list which the staff knew well.

We only had a couple of days along the Great Ocean Road and there would still have been more wonderful dining to sample. Some other places that come highly recommend in the area were:

Chris’s at Beacon Point – Apollo Bay
A La Grecque – Airey’s Inlet

Do you have any favourite establishments from the area to add to this list?

Photo by The Noodleater

I’m pretty sure that in every country there’s a food peculiar to just that place. In Australia, it’s Vegemite. Vegemite is a savoury spread that as the example in the picture above shows, we put on toast, crumpets, and savoury biscuits etc.

It has an unusual flavour and if you haven’t grown up with it, it’s not something that you’ll probably like. I know I’ve asked many people that have moved here if they’ve tried Vegemite. More often than not if they have tried it, they don’t like it.

As written in an Illawarra Mercury news article about people new to Australia:

‘They wrapped themselves in Australian flags, plastered their faces in flag tattoos and munched on lamingtons – but one Aussie tradition repeatedly got the snub.

“They’re turning their noses up at the Vegemite, but they want the Tim Tams,” said Ronelle Peardon from her Everything Aussie Festival stall.’

I could get completely sidetracked here and talk about how lovely Tim Tam biscuits are, but I’ll save that for another time. Back to Vegemite.

I don’t eat Vegemite a whole lot so a jar will last a fairly long time in my house, but it’s great to have because sometimes Vegemite on toast is just the thing to get a savoury fix.

Luckily for Australians living overseas many places sell it. I know I was able to get it in London when I lived there (I had to get Tim Tams sent to me though). Similar looking spreads like Marmite are quite different in taste and I’ve never acquired a liking for Marmite.

If you’re a person who hasn’t grown up with Vegemite, do you eat it? If you have tried it, did you like it?

Whenever I visit with people I’m amazed by how much tea and coffee people drink. In an average week I’ll have a coffee after swimming 3 days a week, and maybe the odd cup of tea first thing in the morning. Especially if it’s cold.

Tea especially seems to be very common among my family and friends. And apparently I’m out of step with all the protocols surrounding tea-making.

See, according to my family, walking in the general direction of the kitchen, even if your actual path takes you nowhere near the kitchen, or past the kitchen, is always noted with the comment “are you putting the kettle on?” which is of course for everyone else, yes. Me? Not so much.

But I do it. Because I’m nice like that.

And then there comes the next part. Apparently, putting the kettle on doesn’t just mean putting the kettle on. It means putting the kettle on, checking with everyone in the house whether they want tea/coffee/hot chocolate and the appropriate milk/sugar ratio. Then, waiting around until the kettle has boiled, and preparing everyone’s hot drink of choice, regardless of whether you’re having one yourself or not.

Sometimes it’s just easier to sit tight and wait until someone else gets up to run to the toilet

So is anyone else’s house like that? Or is it just my twisted family?

In just a few weeks, my partner and I will be flying out for our first overseas holiday – in fact, our first holiday of pretty much any description – in around seven years. We’re going to Poland, Slovenia, Italy and finally to Germany for Wacken Open Air, the world’s largest open air heavy metal festival.

We’ll only be gone for three weeks, but they will be jam-packed weeks for sure!

In Poland, we’re going to be visiting some of my partner’s relatives. We’ll also be visiting friends in Slovenia. This means a lot of good things, but it also means one big headache: finding suitable, lightweight, inexpensive gifts from Australia for people we don’t know particularly well.

Setting off to look in tourist shops, we thought… it can’t be that bad. A couple of nice tea-towels, a coaster of two, and we’ll be done. But somehow, everything we saw was either way overpriced, or junk. Worse still, half of the items we saw were made in China. Is this overpriced, tacky, imported rubbish stuff really what we sell to visitors to remind them of Australia?

Fortunately, we found salvation at a local market: delicious local food items with a unique Australian twist. Macadamia nut fudge. Redgum honey nougat. Quandong jam. Wattleseed tea. Bush tomato chutney. Yum!

Throw in a few bottles of Aussie wine, bought duty-free, and we think we’ll be set. Who doesn’t like getting a gift they can eat?