The Foodiste

I’m excited. I’ve just had a chai and a chat with a lady of vision and calm confidence. IF she says it’s going to happen, I believe her. It’s going to take from between 8 months (what is aimed for) and 2 years (worse case scenario) but Brisbane will have a fleet of around 20 street food vendors selling, food from all over the world, with Helen Bird hopes, a particular regional focus. ie. Yucatan Mexican or Goan.

Bird is founder and director of Streetfood Australia; an organisation that plans to change the city face and offer diners more opportunities than just eating in restaurants or cafes.

”The idea of street food came form me travelling a lot more in the city, really getting intimate with it. It seemed there were limited choices when it came to food; you could sit in cafe or restaurant or go down into the bowels of a shopping centre to a food court. Or there is fast food. Yes, there are food trucks but they are taking more vehicles into the city and the bikes can mobilise to wherever people are.”

Bird, who is a graduate architect, has commissioned the first bike from Denmark. Don’t imagine it’s going to be something ad hoc though-each bike is worth $4000, and will be a done in gleaming stainless steel with the front section capable of supporting 150kg.

”I like the idea of the high end design with a grass roots business. If  a cart is visually appealing, it will attract people and break down barriers, giving the opportunity for vendors to interact with the buyers.”  The bikes will be retro-fitted with solar power to charge a battery which will power a motor to assist with lighting and refrigeration.

An app is also being developed so you can pinpoint where ‘your’ bike with whichever cuisine you fancy is at any given time. ”They’ll work on a roster system. When they leave a site another vendor can come and set up,” Bird says. All will be supplying different cuisines. “We are looking for migrants who are willing to represent their own food in a way that we don’t end up with this very generic style- a bit like Mexican food a the moment, with everything being the same.”

Food will be cooked at what Bird says is a ”common incubator kitchen” for which she hopes some funding may be forthcoming. Each operator will share the cost of the commercial kitchen, but according to Bird the idea is to remove the cost barriers as far as possible in order to create opportunity for people who couldn’t normally afford to open a food business. There’ll be a cafe attached so if it rains for weeks or a vendor is injured and can’t ride, they could run their business out of it and not lose their livelihoods. The cafe is also intended to give them training should they want to take it further and set up something more permanent.

To start off with the bikes will service the inner city, West End, Valley and New Farm, but Bird hopes to take the concept to to other Queensland cities, then into the regions, with street food bikes taking residence in places like Toowoomba and Ipswich.

Personally, I can’t wait-this idea seems like the perfect way to show-off our so called ‘multiculturalism’- something that can manifests as a pleasant idea than being real in any visible way. And of course, the opportunity to explore regional food from all over the world is a big bonus for food lovers.

If you’d like to help with a donation, funding or have some particular expertise you think could be useful (For example. Bird says they’ll need a mentor/business adviser hopefully an ex restaurateur to help the vendors at the commercial kitchen, let me know and I’m happy to pass details on.

AT its American launch in New York, 31,000 people were on the wait list. Now Brisbane is set to be the first Australian city to host the world’s biggest and most secretive dinner.

In 1988 Frenchman, Francois Pasquier decided to organise a catch-up dinner with friends. There were so many takers he suggested they meet in the Bois de Boulogne in Paris, specifying that invitees dress in white so they could identify each other. There the idea for `Le Diner en Blanc’ (Dinners in White) was born- an event that would eventually host as many as 15,000 people in a single evening, with the concept travelling worldwide.

The dinners are held in public spaces, the idea, the organisation says to “enhance the function and value of their city’s public space by participating in the unexpected.’’

Unexpected is a key concept with diners (who have been invited by the organisation, friends or friends of friends or by joining a waitlist) having no idea where the ‘posh picnic’ will take place, only learning via social media and word of mouth at the last minute.

The crowd are asked to dress in white and converge on the site bringing with them food, wine, tables chairs, even their own tablecloths. With military precision, an open air public space is transformed by the foodie flash mob.

Previous events have been held at iconic locations such as the Eiffel Tower, Pont des Arts, The Louvre Pyramid and the Champs Elysee.

This year, Brisbane is one of the fifteen cities worldwide chosen to host the dinner (an event in Sydney will follow sometime this year). Where and when is a still a closely guarded secret. The organisation concede that their presence is not always ‘authorised’ but we can only hope that our City Council chooses to embrace the concept with the same laissez faire attitude as their French counterparts.

So where do you reckon is a good place to hold it?

If you’re not lucky enough to be in the know, you can register to be on the wait list here :  http://brisbane.dinerenblanc.info/waiting.php

It’s true, I am my own harshest critic but tonight even my biggest culinary fan (my partner) agreed after a bit of prodding with a sharp stick that this was one of my worst meals ever.

I read other people’s food blogs sometimes and they seem to turn out these perfect beautifully photographed dishes all the time. How, I want to know???

For me cooking is a huge experiment and while these days I am better at it and have more hits than misses, occasionally there are days like these.

It started well enough- a dozen beef ribs from Superbutcher. I’d never been there before-it’s out of my lazy metro-centric 2km radius. They looked good, but after overnight marinading then a slow 12 hr cooking, they should have been fab but weren’t. They were tough.

Mistake two was forgoing my usual knife for a mandoline- a piece of equipment the salesperson told me had been ‘selling like hotcakes since they used it on Masterchef.” I bought it today and it will probably sit in the ‘shit kitchen stuff I’ve bought’ drawer until my next mass clean up. Without veering too much from the subject- the mandolin was ugly, bulky and hard to use. Unless you used exactly the same pressure each time the thinness of the sweet potato crisps varied. Some were thicker, some were thin little bits. (There’s a market- I reckon they were designed by men who a) tend to be physically stronger and b) spend far less time in the kitchen and thus aren’t as pissed off by crappy ‘tools’ as women who still despite everything use them much more often)

In the end, I thought I might as well chuck the broccoli on top of the ribs which were under foil in the slowest part of the oven to cook thinking they might steam and absorb some of the flavours.

So basically tonight’s dinner was sweet potato crisps that looked like those bits of skin from the bottom of your feet when you or your podiatrist use that razor blade thingy, ribs which had shrunken and fallen off the bone (not in a good way-even the dog spent a while thinking about whether she’d give them a go, tried them and gave up) and the broccoli was sort of khaki and oil infused.

A fail whale of a dinner as the almost 13 year old agreed.

Anyway, would love to hear about your worst home cooking experience if you’d deign to share. It’ d make me feel better to know that I’m not alone

I was honoured to be given this plate on Monday night. One of only 100 made, it is signed by   Masterchefs George Calombaris, Gary Mehigan, Manu Feildel, Janelle Bloom, Alastair McLeod and Damien Heads who together created Plates for Mates to make money to help out their colleague Matt Golinski.

As most of you know, Matt lost his wife and daughters in a terrible housefire on Boxing Day and suffered deep burns. He was recently released from hospital but will be having expensive ongoing treatment for his physical and emotional scars for some time. Plates for Mates is an initiative that has been embraced by the hospitality industry who’ve been very generous in donating their time and own money to help one of their own.

Anyway, I’d like to auction off my plate, with the proceeds to go back to Plates for Mates and I’m asking for generous bids for this unique item.  (Which also comes with a Plates for Mates apron) Please pass this on to anyone you know. You can post on this blog with bids and I am happy to not make the posts public.

And if you just want to make a donation to Plates for Mates; go here http://platesformates.com.au/

How gorgeous are these zucchini flowers? I got them, the avos and herbs in my neighbourhood, growing wild. I’ve always been a forager. I think it’s criminal to see fruit dropping off trees. Anyway, this is just a taster- I’m going to write more on foraging soon.

Everything was conspiring against me. I’d just received a sample of my favourite stock (no, I am not on commission!) The Stock Merchant- crab. Ingredients: crab, water. Love it. So I decided to make some crab ravioli.

my local fishmonger and had none of my favourite fresh Noosa Spanner crab; (no, not on commission from them either) just some frozen stuff. At least it was Australian spanner crab. Then the pasta dough went wrong and my pasta sheets just didn’t work. I had an old friend coming to dinner, and not much time, so I ran down to the supermarket and got some Gow Gee (dumpling wrappers). So much easier than fiddling around making ravioli. Anyway, the end result was delicious, although if I add up the cost, probably ridiculously expensive, but the reduced crab. butter and saffron sauce was so good we all agreed to look the other way while we licked our plates.  For some reason I can’t upload pics at the moment, so you’ll just have to use your imagination and trust me; they were delicious.

Crab ravioli with saffron, butter, crab reduction

Serves 4

• 1 pkt Gow Gee wrappers
• 300g raw crab meat, fresh or frozen
• 100g fresh ricotta
• tsp lemon finely grated lemon zest
• seasalt and pepper
• 2 bags Stock Merchant crab stock
• couple of saffron strands
• 50g of butter

Put the stock and saffron strands on a long, slow simmer. Mix ricotta, crab meat and lemon zest then add seasoning. Put about a teaspoon of the mixture into the middle of a gow gee wrapper in the palm of your hand , fold over and create a crescent shape. Press edges together firmly. If you find they’re not sticking together well, wet your fingers first.

This amount of filling should be perfect for the packet- around 50. Put them on a tray with baking paper and cover with a damp tea towel and keep in fridge until ready to use.

Reduce the crab stock right down-it should be a beautiful bright yellow colour and have a really intense crab flavour.

Put the ravioli in a big pot of boiling water; when they float to the top, take one out and test if cooked. Put in a bowl, and drizzle sauce over. If I was more organised, I would have added a green herb garnish of some kind as well as have some really good bread to mop up the sauce.

I have an old Woman’s Weekly cakes and slice recipe book from the 70s I sometimes refer to. I adapted a recipe from it yesterday and the results were so good that it’s all gone already. I love date and pecan together- the recipe uses walnuts but I reckon pecans (especially Australian ones) are better. I also substituted caster sugar for brown sugar and added a spoonful of maple syrup.  And instead of all that faffing around beating eggs etc, I just put it in as was. So easy and so good and minimal washing up- thus meeting all my criteria.

Date and Pecan Slice

1 cup SR flour

60g pecans

Slightly less than 1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp maple syrup

1/2 tsp cinnamon

120g dates

60g butter

Put dates and pecans in food processor until chopped. Add sugar, flour, melted butter, egg and mix gently. Spoon mixture into a 20cm square slab pan. (Silicon is good) Bake at around 160 for around 30 minutes. Cut into slices while sill hot. Cool in tin.