I bought a sandwich toaster a little while ago. It’s a dirt cheap, no name, supermarket brand that I thought would be good for the 12 year old to make an arvo tea toastie on.

I have been discovering other things apart from sangers you can cook on it though. First was pancakes. The 12 year old and friend were coming home alone and I wanted something easy (and not too messy) for them for arvo tea. So I made a pancake batter and tested it on the sandwich press. For some reason, it makes the most perfect, circular pancakes. Just pour on, wait until the batter bubbles and flip. Voila.

So then I started to experiment with other things. The sandwich press, it turns out is good for other things. Last night I grilled some witlof on it, then served with a little lemon and olive oil. I’ve grilled mango on it, with a sprinkle of palm sugar. I’ve crisped pancetta for a salad.  I remember my mum making sort of puff pastry apple turnovers on ours when we were kids.

The beauty of the sandwich grill is it’s mini-size. So efficient. So little cleaning up.

So do you have any sandwich toaster recipes you’d care to share?

So, it’s farewell to The Courier Mail. I started at the paper in in 2004 under the lovely Sandra Killen who was in charge of ‘Home’ Magazine, which was quirky and colourful and very much Sandra. She was a wonderful boss; inspiring and creative and willing to accept ideas that were sometimes out of the square.

Then I moved on Good Life, firstly under Madeline Healy, then Fiona Donnelly, who both taught me much and did an amazing  job creating a food section that any paper would be proud to have.

Since then, it’s been all food for me-working in both the news and features sections. I’ve learned so much, met so many wonderful people, both at work and outside it that it’s bittersweet to leave.  But it was time to move on.

So that’s what I’m doing. It’s a big, slightly scary adventure, but the best things in life do have the element of risk.

I will miss the Courier Mail though, it’s been part of my life for a long time. The paper still has a whole lot of very talented writers though, including food writers like Fiona Donnelly, so I imagine that the food sections there will continue to evolve and grow quite satisfactorily without me.

Farewell CM.

Great news for North QLD as the announcement comes that Australia’s first origin grown chocolate made from cocoa grown in Queensland’s Mossman region, is ready to eat. 

“Daintree Estates will unveil its market ready product and celebrate with an official launch in Port Douglas on Friday, 4 November.

 According to the Executive Chairman of Daintree Cocoa Pty Ltd, Ray Durrant, the forthcoming launch is significant in that it is the culmination of a decade of hard work and commitment. 

“This is an exciting time for Mossman, Queensland and the $1.4billion dollar Australian chocolate market that has never before had a locally grown commercial offering.   What we have achieved is the first Australian made chocolate made for commercial use from cocoa grown here in Australia – specifically, our tropical north.

 ”The cocoa we use has been nurtured from four estates in the Mossman area of the Daintree National Park. Each farmer has a special story to tell about their love affair with the land, region and cocoa and the opportunities this brings to the region,” he said.

 ”For both chocolate lovers and the food industry, this is an excellent quality and welcome addition to the market – that we believe not only tastes delicious, but is completely unique in its flavour to any other brand.  It is this taste that only an Australian origin product can bring to the palate,” said Ray.

The poor north has been battered of late with a downturn in tourism and cyclones and flooding, so bringing a new industry into the area is a great boon.

Incidentally, here’s my piece about the cocoa plantation I wrote way back in 2007.

Home-grown chocolate puts down roots in tropical north

Natascha Mirosch

AUSTRALIA may soon be the only developed nation in the world to produce cocoa. This week, 2000 cocoa seedlings will leave a north Queensland nursery and be planted as the first commercial crop in Australia. About 2500 cocoa trees, developed from a hybrid seed originating in New Guinea, were originally planted as a research crop by the Department of Primary Industries and Fisheries in partnership with Cadbury near Innisfail and Mossman in 2000. So far, the results have been promising.

‘‘The yields are high,’’ said the department’s Yan Diczbalis, who has been with the project since its inception. ‘‘Normally, you would expect around a tonne per hectare — these trees have been producing around three tonnes.’’

Of the five hybrids researched, four have been selected by the department for commercial production and will be planted in the coming months on north Queensland farms. ‘‘The conditions here have proven favourable — cocoa likes a humid, tropical climate and fertile, welldrained soil, which we have,’’ Mr Diczbalis said.

Chocolate made from the original trial plantation, including dark and milk chocolate, had been well received, however Mr Diczbalis said the market would initially be purely niche-based.

‘‘The DPI&F says that all being well, we can expect to see an Australian-grown and produced single-origin chocolate within the next two years,’’ he said.