Hobart Apprentice chef linked to Al Qaeda!

FEDERAL POLICE, ASIO, MOSSAD & INTERPOL have charged a Hobart Apprentice Chef over a series of incidents that have kept the Tasmania Police bomb squad busy during the past fortnight.

The person who cannot be named appeared in an out-of-sessions Hobart court at 6pm yesterday.

It is accused that the man has strong links to Al Qaeda and had done some basic military training in the Eastland’s car park after hours. Acquaintances of the man said he ‘was a crack shot’ at the air guns in sideshow alley at last year Huon Show.

The apprentice chef was charged with four counts of creating a nuisance under the criminal code.
The man did not enter a plea and was remanded in custody. He has been sent to an undisclosed location, some speculating that it might be the cellar at Sapphire Lodge where he will be subjected to Water-boarding and interrogation.

Five improvised explosive devices were discovered on Hobart's Eastern Shore during the past two weeks.
The first device was found about 9.30pm on February 19, forcing the closure of parts of Lindisfarne.

A second device was found on the ground outside a house in Cornwall St, Rose Bay, on the following Monday and a third was found on a bush track off Flagstaff Gully Rd at Lindisfarne.
A fourth device was discovered on Saturday night at Kangaroo Bluff near Bellerive. The devices were made from basic materials including Soda Stream bottles, crushed firelighters, aerosol cans and sparklers.

Some were wrapped in brown paper. Others were wrapped in Mauve Tuille with sparkly ribbons and a signed card.

The fifth device was found at the recent Hobart International Track and Field meet but Police were not concerned as attendance was so low it was never going to be a threat.

Tasmania Police's Con Rilios said two calls from members of the public late last week had helped the investigation.

"The images that were published in Thursday's Mercury triggered very specific information from members of the public," he said.
We are indebted to Mrs Vera St Hubbins and Mr Wesley Vanden Donger for their alert but not alarmed observations.

"Sadly the spectre of world terror has arrived here in Hobart, this city will never be the same again".

Chilling stuff indeed.

Good food takes time mate!

‘Well just bloody well wake up earlier and bake some more’ was the delicately put advice given to me once by a clearly annoyed customer on discovering we had sold out of bread that day.
From that day forward two things became clear to me, there is an expectation from some members of society that their needs will always be met and the other was I had discovered that ‘Bread-Rage’ could be added to the growing number of the modern day malady.
In today’s Elizabeth Merryment column in the Weekend Australian I was struck by the comments that Igor Ivanovic an artisan bread maker in Sydney had to say.

“We can’t physically make more bread than that in the space,” says baker Igor Ivanovic with a shrug. “Although more people come, all that happens is that we sell out earlier. Some people get very unhappy about that, but what can you do?”

And this

“I remember growing up in Europe. If you went on the weekend to the bakery after nine or 10 o’clock, there was no bread. Here, that’s a new thing. But I think people quite like that. It lends it a bit of … magic.”

At the café we don’t do pre-orders of bread. The reasons are simple. We are not a bakery, we are a café that makes its own bread and we sell whatever will suffice for the cafes needs that day, the rest we sell. In an earlier time, we were faced with the absurd reality that all the bread for sale had been pre-ordered and no one making the effort to come in early for a loaf could get one. This lead to much Bread-Rage.
If you want the bread you must come in and get it. Sometimes the bread isn’t always ready at 10.30 and this understandably can lead to frustration. Making sourdough is not a finite science. There are so many factors in which can affect the finished loaf.
This certainty and consistency is why the large franchises do so well, because they have altered aspects of the bread in order to meet the demands of the market. Smart move one might argue if your goals are market domination, so what’s the problem?
Well some of us believe that in this quest to satiate this constant demand and instant gratification, we have lost sight of the importance of the integrity of the product. Also and this is the thing that I am most interested in; that somehow we have lost the ability to ‘wait’ for our food. We become indignant, impatient and incredulous when we are told, ‘I’m sorry we have sold out today’ or ‘we only made a few loaves of these as they were special’.
This does not sit at ease with many modern sensibilities where virtually every whim no matter how niche is not only catered for but seen as a unique business opportunity.
In fact some businesses are even seen as dinosaurs because they don’t bend instantly to the constant winds of the market. Curiously though there are a few acceptable anomalies that are affectionately regarded as ‘quaint’ or my ‘eccentric’ or my favourite ‘Old fashioned’
The irony with this last one is that in order to now be regarded as ‘old fashioned’ they must withstood the changes thrust upon them and weathered the many fashions that have come and gone, which must have been every hard at times.
Their reward? To be seen as some sort of anachronistic throw-back to a time when we didn’t expect the shops to be open 24/7 and we could only get one sort of bread, but at least it was a decent loaf made with quality ingredients, love and the time to make it properly.

The Swan Inn, Stratford St.Mary 1988

My fondest memory of that time honoured of hospitality institutions, the knock off drink(s) was way back in 1988, between the hamlets of Dedham and Stratford St. Mary, just outside of Colchester in England
At the time as a journeyman chef I found myself sweating away at an historical coaching restaurant with a dynamic if not eccentric chef, hell bent on achieving a coveted star in the Michelin Guide.
We all lived in the tumbledown staff lodgings which really equated to some very average digs of questionable suitability.
Gumboots were swapped for slippers at the bathroom door at one of the two toilets which was perpetually broken and flushed its contents across the floor wetting the feet of the not yet fully inducted new staff member. The Maitre’D would get himself hammered every night and would frequently neglect his cat which turned to the wilds for its supper. One morning after following the stench to his bedroom door, we peered under his bed on which he continued to snore and fart unhindered by our presence to locate the cadaver of what looked like the putrefied and decaying remains of a woodland animal.
Meals were provided, that was of course if you were happy for your diet to consist of fried potato peelings and fried eggs with HP sauce, three times a day. Otherwise one had to supplement your calorific intake with packets of pork scratchings or Walkers salt n vinegar crisps from the Swan Inn, the better of the three local pubs.
Our regular working day would start at 7.30am and we would mostly get out at 4pm, race home for a kip and be back in the kitchen at 5pm. From then we’d do service and finish at around 10.30 or 11 o’clock and it was always a mad scramble to finish on time. We would all bolt down the tree lined road still in uniform with our heavy coats trailing and the bubbling of a tributary of The Stour River as soundtrack. All along the road were bushes of thick nettles which claimed several of our number over the year of stumbling back to the staff house after a session at the Swan Inn.
The pub shut its doors at 11pm I think so if we got there before then the publican would ‘lock us in’. This meant he drew the curtains and to an observer outside, the pub would appear closed and thus keeping to its licensing requirements. Inside however the place was alive with patrons unshackled from the burdens of work and mischief was in the air.
My routine began by claiming a table by the fire to write many detailed letters to my friends and family back home, my toes warmed by the radiant heat as I gulped copious pints of hand drawn ales. Then it was darts and then taking turns at the bar to talk shit and out-do the previous story. Of course staff fraternising was part of these evenings and our luckily for us, our restaurant was a participating training partner for the near bye Hospitality college in Norwich. Every two weeks a new ‘batch’ of trainees, mostly woman and curiously from the Scandinavian countries, would arrive to do their placement. Their presence in this grim time of night always kept the mood electric. Though we worked hard, they were great days and nights, drinking and chasing the girls. We usually got kicked out of the pub in the wee hours and suffered horribly the next day at work. Sadly this routine was to claim the pay packets of at least one of the chefs who owed the publican his wages nearly every week. What a sorry figure he began to cut, cadging drinks from anyone who’d not heard his sorry tale of woe.
The sheer dread one would experience when the knock at your door on the morning of a rostered day off would indicate that one of your workmates was sick and you had to cover for them. ‘Bastards”, you would think, ‘they were fine guzzling pints the night before’.
I can actually recall turning off all my electrical appliances on one of these occasions to fool the belligerent Sous chef that I was not in my room when he hammered on my door, bellowing for me to come to work. His words muffled as I submerged myself under the refuge of my doona, secure at least on this occasion.
Then conversely there was the pure unbridled elation one experienced when a rostered day off appeared from the mire of work and you could really let your hair down knowing the following morning could be slept off under the covers of your eiderdown.
I always wished I could bottle that feeling.

Cheap ethnic food, our right or our prejudice?

I’ve often wondered why it is that we assume that many ethnic cuisines will be cheap. Why is this so?
For many people a cheap night out will often include a meal at an ethic restaurant be it Turkish, Somali, Vietnamese or Indonesian.
If you are talking about takeaway food then then the anticipation of thriftiness is increased. I suspect that the very early Chinese restaurants in this country were also subjected to this kind of prejudice but it’s amazing what a few generations of acceptance can do. These days many of the nation’s better restaurants are Chinese or more specifically, Cantonese and customers expect to pay a premium for this experience. It could have been the same prospect for those early Italian eateries, which are now such a far cry from today where Italian food is not equated with cheap, far from it in many cases. The dining public’s acceptance of more costly Japanese food has also changed somewhat over this time.
Paradoxically, Greek food until more recently has mostly been confined to the low price point threshold whilst conversely Indian food has always been on the more pricey side of the ledger. In the case of Greek food, I suspect unlike the Italians, that he Greeks had some sort of culinary cringe when it came to exporting their cuisine. This theory stands up especially when you consider that Greek cuisine eagerly absorbed many French techniques in their quest to modernise and be a part of a progressive Europe. Many dishes we equate being Greek actually are French in origin. This in itself is not as remarkable as many cultures enjoy pinching dishes from each other, however when you consider how almost primitive and basic the cuisine of Greece was, these additions must have been very seismic in their effect.
The fact that Indian food has always enjoyed a consistently high monetary value could be attributed to the fact that it is very familiar especially in England so it’s been absorbed over a couple of hundred years already, thus ‘doing its time’ as a cheap alternative and now has ‘earned the right’ to charge accordingly. These are all just my own views and are not based in any concrete evidence, just bits I’ve read and observed over the years.
Over the decades a few attempts have been made to ‘sex-up’ read,’ charge more’ for Vietnamese food. For the most part, this has manifested into the décor and fit-out of the restaurant. Banished were the cheap Formica tables and plastic condiments caddies and in were the bold statements of interior design. Linked to this was the notion of travel. Vietnam has been a hot spot for travellers for the last twenty years or so and people returned hankering for those authentic tastes. Throw into the mix a new generation of savvy entrepreneurs born with a sense of pride at their cultural differences and the smarts to know how to present and make money from them and you have a big shift in the dining publics’ perceptions.
Maybe one day the Vietnamese restaurants will be regarded as venerable as say those of France and Italy and then they can charge aptly?
However sadly I suspect that one new cultures' acceptance and sense of worth in their adopted country might even be defined by their entrenched price points in restaurants and cafes. Something to mull over and discuss I think.

Jake Gyllenhaal goes under the knife to appear on reality TV Cooking show!

Jake Gyllenhaal after surgery. Arguably a sad day for the ladies.
Really shocked to have learned about a new-ish phenomenon that is taking a throat-grip on the contestants of prospective reality TV contestants in order for them to appear more 'believable'.. The term ‘Contestiplasty’ might be new and invented by yours truly but its insidious talons reach way back into our history of apparent need to conform to stereotypes or be overlooked by the food networks.

Media companies are always looking for the next big thing, My restaurant Rules, Masterchef and My Kitchen Rules spring to mind, OK scratch My Kitchen Rules but these programs need the modern society to be represented on the tellie as to reflect their viewing audience and thus appeal to their core demographic, no not the audience silly you, the advertisers!

The advertisers call the shots. You think you are watching some epic contest between a few precociously talented twelve year old home cooks? Wrong! What you are witnessing in prime-time is overt product placement punctuated by some bratty kids cooking their Stage-Mums dinner party soufflé and the subsequent meltdown when big Matt doesn’t score them large.

In fact in this age of the cult of celebrity chef it seems everyone’s a contender despite of or because of their lack of experience. These days it’s less important to have any kind of track record in the field but you must be telegenic above all else to succeed. I am saddened to report that a growing number of talented chefs and cooks, eager to get their mugs on the box have succumbed to the slashes of the surgeon’s knife. It seems it’s no longer possible to make it on talent alone these days and there’s a mad scramble to ‘Nip & Tuck’ or ‘Botox’ the imperfections away to suit the 'profile' of what the show requires.

They want a tubsy-happy-go-lucky 'Kenny' type, no problemo Or a street-smart-young-n-sassy Eurasian woman-done. Oh, and who can overlook the battling suburban Mum type? Because these profiles are so familiar on our screens, folks are ready to go under te knife in order to sharpen their chances of success.

But with every story of those who stretch for the lofty heights of stardom comes a fable of those who crash down to reality with an ignoble and inglorious thud.

Take this guy, a modestly talented and capable cook who in his quest for greater glory underwent hours of major surgery to fulfil his deluded dream of landing a TV show.

Sadly for him the dream was to turn to nightmare when his surgery went all so wrong.
He recounts;” Yea I was a major acting player, a few notable roles under my belt and I knew how to appear on screen for sure, I mean, you guys know I was nominated right?! This was different though, I had to appear as if I was confident yet not egotistical. Shit, it was my toughest gig if truth be known and that’s when I decided I should try the Contestiplasty to give me the edge I needed to get the gig.’

What was intended as a minor facelift took all the wrong turns and for those of you, whom are familiar with this actor’s body of work, is still being fought over in a Hollywood court today.

‘If I have some advice for you kids dreaming of becoming an actor out there in their suburban bedrooms, live that dream, don’t complicate it by trying to be a celebrity chef contestant or ever getting Contestiplasty!

Like the sombre words 'Don't smoke' of sadly deceased former actor and smoker and Yul Brynner, hang ominously in the air and so echoes the tale of Hollywood heartthrob Jake Gyllenhaal, ‘Please don’t get Contestiplasty in order to appear on a cooking reality show, it ruined my life and my acting career’.

Hobart City Council rejects mobile Halal abattoir in the Mall?

Hassem el Jabani has lodged an application to establish a mobile Halal abattoir in Hobart's Elizabeth Mall despite advice from the city council that his proposal would likely be rejected.
Mr el Jabani said he had asked for the decision to be made by Hobart City Council aldermen, because there would be no change to policy regarding mall stands until it was determined by aldermen.
He said he had surveyed retail business owners or managers in the mall and none had a problem with his plan.
Of those canvassed 55 per cent described it as a great idea, 27 per cent said it would attract people to the mall, and 18 per cent said the mall badly needed revitalising with something new.
And Mr el Jabani said there were no other mobile Halal abattoir’s in the locality, Peter Simmonds who had the Donut King franchise in Cat and Fiddle Arcade, said he had no issue with the proposal.
He said Mr Simmonds did not butcher Halal meat products and he believed variety was good in a dynamic retail environment.
Centro Cat and Fiddle arcade manager Caroline McGovern also had no objection.
Mr el Jabani said public comments also supported his proposal.
He said his mobile abattoir would conform to food handling regulations and would enhance the mall providing a new food option for people.
The supporting businesses in the mall included ones selling food and drinks.
"Many of those commenting said it may bring more people into the mall at a time when there has been a downturn in business," Mr el Jabani said.
But he expected council to be "hard set" in its policy not to allow more commercial stands in the mall.
The only portable permanent business in the mall is the Flower Barrow.
"I am wanting them to relax that policy and be forward thinking and innovative and at least allow it for a trial period," Mr el Jabani said.
He said space he occupied in the mall would be charged at a commercial lease rate, and the council should consider each application on merit.

Self censorship in action!

It was all a dream....

The Cooking show talent spotters

Three men sit at the end of a long board room table. A jug of water, glasses and three neat A4 pads and pens are arranged at each place sitting. The company logo, Freementle Media, adorns the pads.
Two of the youngish men are in smart suits whilst the third, lets call him ‘the Talent’, is a portly orange-tanned middle aged man with bleached teeth, blond highlights and a paunch not tamed by his low-cut skinny black jeans.
The camera zooms in to the head shots and we take up the dialogue:

Suit #1; ‘Well Mr _______. you certainly are tenacious and I have to congratulate you on your chutzpah, I’ve not seen anything quite like it before, so I hope its all worth our time. I’ll cut to the chase, how can we help you?’
The Talent: ‘Yea cheers but first I’ve got a question for you’
Suit #1; ‘Go ahead’
The Talent: ‘What’s Choots-par? Is it a curry or sumfin?’
The suits exchange looks, whilst Suit #1 draws a thin redline across the words: Poss guest chefs/Masterchef
Suit #2: ‘Ok, let get to the point, what are you here for?’
The Talent: ‘I want to do a show’
Suit #1: ‘A show?’
The Talent: ‘Yea, you know, cookin ‘n shit. Moochin’ around in the deep-country meetin’ six fingered farmers & two headed fishermen n shit, you know keeping it real.’
Suit #2: ‘N shit?’
The Talent: ‘Exacly! I wanna be big, real big, bigger’n that Hugh Fartsy-Know-it-all. Bigger’n that shouty-sweary Ramsay. Bigger than even him.’
Suit #1: ‘Him?’
The Talent: ‘You know, HIM, the bloke who’s bigger than Ben Hur n'shit, the biggest and baddest one of the lot.’
Both suited men look blankly for a moment.
The Talent: ‘The bloke who we are not allowed to mention, for crissakes’
Suit #1: ‘Er, you mean Voldemort?’
The talent getting frustrated: ‘Fuck no, Mr Luvery Jubberly hiself, Jamie freakin Olivar mate, thats facking well oo!’
Suit #1: ‘Oh right yes I see, the other network, of course.’
And exchanges looks with suit #2, clears throat and holding his pen for ballast, continues: ‘We feel that in order to portray you convincingly, as a travelling chef etc etc, that you must have some actual culinary experience under your belt alre…..’
The Talent cuts him off mid sentence and crows
‘HA! Got ya!’ thumping the table for effect. ‘I’m already enrolled in Cert 3 at the bloody Polytechnic!’
Stunned, the suits chime in unison ‘The Polytechnic?!’
The Talent continues, ‘Yea they advertised a while back, ‘Do you want to be the next Jamie Olivar n'shit?’ ‘and my freakin’ answer is Yes. Yes and freakin’ Yes!’
‘Now how bout my show then?’
The suits look at each other before suit #1 shrugs his shoulders and suit #2 flips his pad onto a new page, writes Contestant in bold letters, clears his throat and says;
‘Righto then, first question: How convincingly can you cry?’

Camera fades to The Talent belting out his best ever Crocodile tears

The antidote to all those 'must-invite' dinner lists

It’s such a cliché but whenever someone gets asked who they would invite to their ‘ultimate’ dinner party, inevitably Ghandi, Mother Theresa and Einstein are in their list of ‘must haves’.
The list, you understand, is meant to inform the reader of the extensive interests, profound ponderings and immeasurable character of the listee.
In short, it’s not really about the dinner guests at all. It’s about the person who wrote the list and a reflection of their tastes.
I suspect it is a widely held acceptance that list-making is mostly the pre-occupation of geeky Male-Kidults who don’t quite fit in anywhere, so amuse themselves by sequencing their likes and dislikes. Look Nick Hornby explains this way better than I ever could so I’ll move on.

Instead of boring everyone with my ideal dinner guests, I’ll bore everyone with my list of non-invitees.

Fabio Grosso-the Olympic diver who plays soccer

Hugh Grant-no not the actor and curb crawler, the CEO of Monsanto

Ray Croc-the bloke that did a deal with the Devil, Walt Disney to change forever the way advertising is marketed toward children

The person that invented the cheesy-multi-crust pizza. WTF?

That killjoy at Banjos HQ, who insists on forcing upon us the old fashioned tomato sauce portions-Fuck-all sauce with maximum hardship.

The person from the Huon Council that decried ‘No standing’ on the stretch of Mary St in Cygnet, where its, err… OK to stand?

That short, curly headed bloke from Air Supply, who seems to have all his songs on high rotation on Hobart’s FM stations.

That ‘Free-Hugs’ try-hard bloke from a few years ago plus those annoying people that put smiley emoticons on their emails.

Oh, and while I’m on it, that: ‘Stuff white people like’ wanker, the ‘You are what you eat’ bully and the ‘Biggest Loser’ creators too.

I will NOT be inviting Noel Gallagher, Simon Cowell, Mark Holden, Lady Ga Ga, or any of those overly warbley, high note reaching, Beber-esque lady-boy singers.

Phillip Ruddock is most definitely, not invited, nor is Henry Kissinger, Don Rumsfeld or Dick Cheney

Milo Minderbinder, prototype capitalist and film arch-villain, not on the list.

Brendon Fevola, Shane Warne, Kevin Muscat, John Hopoate, Anthony Mundine, and Mike Tyson won’t ever be welcome at my table

Sorry but the people responsible for the lax food labelling in this country, are not welcome either. Nor are the ones letting GM-free farmers hang out to dry whilst big agribusiness sue them for breach of copyright. Ditto those in the RSPCA for giving ticks to those responsible for the questionable treatment of animals.

Nor is Kyle Sandilands, Piers Ackerman, Andrew Bolt, Neil Mitchell and Steve Price

The people responsible for ‘Freddy got fingered’, ‘Battlefield Earth’, ‘Pluto Nash’, ‘Soul Plane’, ‘The Pink Panther two’, ‘Year One’, ‘White Chicks’, ‘The Love Guru’ plus many more…

Sheesh, I could really go on and on…