A Taste of... The Dairy at InterContinental Sydney

Hotel restaurants aren't necessarily top of mind when dining out as a local, but after sampling the A Taste of... menu at Cafe Opera in the InterContinental Sydney recently, it seems I've overlooked the fact that five-star hotels have five-star restaurants too.

InterContinental Sydney's executive chef Tamas Pamer likes to think the restaurant merely sits within a hotel rather than being a hotel restaurant, and initiatives like the A Taste of... themed dinners promoting local Australian produce push this line.

Canapes for A Taste of... launch at Cafe Opera, InterContinental Hotel, Macquarie Street, Sydney

Until 30 April 2014, it's A Taste of... The Dairy, featuring cheeses and milk products from a range of local producers. Certainly not for the lactose-intolerant, this is a bit a heaven for cheese lovers, especially when matched with local wines.

As a launch event, we were treated to canapes that aren't normally a part of the three- or five-course degustation: creative dairy-focused morsels like seaweed crackers with ricotta and Yarra Valley salmon caviar whipped up by Pamer and his buddy and executive sous chef Julien Poteau.

Executive Chef Tamas Pamer (right) and Executive Sous Chef Julien Poteau (left)

Both of European backgrounds (Pamer is German while Poteau is French), both chefs were very complimentary of Australian dairy produce and produce generally, noting that Australian producers don't have the customer support and associated financial backing of European producers.

This is part of the reason that the InterContinental Sydney strongly supports local producers in events like the A Taste of... dinners and throughout the hotel's food offerings. It makes sense that a tourist staying in the hotel might like to be enlightened as to our fantastic local produce, as well as us locals too.

Table settings for the A Taste of... The Dairy degustation

We were treated with dining in Cafe Opera's ambient private room, differentiating the degustation experience from the restaurant's usual buffet offering.

G.H. Mumm Champagne

We started on Mumm Champagne with the canapes, which is as lovely a way to start a meal as there is.

Pepe Saya butter and bread

At the table, we were delighted to find large, drilled out, smooth river stones at each setting, filled with Pepe Saya butter and re-labelled with the brand's signature sticker.

Some of our country's best cultured butter doesn't taste much better served in a rock - it's so good anyway, slathered thickly onto a crusty seeded bread roll, that I managed to get through most of my stone's serve.

Logan Vintage 'M" Cuvee

Following champagne, our first course was matched with the Logan Vintage 'M' Cuvee; a sparkling blend of equal parts chardonnay, pinot noir and pinot meunier from Orange.

Gorgeously coppery in colour with a nice, dry palate, it was described as an adventurous wine pairing with our first course of cured trout.

Beetroot cured trout, fromage frais, chive, pickled cucumber

It was a stunning dish to look at featuring a beet red-tinted block of firm ocean trout resting in a verdant pool of creamy chive puree.

On top was a cute pink meringue wafer, flavoured with a native peach, sandwiching fresh, herbed fromage frais from Pokolbin's Binnorie Dairy.

Together, the sweet meringue, creamy fromage frais and salty cuts of ocean trout were delightfully light, making for a sophisticated layering of unexpectedly complementary flavours.

Jannei goat milk pudding, young pine needle, caramelised turnip, buckwheat

Our next course was of the nature-mimicking food trend that's popular in many restaurants now. Served in a jar was a forest floor-like crunchy mixture of puffed buckwheat and blitzed, crisped porcini mushrooms, hiding juicy cubes of soft, caramelised turnip.

It all came topped with a foamy pudding of Jannei goat's milk from a farm near Oberon and then crisp young pine needles; the distinct flavour of the goat's milk lifting the rest of the dish's mostly crunchy, brown components.

The savoury pudding was served with Polin & Polin John Rook's Rose; an amazingly dry, even savoury, rose from the Hunter Valley.

Butter milk roasted Barossa chicken, chestnut mushroom, potato maxim, cheddar emulsion

To the main meal we were presented with a spectacular composition of chicken that definitely took it out of boring poultry territory.

The golden-skinned breast portion featured an artistically layered stuffing between juicy chicken flesh which was roasted in Pepe Saya butter milk, joined by a myriad of accompaniments on the plate.

Butter milk roasted Barossa chicken, chestnut mushroom, potato maxim, cheddar emulsion

There was a Pyengana cheddar foam atop deep fried enoki mushrooms, braised chestnut mushrooms, little roasted potato silos and the crisp potato maxim ring that pretty much tasted like chips.

There wasn't a dull moment to be had with this Barossa chook, served with Montrose Stony Creek Chardonnay from the Mudgee region.

Ross Hill Pinnacle Series Cabernet Sauvignon

The spicy Ross Hill Pinnacle Series Cabernet Sauvignon from Orange came out with the cheese course in a stunning Plumm decanter.

In fact, the InterContinental Sydney now uses the full range of Plumm glassware throughout the hotel in another significant vote of support for Australian brands and producers.

Baked Reblochon (The Mountain Man), confit fig, walnut bread

The cheese course was easily my favourite featuring an organic French-style cheese by Victoria's L'Artisan Cheese Timboon called The Mountain Man, made in a French Alps Reblochon fashion.

A whole wheel of the cow's milk washed rind cheese was baked and served at the table, in its full oozing, stringing cheese glory.

Serving the baked Reblochon

This glory also made it into a goodie bag to take home - pretty much the best goodie bag ever, with a whole wheel of The Mountain Man cheese, plus Pepe Saya butter and crème fraîche, the lush Country Valley natural yoghurt and a mini loaf of brioche.

Baked Reblochon (The Mountain Man), confit fig, walnut bread

Baking the cheese seemed to reduce much of the washed rind's stinkiness, which is not necessarily a bad thing. The gooey melted cheese was simply divine with the sweet, yielding half fig while the toasted twig of walnut-studded bread was the perfect finishing touch.

Brie custard, apple, thyme honey, brioche, macadami

While the cheese could have been the end for me, the proper dessert course was one I'm unlikely to ever encounter again: a pot of thick, warm custard made of L'Artisan brie cheese, with lumps of the cheese's skin even.

The creaminess and slight saltiness of the cheese were apparent, highlighted against soft cooked apple, caramelised macadamia nuts and honey. The ice cream on the side consisted of Country Valley milk from Picton, cooked down to a dulce de leche state to form the sweet, milky ice cream.

Dessert was matched with the Small Acres Cyder Pommeau which is a fortified cider from the state's central west, though its potent taste makes it more like an apple brandy.

House made Easter eggs

We ended the amazing meal with house made dark chocolate Easter eggs, not part of the usual offering but so deliciously timely.

As a Sydney-sider I've got limited experience of our high end hotels from a guest point of view, but given a taste of what the InterContinental Sydney and Cafe Opera have to offer - a fine dining atmosphere and interesting, relevant produce on the plates - the A Taste of... concept has a unique drawcard for locals and tourists alike.

The Taste of... The Dairy dinners are on until 30 April 2014 at Cafe Opera. It will be followed by A Taste of... Head to Tail and Forest Foraging, respectively, in later months this year. Bookings are essential - see here for more details.

Food, booze and shoes dined at Cafe Opera at the InterContinental Hotel as a guest, with thanks to Pulse Communications.

OzHarvest Feeding the 5000 with rescued food to highlight food wastage

Food wastage is an issue close to my conscience and fridge – I hate throwing out groceries from the fridge or pantry. I feel guilty about the financial and environmental waste, as well as the thought that someone else out there really could have done with the extra food.

Feeding the 5000 by OzHarvest, Martin Place, Sydney

Australians throw out $7.8 billion of food every year, according to foodwise.com.au, which equates to every Australian household throwing out $1,038 worth of groceries each year. That’s four million tonnes per year of food which ends up in landfill, and yet there are those without enough food.

Pop-up milk crate garden

And not that food supply is an issue in Australia. Our country produces enough food to feed approximately 60 million people, according to the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (including exports, of course) – yet two million people in Australia still rely on food relief every year.

OzHarvest volunteers

Just last month, OzHarvest – the not-for-profit organisation that rescues food and delivers it to people in need – hosted a major awareness event in Sydney CBD's Martin Place, partnering with the United Nations Environment Program (OzHarvest is the official Australian partner on the global Think.Eat.Save – Reduce your Foodprint campaign).

Maeve O'Meara (centre) with volunteers

Feeding the 5000 brought together a number of restaurant chefs and industry figures, hundreds of OzHarvest volunteers and rescued ingredients to raise awareness of food waste and consumer tips to help reduce wastage.

Chef Lauren Murdoch (left) at the vegetable curry station

Surplus vegetable curry with rescued rice, onion relish and yoghurt

A free hot lunch for 5000 people was created out of ingredients that would have otherwise ended up as landfill. The menu included a full-flavoured vegetable curry made of surplus vegetables from the Sydney Markets and rescued sauce from MARS Food, served with rescued rice, onion relish, yoghurt and day-old bread salvaged from Brasserie Bread.

Brasserie Bread and saved potato and ham hock soup station

Dessermakers, Heilala Vanilla and Brasserie Bread's rescued bread & butter pudding station

Lemonade by 42 Bannerman

There was also saved potato soup with smoked ham hock by Martin Boetz of the Cooks Co-Op and James Viles of Biota; rescued bread and butter pudding by Dessertmakers, Pepe Saya and Heilala Vanilla; onion relish by Three Blue Ducks, chapatti from the Sydney Sikh community; gazpacho by Hungry Mondays, yoghurt by Kristen at the Full Circle and a fantastically refreshing home-style spiced lemonade by Salvatore Mammoti from 42 Bannerman Trattoria e Bar.

OzHarvest founder and CEO Ronni Kahn (left) and OzHarvest patron Thérèse Rein
(Photo by Giles Park, courtesy of Liquid Ideas)

Founder and CEO of OzHarvest, Ronni Kahn, said the aim behind the Feeding the 5000 event globally is to help raise awareness about the disturbing amount of food wasted around the world and how individuals, producers, supermarkets and governments can do a lot more to reduce food waste in our country.

"Food waste is a huge challenge that needs to be addressed locally and be embraced within our own homes first, so that we can affect incremental change globally. Our challenge is to create a sustainable food culture that can be shared by all. It’s a paradox that we produce enough food to feed all seven billion of us, yet so many in this world go hungry," Kahn said.

"The aim of this event is to educate all people – producers, consumers and businesses alike. We should not buy into the fact that fruit and veg needs to be cosmetically beautiful before we’ll buy it, because for every bendy or blemished carrot thrown out – we throw away embedded water, energy and fuel,” she said.

Billy Kwong's Kylie Kwong dishing out the vegetable curry
(Photo by Giles Park, courtesy of Liquid Ideas)

Nick Nuttall, UNEP spokesperson, added: “The way humanity manages or mismanages its food supply will in many ways define the 21st century – currently we know that we are not doing a great job with at least one-third of all food produced lost or wasted.”

"All of us are connected to food and every one of us can make a difference in the lives of those in need and the health of our planet,” he said.

In attendance at the Feeding the 500 event were OzHarvest patron and current First Lady (or Mrs Kevin Rudd) Thérèse Rein; Lord Mayor of Sydney Clover Moore and United Nations representative Julia Dean.

OzHarvest founder and CEO Ronni Kahn speaking on the panel

There was also a panel discussion on Food Waste, Food Sustainability & Food Security featuring OzHarvest’s Ronni Kahn; Joost Bakker, sustainable architect of Greenhouse by Joost fame; Anabella Sao, a local grower; Indira Naidoo, author, blogger and former TV personality; Professor Veena Sahajwalla of the University of New South Wales; and Stephen Beaman, Director of Waste and Resource Recovery, NSW Environment Protection Authority.

Efendy's Somer Sivrioglu (right) cooking at the stove(Photo by Giles Park, courtesy of Liquid Ideas)

Chefs throwing in a helping hand included Kylie Kwong of Billy Kwong; Martin Boetz of The Cook’s Co-op (and formerly Longrain); James Viles of Biota Dining; Lauren Murdoch of Three Weeds; Somer Sivrioglu of Efendy; Grant LaBrooy of Three Blue Ducks; and Omar Ivan Andrade, Ben Sampson and Hendrik Vogelzang of Hungry Mondays.

The event was also supported by the NSW Environment Protection Authority’s Love Food Hate Waste campaign.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, roughly one-third of the food produced in the world for human consumption every year — approximately 1.3 billion tonnes — gets lost or wasted. Every year, consumers in rich countries waste almost as much food (222 million tonnes) as the entire net food production of sub-Saharan Africa (230 million tonnes). Food loss and waste also amount to a major squandering of resources, including water, land, energy, labour and capital and needlessly produce greenhouse gas emissions, contributing to global warming and climate change.

Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt celebrates season start

If you haven't already seen it all over current restaurant menus and chefs' Instagram feeds yet, it's truffle season in Australia.

The valuable fungus tuber melanosporum is harvested from underground near the roots of oak and hazel trees in the winter seasons, which means the first picks of the season are now out and about.

Perigord truffles in jars at Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt held at Kitchen by Mike,
Dunning Avenue, Rosebery

Australian truffles were showcased at the recent Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt producers event, co-hosted by Pepe Saya and held in Rosebery's Kitchen by Mike.

Unlike Ms. Darlinghurst's usual Secret Foodie events where diners don't know where or what they're dining on until a few hours before the event, the Truffle Hunt was a less covert, cocktail-style event with food stations and their respective producers dotted around the canteen-style restaurant.

A 19 gram truffle

And so Perigord Truffles' Duncan Garvey and crew were on hand, showing off jars filled with their first-pick-of-the-season truffles from Tasmania.

There were plenty of long sniffs from the jar, with the truffles also on sale for $2 per gram. Garvey's tip for storing truffles had to do with taking a few slugs out of a full vodka bottle, inserting the truffle into the bottle and freezing the entire thing. Truffle vodka, anyone?

Yarra Valley salmon caviar with crème fraiche

The night kicked off with a range of organic and biodynamic wines from Mudgee's Lowe Wines, including a delightfully berry-sweet sparkling merlot.

The warehouse/industrial space filled quickly with chatter, wining and devouring of delicacies like Yarra Valley salmon caviar, served simply and prettily atop luscious Pepe Saya crème fraiche.

Prosciutto sliced from the bone

I could have stood beside the leg of prosciutto all night as it was being sliced by hand; the lush, fatty texture just about perfect with the home-made bread and a liberal spread of Pepe Saya's cultured butter for good measure.

The crowds and food on the table

There was also a huge cake of truffle butter; a collaboration between Pepe Saya's butter and Garvey's Perigord truffles which was truly and divinely luxurious spread thick on a piece of bread. Indeed, I think it'd be feasible to even eat the truffle butter by the teaspoon, such is its intoxicating aroma.

Pierre Issa of Pepe Saya butter and John Susman of Fisheads
serving up Kinkawooka mussels

Seafood industry legend John Susman was behind the counter with Pepe Saya's Pierre Issa, dishing out plates of Kinkawooka mussels cooked with Pepe Saya butter, as well as bowls with creamy dollops of polenta with truffle.

Shaving truffles onto polenta

The generosity of the truffle shavings on the polenta didn't go unnoticed which along with grated parmesan cheese, really pepped up the soft, filling polenta.

Truffle polenta and Kinkawooka mussels cooked in Pepe Saya butter

Served with the always soft and sea-sweet Kinkawooka mussels, it was quite the hearty meal. I had to restrain myself from more polenta/mussels/prosciutto/ bread and butter as the Dessertmakers' dessert spreads covering an entire table had tempted since the beginning of the night.

Warm dessert options by Dessertmakers

Huge platters of bread and butter pudding festooned with sultanas and apple crumble garnished with fresh walnuts waited patiently as truffle hunters did the savoury rounds.

Dessertmakers' bread and butter pudding

I was enamoured with the soft, warm bread and butter pudding, made with Pepe Saya butter, of course (Dessertmakers and Pepe Saya share the same Tempe factory).

The subtle sweetness and creaminess, not to mention the carb-loading factor, make this a winner in winter with thick yoghurt or a bit of ice cream.

Truffled rice pudding

On theme was Dessertmakers' truffled rice pudding, a warm and creamy spoonful of soft rice speckled with truffle gratings. The truffle flavour was subtle beneath the sweetness, but definitely present in this ideal winter dessert.

(From left) Ms Darlinghurst from Secret Foodies, Maya from Kinkawooka Mussels, John Susman from Fisheads, Pierre Issa from Pepe Saya, Merna Taouk from Dessertmakers and Duncan Garvey from Perigord Truffles 

Towards the end of the night Ms Darlinghurst got the producers out front for a question-and-answer session, including questions from the audience.

Aside from the producers' intimate knowledge of everything we'd sampled and consumed that night, it was easy to see their passion and dedication for their respective specialties which really does seem to make their produce taste better.

The crowds for Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt at Kitchen by Mike

Going by the satisfied faces in the crowd, it looked like the Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt was a successful hunt, boding well for the Australian season for diners and restaurateurs alike.

Food, booze and shoes attended the Secret Foodies Truffle Hunt as a guest.