In my time as a food blogger, I've been fortunate to receive some truly fantastic opportunities and invitations to some great events.  (You know, a pudding making class, a spring lamb degustation, that whole Barossa thing).  Most recently, I was delighted to receive an invitation that seemed to speak directly to me: "Celebrate 25 years of Cloudy Bay at the Emerald Peacock Rooftop".  My family's favourite wine?  At one of Melbourne's hottest bars? Yes please!  My week in the Barossa saw me develop a whole new appreciation for wine (fret not, many more blogposts to come!), so I was especially keen to revisit this family favourite with my newfound understanding.

The Emerald Peacock
233 Lonsdale Street
Melbourne VIC 3000
Ph: (03) 9654 8680
Website

My dad has been drinking (and loving!) Cloudy Bay sauvignon blanc for well over a decade now, long before the bottle shop shelves became awash with Marlborough sauvignon blancs.  (We've also enjoyed the pinot noir, and the late harvest riesling).  So it was absolutely no surprise to me when he said he'd be my plus-one for the night.

Pillows

On offer were a few different wines from the Cloudy Bay range; we tried the 2010 Sauvignon Blanc, the 2008 Pinot Noir and the Pelorus sparkling wine.  (I couldn't say no to the sparkling wine. Typical.)  The Pelorus, Cloudy Bay's sparkling wine label, was named after Pelorus Jack, an albino dolphin that was famous for meeting and guiding ships through Cook Straight in New Zealand.  It is a mixture of chardonnay and pinot noir grapes, making it an easy drinking wine that would go well with savoury canapés - think Parmesan gougères or mushroom tartlets with flaky puff pastry.

In addition to the wines, we were served a light meal: an antipasto platter and pizza!

Antipasto Platter

The Cloudy Bay Bubbly Prawn Pizza

The Cloudy Bay Bubbly Prawn Pizza was created exclusively for the Cloudy Bay rooftop, and will be available for purchase whilst the rooftop is open - $30 with 2 glasses of sauvignon blanc.  It is topped with prawns marinated in Pelorus sparkling wine, (how luxe!) and has a nice fiery kick from fresh chilli.

Lovely night for it...

Sarah and Fred attended The Cloudy Bay Rooftop as guests of The Emerald Peacock, with thanks to Victoria from Mango PR for the invitation.

Picture Source: Tourism Barossa's Barossa's Table Competition - Winner's Journey! Facebook Album

After my afternoon at the Food Forest, I drove to my accommodation to check in and have a little rest.  I couldn't rest too long, however, as I was about to be picked up by Jaci from Tourism Barossa and taken to dinner!

1918
94 Murray St
Tanunda SA 5352
Ph: (08) 8563 0405
Website

Balcony

Freshly baked bread with house made parmesan oil - $2.00

Mmm... fluffy crusty bread.  I later learnt that the bread is baked down the road at the Apex Bakery (you may remember from my itinerary that I visited Apex later that week!)  The story goes that 1918 asked Apex to create a bread for them, which subsequently became so popular that Apex now stock it as a standard item, called, unsurprisingly, the 1918.  I'll write more about it when I write up the Apex bakery, but suffice to say, it's good bread and well worth picking up a loaf if you are in town!

Each of us went for the 2-entrée route, which is a great idea if you are trying to reduce calorie intake, or like me, trying to save room for dessert!

I went for the soup special: soft white cabbage in a rich broth, with baby corn, spinach and slices of lamb sausage.  Very similar to what I'd call a "Saturday afternoon soup" back in Germany - comforting and delicious.

Soup of the Day - European White Cabbage soup with lamb sausage - $9.50

Jaci and Reneé each ordered the seared king prawns.  In contrast to my comforting soup, this was a fresh and lively dish. Underneath the big, juicy prawns was a refreshing herb salad of fresh coconut, coriander, mint, basil, chillies and bean shoots.  As an aside, I love this type of food - great tasting and diet-friendly, without the need for any modifications.  (I made some similar dishes here).

Seared king prawns, asian herb salad, fried peanuts, red curry dressing - $20.00

And in complete contrast to what I just wrote, (well, I was on holiday after all!), both Jaci and I had the pork belly for our 2nd course.

Roasted pork belly, orange segments, apple aioli, endive and toasted fennel seeds - $18.50

I'm not normally a fan of citrus in salads, or indeed fennel, but I thought the salad matched the pork perfectly, cutting through the oiliness and preventing it from feeling too heavy.

And here's what the pork looked like under the salad!  (Don't worry guys, I'd never leave you hanging for a shot of pork crackling!)

Even with the fab pork, I was really envious of Reneé's 2nd course.  Check out those slabs of haloumi!

Fried haloumi, hommus, eggplant salsa, fennel and freekah wheat tabouleh - $18.00

Haloumi, hommus and eggplant are 3 of my favourite foods.  I tried a bit from Reneé's plate, and it was just as good as it looked.

We ordered 3 desserts between us to share.  First up, we have the dessert special of the evening: roasted peaches, peach ice-cream and a little pastry hat with yet more peaches.  Peaches are in season at the moment, and it was lovely to try a dessert that made the most of the local bounty.

Dessert Special: Roasted peaches, peach ice-cream, peach pastry lid - $14.00

Being a Melbourne girl, you know I just saw "salted caramel" and said: "Yes please!"

Chocolate & hazelnut torte, popcorn ice cream, salted caramel, hazelnut cream - $14.00

The chocolate torte was rather like a dense brownie, sitting in a pool of salted caramel.  Both the popcorn and the popcorn ice-cream were great, but I thought the hazelnut cream was the standout element of the dessert.

However, the best dessert was definitely the white chocolate parfait.

White chocolate & honeycomb parfait with roasted strawberries,almond tuile, strawberry sorbet - $13.00

The parfait was velvety soft and creamy, and I loved the different strawberry flavours - roasted whole strawberries, a strawberry sauce, and an incredibly pure-tasting strawberry sorbet.  A little almond tuile provided a welcome crunch.

Irish Coffee

A little Irish coffee to round off the night, and that was the meal!  1918 was a wonderful introduction to the Barossa: friendly service, delightful atmosphere and fantastic food.  If there had been more time on the trip, I definitely would have liked to come back and try some more!  From my conversations with people I met on the trip, many locals visit 1918 regularly, and I can definitely see why.

The first stop on my busy Barossa's Table itinerary was The Food Forest, a permaculture farm in Gawler.  It was literally my first stop: straight from the airport to the farm!  I wasn't quite sure what to expect, as my itinerary only said, mysteriously: "Food Forest Workshop".  I'd had a quick sticky-beak at their website the week before, and learnt that they produce around 160 varieties of organically certified food, run courses on sustainability and host visitors for educational trips.  Great stuff!  But I still couldn't figure out what I'd actually be doing there.  Would they teach me how to forage for food? Would they set me to work on their farm? (Eep - manual labour is not my strong point!)

What we actually did was relaxed and low-key, but still informative and enlightening.  (Especially for a city-slicker like me!)  I enjoyed lunch with owners Graham and Annemarie Brookman and their WWOOFers (Willing Workers On Organic Farms), and then they took me around the farm and showed me how permaculture works practically.

Let's start with lunch:

Yummy Lunch!

Annemarie and Graham had just come back from the Adelaide markets, so they had a great stash of tasty treats: bread, watermelon, peaches, cheeses, salami and more!  Apparently, when the market is winding up and the stallholders all start trading their remaining items between themselves - great idea!


The WWOOFers had made pickled zucchini and hot pickled chillies - delicious.  One of the WWOOFers, Gabe, had also made acorn flour the week before - how cool is that?!  Unfortunately there wasn't any left so I didn't get to try any.  I wonder what it tastes like?  I'll have to make it a point to find some and try it.

Following lunch, Annemarie took me into the garden and showed me how they designed it according to permaculture principles.  Basically, permaculture is an approach to designing human settlements and agricultural systems that is based on the relationships found in natural ecologies - it is about sustainable land use. (Thanks Wikipedia!)  That definition does sound a little theoretical and academic, but as I saw, the actual practice of permaculture is extremely practical, and involves a good deal of plain common sense.  It's things like having north-facing windows to maximise light coming into the house, collecting rainwater for household use, using a natural reedbed system to filter grey water so it can be reused in the garden, and even just keeping the veggie and herb patch near the kitchen so that it is in easy reach.

Annemarie and Graham built this pizza oven from scratch!

Pizza Oven

Graham then took me for a walk around the wider farm and the learning centre.


Apart from fruits and veggies, Food Forest also grows nuts, and is a prominent producer of organic pistachios (Graham gave me a bag of raw pistachios - they were so good!)

Top: Raw Pecan Nuts Bottom: Raw Pistachios

They've also just invested in a pistachio-processing machine, which means they won't have to send their raw pistachios away for processing any more: less food miles!

Funky pistachio machine

One of the highlights of the day was walking through the cornfield, not just because it looked awesome...

Cornstalks

... but because they plucked and peeled a fresh cob of corn for me!

Graham said he'd normally cook it, but those "raw-food-types" would eat it raw, so I thought, "why not?" and chomped straight into it.

Such delicious corn!

They also produce wine (I soon learnt that almost everyone in the Barossa is connected to wine in some way!)  Graham generously gave me a bottle of semillon and one of cabernet merlot - I can't wait to try them!  (The rest of my Barossa trip was very wine-heavy, so I didn't even get a chance to try these wines while I was there.)


They've got chicken, roosters and geese as well.  This was about as close as I could get to the geese before they started waddling away!

Palm trees lining Seppeltsfield Road

Hello Hello!  I have just come back from an amazing week in the lovely Barossa!  As you may know, I was lucky enough to win the Barossa's Table competition, run by Tourism Barossa!  (My winning entry is here).  The fabulous prize included:

• Return flights for 2 people from Melbourne to Adelaide
• Car hire for the trip
• Accommodation for 7 nights
• Barossa food and wine experiences for each day in the Barossa, which included winery visits, delicious dinners, gorgeous long lunches and loads more!

Just quietly, I also won the parallel Barossa competition that Nuffnang ran for its bloggers, which was a weekend away to the Barossa.  However, I would have felt a bit greedy taking both prizes, so I said that they could give their weekend-away to the runner up.





Day 1

• Food Forest Workshop
• Dinner at 1918 Bar and Grill

Day 2

• Careme Pastry Workshop
• Pizza-making workshop: visits to Barossa Valley Cheese Company, Schultz Butchers and Gully Gardens to gather ingredients, Pizza-making at 40's Cafe
• Yalumba Winery Tour and Tasting
• Dinner at Vintners Bar and Grill

Day 3

• Coffee with Maggie Beer at Maggie Beer Farm Shop
• Workshop with Chris Wotton, Product Development Chef for Maggie Beer Products
• Time in the kitchen with Saskia Beer at The Farm function centre
• Tour of Seppeltsfield 
• Lunch at Maggie Beer Farm Shop
• Tscharke Winery Tour and Tasting
• Dinner at Lyndoch Hill Restaurant

Day 4

• Charles Melton Wines Tour and Tasting
• Sensory experience and lunch at Jacob's Creek Visitor Centre
• Te-Aro Estate Tour and Tasting
• Dinner at D'Artagnan restaurant in Adelaide
• The Garden of Unearthly Delights (Adelaide Fringe Festival)

Day 5

• Visit to Hutton Vale Farm
• Lunch at Radford Wines with Gill Radford
• Henschke Winery VIP Tasting and Tour of the Hill of Grace Vineyard
• Dinner at Wanera Wine Bar and Restaurant

Day 6

• Visit to Apex Bakery
• Teusner Wines tour and tasting
• Apex Bakery Long Lunch
• Dinner at Appellation

Day 7

• Barossa Farmers Market
• Sausage making workshop at Moorooroo Park Retreat
• Long lunch at Moorooroo Park Retreat
• Dinner with Damien and Eva Tscharke from Tscharke Wines

Day 8

• Private Wine Tasting at Peter Lehmann Wines 
• Weighbridge Platter Lunch

Last week, I received an invitation to: "An Oeuf Roe: a nine course degustation of eggs and caviar" at Provenance Food and Wine on Smith Street in Collingwood.  After having a quick squiz at Provenance's website to find out what they do, my answer was a very enthusiastic yes!

Provenance Food and Wine
288 Smith Street
Collingwood, VIC 3066
Ph: (03) 8415 0700
Website

Knowing that the menu would be heavily based on seafood, I invited my semi-Pescatarian cousin Catherine to come with me (Hi Cuuuuuuuz!).  We went on a Friday night, and after a mega-hectic week at work, I was totally looking forward to a nice dinner and some wine!

Kitchen

We had a quick chat with Dave the owner, and after checking that neither of us were a designated driver (drink responsibly!), out came the food and wine...


This looked like a very cheffy dish, but tasted clean and fresh.  The kingfish, crunchy nectarine slices and slightly sweet puree matched well.  I'm not sure if the tarragon added anything to the dish, but the salty pearls of avruga caviar balanced out the sweetness of the dish nicely.


I greatly enjoyed this course (as y'all know, I love cured salmon and ocean trout!).  The fish was soft, and the extra elements - horseradish snow, dill, and trout roe - added interest without detracting from the fish itself.  I also enjoyed the pinot gris; it had a strong caramel aftertaste and complemented the salmon well.


Even though I love it, I don't often eat tuna, due to it being overfished.  So it's a very rare treat for me.  The tartare comprised super-fresh cubes of raw tuna, crunchy cucumber and some lemon oil.  The bright citrussy taste of the tobiko perked up the tuna, but I think the creme fraiche masked the delicate flavours of the fish.  The accompanying wine (and remember, I am no wine buff) was very crisp, had what I would describe as a very short palate.


I liked the cute presentation of the oyster!  We were instructed to eat it "all in one go", and the wasabi tobiko was (thankfully) not as hot as I expected it to be, hehe!


The fondant was, undoubtedly, my favourite dish of the night.  (Potatoes plus butter equals good times).  Inside the column of potato was some lovely prawn meat, and the salty bottarga-spiked butter sauce was delicious!  That fluffy flower is actually edible, soaking up the butter sauce.


This modern take on the classic pea-and-salmon combo was my cousin's favourite dish of the night.  The salmon fillet was perfectly cooked, and wrapped in rice-paper, sitting in a vibrant pea-soup.  I loved the salmon crackle and the salty pearls of salmon roe.  Our waitress told us that the roe is from the Yarra Valley, and comes from delicately hand-milked salmon (and yes, that process is exactly what it sounds like).


And now, our final savoury course.  Inside that hollowed out little egg was a very softly set egg custard (like chawan-mushi), with little pieces of sea urchin roe.  It was deeply savoury, thanks to the shiitake air and dashi, and totally delicious.  It came with a Sapporo beer, which despite all the alcohol preceding it, was all too easy to drink.  Kanpai!

Between the savoury courses and dessert, we received a little palate cleanser of tomato consommé with salmon roe.


I was amazed that the liquid was so clear, but had an incredibly intense tomato flavour.

And after a short break, it was time for dessert!



I don't ordinarily like jaffa, but the combo here worked really well.  My only gripe was that it got a little too sweet by the end, especially when paired with the sweet pedro ximenez sherry.  (Incidentally, I'd never had pedro ximinez before, despite how much Nigella raves about it.  I enjoyed it, but my main impression was that it was incredibly intense, like there were a thousand sultanas in every sip.)

Our final course came with a non-alcoholic beverage - probably a good thing, considering how much we'd already drank by that stage!

Shhh...

Cold infused peach green tea

I thought the green tea was a nice, refreshing way to end a long meal.  My cousin thought it had the aroma of daikon - perhaps this came from the peach skins during the infusion process?

And how cute is this dessert?  The white part is coconut pannacotta, with a mango "yolk", and the black specks of "pepper" are vanilla seeds.


I loved how the "yolk" oozed out like a real egg when I dug my spoon into it...

We had a great time at Provenance.  The atmosphere was warm and welcoming, and I thought the meal was very well balanced.  Despite there being 9 courses, there was a good amount of food - not leaving us weighed down or still hungry.  Our waitress was so nice and enthusiastic, and had a very in-depth knowledge of the menu and all the many ingredients.  There were a couple of minor issues, like our wine being brought out slightly after the matching course, and our final course being brought out without a spoon, but overall the service was both professional and friendly.

Provenance Food and Wine will be hosting another An Oeuf Roe degustation evening tomorrow (Sunday 26th Feb), so there's still time to try it out!  It costs $85 per person, with $55 for matching wines.  Degustation starts at 7pm.  Bookings on (03) 8415-0700.

Sarah and Catherine enjoyed An Oeuf Roe as guests of Provenance Food and Wine, with thanks to Dave Hynes for the invitation.