SAZL Scenes: Melbourne Food and Wine Festival 2011: Theatre of Ideas: Bompas and Barr & Elena Arzak

I really hesitated when I booked this session of Theatre of Ideas. First off, I didn't know what to expect and I'm not sure if I'm going to get my money's worth. After all, it is $160. I chose the session by Bompas and Parr & Elena Arzak because I thought they're different and yes, admittedly, I was curious.

Bompas and Parr were charming. These two jelly mongers from London know their stuff - and it's all wobbly and shmansy. They started off with no culinary experience whatsoever but there's a passion lingering from their respective fields. One majored in Geography and another in Architecture, they talked about how they found out and experimented on how to make the best jelly, to designing their own moulds and to crazy, out of this world projects for various institutions and industries. These guys are the rockstars of the jelly world. One thing that really caught my attention was when they made the orange striped jelly with orange juice and milk. I know this is nothing revolutionary but I think it was really cool. They also gave us a few samples of jellies to taste. The one I tasted was in a shape of a minitiature Shrine of Remembrance and the flavour was, get this, Gin and Tonic. A teaspoon of this baby will set you off with a bang! The second one I tasted was a Champagne with gold leaf Funeral jelly (a tribute to Funeral cakes). It was beautiful and it made me feel rich. =)

The picture below showed the girl sliding through a pool of jelly, just one of their "small" projects.

The striped orange and white jelly that got my attention.

I was sad with Bompas and Parr had to go but I'm excited over Elena Arzak. Emerging from 4 generations of chefs, she simply had to take on the challenge of revolutionizing their restaurant Arzak, in San Sebastian. She talked a bit about the Basque region and how the food is important to its people, then about experimenting with food and having over 400 spices in their spice room. She believes in the code of flavour and adapting to the Basque taste. She started the demo with a simple (or rather not so simple for us anyway!) beetroot cromlech (beetroot juice and tapioca flour, that's fried and puffs up). The picture below.

The picture above, evolved to the picture below, which is the same tapioca flour, half mixed with squid ink and half with turmeric powder (to explain simply). Underneath it are small squares of foie gras topped with onion relish (among other things) and the plate is sprinkled with 3 types of powder - parsley, linchen/sea urchin and chicken powder (or something made with chicken powder).

She explained a lot of things that day but the one below for me was the highlight. Imagine a plate with a view, literally. The screen underneath the plate shows a video of the beach, so you eat off the screen -- Pan fried monkfish, edible shells, jellied starfishes (made from curacao) and seaweed. This is definitely one dish I would love to try.

Just when I thought that there was nothing exciting about food at all, then I came and met these amazing people who are setting the trend on food and how to step up the experience for the people savouring the food. They believe that food does not only nourish, it has to excite the senses as well. If this is the way food is going, I can't wait to be in the future!

Almost Missed Brunch @ Pope Joan, Nicholson Street

We decided to take the 96 to Nicholson Street to have brunch at Pope Joan. We had fun getting lost, hoping off then on the tram again. At first, we thought we missed it, but then, PG saw that we need to walk 30 minutes to get there, DG thought it's a good idea to hop on again. Yea, I agree. We got off too early. For those who will be taking the 96, get off 2 stops after Scotchmer Street. Walk half a block and you're there.

DG loved the place the instant we walked in. And I have to admit that the place is charming, probably next to Hardware Societé which is my absolute favorite brunch place in terms of the interiors. We decided to take a seat outside the courtyard because it is a good day to be out and indeed it is.
Coffee is from AllPress, which is nice. We had 2 coffees each. DG promptly checked that the foam was not burnt, an inside joke we started when we had bad coffee at Healesville (Giant Steps). Food-wise, I had the Corned beed croquette, fried egg, celeriac remoulade. I can't really say that it's outstanding or mind-blowing but it is certainly different. Combination was good, I love-love-love the celeriac remoulade, I can have cups of these on a sandwich with whatever meat or seafood. The corned beef croquete was nice and I like the way they made it, it wasn't mushy but still bursting with goodness. I honestly envied PG's choice of Smoked Egg, grilled corn zucchini omelette. A mental note to have it next time.
Nice weather with nice good, good coffee and excellent company. Great way to start off the weekend.

Moomba Festival is on!

Macaron Tiffin @ Aria, The Langham Hotel, Melbourne

I managed to convince PG and MH to come with me to the Langham for afternoon tea. Mission: Hisako Ogita's macarons. Yes, ladies and gents! She's in town for the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. It was actually my first time to have afternoon tea at Aria and I have to say that this place is way nicer than the afternoon tea at the Hotel Windsor and at par with The Tea Room at NGV.

The setting of the lounge is opulent and intimate. I love the gold leaf trimmed lamp shades, the plush velvety sofas and the silver. MH had chai latte, PG had the Well Being tea and I had the White Rose tea. Now, on to the tiffin.

We started from the bottom-tier up to the sweets. The sandwiches were nice. They have your usual cucumber sandwich, egg sandwich and tuna sandwich. I liked the ones with the white bread better than the whole grain ones.

The scones were nice and warm. Crumbly and very buttery, just the way I like it. Smother it with a layer of raspbery jam and clotted cream on top. Bliss.

By the time we had the sweets, we were almost full. We weren't able to finish the top tier. I just had a chocolate coated strawberry and a fruit tart. PG and MH weren't too impressed with the eclair, so I skipped it entirely.

Now, the moment of truth, the macarons. There were three flavors: green tea, pink ginger and chocolate. I liked the pink ginger the best. Texture-wise, the three macarons I had were inconsistent. I think the pink ginger was the best because of the taste and the texture of the macaron. It doesn't have a crunchy top that when you bite into it, it was airy inside (that's what happened to the green tea when I bit into it). The chocolate macaron was too crumbly. Of all the macarons I had, these are the least sweet of all. Sweetest would be from Luxbite (but it depends on the flavor).