When Lady Bracknell, the haughty dragon in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, discovers that her daughter's fiance is an orphan who was found abandoned in a piece of luggage at a railway station, she exclaims, extending the vowel to hilarious effect, "A haaaaandbaaaaag!"Some travellers react to the prospect of a packaged tour in much the same way. A ...

Introducing a salty twist to your next booze-up. If you're one of the many food-and-drink-loving Australians who has made Brooklyn part of your American itinerary in the last 12 months, you've probably come to know the Pickleback, and you may or may not be delighted to know it has now found its way to our shores. Many bars now make ...

Falling in love with a song written in a foreign language can have unforeseen consequences. Consider 'Staralfur', a haunting track by Sigur Ros, Iceland's top ambient rock band. When I learn it's about a sleepy boy surprising an elf who is peeping in his window, I imagine this fey creature, mouth open, lost for words. A startled elf. "Whatever you ...

"I haven't mellowed, I've just learned to bite my lip," says Colin Fassnidge. "I'm still angry on the inside, but now I've got a personal trainer, so I can work that out." The 37-year-old Dublin-born chef has been consistently impressing diners at the Four in Hand in the inner-eastern Sydney suburb of Paddington since 2005, but lately has found a ...

Mountains, it has to be said, aren't the first thing that spring into the popular imagination when you utter the word "Idaho". (That would be potatoes.) Until you get close, it's flat, flat and bright, and if you're coming by road, many of the highway approaches stretch off deadstraight to vanishing point, past the occasional stand of wind turbines, motionless, ...

It hasn't been easy. The talent levels in the local restaurant industry are looking pretty good from where we sit, so winnowing the selection down to the shortlist you see here has been challenging, and there are many more names which only barely missed the cut. Picking the winners, to be announced at the Gourmet Traveller Restaurant Awards and 2011 ...

Whole roasted stuffed onions with cream, parmesan and mushroomsThis recipe is inspired by one by Nigel Slater. It's important to keep the onion shells intact when removing the insides.Prep time 30 mins, cook 1 hr 20 mins Serves 6 as a side or as a light meal with crusty bread6 onions, peeled, keeping root intact40 gm butter, coarsely chopped50 gm ...

Pork and apple go so brilliantly well together, it's almost enough to convince a hardline atheist that there may be something to this "intelligent design" malarky after all. While the favour of apples is an important ingredient in these pasties, it's the liquid expression of the fruit as an accompaniment that interests me more. Traditional cider apples are classified by ...

"What's your favourite MoVida?" For Melburnians of a certain bent this is a question that's sparked some heated discussions following the opening of MoVida Aqui late last year. The Spanish restaurant that started life in a slightly scruffy pub in the city's west end before embracing laneway culture, garnering rave reviews and an almost prohibitively lengthy wait list, has become ...

The more you travel, the more you resent expectations. If you go on holiday once a year, then the expectation is all part of it - perhaps the biggest part of it. The planning, the shopping, the brochure worship, the web's hol-porn.But expectation is essentially wishful preparation, either for a repeat of the experience you had last year or for ...

Beat the winter blues with these knockout desserts, from traditional golden syrup, bread and rice puds to lighter, more delicate variations featuring yoghurt and orange- blossom or ricotta and mascarpone. Just how good are they? The proof is in the eating.Yoghurt and orange-blossom puddingsThese puddings are delicate and need to be handled gently when removing them from their moulds.Prep time ...

This dense, intensely rich chocolate cake, drenched in - what else? - more luscious chocolate, is as smooth and seductive as the dark, mysterious canals of La Serenissima."I love the Venetian chocolate cake at Assaggio Ristorante. It's the next best thing to being in Venice - maybe better. Please publish the recipe."Venetian chocolate cakewith star anise gelato You'll need to ...

The tiny golden pumpkins were piled high on the counter like candy. So, too, were the baby squash, pallid autumn tomatoes, tiny artichokes - all talismans of the most important time of the year in Americas most important food city. Fall in San Francisco. The high holiday of Halloween was in the air, and brilliantly coloured maple leaves were strewn ...

Of all the new red grape varieties that have been planted in Australian vineyards over the last decade or so, the one with the most potential is tempranillo. In fact, I would go so far as to predict that one day tempranillo will make its way up the grape charts to sit under shiraz and cabernet as the third most ...

Winter is a challenge for the vegetable gardener in the colder states. I find it a challenge to keep up the salad supply. Radicchio seems to thrive in the cold, as do the frilly-edged oak leaf salad varieties. I still have brave cos lettuce plants growing, but slowly. Together with a few small spinach leaves and some rocket pickings, though, ...

There's a particular magic that springs from the marriage of pea and pig on the stovetop. Every winter, pea and ham soup rockets to the top of the GT website's most searched list, but its appeal is nothing new. That pork-and-pulse magic is something that has been understood across many centuries and cultures. A good pea and ham soup can ...

I recently spotted a big patch of stinging nettles growing alongside the fence of the Collingwood Children's Farm in Melbourne. This dark green leafy weed has a mild and slightly bitter taste, and I was reminded of a beautiful torte of bitter greens that Stefano di Pieri once made for me. Rustic and unusual, it had a very thin pastry ...

The joys of puff pastry are widely appreciated.Witness the Saturday morning queues at any self respecting patisserie, all those customers toting whitepaper- bagged trays of golden goodness. Unfortunately, though, unless the aforementioned patisserie is willing to sell you a slab of its house-made pastry, or your local deli stocks the Careme version (yes, we sing its praises regularly, and no, ...

Clam, bacon, kale and potato soupServes 4 (pictured p45)60 gm butter, coarsely chopped1 leek, finely diced1 onion, finely diced200 gm bacon, finely diced2 garlic cloves, finely chopped750 ml (3 cups) chicken stock120 ml dry white wine3 kg clams, soaked in cold water if gritty2 tbsp plain flour1 kg Desiree potatoes, diced Leaves from 1 small kale (about 260gm)125 ml (1/2 ...

GRILLHOUSE: GASTROPUB AT HOME Ross Dobson (Murdoch Books, $39.95, hbk)This invitingly tactile book embraces modern gastropub classics with lots of comforting and user-friendly recipes. Dobson's ethos is simple, and his food is defined by its robust flavours. These bistrostyle dishes are suited to lazy winter feasting, from golden cheese croquettes, seared calf's liver and slow-cooked beef Burgundy to bourbon and ...

Vini is the definition of the little restaurant that could. And when we say little, we're talking minute. When it opened in 2005, the original premises were so small that they couldn't use any pasta thicker than spaghettini, and it was only after expanding into a shipping container in the loading dock out the back that they had the space ...

Jill Norman might be thought of as the original spice girl. In 1990, six years before Victoria, Geri, Emma and the two Melanies hit the charts, Norman's The Complete Book of Spices not only established her as the authority on the subject but also marked her transition from the role of celebrated editor to that of celebrated author.In a sense, ...

Asked about the inspiration for the recipes she's put together for this month's issue, Rita Macali pauses, unwilling - or even unable - to give just one answer to the question. Macali, the chef who drew a legion of fans at Melbourne's Ladro, now chef a n d co-owner ( with partner Giovanni Patane) of Supermaxi, believes many things come ...

By and large, food and restaurants haven't had much of a look-in in the world of self-published magazines. Or at least until now. Whether it's eating diaries such as those published by Dawn Tan and GTs very own Anna Vu, or the more expensively produced Scraps, a staple-bound booklet of leftover material from the Momofuku cookbook available only at the ...

Its our latest food find (yes, you can thank us later). God bless Australia's chefs. The GT team and I spend a lot of time in restaurants, especially at the moment as we make the final checks on our critiques and ratings for our 2011 Australian Restaurant Guide. The reviewing team, led by chief restaurant critic and resident food fiend ...