All manna of meatballs at Ballers Polpetteria

Meatball manna

A menu featuring meatballs is a boon in my book, so a menu comprised entirely of meatballs is nothing less than a culinary windfall. Kris Schiller has put all his eggs in one basket, or rather all his meatballs in one polpetteria, which is located amongst a potluck of eateries on Sydney’s Enmore Road.

A freezer stocking frenzy

I’ve been stocking up the freezer. I’ve amassed quite an edible stash. There are 35 double portions of hand-made meals in plastic containers, plus 10 single portions of random things. That’s 80 individual meals, frozen in time.

There’s a good reason for this bizarre hoarding. We have just embarked on a back-of-house extension and kitchen renovation, which will render us kitchen-less for about eight weeks. The fridge-freezer and microwave have been redeployed to the dining room: we’ll be eating defrost/reheat-style for several months.

Getting healthy with Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, I may just have crush. On your food that is, and your philosophy, and your stunning new cookbook, River Cottage Light & Easy. I’ve heard a lot about you Mr Fearnley-Whittingstall, but I never endeavoured to get to know you. You were just some crazy-haired, outdoorsy, wellington-booted, wooly-jumpered, British farmer-chef with a cult-like following — which is not really my kind of thing. For my recipe fix I relied on chefs closer to my Sydney home, or proponents of the cuisines that I adore, such as Thai, Indian, and Mediterranean. That is until I decided to take an even healthier approach to what I’d always considered to be a relatively healthy, home-cooked diet. 

Zeus: a Greek street food phenomenon

Souvla filled pita (Photo: Courtesy of Zeus)

What do you get if you combine a restaurant named Zeus, a co-owner called Costa and skewers of meat, or souvla, slow-roasted over hot flames? Answer: an innovative Greek street food venue that has customers queuing outside and the intoxicating aroma of char-grilled meat wafting along nearby suburban streets.

Zeus opened just four months ago and already has a cult-like following. The sleek interior, where just about every table is full and an infinite queue of customers order souvla to go, says this is not beginner’s luck.

Raising backyard chooks: why it’s not all it’s cracked up to be

Fresh eggs are one of the benefits of raising chickens at home

I’ve been on the chook roster at our community garden for over a decade: happily putting their little feathery butts to bed on Saturday evenings and mucking out their stilt-house (it has rafters for straw storage, perches for roosting and plenty of nesting boxes for the all-important egg laying). I’ve fed, watered, medicated and even chauffered them to the vet, on the odd occasion. The rewards have been great: more fresh eggs than I could possibly count and watching with wonder the pecking order and hierarchal shenanigans of a suburban hen house.

But would I raise chooks in my own backyard? Probably not. Unfortunately, plenty of people come to this same conclusion after they have acquired chooks. How do I know this? Because I’ve seen the ignorant ramifications of it more times than I like to remember.