The Melbourne Food & Wine Festival is now officially an adult, after clocking up 18 years of interesting food and wine themed classes, demonstrations and dining experiences. 2010 is set to be another great year with over 250 events scheduled across 12 days. The only difficulty now is figuring out which events I want to go to!
To celebrate the upcoming festival, the festival organisers hosted a media launch for both industry and media, and even a few of us pesky bloggers. We were to be led up the garden path by Michael Ryan from the Provenance Restaurant in Beechworth (@theprovenance), and Nicolas Poelaert (@NicPoelaert) from Embrasse Restaurant, with a feast inspired by regional produce and wine.
The event was held at The Abbotsford Convent, a corker of a venue perfect for such a convivial gathering.
The first course was created by Michael Ryan; raw zucchini, goats curd, zucchini confiture, parmesan gel, olive and tomato sauces and thyme. Despite looking rather delicate and summery, this dish was infused with some great flavours. The parmesan agar added an interesting glutamate, and with the pickle-y confiture made me think this dish could almost impersonate a carpaccio.
Michael followed this with another dish that showcased the wonderful heirloom tomatoes that are just so perfect this time of year. The tomatoes had been prepared in a number of ways; olive-brined, dried, slow-roasted and just sliced fresh. It tumbled down the plate on top of a spicy and sweet gazpacho,and sourdough croutons added crunch. This was just summer on a plate.
Nicholas Poelart took the helm with the next dish, a visually impressive john dory cooked with squid ink, Daylesford Organic beetroots, burnt carrot puree, rice paddy herb and glory spinach. In fact, it was not only visually impressive, but aromatically impressive as well; I could smell the sea before the plate was even put in front of us. I just loved, loved, loved the beetroot; a variety of different colours and textures on the plate. But I can’t help chuckling when I think of Ed (@tomatom) affectionately referring to this dish as a squidmark on a plate 
.
The mains were served platter-style for sharing, above Nicholas Poelart’s Mt.Donatis pork belly with Warrandyte cherries, QV Market fresh mustard, Embrasse’s own white carrots rolled in very starchy potato and stuffed capsicums from Albert in Sunbury. The highlight for me, funnily enough, were those carrots, which were a sweet distraction from the richness of the meltingly tender pork.
But one of my favourite dishes (apart from dessert to come) was this creation from Michael Ryan – confit chicken wings, dashi braised eggplant, daikon, spring onion and konbu no tsukudani. This dish just tasted of Japan to me, and makes me ever so jealous to think that Michael today is jetting off to Japan for a holiday! Anyway, the chicken wings had been boned for our convenience, and were absolutely sticky with chicken flavours. The braised vegetables were highlighted with umami flavours, care of the dashi and the konbu, and I think the braise had been thickened with kuzu to make it silky smooth.
But the dish that had us all in awe was Nicholas Poelart’s hazelnut parfait with meringue, honey / chocolate and sorrel mint granita. How fabulous does this culinary landscape look? The “forest floor” was made of cakey crumbs, “mushrooms” from the meringue and parfait, “moss” from the sorrel and mint granita, and then shards of chewy honeycomb. This was an absolute delight to eat.
So which Melbourne Food & Wine Festival events are you going to? Being a CBD resident, I’m looking forward to seeing the City Square turn into an edible garden. *sigh* I just wish something like that could be a permanent installation.
Oooh so jealous! The event looked fabulous, especially dessert – looks similar to the violet crumble at Attica.
Jetsetting Joyce
The colours in these photos are amazing! The dessert looks out of this world! Yum!
Oh YUm! totally envious….the forest floor – favourite so far!
So excited to see the pic of Nicholas’s gorgeous dish wth the squid ink and our beetroots. Is this your photo? and would you mind if I posted it on our blog, with a link back here of course. Thanks.
Hey Joyce – it was a great event! And that reminds me, I still need to go to Attica. So many places to eat, and not enough dollars and calories to share round!
Hi Pip – thanks for your comment! We had some really beautiful natural light as we were outside, and it just made all the colours pop out from the plate. Not bad from a compact, eh?
Hiya Penny – it’s a great concept, huh? I love these landscape type dishes. Reminds me somewhat of the Autumn, Shoots and Leaves from the Royal Mail, or a Heston type creation.
Hi Daylesford Organics – welcome to tummyrumbles! You are more than welcome to use the photo. If you want a higher res version, feel free to contact me on mellie AT tummyrumbles.com. As I said in the post, your beetroots were absolutely amazing!
Delightful! I love seeing fresh vegetables as the main star of the meal like this. I’m thanking my lucky stars that I now live in Melbourne and get to attend more Food & Wine Festival events. It is so hard to choose which handful to go to, though I’m especially looking forward to the edible garden, the Spanish themed dinners/wine events and the Hawker markets.
They are great looking dishes!
I got to have the zucchini dish at Provenance a couple of weeks ago as well as the confit chicken wing albeit in a differnt arrangement so I know how good those ones taste. It looks like I’ll have to add Embrasse to my list of restaurants I need to vist too.
Hi Tresna – yeah…it’s just so hard to pick, eh? I think this year I’ll probably stick to the dining experiences, as opposed to any Masterclass type things.
G’day p – I’m still dreaming about that confit chicken. How fantastic was it? I too haven’t been to Embrasse, and need to rectify that immediately!
Ooh, that time of year again. I have no idea what I’ll go and see, wish I could do it all.
That food looks brilliant, and that dessert… whoa.
Clearly, Nicholas Poelart is a genius! I’ve passed Embrasse a billion times but I’ve only been in once – and that was for a function enquiry. Maybe it’s time to pay a visit!
Hey Anna – we’ll have to sit down and compare lists and see which ones we can do together!
Hiya Vee – he is also a very quiet, modest and shy man, which is kind of endearing for someone so talented.
Yes! Am also looking forward to the edible garden…it will be like Willi Wonka’s version- only healthier! hehe
The honeycomb on the dessert…speechless.
I’m so happy to read that I wasn’t the only CBD resident pining for an edible garden in our neighbourhood. Maybe we should take it up with the Council? But considering how much land space costs in the CBD these days, I doubt that anything will ever come out of it. One could always live in hope though….
Oh, that dessert just looks so divine!
I was hoping to do the express lunch on a Sunday afternoon at Embrasse but sadly, couldn’t fit it into my schedule. I have booked the Cumulus Inc Oyster Masterclass though so at least I have something to look forward to
And yes, I’m definitely going to suss out the edible garden!
Hey Adrian – hmm, I actually wouldn’t mind Willy Wonka’s garden either
Hiya Christy – I’ve actually been seriously thinking that! I know the MCC does have a greening policy, especially for rooftops. Perhaps there is a spare council rooftop we could take over? I think it’s definitely worth investigating!
Hi Libby – I’ve heard great things about that Oyster Masterclass (check out Melbourne Gastronome’s post on it last year.