Food review by James Tinslay

Progressing to CoTY cook-off 4 we had James Hill in the kitchen today ably assisted by Bill Alexiou-Hucker.

The starter came in two parts, on one plate. First off was a consommé made from oxtail and brisket. Luscious meaty flavour sprang into the mouth and left me wanting more. In this case, more was the second starter which was described as Peppers Piedmontese. There were several components to this dish. The red peppers had been roasted and in the centre was a roast tomato, accompanied by anchovy and garlic with a few olives scattered over the top. The anchovies provided a flavour boost for the dish (as they always do, delightfully). The garlic was certainly not unnoticeable and a few at my table would have preferred the garlic to have been lightly fried before going into the dish. A simple but tasty dish.

The main was quail involtini with pork and pistachios stuffing covered. This dish speaks to you about the work involved to prepare it. There were a lot of moving parts. What is firstly evident is the vine leaf that covers the torso of the quail edge providing the curious look of two little leg bones protruding. The satisfyingly moist quail was accompanied by broccoli, kipfler potatoes, onions, grapes, feta cheese and cooked fennel. The quail was cooked with verjuice and butter, which provided the jus for the meal.

Leaving the best last, that would be stuffing. The ingredients were pork and fennel sausage mince with onions, pistachios with fennel and cumin. Once the stuffing was removed from the cavity of the beast, it held its shape and enabled us to enjoy it as a side dish. A very appealing main.

The cheese presented by James Healey today provided a number of us to learn a new term, a truckle. Ignoring “to push (a piece of furniture) along on truckles” it is an English term for a small barrel-shaped cheese which is exactly what James served us today. A lovely cheese, it was a Pyengana cloth bound truckle weighing in at 1.1 kg. Pyengana is a relatively common serving at the Society, but this particular product was new and was marked by a particularly yellowish appearance. It is a seasonal cheese described by its maker as follows:

This small truckle is made only seasonally, just in time for Christmas each year, making it the perfect gift for cheese lovers. The curds are formed using a technique known as ‘stirred curd’ and after hooping, the rounds are clothbound and pressed on an antique Victorian bed press. Pyengana Dairy matures the truckles for 6 months encouraging the symbiotic relationship of the surface moulds and cultures. The result is a fine-textured, crumbly body, with subtle flavours of pasture and a lingering nuttiness.

The cheese was served with terrific figs.

The coffee was the Society’s house blend, for the time being, Calibrate Coffee White Blend. This is a mix of Brazil Fazenda Imperio, Ethiopia Yirgacheffe, and Java Jampit 1X.

Another appropriate meal for a cookoff.

For wine, Chilly Hargrave served us:

2007 Lindeman’s Reserve HR 0755 Semillon

2007 Tyrrell’s Belford Semillon

2015 Georges Lignier Gevrey Chambertin

2014 Pooley Butcher’s Hill Pinot Noir

2009 Tyrrell’s Lunatiq Heathcote Shiraz

2009 Bress Heathcote Shiraz