Food Notes: Nick Reynolds; Wine Notes (incorporated): Chilly Hargrave

Only 20 lucky members attended Peter Kelso’s lunch.

Why lucky?

Because it was one of the best-balanced, well-presented meals that we have had all year and the wines matched the main course to perfection.

Peter had prepared two canapés but due to an oven incineration incident, we missed the choux puffs.

The one we had was a simple, comforting egg and avocado dip on toast. These were accompanied by a 2014 Leo Buring Reserve Bin Riesling from Watervale. A wine that carried a certain richness and ripeness (12.5%) but was still in bright condition with delicious lime notes. 

While native ingredients are trendy today, it hasn’t always been the case. Kangaroo meat has been legal for human consumption only since 1980 in South Australia. In New South Wales, it could only be used as pet meat until 1993 and it was only as recently as 28 January 2021 until kangaroo could be harvested in Victoria for human consumption.

But, what’s that Skip? You’re delicious, healthy and nutritious as well?

Kangaroo meat is very high in protein and low in fat (around 2%). It can be overcooked extremely easily but today it was cooked to perfection. Kangaroo has a game-like flavour that is ideally accompanied by a sweet berry or similar accompaniment.

Peter Kelso marinated his kangaroo loin fillets in olive oil and juniper berries for 24 hours before searing them quickly in a pan. Instead of berry, he used a dollop of homemade quince jelly. Anyone who has made this knows that it is the equivalent of kitchen napalm spitting on the oven so Peter went well beyond the call of duty in creating this for us to eat today. The kangaroo was accompanied by diced and roasted root vegetables (beetroot, red onion and carrot) mixed with a spicing of smoked paprika, ground cumin and olive oil with brown lentils preserved lemon and parsley. It was served topped with a dressing of yoghurt lemon juice and garlic. The whole gave a sweet/sour combination that matched the protein perfectly. Our Winemaster, Chilly Hargrave outdid himself by matching this dish with two Aussie cool-climate Shiraz. The first was a 2012 Wynns Black Label Shiraz that showed spice and fruit notes that were a perfect fit to the main. The second wine, a 2010 Cherubino Acacia Frankland River Shiraz, was a more complex, savoury, and layered wine. At twelve years of age, it is still alive and now drinking at its best. 

While everyone easily identified the cheese as a washed rind variety, its origins stumped the room. James Healey presented a Jensen’s Red from the Tarago River Cheese Company. It came to the table in perfect condition and was accompanied (for nostalgia) by a salad with small bacon bits. The salad was a mix of bitter leaves: radicchio, endive and arugula. Peter dressed them with a vinaigrette based on walnut oil and sherry vinegar with a dash of Dijon mustard. With the cheese, we tasted an interesting match of 2 aromatic, tannic varieties. The 2016 Massolino Dolcetto d’Alba had a vibrant nose and colour with its varietal tannins softening, but perhaps the fruit is going with them. We returned to Wynns Black Label for the last wine, but this time the 2008 Cabernet Sauvignon. It’s a Society (and Australian) favourite and this was true to form. As with the Shiraz, it showed obvious vanilla oak notes, but the fruit and tannin balance carried through. Not the best vintage in Coonawarra, but this wine is still shining.