Category: Food and Drink

  • Cider (Homebrew) April 2014

    I bottled a home brew cider on the 24th of April. I grabbed one of the bottles and decided to taste, this is the result:   Colour is a fairly deep yellow/orange. Nose is yeasty, herby and apply. Taste hits with a nice sharp apple twang, progresses into a smooth taste, then the yeast dominates…

  • Lark Hill (Cellar Door) – Canberra District April 2014

    As a Canberra local it’s only natural for me to completely take for granted the local wineries, and not visit them until having a visitor to take around. This seems to be a common theme among locals of most wine regions, they rarely if ever visit them and typically when they do visit it’s because…

  • Moroccan Slow Cooked Lamb Shanks w/ Couscous

    8 frenched lamb shanks 2 tbsp plain flour 1/4 cup olive oil 2 med brown onions chopped coarsely 3 garlic cloves 1 tsp ground cinnamon 2 tsp ground cumin 2 tsp ground coriander 1 cup dry red wine 2 tbsp honey 1 litre chicken stock 2 small sweet potatoes chopped coarsely. Toss lamb in flour.…

  • Tatachilla – Shiraz (Reserve) 2008

    This drop hailing from the McLaren Vale this is an interesting wine at the price point. (Currently available at 12.90 when purchasing 6 wines from Dan Murphy’s). Nose: This is nice and brooding, rather dark. Spicy, a little star anise and vanilla. It’s fantastic and seems to evolve in the glass, my favorite aspect of…

  • Wine Cellar in a cupboard

    One of my mates sent me a link to this site that has a step by step build plan for creating a cellar in a cupboard. Instructable for mini wine cellar. This solution intruiges me and is worthy of some consideration. If I could improve my passive cellarability I’d be a very very happy camper…

  • Penfolds – 2002 St Henri Shiraz

    Even after 6 hours decanting time this wine is still very tight and closed up. The nose is fragrant savoury smells along with liquorice, some dark berry – I’ve smelt this before but am unsure what is it. A dash of clove along with some Chocolatey characteristics. On the palate – there is fruit starts…

  • Penfolds – “What’s customer service?”

    I’m not too happy with Penfolds today – had a 2002 St Henri Shiraz (one of a 6 pack – this pack had 4 in it, and one of these remaining 4 had a leaky cork). After removing two for gifts I had placed other bottles into the box – 1x 2004 Wirra Wirra RSW…

  • Microwaving beats boiling for cooking most veggies

    Microwaving beats boiling for cooking most veggies Dear people of the anti-microwave cult – the mob who say no I don’t want microwaved food it ruins – please allow me to direct you to some research that have quantified how much microwaving reduces the anti-oxidants within foods. Seems like many foods don’t mind this and…

  • Hugh Hamilton Cabernet Sauvignon ‘The Villian’ 2005

    2005 Hugh Hamilton Cabernet Sauvignon The Villain Glenelg – Australia, South Australia, Fleurieu, McLaren Vale (2/11/2009)A slightly green nose and palate. A good schwag of dark fruit. Oak still very prominent in this wine, held together really well for 48 hours under vacu-vin, there was a large amount of heat on this puppy, I’m not…

  • Wirra Wirra – ‘Sparrows Lodge’ Pinot Gris – 2007

    This review is painful to write – I am sure I will be forgiven any offence caused in it’s posting, for in the wine world there is a chance that this is a one off event a bad bottle, some fluke cause by the handling, or it could be representative… so with apologies I pen…