Who Am I?

I am a great food lover who is now in a position to eat at all the restaurants I have read and heard about.

I am fat, 40 and fabulous! My lover is food. I have had this love affair all my life. I didn't come from a great gourmet family in fact I came from dirt poor beginnings in a huge family of 7 daughters with one small wage coming in existing in housing commission hell with hand me downs all the way and one pair of shoes. The days before payday dinners were invariably only toast and dripping!! ewww to this day I hate the thought of dripping but then the bread got delivered on account so it was one thing we always had.

I am the youngest in my family so as the siblings started leaving home there was more money in the family and the food gradually got better to the point of fantastic! My mother was a sensational cook and a great experimental one when Dad was out of town.... he was a meat and three veg kind of guy so most nights that's what we got. When he went out of town my mother went to town.

I remember this one particular dinner which would have been 30 years ago and she decided to experiment with asian food. First of all I have to point out that I grew up in the Hunter Valley where asian food meant the local chinky down the road with fried rice and sweet and sour pork... something I still can't eat to this day. Anyway the one thing I remembered she cooked was this prawn dish which today is called salt and pepper prawns. It was completely sensational and the first time I had tried chilli. She travelled all the way to Sydney to get the correct ingredients for this meal. It was another 20 years before I tasted Salt and Pepper prawns in Sydney and they were nowhere near as good as my mothers. She also had fondue parties, German Sausage nights and cocktail parties with fabulous finger food like mini camembert garlic bread rolls. She is the direct cause of my love affair with food.

I came to Sydney the day my HSC finished and started working for the State Government. I'm still there but I have managed to get a law degree and get promoted enough where every once in a while I can find someone and go to a fantastic restaurant. I have always tried to taste the best and it started as early as the age of 19 where the only meal I could afford in the 5 star restaurants in Sydney was breakfast. Every second payday a girlfriend and I would go and sample all the breakfasts at the Sydney hotels. I have to say that the best one I had, remembering this was 21 years ago, was at Cables in the Regent. It was the only one who actually made me eggs benedict to order rather than say that they only provided the buffet. It was the first time I had had it and it was smooth and tangy with a fabulous mix of textures and still my favourite treat breakfast to this day. Particularly when it's served with smoked salmon and dill.... mmmmmm At the end of the breakfast my friend, Danielle, and I would then critique it and compare it against the others. That was great fun.

So, fast forward 20 years and I have eaten at some great and some not so great restaurants in Sydney and would like to offer you my opinion. I would not make a great food critic because I actually love food. Most critiques of restaurants that I have read are generally pompous and unless the main costs over $30 they are quite derogatory. I don't really care about the price of the main. In some of my experiences the best food has been found in the seedy little corner of a busy street. The service might be complete and utter crap and the napkins paper but it's the food I'm interested in. That said, I do like to great service.

I pick my holiday destinations by what food I am interested in at the moment and recently spent 6 months eating all over Europe. I learnt to say "what do you recommend?" in about 10 languages and how to say "I'll have that" in the same amount. Most times I had no idea what I was eating and that was a truy liberating way to dine. I have to say I had some very interesting dining experiences and met some very jovial chatty chefs. Just so you know I am not leaving alcohol out of the equation, I am not a big drinker. But, where the restaurant offers and extensive wine list (as opposed to BYO) I will ask the sommelier for their recommendations and generally go with that. Otherwise I have my personal choices but wine is like art, you know what you like. Growing up in the Hunter Valley I have a, better than most, education in relation to wine but everyones palate is different. I know that everyone's palate is different in relation to food as well but I find it easier to describe food than I do to describe wine.

So, now I have gathered a few friends in the same position as me and we make it a point of finding fabulous restaurants and going to a different one every month. Because the group is new the restaurants I am choosing are sometimes 5 star, sometimes just interesting and sometimes because someone else said the food was to die for.

I hope you enjoy my opinions.
Chin Chin