Every child growing up in Australia in the 90's has read Looking For Alibrandi. In this book, the main character, Josie, is from a big Italian family, and they describe an event she entitles, 'National Wog Day.' This year I got to experience my first National Wog Day, a day filled with tomatoes, more tomatoes, even more tomatoes, and then a year's supply of passata!

I was told the day started by 10am at the latest, so in true Indian style, I arrived at 10:05 to find boxes full of bottles being washed and dried.

As the bottles were finished off, boxes and boxes of Roma tomatoes started to be brought into the kitchen, These were washed, and halved, and pretty soon very large bowls were filled with chopped tomatoes.

These tomatoes were sent outside, to where the magic machine was... Let me tell you about the magic machine. Apparently these machines are a fixture in most Italian homes, but I had never seen one! It was a big electric tomato pulping machine, where you put the tomatoes in the feeder bowl at the top, and then out the front came out the tomato pulp and out the side were the skins! I told you it was magic!

The skins were put through a second time to ensure all the tomato goodness was extracted, and then put in a bucket for the animals to eat. Nothing is wasted!

There was a continuous stream of chopped tomatoes being sent outside to be pulped, and the pulp being sent back inside to be bottled. Once the pulp was funnelled into the bottles, a teaspoon of salt and a sprig was basil was put on top and then the bottles were capped.

The bottles were then put in a 44 gallon drum, covered with water, and left to boil for at least two hours to seal and preserve.

And then came my favourite part. Whilst that was boiling away, the decision on what to have for dinner was made. It only made sense to use the freshly pulped passata, and it wouldn't be proper Italian food if the pasta wasn't made from scratch!

The chef decided that tagliatelle puttanesca would be dish of choice, without anchovies to cater for the difficult vegetarian! A short lesson in the Italian language revealed that puttanesca comes from the Italian word puttana, meaning prostitute and we struggled to work out the relationship between a pasta sauce and a prostitute!

I watched closely as the pasta was being made - a lengthy kneading process taken care of by the Thermomix, and then the dough was put through the pasta machine, rolled out till it was thin enough, hung on the back of chair to dry, and then cut into strips.

And then the sauce. Blanched tomatoes with their skins peeled, the pasatta, olives, basil and parsley and just a hint of chilli created a delicious sauce. Together the sauce, and the freshly made pasta created an amazing dish. Let's just say a pasta maker is high on my list of essential items now.

It was a fabulous end to a great day. A big thankyou to the Russos for letting me experience my first National Wog Day :-)

A catch up with the work girls had been on the cards for a while, and we finally got our act together and decided to do breakfast to start off the labour day weekend! When you've got a bunch of foodies, picking a cafe is always going to be a tricky task, but Jacqui suggested 8 Days Cafe, and based on the Urbanspoon review, we all agreed. In true nerd fashion, I decided to tweet 8 Days the night before, to suss out whether the cafe was vego friendly, and to my great delight I woke up on Saturday morning with a reply tweet from them! Any business which actively uses they social media and engages with their patrons automatically gets a tick from me!

Located on the busy Armadale precinct, just down the road from all the bridal shops, 8 days had a steady stream of customers ranging from friends catching up like we were, to locals with their children or pet dogs. They even had a water bowl for the dogs!

We opted to sit outside to take advantage of the nice day and started off with drinks, as per usual I went with my standard latte. The coffee had a lovely full bodied flavour, and most importantly for me, was served at a perfect temperature. I'm the type of person who doesn't like their coffee extra hot, and I have burnt my tongue way too many times, but 8 Days had got it right for me this time!

Next it was onto the menu and there were so many delicious choices. Jacqui decided to go with a sweet breakfast, and whilst 8 Days had tweeted me saying that their French toast was a winner, Jac decided that pancakes were her choice that morning.

Blueberry and ricotta hotcakes with maple caramel and vanilla bean parfait

This was a big serve! 3 large pancakes, so much caramel, and anyone who serves ice cream for breakfast gets brownie points from me!

Ange went for a baked eggs option.

Baked eggs with Tuscan bean cassoulet, salsicchia and rocket salad.

Again, another generous serve, and it was nice to see them use quality bread.

As usual I went for a savoury breakfast option, and chose something with avocado, cheese and chilli - I couldn't possibly go wrong!

Avocado and Persian fetta on sourdough, with a basil and minted broad bean chilli dressing and balsamic reduction

I decided to pair this up with a poached egg, after all you can't judge the quality of a cafe unless you do the yolk porn test!

My breakfast was delicious. I was a bit worried about whether the mint would be the over powering flavour, especially since I am not a big fan of mint, but it was very subtle, and instead combined with the basil and the balsamic to create a complete taste. For those of you you are fans of chilli, be warned that this dish is definitely not spicy, but still very enjoyable nonetheless.

And then, the all important yolk porn test.

WINNING! Perfect oozy yolk, which I mopped up with the sour dough.

One of the best things about 8 Days is that they served my breakfast with a proper Scanpan knife, not a dodgy knife from a cutlery set. Nothing annoys me more than then I can't cut the toasted crust off a thick slice of bread, but obviously this had been thought of!

All in all, this was a lovely experience. Great company, great food and great staff. I think we'll be back!

Small country towns almost demand that you visit the local pub for a pub meal, and the Bright Brewery is no different. Located on the highway in Bright, Bright Brewery clearly prides itself on its local brews. With a menu that offers beer matching suggestions with each meal, kegs scattered throughout the venue, and dried hops used as decoration, there was never any doubt where the focus was. Despite this, I went against the grain and had cider! Poor form for an engineer, I know!

The menu was fairly basic, with a handful of entrées and mains, and then some pizzas. There was only one vegetarian main option, a vegetable frittatta with a garden salad so I chose it.

Vegetable frittatta with garden salad

This dish was definitely not what I expected a frittatta to be. It was more like a vegetable lasagne with layers of cooked egg rather than pasta, but nevertheless it tasted pretty good. The garden salad had all the traditional elements of a salad, and was lightly dressed, which was much appreciated. I am always wary of basic salads being overdressed with glugs of oil. Overall it was a good dish, nothing spectacular, but certainly passable.

I am a firm believer that cheese can make any meal taste better, so when lunch at the Milawa Cheese Company was proposed, there were no complaints from me!

Located in Milawa, en route to Bright, the cheese company has not only a small restaurant, but also sells cheese, jams, chutneys and various other condiments made with local produce. We decided to take advantage of this by doing some cheese tastings before our lunch orders arrived. Hot tip: the ash rolled chévre and the cheddar were definite winners for me!

Looking at the menu, there were only a few vegetarian options but I found one that caught my eye, so I was happy. I had a goat’s cheese galette which was a large puff pastry casing, filled with the Milawa goat’s cheese, char grilled eggplant, caramelised onion, char grilled capsicum, and sundried and fresh tomato, all topped with a rocket and pine nut salad and drizzled with a beautiful sweet balsamic dressing and a few olives on the side.

Goat Cheese Galette

Each component of the dish made a worthy contribution to the overall flavour – the cheese was the obvious star, creamy and slightly salty, the eggplant was soft and had a melt in your mouth texture, but for me the highlight was the caramelised onions. These were places right at the centre of the galete, so you only reached then once you had eaten through half way, and they almost served as a surprise! The pastry was flaky and delicious, and the dressing brought everything together. All in all a definite winner!

The Milawa Cheese Company is a simple place. Don’t expect 5 star service. The staff are friendly, happy country people, but you are required to place your order at the counter, and grab your own cutlery and water. Infact, if I had to pick a flaw, it would be that you have to drink your water out of plastic cups – not very environmentally friendly... But if you want great food out in the country, the Milawa Cheese Company provides a great option!

When I get a message on a Saturday to check if I'm interested to catch up for breakfast on Sunday morning, and I already know I have a busy Sunday planned, the logical thing would be to decline the invitation. But I've never been one to embrace logic, and instead I've always opted to embrace food, so I did the most sensible thing I could think of, and suggested that we keep breakfast local. A quick scan of the internet, and minutes later I was sending a text back to say that we should meet at Oak Room in Ashburton.

Located on the busy High Street, Oak Room is a perfect place for that impromptu weekend breakfast or brunch. The menu is reasonably vego friendly, and the staff are more than happy to modify dishes to suit dietary requirements.

We started with coffees, and I went with my usual, a latte. I'm always a fan of latte art, and whilst it was traditional, I had ot remark that it was well done. Of course, latte art means nothing if the coffee doesn't taste good, and lucky Oak Room didn't disappoint.

Onto breakfast, and it is a known fact that I can't go past fritters on a menu. Oak Room did them well, Mediterranean spiced corm fritters with rocket, avocado and a tomato salsa.The fritters were deliciously crispy on the outside, just how I like them, and the pairing them with tomato and rocket worked well.

We ended up staying at Oak Room well into the lunch time rush, but the staff were great and didn't hurry us at all. This cafe is definitely one to put into the rotation, and there are a few other things on the menu that I am keen to try!

To try and make work a little bit more fun, and to impose some food culture onto my colleagues, I’ve decided to implement a monthly offsite work lunch for my team. I know what you’re thinking, ‘one offsite lunch a month??’ But trust me when I say, this is a big step for us here.

Today, we decided to go to Taste of Singapore, which is a tiny little shop located away from the main strip of Clayton. This however does not deter customers, which is a testament to how good the food us. Although the name pays homage to Singapore, and there is the token crispy noodle dish, the owners are a Malay couple, and the menu is filled with traditional Malay offerings including mee goreng, mee rebus and murtabak. 

We went arrived just after midday and were told that there were no fried options available until 1pm when the burners are started, so our options were limited to rice. This wasn’t a problem at all, because biriyani was the daily special, and there was also nasi lemak available. 

My colleagues A and K ummed and aahed over the choices, but eventually A settled on biriyani with lamb rendang ($9.50) and K opted for nasi lemak with fried chicken ($7.50). I asked the friendly uncle at the counter what he could make for me that was vegetarian, and he suggested I have nasi lemak without the fried chicken and with some additional achar ($6.50). And so our meals were decided!

The service was quick, and before long we had our plates, covered in traditional waxed brown paper and heaped with rice and condiments. It didn’t take long for us to dig and we were all commenting on how delicious the food was. There was a real authentic Asian feel about it, the only thing missing was the 80% humidity that Malaysia or Singapore forces upon you!

Nasi Lemak

Biriyani with lamb rendang

Taste of Singapore is a local gem. It may require you to grab your own cutlery and water or cram you onto a small table, but all is forgiven when you taste the food and look at the bill.

Taste of Taj is our local Indian joint, and lucky for us it's always delicious! I guess it has to be, given that it's in a Clayton strip that's filled with other Indian places, but Taste of Taj is always the busiest. Last night, my mum randomly suggested that we should go out for dinner there, and who was I to disagree!

Usually when I go, I always have a thali meal which consists of rice, naan, 2 vegetarian curries (a dhal, and one curry of your choice), raita and pickles, all for a measly $10, but last night I decided to break tradition and have gobi paratha instead.

Gobi paratha is one of my favourites. The cauliflower is grated into the dough, and flat breads are rolled out and cooked in the tandoor oven to give it that smokey flavour. This was served with pickles, raita and butter. I never eat the butter, but I demolished the raita and pickles.

Taste of Taj is a trusty local option where the food never disappoints!