Tannic Teeth

Restaurant Amusé is in possession of something rare.

If it isn’t the low-lit über-cool interior, or the ocularly observant staff, or the artistry of food and theatre of wine, then it’s a certain je ne sai quois which propels it into the league of top class restaurants — of just a hand-full the exist in Perth.

The fruition of a husband and wife team, Amusé offers dégustations at $120 per head. Wife Carolynne oversees the floor staff in definite direction and classy professionalism, while her knowledge of the food is second only to husband, Hadleigh, who spins the creative yarn from the kitchen. The duet are doing a fine job. Considering the culinary thrill of the eight courses, parting with $120 is worth it. It really establishes the bar for what-to-expect for spending $120 on a meal, let alone dégustation.

I’ve tried to suss out the flow of courses, and they appear to follow the meandering route below.

Snacks

Tea and toast course

Soup course

Crustacean course

Fish course

Game or fowl course

Red meat (or pork) course

Margarita

Dessert one course (fruit, vegetable inspired)

Dessert two course (chocolate inspired)

Petit four with tea and coffee

To labour every course with words of the colours and flavours, would dismally fall short the sheer pleasure it is to partake. Put simply, the food is sublime.

There is an option for matching wines to the seven courses, $60 will give you seven tasting pours. Freedom outside of the tasting pours, the carte des vins is as extensive as light though a glass prism. Exacting thought has gone into the creation of the list, which second year running has Gourmet Traveller Wine List of the Year ‘Three Glass Rating’. It matches the food with cerebral precision and rounds off perfectly an outwardly unassuming East Perth restaurant.

Amusé has advanced towards food (and wine) with the brains of an alchemist and heart of an artist. They’ve already notched themselves as a formidable dining alternative to the usual suspects of Perth. Indeed, we’re all (seriously) amused.

Restaurant Amusé
64 Bronte Street
East Perth WA 6004
(08) 9325 4900

Perhaps it’s remiss to mention it here, but the first thing I notice about Zekka — aside from the modern rusted laser-cut signage; aside from the hand-illustrated shop-long mural, and aside from the snazzy fashion on display — is a penisless cardboard mannequin 1.5 times the size of a normal humanoid.

He They It stands at the entrance, gawking out of the cafe to King St beyond.

Zekka is an edgy, fringe, avant-garde fashion outlet that houses some serious brands I’ve never even heard of.

I haven’t shopped there myself (perhaps sometime in the future), but I do come for the coffee.

The cafe occupies a similar space as the fashion outlet, however it is less edgy and more minimal and a helluva lot more functional.

Zekkacafe is found at the rear of the store which opens up high into the urban environment, the lighting is reflected by the buttresses of buildings. Its an airy column of brick and mortar– good for soaking up the thermal mass of summer, but more like a conduit for breeze in winter.

As you would expect, the cafe does all its own cakes and glass cabinet goodies, light lunches and the like — nothing too serious.

The (coffee) prices are what you would expect in Perth ($3–4), and the quality is worth going back for.

They use Crema (thanks everyone for letting me know!) and Avon Valley Milk.

This time of the year, because of the greener pastures, the milk is sweet.

Don’t believe me?

Order a milk-based coffee without sugar and you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

I’d recommend this place if you’re after a little get-away from burning up the CC on King St or having your office cubicle close further around you. Respite time? It’s perfect.

The space is quite unusual and the coffee is tops — a spirited rival to Tiger Tiger for the best cup in town.

My 2 cents? They don’t have a small bar license. Pity.

(08) 9481 1772
Perth City
74 King St
Perth, 6000

Imagine having the power to sniff out lumps of fungus underground that smell freakishly similar to a sow on heat. To be possessed with that super power you could ravage through the forests of Europe, digging up Black Truffle or Périgord Truffle, then selling it on the [black] market for thousands of dollars per kilo. Alas, only pigs and dogs have the sensory acuity to triangulate these wondrous subterranean growths. And it’s the more reliable–less greedy version of the two, the canine, which is used in Manjimup.

Homesick for the annual truffle festival in France, Alain Fabregues set out to recreate something of the memory of his small town; the merrymaking of food, wine and truffle when the season started.

Sculpture Park — Mundaring is where this franco-joviality has been happening for the past few years.

$10 Entry will get you in among the stalls of providers with a consistent timetable of events throughout the day. Most of the events are free, bar the entry into the Perth Hills Wine Show (2009 link) and the sit-down lunches and dinners.

Mundaring Truffle Festival 2010

Weekend Saturday 31st July & 1st August.

Now I’m not a fan of commercial TV.

Adverts on the box always treat you like you’re some cash-fisted supreme moron.
In fact we don’t even have a TV. Not that we’re book-loving, net-surfing troglodytes anymore than we are sun-loving, real surfing,  socialites.

Like promise of dusting the bike off and riding a lung-bursting 100km, or getting oil paint so forced into your dermal layers you may as well be embalmed for the afterlife, life is an amazing place — to explore. With all that said, I have a confession to make.

I am a Master Chef fetishist.

No, not in that way.

I don’t ogle at the contestants nor any of the judges. Believe me, the sight of an overweight cravat-strangled crusty englishman, expressive as an anaesthetised bloodhound, is not my idea of romantic delirium. However, the dishes are.

I blame it on dinner at my old folks. They have the telly on Sunday night, eating dinner that was inspired from the week before. We’re there and we tune in. Food is central to any family. To see my mother’s cooking style change over time to something that is more experimental and edgy, is humbling. Every kitchen utensil has been replaced with tender detail to the functional and effective. The influence of good food has penetrated thanks to MasterChef.

Along with MasterChef comes events that expose people to good food. For a while now the Good Food and Wine Show have been running annual show-stage for everyone in the state.

So it’s no surprise this event will bring together en masse . The Good Food and Wine Show at Perth Convention Exhibition Centre will showcase gourmet creations like a shiny cabinet of curiosities.

From 2nd–4th July 2010 show up to wallow your way though the flavours of your dreams. And you won’t need to skip the adds.

Prices

Adults $30

Child (6-16) $22

Concession/Groups (10+) $24

Wine Lovers Ticket $75

Winter in Perth is punitive.

It’s not particularly so as a result of the weather — often the powder-blue lens of the sky curves around us most of the day — but more so for artistic diurnal options.

We struggle when it comes to arts and museums. Perth is culturally anaemic.

If only we could be more like our quirky and experimental sister, Melbourne. I guess however one could argue, we would be, er, Melbourne and lose our Perthian identity. Screw that — I ain’t wearing brown and grey tones.

Picking up on the flailing threads of a struggling arts and culture, the new elected Lord Mayor trumpeted to action, reviving Perth’s Arts and Culture scene.

So now we have more interesting nibbles when it comes to exhibitions. The Art Gallery WA is exhibiting ‘Relativity’, the grotesquely endearing works of Australian artist Patricia Piccinini. It unashamedly details the visual affect of converging biotechnology and the human body — we CAN return to apes. The WA Museum is also dealing out it’s own fire and brimstone. A Day in Pompeii it’s called. When Mt Vesuvius spat the dummy.

Due to contractual agreements, no photography is allowed in the exhibition . However what I can tell you is it’s worth checking out.

There is something mortally binding about staring at a body cast of a Roman knowing they were incinerated in 1000C pyroclastic flow. They carbonised.
Their jaggedly poised bodies, speak volumes of our own precarious existence of our life on top a sea of lava. How quickly life is abandoned and forgotten.

It’s an exhibition that doesn’t make the rounds a lot.

The last time it came I was inutero. All I can say is, that it was much better the second time.

A Day in Pompeii — Wester Australian Museum Perth (Cultural Centre)

Erupting 21st May — 5th September 2010

Prices

$20 Adults

$14 Concession

$12 Child

$54 Family

A playwright friend recently asked if I could photograph his upcoming play.

“The Myth of Julian Rose” it’s called.

This solemn and distortive play opens a can of festering worms into the incredulousness of maternal sexual child-abuse.

An unsettling theme flowing though the play like a toxic undercurrent, the main character (and audience) is terrorised by a demonic Minotaur presumably an allegory of suppressed memory thanks to an ignoble mother.

The lack of forgiveness can be seen as a destructive energy, wreaking havoc upon personalities. Yet this morbid glee has another side.

“The Myth of Julian Rose” is elegiacally puzzling as it is avant-gardist.  It’s a squeamish, guileful and instructive invitation of contempt from the audience.

And if had that impact. It got through.

The Myth of Julian Rose, Perth Cultural Centre  53 James Street, Northbridge 8 – 26 June 2010, $25 Full/$20 Con

Bookings through The Blue Room Theatre or (08) 9227 7005

So you’re fresh from your Christmas holidays with the crisp white pages of 2010 to unfold. Your desk is eerily vacant and suspended in time from the last joyous hours of 2009. You’re back into the daily grind till the cooling days of Autumn brings Easter (with more festivities). You also know what’ll help you along the days is coffee. Bitter, sweet, luscious and hot. And if you’re lucky enough to work in West Perth and be in need of the bean, there may be a little (coffee) house right up your alley (literally).

Pony Express O is a coffee house in reverse. Like me, you could be forgiven to think you’ve come through the rear, or heaven forbid, behind the bar. But you’d be wrong. If you’re trying to be smart and go on the other side of the bar, you’ll be faced with another expresso machine. Clearly the function of this coffee house is bring you to the steamy face of coffee. You get to see the extraction as clearly as the barista. This used to be the Ashton Stables, the building is now heritage listed. The space has been transformed. Art hangs from the walls, high airy ceilings upon to a faux-grassed lane-way under umbrellas. The only equine link is the rib-nudging name, Pony Express O. Get it. Hah Hah.

The brain-child of Garret of Blink in South Fremantle,  it carries some of those elements. Smart use of space, clear access to expresso machines, a funky coin payment system and above all else, fine coffee. Crema is his choice of bean. Get to know it. It’s the new Fiori. His attitude is casual, inquisitive and friendly. It’s a communal joint, where you’ll see regulars popping in, picking up conversations where they left off, and others lounging about reading books and eating their lunches. There is a bring-your-own-lunch policy here. Pony Express O plays its cards well, limited sweet pickings in favour of BYO. Bring your books too or read the paper, and use the foot massager. Yes that’s right. A foot massager.

Pony Express O

21 Mayfair Street West Perth

If you’ve been trundling down St Georges Terrace in the past few months, no doubt you would have seen the construction of one of Perth’s most anticipated small bars slash restaurants. The Greenhouse.

Drawn from the valiant effort of its older sister in Melbourne, Perth’s version has the rooftop garden (complete with veggie patch, fruit trees, and herb rows) and that oh so intriguing external lattice. Yes, those are individual terracotta pots. Yes, strawberries. Hundreds of them.

The idea here is simple. Be green. Minimise the carbon foot print. Make us scratch our heads over the energy inefficient lives we live. From the straw-bale insulation to the recycled plastic-container reinforced concrete, every effort has been made to reduce, reuse and recycle. More planning has gone into this than meets the eye. It’s one of those light bulb moments, where the environment and architecture have combined. It’s the way it should have always been. Ecologically sound, holistic approached. In many ways, The Greenhouse is leading by example.

On the menu you’ll find offerings for breakfast, lunch and dinner. All ingredients are sourced from producers either biodynamic or organic. Crushed peas & basil, poached eggs & toast to break your fast, or the tomato & goats curd tart, mixed leaves, aged balsamic for a midday feast, and dinner time it looks like a tapas. Piquillo pepper & manchego croquettes and pig head & trotter terrine, pickled cherries. Yum. And very reasonably priced.

It’s an interesting little zone, the Greenhouse. It’s unbleached, organic and recycled. It’s unapologetic hippy-esque nature lends to the charm. There is a prodigiously young staff-ship who look like they’re on their way to a Copenhagen; chirpy, hard-wired for action, in the first flush of youth.

Can’t wait to see those strawberries bloom. And for the place to put down roots.

The Greenhouse

100 St. Georges Terrace
Perth WA 6000

Mon & Tues 7am – 5pm

Wed to Sat 7am -12am

It has become somewhat of a Perth institution that lead the way into opening up the now gilded King St. From what used to be warehouse storage and a no-go zone of Perth, the change has been, to use a sorrowful pun – dramatic.

King St Cafe AKA 44 King St, is a contemporary Australian menu with offerings from pizza to cous cous in a laid back atmosphere. It stares across the street at Tiffinay and Louis. Quite possibly the classiest street in Perth.

For ten years it’s been operating, churning out it’s own breads, roasting it’s own coffee and providing the people of Perth a friendly, artisanal experience.

Not a bad environment to be in, when you’re sipping to the cup of inspiration. The coffee is very well made and fruit toast is amazing.

Speaking of amazing, the wine list is probably one of the best in the state. Any (Australian) wine worth its salt you’ll find gracing the carte de vin.

The place is decked out with the functioning bakery at the back, mirroring the other side where a coffee roaster sits flanked with rows of roasted beans. It adds to the grass-roots feel of the place, the open air kitchen pushes further the theatre of food. You may stay longer than you had intended, for this is what happened on this particular day.

And if you were after a live performance of whatever takes your fancy, His Majesty’s it’s less than 30 meters away.

7am till Late every day

44 King St Perth

Take your time. Enjoy.

I acknowledge it has been a while since the last small bar review because life seems to have its way of insisting to apply more attention to where it’s needed most.

So it was refreshing that to get back into a small bar late on a sunny afternoon in Fremantle.

Mrs Brown is the name. And she ain’t as boring as she sounds.

As the story goes Queen Victoria had a little thing for a Scottish servant called John Brown. Perhaps it was more than the companionship he offered or how he fiercely protected her. Either way, Vicky and John became something of an informal item, hence her name Mrs Brown. The location of the small bar (not the late monarch) is on Queen Victoria Street. The location of the bar is a good enough excuse for that name, I say.

You could be forgiven into thinking that this place brings back memories of The Stanley. In some ways it does.

There is a Flipside burger bar next door, and patrons are welcome to bring food over.

Even decor of the bar feels the same. Shabby-chic. Retro meets federation. Have a squiz at the portrait of Mrs Brown and spot the 10 modern elements. Check out the crazy welded lighting feature or play with the magnetic words. It’s mature-age fun.

Wines appear from across the international board, there is one tap beer and the rest are well selected bottles. A top range of spirits crown the shelves, Hendrick’s Gin appears to make an impromptu feature along the stairwell wall.

Grab a burger from next door, sit down with a G & T and watch the world blur by.

Mrs Brown

241 Queen Victoria Street

North Fremantle

P:  9336 1887

Monday to Saturday – open to midnight
Sunday – open to 10 pm.