Food review by James Hill and wine review by Stephen O'Halloran

Food

The North Sea

Simon and Chris North were in the kitchen cooking a memorial lunch for their father and our 50-year member, Jon North Snr.

Simon is a qualified chef, Chris a member of Escoffier and today’s meal reflected their combined talents in the kitchen.

Canapés

First up was a paté made with Swiss brown mushrooms a little chilli and topped with caviar served on toasts. The heat was evident but not too much to overwhelm the flavour of the mushroom.

Then followed some biscuit topped with caramelised onion topped with smoked trout crystal champagne jelly smoke comments thought it thought caramelised onion “novel” others “groundbreaking!”

Next was bruschetta of tomato with cream fraîche on toast. The flavour and texture were a theme in the canapés with favourable comments for the floor.

Lunch started with reminiscences of Jon by the eldest son, Jon.

He lived a full passionate life, devoted to wine and food, especially the Hunter. A great friend of Society he loved the camaraderie the comments on food and the interjections to which a resounding chorus of “bull shit” echoed around the room! His favourite wine was Gevrey-Chambertin and his last drink.

Main

Our main course today was cotechino with porcini mash and slow-cooked lentil sofrito with picada.

The cotechina was sourced from a soon-to-be retiring Haberfield butcher and it is traditionally served on New Year’s Eve in Italy. Today it was poached for  24 hours then pan-seared with slow cooked lentils a rich beef cheek ragu jus and topped with caramelised fennel and apple.

A simple wholesome meal perfectly executed, full flavoured and textural. A favourite dish of Jon’s, gutsy was his description.

Comments today included lip smacking, sticky, great mouthfeel. A perfectly executed winter dish.

Chris added that Jon always said that the Society is our cohort and gives us a  sense of purpose and we are part of the tribe. He reminded us that he and Simon cooked the last lunch at Lower Fort Street premises in 2010.

Jon is well remembered and it was a fitting farewell lunch

Cheese

Cheesemaster Mark Bradford presented an Australian white mould cow’s milk cheese today. It was a Tarago River Cheese Company Gippsland brie.

David Johnson and Laurie Jensen grew up on neighbouring farms in the small Gippsland village of Neerim South. Both families have been dairy farmers for many generations and Laurie’s great-grandfather, a Danish emigrant, often made cheese on his farm in east Gippsland, kindling his interest in cheese and inspiring him to complete a degree in dairy technology.

In 1982, Tarago River Cheese Company was founded when David’s parents formed a partnership with Laurie and his dad, building a small cheesery alongside the milking dairy on the Johnson’s Hillcrest farm. Tarago River Cheese Company is named after the river that winds its way around the gently sloping hills of this renowned dairy region. The farm, now grown to over 500 acres, is home to 400 Holstein-Friesian and Jersey-cross cows who are milked twice daily. The fresh milk, travelling only a dozen or so paces from the dairy to the cheesery, is pasteurized and transformed into a range of handmade, Australian farmhouse cheeses.

Gippsland Brie is made in a special area of the cheesery designed for surface-ripened cheeses. Jersey-Friesian milk is enriched with cream before select cultures and non-animal rennet are added. The resulting curds are gently hooped and then matured at 14°C over the next 4 weeks in dedicated maturation rooms. Penicillin camemberti and candidum moulds give this Australian brie a pristine, velvety white rind. The paste is soft and buttery, becoming creamier with age.

It was accompanied by a salad of English spinach and finely chopped kale, simply dressed, a good match for the creamy cheese today.

Wine

Today the Society had a memorial lunch to honour the Late Jon North an esteemed long-term member of our Society. His sons cooked our lunch and with the collaboration of our Winemaster, put on a superb afternoon. As usual, my comments relate to the wines served only.

The first aperitif wine was a delicious Andrew Thomas Hunter Semillon 2015, 10.3%. A 7/10 year in the Hunter for Semillon. An elegant wine with delicate balance and flavour. Thomas is by universal acclaim an outstanding Semillon producer as was evidenced by this wine. Now 8 yo the wine is drinking beautifully but has the promise of years more wonderful drinking ahead. Would love it see it again in another 5 years. All the key ingredients are there.

Wine no 2, was in my view the Star of the Show, the wonderful Orlando/Jacobs Creek Steingarten Riesling 2005, 12.5%. What a wine and to cap it off, we had our own winemaker Phil Laffer at lunch today, who actually made the wine.

I have always been a fan of this wine stretching back into the 1960s, yes I am getting old! I made a special trip to the vineyard several years ago to see for myself the famous ‘Garden of Stones‘, created by Colin Gramp in 1962. He was seeking to develop a high-altitude vineyard for Riesling similar to those in Germany. The vineyard is near Rowland Flat in the Barossa, on a stone-littered hill some 1600 ft above sea level it must have been a bugger to plant! His efforts have been rewarded by this wine, an Icon of Australian Riesling. Wonderful wine, a delight of mature, harmonised Riesling flavours in perfect balance. No wonder aged high-quality Riesling like this is my favourite Australian white wine. Many thanks, Phil, you did a great job, you should be proud.

Moving onto the red wines, the first was a Massolino Langhe Nebbiolo from the Piemonte 2015, 14%. They say sometimes that Nebbiolo can at times be austere, well I will second that motion. I found the wine to be medium texture with high acid and strong tannins. The wine was I felt unyielding, tight with a very dry finish. Perhaps more cellar time is called for.

The next cab off the rank was my second favourite of the day, the Tua Rita Rosso dei Notri 2016, 14.5%. A lovely wine, warm and generous, just like an enthusiastic hug from that special someone. A very different wine from the taught, harsh Nebbiolo. This wine had that special quality of being welcoming at first taste and wanting to show you more. I would describe it as a lover's wine.  I cannot recall if the components were mentioned on the label which they are often not, however, some research by me indicates that it was a Sangiovese blend with probably some Cabernet and a few others thrown in. Whatever was the recipe. The wine was a gem. Great balance and flavour with a lingering finish. Can I have some more please?

The next wine was the Vasse Felix MR Cabernet 2008. Wow, what a fruit bomb! Massive blackcurrant aroma and taste dominated all else. You would never encounter a quality Bordeaux Cabernet with this presentation. Many in the room seemed to enjoy the wine, coming from a quality producer, but to me, the wine was out of balance, so strong was the ripe fruit/blackcurrant influence. Perhaps the wine should have been opened 12 hours beforehand to lessen the assault on one’s olfactory system!

The final wine for the day, was a Larry Cherubino Franklin River Shiraz 2009, 14.9%. I have been impressed with this man’s skills as a winemaker for many years now, making high quality wines for numerous producers from all parts of the country. I do not think this was one of his best. Possibly my taste buds had been steamrollered by the previous wine, but I found this Shiraz lacked flavour and finished with a flimsy aftertaste. This region produces some fantastic Rieslings, perhaps Shiraz is not the grape for this district. Possibly if well separated from strong flavoured wines, my view might change. Let’s try again.