On a fairly recent trip to Red Hill (I'm so behind with blog posts), we had sampled the beer from Red Hill Brewery at the annual Red Hill Show. After wondering around the show, we felt a need to have a bit of a beer so we headed down to the brewery which was just down the road.


We even made a lunch reservation for the following day without even looking at the menu. After making the booking we did flick through the menu, and it looked like it was going to be a choice of the ploughman's lunch or the steak sandwich for me.

We arrived the following day for lunch, having friendly banter with Dan, the man behind the bar that saw us twice the previous day. We were then seated, proceeded or order some beer and food to match.


I ended up getting the steak sandwich as I had seen quite a few people the day before order it. It did not disappoint. Such succulent steak, and an amazing chutney that brought everything together. How can you go wrong with bacon? Bacon makes everything taste better.


The rosemary chips were the perfect side, just full of flavour that matched perfectly with the beer.


Hamsley ordered from the specials, as the chicken dish caught his eye. He loves chicken and leek, and he absolutely loved this dish. He kept telling me how good it was, and then promptly ordered another beer after he finished, since he wasn't driving home!


This was Halle the brewery dog. She wouldn't move at all in the car park, just stood there and didn't care that cars were trying to move. She was so cute, but sadly passed away since our visit. I hope the crew down at Red Hill Brewery get another four legged friend again to great customers.


As well as beers on tap, you can also take them home. So don't go home without a take home pack!


Whilst we could have gone dessert as well, we were mighty full from lunch. Perhaps next time we will peruse the dessert menu!


Thanks again to the wonderful staff at the Red Hill Brewery for an unforgettable lunch. You provided us with such warm hospitality and comfort I think all restaurants and cafes should have!

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I wasn't planning on doing a post tonight. I sat down to catch up on Ross Noble's Australian Trip, and found myself editing and compiling images. Now I'm chilling out, listening to music; so I might as well tell you all about the Healesville markets!

With plenty of cuisines on offer; you are bound to find something for everyone at the Healesville Markets. They even had souvlakis amongst the satay, pizza and other vendors.

I thoroughly enjoyed my lemonade from the lemonade stand. It set me back a whole $2, and it was so tangy and delicious.
Some guy was even baking bread at the market!!
And the stand Curry Creations, features in the The Age's, Foodies Guide to Melbourne. We didn't sample anything, but I was tempted to buy their butter chicken sauce... Alas, next time!

To wash down my lemonade, I stupidly got a lemon tart. The sign said "Best Ever Lemon Tarts"... how could I walk away? It was pretty damn good, I wanted it to be more tangy though.. but perhaps my taste buds were tainted from the hit of lemonade. On my next trip, I will be trying his other goodies.

mmmm.... they look so good!

I love the colours in this photo. I'm a fan of these guys. I have a few drink mixers on my shelf at home. And I'm a sucker for cute packaging. I came home with a sticky date pudding & sticky butter scotch sauce for $10. My god it was good!! Will be getting more when I see their stall next.

I would have loved to have gotten a fresh cup of Twinnings Earl Grey tea, with a freshly made scone, but I was saving my stomach for lunch at White Rabbit. This is another next time thing! ... as well as those homemade Italian donuts.

Chirping Bird Moscato wine was rather nice. The guy running the stall was rather excited I was taking photos, and was going to make his wine famous.
Uncle John's chocolate coated licorice is so insanely soft and fresh. It's even won a gold medal at the Royal Melbourne Fine Food Awards last year.

Some of the random things you will find at the markets. Mind you, the puppets were rather cute!

If you are taking little tackers along; there is a petting zoo! I wanted to get in and play with the bunnies, but I resisted. How cute are they though?

With SO much on offer, I would have to say I'm a fan of the Healesville markets... and not just cos I got free fudge! We went on a horrible, rainy day; and it was still busy and happening. Can't wait to return!

For more information on the Healesville Markets: http://www.craftmarkets.com.au/healesville.asp

I promise a cooking post soon! Stay tuned.

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Well folks....
It's official......
I take far too many photos.
The Yarra Valley Market isn't even that big. In fact I was rather dissapointed when I saw how small it was. I was expecting some huge market. Yet, for the last hour or so, I've been editing photos and compiling the images together. I'm dreading blogging about the Healesville market which was at least 4 times the size of this market!

One of the first food stands we encountered was this one. The lady at the stall was either wanting some sympathy, or business... or possibly both, as she told everyone around the stall she was up at 6am that morning baking. As good as they looked; we had just arrived, and wanted to see what else was on offer to feed our bellies.

The next stop was the stall of "Unforgettable Meringues". They were pretty damn good, and I won't be forgetting them, so long as I have these pictures to remind me of them. The stall sold do it yourself packs for lemon meringue tarts & pavlovas. A very cute concept.

Whilst the market had the usual stalls with the crappy crafts that you always see at these kind of markets, I chose not to photograph them! Instead I mainly stuck to food, or funky things. Bottom right hand corner is kiwi fruit jam & chutney. Rather delicious, I came home with a jar of jam. They also make a kiwi fruit wines, that taste like your regular wine!

There is a good range of stalls to feed your face at. Especially for the vegetarians. This stall looked and smelt delicious.

Right next to the vegetarian stall is the biggest mother fudging paella pan I have EVER seen. You can't appreciate the shear size of it from these photos, but I assure you... it was HUGE. If I ever return to these markets, paella lady will be getting a visit from me.

Considering it was WAAAAY too early in the morning to be eating paella, Thai food, or wanting to line my stomach with a drum of grease from an egg and bacon roll; we decided to try some poffertjes. Since I had never tried these Dutch pancakes, it was pretty much essential I had them, then and there. We got some coffees to go with breakfast and sat down with some lovely old ladies to enjoy our freshly made poffertjes. We were all dissappointed the coffees were luke warm and not hot. I was most dissapointed we didn't get the maple syrup we paid $0.50 for to go over the poffertjes. It was just like eating pancakes basted in butter. They were good though, if you didn't get too much butter.

However, talking to the lovely ladies, we found out about the Healesville markets, and other markets around Victoria. Then we they left the table, another old couple arrived with their dog, and the old man felt the need to talk cameras with me. Bless him, and all the funny old people out there!

More stalls, one even doing edible bouqets. Similar to what Edible Blooms does.
Some delicious looking cupcakes too... I would have purchased some, but I had already clogged my arteries with butter from the poffertjes.

Stalls selling freshly baked bread, olives, a variety of amazing salad dressings.... and these amazing lollies. They have sweet and sour varieties. I originally thought they were licorice, but the friendly crew at the stall made us try a few flavours and we were hooked. We bought a sampler bag to take home, and they were all so damn good. Soft in texture, and true to their flavour descriptions.

And of course, some fresh fruit and vegetables; like any market should have!

Like I said before; Yarra Valley market is pretty small. I much prefer what the Healesville market has to offer. But considering they are 15mins apart from eachother; you can do both in the same day like we did!

For more information on when the markets are on: http://www.craftmarkets.com.au/yarraglen.asp

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Lately, I just feel the need to get out of town on the weekends and go exploring. On a recent trip out to the Yarra Valley region, I stopped at one of my favorite breweries again, White Rabbit.

Some of you will remember on my trip to Marysville I popped in to check the place out. This time, I stopped to feed my face!

Since White Rabbit is mainly just a brewery, there isn’t a fully equipped kitchen. So don’t go expecting meals like at Little Creatures. But you can still leave feeling full. I was tossing up between the Ploughman’s Board and the Weekend Sizzle. Due to the horrible rainy weather, I went for the Weekend Sizzle as it was going to be hot and comforting.

My partner in crime and I sat down with a nice glass of White Rabbit dark ale and waited till our sausages were cooked.  We were given a table number, which also contained our serviettes; some tables got their cutlery also put in their table number holder. It was a bit Alice in Wonderland, which I thought was pretty cute.

We were then brought over to the massive skillet and given a massive bread roll that had been cut down the middle. We had the option of onion and sauerkraut to go in the bread roll along with the sausage. I got both, and topped it all off with the spicy capsicum and tomato relish. Other condiments on offer were tomato sauce and seeded mustard.

The “local snag in bread” went PERFECTLY with a nice tall glass of beer. I can see why those Germans love a good sausage with their beer! Not to mention the sheer size of it all! It was insanely huge; money well spent.

I am just in love with the Little Creatures Brewing Group. They just seem to have a funky way to go about things, making everyone who walks through their doors feel like part of the family.
I thought it was pretty cute they way the wrote the recipes on the kitchen wall tiles.

So next time you are passing through, why not stop by for a beer tasting, or a quick bite to eat. Although it will be a tough decision, since White Rabbit is located next to the Beechworth Bakery & The Giant Steps (which is meant to be a foodie's heaven I'm told... I'll check it out next time).

Eaten at White Rabbit? Vote now:

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So I went out to the Yarra Valley region again, to check out some of the local markets. I will be blogging about them at a later date; but I thought I'd just blog about some amazing fudge first.

I was busy snapping away at the Healesville market. I arrived at a good looking stall that specialised in fudge. I of course took a few photos, tried a few samples. The lovely lady running the stall, Bella, asked me if I was doing a project; due to my taking lots of photos. I explained I have a food blog, and we got to talking. She kindly offered me a free bar of any flavour fudge I wanted, since I was going to do a write up, and share the fudgy goodness with my closest interweb friends; you guys!

Not only is it packaged really cute, you can't miss the stall with it's massive "Fudge" sign. And I highly recommend you go out of your way to find the fudge stall, and by yourself some fudge for the car ride home.
With many flavours on offer, it's a hard choice to decide which one, or two... or three you will want to take home. Cookies and cream was a close contender, but I settled on the chocolate and macadamia.

The taste test:
It was delicious! The fudge just melts away in your mouth. It even melted a little in my hands too, it was that soft. The large chunks of macadamia were fantastic. A nice crunchy texture to work with the smooth texture of the fudge.

I can't wait to go back and buy a few bars. The cute packaging makes them great for ready wrapped gifts too. Go pay a visit to Bella, and tell her I sent you ;)

Healesville Racecourse Harvest & Craft Market
Next Market 1st November 2009.
For other market dates and information: http://www.craftmarkets.com.au/healesville.asp

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Today was a day of amazing food, delicious local and imported wine and fabulous company.
We set out for a trip down to the Yarra Valley to celebrate Alana's birthday. With lots of wineries only offering extremely high priced set menus on a Sunday, the birthday girl found a lovely place that didn't send us broke; Zonzo restaurant at Train Trak.

On a Sunday, the busiest day of the week, there were only 2 options; order a la carte or a sharing menu at $40 per head. As there were 7 of us, we weren't too sure what to do. We wanted pizzas, but pizzas weren't on the a la carte menu, so we did a silent ballot to decide. It was 6 for the sharing menu and 1 for the a la carte, so we went with the sharing menu. The good thing about the sharing menu meant, all you can eat pizza, so we knew we could get our money's worth.

The Moscato wine was Tristan's pick and it was just amazing! Very fruity, sweet with a light fizz was a nice wine to accompany everything.
The dining room was very open with gorgeous views of the vineyard and cascading countryside, allowing lots of natural light in, almost giving the illusion of eating outside.
We received 2 antipasto platters with delicious fresh produce, including proscuitto, artichokes, zucchinis, olives, a selection of cheese, eggplant, onions, pancetta and the most amazing semi-sundried tomatoes I've ever tasted. They were rather sweet and just divine! To accompany the platters, we received fresh bread and 2 salads.


I cannot express in words how amazing these pizzas were. But I will say, for me to find the perfect pizza it's very hard. These were just perfect, thin crispy base, loaded but not overloaded with fresh napoli sauce, fresh herbs and fresh toppings. The flavours were just bliss for the tastebuds! ... ok I think you might get how good they were now.

Service was very attentive throughout our dining experience. The views and company definitely helped us enjoy such a delicious menu. I really look forward to returning here again to gobble my way through the rest of the menu!

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As many of you will know, earlier this year Victoria was in shock with the mass devastation of the bush fires. Known as Black Saturday, none of us will forget how we felt seeing images and the horror on the news. To follow up from a previous post, I took a drive out to Marysville, one of the affected areas to see how the community was coping, a few months on.

It was a great opportunity to support the local community and get out of town for a few hours. As you can see a lot of the trees were still black, but the amount of greenery emerging was just amazing. We saw lots of houses still at ground zero level which really brought us back to earth and realising what truly went on here just a few months ago.

In the main town, a shop front is still charred, whilst the main bakery still stands. I was glad the bakery was still around, because I remember visiting it a few years ago, and having a killer sausage roll!

Business is busier than ever, being pretty much the main place to grab a bite in town, other than the temporary marque restaurant set up across the road. We had to take a number and wait amongst the huge crowd to get served. It was worth it though because everything looked so good.

These photos only show a small portion of the size of this massive bakery. We luckily got a table outside to eat as it was a gorgeous Autumn day, raining quite heavily! I got my killer sausage roll, Nerdy Rob got a steak pie and our newest entourage member, Hamish got a steak and mushroom pie. We also got some wedges to share. Nothing beats country bakery pies and sausage rolls, although this time the sausage roll wasn't as nice as I remember it, however it was still pretty good! The wedges were nice and fresh, I wish we had gotten a bigger bag to share!

We headed back to Healesville to the White Rabbit brewery;
Rob and I heard about this place at the Good Food & Wine Show only a few days earlier. Being part of the Little Creatures group, we were very interested to check it out.
The brewery has the same kind of atmosphere the Fremantle Little Creatures brewery has. Laid back, beer vats, matching food and friendly service.

The beer is still in the trialing phase, so that is probably why you can only try it in Healesville at the moment. We were quite amused by the bill, coming in a Little Golden Book. I used to read these as a kid, it was a nice quirky touch that I would expect from a place like this!

Right next door is the famous, Beechworth Bakery:

Another huge, busy bakery, probably most famous for their vanilla slices, beestings and other goodies. The boys got vanilla slices and I got a "granny smith", which was basically an apple cake. The pastry was lovely, not too thick or thin, and not too sweet.

We ended the day trip with a look in the local chocolate boutique;

Kennedy & Wilson was very fancy, with fancy names we got a couple to try. We each got 2 but we found one was pretty good, and the other was pretty average. It was a bit hit and miss, but I did like the layout of the chocolate, it was like walking into Tiffany & Co for chocolate.

If you are in Victoria, it is well worth the trip. Lots of local produce still available and a great way to support those in need.

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