WTF? Wednesday (AM)

So on the weekend I was in the Myer toy department. It's a great place to take Baby because there are all these giant toys, like giant Elmo, giant Big Bird, giant Thomas the Tank. It's like a theme park but for free.

Anyways I was there just trying to have a nice day with Baby but kept beng distracted by all these ridculous toys! WHAT THE EFF?!?! I kept askng myself. And I really had to say eff 'cause I was in a toy department.

First there was 'My first ATM'.

 

What the fuck?? How is that fun? A fucking ATM? That's not fun. How would you even play with that? They are big, like the size of a toddler and there was a whole shelf of them. Are people buying them? WTF???

Then, just as I was getting over the effing toy ATM I saw the new Barbie. Video Girl Barbie. It's a video and a Barbie. WHAT? Yeah, you see that black dot on her chest? It's a 'necklace' and a camera.

What the eff, guys? What the eff?!

TOYS Collective - again

K: So mate, our second TOYS. Monday, 21 November at Cutler and Co., with Russeth, Rumpy, David and Welly.

J:  Let me first say that I was so effing excited about TOYS that all Monday it was all I could think about and by 5PM I was feeling as if I was about to go on a date with someone I had had a crush on my whole life. It is fair to say perhaps I was too excited

K:  Oh sure. I felt the same way. We had been talking about it for days. We loved TOYS Part 1. We had every reason to believe that TOYS Part 2 was going to be even better. Lets talk through the dishes and see whether it was, shall we?

J:  Yeah, because it cost so much money. But yes, let's talk food.

K:  Ok, shall we begin with the COCKtail? Chesapeake Bay Punch, made from aged stolen rum, cognac, peach liqueur, fresh lemon and sparkling wine.

It looks so innocent, but it really packed a punch. Bam!

J:  Yes. The COCKtail. Now I think it is not fair to compare TOYS 1 to TOYS 2 (or TOYS 6 to 8 if you are anyone other than us) BUT at our first TOYS we had a foggy PB&J COCKtail. This time we had a champagne peach one. Nice, but when you have had Strawberry COCK with peanut butter fog in your mouth not much can compare 

K:  Its true, not much can compare.

  

J:  It was nice enough.

K:  Yeah, but It didn't start my night with a mind blow (?)

  

J:  No. I would have gagged for a mind blow!

  

K:  I was kind of jonesing for a mind blow. But that's more about us than the Ramjets I guess.

J:  I don't think so. I think those guys present themself a certain way and that if we want a mind blow from them it is only cause they were asking for it.

K: Ok let me just say this before we go in to details of the meals...Due to an unfortunate seating placement issue, I did not have a menu describing the different dishes I was eating. And because I like surprises, I avoided reading the menus around me. And frankly, I think it was the best decision I made all night. It's hard to feel good about the words some people use to describe their food. It's like the more they can blow your mind with food, the more they can make you want to slap your forehead with the words they use.
 

J: I didn't read the menus much either, but I actually wish I had more. I guess I like anticipation

Anyway lets move on to the first course.

K:  Yes. Scattered, not stacked by Daniel Wilson and Andrew Blake. Cucumber and vodka cured kingfish smoked salmon roe, pickled samphire, buffalo fromage blanc, potato and wakame paper.

That salmon roe is being so coy

J:  OH YEAH! Things started to get real real here! That wakame and potato paper! YEAH BOYYYEEEE! Also I loved the samphire. Like a fresh spring sea vegetable!

K: Samphire tasted to me like green beans that had been living in the ocean. I loved it. And I loved that salmon roe that went pop in my mouth

J:  Yeah. You know because I asked for vegetarian meal I had beetroot instead of kingfish and roe and the beetroot did nothing much for me but everything else on the plate was delicious. Also I 
tasted roe from Russeth's plate and it was YUMMMMMMM!

K:  It was a pretty great dish really. A good start.

  

J:  Yes. It was very very good. And then we had...

K:  New Michelins by Brad Simpson and Michael Lambie. Quail and foie gras ballotine, pistachio crust and sauternes jelly, pear and ginger chutney, toasted brioche. At last, we mention brioche on MSC.

Bunny ears by Rumpy.

J:  FINALLY! Welcome brioche! I did not have brioche though. I had silken tofu with ginger and pear sauce, garlic chips and chilli.And it was delicious! So fresh and tasty!Russeth even said it was better than the meat dish.I loved it. I wish I was eating it now.

K:  It was indeed delicious, but for my money, the meat version was the dish of the night.

J:  Oh, that is interesting!

K:  Look, its probs a tie with the next dish. But lets focus on this one. Biting into crumbly brioche, smeared with that velvety foie gras, and set off with that tiny little pear that tasted EXACTLY LIKE CHUTNEY is kind of the enduring sensation of that night, pour moi.

J:  Oh yeah that chutney-tasting pear was really a mind-bender!

K:  It was a pear, but it tasted like chutney! How does that happen?

J:  Magic happens in those kitchens!

K:  It sure does.Like the next dish: Vue of View I by Nic Poelaert and Shannon Bennett. Confit ocean trout, cheval osso bucco sauce, cauliflower custard, pickled marmalade.This fucking dish!

J: This fucking dish! For me this was dish of the night! I mean I loved my fresh silken tofu but this guy! The way the pickled lemon marmalade played off the cauliflower! Shit! I had no idea cauliflower could do anything like that!

K:  For real.

J:  Oh, BTW readers I had asparagus instead of ocean trout and horse osso bucco sauce and it was still the bomb!

K:  Did we get confirmation that it was horse osso bucco sauce? So like, horse shin sauce? It doesn't matter I guess because it's not like I am going to start cooking with horse shins. But now, when I go out, I am going to want all my ocean trouts to be confit, and in horse shin sauce.

J:  HAHA. Eeewwww.

K: They've basically ruined me for other ocean trouts now. But that's the chance you take at TOYS, right?

J:  You said it mate. What goes up must come down.

K:  And down we came, to the Pig in the Pound, by Josh Murphy and Andrew McConnell. Wood grilled pork chop, salted lemon and cucumber, anchovy relish.

J:  Um, this is embarrassing but I have no idea what I ate here. I guess it was not that good. And because I forgot to photograph it and photographed Russeth's armpit followed by the spot on the table where my plate had been after I ate it I have nothing to help me out. Mate...?

K:  Shit mate, I have no idea either! I was just wondering that myself. But what I can say is that I think at this point we became kind of drunk.

J:  Yes, I guess it was about this time we started tweeting things like "@AlecBaldwin even you are not eating as well as us tonight #toyscollective"

K:  Yeah. We had to draft that tweet about three times too, because we kept forgetting to hash tag that shit.

J:  Well, was your pork good?

K:  Pork is always good, so I guess so. I don't have much more than that and I don't have a photo of it. Look, I think it's fair to say that this dish came at the point that Miss Soft Crab was taking five. From our brains.

J:  Yeah we were. But when the cheese dish came back we were back on it!

K:  Back on the shit out of it! The dish was: Bushfire, old forest, new forest by Aaron Turner and Corrine Blackett. Handmade goat cheese, buried, burnt. This cheese blew my effing mind.

This is the photo TOYS took.

This is the photo we took. It's all the same delicious cheese though. 

J:  I loved that. I loved it hard and I loved it good!

K:  People, imagine you are eating the smoothest goat cheese ever, and it is coating your mouth like nobody's business.Then imagine it tastes like a fire.Like the best parts of fire, and none of the dud parts.

J:  I seriously woke up on Tuesday thinking about it! How can bushfire taste so good. Shit I can practically feel that cheese in my mouth right now!

K:  And it kind of tasted like if Australiana fire.

J:  Yeah it did. In that really good way! What?!

K:  I know, stay not on fire please Australia. But we can't help what we felt when that cheese was in our mouths, right? And the dreams it gave us? Forgetaboutit.

J:  I have eaten so many great cheeses that it seems crazy to say there could be a best one. But seriously, I think that was the best one.

K:  I think it was the best one. What a thing!

J:  I know! Also, maybe that is what made us tweet this: "We love all the courses. Shut up they are bringing out desert #hilariathomas" And also think it was the funniest thing we have ever written.

Or maybe that was all the perfectly matched wines (except that first red one, a beaujolais, which was ill-matched if you ask me).

K:  Yeah. the wines. Now that I am reflecting on what came next, I realise that this cheese was not only the best cheese, but it somehow pulled us out of the matched-wine fog that meant we can't really comment on the pork course, and all I can really say about dessert was that it was there and I ate it.

J:  It was yummy. A tart sorbet with some chocolaty deliciousness.It was good. But you are right. TOYS had me at the cheese course.

K:  For the record, dessert was Bloody Beetroots by John Paul Twomey and Paul Wilson. Chocolate ganache, blood orange, beetroot and almond.

J:  Oh yeah. It was good!

K:  It was good, but I was pretty overstimulated at this point and could barely take it on. We had kind of lost it, right? Note the placement of Rumpy's head in this picture and understand where we were at, guys.

Top right. That's a head.

J:  It's true. We'd been on a journey and we were pretty far gone by the time dessert  arrived.

K:  I ate all of it, of course.

J:  I ate seconds!

K:  Oh jeez. I think I had a dip at seconds too. Oh well. Better to regret the things you've done, than leave food on the plate. That's a thing, right?

J: Its definitely a thing! And I live by it!

K:  Well that's good enough for me mate. So that was TOYS 2.

J:  Yep. That's it I guess.

  

K:  I think next time I am going to anticipate less and drink less.

  

J:  I will definitely anticipate less, and I hope I drink less but I am only a human.

K:I'm really human too.

TOYS Collective

On Monday night K and I went out for a fancy dinner. You remember, footballer Will Minson was there. But let me back track a little. A few months ago K told me about this thing called TOYS (Taste of Young Sydney) Collective. A bunch of chefs just getting together to blow your minds with food. I'll be honest, when I heard about this I really thought it sounded like a wank. I love food, especially the delicious, mind-blowing kind. Who doesn't want food to blow their mind. I do. But why you gotsta get all collective on our arses. Why can't you just cook some delicious food. So when K told Russeth and me she was going to go to the 4th of July TOYS Collective dinner in Melbourne I felt so torn. Like I wanted to eat all that delicious food but did not want the wank. But Russeth agreed to go straight away, so I sure as hell wasn't about to miss out. And boy am I glad! Oh TOYS. I love you, I hate you, I love you, I hate you, I love you.

In our first ever Miss Soft Crab joint post K and J discuss this 'Stars and Stripes 4th of July' TOYS Collective dinner. READ ON!

K: OK, here we go.

First, bread by Andrea Riess. Foccacia with sun-dried tomatoes and brioche corn bread with jalapeno peppers and corn.

J: Well I freaking love jalapenos any which way and I pretty much loved the shit out of that brioche! It had this sugar crusted top that was sweet and delicious and made it so kind of fucked up but wonderful. So American.

K: Indeed. The sun-dried tomato one didn't leave much of an impression with me. I liked the jalapeno a great deal when I was putting it in my mouth, but I came to hate it because it was taking up so much space in my tummy. Space I later needed.

J: I just want to add that while the sun-dried tomato foccacia was less special it made beautiful love with the olive oil on the table.

K: That's for sure. OK, next up, PB&J cocktail: American Whiskey, strawberry, sparkling rose, aromatic peanut fog.

J: Well that is where my mind pretty much got blown. We almost missed out on this but then K asked the adorable cocktail guy if we could get one.

K: Yeah, Luke the cocktail guy!

J: Luke from Trink Tank. That guy RULED!

K: Readers: be sure to draw on his services when you need cock. Tails.

But back to the cock. Tail. (I'm sorry, I can't seem to stop). It was basically this delicious sweet thing but with AROMATIC PEANUT FOG! It was just so great!

J: I have never had anything so gastroscientific and frankly I kind of feel like I can't go back to regular food. (I have, of course, but I am not happy about it.)

K: Next: Oysters Rockefeller. Bechamel, spinach, green herbs, pancetta, Pernod. Let me just jump in with a little oyster comment.

J: Go for it

K: OK. So I think these were creamy and delicious. It tasted like a herby creamy delight.

But my heart belongs to the natural oyster. Neville likes to say that oysters taste like what it feels like when you've been dunked by a wave and she's totally right.

J: You know this course was my least favourite I think. I got a vegetarian dish but I did eat an oyster, cause I forget to read the bit about pancetta. I've never really eaten oyster and what I realised is that perhaps they are not for me. Perhaps some people like that wave dunked taste and some people don't. I don't mind it if I have been dunked by a wave though.

K: I think you should try a natural oyster mate. No disrespect to the nice lady that made the oysters, the nice lady whose restaurant we dined in, but I think there is no improving on the natural style. IMHO.

J: My vegetarian dish was nice but not mind blowing. It was artichoke, heirloom carrots and beetroot. What is IMHO?

K: In my humble opinion

J: And maybe I will eat a oyster au naturel

K: Do you know FOMO?

J: FOMO?! FOYOU! Remember how Russeth said if he wanted a Irish girlfriend he would say he was after an oyster Kilpatrick? HAHA!

K: HAHAHA that was a really good one, Russeth. OK, lets move this along shall we?

J: Yes. But what is FOMO?

K: Fear of missing out. The reason you ate the oyster, I guess. That and the fact that I bullied you a little. Sorry. I just wanted you to taste the wonder.
Anyway, next dish: Mint Julep. Confit mint-julep cured salmon, jicama & jalapeno slaw, chicken fried clam.


J: Well this is where shit got real as far as I am concerned. From here on in everything was win win win! That chicken crumbed tofu, in my case, with that fresh jalapeno slaw, so tangy and delicious! And that salmon, which I had to steal from Russeth's plate. CURED AND CONFIT! So creamy and delicious!

K: Your chicken friend tofu looked fantastic. We've come such a long way from the Kentucky fried tofu we used to have at Kum Den, right? Right. This dish did herald the beginning of the wonders. Confit salmon and slaw are a great match y'all. Sticky but clean.

J: I still love the Cum Den's, I mean Kum Den's Kentucky Fried Tofu, but I guess this was a little classier.

K: Yeah, classy. Just like the squab liver hot dog, bean ragout, pickled onions and brassicas we had next. This dish puts the assy in classy.

J: Yeah that was something else. I had a slow cooked egg instead of squab hot dog but everything else was the same. SLOW COOKED EGG! It was everything I knew it could be. Creamy, solid, liquid all at once. That made me want to cry! And the goddamn mustard. Some said it was just Dijon, but that was the best mustard I have ever eaten. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

K: I wonder if it was a squab egg? I guess it probably wasn't. Anyway, I personally love a bit of liver. And the fact that I was eating squab liver pleased me for the opportunity it provided to get one back at those pigeons that so enjoyed shitting on me in NYC. Yeah, take that you losers. But seriously folks, this thing made me extremely happy. Classy versions of a nasty dishes are pretty much my favourite things. They don't get much better than this. It was wonderful.

J: Yeah, I guess that's one pigeon that won't be shitting on you again.

K: OK mate, it's the moment we've all been waiting for. The RAMJETS fried duck , corn, cheese and BBQ sauce.

J: Well if the slow cooked egg made me want to cry this made me want to laugh. I loved it so much. I got eggplant instead of duck. EGGPLANT IS PRETTY MUCH MY FAVOURITE VEGETABLE. When the waitress told me what I was getting I practically whooped with joy. But if that wasn't enough, the cheese corn was the best side I have eaten in my life. Pretty much ever. In my life. So cheesy and creamy. Like the corn was both corn and cheese all at the same time

K: You're exactly right about all of this. The cheese corn side was the best side ever. EVER. And you do not get to look like I look without eating a lot of sides. No sirree. The duck was crunchy on the outside and juicy on the inside. It was fried duck, after all. Later, I got to watch Rumpy discover it because they let us take a doggy bag home for him. Dude practically needed to get a room with the duck. Also, it should be noted that the duck made beautiful love to (with?) the BBQ sauce. But that corn. My god, that corn. At this point I started to feel the danger signs of fullness.

J: Damn, that smoky, tangy, beautiful BBQ sauce. I hope Rumpy got some of that too. That was so nice how they let us take doggy bags. I bet Rumpy was in rapture with the duck more than any of us because he had only had a Subway beforehand, not three courses plus bread plus cock! Tails.

K: Exactly. Exactly! But the way we all felt about the duck and the salmon and the everything that came before was nothing, NOTHING compared to what we felt for: Bagel and Choca Cola. Chocolate and coke soup, caramelised popcorn bagel, sweetcorn cheese, pumpkin sauce.

J: It's true. Everything that came before was pretty fantastic. In fact truth be told it's like each dish was better than the last. And never was a truer word spoken than about this 'bagel'. A bagel made of popcorn and caramel and nuts and seeds. Not a bagel at all. And all this caramel sweetness was cut through by pickled green mango and a single spinach leaf. And the textures. My god the textures.

K: I loved everything about this dish. Down to the little poppy seeds on top. It was a delight, in every way. But it did make me want to lie down a lot.

J: Me too. Also I wish there had been no Choca Cola soup. I kept trying it because I thought I should, but truth was that the bagel was so special the soup only detracted from it. I loved it. I loved it so much. You know thinking about it now and talking about how those other dishes made me want to laugh and cry I realise that is not really true. I loved those other dishes but it was the bagel that made me feel these things and it is like that kind of coloured the whole night retrospectively.

K: I agree. The bagel brought it all together. It was like the moment in the musical where the whole company is singing and dancing and everything is coming together in this perfect crescendo and you don't ever want it to stop. The bagel was like that.

BUT THEN CAME PETIT FOURS!!!

Key lime pie, cookies and cream, S'mores and Caramel Corn.

I'm embarrassed to say I could not eat all of them because I needed to lie down so badly.

J: The bagel was like that! And then after that number in the musical there is the final resolution then FIN. I think the Petit Fours were too much. We should have just been served a nice desert wine as resolution.

I am embarrassed to say that I ate each one of them! Plus an extra half a S'more. Those S'mores were so good. I have never had such delicious marshmallow.

K: I'm glad to hear it. Then we all looked at Will Minson for a while and then FIN.

Right?

J: Yes. That is pretty much exactly how it happened.

FIN