Mavis Revisited

Eating good food with great friends (even if they lurk on my blog and can’t be bottomed to comment) is one of life’s pleasures. As I got to choose the venue it was a pretty easy decision to go Mavis’s. When I booked and enquired as to what would be on the menu, I was charmingly told that they would probably decide on the day. The menu is a classic table d’hote (an old fashioned, but excellent bridge between the degustabinge and a la carte. Everyone has the same number of courses, so there is none of that horrid anti-social gap time when the greedies gobble embarrassedly while the more restrained are simply fanging just to be fed. The menu was simple, unpretentious with no self love language.

For starters: soup in a mug, pate and a nicely plated stack of eggplant, tomato and boccocini which had been plated by a chef, not an engineer.
Mains were roast pork loin, seafood pie and a sound vegetarian option (sorry don’t remember as my vegetable loving carnivorous friends didn’t order it). These were accompanied by a simple well –dressed green salad and new season chats which tasted like the soil they came from. These were seriously fine spuds. Desserts included a gorgeous pavlova with fresh seasonal fruit, chocolate brownie (deliriously fudgy) and a well made lemon tart.
We drank a WA rose which was perfect for the meal. I was able to have a cocktail, because Sir Tuesday Knight was driving. I’m partial to a well made cocktail without umbrellas and pink giraffes. There was plenty of good water throughout the meal.

The restaurant has received some good press in the SMH and Jetstar mag and the whole place was buzzy with only one empty table. Service was unhurried and professional. Our plates went back to the kitchen empty. Peter kindly lent/ gave me some camera batteries as mine were flat after the first photo. Guess I’ll have to go back sooner rather than later to return them. Darn!! I love this place. It seems so simple, but is quite rare in restaurant land to eat good, honest, well cooked food at such reasonable prices. ($34.50 pp). I’d advise booking because this place will soon be difficult to get into at short notice. Read the website for details.

http://www.maviseskitchen.com.au

We left feeling quite satiated (unlike leaving a Bangalow restaurant with that verb used as the name, where we had spent 4-5 times as much money. It was good but I could have detoured to Milk and Honey for a couple of slices of pizza for afters.
Thanks for a great night Blog Lurkers!! Be afraid…be very afraid as I have now unflattering photos of us all and have no hesitation about using them if you don’t comment at least occasionally! Oh b….. mine will be the most unflattering of all.

crabbysands

Feeling Crabby
I don’t like the last day of the holidays and today was the day. I also had Stuff to do eg registering the car. Hardly much to look forward to…. I was in a crabby mood.
I took a slight detour to Bird’s Bay Oyster Farm / catch a crab tours. They have made it into the Jetstar mag, but the owners haven’t read it yet. Follow the map on the website. http://www.catchacrab.com.au/ and you will find at the end of a very lovely lane, a clean, pretty functional shop and food area. I was late…so unusual… and saw that they closed earlier, but it was QLD time. There was no-one there, but good clear signposting led me to the restaurant area.

They are just starting out from a popular tourist thing and an exciting, but little known oyster farm with a lease sale door (not sure what the equivalent to cellar door is..) I was yet again dining with my book (Mungo this week) Usually if I see totally empty tables I leave, but the cook was so sweet, I couldn’t. The oysters were good, but after Tassie…. I ordered a mixture. Found out later they were from Port Stephens. The spawning thing again. Nonetheless they were still just fine. I also order a crab soup. It was excellent! A delicate broth and lots of crab served with enough weapons to make the extraction of the meat do-able. Personally I would have loved much more chilli and Thai flavours, but that it is me. The flavour and texture of the crab was fresh and fabulous. It was simple and good.

Had a chat with them after the meal. They want to start slow, are very interested in promoting the region and its produce. Take a drive and have a lovely lunch. It is a very short drive from Tweed/ Coolangatta and the much lauded Tweed Coast. If they are closed, there are some good fish and chip shops on the way along Kennedy Drive (or follow the signs to Seagull’s pokie palace but don’t eat there)

I love people who are having a go!
For the jetstar article read hear and pay attention to Mavis. http://jetstarmag.com/2008/01/01/flydrive-8/

Milk and Honey

An Italian woman shared with me her ideas of milk and honey men. They are men that cherish, nurture and encourage you to to be the best you can possibly be. This was over stirring the biggest pot of sauce, that I have ever seen. It was in a basement underneath a school. As the women stirred, they gossiped and shared stories of men. I was removing the green bits from the worst strawberries, that I have ever met.
I digress this is a restaurant review after all.
Well Milk and Honey at Mullumbimby is like the milk and honey men. It is for me, as a paid up carnivore, inspires me to eat better and be nicer. The food is so fresh, mainly vegie...there are meat options, but quite frankly i don't give a damn. It is a cheap eat usually less than $20 per head for greedy people. Service is Mullum laid back and I have never been there when it it is not busy. The desserts are up with Phillip Searle's... I'm not a dessert eater, but despite my pleadings..you do have to order your own, otherwise no-one else will share.

If I was going to have last one meal before I left this earth, i would go to milk and honey. I would take a fine bottle of wine from around the corner bottle shop...sit out side amidst the passing traffic, order a salad, a couple of pizza and pretend that I would not order dessert.
I would love the friendly service and admire the maniac who sweats the wood oven and makes the best pizza ever. I would be amazed at the freshness and perfection of the salad, tremble at amazing taste of the whatever I ordered..they are all good. I would ask for chilli... and lots of anchovies...it is after all my last meal. But I would leave my last tastes for the dessert. I would still be amazed at the perfection of it all.