New Motorcycle

Having just finished my first year on P plates, I was pleased to find that I was no longer restricted to riding a LAMS motorcycle. Don't get me wrong. My Suzuki GSX650F was a great bike, but it did have its limitations, and not being able to ride at more than 80kms (or, to be more precise, the risk of being caught riding over 80kms) was restricting.

So fast forward to walking into Motorworks and seeing a beautiful Triumph Sprint ST sitting there on special. Fantastic bike, in fact the one I wanted when I first started to ride again in 2009. I WILL HAVE IT.

I can't actually ride this beast officially until Monday, so my first impressions are very fleeting cameos around town, extremely cautious, and anyway, I am running my baby in aren't I.

BUT

What a difference. The Suzuki is like making souffle while the Triumph is like a spit roast. The Suzuki is great on take off ... very quick and nimble through the gears. The Triumph roars and shakes its way ... and before you know it you are ten km over the limit without even thinking about anything. This is a bike for the open road or the race track. It is a harnessed beast around town, and I love it.

Fish, OnBar and Raincheck, North Hobart

Living near the North Hobart strip means that a quick eat is within five minutes walking distance. Just at the moment, five minutes takes the breath away and just getting there is the first real achievement of the night.

Our quick eats centre around three restaurants - Fish, Raincheck and OnBar. While all three provide good quality quick meals, each is quite different.

I am not fantastically fond of seafood - and Fish tends to be a bit more production line than I would like, so this is probably the one that sweetheart and I fight over most. But when we get there and order I am always pleased that we have come. Not that the menu changes that much. The service is always friendly and professional. And fast. You can be in and out of there within thirty minutes easily. And you can stay longer if chatting and people watching is what you want to do. The atmosphere is bright and energetic. The coloured pictures on the wall is testimony to the number of family groups that come through. But they get a wide cross section of people - young ones on their first date, local residents doing what we are doing, parents taking out their kids, and kids taking out their parents.

OnBar, on the other hand, offers much more than it delivers. It is stylish and slick, and has a great location for sitting and watching the bustle of the city. The staff are really friendly and the service is great. The menu looks fantastic, but that's where it all unravels a bit. Sweetheart and I don't go here often - especially at the moment because its the furthest to walk to and lets face it, bloody cold. Anyway, back to the food. Menu looks great, presentation done very well, execution ... hmm, I reckon competent is about as good a description as I could give. Don't get me wrong, its still good ... we are particular about where we eat.

Ah, Raincheck. They have introduced the chefs table. Been there for a while now - twelve months? Available Wednesday to Saturday. Sometimes a bit hit and miss, but most often bloody fantastic. About $55 for four courses - tapas style, for two. Throw in the recommended wine and you are out of there for less than $90. And the food is cooked with love. And the staff treat you like you are long lost friends dropping in to visit. And if you are really lucky you see North Hobart street life at its best ... who knows who or what is going to walk in through the door or go past the window.

There ... three great restaurants all within five minutes walk of home and perfect for quick eats on those down nights when fine dining is not on the menu but you don't feel like cooking. Love it.

Garagistes

Its been sitting there quietly for about four months, according to our waiter. We are sitting in the former volkswagen garage in the centre of Hobart, now decked out in the ubaindustrial look that is so popular on the mainland.

Concrete floor, open kitchen, huge woodfired pizza oven, and refectory tables that seat about ten. No booking - just turn up, find a seat and meet the neighbours.

We are early and its not busy. Our food starts to come quickly. We open up with three snacks that arrive at the same time "the idea is to share your meal" says our excellent host. Soft boiled quail eggs on aioli, salfish fritters with lemon mayonnaise and fried port stuffed olives with almond and marjoram aioli. Beautiful food served on gorgeous ceramic "slides".

We try a carafe of house red - a pinot from Birchs Bay D'Meure winery, a small (one hectare) vineyard following organic and biodynamic practices. This is an unusual and lovely wine. And what a refeshing change to move away from "by the glass" to something a bit more practical - a half bottle carafe.

Waiting for our mains we find out from our host that the restaurant is owned by the former owners of flirties, another old favourite. Our mains are equally fantastic - grilled lambs tongue, mustard dressing, kale and hazelnut puree; whole jack mackeral, artichokes and stemperata salsa; and steamed vongole with tashiminori rice polenta, parsley adn almond.

"Any deserts?" we shake our head. "Just a heads up then - the goats camembert is just perfect at the moment, couldn't be better". We he has been 10/10 so far, so lets try it. We are not disappointed.

Garagistes - I enjoyed taking my VW there back in the eighties, but I am going to enjoy taking my tummy there even more now. Highly recommended.

Lazy Sunday

Bill and I had gone sailing that morning. A two handed race in which the conditions had gone from challenging because there was no wind, to challenging because there was so much wind. On top of that, we had not had the yacht out racing since summer so we were rusty. None the less, we came a respectable fourth.

At home I suggested going out for lunch ... not confident that the reply would be in the affirmative. She likes to lie around on a Sunday arvo with a good book, and when I got home that's just what she was doing. "yeah, sure, where shall we go?" Alright!

So, in keeping with the nautical theme, we dropped in on the Boathouse which was pleasantly busy and warm inside.

Now, I don't usually do oysters in a restaurant - I prefer them natural and begrudge paying more than double for half a dozen that I could do just as well at home. But this was different ... chef had two "flavoured" oysters on the menu - the flavours change by the day. One was natural with lemon and lime myrtle. Smashing. The other, which looked extremely dubious on the menu, was absolutely fantastic - oyster in potato chowder with fresh corn. The chowder had been frothed giving it a wonderful light texture, and the corn was a perfect accompanying flavour.

Moving on, she had blinis topped with smoked salmon, spiced beetroot pickle and sour cream. I went for the seared eye fillet of beef rolled in szechuan pepper. Both fantastic dishes, and listed as "smaller lunches", so really good value. Based on their size, the bigger lunches must be enormous.

So we enjoyed these great meals watching the tide come in, kids enjoying themselves on the shore, and the sea birds picking delicacies off their menu. Boathouse has a great outlook, and the food matches the view.

Clareville Kiosk

Just every now and then you find something special. On a recent visit to Sydney we decided to tour the Northern Beaches - "I read something about Clareville Kiosk" she said, "Lets try that for lunch!". So, after punching in the details to the iPhone, giving the restaurant a ring, and using the map to guide us there, we were soon sitting in the sunny front room of a delightful cottage restaurant in a tree filled bay at Pittwater.

This was always going to be something special. A lovely looking menu, great wine list, and lovely welcoming smile from our host gave it all away. The degustation menu looked fantastic - but hey, we were just here for a casual lunch!

So we ordered a bottle of rose and the tasting plates of cured and smoked fish, and antipasto featuring an Italian Blu di Moncenisio. First, a beautiful roll and amuse buche set our palletes tingling. Absolutely wonderful food.

Our mains were equally fantastic she had crisp skin pork belly with pinapple and ginger relish. She had that because it came with congo (blue) potatoes. That meant I had the dish she dropped to defect to the pork, seared scallops, butternut and mandarin pure, salsify, with porchini vinaigrette. Both dishes worthy of the highest praise. Harry had another great plate - roast duck, baby turnip, quince, quinoa, and king brown mushrooms.

We had to try dessert ... well, at least, Harry and I had to try dessert. I had vanilla bean creme brulee, roasted strawberries and basil ice cream - wonderful. The ice cream especially. Harry enjoyed his hazelnut praline, pear icecream and blood orange jelly.

Our sightseeing was over. After coffee and complimentary petit fours we spent the rest of the afternoon lying in the winter sun on Clareville beach congratulating ourselves on such a wonderful find.

Visiting the tourist trap

OK, we said, Mure's upper deck it is. Our interstate friend knew Hobart's reputation for seafood, and somehow Mures have long held the reputation for providing the best of it. Now, we long term residents of this beautiful city know that reputation was forged at Mures Battery point, that quaint restaurant in Knopwood street, not in the tourist trap now known as "Mures".

Anyway, off we went to upper deck with our friend. First impression is this is a high quality venue for visitors - the beautiful docks full of fishing boats and surrounded by the Bond stores of Salamanca and Hunter street made all the more attractive by the sparkle of street lights reflected on still seas. The service was pleasant - friendly and professional - and the restaurant is full (of tourists).

Unfortunately, that's about as good as it got. The chowder was workmanlike - most pubs would do a similar version, many would do better. The flavours were commercial, not fine. Her scallop linguine was gritty. My seafood platter was similar to the chowder - passable as pub food, but too reminiscent of dishes we all cut our teeth on in the seventies and eighties. Our friend had a prawn platter, which she ripped through with gusto. The conversation was great, and in the end, a good time was enjoyed by all.

But in the overall scheme of things, Hobart visitors can do a lot better when it comes to seafood ... try Catch, which has a FANTASTIC chowder and several great seafood dishes; or Flathead for a homely but extremely professional range of great seafood; or even Fish Frenzy, which still rightly claims the best fish and chips in Australia.

Jamming the night away

Having got back from the walk and freshened up with a sauna, I asked her if she wanted to do something for dinner. Lets go to Salamanca and see what the big sing is all about? So we did, meeting up with Angie along the way.

Well, it was a hoot. the bonfire was great, and there was some great singing. The orchestration of the crowd to provide massed voices was pretty spectacular, and all credit goes to the organisers for doing a fantastic job of something that one would assume would be pretty complicated - not to mention scary for those of us who are not used to singing.

Anyway, we went on to dinner to follow up the good times with a good meal. The Henry Jones. Haven't been there for a while, not since Iain Todd and Elysia Mannix did such a great job there, lets see what its like.

Unfortunately, can't tell you in detail what we ate because their menu is not on the Internet - which is curious. The menu is divided into two, one side classical standards and the other designed to show off fresh local produce and the chef's passion. I went for passion - fetta on beetroot and duck. She had a bit of classical and a bit of passion - salmon, and then pork.

The food was good - seriously good - well presented and equisite flavours. Unfortunately, the service did not match. Most glaring of all was the lack of space between courses - not even enough time to finish the glass of champagne that accompanied the entree. And then we were half way through the main before having to remind the table attendant that we had pre-ordered a glass of wine to accompany our plate. For a restaurant of this standard, that's not good enough.