eating & drinking sydney - the guide!

Eating & Drinking Sydney
In stores 1st September 2011
RRP $29.95

FIVE COPIES TO GIVE AWAY!

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This is a momentous milestone for me. I am now a published writer!

Although I’ve been published online before, there’s something very fulfilling about a tactile, physical book that has your name scrawled across the cover.

This is Hardie Grant’s new guide to Sydney’s restaurant and bar scene, and I was cast in the role of Chief Contributor, Bars.

The goal of the guide was to capture a cross-section of venues in each of Sydney’s distinct locales and to demonstrate the unique reasons that making any given venue worth a visit. I’m pretty proud with what we achieved.

What does a chief contributor do?

My job was to compile a list of the 200 bars to be reviewed as well as some top 10 and top 5 lists and a few break out boxes on topics like NSW wines and cider. It was tough selecting only 200 bars for inclusion, especially when we had to cover off such a huge geography across Sydney. Some very worthy venues just couldn’t fit in.

Although I wrote many of the bar reviews too, there was an army of other writers out there, drinking and boozing away to give my poor liver some time to recover .

Besides bars, the guide covers restaurants and a cheap eats too. Professional journalist Lizzie Meryment, food critic at The Sunday Telegraph and The Weekend Australian, managed the 330-strong restaurant section and suburban dining expert Helen Yee, blogger of the much celebrated Grab Your Fork, came up with 170 cheap-eats.

Guiding us throughout the creation of this guide was the talented and incredibly supportive Clare Brundle. She was the project manager and editor, flying solo without a sub-editor and doing a marvellous job at getting the content ship-shape and off the publisher. We'd have nothing without her!

Being part of this project was a wonderful experience and I’m so pleased with the final product: this shiny, ultra-professional guide book.

The true test is whether I’d buy it myself and, yes folks, I would!


What were my favourite cocktails?

Having quaffed my way through a myriad of Sydney bars, apart from borderline alcohol dependence, I’ve built myself a list of favourite cocktails. My all time favourite is a well prepared Charlie Chaplin, made from sloe gin, but of the unique inventions I came across, these are the ones that resonate in my memory and draw me back for seconds, thirds and tenths.

NUMBER TEN
The Winery
Rosé Sangria
Rosé wine, Martini Bianco, lemon, strawberries

NUMBER NINE
Bloodwood
Grandfather Gus
Chivas Regal 12yr, Disaronno Amaretto and a slice of dried fig

NUMBER EIGHT
Madame Fling Flong
Madame Coco
Creme de Cacao, Frangelico and Baileys blended with milk. Poured gently into a chocolate sauce coated glass & topped with a light dusting of chocolate powder

NUMBER SEVEN
Eau de Vie
Smoky Rob Roy
10yr Talisker and 16yr Lagavulin Scotch whiskies, sweet vermouth, Olivia #5 cigar infused Zacapa 23 rum, Laphroaig quartercask rinse, orange bitters and a bourbon infused cherry

NUMBER SIX
Lotus
Celestial
Plymouth gin, lime juice, elderflower cordial, apple juice, kaffir lime leaf

NUMBER FIVE
Ms G’s
Yuzu Slushie
Limoncello, Russian Standard Vodka, shochu, yuzu juice, yuzu curd and Regans’ orange bitters

NUMBER FOUR
The Loft
Baghdad Iced Tea
Cucumber infused vodka shaken with fresh apple, mint, apple liqueur and rose syrup served tall, topped with chilled jasmine tea

NUMBER THREE
Tokonoma
Saru Caprioska
Monkey Shoulder Whisky muddled with pineapple, lemon and house-made vanilla & ginger sugar


NUMBER TWO
Gardel’s Bar at Porteño
Banana Old Fashioned
Banana infused Jack Daniels shaken with smoked maple syrup and served on hand-hewn rock ice

NUMBER ONE
Stitch
Grandma’s Addiction
Clement Creole shrub liqueur shaken with Mandarine Napoleon, Tiki spice syrup, balanced out with fresh lime juice & orange bitters.


Do you want to WIN a copy?

Then tell me, what’s your favourite cocktail?

GIVEAWAY:
For Morsels & Musings readers, Hardie Grant is giving away five copies of the Eating & Drinking Sydney!

HOW TO ENTER:

Tell me, what’s your favourite cocktail or drink?

Leave your answer
1) As a comment on this post (AND email morselsandmusings AT yahoo DOT com DOT au so I can get in touch with you if you win)
2) As a comment on the Morsels & Musing’s Facebook page

Entries close Friday 16th September when five lucky winners will be picked and a guide mailed their way courtesy of publishers Hardie Grant!

Eating & Drinking Sydney
In stores 1st September 2011
RRP $29.95


An iPhone app is on it's way too!

zeta bar's 5th birthday

Packed out!

I was lucky enough to attend the Zeta Bar’s invite-only 5th birthday party on Wednesday night.

Zeta is a wonderful cocktail bar in the Sydney Hilton, and over the last few years I’ve had some bloody good cocktail experiences there, even if I couldn’t always get past the bouncers and into the lifts.

In fact, some of my most memorable cocktails have been Zeta creations:
• an excellent Charlie Chaplin served in an antique silver goblet;
• a perfect, huge sphere of ice chilling down smooth Japanese plum wine;
• a caramelised pineapple martini where my fruit had been grilled until smoky, moments before it was served up.

To name a few.

But this time my name was on the list and, after being asked for ID (wow! even at my age), I was in!

The bar was alive, crammed with people and buzzing on the Beach Chic theme. The second we stepped out of the lifts waiters greeted us with our first tasty treat.



Deconstructed Raspberry Mule  (jelly & fizzy sherbet)

 Despite the weather being unseasonably stormy this year, Sydney came dressed in our Beach Best, with a whole lot of colourful maxi dresses, flowing full skirts, tiny shirt dresses, men in indecently scooped V neck shirts and amazing array of sandals and mandals.

The bar shovelled in tonnes of sand, hired models to strut around near-to-naked and projected images reminiscent of Beach Blanket Bingo on the walls.

The crowd starts to arrive

But I was here for the cocktails, and Zeta did not let me down.

No less than 10 alcoholic beauties were offered up for consumption. I drank up every drop, and felt very queasy in the AM.

But it was worth it.

An original Bellini (peach) with Peach Air - DIVINE!

Five types of alcoholic sorbets - I tried them all!

Mojito Sorbet

Piña Colada Sorbet

Belvedere & Tonic sorbet

Tuna with wasabi mayonnaise & cress on cucumber

Seaside Summer Punch in a bucket! made from Belvedere Pink Grapefruit, cranberry juice, elderflower cordial & lychee

Apples soaked in cider until infused then dipped in toffee

Dehydrated Chandon ground into sugar and spun into Fairy Floss

Pink Grapefruit & Ginger Cosmopolitan

white sangria

Roast beef salad with mixed peppers & rum salsa

Raspberry Mule (so intensely raspberry! no skimping on the berries here!)

Fresh Lemonade with Belvedere - DIVINE!

the Wimbledon Martini (strawberries & cream) was a perfect dessert cocktail

the Zeta Espresso

Other items I tried but forgot to photograph included the Long Island ice tea snow cone, Chandon nitro puffs, avocado and egg nori rolls with soy sauce, fried pumpkin and ricotta parcels with passionfruit sour cream, Kohuna ham & pineapple mini pizzas, coconut crumbed prawns with mango mayonnaise, crispy fish & chips with lemon in a noodle box, mini cheese burgers with pickles.

A great night.