Welcome to the first aussiebarbie blog!

Being a technical dinosaur, blogs are a new toy for me, but I’ll do what I can and talk about food a lot.

Hopefully I can give you some useful barbie ideas and plenty of news on restaurants and food around the country.

I’m not sure whether it is good news or bad, but The Great Aussie Barbie Cookbook by yours truly just came second in its category in the Gourmand international cookbook awards held in London last week. Second, bugger it.

The next book- The Aussie Bloke’s Cookbook will be out through Penguin in November.

I’ve had a great week on the fang. The highlight was a whole roast chook and Paris mash (for two hungry boys) at Bistro Guillaume, Monsieur Brahimi’s new venture in the Melbourne casino. Really smart food in an equally smart room, though the casino is still as awful as ever. Had more good food at Glebe Point diner, Sopra at Fratelli Fresh, Fratelli Paradiso, upstairs at the Woollahra pub (Bistro Moncur was as full as a catholic school hat rack) and good pizzas at Love Supreme. I also had cracker pastries at Bourke Street Bakery. That place produces such a great product, even if it does little for my boyish figure.

That’s enough for now, I have to prep some new recipes for cooking school.