Bush birthday round two.

I escaped the torrential rain in Sydney on the weekend, by heading to the farm. It was another weekend of birthday celebrations. After hearing about the birthday feasting at the farm that we had for Stu late last year, my friend Marcus did not want to be left out and it all just went from there.

I emailed Marcus my suggested menu from Jamie, he approved it, I wrote a shopping list, Mel went shopping (bless her), we jumped in the car, we sat in the traffic, it rained a lot and eventually we got to the farm!

Roast Fore Rib of Beef with Beetroot & Horseradish
The Best Onion Gratin
The Ultimate Fruit Meringue with Vanilla Cream, Hazelnuts & Caramel

In a pestle and mortar, we bashed garlic cloves, lemon rind, thyme leaves, anchovy fillets, S&P and olive oil to make a paste, which I then rubbed all over the two fore ribs of beef and popped them into a warm oven.




I boiled beetroot and kumera (separately) until they were soft, peeled the beetroot and after an hour in the oven, added the beetroot and kumera to the beef, then put them all back in the oven for an hour.

For the onion gratin, we peeled and quartered a stack of red onions, then pulled them apart into “petals”, spread out in a large baking dish and drizzled with olive oil, some S&P, some sliced garlic and thyme leaves, plus a large glass of wine. Covered with foil and into the oven.

By this stage, Mel and I had had a few large glasses of wine ourselves and I was starting to wilt a little in the kitchen. So while everything was roasting away, I had a small sit and chat with the rest of the gang. Feeling revived, I headed back into the kitchen for the final preps, which basically involved adding crème fraîche and grated parmesan and gruyere cheeses to the onions and then putting them under the grill to brown and melt.

Beef rested and carved, we served it all up with roasted potatoes, sugar-snap peas and an amazing creamy accompaniment of crème fraîche mixed with horseradish, lemon juice and finely chopped parsley.

The whole thing was sensational and it was quite good that it wasn’t a scorching February day and rather a drizzly one instead. Marcus sat at the head of the table, toasted himself and the chefs and we all enjoyed our lunch and a few more glasses of wine!

Then came dessert!

I’d made the meringue earlier. A long, thin-ish meringue, taken out of the oven and squished in the middle to create a dip. We then filled the dip with layers of cream (mixed with the seeds from a vanilla pod and icing sugar – completely decadent), roasted & crushed hazelnuts and fresh raspberries and blackberries. And then, the pièce de resistance was the toffee. Yep, toffee. Because there wasn’t enough sugar in the pav already… It took us some time to get the consistency right, but then we drizzled it voer the top and the whole thing kind of formed a gooey shell over the berries etc. Quite a sight.

And what a triumph. I’ve never seen people go so silent when eating. Literally no-one talked. They just sat back and inhaled the sweet and sticky goodness. I was pretty chuffed.

Birthday in the bush part two = a success. Who’s birthday is next?!!!

xx