In search of a decent curry on the Sunshine Coast

It's time to exact my revenge on all those revolting bowls of gravy I've been served in the 'curry' houses of Queensland. For all the soft poppadoms, raw meat starters and insipid spices, I'm going to get my own back... or a libel suit maybe.

Firstly, let me start by saying that most restaurant experiences in South East Queensland are really good. Whatever restaurant you choose will offer well cooked, interesting food and plenty of it, served by friendly staff. Now try going to an Indian restaurant.

If, as a pom, you wanted to be able recreate those exuberent Friday nights out in the local balti hut, forget it. For a start, they're usually all shut by 10pm, having been trying to waft you out of the door since 9pm. And secondly, the dining experience itself is grim to say the least.

Coming from a nation whose favourite national dish is chicken tikka masala (ok, I know it was invented in Glasgow with a tin of tomato soup), whose Indian and Bangladeshi populations provide the most competitively yummy curry and balti houses in the world and whose favourite Friday night activity is to go down the local and order a madras with half and half, it's all a bit disappointing. Having spent my formative years frequenting the curry houses of Wolverhampton, Birmingham, Rusholme in Manchester and the Wellingborough Road in Northampton (yes, Northampton - go and see for yourselves!), I feel suitably qualified to judge.

Indulge me for a minute while I have a full blown whinge right now: WHY OH WHY DO INDIAN RESTAURANT OWNERS IN SE QUEENSLAND THINK THAT AUSTRALIANS DESERVE SUB STANDARD FOOD? AND WHY OH WHY DO AUSTRALIANS LIKE IT???!!!!

The situation is so dire on the Sunshine Coast that a group of us -all poms - have got together an informal curry club to seek out the best curry house in the area. Every couple of weeks we meet up in a local restaurant to see what we all think. And fair dos, we always give it a second chance in case they were having an off night. So here are the results so far, in no particular order:

(1) Magic of India, Thomas Street, Noosaville - good service, reasonable food, bit salty, provided minced chilli on the side to make the dish hotter (!), would go back with moderate enthusiasm. Winner of an award, apparently. Maybe the best Indian restaurant in Thomas Street award? It wouldn't be difficult because the other restaurant there is... (cue dastardly music)...

(2) Chutney Mary's, Thomas Street, Noosaville - DO NOT repeat DO NOT GO HERE! The poppadoms were microwaved, the kebab starter wasn't cooked properly, the vindaloo tasted like bad bisto, in fact the food was so bad I had to pop my head round the kitchen door to make sure there were Indian/Bangladeshi people 'cooking it'. And there were. The only saving grace was the service, provided by a team of young girls who all seemed to know what they were doing. This place is packed out on weekends - we can't understand it. It was truly vile.

(3) India Today, Aerodrome Road, Maroochydore - looks amazing with all the saris, ornaments and dangly bits everywhere. But the service was not brilliant and food pretty average - again with the bowl of minced chilli to make it hotter! The second time we went we had the courage to question the service and some of the food (question mind, not complain), and a very unpleasant woman (the owner?) appeared from nowhere to confront us about it and more or less told us it was our own fault we hadn't got the service we were looking for. Not just that, but she then clearly forced a poor unfortunate member of staff come out to apologise for the service which she had just told us had been our fault. We resolved never to go back.

(4) Hathi, Aerodrome Road, Maroochydore - best one so far but don't go for the all you can eat buffet. It's not good. And don't bother ordering poppadoms - they're disgusting. On our second visit we chose off the menu and it was all pretty good. Hot seemed to mean hot (although not British Indian hot!) and no additional chilli was required.

To be fair on the restaurant chefs here, they aren't helped by the average aussie's aversion to spicy food. A mild korma would cause an Australian to flap his hand frantically in front of his open mouth and drink a ton of 'warda'. But, equally, it's no excuse for rubbish food. Especially when you consider how many poms are moving over here. So restaurant owners need to sharpen up their act.

Based on this report, here are my recommendations:
(1) All curry house owners in SE Queensland need to know that poppadoms should be deep fried in ghee to make them crispy and buttery. In fact,
(2) All curry house owners in SE Queensland need to go to Bradford for a residential cookery course.
(3) Try eating Thai on a Friday night instead - there are lots of them and they're usually very good.
(4) Eat your last good curry in Southall before you catch the plane to oz from Heathrow.
(5) Forget all that foreign muck and get an excellent, wholesome, organic, aussie feed at Modern Primitive in Eumundi.

Sooner or later I'm going to have to tell them I keep mentioning them in ma blog. Maybe I'll get a free pud!

9.10.2008 - And I did get a free pud - what a great place!! AND they've just won best newcomer restaurant award for the Sunshine Coast. What can I get for mentioning that do you think?

First trip back to Blighty: more weather

Blimey! UK public transport's no better then. And what a waste of chocolate biscuits. My love of PLAIN chocolate McVitie's digestives is documented in my blog banner and I have searched high and low for them in Queensland. So far I have located two somewhat unreliable sources but I'm always on the lookout for more.

So this was the scene that greeted me on my first trip back to the Motherland after a year of being in oz. More specifically, this was what the tide left behind in my home town of Blackpool, along with one lorry's entire cargo of choccie biccies. Shortly after this photo was taken, the local authorities realised an exclusion zone needed to be put up to stop scavengers being squashed by falling lorries - duh!

I went back to England hoping for some better weather than we'd had here in Queensland but, alas, the weather troll had other ideas. While I was in the Lake District we were subjected to regular mini power cuts due to the conditions and the fact that United Utilities are 'responsible' for the electricity. However, it was great to be back and it was nice to have some cold for a change rather than the relentless warm or hot I've put up with for the last year. ;-P

My first priority after I'd arrived (after the shopping of course) was to go eat a stonking good ruby. Unfortunately, curry such as we know it in the UK just doesn't exist in Queensland, (although I do hear tell of a mystical place near Redcliffe....). Believe me, I've looked and, in most instances, tried with very unsatisfactory results. To put it another way, one so called Indian meal we had at Chutney Mary's in Noosaville included microwaved poppadums, partially cooked kebabs and vindaloo that tasted like gravy. Being English though, we didn't complain and slunk out vowing never to go back. But this restaurant is packed out on weekends and we can't understand it. It merely serves to prove that aussies don't like spicy food and have never experienced the phenomena of English Indian food - if you see what I mean. Otherwise they wouldn't go near the place. Bleugh! Anyway, my mission was accomplished twice in the first week. First in the Lakes with my Mum, then in Northamptonshire with some lovely friends.

Back to the weather. Needless to say, while I was away in the damp depths of an English winter, the weather in Eumundi was glorious. The house started to dry out and Dave started winning the battle against the mould. Of course, 24 hours after I left Blighty the sun reappeared there. Right now, back down under, I'm looking out of the window at a monsoon. A weather report has just flashed up on my screen to say the Low will be passing over the Sunshine Coast late tonight and everyone has to secure outdoor items and not go out. We haven't even HAD the Low yet - AAARRGGHHHH!!!

I will be back here soon, assuming I make it.....

Places to visit: A Town Called Eumundi

First impressions of Eumundi, especially on a stinking hot day, are that it's maybe just another one horse town along the railway line, on the way to somewhere more interesting in Noosa. But STOP! Take a closer look. Or alternatively, take advantage of the air conditioning inside some of the shops and cafés. It's a little gem.

We have recently moved to the outskirts of Eumundi and, by UK standards, it's more like a village. There's one main street where all the shops and cafés are and residential areas are mainly behind this street on either side. It is most famous for its markets which are held in the town centre every Wednesday and Saturday. You can buy all sorts from here, particularly clothes and jewellery and it's quite good for souvenirs to take back home to Blighty.

These markets have enabled Eumundi to develop a bohemian, arty crafty image up and down the main street. You can choose from exclusively designed art from the glassware shops or gear from The Hemp Shop (man)! And the most exciting shop to open recently is Berkelouw's bookshop which sells a vast array of over 100,000 second hand, rare and out of print books, all classified and displayed accordingly, in addition to brand new ones. It's a family owned small chain of 7 stores in Australia and one in Los Angeles. The Eumundi one has a great café attached to it - guaranteed to help you lose track of time. We recently had breakfast in there and it was yummy. And of course we had to buy a book!

The choice of where to eat is great for such a small village. In our first week here, up to our eyes in cardboard boxes and not wanting to cook or wash up, we grabbed a take away from a Thai place. It was good and we could just as easily have stayed there to eat. In fact it would have saved me from even more washing up.

Last night we went out for dinner properly in our village for the first time. We had a BEAUTIFUL meal at the Balinese looking Modern Primitive, although the food wasn't balinese and, during the day they serve tapas. It was all organic and cooked to order, and we realised after a while that the reason they weren't very busy was because they were staggering the bookings so that you got really personal service. It was great to eat in a restaurant where the staff were keen to suggest what would go well with your meal, and the flavours were awesome!

How cool is that for a village? And that's the first place we've tried. We've got all the rest of the main street to do yet!

I'll be back with any further updates on the quest to eat my way round Australia!

(19.2.08) Non food update: Eumundi now has a lovely, brand new, open air, heated swimming pool. It's not very big (25m) but I racked up half a kilometre easily enough and it's fine for keeping up your fitness. The best thing about it is that (so far) it's not very busy, during the week at least, and the kids pool is a good distance away from the grown up lane swimming one. It's basic but clean and peaceful, and we really like it so there.

Garden creatures in Australia - don't panic!

Well living in the Noosa 'hinterland', near Eumundi, for the last 2 weeks has been interesting. Being in such close proximity to snakes and lizards and stuff has had to make me adjust somewhat!

Mini lizards are cute and interesting to watch until they suddenly disappear into the waiting mouth of a snake you didn't know was lying under the back step. Fortunately, it was 'only' a green tree snake and, although we eyeballed each other suspiciously, it wasn't very interested and slithered back under the step. And at this present moment I can see what I have convinced myself to be a carpet python right outside my window. I would like it to be a carpet python because they aren't dangerous and only bite people when they have been seriously pissed off. They also, apparently, eat the young of other, more poisonous snakes and ensure your mice and rat population are in the past tense. It has fastened itself to the chain which anchors our bird feeder and pointed itself at the bird seed tray, coiled up and ready to spring. It has been in that position all night so we are speculating whether it has in fact died of starvation and rigamortis has set in. It certainly doesn't seem to mind us taking photos of it. Or maybe it's just lulling us into a false sense of security. Either way, our noisy lorikeets and flappy pigeons are notable by their absence! Shame really as yesterday a beautiful king parrot had a nosey at the bird feeder. A sort of grisly curiosity has got me intrigued as to whether a snake of that girth could actually digest a pigeon. Apparently the thing to do if you're worried about having snakes in the garden is to get a dog. The snakes will be put off by the scent.

We've also discovered what has been making the little holes in the front lawn. Not funnel web spiders, as I first worried about after watching a documentary about Fraser Island! But bandicoots! They look like a cross between a rat and a wallaby, and are about the size of rabbit - very odd. And I thought they were just a Sony invention.

(Non poisonous) Snakes and bandicoots I can cope with. Bugs and spiders I'm not very good with, especially if they are flying or running towards me. Redback spiders are ones to watch out for, although I still haven't clapped eyes on one since Diver Dave's been very pro active with the bug spray. They like to lurk about in exterior wall crevices and garden furniture. Like most things, they will only bite if they're upset and you should get immediate medical attention if you're the victim. Huntsman spiders are BLOODY scary looking (especially if you happen to notice one happily sitting on the sanitary bin next to the toilet that you are sitting on in Noosa National Park!), but they aren't aggressive. In fact one Aussie told me about their 80 year old grandmother who would pick them up and lob them out of the window if she ever found any in the house. Since they are about the size and shape of a tarantula, this is no mean feat. She obviously didn't have any fly screens though.

In the evenings we have literally been bombarded with massive suicidal beetles, jovially named Christmas beetles. They seem to bounce off your windows or head and end up breakdancing for hours while they shuffle off this mortal coil. They aren't engineered very well since they cannot upright themselves once toppled over and die if they aren't up righted straight away. What a stupid design fault. I am looking forward to whatever day of Christmas it is when these beetles cease to be.

Meanwhile, we haven't really had any problems so far with mosquitos. this may be because we have a yellow UV light out on the deck which apparently doesn't attract insects (tell that to the xmas beetles). A top tip the estate agent told me was to make sure you empty the water from the trays of any pot plant after rainfall as the stagnant water will attract the mozzies.

Unfortunately, this week Diver Dave had to dispatch a cane toad right outside our front door. Cane toads are officially a pest in Australia and you are supposed to get rid of them straight away by any means possible to try and stop them spreading, which they are doing anyway in their thousands. It's not really their fault. They can blame the farmers in the 1930s who introduced them to eradicate pests in the cane fields. This exercise failed monumentally and only served to introduce a non native species which is seriously poisonous to other, native species.

We had to consult the world wide interweb to confirm identification first though to make sure we weren't about to eliminate a cute native frog. It certainly didn't look very cute. It looked shifty. When they are croaking, these toads are bleedin obvious. They sound like mini jack hammers. But this one wasn't croaking, probably because it knew it was about to. Diver Dave identified it by its poison sacks on either side of its 'shoulders' and promptly used a rake handle. Yuk.

I will update this post with any further worrying wildlife developments!