For all those playing at home, I don’t have red hair and a beard and I’m not G-bags Mcfilthy mouth… no, I am not the father of this blog, I’m perhaps best described as this blogs estranged brother that likes to drop by unannounced and expects every thing that’s great about writing a blog whilst having no responsibility at all… yes that is me in a delicious nut shell, I’m simply a man called Paul who has a shit load to say about food and anything even slightly related to it, like travel, drinking and eating of said food.
I’m a chef that has been cooking for overs 20 years all over the place and I have been extremely fortunate to have known G-bags for all of that time. We share a love of food, swearing and most importantly telling the whole fucking world about it, so a blog seemed inevitable. I’m honoured he allows my scribbling’s to be part of foodisthebestshitever and I hope you enjoy them just as much as we love bacon, but lets face it that’s asking quite a lot. P
Bonjour my friends, I am alive and well living the European dream actually on a train on our way to Prague, my only excuse for lack of writing is pure laziness mixed with equal parts of cheese and pork pies. But with that delicious recipe comes some serious side effects, yes fellow foodies let it be known that cheese and pork products of pretty much any kind contain stuff that makes your belly big, its like magic and not the good magic that pulls fucking rabbits from hats, no on the contrary the fat bastard rabbit would in this case be stuck in the hat.
But this isn’t to say I’m so massive that I could no longer use a keyboard because of my now swollen fingers, not at all it just means that I have to run many km’s everyday just to keep the scales of my existence level (deep shit right there). This has been made extremely easy as I’ve been living in a kind of fairy-tale land in a walled estate with a huge stately hall in which we were living in a tower, so running around said estate was not a hard sell at all.
But after now living in France and the UK for the last year and in-between travelling to a ridiculous amount of other countries, I have decided that eating well over here seems a lot harder then when in Australia. Now don’t get me wrong we have eaten some incredible food in every country we have been, but in general the meat to veg ratio is never as low as when in Australia. For example we have just spent the last few days in Berlin and the food was so good, Jagarscnitzel, spatzle, flamchuken the list goes on and on, their bread is top notch but did we see any green on a plate of food? Did we fuck!
It must be against the law to serve veg unless they just see us coming dressed like the super tourist I become once travelling, dressed like a mixture of someone about to climb Everest and a member of the Taliban, they save all of the healthy stuff for the local and leave us slowly dyeing as we gobble down meat in cream sauces served with potato dumpling to fulfil the stodge factor. And before any German readers start to get all high and mighty about me pigeon holing an entire nations culinary delights of the back of a few days eating, I freely admit I may of just walked into the wrong places but its not just Germany, France is very much the same, even salads seem to be filled with so many non healthy ingredients or dressing that you truly find it hard to eat well when travelling. Amsterdam is a little better as was Belgium lots more veg but still nothing like the extensive array of goodness on offer in Australia cafes and restaurants.
I must say Spain is an exception and tapas lends itself to good healthy eating and we are never disappointed when dining in Española, markets are always filled with delicious fresh veges and fruit and the array of different cuisines is spectacular, even their coffee is acceptable in places.
Now lets get started on England, land of delicious food that makes me so happy as its what I grew up on, but lets not forget that I was one fat little fucker and I now know why… they class potato crisps as veg! That should be explanation enough but I will go on, I find the comparison to America and England getting a little closer as the years goes on, I was freaked out by the choice of sides offered when in America but its now pretty much the same now in England, if you order for instance a pie in an Australian café you may get the choice of chips or salad with it which in my opinion is a good thing, as I like to play the balance game of a little bad and a little good… now if you were to order a pie in England you would firstly have to choose which form of potato you would like with it. Chips, mash or jacket filled with cheese, then it would be the green component, pies are revered in England but generally served in the mushy form but can be ordered garden style (which must mean over cooked and grey) if you were to ask for a side salad instead of the usual you may be lucky enough to get a hospitable chef that will rack his culinary repertoire to find 1 piece of iceberg topped with 1 slice of cucumber and 1 slice of tomato, that its! So not to surprisingly you end up ordering chips because they are fucking delicious and when in Rome.
I want to clarify that have found exceptions to the rule everywhere we go but it is very hard work, but what we miss the most out of all the meals each day is a bloody good breakfast… no where and I mean NO WHERE does breaky like Australia, plates full of spinach, avocado, bacon, ricotta, sourdoughs, nice honeys and coffee yes coffee lets talk about coffee shall we….
How the fuck doesn’t the entire world know about good coffee? Time after time I get excited ordering my favourite beverage in the world and after finally working out what a ‘long mac topped up’ is in whichever country we are, I then prepare myself for impending misery mixed with extremely hot badly frothed milk, and with a few exceptions I’m never let down… time after time the coffee has no taste and the milk is a non event, quite often its served in one of those ridiculous glasses with a handle too low down which fucks with its centre of gravity, then one sip in and the creaminess disappears and I’m let with a murky cup of brown shit. How can this be? How did Australia become the world leader in coffee preparation? I need to know, and more importantly more Australian Barista’s need to start travelling now.
So we really do miss Australia and all of the incredible chefs and barista’s that it holds, but as it may be quite some time before we come back I just want to let it be known Europe that I’ve noticed what you’re up too and we will be keeping an eye on your progress, but in the meantime sort your shit out and make a decent coffee for the love of god.
