I am a contributor to Good Weekend magazine's beloved Two of Us column, in which two people talk about their relationship. In this case, it was Melbourne painter Vincent Fantauzzo (left), 41, and Sydney chef Matt Moran, 49. They met in a bar, hit it off instantly and now have a long-distance friendship based on honesty, vulnerability and a shared love of fast cars.
There is always so much to learn when it comes to food, so I was grateful for the opportunity to dive into Korean food at a cooking class and lecture in Melbourne last week. The guest of honour was Buddhist monk Seonjae, who is also a chef and the President of the Korean Food Promotion Institute.
There's a contradiction at the heart of Bros', the two-year-old restaurant that Isabella Poti, 22, owns with her boyfriend Floriano Pellegrino, 28. On the one hand, its mission is to preserve the culinary traditions of Lecce, the restaurant's home in the southern Italian province of Puglia. But on the other hand, there's scarcely a dish served in the 25-seater that any Lecce local would recognise. "We keep our traditions, but we make them new," Poti says.
“Steak’s up guys,” says Curtis Stone, slicing into a hunk of beef, appraising it keenly, chewing on a morsel with faraway eyes, then passing slivers around for feedback. He’s not at Maude, his feted Beverly Hills restaurant. He’s not at home in the Hollywood Hills, feeding his actor wife Lindsay Price and sons Hudson and Emerson. He’s not even filming for a television show – All-Star Academy (like The Voice, but with cooking) and Kitchen Inferno (a game show, like a speedy MasterChef with more fire balls) are two US series he’s hosted recently.
The Slap “one of the most talked-about novels of recent years” is now a TV series. Here, its author, Christos Tsiolkas speaks with Dani Valent about the time he was slapped himself, his stint in a fundamentalist Christian group, and his “own dark soul”. Click here or on the image above to read the article as it appeared in the (melbourne) magazine
If the opinion polls are right, Julia Gillard is on her way to becoming the most powerful woman in Australian politics. It’s no surprise to those who know her well, writes Dani Valent.
After the Columbia disaster in February, many people thought America’s space program was over. But now NASA is planning a new shuttle launch, and Australian Andy Thomas will be aboard. He spoke with Dani Valent.
There’s a lot more to George Calombaris than MasterChef. Like his plan for “global domination”. He speaks frankly with Dani Valent. George Calombaris has a few things on his mind. Like opening a restaurant in Kew, and one in Sydney, and another in Athens. And maybe a Greek deli, if the numbers stack up. He’s thinking about his role as judge on Celebrity MasterChef, on air in October, followed by a new MasterChef series for the not-yet-famous. And there are meetings with Channel 10 sponsor Coles to develop supermarket meals: a marinade for boil-in-the-bag pork, something with West Australian truffles.
With philanthropic support from an unlikely source, the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia is at the forefront in the search for a cure. Dani Valent meets four of its hopeful young scientists and their benefactor.
