I went to dinner at Ox Eatery tonight. Ox Eatery is part of the new renaissance of carnivore restaurants in Canberra. Big fuck off rotisserie, centre stage, with slabs of pork, beef, lamb and chicken happily spinning around. It's the second time there - and to be honest, it aint bad at all. Tonight the beef was probably the best beef I've eaten in a long time. Thin slivers of pink, encased in char grilled goodness. Well rested and extraordinarily tender. It reminded me of the time I ate a Salisbury steak in Vegas. Not really, and to be honest that is an entirely other blog post.
Back to Ox.
So while the food is great, the fit out is delightful too with some very comfortable leather booths which provide an entertaining view of the kitchen. Which is great if you are a woman who has a PhD in celebrity cooks, and by default is now an expert in observing the goings on of a kitchen. Queue story about my mother.
My mum has this cute habit of talking about all the celebrity chefs with cooking shows, like they are her super bff. Jamie this, Bill that...Kylie, Jill, Stephanie, Maggie - the whole gang! And with this intimate relationship brings a firm knowledge about food. An expertise you might say. And watching in real life....oh my. So many questions about who is doing what. Not in a bad way...just in a mildly TV show commentary way. If only there was a camera panning in for the close ups.
Which did lead me to think - before all the TV shows about chefs, cooking and produce and the like....when chefs were just people who, I don't know... were skilled in a trade, did anyone care about anything they did? Probably not. But now everyone is an expert thanks to reality TV. Everyone has an opinion, everyone is a critic and everyone thinks chefs are demigods or rock stars (or both).
I've never worked in a restaurant, but I'd say it would be anything but glamourous. Maybe I'm wrong, but either way - the hospitality world should ride this thing for as long as it lasts. I'm sure chefs, cooks and kitchen hands are all milking this thing for what its worth. Will it last? Probably. And if it does, good luck to them.
PS, next time I go to Ox, whilst observing the chef folk, I plan to eat a whole pig with 17 of my closest friends. Who's in?
Back to Ox.
So while the food is great, the fit out is delightful too with some very comfortable leather booths which provide an entertaining view of the kitchen. Which is great if you are a woman who has a PhD in celebrity cooks, and by default is now an expert in observing the goings on of a kitchen. Queue story about my mother.
My mum has this cute habit of talking about all the celebrity chefs with cooking shows, like they are her super bff. Jamie this, Bill that...Kylie, Jill, Stephanie, Maggie - the whole gang! And with this intimate relationship brings a firm knowledge about food. An expertise you might say. And watching in real life....oh my. So many questions about who is doing what. Not in a bad way...just in a mildly TV show commentary way. If only there was a camera panning in for the close ups.
Which did lead me to think - before all the TV shows about chefs, cooking and produce and the like....when chefs were just people who, I don't know... were skilled in a trade, did anyone care about anything they did? Probably not. But now everyone is an expert thanks to reality TV. Everyone has an opinion, everyone is a critic and everyone thinks chefs are demigods or rock stars (or both).
I've never worked in a restaurant, but I'd say it would be anything but glamourous. Maybe I'm wrong, but either way - the hospitality world should ride this thing for as long as it lasts. I'm sure chefs, cooks and kitchen hands are all milking this thing for what its worth. Will it last? Probably. And if it does, good luck to them.
PS, next time I go to Ox, whilst observing the chef folk, I plan to eat a whole pig with 17 of my closest friends. Who's in?
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Me! Me! Mememememe if it involves pork. But I don't know if family counts as closest friends (cue comment about you can pick...).
ReplyDeleteDunno if I mentioned one of our favourite lunch haunts at work was a place that did sandwiches / rolls called cubanos. I'd never heard of that before, but it involves pork and pork: basically slow roast pork *and* ham (and other bits). The only thing that it misses is bacon on top of the other two porks.
You should suggest the bacon. Family welcome on pork fest, though a friend and I went there last week and saw a piggy being taken into a private room. Piggy was small though....maybe they do mini pigs?
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