estestest was, this book tells me, was a Melbourne restaurant. Now, I've heard of Donovan Cooke and Philippa Sibley. What the book tells me--not directly, but through its recipes--and what old reviews, too, tell me is that estestest was very good at what it did. This is a book that is so beautiful it makes me a bit sad. I wish I could eat at this place. The roast hare, the Muscovy duck breast, all that kind of gear ... they're my idea of a good time. Treading the line between fine dining and rustic. 'Wholesome,' said my housemate. Meaning these two, Cooke and Sibley, they didn't fuck about.
Cooke is doing something new in Melbourne early next year--a seafood place called Atlantic in the Crown complex, apparently--so that's alright. But yes. This book. Now 11 years old. Out of print and, according to Amazon and BiblioOz, now worth hundreds of fucking dollars. And there it was, just sitting in the library the other day.
If you can get hold of it, Marriages is the loveliest of books. It's a serious cookbook but has photos of basically everything. It's one of those seasonal books: rather than being arranged in the format of 'entrees', 'mains', 'desserts' or whatever, it's set out as four books, almost, in one. Four distinct, seasonal menus, each more beautiful and epic than the last.
While not fucking around hugely, the book is accessible to the home punter. If you sprung for the ingredients--and only a handful of them are truly expensive--you could make them at home if you were prepared to invest enough time and effort and love. What's really cool is some of the recipes have a step-by-step breakdown, with photos and detailed instructions explaining each key point in the process.
Worth the $600+ I saw it going for on BiblioOz? Probably not. But if you stumble on it in a second hand bookshop somewhere, you simply must have it.
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