Bairnsdale

[Digger]

Anyone going through our fair town over the holiday period and wanting a good feed, may I recommend the Grand Terminus in Mcleod Street (runs parallel to the highway, one over)..
Gael lost her sister Joyce yesterday and neither of us felt like cooking so we went to the Terminus for tea.

I’ve seen “Sliders” on the menu in this country only twice and wanted to try them.

We chose sliders as a shared entree with a bowl of the best beer battered chips you’ve ever tasted.


Gael had the pulled pork and I had the beef & chicken. They were all yummy! The brioche buns were soft and perfect for the job.

The pork had a tasty chutney flavouring, the beef, slices of pickle and a nice sauce and the chicken was crispy and on a bed of tangy coleslaw. We will be having them again!

With the chips this is certainly a meal for one but last night we shared the sea food plate too. The beer batter on the fish came through as tasting of beer and sweet, lovely fish in fact. There was a separate bowl of mussels cooked in a sauce that was basically Mediterranean but you could taste the individual flavours in the sauce which to me is the sign of a good chef.
All very fresh!

We had a fantastic meal for $55 for 2 and the waitress was great (and cute), so if you are travelling through our fair city and want a good meal, I can certainly recommend the Sliders to you.

[bunyip]

We are coming down Tuesday to get the yacht wet at Paynesville, which side of the highway?
Have tried a few pubs and not sure if this is one of them.

[Digger]

We are coming down Tuesday to get the yacht wet at Paynesville, which side of the highway?
Have tried a few pubs and not sure if this is one of them.

RHS coming the way you are.

Right at first set of lights then right at the roundabout and the pub is on that corner. (Service St & Macleod St.)

We have some good pub meals here but currently this is the best of them.

Enjoy my back yard. How long are you here for Iain?

[bunyip]

Depends on the weather, we have a visitor on MOnday night and I don't know what time he is leaving Tuesday but we want to sail to Bunga Arm and possibly see who we know at Duck Arm as there are a few yachts on the loose at the moment from what I have heard, if it gets too hot we won't be staying very long at all and I have plenty to do at home.
We are both back at work Monday week.
The yacht lives at Blue Water Marine in mast up storage and I need to make sure everything is OK before we head out but we often stop at Bairnsdale for lunch on the way through, a phone call before we head off and the boat is in the carpark for us, another call and it is launched, $7 for the car park or $10 for a launch, saves me 3 hours of rigging and costs $1K a year.
Incidentally, sliders are quite popular around here and seem the same as what you have on offer, I ask them to omit the pork which most will do quite happily, I can't eat pork as it makes me quite ill.
Easy to make yourself too, we do them at home in the smoker with a dry rubbed brisket, takes about 12 hours to cook but is worth the wait, we do ribs (4-5 hours) at the same time and a couple of chooks (2 hours), all goes in the freezer for later.

[Digger]

Damn!

Now you’re making me hungry!

I should do more with my wood oven as I’ve really only smoked fish, mullet make a great dip!

I always put a bit of smoke into roasts and roast veggies though and that is really nice.

I might smoke some chicken breasts as they are lovely for nibbles.

If you get to the terminus I hope the A team is on as thats always the risk with revommendations.

[peatop]

When i live up bush i built a smoker, i used to breed chooks just for the smoker Mmmmm smoked chook i once tried to smoke a leg of ham, but the pig wouldn't hold still long enough to cut his leg off.

[bunyip]

I tried smoking a pig but didn't know which end to light.
I bought myself a Pro Q Frontier smoker for Xmas, great little beast and better than the ccheap one I had that would fall apart when you touched it plus it has hangers in the lid for chooks etc, I have smoked thick sausages and they come up really well.
There are so many local timbers you can use too apart from the American favourites, for a real Aussie taste smoked four n twenty pies with treated pine is good

[peatop]

PMSL @ treated pine i used redgum, stringy, blackwood and yellow gum, being a self sufficient person i built a swingsaw and used to cut my own building materials, so i just used the sawdust and cold smoked everything. Not a bad idea though smoked steak pies would be awesome.

[bunyip]

We use small chunks of wood but be sure to remove the bark, ti tri works well with fish especially oily fish like mullet so SWMBO tells me, I don't like any fish so if it's bad tell her!!!
We have a lot laying around plus I scrounge of people I know who have been pruning fruit trees but don't forget to remove the bark, it tastes bloody awful if you don't.
For long smoking we use the 'snake' method, a coil of charcoal heat beads with a small pile of live ones at the end, it takes a while for them to ignite and can prolong the smoking/cooking time without the need to top up.
The smoker has a water filled deflector at the bottom and it is easy to run a long cooking time at about 200°F.

[bunyip]

After a lot of messing around and searching I have found the magic formula for dry rub, simply a ratio of 8:3:1:1
8 is brown sugar but we have used coconut sugar on chicken and it imparts a different taste.
3 is salt, a good sea salt not the cheap iodised stuff, we use Maldon Sea Salt
1 and 1 is up to you but if you use Tablespoon measures this 1 and 1 can be broken down to 4 and 4 teaspoons, one for brisket we use is 2tsp Cumin 2tsp Coriander 1tsp chilli 1tsp paprika (smoked if you like) 1tsp black pepper and 1 tsp oregano.
Play with the mixtures, anything goes but the formula works well and can be flexible but don't get too complex.
I haven't tried it yet but rub the meat with a mild mustard before rubbing in the dry rub and you can also baste with a mixture of beef stock and cider vinegar.