EDITOR’S LETTER

This issue is dedicated to eating and drinking in the great outdoors: packing up your

Esky, picnic basket or backpack with the best bread, cheese and booze you can access and savouring that glorious springtime combination of excellent produce and abundant sunshine.

But before we get stuck into that, I want to take you down a curved and moodily lit set of stairs to a basement in Sydney’s CBD. I’m talking about Restaurant Hubert, where last month we celebrated the launch of our annual Restaurant Guide and the announcement of this year’s Restaurant Awards.

It was a night of jubilant celebration, raucous camaraderie and abundant Negronis as we announced Quay as our Restaurant of the Year and Josh Niland as our Chef of the Year among a suite of other categories. The full recap of the night’s many highlights is on page 56.

Back at ground level and readjusting to natural light, in this issue we take a look the revolutionary vegan food that’s being turned out at Melbourne restaurant Smith & Daughters by Shannon Martinez and Mo Wyse (page 74), we discover what it takes to be a cheesemaker with Kris Lloyd (page 82), we’ve got all your alfresco eating and drinking needs covered from page

89, plus we asked some of our favourite chefs and producers to pack us their ultimate picnic basket on page 68.

Pop this issue of Gourmet Traveller in your hamper and head outside,

From left: Gourmet Traveller editor Sarah Oakes; Restaurant of the Year winners John Fink, Jeremy Courmadias and Leon Fink of The Fink Group, and Quay chef Peter Gilmore.

Above: Chef of the Year, Josh Niland of Saint Peter; Rolando Schirato from presenting partner, Vittoria Coffee, accepts a plate from Sarah Oakes and Pat Nourse celebrating 60 years of Vittoria Coffee.