ED’S LETTER

OUR LOVE AFFAIR WITH spending time outdoors, socialising on the deck or at the bach, and entertaining in that stress-free, Kiwi-casual way continues in this gorgeous issue.

Ginny Grant is taking toast to next-level deliciousness with an array of toppings that will make your usual smashed avo or fried egg look staggeringly dull, and Fiona Smith has infused late-summer ingredients with Persian flavours to prove that there is so much more to Iranian food than just hearty kebabs and fluffy pilafs.

It’s a given that food cooked over coals – charred and grilled to smoky perfection – tastes great. Will Bowman and Jane Lyons have hit the coals to put vege skewers at the top of your barbecue game. Emma Galloway is finding sizzling new ways to put summer veg on the grill and superstar guest chef Ben Bayly is serving up a sustainably focussed menu and, I promise, if you like a bit of pork you will be powerless in the face of his pork belly skewers.

Ben Glover and the Cuisine wine tasting panel have been sipping their way through hundreds of bottles of riesling, gewürztraminer and pinot gris to bring you our pick of the best on page 118, while Master of Wine Simon Wong examines our changing tastes in aromatic wines, concluding that what was once confronting is now invigorating.

Pat Nourse, Creative Director at Melbourne Food & Wine, gives you some very good reasons to visit the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival this March. While all of this glorious grilling, smoking and charring was underway for this issue, we were feeling very uneasy as we watched the Australian bushfires unfold. As reports of the shocking amount of loss on so many levels started to surface it was heartening to see the amount of hospitality people here who jumped in and organised fundraisers. The consequence of these catastrophic fires is and will continue to be extreme and there has never been a better time for us to support our friends across the ditch.

Read on and cook and eat well...