What’s cookin’ Down Under with the cuppa?
The Dilmah Australia Real High Tea Competition always throws up a few surprises. This year it was J.D. Wingrove and his bagpipes. Dressed in a Scottish kilt and standing beside his lovely wife Sandy, he played his instrument for a delighted crowd at the Dilmah tea bar at the Hilton. Sandy and JD are closing in on fifty years together and every visit to Sri Lanka is a special one. They were the winners in the amateur category in 2011 as well, and Sandy says she was deeply moved by the Scottish connection in the person of one of the country’s original planters – James Taylor. (A big banner in front of their table bears his name). Though she’s a Scotswoman herself, Sandy’s connection is even more personal. She lived in Sri Lanka as a child for four years, staying at the Galle Face Hotel while her father worked at Standard Motors “just down the road.”
Some of the elegant creations served up
According to JD their decision to compete in the first Dilmah challenge happened the moment Sandy saw that it would include a trip back to the island she had such great memories of. In 2012, for their second bout in the ring, they wanted to get a lot more sophisticated in how they incorporated tea. Their recipe though was a simple one, something Sandy has been making for JD for years now – marmalade. “I eat marmalade every morning,” says JD explaining that they had to try quite a few different teas before they settled on Masala chai as the perfect way to get a “kick” in to the marmalade. “Now it’s got a bit of a bite in it,” says Sandy, who soaks 10 tea bags overnight to get the flavour into the fruit which they then layered into their fiery masala chai marmalade cake and served with sparkling peppermint iced tea.
For Gold with distinction winner Kittea Kelsey, Sri Lanka too has proved special in more ways than one. Two weeks ago she tied the knot with fiancé Dave Ukkola at Tea Trails. Golden and gleaming with health, Kittea makes a convincing argument for going organic and healthy. Serving a sweet avocado tea mousse and tea sticks with Dilmah lassi, she said was all about conveying her passion for this kind of cooking. Describing herself as a herbalist with an Ayurveda background, she said: “I would rather drink tea than alcohol.” While planning her menu, she said “I wanted to show them a day in my life.” She either grows her produce or buys it locally and Kittea says it was all about showcasing the health benefits of tea.
While the amateur category dazzled, the professionals really showed us how it was done. Among this year’s winners were Chad Tilbury and Cameron Wetton from the West Coast Academy of Hospitality and Tourism in Western Australia. Their rose and vanilla macaroon was served with Earl punchy. Cameron has had plenty of experience with high tea, having served it many times at the Golf club where he works. He describes his style as Contemporary Australian, explaining that he enjoys the many multi-cultural influences that come with such cooking. Having competed in a Nestle competition before made him confident that the Dilmah one would have good prizes and most importantly offer him a chance to discover more about tea. “Even during the competition I wasn’t as knowledgeable as I am now about tea,” he says.
Selvana Chelvanaigum and Ian Jones, another professional pair, this time from The Tea Room at the National Gallery of Victoria in Victoria had their medals on display as they served up a Dilmah Earl Grey sphere and a lime berry cocktail. Selvana explains she’s cooked with green tea before, but that the Dilmah competition opened her up to a world of different techniques and cuisines. She uses tea to marinate meats, and smoke ingredients, incorporates it into creams, foams and sauces. “It can be sweet or in a mousse or in a coulis for visual texture,” she says, explaining you have “to try different kinds of tea before you settle on one.”
Among the other winners displaying a selection of their entries were Sue Collins from Queensland (Gold – 1st runner up) who made lemon myrtle and wattle seed almond shortbread crescents with a Dilmah dreaming cocktail. Emily Brown from Tasmania (Gold) with a watermelon and feta with balsamic tea glaze and a vodka and apple Dilmah iced tea. In the professional category, Michael Nicelaou and Matthew Eastwell from New South Wales served up Western Australian blue swimmer crab and haloumi tartlet with baby celery and chard salad with a Dilmah Ceylon Supreme chai milk tea. Alison Howard and Grant Turner from the Stamford Plaza Brisbane in Queensland made lovely delicate looking peach blossoms and a Dilmah tea cocktail.
“This is actually just the tip of the iceberg,” says Dilhan Fernando, the son of Dilmah Founder Merrill J. Fernando, who along with his brother Malik runs the family business. Dilhan says that he and his wife Serena began experimenting with tea in their food as early as 1999, when they used to cook up a storm in their kitchen in Rosmead Place. Real, high quality Sri Lankan tea offers a unique and wonderful palette of tastes, texture and colours that makes it wonderful to cook with. “We really challenged our chefs – everything from the harmony of tea, to the respect for the product, to the pairing of the ingredients, to the originality and the creativity of the dishes, we judged them on a whole combination of elements really,” says Dilhan. As 2012’s winners enjoy their prizes, the company is getting ready to kick of the 2013 competition in Australia (www.facebook.com/dilmahaustralia). Once again Dilmah’s determination to “taking quality tea beyond the cup and into gastronomy,” will hopefully inspire hundreds of chefs to reconsider one of Sri Lanka’s most famous exports.
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