Winter time at Inveresk Tramsheds

Well - it's official - it's now that wonderful season called 'winter'. Surely one of the many reasons we all choose to live in Tassie? We have rain, fog, frost, storms, snow, ice, sleet - all the things that prove to you that you are truly existing in an environment that screams out for beautiful cold-weather food.

We can now justify getting those long slow Beef in Red Wine recipes out again, and re-looking at them, re-jigging them to suit tastes, seasonal ingredients etc.

Up in the north of the state for the past few days, I attended a working dinner at the Inveresk Tramsheds. It was a lovely, simple introduction to this years winter. It was in the style of a smorgasbord, served by two willing, happy and big-hearted middle aged ladies (and I use those words quite deliberately, so you can get the most accurate word picture of the scene). The food choices comprised Chicken Curry, Beef Casserole and/or Lasagne. Rice, steamed vegies and caesar salad were there for you to help yourself to, as well as dinner rolls and BUTTER (YAY!!).

You cordon bleu foodites will cringe bigtime with my description of the above, BUT, you know what? It was all top tucker and you know what as well? I defy anyone to doubt the realism of sticking to what you know best when you're catering to many in a scenario like that. These simple people (I mean that in the kindest way, not talking about their mental capacity) cooked what they were totally at home with and best at producing. And it was bloody great.

Dessert was Lemon Tart or Apple Strudel.

On the other side of the coin, I had occasion to phone round some local venues this week with a catering job I needed doing.

Quite simple requirements I thought - I could have (and would have) done it myself standing on my head, half asleep!

I wanted a hot lunch for 10 people. I wanted to 'win' them so I wanted something a bit out of the box. I wanted a private room so the speaker I was bringing down from Melbourne could speak to them uninterrupted over this fabulous lunch. I wanted 2 courses. I was happy to pay whatever for it, but was pinned down to articulating a price so said $25-30 per person in an effort to be helpful.

I really can't see anything too laborious about that, but apparently, from the responses I received, it was a big ask!

I've now booked somewhere, and I'll be reporting back here about the outcome, good or bad!

Anyway - I'm breaking out the Le Creusset and looking forward to many casserole meals and corned beef meals (which I love) like the food at the Tramshed in Launceston.