July Bugle 2013

4 Tingira Cres

t: 4232 4990

littleblowholecafe@gmail.com www.littleblowholecafe.com July 2013

Beachside Bugle Brought to you monthly by Cathy and her team at your local cafe

Pardon me boy, is that the Kiama Choo Choo?

Always longed to be part of the romance of the Big Band era, where the women were glamorous, the men debonair and the music big and brassy? Well, the Kiama Scouts are once again giving you the chance to live out the fantasies forged by watching all those Hollywood heyday movies about the big band coming to town.

In what has quickly become one of the highlights of the Kiama social calendar, the Fabulous Forties Night, featuring the mighty impressive South Coast Big Band, is on for the third year. It is a night to put on your glad rags and your dancing shoes, and leave all your worries in your old kit bag. Even if you have two left feet, you’ll enjoy singing away to the classic swing melodies.

We will once again be doing the catering for the two course dinner, which is included in the ticket price.

All funds raised will go to helping the Scouts in Kiama.

Details: Saturday 27 July, from 7pm The Pavilion Kiama Tickets from Dougmal Harcourts Real Estate t 4232 1322 $60/head or $55/head for a table of 8

Say hello to James With Cohen’s departure after three and a half years, we are lucky to have found James as a replacement.

With ten years’ experience in kitchens, he is happy to have found a role that doesn’t require him to work nights! We are happy because he genuinely enjoys cooking, has such a calm and organised approach to his work, and is very interested in becoming involved with our commitment to local food.

We warned him we have a lot of regulars, but the poor guy has met so many people over the last week that it will be a challenge to him to remember all the names.

So pop in and introduce yourself to confuse him further!

A treat for cello lovers Celebrated cellist David Pereira is returning to Kiama for a concert with his former student, Rachel Scott. David was the principal cellist of the Australian Chamber Orchestra for seven years and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra for three years.

Denis Koks assures me it is a concert not to be missed, and given my experience in the audience at his last concert here I'd have to agree. The program focuses on Bach, and will feature cello duets and solos.

David plays a wonderful old Italian cello by Guidantus dated from 1730, generously on loan from the family of Nick Holmes.

Details: Sunday 21 July, 2.30pm The Pavilion Kiama tickets $25 or $20 concession available from the Kiama Visitors Centre

Fancy our food for dinner?

Thursday nights at the Leagues Club

Check out our new freezer next time you are in, as we are now selling our food for you to take home frozen. Perfect for those days when you don't feel like cooking or just don't have the time to prepare a nutritious meal.

Given that Hugh FearnleyWhittingstall's River Cottage Australia is based on the South Coast, I'm really keen to see how our region is showcased to the world (especially after he visited the Café that time).

All of the food we will sell will be made from scratch, and come with heating instructions and serving suggestions. No preservatives or other nasties, so the contents list will be full of things you recognise, rather than numbers.

For those of us who don't have Foxtel, I have organised to have it shown at the Leagues Club each Thursday night on their big screen. You could even catch the free bus there! Just phone and make a booking like I did last week. I got to meet a group of Welsh Lions supporters staying at Easts Beach. Boy, did they have a good night in Melbourne…

Come along and be a critic with other foodies.

So far we don't think Paul is a scratch on Hugh, but we’re open to persuasion.

facebook.com/littleblowholecafe

Details: Each Thursday, 8.30pm Kiama Leagues Club

Join us for an English Winter’s Lunch As the Bugle goes to press, we are in the midst of submitting our application to extend our trading hours on Friday and Saturday nights so that we can have the occasional dinner. We would like to thank the many of you who have come in especially to sign our petition which will show that our application has community support.

Not knowing how long these things take, we have decided our July Dinner Event should take a different timeslot to match in with this month’s cuisine, the food of England. The Sunday Lunch format means we won’t have to hurry you out the door at 9pm (we felt so bad shooing people home on the Swedish Night).

We hope you can join us to celebrate the new wave of English food that has taken the world by storm - a mix of old favourites with a modern twist and a focus on local and seasonal produce.

I find the idea of a long, lazy Winter’s Lunch very appealing, and hope you do too. It might be a chance for some of you who prefer not to go out in the evenings to come along to one of our special events.

Details: Sunday 21 July, 1pm Three course fixed menu $45/head Bookings essential t 4232 4990

Now you can enjoy Kiama’s own milk The wait is over. We are pleased to report we are now using and selling milk from The Pines Kiama, and the reaction from customers so far has been fantastic. As avid readers of the Bugle will know, the Grey family have decided to come out fighting to protect their six generation dairy heritage.

The milk marketing war waged by the major supermarkets has hurt no one but the dairy farmers, and for many of them the 15c a litre they are receiving is the last straw.

Kel and Mahlah Grey with their other joint project, the gorgeous Tilly

If we aren’t prepared to show we value milk at more than $1/litre (which is a hell of a lot of nutritional value for around a third of the price of bottled water), then Australia won’t have a dairy industry for future generations. They’ll be drinking UHT milk, like most Europeans do already.

Kel and Mahlah are also selling their gelato at local produce markets in Kiama, Gerringong and Berry, as well as further afield. We’ll have it in tubs at the Café in Spring.

Details: The Pines’ full cream unhomogenised milk is available at the Café for $3.5/litre.

Once you’ve tried it, you won’t look back!

Accessing local history becomes easier Through the National Library’s Australian Newspapers Digitisation Program, the Kiama Independent has been digitised from 1863 to 1947 and is now available to read online through Trove: http://trove.nla.gov.au/ newspaper.

The newspaper is fully text searchable, so you can easily hunt for references to your family or other areas of interest.

“We are encouraging those who read the newspaper to enhance the service through subject tagging, text correcting and annotations,” explains Kiama Council’s Manager of Library Services, Michelle Hudson.

This is an amazing opportunity to add flesh to the records of the day, and seems like a great thing to keep you occupied over winter. Over 300 other newspapers are also available through Trove, so you can search further afield.

Noticeboard Roz gets a reinforcement Roz at the Salon on Tingira wants to thank people for their understanding during her recent illness. She’s worked hard building the business up on her own over the past year, and is very pleased to announce she is now being joined by another Ros on Thursdays through to Saturdays.

Aquaponics anyone?

Aquaponics is a sustainable food production system combining the raising of aquatic animals (fish, crustaceans, molluscs or snails) in tanks with growing plants hydroponically in a symbiotic relationship. You feed the fish, the fish feed the plants and then the plants and the fish feed you.

John Burgess, one of Australia’s most experienced aquaponisists (good luck saying that), is teaching a weekend workshop at Jamberoo Valley Farm later this month.

He is one of the few people who combines formal aquaponics accreditations, demonstrated commercial hydroponics experience and years of practical aquaponics systems installation and maintenance, so there isn’t much he doesn’t know.

Details: 20 & 21 July, Jamberoo Valley Farm Call Tass on 0412 861 586 or email tass@jamberooovalleyfarm.com.au to book a spot or find out more. Single day $195 per person; both days – $355 per person; includes food, tuition, course notes and more than a little inspiration. www.jamberoovalleyfarm.com.au

Get in quick for the sourdough Once we tasted Gary’s Slow Dough sourdough, we were hooked! As well as using it ourselves, we are selling it. Those of you who have bought it keep coming back for more.

Consensus is it’s the best they’ve ever tasted.

It comes in late Thurs afternoon, and is gone

by Friday. Orders taken. $6.5/loaf

This Ros is from South Africa, and has over 20 years’ experience (the last seven in Kiama).

The Salon is open Monday to Friday, and on Saturday morning. If it appears closed, check the door for a note, as she might have just popped up to see us. To make a booking, call 4232 3918 Note: Closed 8 & 9 July for a school holiday treat for Cameron.

Please note: While we try to get everything right, we are only human and cannot be held responsible for any errors or omissions.