We have been in Lockdown here in Canberra for nearly six weeks’ and will continue for another three weeks’ until 15 October; well hopefully that will be our end date! So whilst I can’t leave the ACT or travel very far from my home, I have been looking at old photos of places I have been lucky enough to visit. One place is a lovely little country town called Jugiong which is located on the banks of the Murrumbidgee River about an hour and half drive from Canberra. The drive is mainly highway but once you veer off towards Jugiong, there are lovely homes and interesting sculptures on the road.
Such a gorgeous little township which has a population of around 150 people. I think its major draw card is The Sir George hotel which is the main reason we visited. We had booked lunch but had left Canberra early so that I could take a walk around the town; must say this only took about half an hour but the shops were really sweet with lots to buy.
Our first stop was the Long Track Jam Factory, a lovely little store that sold…well jams…but also a range of condiments, tea towels and kitchen utensils. I love raspberry jam so bought a jar along with a few other condiments because you can never have enough condiments!
Our next stop was the Long Track Cafe & Pantry followed by the Lickety Splits Gelato Bar. Whilst I didn’t buy anything from the gelato bar, I certainly did buy a few items from the pantry including chocolates for friends and a few household items for myself.
It was then time for lunch. Our walk only took us two minutes but arriving at this beautifully restored hotel was something wonderful. We took a quick walk around the grounds and smelt the purple wisteria and checked out the barns which are available to stay overnight.
We ate lunch inside the restored 1852 stone pub as the courtyard was already booked. But I wasn’t disappointed as the interior was so lovely. We started off with a bottle of bubbles and I ordered a medley of vegetables and the boys ordered a haloumi burger which came with thick chips and a salmon dish with a pesto dressing and vegetables.
After our lunch we walked a little more around the grounds where we met a few of the resident goats and enjoyed fabulous views of the local countryside.
Once we had spent enough time walking the grounds our last stop was the Jugiong Wine Cellar which sells great local wines. My friends bought some sparkling as had previously tasted and loved.
Then it was time to drive home…a great afternoon visiting local areas and being able to contribute to the local community is great as well as spending time with my dear friends Wayne and Jef.
About a half hour drive north from my home in Canberra is a lovely old town called Gunning which is located in the Southern Tablelands of New South Wales. The town has a population of just over 600 people and located inside the historic and refurbished 1865 Royal Hotel is a lovely restaurant called Grazing. The restaurant serves decent size portions of food, made with fresh seasonal organic and local ingredients along with an extensive list of Canberra District wines.
It’s a lovely drive to the township through country farms and bushland. We arrived a little early and took the opportunity to walk along the main street and pop into a couple of stores. Then it was time for eating (yay)…we were seated in the main part of the restaurant; there are smaller more private rooms but usually for more than six or so people.
The meals were as good as they were on my previous visit. We started off with a salmon pate on crisp bread which I declined but my friends thoroughly enjoyed. 
I ordered a risotto which the chef was happy to make vegan. It arrived with Jerusalem artichoke and greens; beautifully presented and delicious. One of my friends ordered the original risotto made with braised lentils, Wagu beef cheek, Jerusalem artichoke, chestnut and truffle dressing.
Also ordered was the Barramundi which was oven roasted and came with curried celeriac and crab crust, buttered cabbage and fennel velouté. And we shared the baked eggplant with miso glaze, blackened Baba Ghanoush, sesame and labneh. Again I must say all the meals were beautifully presented.
We also ordered a couple of other dishes but looking at them now I genuinely cannot remember what they are well apart from the Brussel sprout dish; guess it’s such a long time ago and the dishes are not still on the Grazing on-line menu.
Gunning is a lovely little town to visit and Grazing is especially worth a visit with good friends.
I travelled by plane to Brisbane with a short stop-over in Sydney and took the two hour shuttle to Noosa. Initially my friends and I were going to meet at Brisbane Airport and hire two cars to drive to Noosa. But…my friends were unfortunately stuck in Canberra Airport for seven hours due to an issue with their plane. They didn’t arrive in Noosa until just after midnight so luckily there was a shuttle to drop me off right outside my accomodation!!
I decided to go for a walk to familiarise myself with the area and walked to the main shopping street which took about thirty-minutes. It was lovely how lush and green the vegetation was along the way. When I returned to the resort, my friend Mandy and her partner came over for a glass of wine before I retired to my room for an early night.
Early the next morning I did the same walk down to the beach and then met up with Mandy for breakfast at a cafe overlooking the beach called Bistro C. 
Lots of people out and about swimming or surfing or just relaxing like us enjoying breakfast.
It turned out that this was not the only time I was to eat at Bistro C. One of the girls who had arrived late from Canberra messaged me to say that a birthday lunch had been organised that day for Mandy and it was at Bistro C!!
I decided to take the shuttle bus back to the resort as I was a bit weary after my walks…and a couple of hours later, it was time to return to Bistro C for lunch. One of the girls and I chose the roasted beetroot, feta and legume salad with fig, spiced pumpkin, radish, pomegranate and pea hummus. I opted for no cheese and mayonnaise and it really was absolutely delicious. Coupled with a glass of champagne it was a great way to spend a couple of hours!!
Now I know there are many wonderful restaurants in Noosa but I had seen something else delicious on the menu. The next day I walked back into town and stopped off for lunch at Bistro C...the dish I wanted to try was the fried shiitake mushroom, water chestnut and spinach dumplings with Sichuan eggplant, sesame broccoli, snow peas, green onion and ginger broth. Unfortunately I was very disappointed with this dish. The dumplings tasted like they had been sitting around for a while and there was no Sichuan eggplant or ginger broth on the dish.
At the time of our visit the Noosa Food and Wine Festival was on so we had tickets for a four course dinner at Peppers Resort with a few guest Aussie chefs. Matt Moran whose restaurant is Aria overlooking Sydney Harbour and Matt Preston from Australian Masterchef were two I saw and had photos with. Nice to spend time with the girls but the vegan food was incredibly disappointing; so much I didn’t even stay for dessert!
The views over the swimming pools, beach and ocean were beautiful…
We walked down towards the beachfront to the restaurant and because we were so keen we had arrived about fifteen minutes too early. We waited [hungrily] in the shade and soon were seated at a round table near the window.
Our waiter informed us we could eat from the buffet and we could also order anything from the menu – all included in the one cost ($100 AUD). And of course we could order any drink we wanted…
I stuck with my usual sauvignon blanc and the other girls ordered espresso martinis, the resort’s signature cocktail and mojitos.
There was a roast station, hot quiches, pizza, pasta with a large array of sauces and Asian food including all sorts of hand made noodles. I saw more bread and cheeses than I think I have ever seen. My photos absolutely do not show how incredible the food was unfortunately and I didn’t take photos of all stations.
I had become a vegan two months prior so there was so much food I could not eat. But there was so much I could. Tempura/lovely breads/amazing salads/warm vegetables/pasta/noodles just to name a few. I did order an open falafel burger from the menu which was very nice.
Then it came to the dessert area – oh my goodness! Anything you wanted was there and like the entrees and main meals you could also order from the menu. My friends ordered one dessert which was a chocolate ball which when arrived, hot chocolate was poured over. The outer layer of chocolate then melted onto the plate and inside was more chocolate; mousse – incredible! 
And this chocolate cake looked incredible and the chocolate fountain was a hit with the girls, well with all other diners really.
As we were eating dessert (I enjoyed some sorbet), the waiter came around with warm doughnuts and a hot chocolate sauce for those who wanted them…
By this stage we had been at the resort for about four hours and eaten our weight in food…time to say goodbye – what a day!
A couple of weekends ago, I travelled about two hours from Canberra to the south coast of New South Wales to stay with friends Sharon and Brenden. I hadn’t seen these friends for some time so with my little dog Axel we set off around lunch time on a Friday and stayed until mid morning Sunday. Driving along their street is wonderful as there are many kangaroos that come to the front lawns of homes to eat every afternoon and early morning.
We arrived at St. Isidore and wow what a place. A casual feel inside, tables presented nicely and lovely views of the gardens from all windows.
The grounds really are gorgeous, service is great and food very good. We were seated at our table by a very friendly waiter and I took a walk around the grounds to take some photos.
We ordered our drinks and took a look at the menu. I had already checked out the dishes on-line as wanted to make sure there were vegan options; there were!
I ate very healthily. I ordered a pasta dish with broad beans and an olive oil dressing for entree and a tofu and vegetable dish for my main course. My main had grilled eggplant and I love eggplant but definitely not grilled so that was left in the bowl.
My friends ordered an array of dishes which they said were all delicious.
All in all it was a very lovely evening…
I had read about the Chinese restaurant at the Canberra Casino which had very good reviews but had not particulary wanted to go there as it was located inside the casino and guess I didn’t think it would have great ambience being next to gambling tables. But… recently I read another review at the beginning of Chinese New Year (gong xi fa cai to my Chinese friends) which again mentioned how good the food is…so knew I had to go especially over CNY.
We were the only people in the restaurant which had lovely Chinese lanterns all throughout and was served by a beautiful girl who was born in Japan and moved to Australia to be with her partner; an Aussie boy – lovely chatting to her I must say.
I am not sure where the name Natural Nine comes from but all the colourful paper place mats have the Chinese character for the numeral nine on them and also the same character is on the walls. They all look fabulous.
The menu is extensive and great for vegetarians and I think that is why we ordered so much food. 
First up we ordered the steamed mushroom and water chestnut dumplings with black garlic dressing and as Jon loves spicy food and chicken wings he ordered the Sichuan pepper and lime chicken wings. Both dishes arrived pretty quickly which made me think they are part made and heated up when ordered but my dumplings were still very good and Jon said the wings were extremely tasty.
Our next dishes were the sweet and sour plum eggplant with handmade egg tofu – best dish ever!!! I loved it. This came served with a bowl of steamed rice but as we had ordered another rice dish we did not touch it.
We also shared a bowl of exotic mushroom and burnt onion wild fried rice; so delicious and such a big bowl, so we only were able to eat about half. Shame we were so full as it really was very good.
This restaurant is well worth visiting; such good food. After lunch we head to the Casino and watched a few people start with a huge pile of chips and end up with none!! I guess that is why I never gamble!!
When I spoke to the waitress, I had mentioned that the paper place mats were fabulous, so when we went to pay she gave me two to take home…very kind!!
You know when you have heard and read about a particular place and you feel you really need to visit there?? Well the place I had heard about and wanted to visit was the restaurant at Canberra’s Botanic Gardens.
The restaurant is open for breakfast and lunch and I recall thinking the breakfast menu looked a little better than the luncheon menu; more choice! But funnily enough I just took a look on-line to see the menu [to remind myself what we ate] and the luncheon menu looks better than when we visited. So perhaps another visit after a stroll around the gardens.
We sat inside but had lovely views of the rainforest area outside. Inside is really quite lovely too; rather old fashioned which is very sweet.
I think I would probably call this more a cafe than a restaurant as you receive your menu but have to order at the counter. Meals and drinks are brought over to you though by the waitress which is so much better than those cafes where they call out your number and you have to return to the counter to pick up your meal.
My friend Jane’s husband Paul ordered a burger from memory which I forgot to photograph and Jane had the salmon nicoise salad which was a huge plate of salmon with sugar snap peas, sweet potato, olives, a poached egg with cherry tomatoes and Spanish onion then with a drizzle of green goddess dressing! As you can see pretty big meals for a Sunday lunch…
It’s a lovely little cafe and nice for a casual breakfast or lunch and must say the flower display near the front door was stunning!!
Today I also thought I would also introduce my beautiful little rescue dogs Axel and Bindi, who have lived together since they were born. I bought them from a rescue organisation about six weeks ago and we have fallen in love with each other. They are so [so] sweet and really quick learners.
Axel has a very funny little smile with crooked teeth, which he likes to display and sit up when he is allowed on the lounge (after the blanket is put down of course)…
And Bindi has had a nice hair cut for twice daily summer walks.
At the beginning of this month, my friend Jon and I went to lunch at a restaurant I had not been to. Other friends had been and recommended it for breakfast but we thought we would try its lunch menu. The restaurant is located at the National Arboretum and features ninety-four forests of rare, endangered and symbolic trees from around Australia and the world as well as a cafe and restaurant. 
The Arboretum’s website says that many of the trees are still young but two of the forests are nearly one-hundred years old. Over 44,000 trees from over 100 countries are growing across the 250 hectare site, making it one of the world’s largest living collections of rare, endangered and significant trees. (I did not know that!)
Prior to the early 2000 Canberra bushfires, the Arboretum site was mostly covered in pine plantations and after those fires the local government consulted extensively with the community and experts about the best use of the large areas of land occupied by burnt-out pine plantations resulting in the Arboretum…
Both the cafe and restaurant are located inside the main building and we had booked the restaurant which has wonderful views of the local area and parts of Lake Burley Griffin.
The restaurant is very much open plan and has a small menu which did come along with a specials page. We decided on sharing some thick sourdough bread and butter and my staple; a bowl of fries – must say these were delicious so I probably ate too many.
Jon decided to order from the specials page. He had the chargrilled lamb backstop on a mushroom risotto with a lemon thyme jus followed by Eton mess with brown sugar meringue, whipped coconut and raspberry compote. Both dishes looked really good and Jon said they were very tasty- he hadn’t tried Eton mess before so enjoyed something new.
I chose from the regular menu and was a touch disappointed; actually rather disappointed! I chose the vegan tasting platter and I thought I would see a plate with all different types of vegan bites, but it was nothing like that – it really was just a large plate of vegetables with a little bit of tomato salsa on top. I mean I enjoyed the snow peas and fennel and the broccolini but must say it was a little tasteless. Anyway I ate about half of the vegetables and some more fries!!
About half way through our meal, a group arrived for High Tea which when served looked great, so I think if I had any visitors to Canberra I would return for the High Tea rather than the restaurant meals.
Sue's Fabulous Travels 
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