As foreshadowed in Gusto on May 3, Jeremy Cariss has opened Bistro Felix in Subiaco after a massive renovation to transform the former Atlantic Restaurant into a contemporary establishment.
Bistro Felix offers diners an extensive wine list and a menu of modern Australian cuisine cooked up by former Harvest chef, Damien Young. The venue brings moody lighting reminiscent of Altos back to Subiaco. Bistro Felix, pictured above, also includes a private dining room at the back of the venue.
• • •
Passionate members of the Perth branch of global food organisation, Slow Food, are on a mission to save recipes in danger of extinction.
Slow Food Perth committee member Vincenzo Velletri is encouraging people from different cultural backgrounds to dig up their mother’s or grandmother’s recipes to help the organisation gather as many original family creations as possible for inclusion in a book showcasing the food and its origins.
“The food knowledge held by our parents, grandparents and their parents is part of Western Australia’s rich food heritage,” Mr Velletri says.
“But as we become a more homogeneous society, those ideas and methods our mothers and grandmothers used in their kitchens to feed their families tend to become diluted or vanish altogether.”
Slow Food Perth co-leader Pauline Tresise says many versions of original recipes are still used, however, there are many others in cookbooks put away in boxes and left unnoticed.
‘‘Western Australians have come from 170 countries across the globe,” she says.
‘‘When they arrived here they had to adapt time-honoured family recipes by using often quite different ingredients in what was to them a new country at the edge of the world.
‘‘As one generation raises another and we become more or less a seamless community, the cultural distinction from different countries can be weakened and often disappear.”
Slow Food Perth’s project is called Slow Food at the Edge of the World, and food lovers are encouraged to send recipes, along with how it was used in their country of origin, whose recipe it was, how it may have been adapted and whether it is still used in the family to info@slowfoodperth.org.au
