The
Good Life
Tweed River House reopening
How chefs helped
CLUB BYRON WANTS
CATERERS! Club Byron are looking for new caterers to take over our kitchen full time from 11 April 2022. Trading hours will be lunch 12–2pm, and dinner 5–8pm. Work with us and help both businesses grow. Negotiable rent. Email expressions of interest to info@clubbyron.com.au
With some welcome help from the ADF, and locals, Tweed River House is reopening. Simon Haslam If you’ve been to the elegant Tweed River House in Murwillumbah, you’ll know the restaurant sits right on the riverbank, in River Street in fact – right on the frontline of the recent floods. But three weeks later, after digging out three feet of mud from the lower storey, the restaurant is set to reopen. ‘This old house has survived many floods,’ says general manager Gregory Lording, ‘We were lucky that the house was raised, 20 years ago, above a big flood then, and although we were never worried it would get in
g n i r i H e r ’ We
We are looking for people across our floor, bar & kitchen departments to join our dynamic, enthusiastic & focused team in the heart of Byron Bay. - Competitive salary packages - Full time & part time positions available - Sponsorship opportunities available - Passionate management team - Great environment for training & upskilling - Great team culture - Fully air-conditioned, cool venue for summer - Apprenticeship/Traineeship opportunities
upstairs, it actually lapped at the river-facing balcony, and of course the water swept everything out from the storage downstairs. A 300kg ice chest just floated away. Like most of our neighbours, the entire lower storey of the house was flooded, causing property damage and loss of stock, but with the help of many volunteers, and the ADF, we have finally cleaned up.’ ‘We were caught by surprise, to tell you the truth – we were actually planning to open on Sunday as the forecast wasn’t that bad, and Murwillumbah wasn’t even going to be affected by flooding. But by 9am on Sunday we cancelled, mainly because we were worried about guests and staff driving to us, or not being able to get home. Then the situation got rapidly worse – by the time the SES advised us to evacuate at midnight, it was really too late, the water rose unexpectedly fast.’ The restaurant had an excellent wine cellar, and many fine wines were washed downstream, but unfortunately they won’t be as easy to locate as the time the beer truck fell into the river at Murwillumbah! Tweed River House is set to reopen on 1 April, and you can support them by rebooking. Tweed River House Ph 6672 5269 tweedriverhouse.com.au
To apply: email cover letter & CV to admin@loftbyronbay.com.au
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@loftbyronbay
16 The Byron Shire Echo lëſĈIJ ǩǪǽ ǩǧǩǩ
Two Northern Rivers’ chefs, assisted by a great team of local food businesses, raised over $170,000 from a GoFundMe which helped to deliver over 200,000 meals to communities cut off by floods. Pip Sumbak of Pip’s Plate and Wal Foster of Natural Icecream Australia responded as soon as they heard the news of those stranded; first by cooking at Bay Grocer in Byron Bay, and then at the Lion’s Club at Bangalow Moller Pavilion, utilising a refrigerated shipping container. As a group of small business owners with their combined skillset they were able to set up a food hub; all done through a message thread, which grew day-by-day with volunteers divided into groups for transport, chefs, producers, sandwich making, and runners. Soon, another team of volunteers at Byron’s Beach Hotel started taking care of the ordering of bulk goods for the restaurants, since produce, food and containers were hard to come by. Five days in and people still didn’t have a reliable phone service; they had no WiFi, or fuel, and no idea which roads
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Sandwiches. Photographer Mark Stevens
(02) 5605 8401 TUES - SAT 5 - 10
CORNER OR CARLYLE ST & KEESING, LA BYRON BAY
were safe to drive. Despite these challenges nearly every restaurant and chef in the Northern Rivers contributed their time and energy to the cause, including Three Blue Ducks, Bread Social, Bay Leaf, Fleet, Eltham Hotel, Paper Daisy, Frida’s Field, Barrio Eatery & Bar, The Diner Lennox, Harvest Newrybar, Salumi Australia, Lightyears and many more. People in cut-off areas were getting snippets of phone signal, and through social media discovered that Pip and Wal had hot meals and drinking water ready to go, and were calling them direct, in need of help – many people hadn’t eaten in days. Privately funded helicopters, boats, vans, jet skis, and community volunteer leaders got in touch and started distributing food to those stuck in the most remote areas and those on the roofs of houses… Now that the immediate crisis has passed, Pip and Wal are using the GoFundMe money to supply fresh food to community hubs in the Northern Rivers for those left homeless – see @pipsplate or @naturalicecreamaustralia.
Byron pizza icon for sale After 19 years, four locations and probably close to a million pizzas, Denise and David are ready to retire, and ready to welcome a new Earth ‘n’ Sea family to Byron to take the business into the future. Earth ‘n’ Sea Pizza has been part of the Byron Bay dining scene since 1976 – it would be hard to find any long-term local who hasn’t had a good night there, and since the restaurant only trades in the evening there is also the opportunity to create a new café in Marvell Street.
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