Worldly Delights
Tasting Queensland: Creative cuisine in a surfer’s paradise By Cinda Chavich
Wild, indigenous ingredients and organic farm-to-table menus are bringing savvy diners to Australia’s Queensland coast, for tasty explorations beyond the beach.
CHEF MATT SINCLAIR’S GLAZED KOBE ORGANIC BEEF, SESAME AND LOCAL GINGER CREAM, PEA LEAVES AND ROASTED RICE
BEACH BIOSPHERE It’s both the laid-back, family lifestyle and local bounty that lured celebrity chef Matt Sinclair from the big city to a beach town along Australia’s Sunshine Coast. “Chefs who have young families have had a big influence on the emerging food culture in Queensland,” the MasterChef Australia contender tells me, serving up South Asian-inspired specialties at his Sum Yum Guys restaurant in Sunshine Beach. “The Sunshine Coast is not the hustle and bustle of the city but it’s the whole package. People are food-obsessed up here — the spotlight is starting to shift away from the larger centres.”
68 • Vacations ® • Winter 2019
Sinclair combines local ingredients with Thai, Malaysian and Korean flavours. His grilled “toasty” starter is filled with lemongrass-scented spanner crab salad, the charred kabob of organic Australian Kobe beef short rib is served with roasted rice and sesame cream, and there’s red curry sauce and Thai basil alongside the lightly smoked Moolooaba mackerel. Noosa, the biggest beach town here next to the national park in a protected biosphere, is a place to surf, stroll the rainforest walkways and spy tropical birds and even elusive koalas. It hosts the annual Noosa Food & Wine Festival, one of the country’s top food events with visiting chefs and local producers celebrating the coastal bounty.
