We're driving through the Riverina towards Canberra on a road trip showing
MJ the best lamb in the country.
The best lamb in the country? Big call!
So we're going from Griffith to Canberra. Through Jugiong, through Gundagai.
Gonna 'serve up' some lamb? Gonna serve up some lamb that's exactly right.
Local lamb tartare. The mayo is from the liquorice powder. I think we should dig in.
That lamb is so beautiful.
This is such an amazing spot in the middle of nowhere but it's right on the highway
between Sydney and Melbourne and you're right in between big centres like Wagga
and Canberra and even Young. So when we started three years ago we started with
about four in the kitchen we now have a crew of 13, it's grown immensely over
last few years. Big focus on local meats especially our lamb.
And Kate, it's your husband that grows the lamb?
Yeah, I think we've got some brand new season MeatPlus
We go through about 15 whole lambs a fortnight and we have
them broken down we use everything from neck through to shanks, prime cuts which
we do over charcoal. Then we do like lamb croquettes, braising, pressed shoulders for weddings,
lots of house-made smoked sausages.
Our lamb, Cooridoone lamb loin, has been sousvide, then we've got some veg from the
garden, broad beans, asparagus and house-made smoked lamb sausage with
a bit of cumin and garlic.
Day two. We're kicking off in Yass at Clementine restaurant. I've heard a lot about this
awesome restaurant. It's pretty cute.
Roasted Cootamundra lamb rump, some smoked potato puree, some broadbeans and some oregano.
Oregano, caper and lemon.
Basically slow-cooked whole shank for six hours, then we break it off the bone,
chill it down, thicken the sauce up, then it goes into the pie from there.
So we try and use local when we can.
We bake it off for 12 minutes and then it's ready to eat.
Gourmet style pie but still your Aussie meat pie.
I don't think there's anything better than a pie and a beer.
We're a sheep and cattle farm, 7,000 acre sheep and cattle farm mainly dealing
with meat and we've also opened up the farm as a tourism opportunity as well.
Sort of decided that we'd start running weddings and some accommodation onsite, built
a couple of eco lodges, we've renovated some shearers quarters that we're at today.
And Luke's going to cook us some lamb tonight, some of your lamb?
Yes, yeah I'm looking forward to seeing what Luke can do with it.
The great thing about lamb, or cured lamb, is that you never have a tough one.
We have cured it in a brine for about 12 hours and we've then hot smoked it.
So you can serve them like little heavy-duty finger food. We always have it
on our menu here, it's one of our signature items, simply delicious.
I think for photographic purposes you ought to keep on trying it.
I'm happy with that.
The lamb ribs are from Lost River, super local. We've braised them in a masterstock,
back in the oven. And they're going for like a san choy bow, just really using your hands as mush as possible.
Looks great. San choy bow lamb ribs, sticky plumb glaze.
So wrapping up in the nation's capital. It's been a an awesome few days. I've
just loved seeing how much is going into regional food at the moment it's really
inspiring to see the quality and just the yeah the investment in regional
areas in food is amazing. Just showcasing what they have and each
little area just had something a little bit unique and a little bit different.
It's been really diverse and delicious. Can we do it again next week?
Yeah we probably can.