Food .&Drink
Eat out, drink up
Side dishes
An extra helping of news . . .
Sk' f' I / ippy I ets
Cook me kangaroo up, sport Words: Barry Shelby
alkabout, the Sprawling Australian theme bar.
has arrived in town and Skippy is on the menu.
There it sits. inconspicuously between New Zealand lamb steak and the rib eye: kangaroo fillet with authentic western desert seasoning. $6.50.
To the chain pub's credit. Walkabout PR hasn't really hyped the hopping marsupial (nor the crocodile tails. which apparently sold out in the bar's first weekend of business). Leave that to news media hungry for a sensahon.
Notwithstanding the novelty. however. overall Australian kangaroo meat sales were expected to increase 20% last I year in Europe thanks to the difficulties with our more .31.. traditional livestock. So don’t rue the 'roo. According to the Overseas Game Meat Export company. based in Nerang on Queensland's Gold Coast. it has about a third less calories and one-tenth the fat of lean grilled beef.
Still, how is it. you ask? Tasty. if you fanCy red meat. Comparisons to venison seem fair enough as the flesh has a coarser grain than beef. Although not nearly as gamey as deer, kangaroo. because of its similarly low-fat content. is best prepared rare. which is how the staff at WalkabOuI advise Customers to order it (curiously. it does not seem to bleed as much as y0ur average bovine cut).
Walkabout's reCipe includes a marinade of dusky. peppery spices contributing to the barbecued. char-grilled flavours. The portion is more than ample: what seemed like a half pound of meat is served With a pile of seasoned ,. chips lnot hand cut) and Side salad. Chased with a bottle of Crown Lager. your appetite is certainly sated.
I Walkabout. 7 l Renfrew Street. Glasgow, 0747 332 8209
I FOUR EDINBURGH AND two Glasgow restaurants are participating in an ‘Eat Out For Amnesty’ fund-raiser for the human rights organisation Amnesty International. On Thursday 7 February Iggs, Gulnar’s Passage To India, Pizza Express (Stockbridge) and Wok Bar in the capital - plus Nairn’s and Creme de la Creme in Glasgow - will donate £5 per head for each party that books in advance, quoting ‘Eat Out For Amnesty’. The Scotland-wide event aims to raise £3,500.
I HOWIES. EDINBURGH’S home-grown group of restaurants, has renamed and revamped the branch at 63 Dalry Road. New specialising in char- grill. the restaurant has been christened the Flaming Red Dining Room. The menu features steak and fish as well as vegetarian options.
I THE NEW MICHELIN RED Guide, with its coveted star awards, produced no real surprises locally, and one slight embarrassment. Gordon Ramsay’s Amaryllis in Glasgow received a new star, but the former occupant here (the esteemed One Devonshire Gardens) had one Invented 1902 in Burton-on-Trent. Yup, it's 100 years old. Although if we're being strictly previously and Ramsay‘s accurate. from 1680 onwards scientists were investigating the properties of brewer's yeast. restaurants down south
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