A Global Gathering

As part of this year's Melbourne Food and Wine festival.

A Global Gathering is all out foodie event which is spread out all over Bridge Road. From free food to $5-$10 tasting plates there is something to please everyone. Even the pickiest of eaters. There was free face painting for the kids.

My four stamps

Free popcorn

Free face painting

It is only a short tram ride away from the city. At the Information hubs we collected our passports and stamp form and off we went. If you got four stamps like we did then you would be in the running to win a SMEG kitchen pack from Harvey Norman, which leads us to our first stop for free food.

1) Harvey Norman
Harvey Norman offered free chippolatas and tastings of their stir fry. We couldn't stay long but they did offer free cooking classes and the bake off at 12pm.

I really loved that sweetness in the stir fry and the onions. The sales rep from SMEG said it was 4 mins to make the stir fry and it worked a treat.

The stir fry for everyone

2) Three One 2 One café

The entrance

Salt and sugar

This place was just literally across the road from Harvey Norman, but due to the heavy traffic it was hard to cross. Maybe they should have closed off that whole road and then have lots of roadside stalls.

The café is pretty homely and they make their own jams and have about 21 varieties of sauces for people to peruse on their dishes. I had the mushroom arachini which had that subtle taste of mushrooms and it was not too overpowering. I also loved having the chilli jam on the second ball= yum

3) Bouzy Rouge and their salt cod ball ($2)
What attracted us to this place was the paella and the look of the balls. It was on the way to Osteria. The balls were full of flavour and many people got attracted to the paella. The paella smelt good but we had to leave room for other things.

Wine lis

The cod ball tasted like cod and cheese, match made in heaven.

4) Osteria la Passione 

This café is just a few blocks away from three two one and here we had the cold meat plate for $5. It was $10 just to add the drink as well. We loved the cold meat platter as it was yum and the meats were very fresh. I think it was lamb. We also enjoyed the baked bread and the balsamic vegetables which were drizzled on top of the meat.

Before going in we tried their extra virgin olive oil samplings and bread and gosh it was sooo strong.

This café was very homely, it reminded us of regional Italy and we loved the products on display.

Before we got to number 5 we checked out all the BBQ displays with Gypsey and Mosquito barbequing wallaby and Big Boy's special of $7 for their special chips.

We also checked out Slowpoke's free masterclass.

5) Laikon Deli
This place has been going strong for almost forty years and they sell heaps of fresh Greek food in which you can take home or eat outside.

We got the cone and loved the olives and the freshness of the salad. Yum! I say. And the man that served us was very friendly.

By then the street was getting busier. Oh well only one more stop.

BBQ at Gypsey and Mosquito

6) The Groove Train

This is the last stop and I was really disappointed with my eggplant chips. Although nice it was a little bit bland and it took waaay longer than I had expected. The service was very slow for a not so crowded place. I had always wanted to give this place a go.

I had expected stellar chips as that is what I got everytime I had been to the other Groove trains. But these ones were not even crunchy.

That Sugar Film

As part of Bupa's best blog for 2015

Is having too much sugar that bad for you? How much sugar should you be having in a day? We find out the truth about these dangers when we saw that Sugar Film

That Sugar film is a documentary about this guy (Damon's) real life in suburbia Melbourne. It explores the side effects that having too much sugar can have on you as a person. Damon was on a no sugar diet until September last year and then he went on this experiment for two months where he ate things that had sugar in them. He ate things like cereal which has about 4 teaspoons of sugar, low fat yoghurt which had about 3 teaspoons of sugar and apple juice which has heaps of sugar. He had to have 40 teaspoons of sugar per day. Equivalent to an Australian diet of that.

Many processed foods contain sugar. Did you know that Lipton Iced tea contains 35g of sugar in there? Also Gatorade has 50 grams of sugar per bottle.

He puts on lots of weight (about 8 kgs) and puts on 10 cm of visceral fat around his stomach. That fat is really hard to remove. Even I hare troubles removing that fat. Damon also started experiencing the mood swings as well and found it hard to concentrate as his body constantly craved sugar. When I had too much sugar in winter I also experienced many mood swings.  On day 45 he started developing lots and lots of pimples. Damon lost the focus to exercise in the US. The US has this huge sugar obsession where many people are obese.

The aftermath
The experiment was well worth it and a month after it had finish Damon lost the weight and he was happier.

What did we take from it?
An average person should have 6-9 teaspoons of sugar a day and no more. The average iced tea has 8 teaspoons of sugar. Fruits have natural sugar.

Last year the sugar industry spent $50 billion in advertising alone and they earned a fair bit of money from unwary consumers. Next time when you are in the supermarket do read the labels as 4 grams of sugar is equal to one teaspoon of it. They put all the sugary stuff in the middle so that people can just buy it.

Moderation is the key to having a good diet.

If you eat lots and lots of calories and not much exercise you will put on weight and damage your liver kidneys. This will in turn lead to problems like obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart attack.

Pearson's and other language tests to be accepted by Universities

 Students here is some good news about English tests. Do read on

Test: Image courtesy of washingtonpost.com

 

As of now the DIBP (Department of Border Protection) has announced that Pearson's among other tests will be accepted as part of student visa and uni applications.  Hence this will make it a lot easier for students to apply for courses this year and for years to come.

This was in response to the Knight review in 2011.

This change has affected all visa applications including student ones and is a good move both for universities financially and for students as well for their ease of mind.

It is also a good move for Australia as they earn about $15 billion per year from International students alone. This will be in line with the Uk and US universities which are already accepting other tests other than IELTS.

Best chai in melbourne

As part of Bupa's best blog competition for 2015

Chai is a milky Indian sweet tea. Although this is found in India it is not so common in Melbourne.

Here are some places that do good chai teas
Journal- Here they have the biggest Chai to date for $4.
Realfoods- they do a great chai.
The original Chai stall also does such teas.
Many of the Organic places do great chais as well.

Or you can make your own at home
Here's how (the recipe is from food.com, btw)

Ingredients:

Yield:

2-3

Units: US | Metric

• 4 whole cloves
• 2 cardamom pods
• 1 cinnamon stick, broken into pieces
• 3 cups water
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/8 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons black tea (decaf is best)

Directions:

1. 1
   In a mortar, crush the cloves, cardamom pods and cinnamon, or use a coffee grinder.
2. 2
   Transfer the crushed spices to a small saucepan, add the water, ginger and pepper and bring to a boil.
3. 3
   Remove the pan from the heat, cover and let steep for 5 minutes.
4. 4
   Add the milk and sugar to the pan and bring to a boil.
5. 5
   Remove from the heat and add the tea.
6. 6
   Cover and let steep for 3 minutes.
7. 7
   Stir the chai, then strain it into a warmed teapot or directly into teacups.
8. 8
   Enjoy!

Australia is racist towards us- stories by women

In recent months in 2014, the Australian Government has wrongly blamed the Islamic community which has lead to increased incidences of racism, some which involve International students in Melbourne. We provide three stories from International students.

Lady no 1
No one will sit next to me on the tram because I am wearing a hijab

I am a Muslim woman who lives out west nearby a tramline. I go on the tram everyday to uni. Because I am wearing the hijab, not one local would sit next to me on the tram. In fact they all run away or prefer to stand. They are scared that I will bite. Truth is, I don't bite.

I get attacked late at night

Lady no 2
I am a Postgraduate student who studies late at night. Like the first story I also wear the hijab (head covering). I live in Dandenong (Dandenong is about a 30-40 minute train ride) and the Pakenham/Cranbourne line is full of junkies at night. My house is about ten minutes walk away from the station and I don't have a car (or anyone to pick me up late at night).

So one night I was walking home from the station and a group of thugs punched me. Another time someone shouted abuse at me. Another time I was robbed.

I am scared as I am telling you this but I can't afford to live anywhere else.

I was called names

Lady no 3
I am from Middle East and I live in St Albans next to a white Australian neighbor who keeps on calling me names.

I was called a pig once. And then I was called a slut. And then my niehgbour shouted: "Go back to where you came from". I reported it to the police but they were no help.

Don't get me wrong Melbourne is a nice place to study. But some people are racist towards us.

Perhaps there might be a resolution?
In the new year the RNIS bloggers hope that the Government will intervene to stop this racism and harsher penalties for such things. If the racism stops then Melbourne might be a bit more attractive for International students. Melbourne might be in the first place.

Meanwhile the RNIS bloggers are welcoming of everyone no matter where they come from. We call for harmony and tolerance towards everybody. And we are concerned about the Governments action to combat domestic terrorism