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Travellers' Tales
Over a weekend of brunching with various friends,
friends of friends and business associates, we were treated
to travellers’ tales from the ridiculously sublime to the
sublimely ridiculous.
A couple recently returned from OS had stopped over in Abu Dhabi to see friends.
Apart from the blast-furnace-like heat, the fabulous
designer shopping and the fascinating classified ads in the
local press ... Porsche Carrera, new, $80,000 – unwanted
gift ...they were very taken by the 7-star Emirates
Palace Hotel Not that they stayed there –
just dropped by for a sticky and a cappuccino. The tab for
four? AUD$80. It just may have been
because, instead of the usual powdered chocolate on top,
these cappuccini came sprinkled with shreds of (ahem) 24
carat gold! Presumably this was at the Al
Majlis and Caviar Bar, which also offers specialties ‘from
gold-drizzled chocolates to tantalising teas’.
The same hotel offers
The Palace Brunch, where the Curée (sic) Josephine Perrier
1995 Champagne flows freely and the nosh includes
goose liver pate, oysters, lobster and other delicacies from
all over the world. At a mere AUD$120 a head, it’s a steal.
Rooms at the Emirates Palace start at around $465 a double with
their summer special rate, while suites start at around
$2000.
So much for the
sublime. Now for the ridiculous. A friend and colleague had
flown from Sydney to Canberra on the Qantas Saturday 8.45 service.
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We were meeting for
brunch, so he wasn’t looking for a hearty airline breakfast.
However, the solitary chocolate-chip cookie that turned up
seemed an odd offering at that early hour.
Things went from bad to worse, however. On checking the
use-by date on the packaging, he discovered said cookie
should have been consumed by June ’06! He craned his neck,
unsuccessfully trying to spot the date on the packaging his
neighbour had discarded. However, since the poor chap had
already consumed the biscuit, our friend opted for silence,
rather than cause alarm.
Open letter to Neil Perry:
Dear Neil,
I know your Melbourne restaurant has just been awarded a
gong by Gourmet Traveller Magazine. Possibly the strain of
getting this venture up to award-winning standard has
temporarily distracted you from your duties as the culinary
capo at Qantas.
I realise you don’t actually bake the cookies served in
economy class with your own hands, and the breakfast in
business class may well have been superb. However, as the
Person With Whom The Buck Stops, perhaps you should think
twice about lending your name to an organisation that
considers a chocolate cookie more than 12 months past its
use-by date as appropriate breakfast fare for the poor
buggers in steerage.
Kind regards….etc.
Jan O'Connell 28 August 07
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