Celebrity chef Lyndey Milan’s guide to hosting an Australia Day barbecue
Celebrity chef and Australia Day ambassador Lyndey Milan shares her love of Australian cuisine and gives her top tips to hosting a barbecue.
Celebrating our country’s food goes well beyond meat pies and lamingtons for Lyndey Milan.
The celebrity chef, author and tour host says Australia has an extraordinarily diverse cuisine to enjoy thanks to the vast array of fresh produce we have access to and our multicultural society.
“I try to always buy Australian produce and I don’t buy things out of season,” she says. “There are a lot of native spices to try — wattleseed is really lovely and finger limes are like lime caviar. You just put them on oysters — extraordinary.”
Milan has been named as an Australia Day ambassador for the 17th time.
And while she is an advocate for exploring our native produce, her advice for anyone hosting a get together to celebrate our national day is to keep the cooking within your comfort zone.
“It’s about enjoying your friends and family so just do something simple and get people to help,” she says.
“A barbecue keeps it out of the kitchen, which with the weather we are having now is a really good idea.”
Milan says the common habit of constantly moving the meat around is especially important to avoid when barbecuing.
“The blokes like to stand at the barbecue with a beer turning the meat over and over again to look like they are doing something but it’s about the worst thing that you can do,” she says.
It’s also a good idea to keep the temperature in mind when planning the dessert, which Milan recommends making in advance.
“You don’t want to be making pastry on a hot day,” she says. “Just be a bit careful of anything that’s going to melt or spoil.”
BBQ PRIME RIB OF BEEF WITH BABY BEAN, CORN AND SWEET PEPPER SALAD
Serves: 2
Preparation: 10 minutes
Cooking: 10 minutes plus 5-10 minutes resting
Ingredients
1 beef rib eye steak (approx. 600g)
2 tsp ground native pepper
2/3 tsp ground wattleseed
2 tsp sea salt flakes
1 Tbsp (20ml) olive oil
Salad
125g baby beans, tailed
1 cob corn, boiled until tender in salted water
1 long green pepper, cut into long, thin strips
1 long yellow banana pepper, cut into long thin strips
125g baby Roma tomatoes, halved
½ tsp sumac (optional)
Vinaigrette
½ Tbsp (10ml) lime juice
2/3 tsp dried lemon myrtle
2 Tbsp (40ml) extra virgin olive oil
Salt flakes and freshly ground black pepper
Method
1. Pre-heat BBQ to high. Brush beef with 1 tablespoon olive oil then rub in
combined spices. Cook for 5 minutes or until brown and crusted on one side.
Turn once only, cover with BBQ lid or foil and cook on the other side for another
5 minutes until brown, crusted and cooked as desired. Remove to a warm plate,
cover loosely with foil and rest for 5-10 minutes.
2. Meanwhile whisk together vinaigrette ingredients or shake in a jar.
3. Place all salad ingredients except the sumac in a bowl and toss together with
vinaigrette. Place in a pile in the centre of two plates. Carve the meat off the
bone and then slice downwards to make thin slices. Fan around the salad pile,
sprinkle with sumac and serve immediately.
* Recipe by Lyndey Milan.
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