The crime writer and the (food) crime
Investigating the cheese roll burger
He opened the door like a man expecting trouble. ‘Oh aye’ he says as I catch myself in the reflection of his transition glasses...
A couple of hours before I pull up outside Liam McIlvanney’s house in Dunedin’s Māori Hill, I sent him a message.
‘Hey! Cheese roll burger. Road trip. You and me. Work paying for it. Keen?’
‘Well who could resist,’ the author of The Quaker and The Heretic, replied.
Soon we were sitting outside at the Blueskin Nurseries’ cafe on Friday morning.
Liam had ordered the cheese roll burger, preferring water to a drink. I ordered a gourmet cheese roll, and a flat white. Medium.
We chatted about shared interests: football, crime and Scotland. Convivial.
By the time I had my coffee our order had arrived, with all eyes fixated on the latest addition to the menu: The Cheese Roll Burger.
Here is the blurb:
The ultimate cheese roll and beef burger hybrid, that takes this southern classic somewhere deliciously new! Blueskin Nurseries Cafe has refashioned the traditional cheese roll; having two of them step in for the bun in a delicious beef burger. Sandwiched between two cheese rolls you’ll enjoy a luscious, housemade beef patty and fresh lettuce, finished with the one, two flavour combo of tomato relish and aioli. You have to savour this 2022 take on a southern classic! $26.90
Challenge accepted.
First impression for Liam was all positive:
“It is aesthetically very pleasing.”
“It feels like a shame to actually dismantle it and eat the thing.”
He initially couldn’t envisage what a cheese roll burger was going to look like, and decided to tackle the menu with hands first, and then moved to a knife and fork.
McIlvanney said his first close encounter with a southern cheese roll was at Dunedin’s Glenfalloch Gardens, where he had to ask when the ordered item was coming.
Back in his native Scotland, a cheese roll was simply cheese inside a roll or bap.
“Job done . . . that’s a cheese roll.”
McIlvanney was surprised when the toasted Dunedin version emerged:
“That’s when I thought ‘we are not in Kansas anymore.’”
That was somewhat of a deep south epiphany for Liam, “who has kept it up”.
One of his favourite Dunedin things was to have a cheese roll and hot chocolate by the fire at a cafe, while his children played football at Sunnyvale.
That is relatable content.
But the cheese roll burger was not top of his favourite list of southern things, McIlvanney said.
“Slightly disappointing, I would have to say.”
While the burger was nice, the same could not be said for the cheese rolls, which had become somewhat soggy.
“They might need a bit of a rethink there, some way to retain the necessary crispness in the cheese roll.”
“It kinds of defeats the purpose of a cheese roll.”
Liam’s review aside, I’m sure the cafe will do a roaring trade.
The burger was part of Dine Dunedin’s burger competition, and you can read about that here.
I used to love playing and watching rugby. That was (gulp) a long time. In recent years I prefer to watch my kids play sport, than watch the Highlanders or All Blacks play.
Professional rugby seems to have morphed into a yesteryear version of rugby league, but crucially hasn’t taken the fans with it. I think I’d rather watch school rugby, than NPC (now sponsored by Bunnings rather than Mitre 10), than Super Rugby or the All Blacks.
The more professional, the less interesting the sport has become.
It’ll change, I’m sure, but rugby needs to look at other sports.
One of those is basketball. The popularity of the sport has exploded in recent years. Well done to the city council for their new courts all around the city (Mornington next, please).
Also our own Steven Adams just featured in the top assist of the year in the NBA.
Is there anything more Kiwi than casually folding your arms behind your back in the middle of a game? Love it.
My interest in basketball continues to grow, my boys both play it, I watch NBA, and I’ve attended home games involving the Otago Nuggets.
I’ll be there for their last home game for the 2022 season against the Franklin Bulls on Sunday at the Edgar Centre, while the women’s team - Southern Hoiho - are playing at 12:30pm against the Mainland Pouākai.
If you haven’t been, try it out. I can get our family of four in there for about $50 in the main stand. Parking is relatively easy, it is undercover, and the atmosphere is great.
What I didn’t know is that behind the scenes, no fewer than 15 Otago Polytechnic students have been doing the mahi.
They are applying their passion and study in Event Management, Photography, Sport Science/Video Analysis, Massage, Career Pathway and Strength and Conditioning.
I spoke to Elyshia Hunt, who is studying a Graduate Diploma in Event Management at Otago Polytechnic.
She was from a basketball family and enjoyed the opportunity with the Nuggets, “you have to keep up with it in my family”.
Her role included working with corporate partners and their invited guests, which ranged from co-ordinating catering to helping with ticket scanning.
“I am very much enjoying it.”
Angela Ruske, Otago Nuggets general manager, said: “Each and every one of these students is valued by our organisation.”
“It is important to our franchise that we play an active role in our community, and we hope that being able to provide work experience to these students may benefit them in the future as they seek full-time employment.”
That’s awesome, and go the Nuggets!
Also great work from Ricky and the team from Dunedin’s Body Synergy on High St.
The team there are involved in a 24-hour bike erg fundraiser for Jay Dixon, who we featured a couple of weeks ago about his fight with cancer.
“We will be organising a 24 hour bike erg challenge starting from 9am on Friday 5th August until 9am on Saturday 6th August. There will be 2 Bike erg’s going at the same time throughout this 24 hour period.
“Our goal is to raise over $5000, we would love to see Jay take his family overseas for a holiday. During the 24 hour period we want to ride in excess of 100,000 km's. We will be updating this throughout the day.”
You can watch it here.
Here is the account number to donate to in order to help support Jay and his family through this difficult time: Jay's fundraiser - 02-0924-0055618-005
On Sunday there is a protest over saving Dunedin music venue, The Crown, from a possible apartment being built next door.
I love this line:
“We will not stand idly by while the gentrification of our city claims this cornerstone of our grassroots music scene in Dunedin.”
The organisers also add: “We are fighting to protect the Crown, for an approach to planning that ensures a vibrant city, and for commitment to a music action plan that will ensure the future of our music scene.”
“Join us for a day of music, speeches and some good old protest action like chanting catchy slogans and shouting at town hall.”
If you are not familiar with The Crown Hotel, check out some of their clips on Facebook, including this gem from the brilliantly named Ajax and the Washing Up play at The Crown, Dunedin
I had a coffee recently and stumbled across an excellent free booklet called ‘The stories behind the streetnames in historic Port Chalmers’.
I discovered that Magnetic St is so called because it runs magnetic north to magnetic south, and that Mary St is the only street in the port town to be named after a woman “but it isn’t”.
The street is actually named after a ship, Mary.
On the subject of city street names, check out this interesting page from the Dunedin City Council about possible future street names: Gingerbread Way anyone?
I found this interesting.
So a beer company named a beer after Dunedin noise band The Dead C, but didn’t clear it with them first. It is all good now, some beers settled the situation.
Here’s a video of the band playing in LA, with members of Sonic Youth spotted in the background.
Have a great week!
Rugby is dead. Long live the cheese roll.
That's a Cheese Roll crime. Only way to have "Southern Sushi" is using the Joys Cheese Rolls recipe. Be careful when Googling though because one of the recipes has the wrong measurement of cream.