Little Rituals

23 Sep 2019 3 Comments

by Catch Up With A Mate in Coastal Living, Nostalgia

IMG_4138Coogee Fish Shop, 201A Coogee Bay Road

‘ Underrated. A throwback to the 80’s fish & chip shop, so if that’s what you’re looking for then you’ll love it’  The A Team, August 2019

Little rituals. I’ve lived in Sydney for 15 years and for as long as I can remember Potato Scollops and Fish Cocktails 1980’s style are best purchased and eaten seaside in this Eastern Suburbs gem.

I’m an 80’s kids.

I grew up at a time when $2 worth of hot chips would feed a family of 4 and then some.

I grew up at a time when potato scollops were cut by hand and coated in thin, crispy batter and then loaded with plain salt. Chicken salt was not available till the early 90’s.

I grew up at a time when fish cocktails weren’t a thing – battered fish the size if a thong was. A piece of shark would set you back a single gold coin.

Fast forward 3 Decades and 2 Fish cocktails and 3 potato scollops are priced at $7.00.

But for that 1980’s taste I would pay five times that amount.

These hidden gems, these fish and chip shops stuck blissfully in an 80’s time warp are few and far between. When you find them, you stick by them. You travel to support them. And you hold you breath upon approach, hoping to god that they have not succumbed to high rental costs, the Hungry Jacks or Subway epidemic that swallows up seaside realestate.

Today as I ate my 2 fish cocktails and 3 potato scollops I was that 80’s kid again. Carefree and smiling as oil dripped from the fish cocktails, coating my fingers. Salt coating my lips as I crunched my way through the crisp battered hand cut potato scollops.

Today was a good day. No, today was a great day.

 

 

 

 

 

Whitney

20 Sep 2019 2 Comments

by Catch Up With A Mate in Classifieds: Births, Death, Marriages, Nostalgia Tags:

 

Oh Whitney!

Last weekend I had the pleasure of having lunch with childhood neighbours, the women responsible for introducing me to ‘ that voice’.

I recall with fondness said neighbours playing Ms Houston’s vinyl records at volume, the sound reverberating off the Illawarra Escarpment and into my childhood bedroom.

Decades have passed but the love for this songbird remains steadfast.

Yesterday I spent the morning at a Business Chicks breakfast with Australian Supermodel and serial Entrepreneur Elle McPherson, who disclosed she shared her first US modelling job with Whitney.

So perhaps the fact I dusted of Ms Houston’s greatest hits cd to accompany me as I drove from the east to west last night to collect a parcel from a friend was predestined?

Disc one of the two cd compilation – ‘ Saving All my Love for You’ and I’m transported back in time. I’m 10 years old, in my childhood bedroom, the yellow walls glowing in the afternoon sunshine. Whitney is playing on my tape deck and I’m singing along, with a toilet roll microphone. A private concert for my Cabbage Patch Kid, Care Bear and My Child.

But it’s  2019, the eve of another birthday. I’ve driving a silver Honda, careful of inner city speed limits, indulging in a car disco for one. And still, after all these years, Whitney’s songs define moments in time.

My birthday this year will be low key. Catch ups with  friends and family to herald in the occasion. A cake from an Italian patisserie,  dinner at an inner city hot spot, a massage, time with Jenny Brown the cat.

And Whitney will provide soundtrack. Three decades of devotion to an idol and her other worldly voice forever serenading the passing of time.

 

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