The Curated Plate 2025: Inside this Queensland food festival

NZ Herald

19-05-2025

Rather than one central hub, The Curated Plate is hosted in the producers' own patches of paradise, all across the coastal biosphere that stretches from the sea up into the hinterland, taking in award-winning restaurants and breweries, dreamy beachside brunch spots and quaint farm-gate stands.
I spent two days in the pantry of the Sunshine Coast getting an up-close and personal taster of the region's homegrown food and drink festival.
Growing gourmands
The coast's hinterland has a fruitful farming tradition: a subtropical climate and nutrient-rich volcanic soils combine for fertile growing conditions.
The Glasshouse Mountains have been part of the landscape for more than 25 million years and at Yanalla Farms in Beerwah, the area's agricultural history is all around. Enthusiastic horticulturalists Robert and Karen Martin bought the tropical farm from Robert's parents in 2011, converting what was first a pineapple, then an avocado farm to focus on exotic fruits such as custard apples and dragon fruit. Macadamia trees grow on the food-bowl property, as do pecan trees – a remnant from the property's tenure during the 1920s as a soldier settlement allotment.
Come July, the couple will set up a long table among the lychee grove and welcome 180 lucky diners on to the picturesque property for the ultimate farm-to-table lunch. The Celebrate Glasshouse Country Long Lunch features a lavish meal crafted from local ingredients, with the producers contributing to the menu, such as Green Valley Finger Limes, Maleny Dairies and Barry Family Butchers, joining guests at the orchard table for a true taste of charming hinterland living.
Raise a glass
With the Sunshine Coast's 24 breweries and a population of just under 400,000, producers say it has more breweries per capita than any other state or territory, making it Australia's true craft beer capital. Brouhaha Brewery has been producing small-batch brews in Maleny since 2016 and recently expanded its brewing capacity, opening a new tap room and brewery in Baringa. Brouhaha will be at the Asian Food Festival, proving just how food-friendly its approachable beers are (the Strawberry Rhubarb Sour is a must-try), as are those gold-medal cocktails from Sunshine & Sons.
A sellout in previous years, Mooloolaba Seafood restaurant Fish on Parkyn's competitive Grape vs Grain lunch returns in 2025, pitting craft beers from local 10 Toes Brewing against award-winning Barossa wines from Brockenchack Wines across an interactive, five-course luncheon where diners cast the deciding votes.
The Sunshine Coast is contributing to Australia's famous coffee culture, too. Aussies down more than six billion cups of coffee each year, but less than 0.5% of that coffee is grown locally. Glasshouse Plantation is one of a handful of collegial local producers working towards the goal of the Sunshine Coast being to coffee what the Barossa is to wine.
Nick Edwards, a sixth-generation farmer, has worked with his agricultural scientist parents to regenerate four hectares of Glass House Mountains land, planting 5000 Arabica coffee trees uniquely suited to the copious sun and rain of the sub-tropical environment. They'll have their first commercial harvest mid-August and in the run-up are hosting a Coffee Farm Tour and Tasting Experience to showcase the potential of Australian-grown coffee.
Street food, on the lawn
Held on the lush lawns of Spicers Tamarind Retreat, a luxury resort in verdant Maleny, the Sunshine Coast Asian Food Festival is the festival's flagship event. Across two days, picnickers roll blankets out on the lawns of Spicer's 7.3ha property and settle in for an afternoon of live music and even livelier plates.
A superb street-food inspired menu is the collaborative work of some of the Sunshine Coast's most celebrated chefs. Mitch Smith from trendy harbourside restaurant and cocktail bar Rice Boi will serve decadent black sesame prawn toast with mandarin dashi caramel: spot Tom Hitchcock, of venerated restaurant and cooking school Spirit House, behind plumes of smoke grilling wagyu beef skewers served with a black Indonesian sate sauce.
The retreat's own Tamarind Restaurant executive chef, Daniel Jarrett, ensures the day ends on a sweet and fragrant note, dreaming up an unmissable Thai tea gelato sundae, generously topped with coconut, caramel and roasted peanuts.
On the seas, behind the scenes
This year will there will be a strong focus on seafood. Fitting given Mooloolaba is one of the busiest fishing ports on Australia's eastern seaboard – a hub for industries catching prawns, barramundi, spanner and mud crabs locally and sustainably. Festival culinary director Peter Kuravita is passionate about highlighting the important part these often overlooked suppliers play by offering a behind-the-scenes tour of the Mooloolaba trawling docks and local fishery businesses who do the hard work bringing this supreme seafood from origin to plate, as freshly as possible.
To meet these local heroes traversing the deep-freeze chillers, head along to the Mooloolaba Seafood Market Day, where pop-up food stalls by local fisheries will nestle on the wharfs and serve up $5 and $10 taster plates of locally sourced fishy treats.
The marina is also the largest southern bluefin tuna fishing port in Australia. The impressive species (and how they get from ocean to plate), will be on display during SOKA's Tuna Cutting Show. Head chef Kenji will demonstrate traditional tuna-cutting techniques on a 35kg whole tuna sourced from MSC-certified Walker Seafoods. Afterwards, guests can enjoy a tasting menu of premium tuna dishes including sashimi, tataki and sushi.
Culture of the coast
Saltwater Eco Tours specialises in helping guests discover the serene waterways of Mooloolaba and Gubbi Gubbi/Kabi Kabi Country from a cultural perspective. Aboard a beautiful, heritage-listed pine sailing ship lovingly restored by founders Jenna Griffiths and Simon Thornalle, this unforgettable trip immerses visitors in cultural storytelling and the tastes of native bush foods. On their Bushtucker Cruise, you get a tasting menu with locally foraged, native ingredients and commentary from indigenous cultural tour guide Aunty Bridgette Chilly Davis, a proud Gubbi Gubbi/Kabi Kabi Country woman with a wealth of cultural knowledge and family connections to the river system.
She tells us Mooloolaba is a matriarchal land, as women hold the lore of the land and that extends to the ocean: 'Sea country is the maternity ward for our animals, and caring for country is everybody's business.'
After hearing the area's history and the ingredients that spring from it, you're gently returned to the land. Aunty Bridgette dots the tops of our hands with ochre harvested from a nearby riverbank, farewells us and offers a poignant reminder: 'As your feet take you places, your hands can do great things, or get you into trouble.'
Checklist
Jetstar and Air New Zealand offer limited direct flights from Auckland to the Sunshine Coast (Maroochydore).
DETAILS
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The writer was a guest of The Curated Plate.