Last Sunday my husband got a little interested in a new wine show.

On SBS, he said.

Not a repeat, he said.

All about wine, he said.

Let’s try something new, he said.

We were disappointed.

The pre-show excitement dulled when two strikingly handsome old-Etonian types named Matthew blathered excessively about wine.

They were the wine wanker cliché. They made my old-lady skin want to crawl like a snake, down a rather deep hole.

Make them go away, I said.

I’ve never seen men this hot in a Tasmanian vineyard, I said.

Here in Tasmania, and perhaps all Australian wine districts, our wine industry folk are, shall we say, sun-kissed with the odd tooth missing.

In our house we try not to be wine wankers.

The Wine Show, she stank! Or, to use the lingo, was corked.

Their overuse of words like “smashing and delicious” was matched by “very nice wine in an innovative style …  classic elegant and noble, interesting characterful, distinctive…”

They spent much time reclining on leather lounges or walking, very slowly though vineyards, mostly at sunset.

The over-styled presentation was enough to make us scream, in unison, “ENOUGH with the elegant!”.

That’s when it came ... ‘Obi wine can obi”.

Did we hear right? Perhaps we weren’t drunk enough to enjoy the tricky little Star Wars moment in the Montepulciano vineyard in Tuscany?

Since when did Jedi come into the wine industry? Since when did Jedi occupy Italy?

What next? Maybe a show about free ranging chooks with a heroine named Princess Layer?

I gulped my wine too quickly, the way you do at the end of a fitfully demanding week.

Respectfully, I slowed for the food.

There are those who exaggerate food and wine, like the two Matthews above.

And there are those, chefs and home cooks, who really know how to make food sing:

My mother’s Christmas pudding, seasonal as Michael Buble.

Terry Fiddler’s stripey trumpeter, a love song.

Raelene Bates’ lemon curd, sweet song.

Dan Alps’ smoked eel and pickled potato, heavenly.

Mondello’s piccolo and orange cake, pure gospel.

Whose food sang for me at lunch last Friday?

Timbre chef Matt Adams’ cheese on toast and his bliss-filled devilled eggs sprinkled with shichimi.

His food brought me back to life.

I learned he had a food pedigree not bought in dollars, but earned night after long and sweaty night on home town kitchen floors as diverse as Fee and Me, Mudbar, the Great Northern, the Riverside Golf Club and Josef Chromy.

The fact that he’s come of age in the Tamar Valley is a credit to those who have gone before and prevailed. It isn’t ever easy.

You can’t fake the ‘just-right’ touch of a great chef.

It’s honed from loving the smell, touch and taste of food. Try. Try and try again. Hard. Really hard.

Last month Adams was named among Tasmania’s most influential chefs as ‘young, respected believing in good, classy food without the pomp’.

Most of Tasmania’s wine and food people work too hard for pomp.

They’re creative, clever, hard working and humble people who make magic and often look like they could do with a good holiday.

Aren’t we lucky?