Newsletter # 69 – Cahill’s Restaurants (Caramel Sauce & Nasi Goreng)
Front: Caramelised Sugar
Middle: with Cream
Back: with Evaporated Milk
When comparing the size of the long-gone Cahill’s restaurant chain to the present day McDonald’s Restaurants, one can only be in awe of what Teresa and Reginald Cahill achieved. Within the CBD of Sydney this sister and brother operated fifteen restaurants compared to the nine restaurants that McDonald’s currently operate. At its peak, the Cahill’s Restaurant chain had locations in North Sydney, Chatswood and Kings Cross as well as the CBD, bringing the total number of restaurants to twenty five. They also had confectionery concessions in cinemas and theatres both in New South Wales and interstate. Definitely not too shabby considering they never franchised.
Yes you could say that starting a food business in the 1920’s would have been a lot easier than today’s heavily regulated industry but let’s not forget that the Cahill’s had to contend with the Great Depression and the Second World War.
Teresa and Reginald had different attributes that together combined to form a very successful partnership. Teresa was a confectioner who had a creative flair and a talent to manage people and also marketing abilities. Reginald was a more ‘back of house’ person who strangely swapped rolls with Teresa to manage the production of confectionery. But both were driven individuals.
Starting with one confectionery shop in 1922 in Pitt Street, Sydney, by 1927 they had five shops plus a production kitchen on the southern side of Sydney at Alexandria. Cahill’s Restaurants reached its zenith in the 1960’s. Cahill’s could lay claim to a number of firsts and other innovations including:
- Reginald recognised the potential of Coca Cola by importing it in the 1930’s
- Cahill’s was the first restaurant chain to offer wine ‘by the glass’
- Their restaurants were recognised as a good alternative for families and also single ladies to dine at
- Cahill’s central kitchen ensured a consistently high quality product for signature recipes
- Cahill’s embraced international cuisine from the late 1940’s
- Adopted self-service restaurants with the introduction of the ‘brass rail’ concept
- Publicly listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in 1961
Perhaps our greatest memory of Cahill’s is their themed restaurants. Whether you dined in one of their full service restaurants or their Brass Rail concept, you could be assured of authentic decor and food reflecting the name of the restaurant. The Coolibah Tree at North Sydney boasted a ‘dinkum Australian atmosphere’ with a speciality of the house being ‘Swagman’s Rabbit Hot Pot’. The Mexican in Castlereagh Street offered Chilli con Carne on the menu and you could have a drink at the Matador Wine Bar. You get the idea.
For memory I only ate at five of the restaurants – The Island Trader near Circular Quay; the Dutch Village underneath the Park Regis building in Park Street; The Tudor room in Martin Place and The African Safariland in Kings Cross at the top Of William Street. That last one was in the Kingsgate Building and not long after Cahill’s closed the African Safariland I started work in the hotel above where Cahill’s had been. It was called the Hyatt Kingsgate. I’m pretty sure I also went to the ‘brass rail’ in the basement of the then named Centrepoint Tower. Cahill’s seemed to have a lot of basement restaurants.
The demise of Cahill’s started in 1971 which coincidently was the same year that McDonalds opened its first restaurant in Australia. By the 1980’s Cahill’s had disappeared. Gone were the Windmills, Clogs, Outrigger canoes and Zebra skin covered bar stools, not to mention the twenty cent glasses of wine.
You can’t speak the Cahill’s name without mentioning their famous caramel sauce. It was not only available in each of their restaurants on the dessert menu, but you could also purchase a waxed tub of sauce to take home. Additionally for a time it was available in supermarkets. This week I will be attempting an original recipe to try and recreate this famous sauce. However the main recipe this week will be Nasi Goreng which was a house special at Cahill’s Dutch Village.
Nasi Goreng.
Some people are still surprised to see an Asian dish in a European style restaurant. The connection with regard to the dish Nasi Goreng in a Dutch Restaurant is a reminder that The Indonesian Archipelago was a Dutch colony up until the end of World War Two and today, people of Indonesian decent form the largest migrant population in The Netherlands.
Nasi Goreng was also a house special in the Dutch restaurant where I spent the first year of my cooking apprenticeship in 1971. That restaurant was called ‘Tulips’ and its remains are now a loading dock for The Establishment in George Street, Sydney.
Ingredients
Equipment
Method
- Assemble your ingredients
- Using clean hands break down any clumps of rice
- Mix 1 tbsp of the light soy sauce with the chicken and refrigerate until needed
- Mix the ketcap manis with the remaining light soy sauce
- In a separate bowl combine the chilli paste, minced garlic, shrimp paste, stock powder with a tbsp of the vegetable oil
- Heat the remaining oil in your frypan and sauté the chilli mix for 2 minutes
- Lower the heat and add the sliced onion and cook until the onion is transparent – about 4 minutes.
- Raise the heat and add the chicken – stir continually until the chicken is cooked
- Add the rice and mix in well to distribute the chicken and spices
- Finally add the kecap manis and stir in well until the colour is even and the rice is hot
- Garnish sprinkled with fried shallots and top individual portions with a fried egg
- Serve with sliced tomato and cucumber on the side
Notes
Caramel Sauce (Cahill’s style)
Before the big manufactures started making their version of caramel sauce at a price point there was Cahill’s Caramel Sauce. A thick and decadent mix that was probably responsible for my (and many others) sweet tooth. In their restaurants it was served on ice cream cake; at home you would warm it a little and serve it on ice cream or sneak a spoonful when no one was looking.
The original recipe seems to be lost and while a number of years ago there was an attempted re-launch, it was thinner that the original Cahill’s. There was also discussion on whether fresh cream or evaporated milk was used in the original recipe. I’m thinking that it was probably evaporated milk (we call it ‘Carnation’) which would have been more widely available than fresh cream. I’ll prepare it both ways. My other addition is a tiny pinch of salt because I generally only have unsalted butter in the fridge.
Ingredients
Method
- Assemble your ingredients
- In a saucepan, combine the butter and sugar over a low heat – until butter is melted and sugar dissolved
- Keep stirring until mixture turns into thick syrup. Be careful not to burn the mixture
- Bring to boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 3 minutes
- Combine the golden syrup and warm water and finally the cornflour – mix until smooth – then add to the butter and sugar mixture
- Stir until smooth. Then bring to the boil, reduce heat and simmer for 2 minutes
- Remove mixture from heat and stir in cream or evaporated milk
- Slight variation: Naturally the flavour will be unlike the ‘burnt sugar’ profile that modern restaurants have adopted. Caramelising white sugar was the original way of creating caramel. So, for a third alternative I thought I’d start the above recipe with ¼ cup of caster sugar and ¼ cup water and cook it to a nice golden amber colour before taking it off the heat and stirring in the butter and then the brown sugar, before continuing with the recipe.
- The Verdict: Visually the image shows little differentiation, and they are very similar in taste with perhaps the caramelised sugar version a little darker and slightly closer in taste to how I remember Cahill’s original. Overall Cahill’s had a ‘fudgier’ texture and my versions were good but not as good.
- Best stored, sealed in the fridge
