Australia "Invites The World To Dinner" In Tasmania

Three of Australia's top chefs and an abundance of the country's best food products feed a multinational crowd at Hobart's incredible Museum of Old and New Art.

Chefs, media, and "influencers" gather at the Elizabeth Street Pier in Hobart for a pre-event reception, and to have a chance to meet and greet their friends and colleagues.

Exquisite Angasi oysters from Bruny Island off the Tasmanian coast were available in profusion, along with good Tasmanian sparkling wine, at the Elizabeth Street Pier reception.

A fast-moving flotilla of Naïad outboard tour boats transported event guests, in a mist of sea spray, from Elizabeth Street Pier to GASP!, the Glenorchy Art & Sculpture Park, not quite five miles northwest of Hobart, for a spectacular if chilly barbecue.

Guests gathered on this dramatic promontory, keeping warm in the chilly early evening air by wrapping shawls around themselves and crowding around fire pits, while indigenous musicians strummed guitars and one played the didgeridoo, an ancient droning wind instrument.

Among the international chefs present at the GASP! barbecue were American representatives Eric Ripert (center, in black) and Jonathan Waxman (to his left, in pink shirt), here getting a close-up look (and taste) of Neil Perry's grilled Tasmanian lobster with kombu butter.

Forget "shrimp on the barbie." These are Peter Gilmore's vividly flavorful grilled Western Australian marron (a variety of plump, savory crayfish of the genus Cherax) with wasabi butter.

Prize-winning Tasmanian whisky-maker Bill Lark (left) with famed British chef Heston Blumenthal at the GASP! barbecue.

Guests arrive at the dramatically designed Museum of New and Old Art from the barbecue, for the gala dinner.

About 250 diners sat at three long tables for the Restaurant Australia feast. The walls of the room are covered with 1620 individual paintings by one of Australia's most famous artists, the late Sidney Nolan. Called "Snake," and considered to be a single mural, this is widely believed to be Nolan's masterpiece.

Neil Perry, popular Sydney-based restaurateur (Rockpool, etc.) and television personality — and arguably Australia's best-known chef — addresses the diners.

Peter Gilmore's smoked and confit pig jowl with black-lipped abalone, koji, (Japanese rice mold culture), fermented grains, shiitakes, and seaweed.

Neil Perry's grilled sirloin with braised beef cheek, oxtail, and tea-smoked oyster red curry.

Part of the cheese selection served after dinner, including Udder Delights King Saul raw blue (with knife at left, and atop the blue package) from the Adelaide Hills.