Dani Valent

Brunswick Street institution Marios is 40. To celebrate, it’s releasing a free book filled with photographs, stories and personal memories from the likes of veteran broadcaster Jon Faine, cartoonist Kaz Cooke, comedian Lawrence Mooney, food writer Michael Harden and dozens more notable Melburnians. This extract is one of our fave parts.

Refugees Mohammed “Joy” Miah and Mohammad Bavi haven’t been free in close to a decade. At the Park Hotel, a makeshift detention centre in Carlton, they – and 30 others – live in limbo, without fresh air or a clear pathway out of what they call “Park Prison”. This is how it felt to be thrust in and swiftly out of the world’s consciousness when tennis player Novak Djokovic was briefly detained there, and what their lives look like inside.

“My whole life rests on my tastebuds, but I’m trying to think of it as just changed for a bit, not that I’ve lost everything. Super acidic things are working: I’m craving South American, Thai food, limes and vinegars.”

Even aside from the stringent new health and safety guidelines – which add more costs and tasks to the reopening process – restaurants can’t just switch on the lights and reopen for service. For many, it’s like opening again for the first time.

This Turkish dish of poached eggs, butter and yoghurt has been around for at least 500 years. Tulum’s version brings modern techniques into play, to great effect.

His new cookbook – featuring recipes from his beloved Melbourne restaurant, Tulum – elevates the home-cooked food of his youth, and has earned praise from Nigella Lawson and Yotam Ottolenghi.