Episode 9

Rick Stein’s journey around New South Wales takes him from the country’s interior back to the NSW south coast. Known as the Sapphire Coast because of its vibrant deep-blue waters, Rick reveals this is his favourite region in Australia. He is passionate about its future and especially the sustainability of its exquisite seafood.

Rick’s journey to the coast takes him through the 'High Country' of the Snowy Mountains. Once heavily wooded, the plains are now much barer after years of logging but still beautiful in their own way. Rick stops for a pub lunch at the historic town of Nimmitabel. Once a bustling regional hub, it lost its mojo when the timber ran out, though the once-closed pub has finally reopened to support its small community.

Rick descends through the mountains to the coast – a place whose staggering beauty and world-class seafood have kept him returning for over two decades.

His first stop is Pambula Lake, Rick explores thousands of years of indigenous care and connection to this country with young Yuin custodian Nathan Lygon. Nathan takes Rick on a kayak trip to see one of the enormous shell middens that speak to how the abundance of these waters once sustained his ancestors. Today, Pambula Lake is largely known for its oysters, which are farmed in long lines of beds across the water. Rick visits oyster farmer and champion shucker Sue McIntyre, who explains the sustainability of oyster farming and shucks Rick as many oysters as he can eat.

Travelling on to meet historian Anna Clark at her family’s beach shack, where her grandfather, one of Australia’s most famous historians, the late Professor Manning Clark, wrote his six-volume opus on the founding of modern Australia and taught her to fish. Anna takes Rick to the crystal-clear waters of the coastal estuary, where they throw in their lines. Back at the beach shack, Rick gently barbeques a fresh tailor (similar to a mackerel) that Anna caught that morning, infusing it with fresh rosemary. Kindred spirits, Anna and Rick enjoy their meal with a view – as a whale and calf breach in the ocean before them!