So I happened to be in Sydney as the same time as Black Bear and Miss Pikachu.. which means one thing.... the burger adventures continues!! To celebrate my recent win (People's Champ, thank you, thank you) I decided it was only suited to be celebrated with burgers. Sadly Mario was still back in Melbourne solving the puzzle to lead to his Christmas present designed by me (his awesome kickass GF), so he couldn't be part of the burger eating fun. However he did make me go again when he finally came to Sydney the following week
Burger Project is one of Neil Perry's latest ventures. It's Perry's take on the good old staple BURGERS. Located in World Square near Din Tai Fung, it was a good central location and makes it a good place for a quick bite or a catch up with friends. The menu had a good selection of beef, chicken and vegetarian burgers, together with sides and desserts.
I was a sucker and went with the guy behind the counter recommendation because I had difficulty choosing, so I got the cheese burger which had a grass fed beef patty, cheese, secret sauce, tomatoes, onions, lettuce and pickles. The beef patty was cooked perfectly, cooked on the outside and a slight pink on the inside. The pickles were homemade and it had a generous amount of filling. It's the type of burger you eat and sauce just gets everywhere. It was served in a sweet Breadtop brioche bun, it was a good quality cheese burger.
Black bear got the American cheese burger (Mario also got this one when I came back with in on the second visit). This came with a beef patty, rose mayo, secret sauce, pickles and onions. It was basically the cheese burger less the tomato and lettuce but with the rose mayo as well. For some reason, getting rid of the lettuce and tomato worked really well in my eyes. This was my favourite burger of the 3 we tried. It highlighted the secret sauce and the juicy texture of the beef patty. It hit the spot for me. Totally curbed my burger craving with satisfaction.
Miss P got the Magic mushroom, which was same filling as the cheese burger except the patty was replaced by a giant grilled confit mushroom. This was one super juicy burger and the mushroom combo actually worked a lot better than I expected, so it means you can also bring all your vegetarian friends here and get a burger together without worrying they will miss out. Though I think Miss P had a bit of burger envy...
When there is burger, there has to be chips. I got the chipotle chilli chips and it did not disappoint.
Where there is a thickshake option, one must not say no. Chocolate shake was rich and decadent. It was a real indulgence and very heavy.
Alternatively the smart choice would have been the house made passion pop soda, which was tangy and the fizz really help with all the heaviness in the other parts of the meal.
By the time, it reached dessert, we did not have any room left, so the only way to taste dessert was to share, I choice the lamington ice cream which came with Valrhona chocolate ice cream (same as the thick shake), tasty course roasted coconut shavings and raspberry compote. I love having the raspberry in this dessert. The sourness cut through the richness in the chocolate ice cream and the coconut added to the texture.
Overall 16/20 I was very happy with the burgers I tasted. I will definitely come back to try more of the menu.
I was in Japan not long and just kept craving ramen when I was back in Melbourne. A few friends kept telling me that I had to try Hakata Gensuke saying it's very close to the ramen that I would find in Japan, but every time I walked passed there was a huge line at the door so I kept putting it off for awhile. Anyway, so I finally made my way there one Saturday night and waited in line. I went with the usual suspects, K, Bobo, Az, R, Mario and this time we had Zad and Lem join us. After 35 minutes in line, we finally got inside and squished onto a tiny tiny table.
Due to wait outside we had already decided on what we wanted so the wait for food was reasonably short.
To share I ordered some gyozas and chicken karage. The karaage came out first, 3 pieces of fried chicken with their 'secret' seasoning. The chicken meat was nice and juicy, it would make a perfect snack with beer.
The gyoza came as a plate of 10. It had a crispy base and well flavoured filling.
I got the black Tonkotsu out of curiosity. I had a really good black tonkotsu when I was in Shibuya and was hoping to get something similar. Hakata offered a good soup base and the broth was thick but it was still not the same thickness as you would get in Japan. The black sesame was great to heighten the aroma in the broth.. Being the pug that I was, I also got extra noodles with it and added an egg and bamboo shoots. You don't really need it but I find it nice to have.
Mario got the signature ramen which was the pork bone broth with char siu, black fungus and I added an egg and seaweed into this one. This was a rich full bodied soup. It is definitely one of the thicker ramen soup bases in Melbourne.
R, Az, Bobo, Lem, Zad and K all got either one of those with different things added in.
Overall 15/20 I like it how you can choose the hardness of your noodles but the wait really put me off. The ramen here is nice but not something I want to wait 35 minutes for. I think I would go back to try their God Fire ramen on a day with less of a wait. Also, the ramen gets quite pricey as you add more things into it. For a similar prices at other places it would include a lot of the additional things like seaweed, bamboo, egg and black fungus. However the price is hardly anything in the bigger picture, it's the wait which is a pain.
As part of a milestone celebration D's family took us all to Spice Temple. Most people would have heard about Neil Perry's Rockpool but it's sister restaurant, Spice Temple many don't know about and should try out. Spice Temple is Perry's take on Asian Sichuan food, headed up by Ben Pollard. Located in Crown Casino along with this other ventures in Melbourne, it is modern spicy Asian fusion with a fine dining touch in a dark mysterious ambient atmosphere.
As with most Chinese food, we ordered a range of dishes to share.
Stir fried prawns with salted duck eggs and four chillis. Beautiful creaminess laced with fragrant of the salted duck egg. This is one of the dishes highlighted in red so it's not for someone who can't take their spice. But if you can, it's a must try on the menu.
Fish fragrant eggplant was done with a modern twist. It was not served in a pot with mince meat but instead the pieces of eggplant were deep fried and infused with the fish sauce mixture. Crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. It didn't look it, but there was a small kick to this one.
Stir fried mushrooms was a combination of brown mushrooms, shitaki , oyster mushrooms, enoki and white fungus. This is one of the none spicy dishes. The range and mushroom texture difference made it an interesting dish and a great way to balance out the spiciness in all the other dishes.
Hot and numbing duck is one of their signature dishes, It's a crispy skinned duck served with a fiery peppercorn themed sauce. As the name suggest, it does leave a tingly numbing feeling but delicious flavors that make it worth leaving your mouth numb.
Corn with smoked pork and chives. This is a simple sweet corn dish with the goodness of smoked pork oil as the key hero ingredient. The small pork pieces gave it that rich taste to balance out the sweetness in the corn and the chives added to the aroma. This was my favourite dish of the night, along with the prawn.
The string beans with pork belly is a colour dish that had a LOT of chillis thrown in, but we were advised it was merely to garnish and not to be eaten. This had large chunks of pork belly in a spicy state. Personally I found the pork belly to be too fatty, and not something that I could eat more than one piece.
We also got the hand made noodles with scallop and chilli paste. Unfortunately I didn't take a photo of it and should have, It is something I would recommend if you are going in a smaller crowd, for a larger crown it becomes hard to share and each person only ends up with like 1 strand of noodle and the noodle is good, so one strand isn't quite enough.
Overall 16.5/20. I was actually very surprised and very pleased with this visit. I have been to Spice Temple on various occasions over the years and this was the best visit by far. Most of the food made me want more and even though it was spicy, it was very appetizing and a great offering. I am looking forward to coming back more.
A few weeks back I was lucky enough to win the competition that Confessions of a Little Piggy was running on her site. It got me a dinner for 2 to try out Vapiano's Spring/Summer menu. K and D being my usual and favourite eating buddies, made it hard for me to choose, so I decided to take them both and just split the cost of the 3rd person amongst ourselves.
K has never been to Vapiano before, so the concept of lining up in front of a chef to watch him/her cook for you on the spot was new to her. Vapiano is one of my regular dining places when working in Brisbane as one of my Italian colleagues can never get sick of it and I must admit, I usually quite enjoy their food too while on work assignment.
I got the pasta special (Gamberi con rosso) which was similar to the normal menu Gamberi pasta they usually have. It came with prawns, sundried tomatoes, chilli in a sun dried tomato pesto base. The sauce was nice and light and served with freshly made pasta (which is actually made on premises). It is nothing like the traditional thick and saucey pasta, but more of the pasta being just coated with enough flavour and the prawns to be the hero of the dish. Fresh and simple flavours.
K got the pizza porporrano which had a tomato base, topped with air dried beef, mozzarella, rocket, parmesen and finished with a generous drizzle of truffle oil, The pizza base was not too thick, not too thin but just right. The truffle oil turned this pizza into a gourmet pizza. Yum yum, perfect carb fix and the rocket made it feel less guilty with all the greenness.
D opted for something on the normal menu. He got the pollo e spinaci, which has a basil pesto base with chicken breast pieces, spinach, caramelised onions, pine nuts and topped with freshly shaved parmesan. It's nothing special that will blow your mind, but just good enough where it's satisfying and you will feel like you had a good meal.
For dessert, K and I got 2 to share. The first one was the white chocolate cheesecake with salted caramel and honeycomb. Creamy cheese on a crumbly base and chunks of honeycomb. It's a no frills dessert, but a good way to finish a meal. Second dessert was the tiramisu, it's almost a sin to visit an Italian restaurant and not have tiramisu for dessert. Again, this was a simple tiramisu, with layers of coffee mascarpone, and sponge fingers.
Overall 13.5/20 for the space that it plays in, Vapiano is a great casual dining experience, you watch the chef cook so you can tell them exactly how you like your meal. The pasta menu tends to have non saucey pasta, so if you like your pasta very wet, you would need to tell the chef who is cooking it. The pizza here is a favourite of mine, and for similar pricing to Crust, I would prefer Vapiano any day.
After some post auction fun, D and decided to head to brunch with our usual brunch buddies K and R. So we decided to hit up Breakfast Thieves out in Brunswick. Located in the back streets of Brunswick, it's really one of those places where you read about it, hear about it or you live locally and you are in the know.
Feeling quite famished we got straight into ordering. I got the PB & J, it was an easy decision since I love peanut butter and jam as a combo and french toast is one of my favorite things to eat for brunch; match made in heaven. The French Brioche toast was served with chunks of peanut butter in a crumbled dough like form, raspberry jelly, lemon curd and candied bacon. It was an interesting, refreshing and new way to eat the classic PB and French toast. I loved the play on textures and found the presentation to be above the rest of the food we ordered in terms of brunch plate up. Definately worth trying!
K got the Breakfast chain. It came with soft boiled eggs, apple crumble, berry yoghurt and cheesy soldiers. This is the perfect choice for someone who can't decide on having sweet or savoury. The cheesy toast is a great warmer to keep you full with that stringy, cheesy goodness. Then you have your solid breakfast favourites like eggs and yoghurt with just enough berry and muesli ratio. Finally the apple crumble is like the naughty way to finish off a good breaky.
R got the baked eggs which came with garlic toast on the side. Tomato based with generous amounts of chorizo, fetta and peas all cooked together. It is a heavier option compared to the others, but it's hearty and perfect for a cool morning.
D got the Ms Omega which was a cured trout with poached eggs and hollandiase sauce on toasted sour bread. It's nothing fancy but if no frill is what you want, then this hits the mark. The egg was perfectly poached and the trout was a nice alternative to the usual ham or smoked salmon that goes with eggs benedict. However for $16, I wish there was a little more on the plate.
Overall 14/20 I really enjoyed their creativity and I found most things nicely executed. I just wished they had more juice options, especially on warmer days when you don't feel like a coffee.
D has been talking about this place for almost a year now. His colleague O recommended it to him and has visited a few times without me. He knows I love Thai food but sadly each time he attempts to take me there, Jinda Thai is either booked out or I'm working interstate. Anyway... I finally made it and got to dine there. *fist pump*
It's located in Abbotsford, off Victoria Street on the "Thai" end of the famous strip of pho noodle shops. It's tucked away and you would easily drive on Victoria St and not notice it. Inside the warehouse conversion style restaurant is a trendy, upbeat modern Thai restaurant. With Thai inspired decor, it really is a hidden gem (like many good Melbourne restaurants). As you can tell by the pictures the place was packed on a Sunday night.
There was no way D was going to a Thai restaurant and not ordering a Thai Milk Tea - it was creamy and sweet. It was the perfect drink to pair with the spiciness to come. I opted for the longan drink which had a concentrated flavour of sun dried longan.
To start we got the Soft shell crab with green apple salad. The crab was crisp and had just the right amount of salt. The green apple salad is for someone that can take heat in their food. The initial taste has a zesty tang, followed by the sweetness of the green apple. However the heat will set in fast and I will not recommend this to people who cannot handle spicy food. Normally I would take chilli with most Thai and Malaysian dishes and be fine with it. This time it was different. I struggled and the worst part was, it was so tasty, I just kept torturing myself with the heat because the other parts of the salad was so good. Just wish the spiciness was more toned down on this dish.
As a balancing act to maintain a 'healthy' diet (I use those words very loosely, I am horrible at dieting), we got the Pad Ka Na. This was Chinese broccoli cooked with garlic and salted Mackerel. Crunchy stems of greens with an intense salted mackerel laced through the stir fry. This is the 'yummy' way to eat your greens!
It is part of the usual routine that D has to order green curry, coconut rice and pad thai at any Thai restaurants we ever visit. This chicken green curry was creamy and sweet. It's tailored more towards a "western" taste so don't come here expecting the same punch as you would get in Bangkok. However, I still quite enjoyed it with the coconut rice.
The pad thai had the usual suspect of ingredients. Peanuts, lemon juice, fish sauce, bean shoots and we picked prawn for the core ingredient. The stick noodles were cooked to a nice soft and smooth state. Good classic, only downside is the size. If I was dining alone and ordered just that, I would walk out hungry.
For dessert I got the famous crepe cake. I keep seeing these photos pop up on my Instagram, so it was a must. The flavor of the cake was green tea with red bean and served with coconut ice cream. I really enjoyed the many layers of green tea and cream between the crepes which gave it the perfect texture. This was a light dessert, so I walked out very happy.
Overall 16.5/20 I found myself to enjoy most things, even when I struggled with the spiciness. The dessert was the highlight for me. I am looking forward to going back to try other things such as the boat noodles.
Last Saturday I was fortunate enough to be invited as a guest along with D to taste some of the dishes the new Pappa Rich in Knox City had to offer. Located in the Ozone area, Pappa Rich had a fast pace buzz and a small queue of people at the door around 1pm. With an array of authentic Malaysian dishes to choose from, Pappa Rich is just one of those places you go when you want a no frills, good Malaysian feed. Perfect catch up space between shopping.
To start, satay was passed along the table for all the guest to try. D and I arrived late so there wasn't much left by the time we got ours. D had one and said it was tasty and well cooked.
For my main dish I ordered the Chilli Pan Mee. This was a noodle dish served with ikan bilis (fried anchovies), mince meat, spinach, chilli paste and finished with a soft boiled egg. To eat it, I popped the egg yolk and mixed everything up. This had the small kick from the sauce and wonderful balance of textures.
D got the nasi lemak, coconut rice with curry chicken, ikan bilis, egg and prawns. I consider this the perfect after school feed.
Then there was dessert. The sago pudding was in a bowl of coconut milk, palm sugar, topped off with read bean. All classic elements of a Malaysian dessert in one bowl.
The egg sago pudding was a small egg pudding surrounded in a pool of coconut milk sago. Nothing to fault in this, except I wish I had more!
Overall 13.5/20. This is good, trusty reliable Malaysian food but it hasn't reached the same 'high' as their other stores, though it is still a store I would happily visit for lunch or dinner if I was around Ozone for a movie or shopping.
