dining out

we’ve just returned from malaysia, having eaten a lot there we certainly have quite a few posts to publish! here’s the first one, a nice restaurant called twentyone kitchen + bar which is located on cangkat bukit bintang, kl. it’s about 5 minutes walk from the shopping malls such as pavillion, however looking for it proved to be a bit of a challenge; we took a long time looking for it!

the interior was nicely decorated and the seats were comfy!

c ordered a glass of coke! i should also note that all alcohol is  buy one get one free during dinner time as it’s considered happy hour, so get a  good deal on alcohol! unfortunately c isn’t big on alcohol and i didnt think i can stomach 2 beers.

we started off with free bread with dips, olive oil and some crunchy herbs/nuts which c reckoned is dukkah. the bread didn’t really do it for me, but c liked it with the herbs/nuts dip.

our entree for the night was the popcorn chicken with lime wedges and garlic aioli drip. this dish was omg so amazing. the chicken was nice and crispy, tasty, and tasted so good with the garlic aioli. you have to order this when you go over. you have to.

c ordered a caeser salad with beef bacon, grilled chicken and egg. the egg was too uncooked for someone who only eats fully cooked yolks so i got the egg from her. the beef bacon tasted almost exactly like bacon. the portion is fairly generous and tasted pretty good!

i on the other hand am a meat eater so ordered a steak and chips with bearnaise sauce and garlic rosemary jus. the steak was ordered medium and came as medium, and was a good juicy steak. the highlight of this dish is the chips, however. stacked prettily, golden and crunchy it’s one of the best chips i’ve had in my life.

for dessert we had chocolate molten with ice cream and white chocolate foam. the dessert was pretty fun, when we broke off the outer crust, molten chocolate flowed out like lava. and who doesn’t like ice cream and chocolate?

we left full and satisfied, service was beyond excellent. my only problem? location, we have to walk through a scary neighbourhood to get there!

my friends and i came up with this rather remarkable idea to have lunch at the diggers club, mayfield on the train to sydney last weekend. since tuesday is cheap for members (only $10.90 for all you can eat!) we wanted to give it a go, and we did so yesterday during lunch. membership costs $5 for a “year”, as turns out the year ends on 31 december of the year so really if you join at in say, december, your membership is only for a month. anyhow, non members pay $15.50 so you kind of make your money back on the first visit.

the dining area is rather big. according to their website, it seats 400 people. as you would imagine, there are plenty of patrons on tuesday when we went.

there was a wide variety of food, actually a wider variety compared to grace hotel i went to recently. being lunch, the seafood options are very limited, but i was told that there are prawns and oysters for dinner, which is understandably pricier. the buffet was divided into several sections:

roasts

salad

deep frieds

western

dessert

and asian food, which i do not have an sharp photo of; 2 of the photos i took were blurry, as i was trying to juggle a camera and a plate of food at the same time =D

the chocolate fondue, soft serve machine and coffee machine is rather hidden in the corner, so you do have to walk around a bit to find it. there are marshmallows too, so my friend dipped his marshmallows in the fondue before placing it in his bowl. here’s also a pic of the soft serve dish my friend whipped up for himself.

my personal picks from the buffet are the chicken with pesto, deep fried tuna bake, char siew, prawn crackers and malaysian chicken. soups are also available in three flavours, chicken and corn, seafood and pumpkin (this one i cannot remember).

the buffet was excellent, and definitely value for money; become a member to enjoy $10.90 tuesdays!

when we went to nelson bay in december 2012, we stayed there for 3 nights and ate out twice. both at this place oddly named bays more then a chook! bays more then a chook is located in the small town centre about 10 minutes walk from where we were staying at oaks lure. it’s a small chicken takeaway shop, with a few beef burgers and gravy on the menu. i believe they do have the obligatory salad as well, but that wasn’t something we ordered; in fact, both times, we ordered the whopper, which is a beef burger, and a quarter chicken with chips with a coke. the second time we got a takeaway, and bought an extra gravy with it.

the whopper itself is an amazing burger. it’s got a piece of steak in it with lettuce and sesame bun. its way better than its hungry jacks counterpart, and i believe that it costed us under $10. see the large featured image for a view of this burger.

the chicken, on the other hand, is your standard roast chicken. chips were good, but again most chips are very good (for the record, i do love hungry jack’s chips). the gravy, however, was rather bland, and i would skip the gravy if and when we go there again.

port stephens is a lovely place to visit for a couple of nights; we went fishing and quad biking and dolphin watching! the beaches are nice, oaks lure is also a good place to stay at if you’re visiting. if you like in nsw and haven’t been there, you should, as there is a direct bus service from newcastle, or it’s even close enough to drive over from sydney!

hi all 🙂

a few weeks ago, fiance and i went to the meeting point for the second time with a voucher. the voucher gives us 1 mixed entree sample or deep fried soft tofu with sweet chilli sauce, 2 shabushabu hotpots or 1 spicy dry pot. 1 fried rice with pork or prawns and 2 berverages. we went with the deep fried soft tofu with sweet chilli sauce, the spicy dry pot and the pork fried rice with red wine and a diet coke. the night we went was a particularly cold night, perfect for spicy food. we were seated upstairs where you can look down and see the mini stage. there was a group of about 4 people playing different genres of music including one of my favourite jazz song “fly me to the moon”. we really liked where we were seated.

after a bit of chit chat, we then proceeded to order. the first to come was the deep fried soft tofu with sweet chilli sauce. it came pretty quickly and we were starving by the time it came! the deep fried tofu were very thin and cripsy and soft in the inside. it was moderately spicy for me and by the time i finished, i was a little suprised by how full i was getting! not a good sign seeing as that was just entree…

we found the pork fried rice a little oily. it was nothing too special but looked very pretty! we would later realise that the pork fried rice would come in handy to cool us down while we ate the dry pot…

for the dry pot, we were first asked to choose the level of spiciness (mild, hot or super hot) and then five different types of meat, seafood and vegetables. we ordered mild with stuffed fish ball, pork belly, beef, lotus root and “yang cheun” noodles. when it came, we were amazed by the amount of chillies we saw! almost one third of the dry pot dish consisted of red and green chillies. i was really excited about the lotus roots because i had a craving for it a couple of days before going to the meeting point. what i liked best about the dry pot was the pork belly, stuffed fish balls and the noodles. unfortunately, the dry pot was WAY too spicy for both of us so we could barely taste the actual flavour (although when we did, it was pretty awesome). we kept drinking water and stuffing ourselves with the fried rice to cool our mouths down. my fiance was sure they got our order wrong and gave us the super hot one. we never did find out!

maybe we just can’t handle spicy food like taiwanese people. we ended up taking away about half the dry pot and fried rice. we later realised that the dry pot had A LOT of chilli oil at the bottom. overall, we really liked the food and the ambience of the place. however, as i pointed out about a million times, the dry pot was too spicy for us and the food was generally a bit too oily. though having said that, i would definiately go there again!

 

hi 🙂

so it was mother’s last sunday! although we didn’t have wagyu, we did have a nice japanese dinner out in belmore. i also bought a green tea cake for my mum from breadtop in strathfield. we were initially going to buy it from “hello happy” in strathfield but they were being ridiculous and didn’t let my fiance take a photo of their cakes so i can choose one (i hurt my leg so i stayed at home while he went out to buy stuff). oh well, it’s their loss!

the green tea cake we chose from breadtop (they call it the green tea gateau) was awesome. it costs $32 and it’s about 8 inches in diameter. my mum and the rest of us really liked it. it wasn’t overly sweet and creamy. here are some photos.

this was actually entree for us because we went out to sushi bluefin right after the cake. it probably wasn’t a good idea seeing as we ordered way too much at sushi bluefin! we have been to sushi bluefin a couple of times before this. i remember we went there last year for mother’s day as well! first up were the oysters and some kind of spicy octopus salad. neither of us tried the oyster but my mum said it was very sweet and fresh. fiance liked the octopus salad but it was a little too spicy.

next up was the chicken katsu. it was alright. crispy and generously covered with panko. it wasn’t anything special but it’s always a good dish to have. it came with a serving of tonkatsu sauce though fiance did not know that…

the tempura we ordered came with prawns and a variety of vegetables including potato, sweet potato and zucchini. we had initally wanted to order the tempura separately but the waiter said it’s better to order the mixed tempura platter. i thought the tempura was average. the potato and sweet potato wasn’t as crispy as i had expected it to be but fiance liked his tempura prawns very much.

some of the sides which comes with the sushi and sashimi platters came next. one of the favourite things i like about sushi bluefin is their cheesy baked scallop with rice and possibly onions. as usual, since i’m not a fan of most seafood, i gave my bit of scallop to fiance and devoured the cheesy rice. i had a couple of the tuna sushi rolls which were simple but nice. we were also given complimentary fried salmon belly, something they do everytime we have visited. my mum and dad loves it but we both found it too bony. it was the first time i tried it so i guess next time, i’ll leave it to my parents!

finally, we are getting to the sushi and sashimi. the sashimi platter came first. we were a little suprised by the fish in the centre because they have never served us that type of fish before. fiance thought the fish was alright but my parents, again, loved it and found it special. other than that, fiance loved the rest of the sashimi and especially the salmon. the layout of the sashimi platter was wonderful as usual. by the time the sushi platter came, we were almost full. the sushi were neatly lined up and my first thought was to try the seared fish sushi on the far left end since i don’t eat raw fish. it was almost like salmon but the texture of the fish was a little different. the salmon fat looked so beautiful but it’s too bad we didn’t eat much of it at all. we ended up taking away more than half of the sushi platter.

the staff were friendly (as usual) and helpful. one of the waiters helped us pack the sushi into a nice round takeaway container. one thing i regret is not asking for the names of the sword fish like fish and the name of the seared fish sushi i had. i’m glad we went to sushi bluefin that night as they have never disappointed us. i wonder when we’ll go there again..

this is the fiance’s post! here i present yass buffet at strathfield,  which we went sometime in December 2012! the part that attracted us was the cheap lunch buffet; however, upon calling, we found out that there is no wagyu for lunch (yes we love our wagyu!) and hence we booked a dinner buffet instead. the place is quite close to strathfield station, so it was a quick walk to the restaurant.

first impression, clean and nice, plenty of good. the good lady assured me that there is no time limit, so we can take it easy. the service is good, grills are changed frequently (and they do get dirty quite quickly!) and food is yummy. i personally loved the wagyu, and both of us ate a lot of it! here are some photos of the wagyu taken pre-cooked and during cooking:

a close up of the octopi we had:

c enjoyed cooking octopus so she did that; i just ate them!

some other dishes of the night including prawn tempura, sushi, japcheh and honey chicken. there was also soup and rice, but we didnt have much of that. i think we did have ice cream for dessert, but that was so long ago and we don’t have any photos of that.

the buffet was yummy, price was reasonable at $30 per head, all in all a good night!

hi 🙂

so as promised, i’m updating this blog as much as i can!

i’ve wanted to write about ben’s thai for a long time already so i’ve decided to finally dedicate a post to their awesomeness. my fiance and i have shared a lot of memories at ben’s thai, we’ve been there many times both before and after we started dating. the first time my fiance went, the lunch menu was only $6! now, i believe it has gone up to about $8 (which is still unbelievably cheap). every time we go, he would order 101 (deep friend chicken) with fried rice for an extra $2 (i think). i would almost always order the lard na with beef (gravy soup flat rice noodles with beef).

the lard na is served boiling hot – so hot that it is still bubbling. i always manage to burn my mouth when i eat it but it’s worth it! with winter coming up, i can’t wait to have it again!

i always end up eating at least a quarter of my fiance’s meal… but of course i’d let him eat some of mine as well. ben’s fried rice is amazing. it is quite oily but the veggies that come along with it cancels out the fattyness. right? haha!

i’ve also tried the pad see ew and the sukiyaki. even though they are both amazing, i just keep going back to lard na. though maybe next time, i’ll have the sukiyaki again… *drools* we both can’t wait to go back to ben’s for a cheap and satisfying meal again!

c

hello 🙂

it’s been a while, haha! my fiance bought me this domain name so that we could both get into this seriously! we’ve also bought a new camera (his name is sunny!) so we could take better quality pics and share it here! and now, let’s get on to my first post in AGES!

it’s been a long time since i’ve dined at a hotel. grace hotel is tucked in a quiet corner just a short walk from the station. it was a cold and rainy night but upon entering the hotel, i was greeted by warm smiles from staff at the reception area.

the dinner buffet at grace hotel is on the second floor. we decided to do a pre-dinner workout and took the stairs! once we got to the buffet area, we were again greeted by friendly staff and upon presenting our voucher, we were led to a table by the window.

there weren’t many different selection of food. the seafood area had prawns, smoked salmon, diy salad bar (with bacon, scrambled eggs, croutons, salad dressing and more), potato salad, seafood salad, and this amazing pasta which had bocconcini and broccoli. the hot food section was limited but satisfying. at the carvery station, only lamb was being served (which i don’t eat). other interesting stuff included tempura barramundi, chicken with eggplant and bread crumbed scallops.

as usual, we overate so we had to rest for about 10 – 20 minutes before moving onto dessert. but before we did, fiance walked past a really cool looking coffee machine and got me a hot chocolate… it was a pretty awesome hot chocolate! i only had a tiny slice of cheese, a little cake and some ice cream for dessert. i was really pushing it after the hot chocolate but how could anyone ignore all you can eat ice cream!

overall, we really enjoyed our night at grace hotel’s buffet. the service was great and the food was satisfying. though we think the hot food selection would need some improvement with winter coming. after the meal, we enjoyed a 15 minute sit on their super soft sofas while resisting the urge to fall asleep. i was so sure we were going to get kicked out!

so that’s it for today. i’m going to try harder to blog more frequently!

c

hi all! i’ve been updating my blog so frequently because i have nothing to do. i’ve finished my degree in november last year and worked for a few months but now i’m unemployed! oh well. i’m sure i’ll find a job eventually!

anyway, as i mentioned, this post will be about wasabi bistro at surry hills and their fail-gyu steak and how they managed to redeem themselves the second time i went. i think i should split this post into two entries.

my fiance bought two wasabi bistro vouchers for us earlier and we decided to go there for one of our special occasions. the voucher we got comes with tuna tartar, steamed gyoza, salmon tataki, tempura, choice of sushi roll, two mains with miso soup and finally two ice creams of our choice.

here’s the tuna tartar. i don’t like raw fish so my fiance had most of it. i picked out bits and pieces of potato and ate that. there’s a very generous serving of red and black caviar and i had most of that. i remember the black caviar was a lot saltier than the red one. on the other hand, there was too little sauce which is a pity because it was delicious. i’m not sure what the yellow sauce is but the brown sauce is some kind of sweet miso like sauce.

next up were the steamed gyoza. these were pretty good. we loved the sauce (soy sauce with dashi and mirin?) that comes with it.

then came the salmon tataki (seared salmon). my fiance loved these and said they were perfect. pity about the portion though. there were only 4 pieces (if i remember correctly). and once again, i didn’t have this because i don’t eat raw fish. i tried raw salmon once upon a time and absolutely hated it. i thought it was slimy. i guess i was traumatised by that incident.

the tempura! i don’t usually like battered stuff but i like tempura because of the light batter which doesn’t make me sick after two bites. the tempura was so nicely done. the dish contained a piece of prawn, eggplant (which my fiance hates), sweet potato or pumpkin (we can never tell in tempura), and some other veggies. there wasn’t enough sauce again but the waiter kindly got us some more.

we ordered the seared salmon sushi roll (dragon roll? i forgot). once again, my fiance ate most of it because of the salmon. i ate some of the rice rolls minus the avocado and cucumber.

finally, after 5 courses, my wagyu steak came. at first sight, it seemed a little cooked and i was surprised by the sauce as i like my wagyu without any sauce.

here’s what the inside of the steak looked like. i could find any traces of wagyu ‘juice’ (aka fat, grease, marbling etc). as i begin to freak out a little, i reassured myself that everything will be okay. i took one chunk of the steak and realised that the steak was over seasoned with pepper. there was absolutely no juice coming out from the meat. i thought to myself, “are you kidding me? this is definitely not wagyu!!!”. it was FAIL-GYU. i was so disappointed and gave most of my beef steak to my fiance and spent the rest of the dinner grumbling about how disappointed i was. when the ice cream came, i was feeling better because i LOVE ice cream. i ordered the green tea ice cream but was too unhappy to take a photo. after dessert, we grumbled to each other about what we were going to do about the other voucher. we bought it just for the wagyu and was utterly disappointed…

to be continued…

hi all! *completely ignoring the fact that she hasn’t blogged in 4 months*

yesterday, i went to burgerlicious in kings cross (with a voucher!) and tried the MOAB burger. honestly it was a little disappointing. after walking from central to townhall and then finally reaching kings cross on a hot and stuffy day, we sat down on the wooden chairs and dumped our stuff on the wooden table. i’ve got to say i absolutely love their tables; the mahogany wood and cleanliness of it was just wonderful!

the MOAB burger consists of wagyu beef, grilled onions, pineapple, bacon, free-range egg, cheese, beetroot relish, tomato, lettuce, special sauce and ketchup. my fiance went up to order our burgers but i didn’t want pineapple, beetroot relish or tomato. we were starving by the time we got there, thanks to the horrible stuffiness and long walk. the wait seemed like so long but it was probably just about 5 – 10 minutes. we needed to wash our hands but there wasn’t a toilet in site around that shopping centre. our burgers came after we made use of some tissue and water we brought along to clean our hands. i was so excited!

the burger looked so delicious! to my surprise, my chips had chicken salt sprinkled on them. awesome! after taking the photo above, i opened up my burger to check if they remembered my order. although they didn’t put the beetroot relish, tomato and pineapple, i was very saddened to see that they have also left out my cheese and grilled onions… i stole some of my fiance’s cheese and realised it was cheddar cheese. a particularly strong type too. i guess i was thankful they left it out or it may have made my burger worst.

i thought the wagyu pattie was a little tough and lacking juice. the chips were good. they got a little sickening as i was quite full after my burger! my fiance enjoyed his burger but was disappointed that i was disappointed. oh well!

coming up next: wagyu sausages?!

🙂