A Sydney Food Post!

okays. for those who read my blog, ull know i headed up to sydney a couple of days back and i gathered some food reviews of places i went so here it is!

Tuesday Breakfast
I flew a budget airline at 9am that morning so I didnt really have time to make and catch any sort of breakfast before I left for the airport at freaking-far-Avalon. So here's what I did: I bought food on board the budget flight! Was feeling peckish although I later suffered from motion sickness, so I got myself a cookie!

Surprise surprise!

Jetstar sells the premier range of Emporio Arnotts cookies! There was only one flavour which was triple chocolate chip and because I was so excited that the flight sold premier brands of cookies I decided to blog about this as well. Haha.

But frankly the cookie was really nice. Melts in your mouth and not too sweet. Perfect if you had a cuppa beside you as well.

Rating: 7/10. =)

Tuesday Lunch:
the moment i arrived, my friends whisked me to yumcha! the restaurant was opposite The Peak Apartments at Market City.

Marigold Restaurant.
Can you read this?

Yumcha there was realllieee good! It's the best one i've had thus far and its better than the reallie expensive ones in Melbourne! Complete with the cantonese waiters and waitresses with trolleys and pushcarts, they had a delectable variety of yumcha dishes to choose from. there were even trolleys that made fried carrot cake for you on the spot!

Let's see what we had..

We ordered:
- Siew mai and har gao
- Char siew bao
- Char siew soh
- Vegetarian mock meat roll
- Fong zhao (Chicken feet)
- Steamed pork spare ribs
- Fried noodles
- Pei dan porridge
- Fried yam balls with prawn
- Paper prawn with mayonaise
- Lor mai gai (Sticky rice)
- Beancurd
- Mango pudding
- Mango crepe

I think that should be it although I believe there was more though coz we were stuffed after that!

Helping ourselves to the food..

And wah lah! Almost gone!

The service there was really good with friendly staff peddling their food to each table. Tea was refilled promptly like almost every 5-10 minutes. I wasnt sure which session we caught because we went to eat yumcha at about 1pm. The trolleys continued going around even though they had already passed us once or twice, which was good because in some places in Melbourne you actually have to grab the chance when the food is there coz it only comes once. So like for desserts, you have to grab it even though you havent even had your fill of the salty food yet.

The har gao was okay because their prawns werent big enough for me, hee.. but their char siew bao and char siew sohs were really good! the char siew was really well done and it was dark red and not artifically coloured like those bright red ones you sometimes get in chinatown or cheap chinese places.. and the meat wasnt too fatty with only one or two pieces of fat in the bun itself.. the lor mai gai (sticky rice) was pretty yummy too given that i hadnt had lor mai gai in a while now..Pei dan porridge was also tasty.. i didnt have to add any pepper in it and it was tasty enough! =)

But the highlight for me here would have to be the desserts. We tried the mango crepes which were new to me. I wasnt too sure about what the crepe was made of, whether it had mango in the batter or it just consisted of egg yolks and flour but inside.. it was heavenly.. there was cream and mango pieces inside the crepe which was delectable when you bit into it.. you know like how doughnuts have cream in them and it oozes out after you bite into it, this was the same.. the cream had a tinge of mango flavour in it as well which made it really nice.. The beancurd was really good as well, as it was really smooth and it wasnt all too sweet. There was a slight tinge of ginger in the sugar syrup but I didnt notice it until we almost finished the bowl. One of the better beancurds I have had in Australia but of course it cannot beat the ones we have back home..

The best dessert in the house was the mango pudding. This mango pudding is heavenly upon heavens. If I thought the mango crepe was good, this was excellent! Its the best mango pudding I have had so far and the milk on top made it even niceeerrr..

As you can see from the picture, the layer of milk was on top and the mango pudding and real bite-sized mango pieces in it! the pudding itself had mango puree like stuff in it so it was really mango-y but it wasnt sickeningly sweet to that extent.. you could finish up the whole thing on your own! =)

Rating: 7.5-8/10. The service there really made the difference. It was the first time I've come across such good service for someone who doesnt speak cantonese but english at a yumcha place in Australia..

Tuesday Tea Time!
Yes we had tea. Of coz you could tell by this time we were on an eating mission in sydney. we were at bondi beach and walking along the street when my friend introduced me to this:

Looook..

Ta dah! Fried Mars Bar!

I know i know.. you may go 'eEEEewww.. Fried mars bar???' I did that too and couldnt figure out how they would make such a thing.. well, I didnt get to find out how they actually fried the thing but when i tried it, it really tasted good! the icing sugar on top made it sweet with the crispy batter and when you sink your teeth into it, mars chocolate flows out! you know how the mars bar is layed with chocolate, caramel and some soft nougat? this is the same! so its really quite an interesting combination.. but its not something you'll have on your own after a full stomach though.. haha..

Rating: 7.5/10 for the fried mars bar.

Tuesday Dinner:
Hoookays. I cant believe how much food i managed to gorge on the entire day of tuesday but im glad it was only for tuesday. haha. lets see. for dinner we had korean! at this place called Seoul Ria along George Street in the city of Sydney!

Seoul Ria, with authentic korean waiters and waitresses as well a head korean mistress in charge of the place

We had a window seat and this was what we saw if we looked out of the window!

We ordered a soup dish, chicken and pork bulgogi on hotplates, fried glass noodles and stew rice.
Lookie here..

Rating: 6/10

Hmm.. my previous blog about korean food was much better than this place, but I guess why i would pass this review was because of its location and ambience.. It was a really nice and busy restaurant where you can see people hustling and bustling around with food for the customers. each table also had a buzzer where you pressed it and your table number would come up on the display near the cashier and notify whoever was free to attend to that table. cool huh.. it looked busily organised.. haha..

Wednesday Lunch
Location: Pancake on the Rocks at Circular Quay

Pancake on the Rocks - very much like Melbourne's very own pancake parlour. Except ours is better. =p

What I had with the girls:
- Chicken Caesar Salad
- BBQ Pork Ribs
- Hot 'N Tropp Pancakes

Here we see the salad on the right and the pancakes with the melting chocolate icecream on the left.

The salad was really good. One of the better chicken caesar salads I've had around with well-marinated chicken pieces as well as a sufficient amount of dressing among the leaves, croutons and bacon bits. A boiled/poached egg was missing though but the cheese in the salad made up for it.

The pancakes had grilled bananas, walnuts and chocolate icecream with cream on it. The pancake itself was abit too thick and it wasnt sweet enough unless you took a bite of the bananas as well. Abit disappointing but nevertheless it was sufficient as a dessert.

Our BBQ Pork Ribs.

It was served with wedges and sour cream and salad greens on the side. The sauce was pretty good but the ribs were so tiny in size! The ones in Cafe Cartel in Singapore are even larger than the ribs here! So, a no-no if you're a ribs lover and you decide to come here. Best choice here was definitely the caesar salad.


This was a pancake ordered by one of the guys. It was chocolate pancakes with chocolate fudge and strawberries. I tried a mouthful of the chocolate pancake and my verdict? Pancake parlour's chocolate pancakes are nicer in tasty chocolate flavour than this one.

Rating: 6.5/10.

Thursday Brunch
Sydney Fish Market was the last stop in Sydney.

I had a lobster and shared sashimi with chengy. The sashimi was really gooooooodd. Fresh and refreshing. It was the first time I had tasted good maguro.. in the past ive always only had salmon sashimi and i decided to give this a go anyway.. and it turned out really yummy~~ oishii~

The lobster on the other hand was ok. So-so. It had melted cheese and cream inside the half lobster shell. Wasnt fantastic but i guess i had too high an expectation. =p

Rating: 7/10 for sashimi, 6/10 for the lobster.

On the way back
Krispy Kremes!

I bought three boxes back. Hahaha. My first time buying Krispy Kremes!

Enjoying it now and i've picked up some favourites. I'm sure everyone has their favourites like Strawberries & Cream and Custurd or Original but so far I really like the Chocolate & Cream doughnut. Yummmmmieee~ =D

Food review - Ocean King Restaurant
Location: Glen Waverly
Meal: Dinner for 7 girls

Menu for the night:
- Fried chicken in orange sauce
- Honey soy chicken
- Seafood tofu
- Oyster sauce stir fried vegies

Yes.. we almost wanted to order the lobster in the house but its companions looked too lonely if we ate it so we decided to order it some other day. =p haha.

And here, you can see the honey soy chicken in the foreground, with sesame seeds sprinkled on top. Not as nice as the one at Wah Kee in Clayton to me. I prefer more honey and smaller bite-sized pieces..

In the background on the left hand side, you have the orange sauce chicken which was pretty unique and yummy. It had a slight tangy taste to the fried chicken which was pleasant. Apparently it was one of the restaurant's specialty. On the right hand side, you had the seafood tofu (i think). Again, it was so-so to me. Wah Kee at Clayton serves excellent tie-ban tofu though. =/

Although it was mostly so-so, we finished everything on the table except the vegies in the far right background. I can't really remember why but I figured I only took the last picture when I realised the vegies were the last to arrive.

Complimentary dessert - sago with almond pudding, or something of that sort. It didnt go down well for me coz i dislike almond. =(

Rating: 6/10. I think it's just me though but I've had better at other chinese restaurants for dinner although their specialty orange sauce chicken was pretty good!

Izu Izakaya
64a River Esplanade Yarra's Edge (70 Lorimer St, Sth Melb) Docklands
ph: 9646 2400
http://www.ikuizakaya.com.au/

Tucked away in a quiet little area of Docklands, Izu Izakaya took a little time to get to, partly because the restaurant was hidden behind a building. Parking was rather tight along the service road as there were apartments/condos nearby which probably utilised these parkings as well.

The restaurant had a dim/dark setting with mood lighting. I rather enjoyed the atmosphere of the place. Other than a nice view of the docks outside, we were required to sit on the floor/cushion japanese-style to have dinner, which was great! The only thing missing from the picture was a nice warm heater under the table =D

We ordered Umeshu (plum wine), mixed with soda water as drinks - my cousin has always raved about Choya but i never actually got down to trying it till that night. lol. and she was right! yum! i'm now a converted fan XD

We ordered Agedashi tofu for starters - it was done really well! the tofu was still crispy hot even after leaving it in the sauce for a bit of time, and who can resist the ginger/onion shavings on the top?

I also had 3 oysters with ponzu chilli lemon and flying fish roe - it looked so tantilizing on the plate! *drool drool* Apparently the restaurant only orders in a dozen oysters every day to ensure the freshness of the oysters. I was tempted to order more, but at $2.70 pp, i decided 3 was more than enough to contribute to the draining of TJ's bank account.

The oysters were REALLY fresh and silky smooth! There was one piece that had a bit of sand in it though, unfortunately. The toppings on the oysters were an interesting combination, but i think they topped a bit TOO much radish on it which hid the taste of the oysters.

Our Yakitori Platter came almost right after we had a bite of tofu, and once it arrived TJ and i knew we both ordered too much... again!

There were 2 skewers of the following: Wafu steak (Beef with Japanese radish), Tsukune (Chicken meatballs), Hotate (Grilled scallops), Bacon & Asparagus, Tori (Chicken thigh), Mushrooms, Nasu (Eggplant)

It all tasted great! Even the bacon & asparagus which initially looked (and sounded!) a bit too adventurous for us. My favourites from the platter were the Nasu, Mushrooms and Hotate! *hearts*

The next dish was the Seafood Tempura which had assorted vegetables, soft shell crab, prawns, white fish and squid. It tastes much better than it looks in the photo - i couldn't get enough of the soft shell crab and prawns! It was crispy yet moist inside, and dipped with the sauce, was just delicious!

I was literally bursting when the waitress served my Sushi and Sashimi platter. They must've thought we were crazy to be eating so much for two.

The fish was quite fresh, but I've tasted fresher tuna before so it was slightly disappointing, but still good. After force-feeing TJ nigiri rolls, I finished the plate! whew.. was so glad I convinced TJ to order it for ONE person rather than 2!

You'd think we learnt our lesson and just stop eating after that, but nooooo.. we had to have dessert. Ordered the green tea ice-cream which we polished off quickly! The ice-cream was smooth and didn't leave a slight bitter tea taste, which I enjoyed. Would've been a nice touch if there was red bean at the side though.

So that was our pig-out night - I was literally dying from over-eating all the way back and TJ's poor bank account had another major setback. Shouldn't he be relieved that anniversaries only come once a year? XD

Overall, the service was fantastic, and the food was great! Atmosphere was very good too - it's a great place for a quiet/romantic dinner, and they have a seperate room for group bookings. The only downside would probably be the prices - not exactly a weekly dining venue I guess! =) Overall rating would be 8 1/2!

Labels: Japanese