Pomegranate restaurant in Kingston - 20 November 2019

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Present: Megan, Ron, Karen, Jim, John, Kim

A special dinner for Jim's birthday, so no dish by dish description except to say it was brilliant.  We dined à la carte.  This was after the argument about should we have the banquet or the dègustation (much pouting from Ron) and since we couldn't decide, the à la carte was it.  The highlight was the wine, 1991 Penfolds Bin 407 and 2011 Leewin Estate Chardonnay.  Very very special and memorable.  Thanks Jim!!!

Chinatown Restaurant at Weston - 23 October 2019

Karen, Jim, Kim, John, Ron, Megan

We didn't take notes for this meal.  Suffice to say that if you go to Chinatown, don't order off the menu but ask the chef Linda to cook a special meal for you and you will get the best cheap Asian meal in Canberra.  Some of the dishes are her grandmother's, some are her own or her own variations, but you'll be assured of a great meal, interesting food at a very reasonable price.

Portia's Place in Kingston - 6 November 2019

Present: Jim, Kim, Andrew, John, Megan Ron.

Andrew is still with us which is nice.

We really enjoyed this meal, every dish was well received.  The duck pancakes were lovely and meaty, not too greasy.
The soft shell crab pretty nice; the lamb shiraz hot pot had a great seczhwan pepper taste; pork spare ribs in aromatic tangy dark sauce was sweet and tender: the beans and chicken were the highlight, stir fried with a chilli bean sauce and the eggplant stuffed with prawns had sufficient black beans for most of us except Kim.

All in all, thoroughly pleasant meal.  The service was quick and efficient, the restaurant is a bit noisy particularly when there was a table of very young people (6 years old) next to us consuming chocolate cake but they left very quickly.

A good night.

My's at Weston 9 October 2019

China Tea House 14 August 2019

Small group, Andrew, John and Ron

Duck pancakes - excellent
Dry fried spicy lamb - favourite of the night, spicy, lovely sharp vinegary sauce
Yu Yuang egg plant - next favourite, very spicy, but still very nice
Stir fried fish fillets with snow peas and snap peas, a bit bland by comparison with the other dishes, but livened up by the two different pea accompaniments
Sticky date pudding, great to finish with on a cold night

Chairman and Yip 1-8-19

Present:

Megan (my birthday dinner); Kim, Ron, John, Karen (Jim was looking after the dog).

We had one entree as the rest didn't really do much for us.

The five mains we had were duck, lamb, pork, eggplant and tofu.
Most of us enjoyed the meat dishes but the ones I preferred the most were the tofu and eggplant.
Chairman and Yip seems to be the most Chinese of this group of restaurants.  All the dishes were done really well but there was not so much experimentation or fusion kind of cooking but more a combination of various styles of Chinese.

I wonder if we couldn't find any number of cheaper restaurants around Canberra serving up the same quality of food.  I think we were paying the extra for the ambience and service.