Oriental Terrace 7-6-17

 

 



 

 

 



 

 

Present: Karen, Jim, Megan, John, Lara,

We headed off to Erindale to visit an old favourite, the Oriental Terrace. It’s a family-friendly restaurant where the owners know all their regular customers, even those (like us) who haven’t been for a while.  Although the menu is predominantly Chinese, there is a reasonable selection of tasty Malaysian dishes.

We started our meal with the Spicy Crispy Duck (half) as an entrée.  Always a winner, the deep fried (dry style) duck is reliably delicious served with Hoisin sauce and Chinese pancakes. We then moved onto the Vegetarian Chinaman’s hat.  This dish has a nice mix of stir fried vegetables (including bean sprouts) with a light style sauce and a soft fried omelette.  Although we love this dish, it’s also served with Chinese pancakes and we thought it might be an odd choice after the spicy duck.  However the owner suggested serving it separately as a second entrée and this worked really well.  

For mains, we had 3 dishes (for 5 people) – the Shantung chicken, BBQ pork and vegetables and the seafood combination with crispy rice.  The seafood was the pick of the main dishes.  It had a nice selection of seafood in a lovely creamy “soup”.  The crispy rice (which was added at the table to maintain its crispiness) mopped up the delicious sauce and gave the dish a nice textural contrast.  It was a wonderfully filling dish for a cold winter’s night.  

The other dishes weren’t as good as the seafood.  Although the Shantung chicken is normally excellent, this version was a little spicy for our taste and didn’t have the crispy skin we had come to expect.   The BBQ pork was also quite nice but a little bland – the BBQ pork was overshadowed by the vegetables when it should have been the other way around.

For dessert (yes, there was room again), we had a mix of toffee bananas and apples to share. It was a nice light way to finish the meal.  

Overall, a great night and we’ll be back again.

 

 



Joe's Thai 12-4-17

Rubicon 24 May 2017

 

 

 

Ron's birthday restaurant pick!! 5 course degustation (included dessert) – we chose 4 mains dishes from the a la carte menu plus we each had an individual dessert of our choice.

We chose 2 "starters" and 2 "mains" Diners: John, Jim, Ron, Kim, Karen and Andrew

Starters: Roasted pork belly – delicious

Seared scallops and confit chicken - lots of flavour for bit sized portions

Mains:

Wagyu Beef Fillet with béarnaise sauce – Delicious with generous serve of béarnaise sauce.

      Duck confit, with oyster and Swiss brown mushrooms – very good

Dessert:
Spiced rum panna cotta, fig and ginger ice cream, drunken figs – very rich and creamy (Kim had this)

Chocolate tart – looked good (Jim chose this one)

Sorbet (John had the sorbet) Pedro Ximenez cheesecake, strawberries, rhubarb, citrus crumb, basil (Ron had this and so did Andrew)

Ginger and lime crème brulee – lovely and light and a nice complement to the richer mains (Karen had this one)

Accompaniments:

Complimentary shoestring fries with smoked paprika – delicious. Came at the same time as the steak and the béarnaise sauce. The béarnaise sauce was a great dipping sauce for the fries Additional comments: Complimentary amuse bouche: 1st Calamari (prior to the commencement of the meal) 2nd lemon sorbet (before dessert)

Kinh Do Macquarie 26-4-17

Jewel of India 29-3-17

Diners: John, Megan, Jim, Karen, Ron

Entrees:  Chicken Tikka and Tali Macchi, Pappadams

Mains: Prawn Curry Goanese, Dum ka Gosht (lamb), Malai Kofta Kasmiri (cottage cheese dumplings), Dal Makhni (Black Lentils), Rice, Naan, Raita

Desserts: Gulab Jaman, mango and pistachio kulfis

Our most recent Wednesday night dinner was at the Jewel of India in Manuka.  The service and food were excellent – yet another good Indian restaurant in Canberra (who knew we would have so many!) 

For entrees, we started with Chicken Tikka (boneless tandoor chicken) and Tali Macchi (Fried Perch fillets flavoured with carom seeds and black pepper).  The chicken tikka pieces were beautifully moist and charred nicely on the outside.  The fried fish was also good – perfectly cooked fish coated in a deliciously spiced batter. 

The mains were all fantastic and we couldn’t pick a favourite dish.  We all enjoyed the Goanese prawn curry whose mild lime coconut curry sauce complemented the sweet delicate prawn meat. Our only meat dish (Dum ka Gosht ) was  also divine.  Described as meat “napped” herbs and spices and simmered in a smooth gravy over a slow fire, the meat (lamb) was so tender, it just melted in our mouths. 

We ordered 2 vegetarian dishes – the Malai Kofta (Cottage cheese dumplings in a cashew nut gravy) and Dal Makhni (black lentils with tomatoes, garlic, butter and cream).  The kofta were very nice but similar to other dishes we’ve had. The black lentils were more unusual and these REALLY yummy – the butter and cream gave the dish a nice mouth feel which worked a treat with the more robust lentils. 

We were all very full with the rich food but as usual, could still fit in dessert – Ron ordered Gulab jaman (with icecream), Jim had a mango kulfi and Megan and Karen shared a pistachio kulfi – standard dishes but all done well…a great way to end the meal!