Mr Wei's, Civic, 29 January 2014

No report yet.

Joe's Thai - Wanniassa 12 February 2014

Entree

• Fish Cakes
• Fresh Rice Paper Rolls
• Spring Rolls (Prawn)

 
Mains

• Beef Massaman Curry
• Yum Ped? (Roast Duck)
• Stuffed Eggplant
• Crispy Calamari with five Spices
• Pad Thai 

Dessert

• Banana Fritters (Caramel)

 

Wine (BYO $3 per bottle corkage)

Xanadu 2005 Margaret River Cabernet Sauvignon 
 

Present: Jim, Karen, Kim, John, Ron

This restaurant is fabulous - don't be fooled by the simple name.

The service was very prompt.
Loved the Rice Paper Rolls - very moist and the (accompanying/garnish) salad was very nice and very fresh.

The chilli in the roast duck dish was hot, but the lime juice sauce was great. 

All dishes were good but the duck was tops.

The Pad Thai had fantastic flavour.
The Beef Curry was well cooked.

The Calamari is beautifully cooked.

Banana Fritters - Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!!!!

Red Hill Tea House Wednesday 15 January

Present:

John, Ron, Megan, Kim, Andrew,Karen, Jim

Red Hill Tea House is an unpretentious little restaurant which seems to cater mainly for locals and take aways.  They have a Burmese chef, so as well as the usual Chinese dishes that you find at restaurants like this, they have added Burmese and Thai food.  We’d been there before and liked it, and decided to kick off the new year there, for no reason that anyone could think of.

We had:

Angel prawns

Duck and onion puffs.

Mains:

Stir fry duck chilli and basil

Red Hill special spicy crispy fish

Pad Siew

Burmese chicken red curry

Mapo tofu with beef

Yushian lamb

Wine: Three bottles, one sparkling, one white and Fox Creek, Mclarenvale, shiraz cabernet sauvignon cabernet franc 2011.

The prawns came in cute individual ramekins with lids on, tasted as good as they looked.  The main flavour was lime leaves, delicious

The puffs were not really a winner, too much onion, couldn’t really tell it was duck.  They all disappeared though.

Of the mains, our favourite was the duck with chilli and basil.  Cooked perfectly, nice mix of chilli and basil, brilliant.

The fish was a favourite also, really excellent with a beautiful mix of chilli and lime.

The lamb was tender, with lots of veges, and the chicken curry came in third, a lighter curry, no coconut cream, fabulous.

The disappointments were the mapo and the noodles.  The mapo was bland, the beef didn’t work and it needed more dark soy.  The noodles were too sweet, just not exciting.

We had some icecreams for dessert, yum.

The overall verdict?  Great little place to eat, not for a huge night out but for a nice relaxed meal with friends.

Elk and Pea 11 December 2013

Not byo, so we had:

490 metres Cab Merlot Central Victoria 2010

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

Elk and Pea, wow.  We saw an advert for it in the food section of the Canberra Times, thought we would check it out to continue our American continent food explorations.

It’s a new, “hip” bar/restaurant/café in the middle of all the bike shops etc in Lonsdale Street.  A cute little place, with cute décor, pictures on the ceiling, peacock on the rafters etc.  A very casual place to eat, some large tables, some benches etc, which seems to be the trend these days.  It could be a bit noisy perhaps, but we were in a table in the middle, not so bad.

The food is geared to sharing, so that suited us of course.  We were warned that one main is usually big enough for two people, which definitely turned out to be the case.

We had:

• Ceviche
• Quinoa and zucchini
• Mussels
• Pork belly
• Chicken jerk
• Goat stew

This list doesn’t really do it justice, the tastes were fabulous, new, interesting.

The ceviche was a lime/mango flavoured fish on top of a corn chip, with avocado and radish.  Really really nice (not sure about the fried potato chips though).

The quinoa was light, crunchy, with cumin, corn, tomato, and some other surpising ingredients.

The mussels came with a think tomato sauce, chilli and chorizo, it was very tasty and very Italian

The pork belly was tender, sweet, no bones.  Chicken was fabulous.  It was moist and flavoursome, chargrilled plus something else done to it, we couldn’t work that out.  It was not bland like chicken can sometimes be, but had a flavour we couldn’t identify, which I thought was allspice/pimento and which turned out to be one of a number of spices.

The goat, ho hum, a bit bland and nothing really.

Desserts?  Well Ron and I had the donut, very wicked and absolutely yummy.  Jim had the chocolate mousse thingey which tasted lovely but looked unfortunate.  Much hilarity ensued regarding its appearance.

Soul Food, Erindale Shops 27 November 2013

Chicken wings

Ron with the Shrimp and Crab cakes

Karen with the Gumbo

Jim with the fish

Wine Picarus Wrattonbully 2010 Shiraz

Mystic Sounds, 2012 Sauvignon Blanc Marlborough

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

We had:

• Buffalo chicken wings
• Victor’s smoking ribs
• Louisiana Crab cakes
• Shrimp creole
• Blackened barramundi
• Chicken and sausage gumbo

Not sure why we deviated from our normal Asian fare, but Andrew (who in the end couldn’t come because he had a meeting with his Thai people) suggested it as something new.

It’s in the area opposite the Erindale Shops, where there are lots of restaurants, and lots of cars trying to park so people can go to these restaurants.  We had been to the Vietnamese place that had previously been in these premises.

Overall we enjoyed it.  The chicken wings were hot and spicy, with a hint of paprika, or was it chilli, with a touch of mayonnaise on top.  They came on top of a plate of chips, which was a strange touch for an entrée, but of course they got eaten.

The fish had a lovely lime/mango coconuty flavour, it was yummy, as were the crab cakes which were nice, very delicate with a lovely texture.  The salad went well with them.

Now the spare ribs, which we nearly didn’t order, were absolutely to die for.  The sauce was amazing, a fabulous smokey flavour, the meat fell off the bone.  We all dived in, wanting more, and Kim bought the recipe book so that she could make them.

The Gumbo and the shrimp dishes were both a bit strange, odd flavour.  Maybe this is what they are supposed to taste like and it’s just that we are not used to these kinds of flavours.

The wait staff, and the boss didn’t like the fact we were taking photos and said it was not allowed!!!.  It seems as though someone on a social media/blog site has given them a bad wrap, so they are forbidding photos.  The boss also came out towards the end, noticed we were taking notes and got a bit twitchy.  This was a bit unfortunate, as it put a bit of a damper on our mood.  If he’s getting bad reviews he should do something about the food, not something about social media.

He loosened up after a bit, had a chat, got his trumpet out and played happy birthday to Jim.  When we were leaving he had ensconced  himself at the other table that was left in the restaurant, and was having a great time.

There weren’t that many people in the restaurant when we were there, which was just as well because I think it would have been another one of those really loud places, with sound bouncing off the ceiling and walls, not ideal for the baby boomers.

Overall, good place, worth going to but make sure you have the spare ribs.

Lantern Room October 16

I didn't manage to get there (was in Perth), so missed out on what the others said was the best meal of the year.
They had the degustation, with an extra fish. They asked to change the barramundi for the ling but were told no, they couldn't, so they ended up with both!.   On another note, I went there the other night with family and asked to change two of the degustation dishes, and that was not problem.

The overall feedback was Ron (swoon and in heaven): others made comments such as "fabulous" "absolutely spectacular" " best meal", "really great".  Wine was amazing (Marlborough SB).  The 3 dishes which really blew them out were the Waygu beek, the barramundi and the ling.  Plus the lamb chops were beautiful.

Delissio 30 October

Wine:Grant Burge Pino Gris 2011
Saperavi _ Alpine Valley - King Valley Gapstead

We ordered a few of the tapas style dishes to start off with, they looked so interesting.  The pork belly was not really exciting, calamari nice and crisp with a polenta crust: the chicken seemed to have a satay sauce and was nicely presented with a cucumber salad. The steamed endamane beans were something different, subtle  but nice tasting once we had worked out how to eat them

For secondi, we ordered Gnocchi verde, Linguini oceania and a penne pollo

The variety of pastas was good, but we felt there was a bit too much pesto on the gnochhi, the chicken was rich, but it was supposed to be.  The salad we ordered was nice, but should have been more.

Dessert was really yum, quite rich, not for those on a diet

Overall, the experience was pretty good, but had learnt from last time not to order too much, the food here is very filling.