Moon Park (Redfern, Sydney)

Moon Park was one of the first modern Korean restaurants in Sydney which stirred up a whole hosts of interest in the Korean cuisine. When it first opened I recall reading many positive reviews of critics and food bloggers.

DD and I finally got a chance to dine there just before Christmas. I was a little worried that my expectations might be too high after reading so many positive reviews but no such thing happened! :)

Be aware of the nondescript black door which opens up to a short flight of stairs. I would have walked past it and not realised Moon Park was just up the flight of stairs! It opens up to a rather open space of tables filled with diners.

Not long after we were seated we were served a side of soy braised beans. At first bite I found it quite salty due to the strong soya taste but something about those beans became addictive and I kept going back for more.

We decided to go for the banquet menu as we had not been there before.

Cucumber kimchi with fresh nashi and perilla - great flavours and I was surprised that the cucumber was still very crunchy.

Deep fried rice cakes with gochujang and peanuts (Ddokbeokki) - interesting chewy rice cakes. I liked it.

Bulgogi beef short rib and anchovy in sweet cabbage (Ssam) - I enjoyed the savoury flavours of the tender ribs. Wrapping the beef in the cabbage reminded me of the Chinese sang choi bow.

Sea urchin and black garlic on seed biscuit - I was initially hesitant to try this as I didn't think I would like the taste of sea urchin. But it was surprisingly tender and delicately offset by the crunchy seed biscuit which had a strong sesame flavour. Such a clever dish and one I thoroughly enjoyed.

Bowery Lane (Sydney CBD)

Bowery Lane opened not too long ago and conveniently for me, it is located a couple of blocks from my office. This lack of distance made it so easy for me to have a mid week dinner with my friends in celebration of one of their birthdays.

It is located in an office building and as we arrived just at 6.00 pm the main entrance to the restaurant was not open so we went up the stairs and entered via the side entrance. As a result of that, I got a glimpse of the kitchen.

As you can imagine, I would have pored over the online menu and as it was, there were so many dishes I wanted to try. Decisions, decisions!

We started by sharing a couple of snack size dishes.

Char grilled lamb ribs with chimichurri and rocket. The lamb was tender and went very well with the chimichurri.

Manchego croquettes with smoked chilli aioli. The croquettes were delicious, not overwhelmingly cheesy but made more interesting with the chilli kick from the aioli. A nice surprise!

We decided to share the 1 kg braised Wagyu short rib which was served with horse radish cream and roasted garlic. I don't think my picture does justice to how beautiful this meat was. It was literally 'fall of the bone' tender and packed with flavour. I didn't need any sauce or cream with the meat. DELICIOUS!

Badmanner Thymes Espresso

Parramatta is certainly upping the cafe scene with new cafes opening up thick and fast. One of which is Badmanner Thymes Espresso. I know not why it has an unusual name but I have made a note to ask the owners one day!

Badmanner recently started opening on Saturdays. Thank goodness or I would not have had a chance to check it out!

It is a rather small cafe space wise but they managed to add a lot of personality to the decor. A sofa resides against one wall, with a guitar to the side and some Art Deco posters add to the feeling of hipster.

On our almost noon visit, we ordered a combination of breakfast and lunch dishes.

Eggs Benedict with Smoked Salmon, Spinach, topped with home made hollandaise sauce on sourdough bread. The dish looked 'eggsmazing'!! Sorry, I had to make that one up! I had a bite to try and there was a nice combination of flavours.

Beef Bulgogi roll with marinated thin slices of oyster blade beef, pickled white radish, Spanish onions, sweet potato chips and spinach with home made wasabi aioli and served in a wholemeal soft roll. My first thought when it was presented to me was how on earth am I going to it this humongous roll?!?!? And it even came with cutlery and there was no way I was going to be polite while downing this delicious roll!

Tender, juicy beef with sweet slices of onions. The offsetting texture of the slight crunch of the sweet potato chips amidst all that beef was good. I personally would have liked the sweet potato chips to be even crunchier.

Cafe Lyon (Lindfield, Sydney)

A couple of weeks ago my close friends organised a birthday dinner catch up and it ended up being French themed. This time it was at Cafe Lyon located in the north shore in Lindfield.

When you read this post, you will notice that I have 2 back to back French dinners posted. Lol! Not planned this way, but sometimes these things happen. :)

Cafe Lyon had a nice French feel to their decor. Touches of Paris could be seen in carafes placed around various shelves and posters which were French themed.

We were seated at the first floor and I was thankful for the great lighting. Food bloggers paradise! Yay!

We decided to go for the 3 course menu which was priced at $65 for 3 courses. Pretty good value I say!

Our entrees were:

Zucchini Flowers, French Goats Cheese, Baby Artichoke & Salted Walnut Salad. The verdict from my friend was it was delicious.

Crispy Pork Belly, Boudin Noir, Wilted Spinach & Lentils De Puy. Two of us had this entree and the pork belly was truly crispy with the delicious crackling. The addition of the lentils did bring a rather interesting element to the dish. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Our mains were:

Ocean Trout, French Onion Purée, Petit Pois a la Francais, Bacon and Champagne Velouté. The trout looked deliciously crispy and I was told it was delicious.

Cho Cho San (Potts Point, Sydney)

The name itself calls for attention. When I first read about Cho Cho San, it was the name of the restaurant that caught my eye. And after reading many positive reviews, I was keen to check it out.

A few weeks ago, there was an opportunity to have lunch here and it was nice that we could actually book a table for lunch.  As opposed to get there early and queue up for a table! When I stepped into the restaurant, my first impressions were bright, light, clean, and modern! I felt excited to be here! The great lighting in the restaurant brought a big food blogger's smile to my face! :)

What's so interesting about Cho Cho San is none of the people at the helm are of Japanese origin and yet the menu is Japanese focused with a modern interpretation.

The menu is divided into Small dishes, Raw bar, Hibachi grill, Others, Sweets and Feed Me Please.

From the Small dishes section, we chose:

Silken tofu in tomato dashi - super smooth tofu with a delicious, flavourful yet subtle dashi. Very elegant broth but so good!

Tempura pumpkin - the pumpkin was soft and sweet with a contrasting texture of the crunchy tempura batter.

Fried chicken - a generous plate of what I would say was a very popular dish with us. The mayo went so well with the fried chicken.

Prawn bun - I wish I could have had more of this. A warm and toasted bun which cradled a beautiful mix of sweet prawn meat which had touches of mayo. Yum to the max! More please! :)

Gia Hoi (Eastwood, Sydney)

Many moons ago I lived in the suburb of Eastwood. I knew every single restaurant, cafe and grocery shop around Eastwood. At that time I would frequent my favourites and knew of the new venues opening up.

That was then. Now I don't go to Eastwood much and this is mainly due to horrendous parking and burgeoning crowds that converge at Eastwood on the weekends. It can be quite off-putting and I tend to stay away unless I have to be there.

Which is the reason I didn't even realise that Gia Hoi had opened a branch in Eastwood. And according to the web, it has been opened for about 2 years. Sigh! Now this is what I would term 'slow as'!

So my checking out begins over 3 visits.

Bun Chao Tom - Grilled minced prawns with rice vermicelli. The minced prawn cake were thinly sliced and served over a bed of rice vermicelli with a side of fresh bean sprouts, pickled carrots and shredded lettuce. The dish was served with nuoc cham. Yum! I have a weakness for this dish. Loved how fresh the vegetables were and the prawn cake was full of flavour.

Bun Bo Hue Dac Biet - Special Pork and Beef with Rice a Vermicelli Soup which is hot and spiced based. I honestly cannot recall if I have ever tried this dish before but I have fallen in love with Bun Bo Hue.

March into Merivale 2014 at Est. (Sydney CBD)

Believe it or not, this is my first time attending a March into Merivale event ever! Why on earth haven't I taken advantage of a $33 meal at a 3 hatted restaurant is beyond my comprehension!

My dear friend CW was the one who suggested we do it and after deciding on a weeknight we met up at Est. for dinner. Having been to Est many moons ago I knew the quality of the food would be great and the service beyond par.

Once again, I was not disappointed. The $33 meal deal includes a main and a drink. The main options were:

1) Palmers Island Mulloway fillet, fennel, tomato, radish, pearl couscous, shellfish sauce.
2) Pan-roasted lamb rib eye, cumin seed spinach, green peas, tahini, chickpea shoots, lemon
3) Glazed beef cheeks, grilled pear, pickled onion, puffed rice, roast celeriac puree.

The 2 wine options were:
a) 2013 Villa Maria Cellar Selection Sauvignon Blanc
b) 2013 Villa Maria Cellar Selection Pinot Noir

We had the lamb rib eye and the glazed beef cheeks for our mains. Great selections. The beef was so tender it was practically melt-in-your-mouth. The lamb rib eye was apparently very good too, evidenced by a cleaned up plate.

Lamb rib eye

Beef cheeks

The wine of choice by my 2 friends was the Pinot Noir. I stuck to sparkling water.

Arisun (Chinatown, Sydney)

The project team were in town and we wanted to organise a nice and relaxing dinner as a thank you to the team for the tremendous long hours and hard work they had put in the past few months. After to-ing and fro-ing, we decided on firstly Korean fried chicken. Then we had to decide which restaurant, it was a pick between NaruOne and Arisun. This time Arisun won because of two reasons.

An open deck area and kegs of beer! The group consisting mainly of men would definitely warm to the beer! Get the pun? :)

What did we order? Here goes!

Spicy seafood on sizzling hot plate

Bibimbap (3 bowls mind you !)

Wasabi beef

Three Blue Ducks (Bronte, Sydney)

My regular readers must be so over me constantly saying 'this is another place I have been wanting to dine at'. It would seem my list is endless and forever changing to add more and more. But it is the truth so I do apologise to those who do read my blog regularly that I will constantly be saying lines like 'I have been wanting to check it out since it opened'. :)

Three Blue Ducks has been on my list for at least over a year now. There was an attempt to dine there last year with a friend of mine but those plans fell through and this time it all worked out!

It was a Saturday night and I elected for the 6.00 pm seating which meant we would have to leave around 8.15 for the next round of diners. Understandably so as it is a small restaurant and a very popular one at that!

I was so excited be to finally be here and I liked the cool vibe. There were some interesting pieces of mural art on the walls and some antique artefacts hanging on one of the walls. And I do like the corridor of sunshine with plants hanging off the walls! The bar area is located on one side of this corridor and the main restaurant is located on the other side.

We were seated in the bar section and the guys serving us were very friendly. I had a mocktail and CM and JM had cocktails.

We decided to share some small plates and ordered a few mains with the idea of sharing some of the mains too.

We started with:

Chicken liver parfait with Iggy's bread (from the bar menu) - a rustic looking parfait but so so delicious! It was smooth and creamy and quite addictive actually. The bread was beautiful, it had the texture and feel of a mini damper. This was JM's first taste of chicken liver parfait and I think he is now a fan!

Mussels and pipis with chilli and lemongrass - seriously YUM! The chilli and lemongrass sauce should be bottled and sold commercially. It was that good!!

Corn, chawanmushi and crab - I asked for this dish because I was wanted to try chawanmushi and I can't say no to crab. It was a lovely dish, light, summery with beautiful textures of the silky chawanmushi. Delicious!

Beetroot salad with parsley and dates - a fresh looking salad with lovely slivers of beetroot. And on top of that we had a side dish of roasted carrots.

And for mains, we had 2 serves of the Egg hopper, caramelised eggplant curry, yoghurt and Sambal. Mmmm..mmmm. A burst of flavours mingled as I savoured the dish.. there was sweet, savoury and a slight tang from the yoghurt. I found out that the curry had toppings of chilli powder, coriander, eschalot and green onion. Another delicious dish.