Category: Chinese

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Wonder Skewers – Burwood NSW Restaurant Review

We spent $104 at Wonder Skewers in Burwood, which was definitely too much, and got us enough food to last two meals for two people.

The problem, kind of like in yum cha, is that everything came in groups of 3-5 skewers. This meant that to have any decent amount of variety as well as to not to eat repeats, you really need to come here with a few friends, not just one other person.

The variety of meats on offer was quite broad. We had lamb (5 for $13.80), beef tendon (4 for $12.80), ox tongue (4 for $13.80), pork with gristle (5 for $12.80), chicken wings (3, but really 6 wings for $12.80), beef ribs (5 for $13.80), and eggplant ($7.80), and scallops (2 for $13.80).

All food was cooked in the kitchen, and brought out to us once ready, rested on a bed which itself rested over a series of tealights, to keep the food warm as we ate. This is a pro gamer move, as oily, BBQ food tends to get much less appetizing once cold.

The chicken wings were in particular very juicy and tasty, with a crispy skin on the exterior.

A relatively special mention should also go to the beef tendon, which had a really gooey and fun texture, though was definitely too much to have all on my own, as my partner decided this was the day that beef tendon would be too weird for her.

The pork with gristle (at the left of the above photo), was really more like pork with soft bones, and quite yummy and good to crunch between the teeth.

The scallops were really overloaded with garlic, but at least had a different flavour to the barbequed meats, which to be honest all tasted very similar to one another.

Sadly the garlic eggplant was then the same flavour as the scallop.

My thoughts are these. The food was good, but definitely got quite repetitive, as essentially all of the BBQ meat had one flavour, and then the sides had another flavour. Two flavours over the $104 of food we ordered. As already mentioned, it is imperative to go with more than one person, unless you’re someone who really just wants to have 2-4 skewers of the same meat, and not try anything else.

Another interesting thing we noticed was that there was a notice on their ordering webpage (via QR code at the table) asking patrons not to abuse their staff for cooking slowly. No idea what that is about, we were served within 5-10 minutes of ordering.

Wonder Skewers
77 Burwood Rd, Burwood NSW 2134
0413 735 979

Categories
Chinese

Chan Kun Kee 陳根記 – Rhodes NSW Restaurant Review

I went to Chan Kun Kee with my semi-Italian friend who has a Hong Kong girlfriend for lunch based on a commenter recommendation. The publishing of this review has been expedited in honour of that.

This Hokkien/Fujian Fried Rice (福建炒飯) ($22) was pretty good in terms of quantity and flavour, though I’m not sure about the use of seafood extender and kind of wish they had used the ingredient known as ‘actual seafood’ instead.

The Beef Served in Sichuan Style Chilli Broth (水煮牛肉) ($18 – lunch deal with a bowl of rice and can of drink) we got as a lunch meal deal, however the rice that it was meant to come with did not come, and we forgot about it by the end of our meal. The quantity was really very good for the price, something that left me wondering whether or not we should’ve just ordered the next meal as a lunch combo as well.

The Deep-Fried Pork Chop with Wasabi Sauce (Wasabi 沙拉豬扒) ($22) was also available as a lunch deal, for a cheaper $18 price, but we ordered it as a separate item in the hope that the serving may be bigger. Judging from the size of the sichuan beef, we’re not so sure any more. This was certainly an interesting flavour concept, not something that I had had before. The wasabi sauce was creamier than I had expected, almost as creamy as the kind of sauce that you would put over Portuguese fried rice. It was pretty good! I would have it again.

Overall I felt that the meal was pretty good, and sharply priced, as long as the portion size is the same for their lunch menu as it is for their normal menu. I would’ve ordered other options, but they were out of essentially all chicken dishes for lunch that day.

Chan Kun Kee 陳根記
Shop 5/42 Walker St, Rhodes NSW 2138

Categories
Chinese

JML Dumplings – Wolli Creek NSW Restaurant Review

This place was really hard to find, owing to the fact that their Google Maps location points to a different and completely unrelated dumpling restaurant, whose staff were at least gracious enough to point us in vaguely the right direction.

We started with some soy/tea eggs ($2 each), for which unfortunately the marinade had not penetrated into the yolk, leaving a tasty white with a boring hardboiled centre.

The Shepherd’s Purse & Pork Wonton Soup ($12.80) had a nice filling (though not particuarly better than the frozen dumplings I’ve been getting from the grocery store lately) as well as a nice wamrth and lightly salty umami flavour to the soup, but suffered from an unusual and unpleasant thickness in the wonton skin, making it more of a meal and a chore to eat this meal than a wonton soup should be.

Though I failed to capture a photo of the Dumplings of Pork & Chive ($12.80) apart from a single cross sectional shot, I much preferred these to the wontons. They had a strong chive flavour to them, which is really what you want and often can’t be replicated by the frozen stuff. The skin was again a bit thicker than ideal, but this was not as problematic as it was for the wontons.

I did not think I would enjoy the Steamed Pork and Sticky Rice Dumplings ($9.80), but they came out first after the eggs, and I guess I was hungry. I’m glad the sticky rice wasn’t too densely packed, because it was a real I heard you like carbs in your carbs so I put carbs in your carbs so you can carb while you carb moment.

The Honeyed Pork Ribs ($12.80) were good, meaty, tender and juicy, but very sweet and sticky.

Overall thoughts
The price to performance ratio at JML Dumplings in Wolli Creek was good. I am a highly predictable rater, and any half decent pork and chive dumpling at a restaurant that offers them boiled will score high marks from me. Their menu is diverse, however, so even if you don’t like anything featured here there is probably something for you.

JML Dumplings
Shop 2/1 Brodie Sparks Drive, Wolli Creek NSW 2205
0481 863 226

Categories
Chinese

Swanky Noodle – Parramatta NSW Restaurant Review

When we first ate at Swanky Noodle back in 2019, we were very impressed by the dingy decor, the no fuss service, and the excellent Northern Chinese cuisine. Flash forward to 2023, and we found ourselves back at Swanky Noodle for dinner in between acute stroke calls, a particularly interesting part of the public health service where a non-radiologist is tasked with reading a CT Angiogram, CT Perfusion, and non-contrast CT Brain and making a decision as to whether or not someone should get thrombolytic therapy within the course of minutes.

Good as ever was this Hot Stewed Beef with Noodle Soup ($13.80). It was a large and well priced bowl, with chewy, twangy housemade hand-pulled noodles in a richly umami soup. There was plenty of very tender beef, and it’s easy to see why this is one of their most popular dishes.

Less good were these pan-fried dumplings ($13.80), which most importantly were pan-fried, rather than boiled, like we asked for. The boiled dumplings were great back in 2019, but pan-fried dumplings are just lower effort in general. They were very meaty.

The spring pancake ($13.80) I also didn’t love, mainly because they were dryer than expected and filled with vermicelli, complicated by the fact that of the two separate guys in the kitchen one guy had cooked the filling but the other guy had forgotten the wrapper until a bit later. The equivalent of this dish that we had back in the day was full of chives (I have photo evidence from the 8th of September 2019) and much better.

OVERALL THOUGHTS

The beef soup noodles were as good as ever, but the other things we had were complicated by mishaps and also just not being what we wanted. It is true that we visited half an hour before closing, but we weren’t the last table to enter and be served, and would’ve rathered a maximum of one accident per meal. I’m upset because I had really quite fond memories of this place. If only we had stopped at the noodle, the fondness would’ve remained

Swanky Noodle
131 Church St, Parramatta NSW 2150
(02) 9633 1173

Categories
Chinese

A Bowl Of Noodles 一碗面 – Haymarket NSW Restaurant Review

Unfortunately my dinner at A Bowl of Noodles did not live up to the expectations set by following their social media over the past year or so.

The Yellow Croaker Noodles ($23.80), one of the restaurant’s signature dishes, did not amaze me. It had unfortunately and probably unavoidably quite a fishy smell to it, though to its credit it did not actually taste fishy. The flavour of the soup was quite light, umami, and pleasant, though pleasant not to the degree that we wanted to finish it.

The Pan Fried Pork Buns (sheng jian bao 生煎包 – $11.80) were fine on the outside with good dough and crispiness, but oddly gooey on the inside. I won’t go so far as to say uncooked, because I don’t know for a fact and I didn’t get sick after my meal, but these buns were generally unpleasant for me.

The chive and pork dumplings (10 for $13.90) were actually very good. They stood alone as a dish that met expectations and were the highlight of the meal.

I kind of felt that the xiao long bao ($9.80) would be a dish that I could trust that a Shanghainese specialty restaurant would do well, but I was of course mistaken. These XLBs were quite dry and devoid of soup, without even any holes in the skin that could explain it. I’ve had much better steamed from a box from the frozen section of my local Asian supermarket.

COMMENTS. I didn’t find what I was looking for.

A Bowl Of Noodles 一碗面
735 George St, Haymarket NSW 2000
0415 483 140