Category: Cuisines

Categories
Indian

Mehfil – Auburn NSW Restaurant Review

I don’t remember much about this Western Sydney Hyderabadi restaurant, even though it hasn’t been so long since I ate at it. I will instead attempt to entertain you with a few pictures, some scattered thoughts, and a fun fact that I learned from my Western Sydney North Indian friend (ES).

I enjoyed the chicken 65 ($15 – actually listed as $14.99, but they don’t carry 1 cent coins), though it was a bit wetter and saltier than others that I’ve had. I was surprised to find that my friend had never had this before. Maybe I’ve just had it a lot because there have been a lot of Indo-Chinese restaurants in the places I’ve lived.

My interesting fact of the day, relating to this mutton biryani ($16 – $15.99, who are they trying to fool?), is that mutton biryani can refer to biryani with meat from either goat or sheep, and it’s not possible to know which one it is unless you ask. Where in Australian English we always mean old sheep, mutton almost always refers to goat in the Subcontinent, and therefore in a Indian restaurant in Sydney it could literally be a flip of the coin. This mutton, whatever animal it may have been, was not too gamey (which is my usual concern with old sheep).

My not so interesting fact about this arachi chicken (let’s just call it $16) is that I’m not the only one who couldn’t recognise this based on the photo. See below a screenshot from a Google Review by ali rizvi838.

I don’t know what this is. I’m waiting on my friend to text me back at time of writing. (EDIT: it is ladoo) It was soft, sweet, and drowned in syrup. It was pretty good.

General comments
It’s weird that I don’t remember much about this place, but the general vibe was that it was good and affordable. Much more memorable was the weird fact that I learned about mutton.

Update – Delivery Order
I didn’t feel like this was worth a separate post, but I had a subsequent delivery app meal around 3am one night from the Mehfil branch in Merrylands. Both the Chicken 65 Biryani and the Chicken Tikka 4-Piece were excellent.

The Chicken 65 Biryani ($17) included not only Chicken 65, but Biryani rice with chicken inside it, a surprising outcome as some restaurants try to get away with a protein-free biryani if the meal is already topped with Chicken 65.

The Chicken Tikka (4 piece for $18) was tender, tasty, juicy and made me feel quite happy. The combination of the two things I ordered made me feel very satisfied and energised me to continue the rest of the night.

Mehfil
52 Auburn Rd, Auburn NSW 2144
240 Merrylands Rd, Merrylands NSW 2160
(02) 8123 8052

Categories
Middle Eastern

Pazar Food Collective – Canterbury NSW Restaurant Review

Pazar Food Collective identifies as an Inner-West restaurant, which as someone who lives two minutes down the road I think it’s a bit laughable. As I told our dining companions on the night, the only people who consider where we live to be the Inner-West seem to be real estate agents. Regardless of which highly-priced clique of Sydney we were or weren’t in, we had a pretty good meal. Prices noted below are inclusive of a 10% weekend surcharge, which, given they’re only open Thursday-Saturday, I think bears mentioning.

We started with this wood baked sesame nigella bread with salted wild oregano butter ($17.05 – $13.20 without the butter). Both the bread and the butter tasted good and fragrant, with a density that might just be in keeping with its own style. Though I enjoyed the bread, I do wish that there could have been a cheaper or even no-cost option (like a flatbread or something, especially because we ended up getting multiple servings, given that such a large number of their entrees are so sauce focused.

People liked the muhamarra ($18.70), but I didn’t. It is a dip that that the menu describes as consisting of roasted almonds and walnuts blended with blistered red peppers, pomegranate molasses, and chilli. It’s hard to pinpoint why I didn’t like it – I think it was a bit loose and watery textured, though clearly no one else around the table had any problems with it. Bread was essential, and again a bit of pita would’ve gone a long way.

I am a lover of meet, and yes the sujuk with hummus and blistered tomatoes ($25.30) was enjoyable. The sujuk was helpfully presented as a mince rather than as slices of sausage, which made a lot of sense for a dish that ultimately surmounted to a multi-textured dip. I tend to eat quite a bit of sujuk during my Western Sydney culinary adventures, often without enjoying it, but I must say that this time I was thoroughly impressed by both the flavour and texture of the mince. Similar to the last dip, the reds were again blistered to this time produce cherry tomatoes that brought with them discrete pops of juice and flavour. The hummus didn’t really register for me. It was merely a creamy carrier for the other tasty ingredients rather than the focus of the dish.

Wow, another sauce, and need for another bread. The braised Japanese eggplant ($23.10) with roasted red pepper tomato sauce, garlic labneh, and chilli crisp did nothing for me. Apart from the slices of eggplant itself (which did not feel extremely Japanese to me) this tomato and capsicum dish felt more or less the same as a combination of the other two dips. Quite missable in my opinion.

We chose to have both the mains to share between us. This is the wood smoked roast lamb ($51.70 – 2 person serving size), atop a bed of bulgur pilav and garnished with pickled chillis, sumac herb and red onion salad. Though I wasn’t wowed by the meat, I did enjoy the bright pickled chillis, herbs, and lemon, which helped to keep mouthfuls of lamb moist and flavourful. This was my first time having bulgur pilav, which from what I can gather by my mouth and by Google is a wholegrain dish very similar to but distinct from wholewheat couscous and quinoa. It had rice energy.

Tied favourite with the sujuk mince was this terribly photographed harissa roasted chicken ($40.7). This half chicken, roasted on charcoal, was super tender and flavourful, marinated in a tahini lemon sauce, and served with chilli garlic and green chilli toum. Each bite of the chicken was really superb, and though it didn’t need the salad to help keep it fresh and moist, its presence was appreciated because it gave me something to eat whilst I respectfully let my co-diners have their fair share of the chicken. Strong recommend on this one.

Comments
This restaurant really has a lot of saucey and dippy entrees for a place that only offers $13.20 servings of bread. It would really make a lot more sense to just have bottomless pita, but it would probably cut into their bottom line and $13 bread sales. The sujuk and the chicken were particular standouts. We also had some pretty good sangria, which I promise I only had a couple of sips of.

Pazar Food Collective
325 Canterbury Rd, Canterbury NSW 2193, Australia
+61 411 727 874

Categories
Bakery

Dulcet Cafe – Sydney NSW Restaurant Review

The Galaxy Mousse Cake ($78) from Dulcet in Books Kinokuniya is one of four or five new full sized cakes I’ve had this year, chosen by my partner who does not generally enjoy a classic sponge.

It is a very dense mousse based cake, chocolate on the inside, and not too sweet. The layer of raspberry and cherry inside the chocolate gave it a bit of black-forest like quality, which was enjoyable.

It was not a transcendent experience, contrary to what some online reviewers will have you believe. As someone who constantly chases novelty, I don’t think I’d order it again, but I do think it was relatively good as far as non-sponge cakes go.

Dulcet Cafe
Located in Books Kinokuniya, Level 2/500 George St, Sydney NSW 2000
(02) 8084 4456

Categories
Café

Yellow Deli – Katoomba NSW Restaurant Review

I worked at the base of the Blue Mountains for two years in my youth, and despite asking my partner on a regular basis we never made the trip up. It would take another two years for her to actually want to go of her own accord, an opportunity that I jumped at – not only to climb an awful amount of slippery steps, but also to eat at the famed Yellow Deli.

The Yellow Deli, according to the internet, is a kind of global chain cafe run by adherents of certain subgroup of Christians. Though many of the online reviews for the cafe deplore the group’s alleged “child abuse”, on further reading it appears that they refer to the use of physical discipline, which whilst I don’t believe is really OK, kind of just sounds like growing up as an Asian kid.

Common amongst the Yellow Delis is this extremely rustic aesthetic, with fit outs of recycled timber, hanging lanterns, and leather-on-chairs. It felt like something you would find in rural New Zealand, though I guess just as appropriately at a town in the mountains.

To drink we had a Hazlenut Dande Mate Latte, which was creamy and nutty and quite pleasant. I will comment here only about the experience of having the drink, and not about any of its purported health benefits.

To eat we had a bowl of chilli con carne ($13), served with jalapeno bread and whipped butter. Whilst the chilli didn’t taste so different from any other chilli, we did appreciate the inclusion of large meatballs within it, though it meant that the meat was focused in discrete areas, and once gone so did we lose our desire to continue eating the rest of the chilli. The jalapeno bread was quite good though, sweet and still warm, and well paired with the butter. It was quite a lot of food for the price.

The reuben sandwich ($13.50) was unfortunately not an advance on the classic, served with housemade potato crisps but otherwise generally uninspiring.

The deli rose sandwich ($13.50), was however quite good, with two types of beef (roast and corned), provolone, onions, butter, and tomato amongst other things. I enjoyed the onion roll here more than I did the light rye bread of the reuben, with its increased softness and textural palatability. This sandwich was also just more moist than the other, with the tomato, although ultimately reminded us strongly of something from Subway. Pretty good though.

COMMENTS
I think the main draw for the Yellow Deli, apart from the obvious, is its sick interior. We had just seen a video about some 1000 year old pub in the UK, and whilst we don’t have any such historic buildings here in the colonies, you could totally imagine this place to have a history like that. Food-wise, nothing particularly special, but out of the things we did eat we liked the deli rose sandwich the most. Most things were a bit too salty for me.

The Yellow Deli Katoomba
214 Katoomba St, Katoomba NSW 2780
(02) 4782 9744

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