The contents of this blog are matters of opinion formed over one more visits. There has been some artistry applied and metaphors and similes should not necessarily be taken literally. All meals are independently paid for - the author has no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Teeming with high school kids on a weekday afternoon, Cafe Crop in Strathfield provides quite good quality, bat-adjacent bingsoo,
We had a mini mixed fruit bingsu ($11.50), with our mini size served within a plastic container while larger sizes are served in Pyrex measuring cups. The shaved ice had a nice creamy taste to it, and we really enjoyed the assortment of fruits – strawberry, melon, grape, mango, (and unfortunately seemingly canned pineapple) – that was included. The addition of some mochi (rice cake) and what I’m pretty sure is Milo cereal also added a nice variation in textures and flavours. The squeezy container of condensed milk was left essentially unused, as the dessert was tasty and sweet enough without it.
On a subsequent visit we had a small mixed fruit bingsoo ($21), a larger, pyrex cup variety of the same one that we had the first time. The scoop of ice cream in the medium size is decorated with milo cereal to form a spooky but cute pig face.
While I thought the bingsoos were good and good value, the pomegranatade coming in at $7.50 I thought was much worse value. While I don’t know the intricacies that go into it – perhaps they have a staff member squeezing the juice out of each pomegranate pip in painstaking fashion – what it tasted like was cordial and in my opinion not worth the price.
We ate at the Haymarket branch of 678 Korean BBQ on a Thursday night after my partner was jealous of me eating Korean BBQ with my colleagues from work the night before.
We thought that it was quite expensive for what you get. The side dishes are quite limited and were never refilled. I have heard that the more money you spend the greater the variety of side dishes but we spent $80 for 2 people and got barely anything.
To add insult to injury, by the time we had arrived they had already run out of many of the beef items.
CLOSING OPINION
Overall quite disappointing and I wouldn’t come back of my own accord.
Back when my partner worked in Concord, she would often come home with milk tea from Bengong. We always enjoyed their milk tea, imbued with a stronger tea flavour than most outfits. We were therefore suitably surprised and a little bit proud when we found that they had opened up a branch in Darling Square. The Concord Hospital boba tea shop had finally made it.
I really enjoyed this Tea Cube Milk Tea when I first had it. I was confused when they asked me to choose a flavour, and I chose lychee. I thought it was so cool that they had somehow created this drink where they put concentrated tea into jellies. I went back a couple of days later and asked for one but without fruit flavouring, and the staff member looked at me as if I were crazy but was ultimately happy to oblige. What I got was a simple milk tea with a lot of ice. I was an idiot. The tea cubes weren’t actually tea cubes, merely fruit cubes.
The Wuwu Oreo Sundae was pretty good! Just a soft serve over hot brown sugar and boba syrup, with an oreo on top. It melts quickly so be sure to eat it just as fast.
Bread is bread. This particular strawberry flavoured bread was not that good.
It’s not often that I have a meal as bad and as expensive as the one I had at CicciaBella.
Zia Romildo’s Garage Pizza, shown here in the Pino’s Pepperoni variant ($14) really does taste and feel like it came out of some guy’s dim and cobwebbed garage. Saucing was minimal, cheesing was minimal with terrible coverage, and pepperoni was delivered as it were a wartime allotment. All that was generous was the boring, dry, and bready pizza base, so bereft of any joy that a lunchable would’ve offered a more preferable topping to base ratio.
Sonoma Bread ($5), expertly removed from its packaging and placed in a basket. No faults.
It’s come to my attention in the past three days that you can get burrata from the local supermarket for $5. That makes paying $14 for this burrata a total outsider move. Very standard, though that’s probably a compliment at CicciaBella.
This rigatoni in ossobuco ragu ($28) was actually pretty good. The flavours were standard ragu, and the pasta, though quite al dente, was quite palatable. The portion size, in keeping in CicciaBella’s apparent theme and philosophy, was unfortunately small for the price paid. In my opinion this is one of the few things worth getting here.
The market fish with lemon and sorrel ($35) was a sorry excuse for cooking. It was a cachectic baby snapper, cooked with as much skill as you would expect from a small child. Less than the bare minimum attempt had been made to even descale this fish, with each mouthful another journey into what can go wrong. I’ve never asked for money back on a bad dish or meal but I’m starting to wish that I had.
VERDICT I wouldn’t spend time or money here again.
My partner was recently accepted onto the anaesthetic training program for 2021, and we broke our own rules on not going out in order to celebrate. We had the $85pp tasting menu at Zushi Barangaroo, which we were able to enjoy after 30 minutes of circling the CBD to find a park. Allow me to explain.
We started off with the sashimi special, which was sliced raw whitefish with a chili ponzu dipping sauce, and garnished with some flying fish roe. I found this dish to be acceptable in freshness, and enjoyed the fish more alone than I did with the sauce.
The tuna tataki was seared yellowfin akami, crusted with sesame seeds and topped with fried leek and shisho cress. We have always been suckers for seared tuna, and enjoyed this dish. We would’ve kept the sauce too, had they not taken it away from us.
The chef’s selection of sashimi was a selection of sashimi selected by the chef. It was fresh and tasty, but certainly not a standout. There was nothing particularly fancy about this dish, a staple if you will. There are no irregularities to report.
I enjoyed the seared Hokkaido scallop in yuzu soy broth. The scallops were sweet, and complemented well by the sour-salty sauce. The radish puree was also sweet and complementary.
The corn ribs and the prawn tempura were the most divisive dishes of the meal. My partner absolutely loved the corn ribs, roasted and covered in parmesan with lime available for squeezing. She loved how juicy and sweet the corn was, and the complementary flavour of the cheese. It was certainly tempting enough for the people sitting next to us to ask what it was and order it for themselves. I’m not so much of a corn man myself so I offered one of my corns to my partner.
I enjoyed the prawn tempura. The prawns were very large and meaty, and the fluffy and fresh tempura batter was a treat. The dipping sauce and lime also worked well. I was able to trade one of my corn for one of my partners’ prawns, which produced a good result for both of us as she hates the cockroach of the sea.
The toothfish was disappointing. We were given this very small portion to share for two adults. How would we have shared it if we were just business colleagues on a business lunch? The actual quality of the toothfish was also very poor. Compared to other servings of toothfish I’ve had at other restaurants it was too firm and overcooked. I certainly expected better.
The duck teriyaki was good and provided in great quantity too. The teriyaki sauce was good with rice. I liked it more than my partner.
It is difficult to mess up white rice too badly. It mixed well with all of the different sauces we had left over. The grilled broccolini was tasty but again there was a lot of it. I did enjoy the seaweed butter flavouring but it got a bit much towards the end.
Overall we enjoyed Sushi Barangaroo. We probably wouldn’t go back for the tasting menu, but there did look to be quite a few attractive looking bentos being served for lunch. Maybe next time.
