Categories
Cellar Door Italian

Hillbilly Cider Shed – Bilpin NSW Restaurant Review

We spent an hour on a Friday afternoon at Hillbilly Cider’s cellar door and restaurant in the Blue Mountains.

They are a local producer of apple ciders, though not a brand I have seen or taken note of in any liquor store. On display on site are these large metal vats, that may or may not be used for the processing or storage of cider.

Also on display are these wooden barrels, which are confirmed to contain the cider poured diretly into glasses for patrons to drink.

We opted for a flight of four 150mL ciders to sample between the two of us. I’ve always been incredibly cautious about driving after having alcohol so my partner kindly agreed to drink less and drive on the way back to Sydney. We had the Hillbilly Scrumpy Cloudy Apple (ABV 6%), Hillbilly Crushed Apple (ABV 4.5%), Hillbilly Sweet Julie Apple (ABV 3.5%) and the Hillbilly Pear (ABV 4.5%) with some parallax error trickery that meant that we received slightly more than 600mL for our $18 investment. While I normally like a drier cider, I found that our sweetest choice, the Hillbilly Pear, was the most easily consumed, while the drier ones – still not bad – were not quite as appealing.

Hillbilly’s wood fired pizza oven is its second claim to fame in the local area, and they really do churn out high quality pizzas in good time.

This Pepperoni Pizza ($23) was rock solid. The base and crust were thin but chewy, cooked perfectly with the avoidance of any charring. The Neapolitan sauce and mixture of fior di latte and mozzarella made for a nice and mild base, and the pepperoni was sprinkled on with expert percision and reasonable generosity. It was all quite good. I don’t know why the pizza is shaped as it is.

The Sweet Julie Apple Calzone ($23), dubbed by one reviewer on Google as “a revelation” was also pretty good. It seems to be Hillbilly’s take on the hot apple pie, a staple among rest stops and little stores within a 5km radius. The filling of sweet caramelised acinnamonised apples was maybe just a little too sweet for my liking, but the pastry just as good as the base of the pepperoni pizza. I was grateful for the whipped cream which helped to temper down the sweetness of the apple filling.

OVERALL FEELINGS
I enjoyed the pizza, and after years of my friend GGL sending our group chat pictures of flights of alcoholic beverages I was finally able to return the favour. Hillbilly Cider Shed is also a great example of COVID-safe dining, with the choice between a huge outdoor dining area with picnic tables, a large gazebo like structure, and a verandah to sit on for those rainy days.

Hillbilly Cider Shed
2230 Bells Line of Rd, Bilpin NSW 2758
(02) 4567 0965

Categories
Café French

Bitton Gourmet Cafe – Alexandria NSW Brunch Review

My partner took us to Bitton a couple of mornings (years now, by time of publication) ago. I had pre-peeked the menu and nothing struck my fancy, but the reviews were good and my partner was keen.

We arrived to an almost full house. There were 4 dogs in the cafe’s outside seating, but none inside. We didn’t have a booking but that wasn’t a problem on this Saturday morning – they were able to ready a table for us in minutes, however didn’t wipe it down.

The coffee at Bitton was good, but not a standout. We did enjoy these nice red mugs that it was served in, however.

The Croque Madame ($21) was a enormous letdown. I had wrongly assumed that $21 would afford me something greater than a mere ham and cheese toastie with egg on top. There are numerous places in the local area to get a croque madame for $12-14, and I truly regret paying this amount. For what it’s worth, the sandwich was fine and tasted good. The spicy tomato sauce and the side salad were also good, but it didn’t really justify the cost.

The Lamb Merguez Sausage (2 for $7) were actually quite coarse and complex. We enjoyed them and they added a much needed meatiness to the baked eggs and sweet potato hash.

My partner enjoyed the Baked Eggs and Sweet Potato Hash ($18) much more than I did. I generally don’t like hash, and this was no exception. The dish alone is vegetarian, and $7 was spent on some much needed sausages. I often find hash too bland in taste, and this was again true this time. They serve pepe saya butter with their bread.

I literally don’t know how much they charged for this Vanilla Slice, but I thought it was only ok. The vanilla slice itself was one of the better that I’ve had, though far from the best – a title which still belongs to Bourkies Bakehouse in Woodend, VIC. I did appreciate the vanilla ice cream and berries, which we weren’t expecting. The vanilla ice cream had black dots, an unmistakable sign of quality.

Overall I can’t recommend Bitton Cafe. We paid an exorbitant amount for food that was just fine. I’m particularly angry at myself for paying $21 for a toastie. I don’t care if it’s French. Never again, though I’m sure that I would have fonder feelings about the place had the prices not been so high.

Bitton Gourmet
36/37A Copeland St, Alexandria NSW 2015
(02) 9519 5111

Categories
Chinese Groceries

Chi Lin Restaurant Frozen Dumplings – Grocery Review

Pegfeeds adherents know that this blog originally started as an idea to catalogue all different types of Asian groceries and snacks so that I could remember what I liked and what I didn’t like. That never really took off, and to this day I still keep buying the same snacks having forgotten that I don’t actually like them.

That said, I have done one previous frozen dumpling review from the yet-unparalleled Big John. Are these frozen dumplings from Orange Supermarket from Wentworth Point NSW going to cut the mustard? Find out more literally in the next sentence.

I boiled these Pork and Chives Dumplings (15 for $12.50) in the usual way. While they were not bad, and definitely better than 90% of the other frozen dumplings on the market, they weren’t quite as good as Big John’s. There was a good quantity of chive, with a good filling to wrapper ratio, but at the end of the day I didn’t feel like the texture of the meat was as good. It kind of faded away into nothing, where I prefer a bit more of a coarser grind to the pork to give it a bit of bite.

Having said that, they’re not bad, right. The flavour was OK, and they certainly slide into the premium tier of frozen grocery store dumplings. They just don’t beat the reigning champ.

麒麟 手工韭菜猪肉水饺 – UPC 0793420734661

UPDATE. I had more of their frozen dumplings/wontons and didn’t feel like it really warranted a separate post, especially as this one’s already been published. Who knows, maybe one day I’ll have an entire meal at Chi Lin and this will become a restaurant review instead of a review of only frozen dumpers.

The Chi Lin Pork and Vegetable Wontons were actually quite good. They were better, in my opinion, than the Pork and Chives Dumplings.

I preferred the thinner wrappers of these wontons, as well as the filling, which had a more complex umami flavour. These wontons even came with soup flavouring for a bit of a hot and sour soup, which was tasty even if not elevated. At $11.50 for 12 from Orange Supermarket in Wentworth Point, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy these again.

Chi Lin Pork and Vegetable Wontons – 0793420734630

Categories
Bakery French

Agathé Pâtisserie – South Melbourne VIC Restaurant Review

After waiting in line in the rain for 45 minutes outside Lune, I decided to better use what limited time I have on this Earth and eat somewhere else instead. Agathé Pâtisserie, at the South Melbourne Markets (at the time of writing only open Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday), is a French bakery at least equal to Lune, without the ridiculous social media hype and resultant line.

I really enjoyed this Pandan Croissant ($8). It was sweet, but not too sweet, with a pandan flavour that did not overpower. The pastry was as perfect as any croissant I’ve ever had, fluffy and pillowy on the inside with a good crunchy crust on the outside. Even the physical act of tearing this croissant apart in my hands was pleasurable, with crinkling of crust an almost ASMR like experience. This was instantly one of the best croissants I’ve ever had.

My partner chose this mushroom puff ($7), a savoury pastry of mushroom, onion, bechamel and thyme. It was not bad, again demonstrating good puff pastry qualities, but I did feel that the temperature was not right for what it was. The addition of a bit more heat to soften the toppings would’ve been ideal.

This peach perfect tart was in fact quite perfect. I don’t even know what the words “fresh peach and compote on a breton biscuit topped by lemon myrtle and vanilla chantilly” but I can tell you that it was delicious, and importantly not too sweet. It even came in a nice little cake box, which was wasted on us as we promptly sat down next to the store (in front of a guy selling roasted nuts, who gave us some free nuts to try) and scoffed it down. Yum.

So after we left Agathe and did half a round of the South Melbourne Markets I went back and got this Kougin-Amann ($7), a sweet and extremely buttery croissant-like cake that by tradition is 30% butter and 30% sugar. Delicious but perhaps still secondary to their croissants.

OVERALL: I really think that Agathe takes the cake when it comes to French patisserie in Melbourne. Lune diehards are welcome to wait in line for an hour in the pouring rain while cultured Agathé fans munch on a deliciously buttery croissant, Tuesday to Friday at their CBD store and Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at the South Melbourne Markets.

Agathé Pâtisserie
South Melbourne Markets – 322 Coventry St, South Melbourne VIC 3205
0403 222 573

Categories
Bakery French

Lune Croissanterie – Fitzroy VIC Restaurant Review

I originally wrote the following two paragraphs as the opening to my review for Agathé Pâtisserie, in my opinion an at least equal French bakery, but on looking back I felt that the level of upset that I was at my attempt to go back to Lune in 2022 deserved its own post.

The first time I went to Lune in 2017 I enjoyed myself. I went to their warehouse in Fitzroy with my then-girlfriend now-fiancée, marvelled at the little pastries in glass cases, enjoyed the interior design of glass and concrete, waited a little bit and had my croissants. It was a nice and yummy time.

The pastries at Lune were the best I’d ever tasted at the time (2017), and as my tastes and experience developed over the next five years I was keen to go back and relive it their well-recognised croissants.

The second time I tried to go to Lune I lined up for 45 minutes in the rain outside their Melbourne CBD spot before I gave up. Not even the novelty of lining up in front of a guy with the same yellow Blunt umbrella as me could keep me going.

There was a lot of sunk-cost thinking involved, but ultimately I do not regret my decision. No croissant is worth that much time and to be completely honest, Agathé Pâtisserie in South Melbourne Markets is just as good, but without the wait.

Lune Croissanterie
119 Rose St, Fitzroy VIC 3065