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.

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

Categories
Indian

Indian Biryani Restaurant – Rockdale NSW Restaurant Review

This is going to be a quick one. We got delivery from Indian Biryani Restaurant during our last run of nights. I had the Chicken 65 Biryani ($19, pictured) and the Achari Chicken ($14, not pictured). Both were very tasty, and probably a bit too tasty to be eaten alone without any non-flavoured staple food. The Chicken 65 Biryani was very edible and safe. My colleagues had some chicken tikka salad and the butter chicken and allegedly all was good.

My overall impression is this: Not many places deliver to work. It really wasn’t bad and we’ll probably get it again before the year is through.

UPDATE
In 2024, we actually went to the store.

Everything was still quite good, and the prices are still really good too. I somehow managed to convince my partner to have mutton biryani ($18.99) which we normally avoid due to a fear of gaminess. Luckily, it was actually quite delicious, and not gamey at all.

The butter chicken ($18.99) was a very normal butter chicken at a very normal price. No complaints, though it’s a bit of an insult to one’s intelligence to end your prices with a .99 suffix. Just call it $19 mate.

The garlic and cheese naan ($5 ea, $10 pictured) was a not a standout, a bit less good than the best ones that we’ve had around the city.

No complaints about this juicy and tasty half tandoori chicken ($14.99), served on a reflective aluminium foil surface for extra ambiance.

Indian Biryani Restaurant
544 Princes Hwy, Rockdale NSW 2216