Tag: lamb skewers

Categories
Middle Eastern

Babylon Bakery & Grill – Fairfield Heights NSW Restaurant Review

I’m almost certain I had written something about Babylon Bakery already, but I couldn’t find anything in the drafts or in the scheduled posts, and I couldn’t even find any notes taken from the meal, so I guess I’ll just do it again from memory.

We visited Babylon Bakery after seeing it recommended on social media by someone who I hope wasn’t a paid influencer. We ordered a relatively large amount of food to eat in, and unfortunately had to wait a relatively large amount of time (21 minutes) for our food to arrive.

We had a one kilogram mixed skewer pack ($40) which consisted of chicken tawouk, lamb kofta, as well as lamb meat skewers for a total of eight skewers worth. This also came with some coleslaw consisting of lettuce and tomato, as well as some seasoned onion, garlic and hummus dips, and chilli coated bread.

This was a large dish and extremely good value for only $40 with an overall huge amount of food. The chicken was my favourite, being quite juicy and tender, followed by the lamb kofta. The the chunks of lamb meat were less to my liking with a bit of gaminess to them, and overall a bit less tenderness than the other two options.

We also had a fattoush salad (regular size – $8) although, and I didn’t know this at the time, we probably could have had fattoush instead of coleslaw on our kilogram of mixed skewers. This was fine, it was what fattoush iss.

Unbelievably, we also had a chicken shawarma roll ($10), originally intended to be for the following day, but then I wanted to try some. This was excellent with a large helping of garlic sauce, and quite juicy with the pickles – not dry at all like some that I’ve had, for example, from Shawarma Albeik.

Overall
We ultimately packaged up the remainder of our kilogram of meat and took it home to eat the following day. Overall, the value proposition offered by Babylon Bakery was quite good, however I guess they’re not particularly well set up for dine-in eaters with only two small tables on premises. The majority of their orders were for takeaway, and perhaps if one is intending to dine there, it would be better to just order as takeaway, arrive 20 minutes later and then eat there, because sitting there waiting for twenty minutes was no fun. The food is all served in disposable stuff anyway.

Babylon Bakery & Grill
187 The Boulevarde, Fairfield Heights NSW 2165

Categories
Chinese

Xi’an Eatery 西安诱惑 – Burwood NSW Restaurant Review

It was the last day before the NSW Dine and Discover vouchers were to expire, and we, along with what seemed like half of the inner-West were lined up on Burwood Rd outside a handful of restaurants still enrolled in the program and willing to accept the vouchers.

We decided on Xi’an Eatery, a place recommended to us by a colleague for its good and cheap food with a reasonable line and an incredibly exhausted workforce who looked like they were perhaps having the busiest and worst day of their lives. Our meal was preceded by an inexplicable half hour wait outside the restaurant as no less than half the tables were vacated and cleaned, before we and the next batch of patrons were admitted. Either fortunately or unfortunately for the staff this was a process marked by significant attrition, as some of our previously unknown compatriots left towards the end of the wait to spend their stimulus-bux further down the street.

Though the outside process was unimpressive, the actual process of dining, from ordering to eating, was incredibly rapid and smooth once we set foot into the restaurant. The staff were flustered but absolutely lovely, probably glad that none of our wave felt the need to engage them into what I can only imagine was an in-depth discussion regarding the origins of the ingredients like members of the previous batch. Food arrived rapidly at our table within just minutes of ordering, and consumed with similar rapidity, hunger being the best sauce.

The Signature Xi’an Pulled Pork Burger (roujiamo – $8.30 including optional coriander) was a specialty of the house, and believed by some specialists to be a marker of a Xi’an restaurant’s quality. I’m by no means a roujiamo expert, but I did find this one to be reasonably satisfying. The filling – mixture of fatty and lean pork – had excellent flavour, moistness, and mouthfeel, contrasting to my other most recent roujiamo at Taste of Xi’an in Wollongong, which I felt did not have as adequate and well distributed fatness. I’m surprised that coriander was a 50c addition, as I feel that the flavour it added was too beneficial to be left out. This must be an option because of the minority of inferior humans who find coriander unpleasant, and perhaps in a thousand years this will no longer be the case. Green capsicum is also a 50c addition, and I regret not getting it. Great filling aside, I did not love the bread, which I found to be oddly crumbly in the mouth.

I really enjoyed how lean these Xi’an Lamb Skewers ($10.80) were, but found them a bit underflavoured for my liking. It was not very spicy, even though the menu threatened it. While some online photos suggest that a bit of chilli powder is served on the side, ours didn’t come with any extra to add on, leaving us with a perfectly tender and lean lamb skewer without much flavour. If I could go back in time I would ask for some.

Another Shaanxi specialty, the Signature Biang Biang Noodle with Pork ($14.30) was one of the best I’ve ever had. The thick gravy was nice and tangy, with a good portion of meat and eggs, while the noodles had a nice Q texture. No complaints here.

The Signature Pork Pan Fried Dumplings ($12.80) were another success in a long string of successes, with a very juicy and meaty filling with good umami flavour, clearly housemade. The cooking style of these pan fried dumplings did however unfortunately lead to some jagged and dry wrapper edges, but not enough to ruin the overall good experience.

THOUGHTS
I had a good and inexpensive meal, and I think so will you. Everything we had was pretty good, and the very nice staff rallied hard in the face of adversity. Recommend.

Xi’an Eatery 西安诱惑
183D Burwood Rd, Burwood NSW 2134
(02) 8056 4600

Categories
Chinese

Tarim Uyghur Handmade Noodles – Auburn NSW Restaurant Review

Last year we went to the Ramadan night markets in Lakemba just down the road from where we live twice, and I got gastroenteritis twice. This year I did not wish to be unwell, and so we skipped the night markets for a sit down meal in one of Sydney’s other Muslim centres.

We started with besip lagman ($18), flat noodles stir fried with diced meat, cabbage and red peppers. We enjoyed these noodles, with its tangy tomato sauce base, good umami flavour, and nicely jin dao noodles. The “meat” topping was stated at the top of the menu as a mixture of lamb and beef, and I wonder if it would have been less suspicious to in the description of each item rather than just at the top of the menu.

The toho qordah (small: $20), descriped as special chilli chicken braised with potatoes, red peppers, and shallots, complemented with flat noodles was unfortunately almost exactly the same thing as the besip lagman, except for the addition of potatoes and the substitution of chicken. Again a tomatoey base, but with a tiny amount of spice this time, and a little bit more oily. I’m not usually a big fan of chopped up chicken drumsticks, but I did not mind it in this case as there were not really any broken bone fragments for me to spit out. My partner, potato-fan as she is, was not too sad at the sameiness of this dish, though ultimately I think we would’ve liked to try something else instead.

The kawap lamb skewers ($4.50 each) were really quite good. Super tender, but not fatty at all. No significant unwanted lambiness to them. Quite good, though I wonder if they would’ve been better with some chilli (I have no idea if this would take it away from being traditional Uyghur cuisine).

OVERALL THOUGHTS. Pretty good. Not expensive. Great lamb. I don’t know why the guys on the table next to us were so surprised that they didn’t serve alcohol.

Tarim Uyghur Handmade Noodles
105 Rawson St, Auburn NSW 2144
(02) 9649 9085

Categories
Chinese

Lovin’ Lamb – Burwood NSW Restaurant Review

I didn’t really love Lovin’ Lamb. I had their signature lamb skewers, and I just didn’t feel like I connected with them. I did ask for them in a mild heat level because my girlfriend is a spice-o-phobe and because we had already eaten that night so I couldn’t justify getting two sets at differing spice levels, but I just felt that they didn’t have much flavour. Even the mild lamb skewers at competitors such Lamb & Cumin have some salt and cumin flavour, if not explicitly chilli flavour, but these ones at Lovin’ lamb left me wanting.

I’m always willing to give places like this another shot, just in case it was my order that was to blame, rather than the restaurant itself.

I’ll edit this post if I ever end up back there.

Lovin’ Lamb
125 Burwood Rd, Burwood NSW 2134

Categories
Modern Australian

Lover – Windsor VIC Restaurant Review

It was tricky finding a table anywhere at no notice on our first night in Melbourne, and Lover on Chapel St (the same street where I accidentally bit my partner’s finger at a hot dog restaurant, the now closed Massive Wieners, in 2017) was essentially one of our only options.

I had this meal in a par-cooked state having been awake the previous 36 hours working an intensive care night shift, travelling interstate and sleep-watching through an Aaron Chen comedy gig (my apologies to Mr Chen who, if his set is to believed, lives in the same inner-South-West suburb as me), so I can’t make any real promises about the reproducibility of my findings, and your mileage may vary depending on your level of consciousness.

These fried sweet corn ($10) riblets were great and well priced. The corn was buttery, moist, and well flavoured with lime and chilli, with the chipotle mayo was a good dip pairing. I have only good thoughts about this.

The albacore tuna skewers ($12) were less fantastic, though I think that may be due to the raw fish used rather than any fault of the restaurant itself. I found the albacore tuna to have an unfortunately starchy quality, which perhaps betrays my preference for bluefin in all uses of the fish. The sauce was however sweet and good.

These beef rump skewers ($14) were quite good. The meat was both juicy and tender with minimal charring on the outside, and the apple salad was crisp, fresh, and delicious. The red sauce that this was served alongside was very spicy and fruity, and while it was nice I would’ve been equally happy without it (this opinion may have been different if I had had more than one skewer to myself).

This is the beef crudo ($24) with cured egg yolk and masa. The beef of this beef was cut into huge chunks, which made it a bit weird as I felt like I had to work hard and chew to be rewarded with the flavour inside (which was good). The masa corn chips were very good, extremely thick and well flavoured. They had top tier structural integrity, with crispiness that lasted throughout the duration of the dish, and even though they were designed as a vessel for the meat, they clearly transcended this simple task.

This barramundi ($38) that’s since left the menu was our only main and final course of the night. This was a relatively large piece of barramundi, pan-seared in the traditional sense with a too-hard crispy skin that I thought detracted from the experience. That said, I very much enjoyed the flavour of the cream that the fish was served upon, as well as that of the fried streaks of allium with their strong umami taste and the combination of these flavours with the fish’s flesh. The leek I felt was a bit overplayed, used as a vegetable rather than a condiment, and I feel that all but the world’s greatest leek fans would feel too leaked out by the end of this dish.

This is either the Call Me Maybe ($24) or Melony ($22). I don’t know. I don’t really drink any more.

OVERALL THOUGHTS
Pretty good, honestly. Some things were better than others, and by the time this is published all of the things I didn’t like have fallen off their menu and replaced by unknowns, while the things that I liked have remained. Perhaps the next iteration will be even better!

Lover
60 Chapel St, Windsor VIC 3181
(03) 9510 6655