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.
NBS Big Bowl (牛百歲) is not the most non-Chinese friendly noodle restaurant in Burwood, but perhaps one of the best. Tucked in an alleyway in the general Burwood Chinatown precinct (though isn’t all of Burwood a Chinatown?) across from the plaza, this tiny eatery with limited daily serves of food has perfected the art of beef noodles, though not the art of accommodating non-Chinese reading customers. Their main noodle menu is written behind the counter in Chinese with no English language menu or photos available, making their food extremely difficult to order. The only foods accessible to your regular Aussie battler (or Chinese immigrant who never learned to read or write) is what’s pictured on the front door and subtitled with English language – some lamb ribs and some pork hock.
The fourth item on the menu, 精品牛雜粉丝汤 – premium beef offal vermicelli soup ($14.99), was recommended on social media and I’m glad it was. Even though I had to order by showing them a photo of what I wanted, the lady serving me didn’t look too fazed – this has probably happened a bit in recent days. Service was extremely fast, and in the time it took for me to get cash out at the nearby ATM my giant bowl of noodles was ready to eat.
The soup was rich, beefy, and complex, having absorbed not only the beef flavours but also the organ flavours and the fresh vegetable flavours from the bok choy. Along with the several types of tripe there is also a large piece of stewed beef, which was extremely tender and tasty. The vermicelli, which I don’t normally go for, was delicious and a good vehicle for the flavours of the soup. Coriander and chilli oil was available for self serve, and I made sure to fill mine up with as much coriander as I could. Even my mother, upon seeing this photo, remarked that it looked tasty. Haters of organs will not enjoy this dish, but those who are willing to try will be duly rewarded.
I ordered the cumin lamb ribs ($15), one of the only things with a photo and some English words, so that I wouldn’t have to keep confirming to the waitress that I was a failed Asian. Even though I would’ve liked to explore the rest of their Chinese menu, I was quite satisfied with these cumin lamb ribs, which were again very tender and flavourful. It was a bit weird that they served them to us in a plastic takeaway container, but the taste and the price, and the addition of some chilli oil made it all worth it.
COMMENTS There’s probably a huge untapped business idea in making an electronic menu for these Chinese restaurants with no English menu and no pictures. I just can’t even speak enough Chinese to even convey this idea to them. Anyway NBS is good. Either bring a Chinese-reading friend (just being Chinese isn’t enough) or bring this blog post to show them what you want.
Long Meng Zhu is one of many restaurants that serve Ma La Tang in Mascot’s recently developed high-rise area, located mere footsteps away from its nearest competitor.
The concept is much the same as every other Ma La Tang restaurant. There is a refrigerated display of a variety of meat, seafood, and vegetables. The selection is a bit narrower than what you would find at a larger competitor like Yang Guo Fu Ma La Tang, but still reasonably appropriate. The meat are fresh and were still being actively topped up by the time I visited at around 10:30PM. What sets Long Men Zhu apart from many of its competitors is the array of soup bases on offer. Along with the classic spicy malatang soup, Long Men Zhu also offers a pork bone broth, a laksa broth, and a chicken broth.
I had a selection of sliced meats, vegetables, balls, and tofu in the pork bone broth. Service was fast however I did notice that one of my fish balls was still cold inside. The rest of the food was thoroughly cooked, and I did not get sick afterwards. The pork broth was quite nice and umami, a lighter option in terms of flavour than the usual malatang soup. It was actually so good that I drank most of it at the conclusion of my meal.
A shoutout should also go to the nice man working front of house, who was friendly and made me feel welcome as someone who pretend not to speak Chinese. He is probably the reason why there is a reasonably multicultural patronage at Long Men Zhu.
VERDICT
Pretty good, worth a try! The boss asked me if he would be seeing me at his restaurant more, and I told him to be honest probably no as I’m moving away from the area soon. I do want to bring my girlfriend back though.
Tucked away on Trelawney St on the Chinese side of Eastwood is Hungry Paulie, purveyor or fine Taiwanese breakfast foods.
The Traditional Egg Pancake with Fried Bread Stick (P15 台式蛋饼包油条 – $9.50) is similar to but not quite the same as the jianbing guozi (煎饼馃子) that I had in my childhood. Thin pancakes with a layer of egg omlette are wrapped around freshly fried yóutiáo, with a bit of very light soy flavoured dressing on top. The yóutiáo at Hungry Paulie are seriously good and well worth a mention, each hand-prepared on site from scratch by artisans working behind a glass window. I can recommend this.
My partner was a big fan of the Black Pepper Pork Pastry with Shallots (Paulie Pie) (P1 胡椒饼 – $6.50), which was essentially a large spherical pie with a huge amount of peppery beef steak filling. There is little in common between this meat pie and the classic Australian meat pie. The shape is almost spherical, with a more dough-reinforced base at the bottom and minimal crust up top. The filing is steak-dominated, with big chunks of chewable meat in a black-pepper rich semi-solid gravy. It was pretty good, and at $6.50 good value and worth a try.
My partner, keen on a dessert dish, ordered the hot Roasted Peanut Rice Milk (D2 – 花生米浆 – $4) This wasn’t quite what she expected. Rather than being a dessert, it was more of a staple meal, with quite a significant size and warmth to it. It had a distinctive peanut flavour and it wasn’t too sweet, but neither of us was a big fan of it. Perhaps it just wasn’t what we were looking for this morning.
The Taiwanese Anchovy Congee (C16 – 台式吻仔鱼粥 – $12) is a loose, wet congee flavoured with little dried anchovies. It is much looser than the congees of my childhood, though not to its detriment. The toppings of youtiao and fried wonton skins added a nice amount of crunch, but unfortunately the anchovy added only a slight almost-imperceptible umami flavour. Though this was a nicely warming bowl overall, I don’t think I really got much out of the anchovy flavouring. I think that if I were to come back I would get a more standard congee, like the one with preserved egg and pork, which is a known favourite.
The Braised Combo Noodle Soup (N6 – 红烧手工牛肉三宝面 – $18.50) was ordered essentially because there was a portrait of it sitting in front of me at the bar seats. It was probably fine, but to be honest at this point in the meal we were a bit too full to enjoy anything properly. The noodles had a slight mala flavour, which I normally don’t mind (and even enjoy) but didn’t appeal to me today. It was packed with protein of multiple bovine sources – muscle, tendon, rumen, and probably some reticulum too. Whilst I enjoyed the muscle, I could only bring myself to nibble on the other beef parts – I think it really is a dish best ordered hungry. The noodles were otherwise good, and the baby bok choy was very tender and sweet. I feel like I disappointed this dish, not the other way around.
The Savoury Rice Pudding (T1 – 碗粿 – $7) was a creamy, almost radish-cakey lump of starch in a bowl of gravy and mince. It was tasty and good, though I’m still not really sure what was inside
SUBSEQUENT VISIT We re-visited Hungry Paulie around 7 months later, under a cloud of general malaise (short-lived, and well worth the extra protection) following the third dose of a COVID vaccine.
The Soy Bean Jelly with Sweet Soft Peanut (花生甜豆花 – $5.50) was like a wet, loose dou fu nao. There was less tofu than I would’ve liked, but I felt it was still adequately soft and silky, suspended in this soy milk soup. My partner, in a moment of surprisingly conviction, said that she thought that the tofu in this was still not as silky as what she gets at yum cha.
The Braised Soy Egg (滷蛋 – $2.50) was a soy egg, cut into quarters, and presented with a bit of garlic and chilli sauce. While there were no surprises with the egg itself, the addition of sauce was completely unexpected, as was the addition of shallots and lettuce. The sauce was ultimately quite tasty, and added to the experience. It’s interesting that there is a price differential between ordering this in the restaurant and via an online ordering app. It appears to be cheaper delivered, which is just strange.
The Fried Radish Cake in Garlic Sauce Dressing ($5.50) was unexpectedly enjoyable. I’m normally not a believer in the radish cakes, but this one had me surprised. The outer layers were crispily fried, whilst the gooey inner layer was only modestly thick and barely noticeable. These radish cakes were drenched in a similar sauce to the eggs, which was very valuable to adding flavour. I think that with optimal frying dimensions and garlic sauce dressing these radish cakes were able to be enjoyed even by the non radish cake lover.
The Traditional Shallots Pancake with Braised Beef (牛肉捲餅 – $11.50) was not as good as the egg pancake, and not as good as I hoped. The actual pancake itself was stellar – thin, hot, and crispy, and with good shallot flavour. What was unfortunate was the filling that the shallot was wrapped around – a huge mass of lettuce, with a small amount of dressing and some cold braised beef. I think some warmth on the beef would’ve gone a long way, and it was certainly not helped by the mass of cold, internally wet lettuce. They really need to rethink this one.
The Taiwanese Pork Thick Soup with Bamboo and added Rice (嘉義赤肉羹 – $17) was quite enjoyable. It had a quality similar to a hot and sour soup, with plenty of white pepper flavour as well as something similar to bonito flake on top. It was thickened, with a reasonable amount of meat, bamboo, and mushrooms for the price. We were almost going to riot for not getting our rice, until we realised it was actually hidden inside the soup. So it was essentially a kind of congee.
This Wintermelon Iced Tea ($3.50) was super fresh, a bit sweet but not too sweet, and quite importantly, cheap. It makes a joke out of Hong Kong Bing Sutt charging $7 for a (delicious) iced milk tea.
VERDICT I quite liked Hungry Paulie, and I’d like to take my parents to the Mascot branch once they feel safe enough from a COVID-19 to leave the house. There are plenty of things that I remember from my childhood on offer at Hungry Paulie that I think they would enjoy.
One tried and true formula for naming a Chinese restaurant is rolling the dice on different combinations and permutations of the words “Golden”, “Empress”, “Dragon”, “Jade”, and finishing off with ” Seafood Restaurant”. Another familiar technique is to name a restaurant after one’s hometown and append “Taste of” in front of it. Taste of Shanghai is one famous example. Taste of Nanking is another.
TASTE OF NANKING is located on Gadigal Avenue in Waterloo, a recently developed strip of Asian (mostly Chinese) restaurants and groceries with quite a few gems to find. It is somewhat down the street from U STORE, an expensive but fun Asian grocery store with a wide array of snacks and a good mix of not only Chinese but also Korean and Japanese goods.
Taste of Nanking’s Mixed Noodle with Scallion Sauce and Minced Pork ($13.80) was really good. It is a dry noodle dish with a delicious sauce base and a generous helping of mince. The serving is huge, and I enjoyed the addition of the steamed bok choy which provided a fresh and moist counter to the thick saucy noodle dish. There’s a chilli symbol next to it on the menu, but it has more of a sweet taste than a spicy taste. I can definitely recommend this one.
Crayfish topping on steamed rice (Luxury)
The Crayfish Topping on Steamed Rice dish comes in three different grades – Original, Luxury, and Supreme – denoting the quantity of crayfish topping added. I had the “Luxury”, level with 120 grams of crayfish topping, coming in at $22.80.
My feelings about this dish were a bit mixed. This was my first time having small crayfish like this, and I appreciated the small prawny flavour but wondered what kind of hell it was to have to hand peel these tiny crayfish that I was eating multiple of in each mouthful. Apart from the yummy crayfish, the sauce that swam in was a bit too salty and tasty for me, and in this sense the rice definitely came in handy. The egg was yummy, and the dish did benefit from the addition of extra egg. The preserved vegetables added a sweetness to the otherwise quite salty dish. Again this was quite a large serving and like the mixed noodles we took what we couldn’t finish home. If I had one alteration to suggest I would either only get the Original variation (assuming that with only 90 grams of crayfish topping there would be less salty sauce) or add some additional rice.
Nanking Special Egg
The Nanking Special Eggs ($2) were a little bit special. They are your classic marinated soy/tea eggs, served cold, and really good eaten with the mains.
Braised Jumbo Meat Ball in Brown Sauce
The Braised Jumbo Meat Ball in Brown Sauce ($6.80) have a maximum order of 1 per customer, which I don’t really think makes sense unless there is a good reason for scarcity – normally more orders mean more income for the restaurant. They are a large ball formed out of minced pork. My partner quite enjoyed their soft internal texture, however I thought that they were a bit too salty to have on their own. They’re not bad, but if you are ordering these balls I’d highly recommend you have them with some rice.
Signature Nanking Soup Dumplings
The Signature Nanking Soup Dumplings (6 for $7.80) were pretty much Xiao Long Bao but without the folds in the pastry. I’m not really sure what else is different – perhaps a difference in the filling, but given the reasonably wide variation of XLB fillings in general I think it still fits in the same spectrum. The soup of Nanjing soup dumplings is also meant to be more prominent, and while these were quite soupy I think again they fall within the same spectrum as the XLBs of Sydney. They are cheap, juicy, and cheerful.
CONCLUSION
Taste of Nanking is not generally well-rated online, but I’m not too sure why. One one star review on Google Reviews was because their air conditioning wasn’t cold enough one Summer day, which I don’t really think is enough to poo-poo an otherwise good meal. Service seems to be another common complaint I thought the guy running front of house was really enthusiastic, although agree that it was a bit odd that we were given one cup to get water from the water cooler between the two of us.
Overall I think the food was good, and any of my gripes about it being too tasty could have been solved by ordering some extra white rice. Portions were huge and the meal was generally quite good value.
4.5/5 – Not for a business lunch or romantic date, but good for a quick casual meal or takeaway.
OLD TOWN DELIGHTS is a Thai restaurant in Mascot with a very focused but delicious menu consisting of only a few choice options.
The interior of the restaurant is a strange layout of a few tables for dining in and a couch for those waiting for their takeaway orders. There is a string of televisions behind the counter, but only one was on, playing YouTube videos of acoustic guitar music. There are also two electric guitars and an amplifier – not being skilled in music myself I did not try them.
Old Town Delight’s traditional duck noodle soup ($15.90) was excellent. The soup had a really deep, rich, umami flavour thanks to its inclusion of an array of Chinese herbs. The noodles themselves were surprisingly tasty, having been infused with some of the same flavours that makes this dish so great. There was a generous serving of gai lan and bean sprouts which added a degree of freshness to contrast with and complement the soup’s flavours. Unfortuantely the soy duck leg itself wasn’t really great – I felt it was a bit too lean and dry, but the beef balls that came with the soup were delicious. Despite the duck being a bit disappointing I can definitely recommend this dish. Absolutely wonderful flavours.
The spicy fried rice with chicken ($13.50) was also very good. It had a bit of pad kee mao quality, with basil and chilli flavours mixed into the rice. The chicken pieces were quite thick and juicy. I had a few mouthfuls in the restaurant fresh, and a few around 4AM that night at work and the food maintained its good quality despite microwaving.
THOUGHTS Old Town Delights in Mascot is an absolute hidden gem. Both dishes I had were really good, and I would readily recommend them to a friend or colleague.
Old Town Delights 830 Botany Rd, Mascot NSW 2020 (02) 8339 0889
