Category: Cities

This is a category for cities. All about food have reviewed restaurants in cities like Sydney, Singapore, Bali Island, Surabaya, and Bandung.

Belly Busters

Rating:

6.5 / 10

Taste: 6.5 / 10

Price: $115 for 3.5 people

Place: 7 / 10

Review:

As someone who enjoyed food so much, just hearing this restaurant’s name is music to my ears. Belly Busters is strategically located at the heart of Surfers Paradise and you would expect with big name like this, people would be enticed to at least try it out. That was exactly what we did…

On this occasion, two of our entrée used the same ingredients, wings. They were Buffalo Wings – Chicken Wings with a spicy tomato sauce – and BBQ Wings – Chicken wings with BBQ sauce. It was quite strange to receive two deep-fried wings dishes, one with tomato and the other BBQ sauce. If they said on the description that it would be deep-fried, I wouldn’t be as disappointed because they actually tasted okay for a deep-fried chicken. However, they definitely weren’t Buffalo or BBQ Wings as advertised.

For the main, I chose Rump n’ Bug – 350 gr rump steak topped with a bug covered in creamy garlic sauce. From the presentation standpoint, it was pretty good as they actually put an effort to decorate the plate. The steak was juicy but was cooked a bit towards the medium side, instead of medium rare. In addition to that, the bug was quite a letdown as it was not as fresh as I would like it to be.

For the next main course, we ordered T Bone n’ Garlic Prawns – 400gr T-bone steak topped with garlic tiger prawns in a creamy garlic sauce. Just by looking at the pictures below, you can see that the prawns were quite insignificant. The T-bone was also quite well done (instead of medium).

I guess when you ordered steak you might want to choose one below your expected level on how they cook the steak.

The final verdict for Belly Busters

Being at the heart of Surfers Paradise, Belly Busters will not need to do anything to advertise the restaurant. However, despite its big name, the restaurant under delivered on the taste department.

Details:

Centro Surfers Paradise, Cavill Mall, Surfers Paradise, QLD

07 5538 2355

Mar 3, 2014
Three Blue Ducks

Rating:

8.5 / 10

Taste: 8.5 / 10

Price: $150 for 2.5 people

Place: 8.5 / 10

Review:

A little prelude before my review of Three Blue Ducks restaurant: My wife had wanted to go to this restaurant before we eventually had the occasion to do so. I would probably describe the restaurant as French-style modern Australian with Asian influence. The only downside here was that I did not bring my big camera with me and had to rely on my iPhone! Three blue ducks menu is a very simple piece of paper on a clip board. I think it is quite beneficial as they change dishes seasonally. The dish was divided into four categories: smalls, bigs, sides and sweets (I think you can figure out what they mean).

It is obvious that we have to select seafood as our ‘smalls’ dish as five out of seven selections were seafood dishes in three blue ducks. Our first option went to snapper ceviche ($14). It was a beautifully presented dish that gave us a fresh start to our dinner. The next one was an unconventional corn, chawanmushi and crab ($17). It came as the ‘swipe’ presentation on one end of the plate.

We also took out their special of the night, beef brisket with chimichurri. When the wait person explained the special for us, all I could hear was ‘Beef brisket… slow cooked for x amount of hours… then cooked with chimichurri’. However, since I am a big fan of chimichurri, I took this option. I know my picture really didn’t do justice here, but the beef was great. It was very soft and you didn’t even need a knife to cut it up!

Now, we move on to the ‘bigs’ dishes. It would be a sin if you go to three blue ducks without actually trying their duck menu. On this occasion, it was duck, chilli jam, mushrooms and greens ($32). I was actually quite reluctant to try because of the word ‘chilli’. However, when a one hat restaurant in Australia specified chilli on the menu, you wouldn’t be expecting a blistering hot one! I had to share the duck with my son, because he chose this more than the beef brisket or chawanmushi we prepared for him. I guess he wasn’t wrong because it was clearly the best dish of the day. We didn’t even leave a single drop of the sauce!

Our other ‘bigs’ dish was wallaby, broccolini, pickled grapes ($30). We tried this out of pure curiosity. How many restaurants listed wallaby as an item on their menu? Possibly not many! The interesting part of this perfectly cooked wallaby was a hint of wasabi on its sauce. To be honest, we had difficulties in actually recognising that it was really a wallaby meat.

They have some unusual items for side dishes, the ‘sides’. However, we found that they were the best value for money and tasted pretty great! For the first dish, it was a rich and flavoursome mushroom and grains dish ($8), they used different types of mushrooms and grains that were most likely consisted of barley and quinoa. We also loved the roast carrots, honey and almonds ($8). Not only they provided a sweet dimension to our dinner, it was also presented in quite a decent size.

I must say the ‘sweets’ section had a list of dishes with quite unusual ingredients. We decided to pick apple & pears, ginger & mint custard ($14). It was quite an interesting mixture of sour apple sorbet, diced pears, and strong flavour of ginger and mint sauce. They also used savoiardi (or ladyfinger biscuit) that soaked up most of the strong-tasting custard.

The final verdict for Three Blue Ducks

It is quite rare that we went to a restaurant with high hopes and met with equal or better presentations. Three blue ducks restaurant actually exceeded my expectations as a one hat restaurant!

Details:

141-143 Macpherson St, Bronte

02 9389 0010

http://www.threeblueducks.com/

Feb 24, 2014
House of Crabs

Rating:

7.5 / 10 Taste: 7.5 / 10

Price: $340 for six people

Place: 7.5 / 10

Review:

Opened at the beginning of November last year, House of Crabs (written as House of .C.R.A.B.S. in their website) has become the ‘Talk of the Town’ in Urbanspoon. The restaurant’s specialty (can’t really call it ‘signature dish’ as there might be different combinations) was ‘The Boil’.

Before we talk about ‘The Boil’, let’s have a look at what they have to offer. The first one to arrive on our table was from ‘The Greens’ section Kale, bean, & broccoli salad w/ spiced sunflower seeds ($16). Kale is the keyword to healthy food these days, but sounded a lot like hype for me. We also had a plate of fried chicken ($18). I must admit that I wanted to order this dish because of the picture I saw in Urbanspoon.

Personally, I think the best dish of the night was the lobster fries w/ lobster gravy, bacon & corn ($12). It was listed under ‘The Snacks’, but in reality it was quite big. I am pretty sure that there was no lobster in the fries, but the lobster gravy that generously covered the lobster fries was heavenly. You must not skip this one! We also ordered deep fried soft-shell crab ($15) from their Special Menu board. I love how the crab gave the complemented crunchy taste to our dinner.

Now, onto the main course, that was called ‘The Boil’. The price that you see on the menu is based on 500 grams of the seafood of your choice. They have six different seafood dishes that can be combined with four different sauces. We had all the sauces, but only three different kinds of seafood. I didn’t try the QLD prawns ($27) with Oriental sauce, but the prawns looked pretty big!

My first taste of the boil was the Alaskan king crab ($45) with Mexican sauce… and boy it was hot! We ordered two portions of Alaskan snow crab ($36) with Cajun and Lemon Pepper sauce respectively. It was quite hard to differentiate the king and snow crab because they were in a bag and the snow crab was actually quite big. From the four sauces, I quite like the non-spicy lemon pepper and the Cajun ones.

There was also a special edition of ’The Boil’ that featured QLD yabbies ($34) with special creole butter sauce. Some of us didn’t quite like the appearance of the peeled yabbies as they were quite dark and looked ‘un-fresh’. After browsing Google for how peeled boiled yabbies might look, it was certainly a lot darker than that!

Lastly, the waitress explained earlier that they pride themselves of an ugly aftermath that showed that you really enjoyed the dish. I won’t post the aftermath because it was quite gruesome, but if you want to see, you can view the aftermath here.

The final verdict for House of Crabs

At House of Crabs, in addition to its specialty, the boil, you must also order its lobster fries.

Details:

Level 1, 305 Cleveland Street, Redfern

[email protected]

http://houseofcrabs.com.au/

Feb 17, 2014
ChaoPraya Thai Restaurant

Rating:

7 / 10

Taste: 7 / 10

Price: $35 per person

Place: 7.5 / 10

Review:

When I went to the Gold Coast the first time, long before I started writing this blog, we had dinner at this restaurant. We were pretty pleased with the food and it left quite an impression that I decided to write my next piece here. ChaoPraya Thai Restaurant has quite a nice interior design, very friendly staffs and the restaurant is located strategically on The Gold Coast Highway.

Our first dish of the day was Fried Rice Thai Style ($15.90), The description said it was ‘chef’s own special style of fried rice with chicken, egg and Vegetable’. All I could remember was that it was especially HOT! They put a decent effort in decorating the dish but it was just too hot for me.

Fortunately the second dish was a lot friendlier to me, it was Sweet & Sour Fish ($33.90) – Fried fillet of fish combined with tomatoes, cucumber, capsicum, onion, shallot in sweet and sour sauce. It was nicely served in a fish-shaped plate and had quite a nice balance of flavours.

Our next one was another nicely-presented dish, Larb Chicken ($24.90) – Minced Chicken cooked with lime juice, onion, coriander, chilli powder, toasted ground rice and mint leaves. It was also said to be ‘served with green lettuce at room temperature’.

The Crumbed Calamari ($12.90) – Calamari rings crumbed and deep fried. Served with sweet and sour chilli sauce – was presented in a squid-looking plate! We couldn’t help but wonder how many plates they have in their arsenal! Unlike the fish, the crumbed looked a bit darker. However the calamari itself was quite okay.

For our dessert, we ordered Sweet Sticky Rice with Mango ($9.90). In the menu it has the word ‘seasonal’ in bracket and we were lucky that mango was in season at that time.

The final verdict for ChaoPraya Thai Restaurant

There is no doubt that you would feel good after visiting ChaoPraya Thai Restaurant. They have good and beautifully-presented food and friendly services.

Did you know?

There is also a Chao Praya restaurant in Sydney. At first I thought they were related. However looking at their website, I don’t think they are.

Chao Phraya (???????????????) apparently is the name of a major river in Thailand.

Details:

Corner Frederick Street and Gold Coast Highway, Surfers Paradise

07 5538 8118

Feb 10, 2014
Donto Sapporo

Rating:

7.5 / 10

Taste: 7.5 / 10

Price: $50 per person

Place: 7.5 / 10

Review:

Urbanspoon listed All About Food Blog as 11% Japanese cuisines. I think now I know why as our first ever post in Gold Coast was (surprise, surprise) a Japanese restaurant! We were actually relying on Urbanspoon’s readers that showed us the best tasting Japanese restaurant around the area where we stayed. Our choice fell to Donto Sapporo Japanese Restaurant.

We didn’t order that many dishes because there were only the three of us. For the first one, we ordered the mid-range Sashimi that they called Fisherman’s Choice Sashimi ($35). The cuts were very fresh and neat as expected. However, the kinds of sashimi they put in were quite on the average-side for the price tag.

The second dish of the day was Donto Sapporo’s special: Duck Soup ($9.5) – my apologies that the name escaped me as it was a combination of long Japanese words. It was a nice and manageable portion of duck with clear broth/soup with some vegetables to accompany the duck. We were pretty happy that our first two dishes were refreshingly fresh!

Another Donto Sapporo’s special for our third dish: King Crab Tempura ($19.5). I must say I was quite surprised when I saw this special menu; there are not many restaurants in Australia that serve King Crab Tempura! In addition to the king crab tempura, they also did seaweed in tempura batter and also some vegetables. The crab itself was very juicy and meaty!

Our last dish was Tempura Udon ($24). There were the usual suspects in Australian tempura dish: prawns, sweet potato, long bean, carrot, eggplant. However, they also threw enoki mushroom into the mix. The udon was also textbook-spot-on. Strangely enough, this tempura tasted a lot crunchier than the king crab tempura. I think it was because the king crab tempura had a lot more meat in one piece than this one.

The final verdict for Donto Sapporo Japanese Restaurant

We left Donto Sapporo feeling pretty impressed with the restaurant. Honestly, we thought we would get those tourist-y over-the-top premium restaurants. However, it turned out to be a nice and homey restaurant with good food and great service.

Details:

2763 Gold Coast Highway, Broadbeach 4218

07 5539 9933

http://www.dontosapporo.com.au/

Feb 3, 2014
Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_message color=”alert-info”]

Harry’s has moved to a new venue, please check restaurant website for its new address.

[/vc_message][vc_column_text]

Rating:

7 / 10

Taste: 7 / 10

Price: $50-60 per person

Place: 7 / 10

Review:

We conclude our feast-ival January with another Chilli Crab restaurant. Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab restaurant has quite a confident sounding to its name. It even has the owner holding a mud crab as a picture on its billboard sign. We only ordered four dishes this time, but that was because there were only four of us. Nevertheless, I am still amazed how we could finish those dishes!

Our first dish of the day was (this is what’s written on the menu) Harry’s Pepper and Salt Calamari ($22.50). I think it was the dish flawless dish of the night. It was presented quite nicely and had an extra sauce should you require it. The calamari itself was perfectly crunchy and chewy at the same time. The calamari was quickly followed by Garlic Sauce Kangkung ($15.00). It was very similar to something that you would prepare at home, it looked very boringly green and tasted equally so.

For our next dish, Today’s Market whole fish in Ginger and Shallots ($38.50), the fish was overcooked. It was quite unfortunate because I think the combination of flavours and presentation were spot on! It had all the flavours of a ginger and shallot dish with additional tofu and green vegetables.

Of course our last dish of the day was Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab (MP $85 per kg). There was quite a messy feel to its presentation, but then again you WILL get messy when eating a crab. From the taste department, this was the hottest crab that we ordered so far (PS: we always asked the chef to cook the crab ‘normally’). It was accompanied by nice-looking buns although it might be a bit too greasy. The crab was quite on par with other mud crab restaurants I have reviewed before.

The final verdict for Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab

The dishes at Harry’s Singapore Chilli Crab was quite average. Given the pricey nature of the crab, you would expect the accompanying dishes to be quite enjoyable as well.

Details:

198 Elizabeth Street, Surry Hills 2010

02 9281 5565

http://www.harryschillicrab.com.au/

Jan 29, 2014