Category: City

A2 Finely sliced beef shin slow roasted in premium soya sauce, a Shanghainese favourite

D2 Guo Tie Lightly pan fried prawn dumplings

SN2 Chef’s own golden snowflake chicken – lightly crumbed chicken fillet, very crispy, tender and moist served with noodles in a pumkin soup

R3 Wok fried medium grain rice with three types of eggs (chicken egg, salted duck egg and century egg), a must try dish

V5 Wok fried mussels in sweet Chinese rice wine

V6 Chef’s own handmade egg tofu lightly pan fried, topped with preserved vegetables

HD1 Steamed sesame ‘piggy face’ bun, as sumptuous to the eyes as it is to the taste buds – a must-try for adults and children (2 pc)

HD3 Steamed pumpkin pastry dumpling filled with lotus paste, a beautiful piece of art (3 pc)

Review:

We will start the New Year with one of the newest restaurants in town, Chef’s Gallery. One of the main attractions of the restaurant is the restaurant-wide see-thru kitchen. It really gave us a unique dining experience and a sense of security because we know what the chefs are doing to our food.Although there were quite a bit of options in the menu, they made it easy for us since they highlighted their signature dishes with a chef hat.

We started off the night lightly with the sliced beef shin and guo tie. These two dishes were too ordinary for this wonderful looking restaurant. There was also accompanying vinegar for the dumpling to enhance its flavour.

The next two served were completely the opposite.With its three egg types, the fried rice was rich in flavour and very savoury. However it was pretty expensive for its size. This is where the noodles compensated. It had a decent size and its pumpkin / egg soup filled in the duty of tummy-filler. The noodles came with golden snowflake chicken aka chicken katsu.

The mussels were quite bland and, again, had a very tiny portion. It was nowhere near the Belgian mussels. However, the last dish was a work of art. The egg tofu was so delicate and its unique combination with the vegetables I’ve never tasted before.

The clear winner, however, was the dessert. Nothing will make the ladies squeal like the ‘piggy face’ bun.The other dessert was also comparable to the bun.

The final verdict for Chefs Gallery

The ‘piggy face’ bun was definitely the dish of the day, although it was too cute to be eaten. The other dishes were also nice with few surprises here and there. It was worth coming back to Chef’s Gallery for seconds.

Did you know?

Chef’s Gallery is one of the newest additions to Sydney’s culinary world. With similar concept to Din Tai Fung’s, it wins a contemporary edge over DTF. Taste wise both of them are clear losers when compared to the cheaper and fast Chinese food of Ashfield and Burwood. However, in terms of table service and hygiene, we know whom to pick.

Location:

Shop 12, Ground Floor Regent Place, 501 George Street, Sydney NSW 2000

http://www.chefsgallery.com/

First of all, we would like to wish you a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. This week we will have a double review. This is the first instalment of the review.

For the first one, I take you to the world of chili, or in this case, Red Chilli Sichuan (or Szechuan). Located at the heart of Chinatown, this restaurant was recommended by our friend. Upon glancing the menu, we knew that there were not many non-chili dishes.As with any other Chinese restaurants, the dishes’ names are loosely translated or just a list of what was in them.

Without further ado we start with the appetiser, Sliced beef, beef tongue, tripe and chilli sauce. Pre-boiled-then-chilled meat was immersed in chilli sauce. It was a nice intro to the chilli night and this one was not too spicy.

The next two dishes had the same attributes, except for the main ingredient. One was Hot pot beef with hot and spicy sauce and Chinese cabbage and the other one was Hot pot fish fillets. Although the pictures can’t really show, these two dishes were gigantic. For chilli lovers, I think they’ll be in heaven with this dish. The soup was literally a chilli pot. In my opinion, it was just too much: too much chilli and too big of a portion.

The next dish I couldn’t taste because there was an element of pork in it, although we specifically said to the waiter that we didn’t eat pork. I guess the poor underpaid girl didn’t really care anyway. It was Stir fried green beans with pork mince.

Two of the better dishes of the night came in last, westernised Kung Pao Chicken and Crispy Ducks. The chicken was an ok dish with some element of chilli in it. The crispy ducks on the other hand were great. They were fried to golden brown with extra crunchy skin. It was served with a nice brown sauce.

The final verdict: Another restaurant that I wasn’t fancy because of the super hot dishes. In addition to that, the service that we received was too similar to any cheap Chinese restaurants in Sydney, even when it charged a premium pricing. The only exception to it was the duck. It was very clean and crispy. It reminded me of how ducks are cooked in Indonesia.

Did you know?

When trying to find the website for this restaurant, I found out that it was part of a restaurant chain around Sydney.

Location:

Shop 3, 51-53 Dixon Street, Haymarket NSW 2000

Website:

http://www.redchilligroup.com.au/

Rating:

Review:

Just like any other well-known Chinese Restaurants, Din Tai Fung is always packed with people. If you go there only with your partner, don’t be intimidated by the huge number of people queuing outside the restaurants. The turnover for two people is quite high, so you will only need to wait for half an hour. But if you go with a large group, I’d suggest you to book in advance.

Din Tai Fung is world famous for its Xiaolongbao (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiaolongbao). It is a very soft dumpling with mince pork (or some other combinations) and gelatine soup. We normally add vinegar and sliced ginger, pop the dumpling so that the soup would come out and enjoy it all in a spoonful. This time, we ordered its variant, Steamed Green Vegetable Dumpling. It was served in a bamboo basket and a layer of white cloth. The dumpling was quite different than any other dumplings we found on a yumcha restaurant. You can actually see through it and looked soft and yet it is strong enough to be handled by chopsticks.

Similar to other fine dining restaurants, the portion of their food is pretty small, thus we ordered quite a few dishes. First one to come out was the appetiser, Drunken Chicken. It was a chilled Boneless chicken marinade in Chinese wine. It was soft and had a hint of sweetness in the chicken. Very good to build your appetite, but unfortunately, this was the best dish of the night for me.

In addition to the dumplings, we also ordered Sautéed Water Spinach with Garlic and Deep Fried Chicken Fried Rice. Although a quite staple food in Indonesia, water spinach is difficult to obtain in Sydney. It is quite nice and healthy. There was nothing special about the fried rice as well, but the chicken was quite crispy and tasty.

To finish the night, we ordered Mango Pudding and Golden Taro with Taro Ice Cream. We ordered the pudding just to be on the safe side (and I think there’s a universal standard for how you make mango pudding). It’s a pretty generous serving of mango pudding with an optional side of condensed milk. Pretty nice, yet pretty standard! The other dessert, however, was really nice. It was a deep-fried, golden brown taro on a side with a scoop of ice cream. It was very crunchy and savoury.

Did you know?

As one of Sydney’s prominent building, World Square housed several big name restaurants, shops, and nightclubs. It is also an ideal meeting place because of the ease of travel to it.

Location:

Shop 11.04, World Square Shopping Centre, 644 George Street, Sydney

https://www.dintaifungaustralia.com.au/