Category: Sydney

All About Food Blog is currently based in Sydney, Australia. It is obviously THE place to be if you want to find food from all over the world.

Wagaya Sydney Experience

My Wagaya Sydney Experience

Wagaya Sydney has been on on my radar for quite a while but they were always pretty busy on weekends. When opportunity knocked (courtesy of SD Marketing Global) to review the restaurant, I wouldn’t want to miss it!

Wagaya Sydney is an izakaya restaurant, which technically means they are more of a drinking establishment than a restaurant. The food serves in an izakaya is meant to accompany the drinks. However, it is quite a posh izakaya restaurant!

Wagaya Menu

The first dish of the day was actually chosen by my son: Japanese Style Scallops Spaghetti. I am not a big fan of Spaghetti, but I really don’t mind eating this one (after being granted the permission to try his food)!

Japanese-Style Scallops Spaghetti – $10.90

From the ‘quick nibbles’ section, we ordered Lotus Root Chips and Crispy Salmon Skin. The lotus root chips was probably the best suited dish for izakaya. You can never get enough off it! I always liked deep fried crispy salmon skins and they are actually pretty good to fill up the tummy.

Lotus Root Chips – $7

Crispy Salmon Skin – $5.80

If you are after a rather ‘heavy’ food, then you can choose one of the Sukiyaki options. Beef Sukiyaki was our choice of the night.

Beef Sukiyaki – $13

They also have an assortment of Sushi rolls and you can either order half roll or a full roll. Given my love to scampi, we chose Fried Scampi Roll. It turned out that fried scampi didn’t have the same appeal as fresh scampi. The sushi itself was quite delectable.

Fried Scampi Roll – Full – $12.50

The one thing that made our visit to Wagaya Sydney worthwhile was its Sashimi. It was arguably one of the freshest Scallops Sashimi I have ever tasted! It actually ‘provoked’ me to order another sashimi dish, Crystal Bay Prawn Sashimi.

Scallops Sashimi – $9

Crystal Bay Prawn Sashimi – $7.90

A couple of dishes that we also ordered on the night were Chicken Gristle and Lamb Chop. The chicken gristle are great bite-sized nibbles! The lamb chop was more of a curious purchase and we were glad we ordered it!

Chicken Gristle – $8.20

Lamb Chop – $12

A few interesting things about Wagaya Sydney

– Wagaya Sydney’s membership card has quite a few perks and it works just like the Credit Card point system: $1 for 1 point. The prizes range from a discount voucher to iPhone!

– Wagaya is part of a Japanese group of restaurants, including Sushi Hotaru.

Details:

1/78 Harbour Street, Haymarket NSW 2000

+61 2 9212 6068

http://www.wagaya.com.au

Dec 25, 2014
Sushi of Masuya

Review:

There was a recent (16 June 2014) change of management to the restaurant we are reviewing this week. Sushi of Masuya was formerly known as Musashi Dining Bar. The new management preserves the former restaurant’s concept of Japanese Izakaya.

The first plate coming to our table was the Sashimi Deluxe Platter. It is only befitting that the first test for a Sushi establishment was the freshness of the fish! The types of Sashimi presented in their Sashimi deluxe platter did not disappoint. The presence of Scampi and beef tataki was a gigantic plus in my good book. They also had the ‘usual’ suspects, such as Tamago (egg), Salmon, Tuna and Kingfish. They also include a little side of tsukemono (Japanese pickles), scallops and squid with fish roe.

Sashimi Deluxe Platter – $58

For our second dish, Deep fried salmon belly, I don’t think it requires a big introduction. The formula is quite simple: Salmon + its belly section + deep fried = happy face.

Deep fried Salmon Belly – $9.80

Wagyu Skewer was a little bit flat and looked a bit uninteresting when compared to the previous dish. It was also a little too well done to my liking.

Wagyu Skewer – $14.80

Our third salmon dish of the day was Spicy Salmon Fin. The salmon wasn’t exactly spicy by our standards but there was still a decent amount of spice.

Spicy Salmon Fin – $9.80

Just when you think you had enough of salmon, we had Salmon Sushi. This one was actually my son’s dinner (he loves salmon so much!).

Salmon Sushi – $8.80

The last dish of the day, Karaage Chicken, was quite a ‘standard’ one.

Karaage Chicken – $8.80

The final verdict for Sushi of Masuya

You should definitely stick to the Sushi and Sashimi in Sushi of Masuya.

Did you know?

At the time of publication (16 December 2014), Sydney was mourning because of the death of Two Sydneysiders (Tori and Katrina) caused by a gunman at Lindt Cafe Martin Place. Our thoughts and prayers to the victims and their families and friends.

Rating for:

7.0 / 10

Taste: 7.0 / 10

Price: $10 – $20 per plate

Place: 8.0 / 10

Details:

447 Pitt Street, Sydney, NSW 2000

+61 2 9280 0377

Facebook page for Sushi of Masuya

Dec 16, 2014
Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration – Part 2

Review:

In this second instalment of the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration, we focus more on the food that they served on the night. If you want to read about the celebration, please go to my Feng Shui Blessing post.

On Arrival – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

The evening started off with the usual canapés and drinks. Unfortunately, my camera went funny when I took the pictures of some of them: prawn and squid shu mai with avocado, and Jumbo prawn dumplings.

Luckily I managed to salvage a picture of the last entry on the ‘On Arrival’ menu: Spicy wonton chips. This dish is one of those ones that you cannot stop eating unless the plate is empty!

Chapas – Chinese Style – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

In line with the usual sharing tradition in Chinese cuisine, the service that they had for the evening was Chapas, presumably Chinese Tapas or some sort.

Macanese style mini burger filled with pork fillet, pork floss, lettuce and a sweet chilli mayo dressing

It was a light and fluffy start to our dinner service. The mini burger was small enough for me to swallow as a whole.

Shredded peking duck with cucumber, hoisin sauce rolled inside a fluffy Chinese roti

Peking duck was my favourite dish of the night. It was anything you could ask for in a Peking duck with the added extra kick of toasted Chinese roti. The Chinese roti tasted a lot closer to a Roti Pratha than the usual Peking duck wrap.

Crispy soft shell crab with fried shallots, garlic and chopped chillies, served with Chinese salad in a sesame soya dressing

Another dish that I have always enjoyed is a soft shell crab. In this dish, the crab was quite obscured by the garnish.

Crispy pork belly and barramundi pieces. Wrap both pork belly and fish in lettuce, topped with fresh basil and mint leaves. Drizzle with a dash of gula Melaka flavoured with cinnamon and mandarin peel

This dish has quite an interesting combination. It is also compounded by exotic flavours of cinnamon, mandarin and sugar (gula Melaka). You eat it similar to Korean BBQ where you wrap the meat inside a lettuce and dip it in the sauce.

For the next three dishes, it was quite a revelation for me that Chefs Gallery put so much pride on their noodles. Not only that they had special Noodle making session on the Opening Ceremony, they also served three noodles dishes (of different colours!) for the Chapas.

Spinach handmade thick noodles, wok fried with prawns, mussels in shell, baby calamari tubes, Chinese shitake mushrooms, dusted with seaweed and sesame powder.

Personally this is the one I liked best after the shredded Peking duck. From the appearance, it looked more of a seafood dish than noodles. It also had quite a strong seafood taste (too strong for Janni the chef). But, who wouldn’t want to try a green-coloured noodles dish?

Fish noodles served with chicken soup

Although it looked quite ordinary, there was nothing ordinary in terms of its taste. It was quite a unique noodles dish with texture I’ve never tasted before!

Knife-sliced sorghum noodles served with a Shanghainese spicy sauce

The sorghum noodles dish was also pretty interesting. It was slightly pink in colour and was cooked with wonton. I kinda like the taste, but unfortunately I wasn’t a big fan of spicy dishes.

Dessert – Chefs Gallery Macquarie

Signature “Piggy Face” sesame bun and “Totoro” marshmallow arranged in an edible garden setting, beautifully presented and served with ice cream.

We would have enjoyed the desserts a lot more if it wasn’t closer to 10 PM on the night and I wasn’t on my 12^th plate for the day. I have always loved the cute-looking ‘piggy face’ buns since the first time I went into the restaurant. It was delightful to see the playful, shared-plate dessert at the end of the banquet.

Details:

Macquarie Shopping Centre Shop 407

197-223 Herring Rd, North Ryde, NSW

+61 2 9267 8877

http://chefsgallery.com/

All About Food Blog was invited by White Works Public Relations to be the guest for the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Opening Celebration dinner.

Dec 8, 2014
Chefs Gallery Store Opening Feng Shui Blessing – Part 1

This will be a two-part chronicle as I think it’s important to tell the story on the actual procession and not just the food.

The second part (the food review) will be available for my next post. I will update you with the link on this page when it is published.

Chefs Gallery Macquarie

I went to the Chefs Gallery Macquarie Celebration Dinner / Feng Shui Blessing because I was invited by Stewart and Leonardo from Whiteworks Public Relations. The event was attended by quite a few notable names in the culinary industry, including chef Janni Kyritsis. Thanks to Chopinand from ChopinandMysaucepan.com, I was spared the blushes of not knowing his achievements!

There were quite a few attractions before the feng shui blesing ceremony started. We were entertained by Master Calligrapher (which I forgot his name – apologies) demonstrating his skills in writing our names using Chinese calligraphy. A friend of mine gave me a Chinese name “??” a long time ago, so I’m getting that calligraphy made.

In front of the master calligrapher, there was a Guzheng zither played.

After a few rounds of finger food and light refreshments, the procession was opened by the usual ribbon cutting ceremony by the owners.

The table was already pre-arranged and I was sitting next to Chopinand and the guy who sponsored the drinks for the night. On our table, we had three distinguished chefs, including Janni, the MC (Claudia Chan Shaw) and a news reporter. The table was beautifully presented and each of us received a token resembling ancient Chinese gold ingot in gold envelope.

Chefs Gallery Macquarie restaurant was decorated with Chinese Calligraphy all around the restaurant and there was a lot of hanging brushes for Feng Shui purposes.

More information about Chefs Gallery Macquarie centre can be found on their website and this media release.

Feng Shui Blessing

So what is Feng Shui blessing? Feng Shui House Blessing website offers quite an extensive article about the practise.

Claudia Chan Shaw (our host of the night) explained that Feng Shui literally meant wind and water. It is generally used to create a balanced chi for your establishments. It involved several steps including the cleansing rituals and appeasing the Gods (in this instance it included the God of kitchen).

The Cleansing Rituals

Appeasing Kitchen God

Appeasing Gods

Noodle Master Pei Lin Jai demonstrating his skills

The last ‘attraction’ of the night was Noodle making session by Noodle master Pei Lin Jai (aka Chef Panda). Just like in the video above, chef Pei Lin Jai masterfully demonstrated how he created four different types of noodles on the night.

The first was ‘regular’ noodles.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

He then made a finer type of noodles.

Up to the point where the noodles were extra fine! They then lit up the noodles that we thought was almost borderline smoke hazard that would set off the smoke detectors.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

In addition to those ‘regular’ noodles above, he also created specialty noodles: spinach thick noodles, fish noodles and sorghum noodles. Unfortunately I only had the sorghum noodles pictured below.

Noodle Making Session by Pei Lin Jai (LJP)

With this, I conclude my first part of the review. It is truly an amazing experience watching Feng Shui blessing.

Details:

Macquarie Shopping Centre Shop 407

197-223 Herring Rd, North Ryde, NSW

+61 2 9267 8877

http://chefsgallery.com/

Nov 25, 2014
Aperitivo

Review:

A few weeks ago, there was a discussion amongst Sydney Food Bloggers about the best pizza restaurant (pizzeria) in Sydney. Some of them mentioned Aperitivo. Aperitivo is a member of AVPN, an organisation that guarantees true Neapolitan pizza. My curiosity surfaced and thought I had to go to the restaurant!

Upon reaching Leichhardt, I realised I went past this restaurant several times on the way to the infamous Bar Italia. My impression was that the restaurant was always buzzing. However, it resembled a bar more than a pizzeria!

As a big fan of nice pate, we ordered the Pate di fegato di pollo e giardiniera. The chicken liver pate was presented with pickled vegetables on a wooden board. The texture was more on the coarse and heavy side.

Pate di fegato di pollo e giardiniera (Chicken Liver pate), $10

Quite a lot of options for the pizza, so you might want to take your time in finding the perfect combination that suit your needs. The interesting thing on this menu is that they have two Margherita pizza. One is the normal Margherita and the other one is Margherita Bufala STG. So, what made it so special and warranted an increase of $7? The footnote gave a little bit of explanation about STG. In 1996, Margherita was recognised as a Specialità Tradizionale Garantita. Technically, you are guaranteed that the pizza you enjoyed is of traditional quality. You also got buffalo mozzarella instead of the normal cow’s milk mozzarella.

Margherita Bufala STG, $24

The other pizza we ordered was Pizza Lampara. This one is the less-traditional seafood pizza. The toppings included sauté calamari and prawns with rocket. I found that this one was tastier than the Margherita one.

Pizza Lampara, $24

We ordered Aperitivo Tiramisu for the dessert. The tiramisu had quite a convincing description: Soft sponge, mascarpone semifreddo, salted caramel, strawberry compote and chocolate crumble. Despite its nice appearance, it fell short in the taste department.

Aperitivo Tiramisu, $12

The final verdict for Aperitivo

There is no mistaking that Aperitivo’s pizza had the nice quality. However it is not enough to dethrone my personal favourite.

Did you know?

There are four members of the prestigious Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana (The True Neapolitan Pizza Association) in Sydney. They are Lucio Pizzeria, Gigi Pizzeria, Pizza Mario and Aperitivo. Its main goal is to promote and protect the “true Neapolitan pizza” according to a very strict standard.

As mentioned above, we love going to Bar Italia for its Mascarpone (pictured below).

Rating for Aperitivo:

7.5 / 10

Taste: 7.5 / 10

Price: $14 – $24 per pizza

Place: 7.5 / 10

Details:

163 Norton St, Leichhardt NSW 2040

+61 2 9564 0003

http://aperitivo.com.au/

Nov 6, 2014
Sel Et Poivre

Review:

I have heard about this restaurant for quite a while and people seem to be singing praise of the cafe, but I just couldn’t bring myself to visit the area (not a big fan of trying to find street parking there!). So, when I finally went to the area, because I also wanted to try Gelato Messina, I couldn’t miss the chance to pay a visit.

The name is Sel Et Poivre (it is the French for salt and pepper) and it is located at the heart of Darlinghurst’s Victoria Street. From the moment we set foot in this restaurant, François (the boss there) showered us with great French hospitality.

Obviously when you are in a French restaurant there are a couple of dishes that you have to order. Escargots are one of them. To be exact, they were called Escargots gratinés au beurre d’ail or Gratinated snails with parsley and garlic butter. It is advised to order the dish with baguette. In addition to filling your tummy quite quickly, the baguette also enhanced the flavours of your escargots.

Escargots gratinés au beurre d’ail – $16.90

The second entree was more on the pretty side, called Galette de crabe au poireau braisé, à l’américaine (Crispy galette of fresh swimmer crab, leeks and sauce a l’americaine). It was beautifully presented and got quite a strong lobster sauce that complemented the crispy galette.

Galette de crabe au poireau braisé, à l’américaine – $17.50

Two of the mains that we ordered might not be your ‘usual’ types of dish. For the first main, it was steak tartare aller-retour avec sauce Béarnaise,frites et salade (Sel & Poivre steak tartare, seared or non seared with frites, salad and bearnaise sauce). Steak tartare is a raw minced beef that you enjoyed with tartare sauce and egg yolk. The sheer size of the steak might be quite intimidating to some and it was quite a heavy dish!

steak tartare aller-retour avec sauce Béarnaise,frites et salade – $26.90

Sel & Poivre steak tartare, seared or non seared with frites, salad and bearnaise sauce

The last dish of the day was foie de veau poêlé à l’échalotte et pommes-frites (Seared veal liver with a French shallot sauce and frites). It is suggested that you ordered the veal liver medium rare. This way you can actually taste the liver’s texture without being too rubbery. It’s perfectly fine if you love this part of the meat. However, it can be quite pungent for those not accustomed to it. Just like steak tartare, enjoying a liver dish also requires an acquired taste.

Foie de veau poêlé à l’échalotte et pommes-frites – $34.50

The two main dishes came with quite a large bowl of salad and fries.

If both mains are a bit too ‘adventurous’ for you, they also have quite a few range in their menu. Sel et poivre can also cook a special kids menu for your little one(s). We chose chicken with chips. They also gave a scoop of ice cream at the end. It was actually quite a big portion for a kid’s meal.

Special Kids Menu – $14.90

At the end of the day, we felt that we ordered a bit too much, but we just had to finish them all! The only regret was that we didn’t come to Sel Et Poivre a lot sooner!

The final verdict for Sel Et Poivre

Sel et Poivre has everything you could have asked for! They served great food and complimented that with great hospitality and service!

Did you know?

Victoria Street in Darlinghurst is the home of one of the best gelato joints in Australia, Gelato Messina.

Rating for Ester Restaurant and Bar:

8.5 / 10

Taste: 8.5 / 10

Price: $25 – $35 main dishes

Place: 7.5 / 10

Details:

263 Victoria Street, Darlinghurst

+61 2 9361 6530

http://www.seletpoivre.com.au/

Oct 29, 2014