Tag: No Pork

A list of restaurants in my blog that is considered to contain no pork to the best of my knowledge

Sushi Tengoku

Review:

Back in 2011, I reviewed Sushi Tengoku with one major issue: wait time. So, what’s so different this time around?

Sushi and Sashimi

Sushi was the thing I love the most at Sushi Tengoku. They are nice, extra large, and served pretty fast! We never miss ordering aburi salmon and aburi scallops. Some people said that the sea urchin sushi was nice, but we always have difficulties in trying to find which one to cut from our order.

If you want variety, we suggest you to order sushi or sashimi moriawase.

Sushi rolls and small dishes

Whenever we are in Sushi Tengoku, we always ordered tamago roll and spider roll. Sushi tengoku’s sushi rolls were humongous as always! Trying to finish them was quite a task.

If you can stand fish head, I suggest you to try teriyaki salmon fish head. For only $5, it is by far the best value for money dish.

Specials

Specials are the one place that was problematic last time around. This time, we upped the ante and ordered two specials: Baked Scallops and Volcano Roll.

We were pretty pleased that the baked scallops were served reasonably fast and they were actually bigger. Baked scallops consisted of scallops, salmon, fish roe, and mayonnaise.

The volcano roll was pretty interesting. There were eight sushi maki with charred (aburi) crab meat.

The new verdict for Sushi Tengoku

We’re pretty impressed with the changes that happened at Sushi Tengoku! Still the same gigantic sushi and baked scallops, but now without the ridiculously long wait time!

Did you know?

My Japanese friend once told me that a good sushi was not judged by the quality of meat, but was actually the intricate process to produce its rice!

Sushi Tengoku is the second restaurant that All About Food blog revisited (Churrasco being the other one).

Why do we revisit?

Some restaurants we visit regularly. If we think that the restaurant has improved significantly, we’ll try to get a new post for that restaurant.

Sushi Tengoku’s Rating:

7.5 / 10

Taste: 8.0 / 10

Price: $20 – $30 per person

Place: 6.5 / 10

Details:

121 Anzac Parade, Kensington NSW 2033

02 9663 3388

They don’t have a website, but they do have Sushi Tengoku facebook page.

May 12, 2014
Triple Pick Coffee

Triple Pick Coffee Review:

This week, I present you a rather unique review. Instead of reviewing a restaurant, this will be the first time that All About Food blog reviews a coffee establishment. For that reason, we will not be using our usual rating concept.

Triple Pick Coffee is the shop that we always go to for a great cup of coffee. They are located in a small street just across the loading bay for Westfield Bondi Junction’s Coles. Despite the busy nature of Westfield Bondi Junction, this location actually creates a more relaxed ambiance.

Triple Pick Coffee only uses Sumatran Mandheling for its coffee. The beans were imported directly from family plantations in Medan, Indonesia. This way, it was ensured that you would get the same quality every time you sip their coffee.

In the summer, you might want to try their Ice Coffee. I love how they do it differently. Instead of having a normal ice cube and whipped cream, they have coffee cube and coffee whipped cream. That way, you will never get diluted feel of the ice coffee. They also have a selection of small bites, homemade sandwiches and cakes to accompany your coffee.

Roasted In-house

One of the unique traits of Triple Pick Coffee was that their coffee beans were roasted in-house. There are only a handful of coffee shops that are also a roaster. What is so special about roasted in-house coffees? Freshness! You just can’t beat the taste of fresh coffee off the roaster.

In Triple Pick Coffee, you can actually see the process of coffee roasting and smell the finished products just as they leave the roasting machine.

The final verdict for Triple Pick Coffee

I have tried several coffee shops that have their coffee beans roasted in-house. I felt that Triple Pick Coffee was the closest one to my taste buds.

Did you know?

Sydneysiders are very particular about their coffees. Coffee culture is so deeply-rooted into the society that great coffee shops often have people lining up just for a sip of their famous coffee.

Details:

17 Gray Street, Bondi Junction

02 9388 9015

http://www.triplepickcoffee.com.au

Apr 22, 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
Malacca Straits on Broadway

Rating:

8 / 10 Taste: 8 / 10

Price: $50 per person

Place: 7.5 / 10

Review:

We always have a grand fiesta at the start of the year, not only to celebrate the New Year but also to celebrate birthdays of people around me. For the first restaurant of the year, we went to Malacca Straits on Broadway that has a unique specialty: BYO Crab! For $20 per mud crab (they only take this one!), they will cook your mud crab in one of three sauces. It is actually a very good price if you buy one gigantic mud crab (2+ kgs), considering that most places would charge $85+ / kg for similar dishes.

However, I must admit that the star dish was the first one out of the kitchen, Golden Sand Prawn ($26.80) – Crispy prawns served in a batter of duck egg yolks. This dish was perfect in many ways – Crunchy, savoury, yummy all rolled into one! We even ordered a second serving, despite being the more expensive dish of the night; it’s THAT good!

Consequently, the Marmite Chicken ($14.80) – Chicken pieces cooked in honey and Marmite sauce – and Oyster Omelette ($16.80) – Oyster pieces in fried egg batter and served with a tangy chilli sauce – that came afterwards fell short of the high expectation set by the prawn.

It went much better when they brought out Chick Kut Teh ($14.80) – Claypot chicken and oyster mushroom in savoury herbal soup – traditionally made with pork, this Halal, Malaysian restaurant changed the meat to Chicken. It provided the clear and refreshing feeling out of the heavy tasting dishes. Kangkung Belacan ($12.00) – stir-fried water spinach with sambal belacan – further cleansed our palate for the finale.

When the waitress brought the mud crabs to our table, they really made heads turned. They looked very delectable! Our first mud crab was cooked as Dry Curry Crab the menu stated that it was “Our knockout ‘dry’ curry sauce” and the owner (I think) actually said that customers loved this sauce more than the chilli crab. It was the right spice but I felt that it lacked that juicy leftover sauce that you could scoop out of the chilli crab.

The second mud crab had to be cooked Singapore Chilli Crab (Sweet and savoury tomato and chilli-based sauce) way! They offered whether we wanted more chilli or the non-spicy version, and I asked for the way they normally cooked it. Perhaps the only piece missing on the night was the deep-fried bun as they do not serve this.

The two desserts that we ordered weren’t exactly light either. Sticky Rice Pudding with Egg Custard ($5.00) with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and coconut milk was probably nice if you haven’t had that much to eat. Kuih Ketayap ($5.00) – Pandan-flavoured crepe filled with toasted coconut and palm sugar and served with a scoop of vanilla ice-cream – might be better suited for this occasion.

The final verdict for Malacca Straits on Broadway

If you want to eat Chilli Mud Crab on a budget, then Malacca Straits on Broadway is the place to be! However, you must also try its Golden Sand Prawn as they were literally golden!

Details:

66 Mountain Street, Broadway 2007

02 8021 7069

http://malaccastraitsbroadway.com.au/

Jan 9, 2014
Tizi Restaurant

Rating:

7.5 / 10 Taste: 7.5/10

Price: $5 – $10

Place: 7.5/10

Review:

This week we will flashback to a legendary German-influenced restaurant in Bandung, Indonesia. Tizi’s restaurant has been there even (I’m pretty sure) before I was born! Unlike other restaurants that underwent menu changes or any other changes, Tizi still sticks to its core! From back in the days till now, they still have their legendary Schaschlik – more about schaschlik as we went through the review.

The unique trait of this restaurant is its integration of Western dish with Indonesian flavour that would suit Indonesian tongue back in the days. Oh, and looking at the price, you can find that they are so affordable and you can have great value for your money, when compared to those over-hyped mall restaurants. Without further ado, I present you three of our favourite dishes when we were at the restaurant.

Beef and Egg (Rp 49,000) is more like a breakfast menu than dinner. It is a simple dish of roast beef with cheese and a sunny side up egg. Beef and egg also came with a side of fries (or mashed potato) and tomato ketchup. If you are looking for a dish that simply can do no wrong, Beef and Egg is the absolute choice. However, you might look into an extended run at the gym given the calories intake for this dish.

My personal favourite is its Schaschlik. Being a German restaurant, it has quite a different feature than middle-eastern shashlik. Just a quick overview, schaschlik is like an Indonesian satay on a steroid with a mixture of vegetables (namely capsicum, onion, and tomato). Tizi offered an option of having one, two, or three skewers. Two skewers would be enough for an average Aussie bloke. They grilled the schaschlik with a homemade BBQ sauce that might be quite sweet for non-Indonesians. Nonetheless, the meat was grilled to perfection and personally, the bite size was just perfect.

Last but not least is a dish that I guarantee won’t likely be in any restaurants but Indonesian steak houses (especially here in Australia!), Oxtongue Steak. Oxtongue is actually quite a common ingredient found in quite a few Indonesian dishes. Although it’s called steak, the method of cooking it was actually pressure cooked, not grilled (as it would alter the texture of the tongue). The dish came with quite runny mushroom sauce and the usual sides of mashed potatoes and vegetables.

There are quite a few other dishes in the restaurant, such as the old-school Potato Salad and their rendition of Bratwurst. But it’s quite a stark contrast when compared to the real German sausages.

The final verdict for Tizi’s Restaurant

There is no better restaurant to bring back such nostalgia as Tizi Restaurant. Tizi offers great value for money dishes and cosy backyard-setting restaurant. Tizi is well-known for its Schaschlik.

Details:

Jl Kidang Pananjung No 3, Bandung, Indonesia

+62 22 250 4963

Nov 19, 2013
Agedashi Salmon and Agedashi Tofu Recipe
This week we are writing a Japanese food recipe that was passed on by our friend when they came to our place for a potluck. Agedashi tofu is probably something that is available in every Japanese restaurant in Sydney. So, we are facing a daunting task of giving you an edible Agedashi Salmon and Agedashi Tofu recipe. It is easier to prepare agedashi salmon, so I will write first about it and have a special section in the end on how to cook the tofu.

Happy Cooking!

What’s needed for cooking Agedashi Salmon and Tofu?
1. 300gr boneless Salmon (skin on or not is up to you)
2. Silken tofu
3. Corn flour (or cornstarch) that is enough for coating the salmon and tofu
4. Salt, as preferred, to be mixed with the corn flour
5. Cooking oil (anything that you want) – we like to use sunflower
6. Spring onion, sliced thinly for the garnish
Sauce recipe:

Sauce plays an important part in this agedashi tofu recipe.
1. 1.25 cup of dashi stock. Dashi stock is an ingredient commonly used in Japanese food. Please visit La Fuji Mama blog if you wante to know how to make Dashi.
2. 5 tbsp mirin. Mirin is a Japanese sauce / condiment that has a lower alcohol level and higher sugar content than sake. If you don’t have / don’t want to use mirin, you can substitute it with 5 tbsp rice wine vinegar and 3 tbsp of sugar.
3. 5 tbsp light soy sauce.
4. 1 small onion, thinly sliced.
5. 1 medium-sized carrot, grate coarsely
6. 1 garlic, finely diced
How to cook Agedashi Salmon?
1. Salmon is diced according to our preferred size.
2. Heat up the cooking oil until around 160°C
3. Put enough corn flour (pre-mixed with salt) as the coating for the salmon.
4. Fry it until golden brown.
To make the sauce:
1. Mix all of the sauce ingredients into the saucepan.
2. Cook in high heat until it boils.
3. Add a bit of corn flour (mixed with a bit of water) to thicken the sauce.
Things to be observed when frying Agedashi Tofu:

Cooking the tofu is pretty similar to Agedashi salmon. However, due to its fragile state, there are things to consider when cooking agedashi tofu.
1. Drain the water when you opened the package.
2. Encase the tofu with layers of paper towel. This will absorb the excess moisture in the tofu.
3. You might want to place the tofu on a plate before you sprinkle the corn flour.
Sep 24, 2013