Dumplings and noodles – two of the foods that we can never get enough of in my house. To me, they are deeply comforting, and have the ability to take away all the tension from the day.
So when you open a dumpling and noodle shop right outside Aldi (my usual hangout), it’s like the heavens have opened and smiled down upon me, enabling me to get my noodle fix, anytime.
Winter weather puts me in the mood for noodles. There’s just something insanely comforting about soft silky noodles steeped in soup or a stew, soaking up all that beautiful flavour.
I absolutely fell in love with Tanoonmai’s Bangkok Steamed Noodles when I went the other day, but unfortunately, Chatswood isn’t right next door to me, and sometimes you gotta listen when that craving strikes!
So based on the description from the restaurant – pork and mushroom cooked in a soy based broth – I found this recipe for Moo Palo from Thai Food Master. Incredibly, this recipe works soooo well. I was a little worried at first since the broth didn’t look quite dark enough, but I’m happy to report that the longer it stews, the darker it gets, and the deeper the flavour.
I’m always envious when people talk about going on pub crawls, since I’m slightly allergic to alcohol – tasting is okay, drinking is apparently not. I always feel like I keep missing out on all the fun!! So when Thang from Noodlies organised a food crawl in Canley Heights with the Fairfield Council, I jumped at the chance!
6 restaurants in 3 hours, will we SURVIVE THE EATING????!!!! Well Thang, Jeroxie, Amy, Christine, Isaac, Kate and I were going to find out.
First stop was at VyVy Garden Cafe, to start the morning off with some Vietnamese drip coffee.
Coffee is different in Southeast Asia. From the roast to the grind to the brew to the sweeteners, there’s a certain richness and aroma to the coffee that I’ve yet to find from local baristas around Sydney.
The mere mention of Vietnamese coffee instantly conjures up images of the drip filter, passed down from the French colonial times. Coarsely ground dark roasted coffee is added to the top of the filter, which is placed on top of a glass that contains your condensed milk. Hot water is poured over the ground coffee, and the resulting brew drips through onto the condensed milk below. The drip filter process is long – there isn’t anything more than gravity to hurry it along – but the resulting coffee is thick and rich, and the condensed milk add a creamy sweetness to it.
When warm, the aromas hit you as you raise the glass to your lips, providing an instant wake-up call. When poured over ice, the coffee provides a refreshing pick-me-up, a great cure for the monday-itis!
Takeaway coffee cups in hand, we move on to our next stop – Bau Truong.
 |
| Clockwise from top left: Bun Bo Hue and Cha La, Bo Lui, Ngheu Cuon, the spread that greeted us, fresh vegetables to accompany our noodles, Pork parcels in banana leaves, Bun Suong |
The original Bau Truong started in Cabramatta when times were violent. The owner used to have drug addicts come into her restaurant, eat, shoot up at the table, and then leave without paying. There were even people passed out on the street in broad daylight.
But a belief in her food has held her through those dark days, and today, her daughter and son have joined her in opening up two other branches in Canley Heights and Marrickville.
Beautiful vietnamese tiles adorned the walls in this recently-renovated restaurant, and a gorgeous graphic design stretched out across the ceiling.
But I had to tear my eyes away from the gorgeous decor because there was an epic spread laid out especially for us! It instantly reminded me of family and home – the spread was the homely feast my friends’ mothers would put out when we visited for a meal, but on a whole other level!
We were greeted by Michael, the son, who painstakingly explained every dish that we were about to eat. We started with Ngheu Cuon, which were fresh rice paper rolls filled with water chestnuts and pipis. Michael explained that in Vietnam, snail meat is often used instead of pipis, but they’ve changed it slightly for the Australian palate.
Bo Lui followed, which consisted of curried spiced beef cooked on skewers, and today we were having it with slices of unripe plum, enveloped in lettuce leaves and dipped in a sweet-salty chilli sauce. Apparently in Vietnam it sometimes is served with starfruit or raw banana instead, for a slight astringency to balance out to flavourful beef.
Of the three noodle dishes we got to try, I highly recommend the Bun Suong, vermicelli and prawn cakes are served in a sweet pork knuckle soup base that is heightened by fermented bean paste and chopped peanuts, and is oh-so-addictive. The slices of pork are tender, and the prawn cakes are bouncy and light, like an extremely premium fish ball. Michael informs us that the prawn cakes were made fresh the night before, and I could definitely taste the labour of love. With the addition of shredded fresh water spinach and thinly sliced banana flower, this bowl of noodle soup was almost reminiscent of a salad, and I wouldn’t have any qualms ordering this in the hottest of summers. Let’s put it this way: I knew we were going to be eating lots and had to pace myself, but I finished the bowl of soup anyway. It was that good.
No sooner did I have the last slurp of my noodles, we were off again, this time to Diem Hen, down the road.
 |
| From left: Sweet and Sour soup, Caramelised fish in clay pot |
Diem Hen, which means “meeting point” in Vietnamese, is an extremely traditional family-run restaurant serving meals found typically in Vietnamese homes.
Thang recounted how his mother would often serve similar dishes while he was growing up – she would buy a whole fresh fish, and use it to cook two dishes: a hot pot of sweet and sour soup filled with fresh vegetables and chunks of firm white fleshed fish, and a caramelised fish cooked in a clay pot, with its dark salty-sweet sauce that serve as an aromatic partner to soft white rice.
The Sweet and Sour soup came in a unique looking pot that had a wide, flat rim around the top. The bottom held hot soup, and the rim was to hold the raw ingredients, to prevent the crisp vegetables from getting soggy and overcooked while the soup came to the boil. The stock had a great depth of flavour, while the wide range of vegetables on the top added a freshness to the dish. Amongst these was something called the elephant ear stalk. When sliced, it resembled large celery stalks, except for its spongy interior, perfect for soaking up all the intense soup.
The accompanying caramelised fish was deep and dark in its flavour, which was a perfect use of the fatty belly of the fish. Apparently the flavour could get deeper and darker still, when the fish is braised for a longer period of time. The use of the clay pot is customary, and Thang recounted times when he’s had this fish dish at home with clay pot-cooked rice, with a brown rice crust at the bottom to add another dimension to the meal.
With three eateries down and three to go, we were starting to feel the effects of food coma starting to fog our brains. What will become of us by the time we reach the end? Stay tuned for Part 2 of our Canley Heights Food Crawl!
Note: Tammi of Insatiable Munchies and other bloggers mentioned in this post dined as guests of Fairfield Council and the restaurants listed.
Street food features dominantly in Asian cuisine. If you ask natives for food recommendations, fine dining rarely ranks higher than a particular stall in the corner of a local market or hawker centre. My Thai friends, for example, are more likely to send me to a place with a name I can’t pronounce, than David Thompson’s Nahm, as nice as the latter might be.
I was very nicely invited to try out the new branch of Wok On Inn at the Rocks by 6dc. Sitting in the ‘fast casual’ classification, Wok On Inn is a chain of eateries that wants to deliver the restaurant quality food of casual dining, but with the convenience of fast food.
The new branch of Wok On Inn is at located at a beautiful courtyard at the rocks. Surrounded by a few other eateries, this gorgeous venue gets plenty of natural light, and a cool breeze coming through every so often.
If you’re not familiar with the concept of Wok On Inn, it’s basically like a choose-your-own with noodles, with a few suggestions made. You get to choose your noodle, sauce, and toppings, with all the flavours inspired by the street food of Asia.
For lunch, I got to try a few of the suggested combinations.
Drunken Noodles (Pad Prik King)
Cashew Noodles
Bangkok Noodles
What surprised me the most was how each dish had its own identity. Many Asian sauce bases have many common base ingredients, and it can’t help that in order to allow for the preferences of the Australian public – chilli levels, for example, have to be dampened ever so slightly. In order to help keep the flavours as authentic as possible – and to retain the core identity of each dish – the owner has developed a relationship with a chef in Thailand, to create these sauces with Asian ingredients local to the region, and then import these sauces to all of the Wok On Inn outlets, to keep consistency up.
In all, it was quick, delicious, and quality that you rely on. I also really like that there are child-size options as well, so I can indulge and try many more varieties!
What’s your favourite?
Note: Tammi from Insatiable Munchies dined at Wok On Inn as a guest of 6dc and Wok On Inn.
I ate at:
Wok On Inn
(02) 9247 8554
17/31 Playfair St, The Rocks Playfair Street, The Rocks NSW 2000
Sometimes you want a change. Sometimes you want something new. And sometimes, you want familiar, comforting food in a new environment.
And that’s how we ended up at Ginger & Shallots. Every time I passed by this bustling, always-busy restaurant, I see fresh hot food getting brought out to tables of happy families and friends. Safe choice right?
More than safe, it turns out. The food was indeed hot, fresh, and incredibly tasty.
Salt and Pepper Squid, $17.90
After reading a few reviews, I ordered the salt and pepper squid as a base comparison. It was fresh and crispy, but just very slightly under salted when you compare it to places like golden century.
What was really nice though, was the Soft Shell Crab Vermicelli with X.O. Sauce.
Soft shell crab, $24.90
When I first saw this dish, I thought that it would be overpriced and not as satisfying. Boy, was I wrong. The portion is massive, and would have been more than enough for the both of us for lunch, without the salt and pepper squid. It was flavourful, crispy and well seasoned. I love the springy texture of the stir fried vermicelli, and it brought back old food memories in all the best ways.
Service-wise, the staff can get bowled over by the sheer amount of customers, but they are quite efficient once you get their attention, and there’s a very no-nonsense attitude to it. It was a really enjoyable lunch, and their specials look worth trying out the next time. I thoroughly enjoyed myself.
We ate at:
Ginger and Shallots Chinese Cuisine
02 9874 8066
Shop 25/1 Lakeside Rd Eastwood, NSW
I’m not usually a soup person. As a child, I used to order noodle soups and then fish the noodle out, so that I get all of the flavour, but have the noodle cool much faster because it wasn’t sitting in soup getting soggy.
But experiencing winter – Singapore has no winter, only rain – in Australia actually inspires me to have soups. Noodle soups, rice soups (ochazuke anyone?), creamy soups, vegetable soups, bone soups…it’s all good to me. There’s something comforting about wrapping your hands around a warm boil of steaming food when your fingers are nearly numb from the cold.
Or you could have a cup of tea. Or coffee. But I like noodles.
And so I went to Zenya Ramen Bar in Eastwood, hoping that it would be a good local ramen bar that I can visit regularly. It being my first time, I decided to go with the Mini Set Menu, where you get a mini version of a couple of things, which allows you to try dishes across the menu! I specifically chose the Mini Ramen and Mini Donburi set, and from that I chose to have the Pork Ramen and the Karaage Don, with dessert and drink. ($16.80)
The ramen came first, and to be honest, it was pretty average. The egg – and you know that the ni-tamago can make or break a bowl of ramen for me – was slightly overdone and under-seasoned for me, the broth was average, and the noodles had a nice bite, but were also average. I did like the serving size though – it was actually the serving size of the meals I would have at home – and the price was not bad for the food, considering the amount of food you get for it.
Interestingly though, for a ramen bar, I much preferred the Karaage Don.
The fried chicken was crispy, not too greasy, and didn’t have a strong chickeny smell that you can get sometimes. Biting into it, it was juicy, fresh, crisp on the outside. My favourite bit though, was the mayo. Sweet, tangy, and just slightly spicy, the mayo completely made the dish for me. This set was actually ordered to share between two people – and there was more than enough to share – but I think I stole the lion’s share of this chicken.
Not knowing that the mini set was actually not entirely too mini, I also ordered a medium plate of mixed sashimi.
The seafood was fresh, and cut so that it was a pleasant mouthful – not so much that I can’t fit in my mouth, but not so small that I miss it completely and am left wanting more. Not the most unique dish, but great quality, and better than I expected.
In all, the food was only slightly better than average, and a good value for money. The service is truly special though, and though the staff might not speak perfect English, I really appreciated the way they interacted with us. For example, when they had to interrupt our conversation to ask if we had any last orders (it was a late dinner for us), they actually hung back till there was a break in the conversation, and then apologised for the interruption in a very gracious way.
I would (and have been) keep going back to Zenya, not so much for the ramen, but for the Donburi and the excellent service.
We ate at:
Zenya Noodle Bar
+61 2 9874 2122
217 Rowe St, Eastwood NSW 2122, Australia
