Food Food

Jugemu Shimbashi

So I've been here 3 times, and I agree with online reviews that this is a hideously overpriced Japanese restaurant, but the food is so beautifully good that the cost is justified. I really like the fact that it's two restaurants in one as well. It's no ordinary noodle/ramen/sushi shop - instead they do soba and okonomiyaki. MmmmmmmPhoto spam inc!

Delicious tuna tataki with a really addictive honey mustardy type sauce! It was a little inconsistent though, this shot being taken from the first time I visited. When I went back today it wasn't as spectacular.

PONCAKE! I can't remember which Okonomiyaki this was but it was tasty.

I've found that asian style duck is always well done, as opposed to a medium to medium-rare that western style does. Still yummy regardless!

Bonito tataki. I was curious as to how this would turn out, since I don't associate raw with bonito. It was okay but not as great as the traditional sashimi fish.

Asparagus in bacon/pancetta. When I showed this to my brother he said it was rather french. But it seems that when japanese chooses to fuse with western, it chooses french!

Scallops in garlic butter and wasabi mayo. Turns out the mayo isn't very wasabi, which was good for me :)

One of their soba specials. It seems to be a rotation of different flavoured sobas, this being a lemon, orange and plain soba with chicken and mushroom broth. The one my dad had today was seven spice chilli, green tea and plain, but they ran out of green tea. However, I tried a little bit of the spicy one and it was surprising and impressive, it left a nice tingly sensation on my tongue which was really cool. Turns out the duck and mushroom soba just uses the duck entree so it was a little disappointing. My brother had a curry soba which was incredible, if I ever go back that's what I'm ordering!

My mum got something different, this was fried "bird's nest" soba. Very cool looking.

Anmitsu, a japanese fruit, red bean, jelly and mochi dessert in a sugar syrup. One of my favourites because of the variety in here, and how fruity and light it is.

This was cool, an ice cream tempura. Fried ice cream! In choux pastry! With berries and fruit and stuff!

This was simple but surprisingly tasty. A soba crepe with fuji applies, strawberries and chocolate, and a very nice vanilla and mint sorbet. That sorbet. SORBET YUMMY.

Aaaand there was also a plum "affogato" that I ordered. Wow plum wine is strong. I remember the first time I had a whole glass of plum wine, I promptly blacked out and had to crash at a friend's place. This time I only had a shot and I got woozy XD. It wasn't technically an affogato since it had no coffee, but it did have the vanilla ice cream. It also had plum wine jelly and some crunchy fried pastry chip things. Very nice.

I love it, but it's expensive. But oh so good.

...

I think I will also go back to cheapo Palmolive body wash rather than Lush/Aesop. I think Lush is attracting ants in the bathroom, and Aesop is simply pushing my hygene budget limit.

Wooooooooozy

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Food Food

Aeropress!

This week I finally managed to summon the courage (i.e. work the sorcerous voodoocraft) to visit Swallow and get the brewstation goodies. I'm always terrified that if I order fancy coffee, the baristas will start talking about crazy flavour profiles that I simply don't understand.We got lucky this week since they were already in the middle of making an aeropress coffee, so I just took my time to stare at it, all the while thinking "YES THIS IS THE PERFECT OPPORTUNITY TO SAY HEY LETS TRY THAT." So we ordered our aeropresses and sat down at the table.It was an incredibly cool process as we got to smell the coffee straight after it was ground, and I was surprised at how fine and powdery the stuff looked. I don't think I managed to smell anything except "generic coffee smell," but that was fantastic nonetheless. It was also served in a pretty looking glass and I was very excited since I'd heard that these brewing methods made the coffee "tea-like" and brought out interesting flavours.I can't remember which origin I had, but it was described as having a plum-acidity and chocolate finish. I also tried taking a picture of it, but I failed. Anyway, it was definitely a very different experience of drinking coffee, it was not as kicky-punchy as espresso. They also told me that the flavours would change as it cooled, and I loved it when it was warm - apparently the coffee is sweetest at around 60° which I definitely noticed. As it cooled it gained acidity, and unfortunately I don't like acidity so I wished I drank all of it while it was sweet - but hey it was learning.The greatest thing about this coffee adventure was that my boyfriend got a different bean, which had a spice-acidity with cinnamon and stuff, and a chocolatey caramel finish. Because we tasted them side by side, the differences in the beans were amazing! I knew that each origin had its own flavour profiles, and to me that it was always as mysterious as trying to figure out wine flavours. However, since we had two beans right there, it was awesome. I finally think I figured that spice = chai, plum = plum, and chocolate = bitter 99% stuff! And I could be incredibly wrong with that :DIt was definitely fun, which means more brewstation, and perhaps even some Single Origin side show to come!JAPANESE FILTER

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Food, Random Food, Random

OMG my blog dieded ;_;

It broke and everything exploded.I will be melting my mind trying to restore things :)In other news I ate an awesome rhubarb pavlova from Bill's in Darlinghurst today. The cream offset the tartness of the rhubarb very nicely, and the meringue was made with brown sugar, which was different. The added honey I think wasn't necessary, but did add another bit of flavour to it. Now my taste for pavlova has been forever snobbified!

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Food Food

Wins hands down and tied behind back

I was looking at Single Origin's menu last night among other things, and discovered that their menu contained this home made creamed corn, avocado, tomato salsa and bacon toast thing. I haven't had creamed corn in a long while, and the thought of it was just so tasty - as I love corn and food in general (but that's obvious). I got so excited seeing their menu and giggling at the term "macerated" and how the only two times I've seen it have been about describing strawberries. It just sounds so messy and violent!Anyway, I'm always trying (and mostly failing) to save money, so I considered not ever trying this wonderfully nice sounding breakfast dish ($15)... but in the end I couldn't resist. I rocked up and ordered it, since they do AMAZING takeaway - they make it just as pretty as if it were on a plate :), so in a way, not only do I get it for the taste, it's just absolutely fantastic to look at as well. So I took it back to work with some awesome coffee, and proceeded to munch/hack away at my food. Wooooow creamed corn tastes SO GOOD! I really need to learn how to make some smashing creamed corn. The bacon was a little more cooked than what I was hoping for, i.e. it wasn't crunchy but it wasn't chewy either. While I generally prefer chewy, I figured that the contrast between the creaminess of the corn and avocado and the almost crunchiness of the bacon did well. However, I don't think I'll ever get over the fact that toast crusts are so annoying to cut with cutlery.

Food and coffee made me very happy! When it comes to good coffee, they have a fair few rivals, but breakfast so far is unmatched by any other shop :)Also my brother came back from his trip to Europe, and got some masquerade masks. I was supposed to get one, but since he didn't have use for the other one he bought, so I'm keeping both for now. I keep wanting to take pictures of them in good lightning, but the weather and sun fail these past few days, so lightbulb it is XD They're so pretty! I think I still like the filigree one better.

And finally, after 3 months and losing hope that this would ever get to me, look what arrived in the mail! TOCCATA AND I CAN NOW FINALLY SAY THAT I OWN AN ARTBOOK YAAAYAYAYYAYAYAAAAYMy life is complete for today :) SMASHING

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