Sokyo Omakase
Oh hello again Sokyo, I've missed you! Last time it was the a la carte, this time it was the omakase. Previously I've only had omakase at the Tsukiji fish markets, so I was excited to have one in Sydney!
And here is Sano-san! The omakase is limited to a few spots every night, and tonight, he was serving four people. The angle I had wasn't great for taking pictures of the cabinet or his work area, but I did get a view of some of the other chefs while they worked!
First up, there was a lot of tasting of the sauce before Sano mixed this up and presented it to us. Toro tartare with caviar. Super lovely delicious flavour!
This was a type of clam, not sure what kind, and was scored and marinated. That little dollop of black was its liver, and was oh so tasty! I love the texture of molluscs, this one was great and crunchy, just the way I like it.
Wagyu shortrib with assorted condiments was next. I can't remember what each of those little dollops were, but there was probably wasabi, yuzu garlic, radish, sesame seed and other tastiness. That's probably a rosemary leaf on there too! It was nice, but I like my seafood more.
Seared scallop muscle. They were pretty big pieces, so they must have come from some massive scallops. I love the flavour of scallops!
And now onto the nigiri. I managed to get mostly decent shots of each fish so I get to post them all instead of mashing or missing some. First up, New Zealand snapper. I only like super fresh snapper, most of the times in normal sushi trains it's not that great. The texture of this one great - slightly firm - and I would happily eat more!
Alfonsino was the next one up, possibly taken from the belly because it was much softer than the snapper.
An0ther clam thing! The first clam thing was tastier. I think there's a pattern here where I like firm/crunchy rather than soft!
A tuna trio! From top to bottom, yellowfin tuna, bluefin tuna, Japanese toro. All three were quite delicious, and the toro was just as tasty as the first time. However in terms of flavour and texture, the bluefin tuna was my favourite. There was something about it that was just nicer than the rest. The only unfortunate thing is that bluefin is endangered.
Next up, kohada! This one had been marinated in vinegar and was almost too sharp, but towards the end of eating this one, it wasn't so bad. Would have preferred the vinegar to be toned down just a tad.
Tempura spanner crab. Spanner crab must be in season right now; it's everywhere! The batter was light and crunchy, this was far better and tastier than the tempura bug tails we had last time from the a la carte.
Back onto the nigiri. Salmon belly with a seaweed type dab on top. I seem to have gotten bored of salmon sushi since there are so many other fish to try, but it tasted good nonetheless - kind of familiar in a way!
Now that's what I'm talking about. Mackerel that Sano cut (from fillet, not prepping the whole fish) before scoring it on both sides right in front of us. That was cool to watch! Since it's a fatty white fish, you could definitely taste the fishiness, but I was loving it!
A break from nigiri, and we end up with grilled kingfish, enoki mushrroms, asparagus and daikon. Very simple, but delicous!
This was a gorgeous piece of scampi that had been seasoned, then flamethrowered quite intensely! Yet it came out beautifully, and was so tasty!
Shio kombu squid. Nicely presented, but it turns out I'm still not a fan of squid. I love octopus, but squid still has a slightly too soft and slimy texture for me.
Rice in a scallop in a seaweed boat! My first reaction when seeing this was calling it a scallop sandwich taco!
Seared kingfish belly.
Seared salmon belly. Nice to end the nigiris on these two classic fish!
Then there was the hand roll with tuna mince in it. It was quite substantial and filled me up. Mine had a burst of wasabi that made me cry, but that was part of the fun! It must have just not been spread out properly.
And the final course, tamago!! Aren't they so cute! My brother and I received rice with ours, where as the ladies sitting next to us received only the egg. When we asked why, Sano explained it was because we were young, so this would help us grow. I loved that! And this wasn't any kind of tamago I was used to, instead of being like a "Japanese sweet omelette" this was more like a light, fluffy egg cake. Amazing and mind blowing!
After a satisfying dinner, we were then presented with a tasting plate of their desserts. I love that they still have the strawberry milkshake ice cream mochi! It's totally my favourite, and it was nice to sample the other dishes as well.It was a great night and didn't take too long - it was about a couple of hours all up. Funny thing though, is that had I not been taking 2-3 pictures of each dish, it would have taken about half as much time. It's amazing how photography increases the dining time by so much - I always knew it would, but it's so noticeable when consuming sushi because each nigiri represents a single bite.Luckily the other diners were also taking their time, so we all pretty much kept the same pace (one tiny bit in the middle where my brother and I were a course ahead), which was cool to see as well. Omakase chefs have to be so attentive!
He also has very shiny knives, so much so that I had to take a picture of them! I had never been interested in mirror finish knives because I thought they looked gimmicky, but in action, they were amazing to watch. Every flash of reflected light caught my attention and I couldn't stop staring.It was a fun dinner and at the end Sano even gave us his number so that if we ever had questions or needed a booking, we could contact him directly and he would book on our behalf, which was a nice gesture! I was kind of sad we didn't have any rare ingredients, but winter's probably a better time for that. It also meant that the dinner came out cheaper than advertised too, which I was thankful for.I think I've been so spoilt by good food in Sydney that now that I'm back in Perth, I can't eat most ordinary things anymore...
Kensington Street Social
First was Commune Social. Then, City Social. And the tidbit of gossip I got from there was that there was going to be a Jason Atherton establishment in Australia. And here it is, Kensington Street Social.
A very hip place with a pun-filled cocktail menu and tapas style dining - the same concept as Commune Social (and probably his other Social restaurants). I went here for both dinner and breakfast on separate occasions, and quite liked it!First off, dinner. As always, we ordered everything that we wanted. The waitstaff recommended six to seven dishes between three people, and we ordered accordingly.
Squid ink crackers, trout roe, cucumber
You can't ever go wrong with prawn crackers, they're so airy and addictive! I found that we ended up with too much sauce - the trout roe went well with the crackers but I found I didn't need too much of the actual sauce.
Hipster breakfast - Banana bread infused Pampero rum, cold drip coffee, salt butter, Fernet Branca
Yes I'm hipster (perhaps just on the inside), so I had to forego every other item on the drinks menu (including non alcoholic... I'm not great at consuming more than a single beverage when dining, unless it's a beverage pairing) just to get this. Isn't it cute! It looked and tasted quite coffee-like! I loved the tag that came with it, too!
English breakfast tea and toast - wild mushroom tea , gentleman’s relish, bone marrow toast
What a cute display! I'm a fan of theatric/hands on/unusual interpretations of food, it makes the dining experience so much fun and much more memorable. Presented as the toast/jam/cream/tea combination, this was a pot of wild mushroom tea that could be poured into teacups of parmesan foam. Creamy white bone marrow and a tangy, jammy relish topped some toast which, with some effort, could be dipped into the tea. The toast was so-so for me mainly because I like chunks of actual marrow (which I need to try at Salaryman!) rather than a tiny dollop. The tea on the other hand, was absolutely amazing, fragrant and hearty! I could drink that all winter!
Vine tomato, Vannella burrata, 25 year aged balsamic vinegar, tomato seasoning
There's always an interpretation of caprese salad on the menu. This one is also featured at Marina Social in Dubai. The outside picture is all you get, I didn't bother taking an inside picture because I figured it wouldn't look very nice. Basically, it's tomato on the outside, and burrata on the inside! Not the creamiest burrata as it looks like they scoop only some of it in, so the gooeyness was a little lacking, but the flavours overall were great.
Grass fed veal tartar, egg yolk jam, radish salad, sourdough
I always have to taste the tartare if I can. The veal was roughly chopped which was a nice change from oggling at the knifework from Fix St James, and the egg yolk jam was pretty trippy! The bread was a little on the holey side so it couldn't scoop up the tartare all that well. Tasty, but not one of my favourites.
Queensland Spanner crab, frozen cucumber gazpacho, rhubarb
A nicely presented spanner crab salad where the gazpacho granita was sprinkled at the table. The flavours were alright, however nothing particularly stood out. Possibly because the granita was super cold and there was a mound of it, and as it melted kind of watered down the rest of the dish.
Roast marron tail, curry butter, burnt lime, leaf salad
Now this is a dish that shows off a super fine crustacean! Marron is seriously my favourite crustacen, plus it's adorable. The curry butter was delicious and a great change from plain butter. In my excitement, I didn't realise just how much this dish cost (though to be honest, I generally don't look at price...). It was worth it, though!
Sea urchin rice, Moreton Bay bug tail, sea blight, bisque
I didn't like this dish. It sounded great on the menu, but it's not really all that shareable, especially since there was only a very small tongue of sea urchin there. The bug tail was nice and I liked the flavour of the bisque, but the rice curse continues! I pretty much always avoid risotto, not only because it's very hit and miss, but also because I don't like rice in general (except in well made sushi). Ours was undercooked, with a hardness and slight chalkiness. I kind of which we received the marron dish last (everything else was pretty much served in menu order).
Then it was onto desserts.
Yoghurt mousse, lemon curd, malt meringue, basil
I chose this unassuming looking dish for the reason that basil was featured. Ever since Commune Social's basil sorbet, I have been chasing basil desserts. However the style of the dessert meant that basil wasn't the prominent flavour. This was all about the yoghurt mousse and lemon curd and offset nicely by a delicate basil aroma. It ended up being my brother's favourite dessert out of the ones we ordered.
Buffalo ricotta, lemon thyme peaches, honeycomb
The second dessert that I ordered (we had four desserts between three people) wasn't that spectacular. The ricotta was nice, though I generally don't like ricotta in desserts. The honeycomb tuile was so thin and light! The peach sorbet was delicious too.
East Rydge Grove arbequina olive oil cake, coconut sorbet, spiced mango, passion fruit ice
This was the dish my brother ordered, and the one I loved the most. I've always thought butter was unbeatable, but that olive oil was so fragrant! And the texture of the cake was great too. I was seriously impressed with this as everything went so well together and the coconut sorbet was delicious. I now need to learn how to make olive oil cake myself!
Baked caramelised apple puff pastry, cider vinegar ice cream and pickled apple
I believe this was a picture my brother took because I had a hard time making it look nice. I had a small sample of this and the puff pastry was very good. This was a dish my friend ordered and she loved it!
So all up, we shared seven savoury plates and three dessert plates. Usually the food is adequate, however, in this case my brother and I were both still a tad hungry. The bill was also less than what I was used to (but that's because I have a tendency to spend extravagantly), so it would have been nice to order a couple more savoury plates.
Perhaps it was due to dining on a Friday night, perhaps it's just their policy - it was the two hour dining limit that was the real restriction. We'd arrived fifteen minutes early (for a 6:30PM booking) and finished at 8:15. However, it was a little alarming that during the dessert ordering, we were advised we only had our seats until 8PM, so I had to ask for clarification that we were allocated two hours.
Mindful of this time limit, we asked for the bill as soon as we were done... and then waited until after 8:30, and still no bill. So we had to ask again. This was possibly a teething issue since the restaurant was only about a month old on this visit, and no one actually came to kick us off our barside bench, so I wasn't even sure if our seats were really booked for 8:30. Minor issue though, I wouldn't think much of it unless it became consistent.
Since I also managed a breakfast visit, I'll tack on a short summary of that here as well.
This was the "wrong island iced tea" - earl grey, apple, lemon, lapsang souchonog. This was a great tasting tea, not overly sweet and with a good dose of tea. I also loved this shot for all the lights in the background.
While this wasn't much of a looker, it's a classic that was very, very tasty. House cured bacon? Guess what, it's similar to the Tommy Prosser style house cured bacon! Only slightly pink, this was delicious! I was very happy to have the house stuff since it's so much tastier than any packet stuff. The black pudding was also very flavourful (especially in contrast to some disappointing stuff I bought from a butcher recently) so I loved that too! The toast crust was slightly on the hard side, but nothing my well practised knife and fork skills couldn't handle, though it would be tricky for most (my friend struggled to cut her toast).
The marinated watermelon salad with mint, raspberries, creme fraiche. While it's a very pretty looking dish, it wasn't too spectular. The creme fraiche was provided as a foam in a separate bowl, but since we were still eating our toast, the foam started collapsing before we had a chance to move onto the salad!
Perhaps it's the newness, perhaps it's the high volume of high calibre restaurants in Sydney. It didn't stand out too much (but I had a superstar list of restaurants lined up this time as well) but very solid nonetheless. If I ever needed a casual spot, this would be a place I'd be happy to come back to.
Now I just have to visit all his other restaurants!
Spice Temple Sydney
It's Chinese New Year. I hate Chinese food. I'm glad to be home. I needed to find a nice restaurant to book....Spice Temple. Sure, why not. I can't even take anything that's even remotely spicy, but where else would I book on such an occasion?I couldn't help but be concerned that I wouldn't like/couldn't handle the food there, but it was the most fitting restaurant choice for the occasion. Plus I'd always wondered what was behind those lovely digital silk curtains every time I'd walked out of Rockpool Bar and Grill. Behind the heavy door were some stairs down and down and down... into a lovely space with the standard Rockpool Group reception, bar area, then the main dining room. It was super dark, but there was lighting at each table so you could see the food.We opted for the Chinese New Year Banquet, categorised by each of the fortunes of the new year. The only one I didn't manage to take good shots of were the Wealth dishes - cabbage and radish, and Sichuan style pickled cucumbers and shitake. Both pickles were slightly spicy (the cabbage and radish had an extra mound of some super hot stuff that I avoided) and so addictive! Who cares about a slight burning when things taste this good right from the start!
Prosperity - Raw tuna ‘yu sheng’ with spicy orange oil
That tuna. Such fresh slices that were absolutely delicious! I didn't get too much of the orange flavour, and since the chilli here was in the form of oil, I felt the burn towards my throat rather than on my tongue, but considering how many spicy dishes there were, I was just eating everything while hurting and loving it!That tuna... so good!
Happiness - Yunnan style chicken salad with salted chili and mint
My parents really loved this dish! I actually kind of wish that there was less chicken, since there were many more dishes to come. It was so good and not half as spicy as it looked. I loved the wood ear mushrooms too as they were crunchy, just the way I like it. Who would have thought that Chinese food could taste so good? Well, there was certainly more to come....
Money - Prawn wontons with aged black vinegar
Why does everything here taste so good? These skins were amazing, they had great chew, which is how I like my dumpling/wonton skins. There was a super happy prawn inside that was unmistakably Chinese style - large and crisp, unlike ordinary restaurants where you often get tiny mush. And that vinegar! What is this lovely vinegar that tastes so good???
Fortune - Pork, egg and garlic chive spring rolls
Ah, pork spring rolls. Meat spring rolls are generally terribly done, to the point where I avoid them like the plague. I only take vegetarian spring rolls because they have a higher chance of not being inedible. These have totally changed my view on meat spring rolls though! How do they make the pork so moist and tender? How does it carry such good flavour? I was totally in love with these spring rolls even though the waitress mentioned that she liked them the least. No way, not with my prior spring roll experiences!
Longevity - XO pippies with fried noodles
These pippies were amazing. Some of the largest, most plump ones I've ever seen. And they tasted great! That XO sauce wasn't too spicy at all. So delicious, though I didn't eat too many of the noodles. Carbs are the killer of an overeater like me, so I only had a bit.
Harmony - Stir fried spanner crab with mung bean noodles and garlic chives
This one was least impressive dish for me, but that didn't make it any less tasty. There was a very generous heap of spanner crab meat, and those mung bean noodles packed so much flavour! It was that traditional salty/soy sauce style, which is just plain addictive!
The rice came out at this stage, and though I don't eat rice, I did try some and it was quite delicious!
Peace - Red braised short rib with Sichuan black beans and shallot
Wow. If everything else on the menu was addictive, then this was addictive x 10! The aromas that came from this beef short rib were amazing! The fragrance of spices carried so well. And that beef was cooked so nicely, everything just fell straight off the bone. It also wasn't too spicy, though there were also very few black beans. Whatever. Those fried onions were piled on, giving the dish some amazing texture and yet another burst of flavour.
Even though I was horrendously full by this stage, I kept picking at it!
Rejuvination - Stir fried baby bok choy with wild bamboo pith
Okay, this place has made me love everything that I'd traditionally hated, except for bok choy. Turns out I still don't like bok choy. But the bamboo pith was amazing - with its porous yet crunchy texture, was totally delicious as it absorbed all the flavour! All the pith got eaten and half the bok choy got left behind. That and the pickles (and complementary rice) were the only things left after this massive banquet.
Love - Pineapple sorbet with soft liquorice and raspberry
Ah, dessert. Second stomachs for dessert only work when you don't fill it up with non-dessert, which I almost failed to do! That's how delicious everything was. This pineapple sorbet was so refreshing - the liquorice was needed and gave it such an uplifting flavour; it worked really well with the pineapple. I'm not sure about the texture as gum candy though, as in the cold temperatures it was a tad too chewy. But it was so good nonetheless!
What an amazing dinner. I had walked in a sceptic, and walked out a fan. Of course only Neil Perry could make such magic with his passion for Asian food. My parents said it was better than their Mr Wong experience, and I loved it a lot more than any other restaurants where there have been hints of Chinese style cooking (such as the ox tail and sea cucumber from Tetsuya's). The spice levels were also perfect for me - a bit too much at the start but nothing I couldn't handle. In fact, I had started hoping that the rest of the dishes would be just as spicy!
The only service hiccup we had was right at the beginning, where I suspect that someone was either running late or called in sick, as the waitstaff didn't have menus to give us right at the beginning, and there was a definite lag with the introductions/questions/drinks when we were seated, but then it picked right up and went very smoothly with some great interaction with the staff.
Anyone who knows me knows I despise Chinese food, but now I know what it tastes like for real - not random Cantonese style stuff that's usually available, but real flavours made with the best ingredients. I loved it so much that I even asked about the bar area and whether or not it was possible to turn up without a reservation - and the answer is yes! I am totally going back....
Salaryman
This new restaurant popped up on my feed and had a very tasty look prawn toast okonomiyaki as well as claims of really good ramen. So, I managed a short notice booking since I had nothing planned on my first night back in Sydney. I'm glad I went!
It has a totally cool looking wall! Not only do they serve ramen, they also have a few robata menu items, of which the octopus and the bone marrow were the most tempting! But limited stomach real estate meant that it was going to be a ramen kind of night.
But first, coffee. I got these next shots since I was conveniently placed at the counter (my favourite spot!). This reminded me of what I had witnessed at Petition Kitchen when all the chefs were served up coffees at the start of service.
Onto food...
Sydney rock oysters - I generally don't like Sydney rock oysters as I find that pacific/smokey bay/coffin bay are my favourites, however I was pleasantly surprised by these ones! They were plump and sweet!
Prawn toast okonomiyaki. Yes! This looked and tasted fantastic. There was just the right amount of sauce, since most times I find it too salty and overpowering, but this went well with the prawn toast. For me, this lived up to the hype.
Pork and pippie ramen. Surprisingly, I wanted this one saltier. It had great depth of flavour but didn't have the usual addictiveness of cheap ramen. The woodfired pippies were delicious! I also liked the noodles on the initial few bites, however I think they kept cooking a tad too much in the broth. It's still a reasonable price but I might need to go back to Ippudo....
Since I only get one visit to Salaryman (there are way too many other places to go to so I'm unlikely to revisit this), I had to taste the dessert too. Black sesame, passionfruit, meringue. The black sesame came in two textures - ice cream and mousse. I also loved the passionfruit being an incredibly light mousse, tangy and delicious!Was a pretty fun experience! Nothing super extraordinary or mind blowing, except maybe it would have been good to try the $42 lobster ramen... that would have been great but I specifically wanted to try out the pork and pippie. That would have been rather interesting to see if the price tag was worth it! Either way this place definitely requires at least two visits, one for the ramen and one for the robata!
(Early) Christmas Roast Duck
Several weeks I signed up to a local farmer's duck mailing list - they had plenty of chickens, but were waiting for the ducks to grow up and had limited supply, so they said I could put my email address down to express interest for a duck. I really had no plans to fork out $$$ for a lovingly hand raised duck, but it turns out their ducks were cheaper than their lovingly hand raised chickens! So I said yes to one when I found that my inbox contained this wonderful news, and picked one up - an added bonus being that this one still had its head attached, how cute! I just wish it also had its feet... oh well.I was a little disappointed that it came frozen instead of fresh, however, that turned out to be a good thing since I didn't plan to cook it till the week after. I had spent the next 5 days agonising on how to prepare this delicious being - halved, and cooked two ways? Lightly seasoned and just roasted? But then I remembered one of my favourite restaurant brands had a gorgeous roast duck dish - and I decided to take a chance and make my own version.
For the first time in a long time, I've also managed to take progress pictures to be able to document this pretty feat of kitchening!
It all started with a duck. A very happy duck!
This guy was then salted and set aside for a few hours.
I made a wild rice stuffing in the meantime (I had to use up my rice somehow) - a mixture of wild rice, brown long rice and red rice. Cooked the rice with some Italian herb mix first, let it cool, then chopped up some pancetta and cherries and mixed it all up. For some reason the flavour of the cherries got lost in this dish - I wanted it to add sourness and sweetness, but it didn't quite get there. I wouldn't have used more though, since I didn't want sweetness to overpower the mixture.
Next up, honey mustard glaze! After consulting the good old internet, I decided to completely ignore most of what I found and made this up as I went. Honey, dijon mustard, wholegrain mustard and rendered bacon fat (yessss!) went into this.
Once it was all ready, into the oven it went! I was also super forgetful and didn't end up buying kitchen twine, but managed to improvise leg-tying with some strips of foil. For those who are also super attentive - yes, a duck neck doesn't bend like that. There's a toothpick holding its head into that position!
I felt very lucky to have obtained a herb haul from the markets! Rosemary, sage, thyme. With flowers too! They smelled so good!
The still happy duck :)
And the plate up and photoshoot. I also baked some kipfler potatoes in the residual fat, but it turns out mixing in thin slices of pink beetroot wasn't a good idea as their colour got lost. Should roast them separately next time.
And the angled shot!The end result? Was very happy with my efforts, though the oven wasn't very great at being consistent, so while the breast was cooked, the marylands weren't as done as I would have liked them to be. I calculated it at my chicken cooking times; 40mins per kilo, and then added time for the fact that this was quite dense and had stuffing in it (though the stuffing was already cooked, and I knew it wouldn't overcook, yay for wild rice). I did have a problem with the glaze and bird beak/wings starting to burn due to the uneven heating of the oven (I never exceeded 180 degrees), but due to my limited time, I couldn't roast this the way I had originally planned (3+ hours cook time at a lower temp).Nevertheless, it was tasty, the glaze was fantastic, and the stuffing tasted good too! Very happy with my efforts!DUCK DUCK GOOSE?!