Insadong Korean BBQ in Eastwood.
I love their new window display! Reminds me of traveling Japan.
Bim bim bap is where it’s at.
I’m a huge Korean BBQ fan. Have never had bad Korean BBQ, ever! This is a little Korean BBQ in Eastwood, it’s always super quiet but the food’s greeeeaaaat!!!!
Walking for about 1km over these rocks at Lurline Bay at high tide made for some exciting moments.
Hun buns.
The path gets really swanky at Coogee, very nice planning.
This big rope mountain climby thing was still there, albeit less red than it used to be when I was in uni. Couldn’t help but climb to the top for old times sake.
We’ll have one of everything please.
The mains – very nice, entree’s were awesome too.
When we got home from our walk we spotted Mia Mau Mau in the window :)
I’ve not seen my bunny in a couple of days (been missing her!), we planned to hook up today as she’s got Friday’s off. Sun was out and she’s been itching to do some exercise so we made the most of the nice weather and decided to do the coastal walk from Maroubra Beach through to Coogee Beach.
We’ve tried it once before, it goes a bit funny after all the rock work, and the path forces you back onto the street, but this time we forged on and re-found the right track.
The walk was awesome, beautiful views along the way, really nice houses too (especially the concrete castle near Coogee!). We unfortunately undid all the hard work with a fancy lunch special at Ceviche. Entree, main and a glass of wine for $28, so much win!
Here’s a guy I used to have breakfast with every morning, when he had a mobile job fixing servers. He’s been owned now for some time though, and I very rarely get to hang out anymore so Stevey and I hooked up for dinner last night.
Plan was to smash a Chicken Jaeger at Una’s but in the end we decided to drop in to Kelly’s in Bondi for ribs (I always think I’m going to run into friends Alan and Carmen when I go to Bondi! hehe). Kelly’s were on fire, ribs were crazy juicy and we were served by Christina’s favorite waiter, Orlando Bloom, who’s cut his hair, and is now wearing glasses so he doesn’t quite look like Orlando Bloom anymore, but it’s still service with a smile! The guy is a champ!
I failed to finish a small serving (so much meat on the bone!) and Stevey failed to finish a regular. He’s a hurricanes man, but I think he enjoyed the ribs at Kelly’s. I bet any money he’ll call me up in a month or so with a craving for ribs at Kelly’s.
Jimbaran 129 Avoca Street Randwick.
Bakmi Goreng Tek-Tek Anugrah – Stir fried egg noodles with vegetables, egg & chicken.
After Richie’s Citizenship Ceremony last night we went for dinner down the road at Jimbaran, an Indonesian restaurant we’ve eaten at many times before. Their chicken satay is awesome, beef rendang is awesome too but I’m always there for their Bakmi Tek-Tek. If you’re a Mi goreng fan you’ll love this dish, it’s like Mi goreng on steroids!
MKV chillin outside.
Live plants! Just makes me want to start up my succulent garden even more.
Linguine with crab meat, zucchini, garlic and chilli.
Barramundi with cannellini.
Spotted: Zoomer delivery scooter at the new Deus on Bourke St. Oury grips, disc brake set-up.
Had lunch with Christina today at The Beresford Hotel. House Made Pasta. I jump with joy (well on the inside anyways) whenever I see fresh pasta on the menu.
David’s R32.
Big guy, big heart.
Stiff Pipe!
Howie’s Porker.
Anoop’s MKVI GTI.
My MKV GTI.
Oven Baked Organic Schnitzel, the (slightly) healthier option!
The tradition of meeting up on the 1st Wednesday night of every month with the Sydney VWGolf.net.au guys continues, tonight we ate at The Bavarian at EQ. Small turnout as the 1st of the month caught us all off guard, always good company though, small crew, or big!
In the morning we made a beeline straight for Degraves for brekkie. Middle Eastern Eggs with spicy meatballs and Spanish Eggs – delish!
Christina continued her shopping spree on Brunswick St. (during my meeting she did well on Chapel the day before), and for lunch we dropped into St Jude’s Cellars which looked really welcoming from the outside. We went all out and went for their $35 lunch special (2 choices + wine).
Love how the logo becomes the filler mark on their wine glasses.
Rabbit chips.
Pappardelle Lamb ragout was beautiful, so homely, such awesome comfort food.
Christina’s rigatoni, much like above was just so hearty and homely.
So much eating means more walking so we checked out the Rose St. Markets which are tucked away behind Brunswick St.
Later that night we had a quick drink in a lane we stumbled into off Little Collins St. This live Jazz trio were killing it. I love Melbourne, lots. Soon after this we got picked up by Kyne who put his hand up to take us to the [VIC] JDMST End Of Month Meet (EOMM).
Christina chose to put us up at The Novotel on Collins Street and I think it’s the best place we’ve stayed at so far as it’s right in the thick of the city’s best spots. This was the view out our window, into the mall!
The meeting I had with the Cycling Express guys (see previous post below) almost killed me. A combination of not getting enough sleep the night before, catching a plane first thing in the morning then taking a crazy long cab drive out to the warehouse (which was out of town) for a 3hr meeting.
Despite being tired we both managed to check out the Tutankhamun exhibition which is now on at the Melbourne Museum.
The exhibit was pretty rad as far as these things go, some of the items on display from Tutankhamun’s tomb are over 3000 years old. The only thing that bothered me was that these belongings were dug out and put on display (these goods were buried with him so he could take them with him to the afterlife after all), that and the insane amount of bad consumer goods in the shop on exit, but if you do manage to catch it be sure to get the audio tour, well worth it.
CHINCHIN on Flinders Lane.
Drinks menu – nice graphic design language throughout the space.
The Mandarin Duck was awesome.
Roti.
They gave us the bug for free.
Liz, her guy Jan was too shy for pics, saying he even hates mirrors haha!
Later that night we caught up with Christina’s friends Liz and Jan who both now live in Melbourne. The initial plan was to go to MoVida, a much respected Spanish restaurant in Hosier lane (my fave Melbourne graffiti covered lane), but they were packed out. We ended up at CHINCHIN. We had no idea whether or not the food was going to be good (Asian with a focus on Thai) but the place was buzzing so we gave it a go.
We had to wait about 20 minutes for a table, and once we were sat down we were moved onto a better table, but then we were getting orders which were not ours (I assume from a table of people who were moved elsewhere). Some of the dishes we ordered had sold out too, which was a little disappointing, but the entree’s came out fast and they were excellent. It was a bit of a wait for the mains and with all the stuff ups they decided to give us a free dish which was awesome (we weren’t even thinking about complaining as the food was so damn good!).
It turns out that they’ve only been open for 2 days (which explains all the cuffaful). I highly recommend the place though, what a killer find!
Sharing style dishes.
Di was just about to relaunch Be The Foodie, her food blog. We got a sneak peek on the new design too, super clean, functional, just how it should be!
Caught up with Felix and Di the other night at District Dining. I didn’t think the food wasn’t that great (but the company more than made up for it!). It didn’t help that we were denied dessert and kicked out as the table was booked for another party after us! Christina and I dined at Emmilou the night before, a Spanish Tapas restaurant which takes Tapas to a new level. I thought Emmilou was so damn good that I’m sure it kinda ruined the District Dining experience for me a little (similar shared dish style concept).
Edit: The all new Be The Foodie is now live!
Christina is sick with the flu, so is her sister, and last night we were meant to get together for a family dinner to celebrate my B’day but my sister is well preggers, and it’s not the best idea for her to be hanging out with sick people so we postponed the night.
I’ve not caught the flu off Christina, neither have her parents, so the Locks asked if I’d like to go for dinner at Excellent Chinese Seafood Restaurant, their local Chinese restaurant of choice.
Tony’s picky about what he eats, and this place makes strange and wonderful dishes that aren’t featured on the menu just for him. I assume Tony wanted to order all sorts of grand dishes for me but he asked me if there was anything I’d like to eat and I jumped at the opportunity to take charge of the order for the night.
I’d had a couple of glasses of wine, and was feeling good. I didn’t want fancy food. I’ve had it before and it’s probably all the chefs out the back ever cook, so I wanted to make it fun for the chefs as well.
I asked if it was alright if I ordered:
– Crispy skin lemon chicken
– Beef with black bean sauce
– Sweet and sour pork
– Pineapple fried rice
– Salt and pepper prawns
Rosemary and Tony thought I was joking but I wasn’t (haha!). Tony was too embarrassed to order the food (he’s got to show face right?!) so I ordered it (waiter’s reaction was gold).
The food came out and it was absolutely demolished. In fact the only dish that wasn’t finished was the one vegetable dish Rosemary ordered (I sure as hell wasn’t going to eat any veggies on my B’day).
Ultimately the flavors of these dishes are uniquely Chinese in my opinion. Nothing like Thai, Vietnamese, etc. Sure Chinese people have think this is “Australian Chinese” food, and it’s kinda like ordering a meat pie at a gourmet restaurant, but it was naughty fun and it really made my day :)