Hi Genevieve! I met up with Suga and Gen in Surry. They were having post lunch drinks at The Winery. The lush outdoor garden like setting reminds me of Melbourne for some reason.

Christina’s Giggly Rose Cocktail.

Sun setting on the Ferry cruise into Manly.

Suga and I.

Docking at Manly.

The macaroons lived up to the name.

We smashed our Pie + Macaroons here.

Cheery American bar waitress at the 4 Pines Brewery was celebrating the 4th of July.

Sake’s amazing Tuna Tasting Plate.

It’s been ages since Suga and I caught a Ferry to Manly, and despite the weather being cold, as well as a little on/off we took a chance. Luckily the rain never came and we got to watch the sun set as the ferry ported us over to Manly.

Through some research I found out that Adriano Zumbo had a shop in Manly so we went about tracking it down. Initially we walked straight past it, with some help from the Google map on my iPhone we found the shop, which was basically a hole in the wall!

We stocked up on lots of macaroons + a pie too. Pie wasn’t crash hot but the macaroons are really nice. We had a drink at the 4 Pines (they brew and sell their own beer there, a must go if you’re a beer lover) and thought about dining in Manly. Hugo’s and Garfish were our options, but then we thought we’d just catch the ferry back and give Wildfire a go, once we saw how quiet Wildfire was, and how heavy the menu looked we decided to drop in to Sake to see if they had a table for us!

We ended up getting a sunken table, which was really just a raised up table that you sit into (I suppose they couldn’t dig holes into the ground floor!). Hard to get into but once in it was fun. Tuna Tasting Plate still blows my socks off every time. Everything else we had was nice too, but the tasting plate is just so good that everything else pales in comparison.

Tour de France time now. I can hear the spectator horns beeping upstairs. Macaroons await. Banzai!

I’m getting into it.

Always book for 6 so you get a booth, the booths rock.

Stephen + Cam.

Cam loved the touch screen ordering system.

Asahi, served in record breaking time as usual.

Sushi Roulette! I was hoping our guest Cam would get the one which had copious amounts of wasabi in it, and too right he copped it!

Hot Sake, so good.

I love green tea ice cream but the black sesame at Wagaya was way nicer.

Great night last night. We took Cam to Wagaya last night. He’s a country boy, not had much Japanese at all so we thought we’d treat him to something different. He loved the ordering system, the food too even if he did cop the huge wasabi hit in the salmon sushi roulette!

Entrees – Salt and pepper chilli squid, Soft shell crab and crispy marinated quail on a papaya salad.

Mains – Steamed fillet of barramundi, warm duck breast salad, stir fried beef.

Dessert – The fanciest fried banana I’ve ever seen.

Had dinner with some visiting relos at Banana Palm tonight in Coogee Beach. I’ve eaten here once before, many years ago. They serve up Vietnamese Cuisine, nothing traditional, more fusion, so much so that I thought 2 of their dishes were outright Chinese, and nothing at all like the Vietnamese food I’m used to. Strange meal, really hit and miss. Some dishes were OK but some weren’t great. The fried banana dessert was almost saved the night except the pear on the plate was nicer than the banana’s themselves!

Sign and menu from the outside.

So much on the menu but my eyes always focus on this bit.

I always love checking out the $40k+ wines on the wine list, but we went for a much more modest Wynns Coonawarra 1994 Cab Sav Black Label (my fave drop of red).

We were there early and service was crazy fast.

Who needs fancy presentation when the produce is this good?

Cam and Suga.

Jason and Alison.

The Pavlova was massive. Cam smashed it too!

Haven’t had a great steak since the Tassie Trip so when Cam (who was with us in Tasmania) was in town we thought we’d line up a dinner at Rockpool Bar & Grill for a killer steak. Jason, who was also with us on the Tassie trip came too so it was almost like a re-union of sorts!

All of us were on Facebook the night before, starving just thinking about the steak, and Rockpool didn’t disappoint. There’s so much awesome stuff on the menu. I’d love to try it all, but every time I’ve been I just go straight for the grain fed steak on the bone. Can’t help it!!!