Assiette, Surry Hills

Today is a special day for Chef S who has been here in Sydney for a year. We are going to Assiette to celebrate. Assiette opens for lunch only on a Friday. We have planned this awhile ago and so anticipate this day to come!


We met at the Central Station and walking our way to the restaurant. The restaurant is situated at the corner and there is nothing fancy outside this restaurant. We were seated at the corner of this tiny restaurant. The open kitchen seems to be unbelievably small.


While we are waiting for another guest to come, we read the menu for their special 3 courses lunch. At first sight, it does not seems to be attractive. However, its a la cart menu seems more interesting. For the price of this 3 courses menu, we all give it a try! :) 

For each course, there is two choices. We picked our own selection. We ended up trying everything off the menu for the date.

 Jerusalem Artichoke with Braised Lamb & Seasoned Chantilly

First the Jerusalem artichoke with braised lamb and seasoned Chantilly to arrive. It is a soup dish. It did not give me the surprise I was hoping for. 

 Thai-Style Fish Cake with Herb Salad & Chilli Dressing

Follow the Thai-Style fish cake with herb salad and chilli dressing. We were talking about whether to be adventurous to try something different? I guess we should follow our gut feeding! :O

Braised Chicken Thigh with Pomme Puree, Mushrooms, Pickling Onions and Bacon

Another adventurous dish to come, braised chicken thigh with pomme puree, mushrooms, pickling onions and bacon. This is to my surprise the chicken is juicy and tender. The puree is so creamy. It is a very nice dish!

Salt Cod Risotto with Pea Mousse and Spring Onion

The salt cod risotto with pea mousse and spring onion. The cod still has a sweetness taste to it. The risotto cooked to it perfection! 

 Quince and Apple Crumble with Vanilla Ice-Cream

Finally the most important dish to come... desserts!!!! I have ordered quince and apple crumble with vanilla ice-cream. The crumble is so nutty and feel like I am having my breakfast cereals. :p

Cheesecake with Passionfruit Ice-Cream

The cheesecake with passionfruit ice-cream is unbelievably taste so great! The cheesecake just melted in your mouth. There is the right balance of the sourness from the passionfruit. This is the most memorable dish I have eaten! :)


We were talking about whether you will come back to a restaurant is whether the dessert at the end of the day will end on a high note. This one is definitely ended on a high note!

Assiette

48 Albion Street

Surry Hills NSW 2010

Phone (02) 9212 7979

Sake Restaurant & Bar, The Rocks

After watching the episode of Master Chef showing how to make sushi, Miss S wants to try the restaurant who the Chef, Shaun Presland, is on the show. She arranged the booking and waiting for the night to come! Since it happened to be Vivid Sydney as well, which the Opera House will be lighted up, we went to The Rocks early to take a few shots before dinner. Glad that there is no rain at the time. It has been raining cats and dogs for over a week!!! Here is the photo of Vivid Sydney.

 Lighting of Sails

After a few shots of Vivid Sydney, we went to our booking at Sake.

Sake Restaurant and Bar

We were lead to our table... the seats and the table is fixed!! It's very hard to get in... especially with our thick jacket and our camera gears. After squeezing into our table, we had to find the menu. It has been narrowly folded printed sheet which was place on top of the sharing plate. We read through the menu and picked the dishes we like.

 The Menu

There are different type of green tea available and we have picked one of each to try. The strongest out of all is the hojicha then follow kukicha. The lightest is the genmacha.

 Various Green Tea

The waiter told us that the sushi or sashimi dishes will come first then following with the main. However, our first dish to arrive is the popcorn shrimp. As the name suggested, the prawn has cut into bite size. The prawn has been mixed deep fried with tempura batter. The creamy spicy sauce is not too spicy. This is the highlight of the day.

 Popcorn Shrimp: bite sized prawn tempura pieces tossed with creamy spicy sauce

We found the name panko rice ball interesting and order this dish. When it arrived, it's not what we expected. As the rice ball has been deep fried!!

 Panko Rice Balls: soy bean & bamboo, shitake mushroom balls with wasabi aioli

It then followed with tartare trio. The kingfish is not as fresh which has a strong fishy taste. Lucky that we only ordered this sashimi dish.

 Tartare Trio: tuna with wasabi soy; salmon with ponzu; kingfish with ceviche dressing

The beef is grilled quite juicy and tender. The spicy antichucho sauce is the highlight of the kushiyaki.

 Beef Kushiyaki with spicy anticucho sauce

We were suggested to order this miso butterfish since this is one of the signature dish of Sake. The fish has been marinated with a sweet miso. The miso sauce is a bit salty, may be we should order this dish with rice?

 Miso Butterfish

We were hoping to order the salmon skin maki. However, it was sold out for the night. :( We then ordered our usual spider maki.

 Spider Maki

Since our stomach still had some spaces, we ordered some desserts as well. Our eyes were on the matcha bombe alaska. The taste of the green tea ice-cream is not strong. There is also some matcha fairy floss which brought back our childhood memories. :)

 Matcha Bombe Alaska

We also ordered reen-apple mille-feuille which is a green apple mousse with layers of thin crispy pastry. This is to my surprise a very nice dessert. :)

 Reen-Apple  Mille-Feuille

We saw George Calombaris walked into the restaurant and seated next to our table. The head chef of Sake was delivering all the dishes to them. I cant remember how many dishes they have ordered, but can they really finished them all?

Sake Restaurant & Bar

12 Argyle Street

The Rocks, Sydney NSW 2000

Phone 02 9259 5656

Black Star Pastry, Newtown

It's half past three and the traffic is pretty bad on King Street. Is there any pastry for me?? Saw I spot near the Newtown station and quickly parked my car there. Rushing my way to Black Star Pastry. Still saw people sitting outside the shop sipping their coffee, so the shop must still open... yeah! Now the difficult part, what shall I get... there are so many things I want to try and my stomach is just enough for small treat! After browsing through the display, my eyes were on the strawberry crumble and chocolate eclair.

 Chocolate Eclair; Strawberry Crumble

While I am waiting for my coffee, the chocolate eclair was the hotties... everyone is going to get one! It must good!! :) As you can see the chocolate filling is so runny and smooth... what a divine. 

My eyes were also on a larger cake inside another display cabinet... strawberry, rose, watermelon cake... a watermelon cake??? It's sound interesting. I guess I have to come back for this one day!!!

Black Star Pastry

277 Australia Street

Newtown NSW 2042

Phone (02) 9557 8656

Nick's Seafood Restaurant, Sydney

My brother-in-law came to Sydney for a visit. He just loves food and we have to choose somewhere with a view and nice food. It happened that I have a discount for Nick's Seafood Restaurant... that's even better!!

We were seated at the podium however we did not get the front row view of Darling Harbour. But it's still nice. We decided to order a few dishes to share.

We were given a stand to hold our hot and cold platter for two. It included king prawns, blue swimmer crab, Sydney rock oysters, steamed mussels, smoked salmon, catch of the day, fried king prawns and baby calamari. It has the variety of Sydney seafood.

Hot & Cold Platter for Two

We have also ordered chargrilled tuna steak to cover the variety which is not offer in the platter.

Chargrilled Tuna Steak

Since my brother-in-law can really eat a lot of food, we decided to order some meat as well. The chargrilled grainfed sirloin should do the job! :) It served with creamy mash, caramelised baby onions, and port jus. Although it is a seafood restaurant, they cooked their steak to what we requested (med-rare)!

Chargrilled Grainfed Sirloin

A very enjoyable meal with the view!

* These photos were taken using phone camera.

Nick's Seafood Restaurant
The Promenade, Cockle Bay Wharf
Sydney NSW 2000
(02) 9264 1212