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New South Wales

Kanzo

Believe it or not, almost three years after moving to Sydney, I’m still looking for a go-to Japanese restaurant. Although I have about half a dozen good ramen restaurants under my belt by now, I’m still yet to find a cheap and cheerful place that serves casual Japanese food – the kind of place you go to on a weeknight when you don’t feel up to cooking. My search today took me out to Parramatta, to a popular sushi restaurant named Kanzo. Based on reviews, I had expected a small and fairly low-key restaurant, but what actually greeted me was a takeaway shop with some rickety stables set up next door, in the vestibule of a run-down shopping mall. Still,…

13/01/2021

Asian, Cheapie Lunch (Under $20), Japanese, Parramatta

Bare Witness

Today, I continue on my journey to try out every single café within a 10km radius of my house, and today my adventures take me to Bare Witness. Sitting right at the edge of the Rhodes waterfront, I first noticed Bare Witness when I was lining up for Left of Field, and was rather taken by its expansive glass walls and waterside location. Pleasingly, the interior of the café was just as pretty as the outside suggested, the glass walls making the most of the daylight, whilst the high ceilings and concrete walls were softened by greenery and strings of Edison bulbs.

06/01/2021

Breakfast, Brunch, Cafe, Just A Bit Special ($20-$35), Rhodes

Student Biryani

I’ve never been to Student Biryani, but I can tell you right now that it does the best biryani in Sydney. Ok technically that’s a bit of a half-truth; I may have never been to Student Biryani in person, but I’ve sure eaten it plenty of times. An old co-worker of mine used to occasionally organise biryani days at work, where he would order entire buckets from Student Biryani for us to feast on. And everyone who has ever tasted it agrees that it is the best they’ve ever had.

30/12/2020

Auburn, Cheapie Lunch (Under $20), Indian, Middle Eastern, Pakistani

Belle’s Hot Chicken

Belle’s Hot Chicken has a special place in my heart. The first time I ever ate there was in Melbourne, and unbeknownst to me at the time, it was just hours before I was to receive the call that kickstarted my pharmacy career. Sure, it wasn’t a big deal in the grand scheme of things, but at the time, getting a job offer at a large hospital after 3 months of desperately looking for work was the best feeling in the world. As it turns out, I wasn’t the only one who’s come a long way since 2015. In the last 5 years, not only has Belle’s became a stalwart for southern fried chicken in Melbourne, it’s also expanded across…

23/12/2020

American, Barangaroo, Cheapie Lunch (Under $20), Fast Food

Ho Jiak

Malaysian cuisine was the first I ever fell in love with. It cemented my now-undying love for street food, and was the catalyst for my first ever overseas with friends. And although I don’t have it nearly as often these days, having gotten the obsession out of my system with 2 weeks in Malaysia, I still very much have a soft spot for the eclectic, multicultural cuisine. Ho Jiak is one of the first restaurants that really put Malaysian food on the map in Sydney. Although there were plenty of places to get your Malaysian fix, most of them were cheap and cheerful eateries that served up just a few of the more well-known Malaysian dishes. Not Ho Jiak. Sure,…

16/12/2020

Asian, Haymarket, Just A Bit Special ($20-$35), Malaysian

Sydney Cebu Lechon

I came across my very first Boodle Fight was when an old co-worker posted a photo of their Christmas celebrations. I had never before in my life seen so much food laid out on banana leaves, just waiting to be dug into with bare hands. And the centrepiece of it all was an entire suckling pig – lechon to be precise. I never got close enough to that particular co-worker to invite myself to one of their family feasts, but the longing for a meal where the size of the plate was measured in meters remained unabated.

09/12/2020

Asian, Filipino, Just A Bit Special ($20-$35), Newtown

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