Butterfingers - American Chocolate

butterfinger

Butterfinger - a chocolate we don't seem to have in mass in Australia. Also, according to my partner, a chocolate bar which gives off wierd X-ray images when you go through customs. Nonetheless, a big box of butterfingers made it through all the barriers from the U.S to me~! :)

Butterfingers have quite a long history. First invented in 1928, the name was chosen by the public and is essentially, a slang used to describe a clumsy person (how suiting for me). Butterfingers were also dropped from planes in cities across the U.S as an ad ploy. It's raining butterfingers!!! Wouldn't mind that here :)

butterfinger insides

So what are they? Biting into a butterfinger reveals a peanuty, caramelly, orange-colored flaky layered center - quite similar to a peanut brittle. In fact, it tastes like a peanut brittle covered in chocolate. It is very yummy on the first bite - and gets sickening sweet if you're finishing the whole bar :)

Suminoya - Sydney

Suminoya

I love Suminoya. Suminoya has to be the the perfect Jap buffet for my partner and I. My partner loves yakiniku (barbequed meat). I love my sashimi. This jap buffet has both - and unlimited amounts of it.

At Suminoya, there are three options. You can order a la carte if you don't wish to buffet it, and there are 2 buffet options - Gourmet buffet for $41 per head (child $16), or the Premium buffet for $49 per head (child $19). There are a few more dishes to choose when you tick the Premium buffet - beef tongue and sashimi included. You can order for a whole hour and you can eat for an hour an a half. Doesn't sound like long - but it's enough time for you to be completely completely stuffed!

The beef tongue here is pretty damn good. Lightly seasoned with pepper, it sizzles and grills perfectly, leaving a chewy tastey thinly sliced piece of beef that fills your mouth with deliciousness. Beef tongue, however, is not for everyone. It's not the "melt in your mind" kind of beef. Rather, it is the beefy tasting chewy type.

beef tongue

Beef fillet is another dish on the Premium menu. The beef fillet chunks are drenched in a yummy marinade which leaves the meat juicy and tender after grilled. My favourite beef is probably still the beef rib - but I think we were too side tracked by ordering more beef tongue and other non-beef foods to have stomach for it.

beef fillet

Lots of scallops were ordered. These were deliciousness. The deal with these are - cook both sides til their sizzling but keep the middle rare. Makes the scallops juicy and super super yummy. BUT - if you over cook these, they will be come chewy, dry and kind of nasty.

scallops

Whenever we eat beef yukke, I always think back to the first time we were here with a huge bunch of friends. That time also marked the first time eating beef yukke for some of us. As it had such a yummy, sweet and intriguing taste, one of my friends could not stop eating this stuff - ordered and ate around 5 plates of this, and felt horribly sick afterwards LOL. Beef yukke is essentially raw ground beef seasoned with soy sauce, sugar, salt, pepper and sesame oil and you mix it with the shallots, sesame seeds and raw egg. Hence, it probably isn't good for you when eaten in mass - but we always atleast order one coz it's YUM :P

beef yukke

For me, we ordered lots of lots of plates of sashimi. There's salmon, tuna, kingfish and squid sashimi. My favourite is salmon and a close second is the kingfish. The sashimi is fresh, tasty and super sweet. Mmm... satisfies my sashimi cravings.

sashimi

I also love the salads here. My favourite is the seaweed and seafood salad. This is a bowl of fresh greens with salmon, prawns and seaweed tossed in a wasabi mayo. Super delicious!

seaweed and seafood salad

My partner also ordered the avocado and herb salad. This was likewise, fresh and tasty.

Avocado and herb salad

I also appreciated the Namaru - a variety of pickled veges korean style.

namaru

There's fresh prawns and there's garlic butter prawns cooked in a foil tin. Being too lazy to deshell, we opted for the garlic butter prawns. For my partner, he ordered unagi (eel). He said it was pretty good.

garlic butter prawns

Unagi

Chicken here is AWESOME. super super tender. super super juicy. A must have - even thought it seems so simple. The chicken pieces here still have the skin attached. As long as you manage to grill the skin, you get the succulentness of the chicken and the crispyness of the skin. Very very yum. :)

Chicken

This dish will remind me to always ask what something is before I order. Trying to order something different from my seaweed soup, I opted for the adventurous egg kuppa. What this is, is that wierd rice in soup with an splattered on top. I don't think I'm a fan of rice in soup. It has a weird texture... too soggy to be actual rice and not soggy enough to be porridge. I don't think I'd be ordering this again.

Egg Kuppa

bbqing the food :P

Last but not least - dessert~!!!! There's green tea and vanilla icecream, lemon sorbet, and coffee jelly. The green tea icecream is smooth, rich and creamy with a delicious green tea flavour. All icecreams are served with azuki beans and cornflakes. I'm also a fan of the coffee jelly which is topped with evaporated milk. According to my partner, the coffee jelly is strong. I think it's perfect~!

Green tea and vanilla icecream

coffee jelly

We hadn't been here for more than a year. The food quality has not worsened. It's just as yummy as ever. The price has likewise, not gone up for a year ago. Definately worth coming back time and time again. However, do NOT come here in your best clothes and you are bound to exit smelling like barbeque :)

Ratings:
Food - 9/10
Service - 8/10
Ambiance - 7/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 31.5/40

Suminoya
1 Hosking Place
Sydney
NSW, 2000
tel: (02) 9231 2177

Palm Breeze Cafe - Burwood

Uni is over!!! :P
As post-uni uni-friend meet ups tend to involve people who live all around sydney, the mid-point for meeting up this time was at Burwood's Palm Breeze Cafe.

I looked at the menu and I wanted to order absolutely pretty much everything! Glancing around at what other people were ordering, I noticed that the portion sizes were pretty HUGE and so, we all just ordered a main each.

Drink-wise, my friend ordered a mango and pineapple frappe. She said this drink was awesome and wonderfully refreshing. My lactose-intolerant friend ordered a soy hot choc - no complaints there either. A diet coke and my awesomeness chocolate thickshake was also ordered. My thickshake was soooo sooo thick! Just the way I like it. Very ice-creamy and slightly too sweet but very yummy nonetheless :)

Mango and Pineapple Frappe

soy hot choc

diet coke

Chocolate thickshake

My friend ordered a half-rack of ribs ($27). This was HUGELY GIGANTIC and piled up like a mountain. Long succulent ribs with meat that just falls off the bone was sitting onto of a mound of crispy yummy chips and topped with barbeque chicken skewers. There was also a big pile of salad accompanied by a tomatoey, subtley chilli may mixture.

half rack of ribs - $27

Two of my other friends ordered veal. There was a vitello oscar ($25.90) which comprised of three hand-sized pieces of veal with grilled fresh prawns, spinach and drenched with hollandaise sauce. The veal was sitting a-top a mound of creamy mash and accompanied with a pile of veges. The other veal dish was the vitello lemon. This veal came with a small jug of light rosemary and lemon sauce. The veal exuded a very healthy vibe to it - none of that juicy fat-ness that you get from a beef steak. The hollindaise sauce was creamy and tasty, and I thought it was slightly yummier than the lemon sauce - which was very quite kind of subtle.

Vitello Lemon - $23.90

Vitello Oscar - $25.90

Lastly, my pasta - pollo al peso ($17.90). My photo does not do justice to it's size. This pasta was tossed in creamy basil pesto sauce, mixed with sauteed chicken and mushrooms and sprinkled with pine nuts. This was very rich and creamy. By the time I was stuffed full, it looked as though I had barely touched my plate LOL.

Pollo al Pesto - $17.90

For dessert, because we were all so full, we decided to share two between the four of us. We ordered the Creme caramel ($8.90) and the Chocolate explosion ($9.90). Contrary to how amazing I found all the mains, the dessert was definately a disappointment. The creme caramel was served with banana and drizzled with condensed milk. Thinking sweet? I'm thinking waaaayyy tooo sickening sweet - so only order if you have a super sweet tooth! The chocolate explosion in real life looked no where near as impressive as it did on the menu. Instead of an impressive warm chocolate melting cake sitting in the middle of a pool of chocolate sauce and accompanied with straweberries and icecream, what we got was more like a cup of cheap watery vanilla icecream with a chocolate pudding that was microwaved minutes before it was served. Very chocolatey though.

creme caramel - $8.90

Not so fab chocolate explosion - $9.90

Overall, Palm Breeze Cafe was a good dining experience. The atmosphere is vibey and the waiters were nice and friendly. I would definately come back for the ribs. And eyeing the seafood platters that came out of the kitchen (plates of seafood piled up like a huge mountain) that should also be an order on our next visit :P However, dessert might just need to be a skip LOL

Ratings:
Food - 8.5/10
Service - 8/10
Ambiance - 7.5/10
Value for money - 8/10
Overall - 32/40

Palm Breeze Cafe
128 Burwood Road
Burwood
NSW 2134
tel: (02) 9715 7222

The Coffee Club - Blacktown

The Coffee Club Blacktown

After playing tennis, my friend and I were on the look out for some yummy food to make up for the energy used. Funnily enough, we did not order any coffee though we were at the Coffee Club at Blacktown Westpoint. Instead, I was happy with my Bundaberg lemon lime & bitters, and my friend was good with his grapefruit flavoured Capi soda.

lemon lime bitters

grapefruit capi

Being slightly health conscious, my friend ordered the Lifestyle chicken fillet burger with a side of chips. This was a grilled slab of skinless chicken breast with tomato, mixed lettuce, spanish onion and light slightly melted mozzarella cheese all cased within a big bun and drizzled with spicy herb aioli. My friend hungrily and satisfiedly gobbled it all up :)

Lifestyle chicken fillet burger

Likewise, I decided to be healthy today and so, I ordered a chicken and avocado wrap - toasted. Funnily enough, what I ended up getting was a chicken salad wrap - no avocado included LOL. I didn't even realise the cafe's mistake until half-way through my wrap, and by then, I couldn't be bothered to complain. My first look at the chicken pieces struck up the word "bland" in my mind. Contrary to my predictions, the pieces of chicken breast were kind of slightly juicy. Looks can be deceiving :P The wrap was also very filling and left me hunger-less after my energy expenditure exercise that morning.

Chicken and "avocado" wrap

In all, the food was average and the service was non-existant (but they probably aren't supposed to do anything). The most important thing was the company - and the company was awesome ~!

Ratings:
Food - 6.5/10
Service - 6/10
Ambiance - 7/10
Value for money - 6/10
Overall - 25.5/40

The Coffee Club
Level 1 Westpoint Blacktown
Shop 1010
Patrick Street
Blacktown
NSW 2148
tel: (02) 9622 5900

Ichirang - Carlingford

IchiRang

Lunch after church rounded up just a small group of friends this week. Hence, surprisingly, we were actually able to fit inside a restaurant~~~

We decided to eat at Ichirang after a friend said that she wanted cold soba (then forgot that she wanted it). Anyway - I had (again) forgotten my camera and hence we all have to settle for my crappy phone pics :)

Situated in Carlingford Village, a place where the food court seems to get the most business, Ichirang did not have the most amount of customers which meant we were seated almost immediately. There are bento boxes (around $15 ish) and lunch specials. Lunch specials for today included the terriyaki chicken with rice and miso soup ($8.50), terriyaki fish ($9.50) or a udon and sushi set ($12).

The two of my friends who ordered the terriyaki chicken set both commented on how full they were after polishing off the plate. From that, I deduced that the meal was filling and must have tasted alright.

Terriyaki Chicken - $8.50

The beef don (looked a bit like beef bolgogi), mixed katsu don, and of course, the cold soba was also ordered. The beef was mixed with lots of onions and a big pile of rice underneath. Same with the mixed katsu don - looked like a heap of deep fried meat. The cold soba was seriously - just cold soba - a huge lump of green cold carbs complete with soba sauce and chopped shallots lOL :)

Beef Don

Mixed Katsu Don

Cold Soba

I ordered a non-jap meal - the Korean pancake ($11), panfried with mixed seafood and shallots. The taste was a little bit bland. It was helped slightly with the sauce. The seafood also seemed like the tiny marinara mixes you get frozen at the shops. Wasn't hugely tasty - but wasn't too horribly bad either. Also - it was huge~ I could not stomach it all.

Korean Pancake - $11

Overall, the service did not bother much with us. The food came in huge portions. Nonthing spectacular taste-wise, but not horrible tasting either :P

Ratings:
Food- 7/10
Service - 6/10
Ambiance - 6.5/10
Value for money - 7/10
Overall - 26.5/40

IchiRang
Shop G21A, Carlingford Village
372 Pennant Hills Rd.
Carlingford,
NSW, 2118
tel: (02) 9872 2629