♥ Garlic Pizza BreadOur very dear
Kendo Maniac aka the Crazy Guy gave us a huge surprise when he really put his words into action - "Pink, I might go back to Sydney next month." No, I didn't believe him at all for he is one who likes to joke with me. But it seemed like I should have believed him at least this once because he was really back!
It was a thursday night and everyone was rather tired after work so we decided to head down to
Macchiato Cafe in the city - convenient enough for everyone to get to and to head home.
♥ tabeshimashita @ Macchiato Cafe on 1 Sep 2005
♥ Smoked Salmon Entree
Sitting at a slightly more private corner of the Cafe, we could not stop talking and talking and talking that we had to wave away the waiter many times. And it was probably for the 4th or 5th time that we really decided on what to order.
Ken: Let's order 2 entree, 2 mains and 2 pizza, seeing there are 7 of us.
Iver: No no no no. Everyone got to have a main!
Ken: We order and see first lar.
It turned out Iver was right. We didn't have enough to eat so we ordered the extra garlic pizza bread, a bowl of chips and a third pizza.
So to start, we had Smoked Salmon. It cost around A$15 I think or a little more. I couldn't remember the price exactly but what I do remember is that Macchiato Cafe is quite pricey, at least to my standard it is.
♥ Lemon Pepper Chicken
For the carnivorous, we had entree sized lemon pepper chicken. I quite enjoyed the peppery lemony sauce.
♥ French Fries A$5.50
Everyone was actually quite hungry well before we placed our orders so it was a good idea that we ordered a huge bowl of chips which came with a small jug of ketchup.
♥ Seafood Platter for One A$29.90
There was half a balmain bug (mostly shell, not much meat - according to Iver, who was feeling rather guilty about taking the biggest portion of the platter for himself but soon found out there was really only one small bite of meat inside) sitting right on top of the platter, around 3-4 prawns, one slice of fish, calamari and squid.
We didn't think the squid was hygienic enough. The two only person who had the squid - ShinChan had stomachache after dinner, and this other friend developed skin allergy on her face. The rest of us were safe because we didn't touch the squid.
Beside the seafood platter, we also had a prawn linguini to share across the table. No photo here though. It wasn't a really good idea to share linguini, especially seeing all the forks picking from the dish!
♥ Supreme Pizza
We heard the pizza was good here so we ordered a few. First up, Iver ordered a supreme pizza without pineapple. *yay* I finally found someone who doesn't like pineapple on pizza like me!
♥ Shanghai Pizza
The most interesting pizza on the menu was probably shanghai pizza - pekingese duck with oyster mushroom.
Now two cute stories about Oyster Mushroom:
Story 1
Iver: what's oyster mushroom?
pinkcocoa: It's a type of mushroom...er...japanese probably..
Iver: But I have never seen it in Japan! It's not Japanese (Iver studies in Japan)
pinkcocoa: er...*sweat drops*...well it's a type of oriental mushroom...
Iver: ok!
Story 2
Zelda: Pinkcocoa, did you tasted the oyster in the pizza? I didnt see any.
Pinkcocoa: er, i dont think there is any. It is oyster mushroom and not oyster...
Zelda: Oh Oops. Hahahaha
♥ Bombay Pizza
We ordered Bombay pizza half way through our meal because there wasn't enough for the 7 of us! The bombay pizza had tandoori chicken and served with cucumber raita and a slice of pampadams, beautifully arranged on top.
Dinner was great - mostly because of the the companions, I would say. I didn't actually notice much of the food because all of us had been talking talking and talking all this while. :-p
♥ Macchiato Cafe
338 Pitt St
Sydney NSW 2000
Tel. +61 2 9262 9525
Continue Reading Macchiato Cafe
♥ Pinkcocoa's Chocolatey BirthdayPinkcocoa has just turned another year older a few weeks ago. You must be wondering what she did on her birthday, in particularly what she ate on her birthday - if there was any fancy restaurant involved, what sort of cake did ShinChan get her, any flowers, chocolates? The fact is the Ageing Monster has started to attack me and old as I am, I actually did not feel like any celebration at all. And I did not even want a cake.
So the day ended up with a quick tour to Bankstown, food highly involved of course and dear, do I have to thank
AugustusGloop's Bankstown Food Guide! Before heading home, we stopped by
Sweet Fantasy Cakes to see if the sighting of a real cake could make me want a birthday cake. And yes, it did and I ended up with a small individual sized teardrop-shaped chocolate mousse cake.
♥ tabeshimashita @ Sweet Fantasy Cake some time in August
♥ Temptation of Chocolate Ganache and Almond Flakes
The moment I saw this small chocolatey cake, I could feel the rich, smooth and shiny chocolate ganache calling and yelling out to me. Yup, I gotta have that cake, now or never!
I was so in a hurry to cut the cake and eat it that I have forgotten to include an overall view of the rich devilish chocolate cake. *Oops* And just to let you know, the pink rose isn't included in the cake. It's one of my cake decorating keepsake. ;-)
♥ Chocolate Mousse sandwiched between
Sponge Cakes
The rich and very chocolatey mousse is sandwiched between two very thin layers of soft sponge cake, and covered with a rich and creamy chocolate ganache. The cake on the whole is very rich and chocolatey. The ganache, rich and chocolatey. The mousse, rich and chocolatey. It is just so rich and chocolatey - perfect for a girl who loves her cake rich and chocolatey!
♥ Sweet Fantasy Cakes
Shop 1a, 222-224 South Terrace
Bankstown, NSW 2200
Mon-Fri 8:00am - 7:00pm
Sat 8:00am - 8:00pm
Sun 9:00am - 7:00pm
Tel: +61 2 9708 6000
Fax: +61 2 9790 2925
Continue Reading Pinkcocoa's Chocolatey Birthday
♥ My Bowl of Fish Head CurryI am a very lucky employer. Very very lucky, indeed. And why is that? It all began with a phonecall that my colleague received in the middle of a Friday morning when the sleepy bugs were attacking everyone.
*ring ring*
Colleague: Yes, big boss?
Colleague: (nodding her head) Oh. Oh. Oh. Ok. No problem.
Colleague: (turned to me, with a grin so broad on her face) Hey, free lunch today! Big boss is treating us! (turned to the others and repeated the same thing again)
Pinkcocoa: (excited and super eagar to find out what we were having for lunch) Where are we heading to? Is it yumcha?
Colleague: No no no! We are trying something new today - Thai Malaysian Cuisine!
Pinkcocoa: Woohooooooo~ *yay* but where?
Colleague: This, you will find out soon.
Expandable Post Starts here...
♥ tabeshimashita @ Senses Restaurant, Chinatown on 02 Sep 2005
♥ Senses Restaurant
Lunchtime arrived, and the whole big group of us started heading down to Chinatown area. As we approached Regal Chinese Restaurant, I thought we were having yumcha but no, we continued along Liverpool Street and turned left into a small streetscape, just behind Regal Chinese Restaurant.
We were heading to Senses Restaurant, a fairly new restaurant that specialised in Thai and Malaysian Cuisine. The owner is the colleague of tau keh niang (Hokkien meaning boss wife) and she had wanted us to try the place out thus the last minute lunch invitation.
♥ 4 Spring Rolls a serve @ A$5.80
We had spring rolls for a start. I forgot to mention that I am to not give my own view on the food we had at the restaurant. Yes, you can call me "chicken" if you want to but I definitely do not want to offend my boss and his wife and the owner if they did happen to stumble upon my post!
♥ 2 Curry Puff a serve @ A$6.80
Then we had vegetarian curry puff.
♥ Inside curry puff
The curry puff was filled with nicely flavoured potato, carrots and peas. Sorry no sighting of peas here but this is very typical of a curry puff.
♥ 4 Thai Fishcakes a serve @ A$7.80
We also had Thai fishcakes for entree. Note the piece of lettuce in the photo, it was added a decorative touch by my other boss who was sitting next to me. My colleagues and my bosses seem to enjoy my food photography session very much. They were all helping me to add this and that to make the photo appears more attractive!
♥ Beef Rendang @A$15.80
For mains, we had beef rendang (Malaysian dry beef curry) to which my colleage got all excited about. We also had lamb kurma (A$15.80) but no photo to show here. The only one I took was too blurry.
♥ Gado Gado
For those into veggies, there was a huge serving for Gado Gado (Indonesian Peanut Sauce Salad). The sauce was quite tangy and slightly spicy.
♥ 1 Whole Hainanese Chicken @ A$28.80
According to Tau Keh Niang, the restaurant has really good Hainanese Chicken and the best thing about it is that it is boneless, making it easier to eat. We also had a pot of chicken rice (A$8) to share across the table.
♥ Fishhead Curry @ Market Price
We pre-ordered the Chef's Special - Fishhead Curry when we booked the table. It came in a huge claypot and everyone was shocked to see the big size. Inside the fishhead curry are of course, the fishhead, lady finger's, tofu and some veggies. We paid around A$50 for this huge pot.
♥ Kangkong Belacan
The last to arrive was kangkong belacan, one of my favourite Malaysian food.
♥ Kuih Dadar @ A$6.50
We could barely fit in dessert after the huge feast yet no meal is completed without desserts so we had kuih dadar, which is just Pandan flavoured pancake with coconut-palm sugar filling inside. It was served in a pool of palm sugar syrup and ice-cream. Note this is not the usual way we could eat this kuih!
♥ Black Sticky Rice Pudding @ A$4.50
As if the sweet and rich kuih dadar wasn't enough, we also had black sticky rice pudding, luckily that was shared.
We walked out of the restaurant all with bulging belly. You would have thought we all have great energy to continue along the afternoon but the fact was we were so full that we were even more sleepy than before after such a big feast!
♥ Senses Restaurant
Shop 2, 6-12 Harbour Street (Corner of Liverpool and Dixon St)
Haymarket NSW
Australia
Tel: +61 2 9283 2988
Lunch Special @ A$10.50
Afternoon Tea Special @ A$7.50
Dinner Special @ A$12.50
Continue Reading Senses Restaurant - Thai & Malaysian Cuisine
♥ Frothy Hot ChocolateI had a strange dream last night where Pinkcocoa was found guilty of not regularly updating her blog! *yikes* So here I am, taking a short break from work and writing a short short post on my breakfast drink - what else but hot frothy creamy chocolate!
Having hot frothy creamy chocolate in a cold winter (ok, I know it's spring now but I still find it cold) morning and pairing it with toasts spreaded thickly with nutella is the perfect brekkie for a chocoholic. Ahhh just thinking of my breakfast, I feel like I am in heaven. The combination helps to ease off my blue mood upon the thought of heading to work every morning.
♥ tabeshimashita @ pinkcocoa's kitchen on
♥ Nestle Double Blend Hot Chocolate - Caramel Flavour
I bought this pack of Nestle Double Blend Hot Chocolate shortly it was out on the supermarket shelves. Of course, I waited for it to be on sale else it would have cost me A$4.99 for a pack of 10 hot choc sachets. Have i mentioned it comes with a small chocolate powder shaker too?
I was actually looking for the original hot chocolate but they seem to sell out really quickly that's why I grabbed a caramel flavour hot chocolate even though I am not really a fan of having flavours in my chocolate drink.
♥ Very Frothy Chocolatey
The hot chocolate is really frothy as soon as I pour hot water into my mug. A sweet caramelly aroma fills the kitchen. What a good way to start the day! On first sip, the drink is actually quite creamy and slightly sweet. As you continue along the way, there is a slight bitter cocoa taste. The caramel flavour isn't so distinct in the drink itself but does have a very sweet sticky aroma.
I haven't yet tried making this hot chocolate with milk, as according to the instruction on the package - for creamier taste, make with milk. I would think it would be overly creamy, at least for me it would be.
I quite enjoymy hot chocolate except for the slight bitter aftertaste which leads me to open that pack of Nestle Double Blend Crunchy Cookie Chocolate sitting on the table. *Oops*
Continue Reading Chocolatey Start to a Day!
