La Renaissance Café Patisserie

This might sounds cliche, but it is one of my favourites cafes in Sydney. It's French and it's located at The Rocks - all tourist boxes ticked.

I always believed the best cafe is the hidden one in a laneway, far from the main street and only advertised word of mouths. But this cafe stole my heart from my first visit and again despite of the touristy location (fyi touristy location = rocketing prices), it just kept on calling my name to come back there.

I have tried various cakes from there and I gotta say they all pretty darn good. Their macarons are quite a big hit too, some of my friends even claimed it better than Zumbo's macarons! I would actually don't have much comment for it, as myself not a big fan of macarons (most of the times I found it too sweet). I mean of course I'd be happy to snatch one but if I had to choose one pastry, I won't hesitate to order the Passion de Pierre - A light creamy passionfruit mousse, with a layer of raspberry jelly, encased in joconde and decorated with fresh seasonal fruit.

For a pretty small cake the price is a bit at the high end, for each visit Moco and I would spend at least $20 - that's two coffees and two cakes. Of course you can cut your budget and just order a take away, but it'd also take away the imagination of having patisserie in a Paris bistro. Imagination certainly does cost money these days.

For that beautiful Saturday arvo, Moco chose to have the Chocolate Eclair - Traditional choux pastry filled with chocolate pastry cream and topped with chocolate fondant.




Oh so many beautiful pastries, so little time.

Svens Viking Pizza

Pizza. Everyone has tried pizza at least once in their lives. But how about Swedish Pizza? Ikea woot? Yeah even my Swedish friend had no idea what toppings they would put on a Swedish Pizza. Would we need to assemble it with an allen key?

Moco and I have been passing this place in Bondi Junction on a regular basis these past few months. So on a wet Thursday night we decided to give it a go.

The tiny restaurant is dominated by a long table that seems to be able to fit the crew of a viking ship or two. We were sat down on one of the smaller tables that had logs for chairs. The place was a bit dark but I guess that just adds to the ambiance of it all, there are also some swords, chain mail and the skin of some luckless animal.

The menu had an interesting array of choices with equally interesting names. We settled on the Embla (slices of kebab, roma tomato and crispy iceberg lettuce with Swedish kebab sauce) and the Ragnarok aka "Judgement Day" (Spicy Chorizo, Pancetta, Pepperoni, Ham and Spicy Chilli Creme). These names sounded so much better when spoken by the Swedish waitress (doh..)


The pizzas came out in a reasonable time and they looked surprisingly like the pizzas we all know and love. The bases were pleasingly light and crispy and they tend to go light on the cheese. Their menu and website boasts about this being the lighter choice over their Italian counterparts and I'd have to agree. The Embla had quite a strong lamb taste and the Ragnarok was no where near as spicy as we thought it would be.

lettuce and tomato salad on a pizza?! this must be the Swedish side..

Moco read on the internet that the pizzas are meant to be served with a light side salad. We had to demand this and well, it's nothing to write home about. Just like a mini coleslaw or dare I say pale kimchi but it did help break down the lamby tinge from Embla.


Will we go back? Not too sure, but we have certainly filled our curiosity :)

Lamb Ragout

Warning: this will be a lame entry with just probably five sentences max (I just posted five entries in a row so I had the full right to be)

After the Aussie's day lamb preview, we decided to get more lamb on the real Aussie Day.
This time we decided to had lamb chops with mash potatoes - same ingredients, different forms.

For some unknown reasons I only found one finishing photo and no preparing photos whatsoever.

So voila..just for the sake of keeping record.



You've been warned!

Bondi Wedtfield Food Court

Whoah I finally am speeding up the post here, I only five posts behind how good is that?

Normally I wouldn't find anything special with food in a food court, but I found the fancy food court in Bondi Westfield was quite entertaining. I can't think of any other food court that has beautiful landscape view nor a dish that costs like in a normal restaurant. Okay I might be a bit exaggerating here but really for me food court has a price range of $7-$10 max. Not $10-$18.

I had the biggest doubt when I saw this overpriced Thai food with menu that looked like just a made-up menu. But surprisingly I thought the pad see ew I ordered was fantastic. Maybe I was starving when I ordered it, but really I liked it. They used the extra flat noodle that I liked, the refreshing lime sauce that I liked, so I got no choice but to like it!

Lime and peppercorn chicken pad see ew

Moco on the other hand, wasn't as lucky. He picked the burrito meal that I think we both liked the chips more than the burrito =p


Definitely nothing compared to burritos we had before..but it's a good value I supposed, $9.90 for burrito, chips and drinks.

So I guess that's where my food court meal prejudice came from - you go to food court for the dollar saver not exactly the taste (although sometimes you just never know your luck).

Lamb Roast

Moco's parents went out the whole day so Moco and I decided to cook dinner for them. I remember this was back on the Aussie's day weekend so we planned to have lamb (plus Moco's dad likes lamb and he's fussy with food)

What's also important that we had lots of veggies..


The benefit cooking at Moco's parents place, the oven was big enough to fit everything! The lamb, the veggies and the bread..

Moco was happy the lamb was beautifully cooked - well everyone was happy.

The lamb was indeed soft and tender but I think what made me happy most was the crunchy herb coated potatoes!

Bau Truong

As you're probably can tell I wasn't too satisfied with my last Viet's dish, so I dragged Moco to take me to the real deal. Cabra. I really like fresh Viet food so it'd really torn me if it wasn't fresh.

Good news, this place has never let me down. From the first time Moco took me there I've been revisiting the resto countless time and always feel satisfied.

Moco felt for something naughty that day so he ordered the greasy Viet pancake - which surprisingly not something that I fancy.


But definitely wasn't my concern, I was pretty busy with my dish already.
And here it was..my fave dish!!



Second look..


Ah...so satisfied now.

Naughty Chef

It seemed that I had lots of free time two weeks ago since I managed to had lunch with another girlfriends. They suggested to had a bite at a small Viet joint at Wynard Station that they normally go for lunch.

I've actually passed this spot so many times at lunch time but never stepped my foot there. It always seemed to be busy so why not I give it a try eh?

The place was actually bigger than I thought. They had a seperate room for ordering/paying and the next room just for the dining room.

My friends ordered same dish, their usual - the beef pho..


And I felt like some lemongrass chicken with tomato rice.


To be honest, I can't really see myself going back to the place. Maybe I ate too much Viet food in Cabra so I found Viet food in City was not original or pretty much just ordinary. The lemongrass tasted like they've been using an instant sauce and the tomato rice was quite blend. But hey my friends seemed to enjoy their lunch so as always food is just about personal pereference :)

Sloanes Cafe

I find it hard to catch up with my friends these days, so I was thrilled when I heard that my bridesmaid chucked a sickie, I booked her for a brunch right away!

She hesitated at first, risking getting caught but I managed to lure her to go out with the potato wedges from Battuta that she likes but after a long walk around Paddo we just couldn't be bothered to walk back to TS.

Desperately looking for food we went to the second cafe that we saw (we were desperate but we still liked to see our options).

I picked this cafe since I've had the coffee there and it's quite nice but I've never tried their lunch menu. I'm not a big fan of sandwiches I find them very ordinary and boring (unless it's a special sandwich with grilled Turkish or sourdough bread with a special filling sealed with melted cheese of course) and unfortunately most cafes only serve sandwiches during lunch time. But on the menu the word pineapple caught my eyes and I decided to give this so called Hawaiian sandwich a go.

Sadly as predicted my sandwich was so ordinary..

In terms of presentation I think my friend's lunch looked more appealing but they went overboard with the melted cheese so really all I could taste was just the cheese.

I really liked the place with its cozy backyard seats but I think next time I will just stick with their coffees and cakes :)

Kelly's Bar and Grill

I'm quite picky with steak since I don't like it raw but when I ordered it medium it's normally really tough. There's only few places where I'm able to find a perfect steak - perfect in my definition of course.

If I could choose anywhere in the world to have steaks then I would choose to go to Takayama where Moco and I had the best beef we've ever had.

But in Sydney, Kelly's at Bondi Westfield would be my choice. I've been raving about the steak I had at Kelly's to Moco since we first dated actually but I just never got a chance to prove it to him until his birthday this year :)

I know the place is always busy even on the weekdays so I made a booking beforehand and requested a table near the window that had a view of the skyline.

But of course we had to get some appetizers before going to the steak.

Lovely fresh and warm brioche

Mixed entree platter with calamari rings, buffalos wings and boerewors*

In my mind I actually had a lil doubt since it was a long time ago when I had that perfect steak, what if it's only perfect in my memory?

Here it comes..

Kelly’s sensational eye fillet with a 3 peppercorn crust and extra king prawns

But thankfully they still got it, the steak might looked a bit small but it was still the perfect steak. It's perfectly medium with a full tenderness of high quality meat with an exquisite taste. The prawns were also beautifully marinated and superb! Oh and I love the onion rings too :)

The birthday boy ordered the scotch fillet with pork ribs on the side with extra mushroom sauce.

Opposite of me, Moco loves his steak medium rare. So first impression wasn't too good for him since he found his steak was just medium instead. But the manager took the steak back to the kitchen and got him a new steak :)

Steak round two!

We must have been really hungry when we ordered, didn't realize we got another side dish!

Mushroom with lemon and garlic

Well done Kelly! Great food, great service and great view. I've succesfully made Moco to admit it's a great place to have a steak :)

* boerewors: traditional South African pure beef farmers sausages with monkey business sauce (tangy BBQ sauce)

January Weddings

Three weddings in January, four actually if you counted the marriage registry of my cousin where Moco and I were the witnesses :)

I might jump ahead of time now but I thought it would be easier to put all the weddings together.

The first reception was back in the middle of January and was taken place at Baulkham Hills. Very intimate and beautiful venue. Moco and I always shared each other dish so we have no problem with the rotating menu.

The three courses meal were great although I found the appetizers were too cheesy - but that's me. I'm still building my way to like cheese more. The main dishes were also nice but I found the risotto in the spatchcock was too watery. As for the desserts, to be honest I found it too sweet, but again it's just me I'm quite picky with sweet stuff as well. I loved to dip the biscotti into the ice creams though - it's amazing :)

Pumpkin cannelloni with ricotta - love the fresh sweetness of the pumpkin

Cheese quiche - olive and rocket salad with special tomato sauce

Tender spathcock on the bed of risotto and green beans

Crispy salmon on the bed of the boiled potato and fresh veggies with creamy sauce

Sticky date pudding with caramel sauce and refreshing vanilla ice creams

Creme bulle and pistachio biscotti

The pretty wedding cake

The next wedding was exactly on the next day. This time we headed north to Newport function centre. The wedding had a beautiful water view :)

We had an Asian twist in the appetizer with the chicken and lemon grass which I liked so I let Moco finished the beef ravioli. The main dishes were quite standard wedding dishes, but I gotta say the chocolate dessert was one of the best desserts I've ever had!!

Beef ravioli with anti pasto sauce (I found the beef too tough though)

Lovely chicken and lemon grass salad so refreshing

Crispy Salmon on the bed of granny smith apple - interesting mix of the apple flavour

Beef steak on the bed of mashed potato, kinda looked like a black lump but the taste was not too bad..

Tiramisu which I found a bit too creamy for my liking :(

My highlight dish of the night - chocolate tart with poached cherry yum! :)

So finally we came to the last wedding in January which fell on the last weekend of January too. The reception was taken place at Conca D'oro in Inner west. It has a similar decor with Le Montage wedding venue (well since they are in the same group), I totally love it. I love candles decorations and I think it made the venue looks extra beautiful.

We had a quite long lists of appetizers just like what we had in Le Montage a while ago.

Italian wood fire rolls

And then the fried calamari and olives to be shared on the table



We also had two more appetizers!!


Moco always lucky whenever we had antipasto dish since I'm not a big fan of it =p

Here comes the main..


Long list of appetizers and long list of desserts too ;)

Creme bulle with the side of wedding cake and chocolate straw :)

Biscuit platter, nice mixture of turkish delight, Asian cookies and chocolate truffle but again were all too sweet for me!

But not too worry, the espresso came to balance it out :)


Moco and I - enjoying our meal :)

I think you're not supposed to have high expectations of wedding dishes since there will always be a challenge to cook so many dishes in such a short time.