Eat Like Ushi

58% rating? Very funny Dr. Jones! Maybe less comical for the restauranteurs than the little kid in Temple of Doom. Going through the Manuka options in the Entertainment Book even if the food isn't that good (let's be honest - in today's food climate around Australia you have to be of at least some reasonable standard to survive, especially with average ratings, unless your restaurant is a front for drug running etc.), a free main course made it an easy decision to test out.

Excuse the photos - it was a high glare day sitting next to the window.

- Chipotle Chicken Wings (mind boggling chicken wings served with citrus creme fraiche) - tasty crispy, not overly oily. Moderately tender chicken. Didn't seem to have much chipotle/chilli kick;
- special Summer Seafood Paella - not a bad collection of mussels, prawns, squid and fish. Rice was well cooked (not al dente if you prefer that) with what I assume was a chicken stock base;
- Confit Duck (five-spice salted duck legs, ginger & shallot relish, superior soy caramel, nori coated rice cakes, roast baby corn & black sesame bok choy) - really good collection of flavours and textures. Particularly the rice cakes with crispy nori salty coating and chewy vinegar rice. The duck wasn't bad either but could have been more tender.

Overall the food was good with reasonable prices. The Entertainment Book made it excellent value. I'll be back next EB year.

02-2015

I actually tried to have breakfast at Penny University however on a Sunday their kitchen doesn't open until 8am. Considering that would have only given me 10mins to eat, I wandered down the street at found Me & Mrs Jones serving food from 7:30am. Since leaving London, I haven't seen black pudding served anywhere. Fyshwick did have one in a vacuum seal once but I didn't buy it. Hence my surprise when I saw it on the breakfast menu here.

I enquired as to a chai latte and was informed it was a powder that contained "a lot of sugar". Doesn't sound enticing.

- Mixed Berry Smoothie - blended berries, milk and possibly a banana but with way too much honey. It was too sweet;
- The Irish (fried eggs with black pudding, smoked tomatoes and bois boudran on house made potato bread) - reasonable fried eggs, excellent externally-bought black pudding on bread that I couldn't really tell contained potato. What was disappointing was that one potato was undercooked and firm and the tomatoes were burn-smoked and horrible.

I wouldn't come back here for breakfast. If I did maybe the fresh options would be better.

Going through the Entertainment Book, the 64% rated Belluci's in Manuka wouldn't have been my first choice but I'm slowly running out of closeby options. I've often found I don't necessarily agree with low ratings that are often given for service and the 25% discount offered here seemed like as good a reason to try this place.

- Insalata Panzanella (fried sour dough, heirloom tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, green olives & roast peppers) - conveniently only a few days before, Jamie's 15min meals had shown me this salad for the first time. It tasted every bit as good as I had imagined whilst waiting Jamie;
- Tortellini all' Anatra (hand made duck parcels with mushrooms, asparagus, pistachio & smoked ricotta) - $30
- Galleto alla Diavola (grilled spatchcock with Calabrian spices, buttermilk slaw & hand cut potatoes) - $36

I must admit from the delicious fresh-tasting salad, to the rich heavy duck pasta and the spiced bird (which needed a little more salt/seasoning for my liking but was still good), that I actually like the food here. I do appreciate that the prices are extremely high for Italian - $30 pasta and $36 poultry. The most expensive Italian places I've eaten are Caffe E Cucina (Melbourne) which is a small step up in price and big in atmosphere, and The River Cafe (London) which is an enormous step up in price and reputation. Given this, it is difficult to justify Belluci's without the Entertainment Book discount.

Maybe it's just me, but I find it difficult to pay high prices for Italian generally (eg. never going to Grossi Fiorentino) unless they have decidedly high world reputation (eg. nearly ended up at Combal.Zero in Turin if it wasn't for the drenching rain).

Back in 2012 at Miami's Ultra Music Festival, Madonna took to the stage during Avicii's set. "How many people in this crowd have seen Molly?" Although she tried to cover her actions by explaining she was referring to the song, it was quite obvious she was talking about this place in Canberra but decided in the end the best course was to keep it hidden.

Molly is difficult to find to the point that the website only gives coordinates (-35° 16' 46.45" S - 149° 7' 35.23" E). To anyone I've ever seen stumbling around town or clubs all over the world looking for Molly, look up those coordinates on Google maps.

This place oozes cool. From the single wooden door with the light globe sitting above it and no sign, walking down the steps feels (what is probably) similar to entering an underground brothel - excitement, trepidation and wonder as to what you'll find around the corner. Luckily what greets you is a classic moodlit bar, the classiest dressing bartenders all skilled to design your cocktail, a piano (although I'm yet to see someone play it) and charcuterie cut to order.

I'm waiting to come on an evening when there is live music and that would complete the excellent experience.

My first trip to Rum Bar last August was the first night out of drinking I'd had in Canberra. Perhaps it was this euphoria and the nice selection of drinks (did not have any food that time) that drove my opinion of this place. In particular the sensational Hot Buttered Rum was a dessert drink of dreams - sweet, warm, soothing, satisfying - and I couldn't help but tell people about it.

When the Facebook page announced a new food menu and a 2-for-1 Tuesday special, there was no better reason to return. I was sad to find the Hot Buttered Rum was only a winter concoction and that they didn't have the equipment to recreate it that evening. Location along the foreshore is as good as it gets in Canberra, and the interior decor is much better than the opposition drinking places in the area.

The drinks on this occasion were much less exciting than previously - it may have been partly due to the high cost of these cocktails (as expected in any higher end bar) but also they seemed relatively weak with the pouring shot glasses not being adequately filled, but I'd recently been to Molly where prices are the same but the drink excitement is better.

- Mini lamb kebab (served with hummus, tabouli, yogurt & harissa)
- Spicy fried school prawns served with aioli
- Flank steak served with potato & horseradish foam, poached egg & potato crisps
- Cheese fondue with grilled seasonal vegetables
- Pork Belly with pumpkin, walnuts & ricotta salata
- Salted cod fish fingers, garlic cream, mint, peas & smoked beetroot
- Octopus with almond gazpacho, olives, compressed cucumber & tomatoes

The food itself was fine without being special. Pork Belly was particularly nice. Overall I think the food prices are quite high given the serving sizes if paying full price. On this evening it did seem to take a very long time to cook (ie. 30mins for the starter and another 30-60 for the remaining), but I assume that was due to one cook and lots of guests taking advantage of the 2-for-1.

I think I'd only come back under two circumstances - Tuesday for 2-for-1 food items with a side drink or in winter if the Hot Buttered Rum makes a return.

One of the things I enjoyed about living in Abbotsford was that after a string of night shifts, I could walk home down Gertrude Street and reward myself with an excellent breakfast at any one of the brilliant cafes - De Clieu, Arcadia, Birdman, takeaway bread from Fatto a Mano, Proud Mary (a short detour) or as close to home as it got at Three Bags Full.

Three Bags Full in particular won me over as all the places serve similarly good and priced food, but they particularly have the gingery chai latte (from Phoenix chai syrup) that slightly burns the throat and makes me feel alive. I haven't had that flavour anywhere else in the world in a chai. I recently discovered a reasonably close cafe along the Kingston foreshore that may soon replace my Melbourne equivalents. Local Press isn't close enough to be overly convenient, but I think it's better than the closer local option of Penny University.

Let's start with the chai - served in a teapot with a warmer jumper, steeped with whole spices and easily avoiding the sweet syrup crap taste that most places have. My only preference would be if it was served with a strainer to prevent floaties in the cup. But I can work around that if the drink is good. Local Press is (probably) alluding to the refreshing juices in jars and there are also smoothies with chia seeds and other super ingredients.

The food is beautifully presented and complements the waterside view (not the best but I'll take it) and general people watching:

- Green Breaky Plate (za'tar coated hard boiled eggs with kale & almonds, avo, asparagus, quinoa tabouleh, fetta & dill yoghurt with smoked salmon) - healthy combination of textures (various seeds & nuts, feta, quinoa, salmon, asparagus, yoghurt...) and flavours including an excellent kale which I don't normally think highly of.

I went back the next month for lunch (woke up too late for breakfast). The dishes are still vibrant and flavoursome and only mildly more expensive:

- Smoked Trout & Quinoa Patty (with green apple, fennel & radish slaw, coriander, candied walnuts, kiwi-yoghurt dressing & sriracha chilli sauce);
- Grasslands' Free-Range Rare Pesto Beef (on Italian-style salad with marinated bocconcini, basil & heirloom tomatoes).

There's plenty of options to try for next time.

03-2015

A late Sunday lunch on a sunny afternoon was as pleasant as can be. The people types ranged from young families with energetic kids, a small mob of Chinese uni students, some early-20s attractive females in tight gym gear and some older couples wearing sunnies.

- Kingfish Sashimi (with pickled ginger, wasabi peas, wasabi mayo, avocado, roasted black sesame, nori sheets & grapefruit) - as usual the vibrant presentation mixing colours and ingredients was matched by the flavours and 6-or-so textures. I have to admit for $24, 5 slices of kingfish seemed a little thrifty but they were excellent quality and complemented best by the small Hershey's shaped wasabi mayo (Kewpie perhaps?). Rocket and firm rice salad added additional elements and made the dish more filling.

This was washed down lovingly with the usual berry & chia seed smoothie. Then it was off to the the gym.

04-2015

Easter Sunday - busy considering it was a Sunday at the best cafe around Kingston and similarly quiet given it was Easter and many were out of town. There was luckily no wait for seats at the communal table, nor were there any shortage of bike shorts and lycra. The beards were less frequent than usual which was great.

Round 2 of chai was served in another cosy teapot with warmer. There are 2.5 cups for the $4.50 (+50c for soy) which makes it an incredible bargain, especially given it's the only drinkable chai I've come across in Canberra. There is a mild sweetness (which can be enhanced at the table by sugar, including coconut sugar ie. palm sugar), a touch of ginger (I'd prefer more but it's acceptable) and is satisfying.

Juice of the day was a pineapple, beetroot, ginger concoction.

- Green Breaky Plate (za'tar coated hard boiled eggs with kale & almonds, avo, asparagus, quinoa tabouleh, fetta & dill yoghurt with ocean trout);
- Green Pea Pancake (with poached eggs, macerated avo, corn salsa, fetta, chilli jam & mint garnish) - another presentation spectacle matched by textures (pea pancake with very mild intrinsic flavour, tomato/peas/corn, smoked salmon, fine feta) and an occasional unexpected chilli after-burn mixed with poached eggs and avocado.

Still my favourite local cafe.

The first time I went to Cupping Room the wait ended up being too long for my stomach to handle. It was an impromptu visit after arriving at the airport that resulted in the second visit in the early afternoon and an immediate seat. Our waitress was a lovely lady whose accent I'm still trying to place - an unusual European or South American perhaps? Maybe I'll ask next time.

The coffee is proudly Ona's and I'm told it's good. I like how the menu espouses the quality of their "local real chai infused with Bonsoy" and I intend to try it one day, as few places make chai lattes with soy which certainly complements the flavour much more than cow's milk. However the barrier to this on both occasions has been this - Dark Chocolate, Cherry & Coconut King Shake. Imagine a cherry ripe blended, chilled and topped with additional desiccated coconut. It is as brilliant as it sounds and a sure fire menu item on my future imaginary cafe.

- Ham Hock, Corn & Potato Fritters (with two poached eggs, 'cuppers hot sauce' & a cress & alfalfa salad);
- Cascara Cured Salmon (with horseradish cream, cress, rye & curroway crutons, pickled fennel, beetroot jelly & a poached egg);
- Asian Honey-Glazed Pork Ribs (with purple slaw & lime) - meaty chewy ribs (rather than bone-slipping) with a reasonable glaze;
- special I can't quite remember with crumbed fish, potatoes and vibrant pickled vegetables.

The food is good, the drinks are great. I'll be back for the King Shake and a side serving of food.

I've previously only eaten in Fyshwick (the real Fyshwick area not the Sunday market) once - it was a surprisingly excellent breakfast at Ona Coffee House. On this occasion I was in the area to grab some padlocks from Bunnings and thought it was a good opportunity to find a quick lunch.

Located conveniently directly across from Ona is Elaine's. It's essentially a small cafe that looks like a milk bar/fish 'n' chip shop. They advertise award winning pies and thankfully the judges knew what they were talking about.

On two occasions I've visited and sampled Pepper Shepherds, (award winning) Beef Stroganoff, the giant vegetable pastie and a sausage roll. The specialty pies (Shepherds or not) seem to have a varying thickness of mash potato on top, a delicious crispy melted cheese coating, and some soft pastry lining the sides. Fillings can be chunky or smooth beef with the relevant pepper, stroganoff or other flavours within. Equally good is the sausage roll with the smoothest mince filling that slides down the throat. Possibly even better compared with the typical competitors is the pastie with a thin crisp pastry enclosing small vegetable chunks held together by mash potato.

The quality is all there as is the flavours. Excellent for a quick meal or takeaway for later in a park or at work.

There's a trip to India planned! It's only been a month in the planning, but I'm enjoying spending my time reading about the delights of Delhi, Agra and Rajasthan. One of the difficult decisions I've been trying to make is to decide where the final dinner of the trip should be. There are two options on my table - Bikhara and Dum Pukht in Delhi. It seemed like I needed to test a few dishes of both types of cooking to see which would be more memorable. Of all the Canberra Indian restaurants, Bollywood Masala is the only one that seemed to have different types of these regional specialties on the menu. I assume there isn't much difference between the Kingston and Dickson restaurants and Kingston is much closer and probably quieter. 6 people went to dinner tonight, to try and give a broad opinion of which cuisine reigns supreme (*Iron Chef joke*).

Dum Pukht is known for Awadhi cuisine. Dum is a slow cooked method of steam cooking using a claypot, sealed with a flour dough, and cooked over and under charcoal low and slow. Dum Pukht is apparently reputed for perfect biryanis, murg kundan qaliya chicken curry and fine lamb kakori kebabs. The awards include San Pellegrino Asia #17 (2013, not featured in 2014), Golden Fork (1989). On this night, I was lucky they had a special biryani that allowed me to pit two-on-two dishes.

- Dum ka murg (from Lucknow in North India - a slow (dum) cooked chicken dish prepared in a cashewnut and yoghurt base) - chicken curry in mild yellow creamy sauce. Tasty but quite simple;
- Lucknavi biryani - mildly spiced and flavoured rice, this one served with goat. Much less impacting than the Pakistani biryani that changed my culinary life at Needoo in London.

Bukhara is supposedly the most famous Indian restaurant in the world with a menu that hasn't changed in 35 years. It specialises in north-west frontier cuisine and largely tandoor based. Sikandari raan (whole leg of lamb marinated for 24 hours in malt vinegar, cinnamon and black cumin and finished in the tandoor) and the dal makhani (black lentil daal) and laccha paratha. The awards include San Pellegrino Asia #26 (2013) and World #37 (2007) and Golden Fork (1991).

- Bollywood leg of lamb (an off-the-bone ‘melt in the mouth’ Mughlai style combination of marinated leg of lamb, pan-cooked in a thick yoghurt-based sauce with a touch of rum and finished with Bollywood special herbs and home-ground spices) - oddly small leg of lamb with soft juicy meat flaked off and surrounding the bone in a rich creamy sauce;
- Daal Bollywood (a slow cooked combination of black lentils and red kidney beans enriched with cream) - simple smoky flavoured lentils, but not as smoothly blended as somehow I had envisioned.

Other than the 4 above dishes, the meal needed extra food, accompaniments and drinks to complete the meal.

- Chooza khas makhni (butter chicken) - a favourite of one of the diners. Not overly rich or or heavily tomato based. Kind of different but not what I'm used;
- Achari baingan (a delicious spicy combination of eggplant cooked in special pickle achari spices) - really fantastic heavily flavoured almost meaty eggplant curry;
- Saffron rice - ghee, rice, saffron, simple basic;
- Garlic naan - soft chewy naan topped with aromatic garlic;
- Peshawari naan (stuffed with a mix of spices, dried fruit and nuts) - chewy sweet naan. Nice but probably I'd stick to simple and plain next time to go with curries;
- Chai (traditional Indian beverage of white tea infused with aromatic spices) - mildly spiced and served without any added sweetness. Half a sugar brings out the flavour more;
- Rose lassi - sadly lassi seems to be made with syrups making them much too sweet. I'd stick to chai, water or BYO wine.

The meal is satisfying although I think I prefer heavier and more savoury curry flavours generally. The votes between the 5 were - 2 for dum style, 2 for Bukhara style and 1 for butter chicken. Although not as enamoured as I hoped to be, I think the more complex Bukhara-style flavours were my preferred too. Dinner is booked - hopefully will be the best ever.

(http://eatlikeushi.posthaven.com/bukhara-delhi-01-2015)

Driving the 3 hours between Sydney and Canberra doesn't always lend itself to needing a break. However it's easy to add on an extra hour or so getting out of Sydney's central traffic, navigating the highways, accidentally going down tolls or stopping for groceries in Cabramatta (which often results in a pre-trip Vietnamese meal anyway). However if there is a desire for food or caffeine or toilet enroute, Goulburn probably represents the biggest place to stop in through.

After some quick online reading, I was actually hoping to get to The Roses Cafe - unfortunately they were closed for reasons unknown. Other cafes, Thai and Italian restaurants that were around didn't really appeal, so the second option on my list was Greengrocer.

This is actually a bike shop with a nice cafe area as well as some produce for sale too. There are bikes, bike shorts, some laptops and plenty of food around. The atmosphere is eclectic and quite nice. Food options include sandwiches, lots of salad options, some nice Greek meatballs and a solid list of gourmet pizzas. Everything is good without being spectacular, but easily satisfying for any reason you decide to stop by.

The state of Vietnamese food in Canberra is actually surprisingly decent. For example the closest pho I'm happy to visit is at Fyshwick market, with a broth good enough to make me happy, and much better than the best London has to offer. I've also heard good things about Griffith Vietnamese, but that will be for me to judge another time.

Pho Phu Quoc also has a great reputation and also helped along as I met the owner at work and she was a lovely person. There seemed no better reason to finally get around to trying this restaurant. I had heard the banh xeo was very impressive and it was with some disappointment that when I turned up for dinner, I learnt it was only available for lunch. Nonetheless there were enough other things to try:

- Green papaya salad - crispy, thin slivers of the pickled vegetables, some prawns and a good nuoc mam cham sauce;
- Chilli mussels - large delicious green-lip mussels with a garlic, soy, fish sauce dressing;
- Pepper fish in claypot - well textured fish chunks with savoury flavour;
- 3 colour drink - the che ba mau ended up consisting of 5 colours. I prefer the shaved ice to be a bit finer to aid in dissolving but at least it isn't ice chunks.

After not being able to try the banh xeo, a lunch meal occurred a couple of weeks later. Other than this, the other dish I had on my mind was bun thit nuong. Unfortuately the restaurant does not serve this, however they were able to create me a dish similar to this using a pork chop and also nem nuoung. It was great!

- noodle dish of unknown name (bun thit ...??)
- Sugarcane prawns - sweet chewy grilled sugar cane with a prawn cake that pulls off nicely to make a rice paper roll;
- Banh xeo - large and pretty using a particular recipe using coconut milk (which is not for everybody). It was good, but I liked the other dishes more such that I can see myself coming back for dinner.

I'm keen to try the pho (given the name of the restaurant) but would be quite content to order anything Vietnamese on the menu. I do find it a little unusual that they have some Chinese and Malaysian dishes - unusual because the Vietnamese food is very good and also there is Dickson Noodle House and other Chinese restaurants all very close by. In any case the Vietnamese is very good homestyle cooking and that is what I'm going back for.

07-2015

The restaurant has now officially moved out of the old premises to a new bigger place around the corner. It still has a friendly feel but it does seem a little less cosy and traditional than the old.

- Pho bo - finally tried the restaurant namesake dish. It was quite good, with the broth having a more medicinal flavour to it. It wasn't as strong and rich as the Fyshwick market Vietnamese bakery version, which still remains my choice in Canberra;
- Bo kho - the traditional breakfast beef stew had an excellent rich flavour that went very well with rice. The beef was a bit too overly fatty meaning there wasn't much meat to enjoy. But what was there was good.

I probably wouldn't order either of those dishes again. It's more that I prefer the dishes I've had there previously instead.