Pasta Kitchen - Sunnybank Plaza

With the withdrawal of active management of Zomato Australia, my go to source for exciting new openings has also been lost. Other than relying on sponsored media sites which are often only limited to flashy big openings, I have had to resort to small social media groups to find out where the smaller and more niche openings were. This has lead me to the recent opening of Pasta Kitchen at Sunnybank Plaza in the food court.

As someone who really misses travelling Japan, one of the foods I miss most is Japanese style pasta. It is more than just Italian pasta as it often incorporates a lot of Japanese elements to the dish. I was really keen for this and the prices are very reasonable.

As the signature dish of all Japanese Italian Pasta places, I could not avoid ordering the Mentaiko Pasta. Mentaiko is a cod roe and it was deliciously savoury and umami with a texture that you would expect from cod roe. The topping was adequate for the pasta and there was a very generous serve of pasta in creamy white sauce. The texture of the pasta was spot on, softer than al dente without being too soft. I really liked it. 

Our second pasta was the Salmon and Prawn pasta. It was similar to the Mentaiko in the sense that it had a savoury seafood taste to it, but rather than umami, it had a deep smokey salmon taste which I really enjoyed. Again the toppings were generous and the pasta was creamy but not overbearingly decadent. It made for an all round wholesome meal and good value for money.

 

What made it better value was the complementary desserts that we received as part of their opening promotion. I had the Matcha and Banana Mousse whilst Dr L had the Peach Cheesecake. Both were generously sized, fragrant and fruity, they were also not too sweet and rounded off our meal really well. I would definitely recommend coming back, if anything for the Mentaiko pasta whilst we still can't go to Japan.

Price Range: $10 - $20pp

Taste: 8/10

Value: 9/10

Service: 8/10

Environment: 5/10

Happy Crab - Brisbane CBD

Had dinner with Iron Fist the other week. He had mentioned to me earlier on how Brisbane was lacking in a good option for seafood boil. Timing couldn't have been any better, as I was looking for a companion to dine with me at Happy Crab which had recently opened in the city, as Dr L refuses to eat anything that has shells or bones (without someone deshelling for him). So we made a reservation and went after work.

Turns out a reservation was entirely unnecessary as the city has been a ghost town since the start of the year. We had the only table in the restaurant and was outnumbered by the staff. Despite the abundance of staff, we were provided a menu via Ipad, which we also ordered on.

 

Despite seafood boil being an American cuisine, the menu definitely had a Japanese twist to it, which is why I had a glass of umeshu whilst Iron Fist had his margarita. I didn't find the umeshu to be overly strong, which is probably for the best after drinking too much over the holidays.

The friendly waitress recommended a side of cheesy garlic bread to mop up the sauces that came with our seafood boil. I'm not sure I know anyone who doesn't enjoy garlic bread, and so we ordered a serve. It came out considerably before the seafood, which put us in a bit of an awkward position in deciding whether to eat it whilst the cheese was melty or wait for the seafood to come. We ended up eating half first and was glad for having done so, the melty cheese was delicious and coupled with the fragrance of garlic and softness of the bread, it was fantastic.

 

Shortly after, our seafood boil came. We opted for a DIY bucket to decide on what we wanted, getting snow crab, prawns and moreton bay bug with garlic sauce, potato and corn. The sauce was very more-ish and I couldn't help but think that it would have gone down wonderfully with a bowl of rice. It could only have been better if it had a little bit of spice. The bug was fresh and the meat was firm, as were the prawns. We didn't enjoy the snow crab as much as we thought we would as the shell was neither firm nor soft but rather a bit rubbery, making it hard to break open and even then, there wasn't too much meat to enjoy. We also liked the corn and potato that it came with as it went well with the sauce. Overall it was a unique experience, the price was reasonable for what we had and I'd be keen to come back to try their other seafood offerings.

Price Range: $70 - $90pp

Taste: 7.5/10

Value:

Service:

Environment:

Milki Dessert - Sunnybank

You might not believe me when I say that sometimes I finish dinner with no solid intentions of having dessert, but sometimes this is the case. Last week I went to a birthday party of a good friend and we had already enjoyed a cake prior to dinner at Hana Zushi but when we saw a crowd outside of Milki Desserts that only got bigger and bigger as our meal progressed, we made our mind up to try some, despite how full we were.

Milki is a drinks and desserts store with a focus on soft serve which has flavours on rotation, parfaits comprising of said soft serve, bubble tea and waffles. I would have been keen on trying more if I wasn't so full that evening.

Service was fast, they prepared our soft serve right after ordering and we had it within the minute of paying. Dr L had a Biscoff soft serve, it was not too sweet and came with a light touch of the signature caramel taste. He enjoyed it but didn't find it all that special compared to other ice cream.

I had the Matcha soft serve. The flavour was a bit lighter than the colour would suggest. Again this wasn't too sweet, which I quite liked. I also like how it it came with a complimentary crispy waffle. Compared to say McDonalds soft serve, the texture of this was not as creamy and a little bit more icy. I would agree that I enjoyed the flavours and the pricing is reasonable, but by way of comparing to  alternative options nearby, I don't think Milki particularly stands out.

Price Range: Less than $10pp

Taste: 7/10

Value: 8/10

Service: 8/10

Environment: 7/10

Brooklyn Donut & Coffee Co - Garden City

After dessert always comes after dinner. Walking around Garden City, it's hard to walk past all the doughnuts without cravings. With that in mind, I really couldn't resist getting some from Brooklyn Donut & Coffee to go.

Despite it being fairly late in the evening, they still had quite a large selection of donuts to go. Service was fast, even though I was quite slow in deciding what to get. 

Both of them went home with us in a cozy paper box. Luckily none of the icing came off on the way home. 

Dr L had the Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter. Lucily for him it wasn't too sweet, the dark chocolate was nice and bitter whilst the peanut butter had a nice saltiness to it. The doughnut itself was quite dense and heavy, he enjoyed it.

Not being able to decide what to get, I stuck with the Original Glazed. It didn't fare as well as the chocolate one but the glaze was still fairly in tact. I found it to be quite sweet and heavy, with a far more bread-like texture than the light fluffiness I've been used to at Mister Donut or Krispy Kreme and it wasn't really my cup of tea. I wouldn't be opposed to trying their other donuts next time I'm in the area though. 

Price Range: Under $10pp

Taste: 6/10

Value: 7/10

Service: 8/10

Environment: 7/10

Gongcha - Garden City

 

Was keen on grabbing a soft serve at Tsuki Patisserie whilst I was at Garden City, but it turns out that they actually close at 5.30pm, meaning that we had to pivot on the spot. Sticking with the tried and true, we saw the long line up outside of Gong Cha at 8 Street and joined at the end.

Between stores, their menu remains consistent, as does their efficiency in preparing drinks. Although the menu was the same, I decided to try something new (for a change). Given the length of the queue, it took a little while for our beverages to be made.

He had an earl grey with three jelly, I had asked for no sugar and standard ice. Compared to other places the which we have had drinks with no ice, this was served a lot warmer than I would have liked and it wasn't chilled. Wanting to try something new, I had a grapefruit green tea with strawberry popping pearls. Turns out the pearls didn't pop and they were quite firm with a significant artificial strawberry flavour. The tea itself was quite fruity but even with little sugar, it tasted very sweet. I think next time I'll just stick to my usual.

Price Range: Under $10pp

Taste: 5/10

Value: 7/10

Service: 7/10

Environment: 7/10 

New Shanghai - Garden City

Since the new year, I have been working from home. Without being able to go into the office every day, I really haven't been able to eat out much. If left to my own laziness, I'd probably spend every day eating at home rather than out. Having said that, Dr L and I decided it would be best to keep everything fresh and make the effort to go out at least once a week to get some fresh air and also enjoy some foods which I am unable to make at home. This week we decided to hit up New Shanghai which opened last year at Garden City.

Despite the alleged hospitality downturn, I made a reservation nonetheless. It was lucky I did as the fairly large restaurant was almost full. We were quickly ushered to our table and given some water. Like their Queens Plaza store, the setup was dark and moody which is enjoyable but not particularly good for photos. 

The menu was extensive, with a huge variety of dumplings, rice, noodles, mains and sides. What was interesting was that despite their paper menu, they had an online ordering system, but the app didn't take payment which was still processed after the meal. In the words of Dr L, this is the most efficient means of reducing wait staff (from taking customer orders) but also not being gauged a surcharge by the payment systems. I guess I can appreciate this. What I didn't really appreciate was the huge number of dishes which were not available, presumably because of supply chain issues, but we can only make do with what we can.

 

Friends would know that I am extremely critical of xiaolongbao. I have in mind an idea of what the perfect soup dumpling is and sadly almost all of the Brisbane options fall short. Alas, I haven't been able to travel interstate to at least hit up DinTaiFung in Sydney for over two years. Although this doesn't really compare, at least I could see that every dumpling was hand made, rather than the depressing machine made type. The skin was thicker than I would have liked, not all that tender or elastic, leaning towards the harder end. The meat was flavoursome at least but there was a minimal amount of soup (if any). Although disappointing, I have to admit that within the small market that is Brisbane, this is already one of the better ones.

Turns out one of the hardest things to make at home is a proper braised beef noodle. Always scared away by the amount of herbs I'd have to gather, I have often had cravings but shied away from making an attempt. We ordered a serve to share that evening. Portion wise was a little smaller than I had thought it would be, especially given the price was a little higher than their competitors. The taste was pretty fantastic though with noodles of moderate softness, a generous amount of beef (given the noodles), a deep and rich soup along with some fresh greens. If it was bigger, I would definitely come back for this bowl of noodles alone.

I am a huge fan of pan fried pork buns. Compared to XiaoLongBao, I find that Chinese restaurants in Brisbane seem to execute them quite well. Unfortunately for me, New Shanghai only offered pan fried pork buns in serves of eight, which is far more than Dr L and I could eat alone if we wanted to try other dishes. The only fried buns on the menu for a reduced portion was the pork and shepherds purse pan fried bun, which is what we ordered. I was actually surprised at how poor the buns were. Although they had a crispy base, my enjoyment largely ended there. The bun itself was thin but also dense, as if they hadn't allowed the pastry to rise. The filling was dense and not too flavoursome and also there was no soup whatsoever in the bun. Very disappointing, especially given the proximity of Taste Gallery nearby

Our last dish was a favourite of ours, the mini pork wanton short soup. This was executed fairly well with a delicious silky smooth skin, flavoursome filling and a wholesome broth. Next time I'll definitely have to come back for this and skip out on the Xiaolongbao and pan fried dumplings as the dishes seem to be really hit and miss.

Price Range: $15 - $25pp

Taste: 6/10

Value: 7/10

Service: 7/10

Environment: 7/10

Kurtosh - West End

Whilst enjoying my ice cream at Anita, I couldn't help but note the bright lights at Kurtosh, signalling that it was still open. Intrigued at the notion of a bakery being open at 8.30pm, I ambled over to take a look.

Their assortment of croissants and pastries really caught my eye. Despite the late hour, there were still quite a few options and I grabbed two items for breakfast the next day.

Other than pastries, they also specialise in slab cakes which you can purchase by the 100g serving. Being already quite full that evening, I made a note to come back at a later date to try out that tiramisu.

Not wanting to stick with the usual Pain au Chocolat, I got a Chocolate Twist for Dr L. He liked it, especially the sprinkling of chocolate chips between the flakey layers of pastry, but found it to be very similar to pain au chocolat. It was a bit oilier than the usual though, with the paper bag being soaked through overnight.

 I started my day with a plain croissant. This wasn't as big and fluffy as it's nearby competitors, but it wasn't dense, albeit a bit oily. The layers had substance and it had a nice sweet maple glaze on it. Not the best but definitely a really good breakfast. I'll have to come back for more pastries and some of their cake.

Price Range: Under $10pp

Taste: 6.5/10

Value: 7/10

Service: 8/10

Environment: 8/10