July 4th, 2009 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 4 Comments »
I remember once being served Okonomiyaki by a waitress named ‘Sushi Susan’ – the Japanese pancake came accompanied by a small ‘pirate ship’ full of food. Around the table, we sliced up and shared the portions as a giant papier-mache squid hung above, like a marine chandelier. Even if this hadn’t taken place in an […]
May 6th, 2009 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »
Jazushi has been on my “meaning-to-try” list for so long now. It’s gotten to the point where people are getting married, having babies and growing impressive years-in-the-making beards and I still haven’t achieved the simple goal of going to the actual restaurant. My friend Rach doesn’t have a Rip Van Winkle beard but she IS […]
January 15th, 2009 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
If the name isn’t already a red (white-and-blue) flag, then the Brie and Tomato Croissants and Savoury Crepe Rolls will clue you in. St Germain Patisserie may be on a Redfern street corner, but its picnic-ready display will whisk you to a small patch in Paris’ Sixth Arrondissement. The Riviera Raspberry and Lemon Mousse Cake, […]
January 9th, 2009 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »
In one big broom-sweep, I’ve found all these blog-dust-bunnies that have been lurking in my “Draft” folder over the last year. So I decided to wipe them clean and give them an airing. In the same way stores go crazy around Dec/January – purging their storerooms and piling their shopfronts high with price-slashed items – […]
November 10th, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
It’s nice to have a place that you can think of as a lunchtime lifeline. The kind that’s worth the extra walking distance, worth blanking out the convenient eateries more closely located, worth becoming momentarily amnesiac over how much you really should be spending on a workday meal. The kind that jacks up the rest […]
October 6th, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | Leave A Comment »
There was a point where you couldn’t go to Cafe Giulia in Surry Hills without bumping into five other people you knew. It was like the Peach Pit. All this social colliding made sense – Giulia was a good breakfast-meet-up-magnet and slurping away on their brightly-coloured fruit frappes was a fine way to revitalise your […]
September 2nd, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
Eating birthday cake is nice, but having four-course dessert ($35) is taking it to the next candle-blowing level. With Bentley restaurant in Surry Hills offering a quadruple-scoop of such sweets on their menu, that’s how we ended up celebrating Will’s birthday. First, we got the support-act savoury dishes out of the way – nibbling small […]
August 27th, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 15 Comments »
If you had to graph our reaction to Sparkle Cupcakery in Surry Hills, our initial response was all off-the-chart spikes. On a less mathematical note, I might even admit to some jumping and down and perhaps the odd (totally undignified) yelp. After all, the display was crammed with colour-coded cupcakes and vivid ingredients listings to […]
July 18th, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 6 Comments »
When Mark from China Heights gallery claimed Cafe Ish as one of his favourites on my list blog, that’s when the place first tripped off my worth-registering-in-brain mechanism. I did a bit more online sleuthing and discovered it was a cafe that specialised in Australian food with a Japanese twist (!) and it flaunted an […]
June 14th, 2008 | by Lee Tran Lam | published in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »
Sadly, I’m not one of those bright, perky people who gets all hopped up about leaving the house at 6AM to “make the most of the morning”. I’m a sleepaholic, so am always pushing my luck being bedsnug for as long as possible. The only thing that can break me out of this pillowy trance […]