Shanghai Tang

As part of my never ending quest for the perfect Xiao Long Bao (Shanghai style "soup dumplings"), tonight we visited Shanghai Tang at 653 George St. We had heard about it from a few friends, and when it got reviewed in TimeOut we decided we better not wait any longer.

It's a small place, at the intersection of Campbell and George up a small flight of stairs. There are black wood tables spread around a somewhat disorganized space, but it feels light and airy and clean. We sat down and quickly looked over the menus, excited by the prospect of good, inexpensive, authentic shanghai style food. We settled on some old favorites in order to judge the place. We got Xiao long bao, of course, and some dan dan mein (tan tan mian) with hot tea. Given that this is a place that bills itself as shanghai style, and that it's in Chinatown, we had high hopes.

The dan dan mein arrived first, and while Shanghai Tang apparently offers hand pulled noodles, these were not. It also seemed more like a soup than I was expecting, but it had some nicely unidentifiable bits of brown meat on top, and lots of sesame, bean sprouts, and scallions. Just as we were considering starting on this however, the xiao long bao arrived and we decided to try them first.

The reigning champion for xiao long bao in Sydney is the venerable Din Tai Fung, a well known Taiwanese chain. They make good xiao long bao, consistently serving hundreds of them a day. But Din Tai Fung is often very crowded, especially at dinner time, and we were hoping for something with great xiao long bao and no wait.

Auspiciously these looked plump and juicy and were served piping hot. The traditional fresh ginger accompaniment was provided, although the amount of ginger was somewhat ... parsimonious. We added black vinegar and tried them out. They were great! Succulent and flavorful, rich meaty broth, tender pork, skins that were thin yet elastic. At last another source for great Xiao Long Bao. We quickly ate all eight.

That settled we moved on to the dan dan mein. Strictly speaking this is a Sichuan dish, not really Shanghainese, but Shanghai Tang also bills itself as a noodle place, and dan dan mein is universal street food. This was good, nicely spicy with flavorful beef and pork (purists would insist on pork only) there were some odd additions - mung bean sprouts and coriander leaves - though I thought they were tasty. I did notice some preserved vegetables but not as much as I would like, and this was a version with sesame paste (again, purists would cavil.) It was a tasty dish, and certainly spicier and more "interesting" flavors than you'd find in a typical westernized chinese place. Another winner, though not as spectacular as the xiao long bao.

Finally we tried something new. Shanghai Tang has two "dessert" xiao long bao on the menu. One filled with sweetened black sesame paste, the other billed as "egg and milk." We decided to try the black sesame and were delighted with the result. Piping hot, sweet nutty liquid inside a thin elastic skin. Perfect with the tea.

We visited again yesterday and tried a few more things, the Crab Meat Xiao Long bao, braised pork spare ribs in sweet and sour sauce, drunken pig knuckle, scallion cakes, and the other "dessert" xiao long bao called "milk and egg."

We started with the braised pork spare ribs in sweet and sour sauce. I found it disappointing. The meat was dry, chewy, and almost flavorless while the sauce was thin and two dimensional, mostly sweet and a little sour but none of the richness or depth I had hoped for.

Next we had the "Shanghai Xiao Long Bao with Crab Meat" - the specialty of the house. We'd seen other diners ordering it the last time we'd gone, and while we were there this time another two tables ordered it as well. So It's obviously popular, and now I know why. The filling is still mostly pork, but the meat and broth are flavored with crab meat. I suspect it's local mud crab which, despite the name, are quite delicious. Again the skins were nice and thin but still elastic. Not too thick and neither gummy or soggy.

We were still hungry and didn't think that dessert was going to be enough, so we ordered a couple of other dishes we had wanted to try. I had seen them preparing the scallion cakes on the previous visit, and wanted good scallion cakes to erase the memory of the ones we'd had at Shanghai Night in Ashfield. I also wanted to try the drunken pig knuckle since it was pork and held out the promise of being a little challenging.

The scallion cakes were everything I could have hoped for. Crispy, flaky rounds not too oily and with enough scallion flavor to earn the name. Exactly what we wanted. The drunken pig knuckles were also excellent, but in a different way. Cooked in rice wine and served cold, they had lovely textures. Silken smooth gelatinous skin, slightly crunchy, firm and chewy cartilage all with lovely meaty pork flavors. A nice contrast with all the hot liquidy smooth textures of the other foods.

Finally we had the "milk and egg xiao long bao." It was indeed sweet, milky, and eggy with strands of coconut as well. Hot sweet milky custard fills your mouth as you bite into them, then you have sweet coconut with supple dumpling skin after. Nicely satisfying and just what we expected, but personally I liked the black sesame more.

The first time the total came to $30 for the two of us, the second time was $40 both of which are quite reasonable. They are licensed for alcohol though we only had tea or milk. We will be back, there are a lot more things on the menu we want to try. I, for one, will be ordering the xiao long bao every time I visit.

Shanghai Tang

653 George St

Sydney, NSW

02 9281 0088

Moroccan lamb

Tonight I needed to figure out what to do with two lamb backstraps. Poor me. So I marinated them with some cumin seed, coarsely chopped garlic, cracked black pepper, grated onion, chopped coriander leaf (cilantro), chopped parsely, some diced preserved lemons and a bit of olive oil.

Grilled them still in the marindade under a hot broiler and served them over lemon parmesan risone. Yum!

Quick Breakfast

A slight departure from my normal photos and restaurants. This morning had a lovely breakfast of steamed brown rice with an egg cracked over it. So far, so mundane. What made it special is that I was inspired to make a little sauce of chili garlic sauce mixed with kaya and sesame oil. Kaya is a Malaysian coconut "jam" that's basically sugar and coconut milk cooked down till it make a thick paste. Think "coconut dulce de leche" if it helps.

Anyway, spicy, garlicky, sweet, coconutty and just a bit of aromatic sesame. Yum!

Shanghai Night

Debbie had been trying to get us to Shanghai Night restaurant in Ashfield for a while. Saturday night we were out running around in the city with our friend Patti and around dinner time were looking for a place to eat, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity.

I'm on a quest to find the best Xiao Long Bao (aka Shanghai Soup Dumplings) in Sydney. We've tried a few places already, including Din Tai Fung and Golden Century, but I'm always on the lookout for new ones to try. Since Shanghai Night is billed as both Shanghai cuisine and snack food and it was highly recommended it seemed like a perfect opportunity.

We decided that with three of us a cab would be cost effective, so off we went. Ashfield is a new part of town for us, and the ride down Paramatta Road was fun. Eventually we were driving through an area full of Chinese restaurants and soon enough arrived. From the outside the place is completely unremarkable, plain and not particularly inviting. Inside though - it's the same. Plain Formica tables, generic chairs, no particular ornamentation or decoration, completely unremarkable except for the fact that it was packed.

We had heard that the scallion pancakes were good, so we ordered those, Xiao Long Bao, some fried garlic, chive, pork dumplings, and a mixed seafood noodle dish. The food arrived quickly each dish as it was ready, first the noodles, then the Xiao Long Bao, the fried dumplings, and finally the scallion pancake.

The mixed seafood noodles were good if not really remarkable. A few prawns, a few scallops, some nice tender bits of fish, some fish cake, baby corn, and fried wide rice noodles. The year we spent in Bangalore, Debbie tried repeatedly to get fried wide rice noodles in Chinese restaurants to no avail, but here? No problem, she was happy. I thought the dish was slightly bland, so I jazzed it up a little with light soy and tiny bit of black vinegar. Later I asked for chili paste which really improved it.

The Xiao Long Bao were a bit of a disappointment. The skins were a little thick, and most of the dumplings the soup had leaked out. The ones that did still have soup were good, nice savory soup and tender pork. Despite not being perfect they still disappeared quickly. The fried garlic, chive, pork dumplings were exactly what I expected. Very garlicky, nice crunchy texture, rich pork filling - what's  not to like?

The scallion pancakes on the other hand were a surprise. Perhaps it's the difference between Shanghai style and Cantonese style, but instead of being thin and flaky it was thicker and chewier. It felt more like a fried flattened bread dough, which is fine - we love fried dough - but it was different from what I had imagined.

Finally we ordered a couple of desserts, a red bean paste pancake and a sesame crusted fried glutinous rice. I'm not usually a fan of red bean paste desserts, but this one was tasty, and the glutinous rice with sesame was fun, lots of nice toasty crisp sesame flavors around a sweet chewy sticky rice center.

The price was right too, around $30 for all of us for dinner. If we lived in the neighborhood I'm sure we'd visit regularly, but it didn't impress us so much that we'll be making an effort to go to Ashfield just for the opportunity to eat here.

Shanghai Night

275 Liverpool Rd
Ashfield NSW 2131
Phone (02) 9798 8437

Oscillate Wildly

Oscillate Wildly is a "trendy" restaurant in Newtown with a reputation for good imaginative food. We've been wanting to try it for a while, but it can be difficult to get bookings. We had heard that they had changed chefs so were curious to see if they were still as great as we had heard. Last Tuesday we had a friend in town and it turned out they had an opening that evening! So off we went.

There is one fixed menu for the evening at AU$95 per person. They're fully licensed now, but thinking they were still BYO we took a nice Rippon Pinot. We were seated at the back of the dining room, near the kitchen. I joked that we had gotten "the chef's table" but was actually pleased as it gave me a chance to watch the kitchen. It's a smallish place, looks like it seats around 20 and they do one seating per night. It's pretty dark, so taking photos was a challenge.

They brought a nice warm crusty malty bread to the table, opened the wine and explained the menu to us. The first dish was an unusual nut based dish, consisting of walnuts, new crop chestnut puree, honey, and a sugar glass. The textures of the walnuts and chestnuts contrasted nicely, I 

think the walnuts may have been blanched to reduce their brittleness, and the sweet honey balanced the savory chestnuts nicely. A promising start.

Next was a tuna sashimi with lightly vinegared cucumber, a wasabi cream garnished with pomelo. Obviously intending to evoke a Japanese sashimi course, the classic combination of flavors worked well and the pomelo added a nice brightness. Tasty and comforting if not sparklingly innovative. The baby shiso leaf on top added a nice color contrast and continued the classic sashimi theme.

Next up were potato gnocchi, with toasted pepitas (pumpkin seeds) dressed with a coffee foam and espresso grains. The gnocchi were nicely executed, soft with delicate potato flavors, the pepitas were excellent. I love toasted pumpkin and these were crispy with good roast flavors, an excellent texture and flavor contrast to the gnocchi. The coffee foam and espresso grains were an interesting idea, but I think the flavors were too close to the pepitas flavors to really work.

This was followed by a fish dish of whiting on a bed of sweetcorn puree, and squid ink pasta with a light citrus foam. The whiting was beautiful, delicate and tender, the rich squid ink pasta and toasty corn flavors all worked well together. This was one of my favorite dishes of the evening. It's easy to over work whiting, but here it was left alone to great effect.

 

Next was a poultry course, a sous-vide chicken breast over puffed grains and celeriac. Another winner, with the sous-vide preparation resulting in a soft tender chicken contrasting nicely with the crispy crunchy grains, which included a puffed wild rice that I thought worked particularly well. Too many places use sous-vide for it's own sake, not putting a lot of thought into how to integrate it into a dish or a meal. I thought this combination worked. Technically the attention to detail was gratifying with the skin wrapped around the rolled breast, browned, and garnished with crunchy salt.

The next dish, venison with chocolate mille-feuille and beetroot, was also prepared sous-vide, but I was not as impressed. I found my venison to be slightly tough with a few strings still in it, which is a serious defect in a sous-vide. At least part of the point to sous-vide is to create something silken soft and smooth, fully cooked but without overheating or damaging subtle flavors. I was also slightly unhappy with the mille-feuille in that it tasted like it might have been sitting out for a little longer than was good for it. Never the less, the flavors worked well together and the crispiness of the mille-feille provided a nice foil for the softness of the venison. This dish was all about deep earthy flavors, and the beetroot rounded that out while providing a nice sweeter note.

This was followed by a lighter palate cleansing fruit course of watermelon, coconut jelly, and candied palm seed. This was a visually stunning presentation with layers of watermelon sitting on a bed of clear coconut jelly, topped with a nugget of candied palm seed, all presented in a crystal clear double walled glass. The flavors were light and refreshing, and recalled Indian or Indonesian desserts. The rich fresh coconut, nutty palm, and fresh fruity melon flavors worked well together, as did the textures of silky coconut, slightly chewy palm, and crisp melon. I ate every morsel.

The more traditional dessert course followed. We had chocolate ganache over poached pear, garnished with chocolate crisps and topped with a celery sorbet. Yes, celery sorbet. I liked it, it reminded me a little bit of that classic New York drink, Dr Brown's Cel-Ray Tonic, though I'm not sure I agree with pairing it with chocolate and pear. The chocolate and pear combination however was strong enough to carry the dish, especially as the chocolate was excellent, including chocolate nibs in the ganache. The inclusion of basil seeds provided a nice visual contrast, and the basil flavors did work well with the celery. An interesting dish and tasty though perhaps too clever for its own good.

Finally we had petits-fours. I'm always interested to see what restaurants do with their petits-fours, they often save their best wit and humor for last. Oscillate Wildly was no exception. The petits fours consisted of three floral lollipops, and three cubes of blood orange jelly, similar to lokum, topped with effervescent hard candy. The lollipops were very fragrant and delicate, which is tricky to do with hard candy, but the effervescent hard candy made me laugh out loud. It was similar to "pop rocks" but with smaller more "fizzy" bubbles. Much fun.

Overall we had a very enjoyable evening, the food was fun, interesting, and well prepared. However I think they were trying too hard to be clever. The dishes were clever, and showed off some impressive mastery of technique, but ultimately I didn't get a feeling of passion for the food or for what they were doing, and it ended up feeling a bit hollow. So - fun to try once, but I don't think we'll be regulars.

Oscillate Wildly
275 Australia St
Newtown NSW 2042
Phone (02) 9517 4700

Azuma

I've been looking for good Japanese food in Sydney for a while. Friends of ours had recommended Sakana-Ya in Crows Nest, and indeed it was good, and of course there's the excellent Tetsuya's Restaurant, but Tetsuya's isn't exactly what I would consider a traditional Japanese restaurant.

We had heard that Tetsuya had a restaurant he liked to relax at, Azuma Restaurant by Kimitaka Azuma. When Azuma opened a new kushiyaki restaurant near Town Hall, that provided the impetus we needed to try them out. We first visited the new place, Kushiyaki Azuma located on the ground floor of Regent Place Shopping at 501 George Street in Sydney.

Kushiyaki or "skewer grilled" food, is often called yakitori or "grilled chicken" after one of the most popular kinds of kushiyaki. Kushiyaki Azuma serves a selection of kushiyaki, but in addition they serve otsumami, a "snack" or "tidbit" - small dishes traditionally served with alcohol.

We ordered a few traditional kushiyaki, one of my favorites - beef tongue, some otsumami including squid shiokara which is squid in salty fermented squid innards, some abalone braised in sake, and a sake sampler.

Kushiyaki Azuma has a nice sake list, with some daiginjo and ginjo by the glass as well as a larger selection by the bottle. We tried a flight of four - Toyo Bijin, Suishin, Raku, and Garyubai. I've had the suishin before and find it a fine slightly light bodied sake. The Garyubai was billed as being aromatic and pungent, I had hoped for something reminiscent of Kakunko but the Garyubai is a slightly more balanced Shizuoka style sake. Very satisfying, we ordered a carafe of it after the sake flight.

The kushiyaki were all excellent, my only complaint would be that they don't have a wider selection! I want more dammit! The abalone was beautifully prepared, soft as butter but with all the delicious abalone flavors, served back in an abalone shell.  Highly recommended, we've been back already and will be back again.

Azuma's flagship restaurant, is on level 1 in Chifley Plaza - 2 Chifley Square at the corner of Phillip and Hunter Streets in the heart of the CBD. It's a lot fancier, more expensive, and harder to get in to (bookings recommended) so our expectations were correspondingly higher.

We talked a bit about the menu and what we should do. On the one hand there were a lot of interesting dishes, and we had a pretty good idea of what we were looking for. On the other hand, in a restaurant where we've established a relationship with the chef, we almost always order omakase or "we trust you" style - which is to say we let the chef decide. In a new restaurant that's tricky - you have no idea what their style is, and they have no idea what your preferences are. However, Azuma had a pre-set omakase that they also called a "degustation" and we decided to try that.

The amuse-bouche was raw oyster and ikura or salmon roe in ponzu, and three different flavor "sheets" with a dipping sauce. The oyster was excellent, briny and set off nicely by the ikura. I didn't realize at first that the sheets were intended to be dipped, and instead ate them by themselves. They reminded me a little of shojin-ryori or Buddhist vegetarian temple style cooking, each of the three sheets seeming to be an agar base with a subtle flavoring in it.

Next was a grilled fish served with a goma-ae "sesame dressing" side of what I believe was broccoli rabe. The fish was tender and moist and well prepared, but the fried accompaniment had been let to sit too long in my opinion. The goma-ae on the other hand was excellent. Tasty dressing, and the use of broccoli rabe was a nice touch instead of the more traditional blanched spinach.

The sashimi was a straightforward tuna and salmon combination. It was fine sashimi but pretty pedestrian. I had hoped for something a little more interesting or creative. Next up was "Azuma's Unique Sushi" which were nigiri composed of seared or tataki style fish. Good, but from the build up I had expected something more unusual.

Next was chawan-mushi or "tea bowl steamed" egg. This is a traditional dish of a steamed savoury egg custard usually with seafood and a ginko nut. Azuma's was made with with Prawn, Scallop and Shiitake mushroom, and the scallop was particularly excellent. Tender and sweet not tough at all -all it would have taken was leaving the dish to sit a few seconds too long - very satisfying.

After that came an assortment of tempura. Tempura is one of those iconic japanese dishes that every restaurant is expected to do. Bad restaurants make a heavy or greasy tempura, while a great restaurant will serve tempura that is as light as a cloud, delicate and crispy. I'm sorry to say that Azuma's tempura while entirely adequate did not rise above the ordinary.

I had some reservations when I saw that the degustation included a wagyu steak course. I don't know if it was because I was getting tired of wagyu this and wagyu that every where we went (our corner pub serves a wagyu burger for example) or if I thought a heavy beef course was inappropriate for a fancy japanese restaurant, but I was concerned. I have to say that while the course wasn't as heavy or overpowering as I had feared, neither did it allay any of my concerns. It was a fine piece of good beef, and seared nicely, but I would have prefered a grilled fish.

Next was a tuna tataki served with daikon and ponzu. This was a traditional "half-cooked" seared fish, though served with daikon instead of pounded ginger. Comforting, tasty, but again somewhat pedestrian for such a fancy place. The last savory course was a tanuki udon thick wheat noodles in a shoyu based soup garnished with fried tempura bits, green onion, and seaweed with a shaker of togarashi on the side. Another warm comforting homey dish.

The desserts on the other hand were quite innovative a small cup custard, a cube of chocolate cake drizzled with a sauce, and a fruit sorbet. I find Japanese desserts in general to be unappealing, not being a big fan of an (sweet bean paste) or glutinous rice. Azuma instead uses more western desserts - a welcome decision.

My conclusion was that ordering the degustation was probably our mistake. I've had a similar problem in other fancy Japanese restaurants, where the pre-set omakase is uninspired and designed to appeal to non-Japanese who want a chance to sample everything the restaurant has to offer. The omakase ends up being made by rote, with very little creativity since the restaurant turns out dozens of them in an evening, all of them exactly the same.

I think I'd like to come back at least twice more. Once to sit at the sushi bar, where we can interact with the chef and discuss what they have on offer, what we've tried in the past and liked, and to start to develop a rapport with the kitchen. Then come back and either order a la carte, or arrange a personalized omakase in advance.

So we were disappointed, but we're willing to try again.

Love Supreme Pizza

180a Oxford St

Paddington 2021 NSW

Phone: (02) 9331 1779

We were in the neighborhood after seeing a movie at the Academy theater. Debbie had been wanting to try this place for a while, but wanted to go there with me so it was the perfect opportunity.

When we walked in it was pretty empty, we looked over the menu which seemed to have some pretty interesting and tasty pizzas. In fact we quickly came to the conclusion that we thought we'd enjoy pretty much any of them - a rarity for us. Given that, the "Surprise" pizza appealed to us. When you order it, what you get is "chef's choice." The server asked if we had any preferences, likes or dislikes, and I replied "No boring pizza. Make it as weird please."

The pizza above is the result. It was very tasty, but not really all that weird. Tomato base, pesto, bocconcini, prosciutto, olives and arugula. Nice crispy thin crust, it was gone in no time at all. Would happily eat here any time I was in the neighborhood. BYO.