It’s all happening in the ‘fern! RaRa is the latest ramen ddition to the neighbourhood sitting just across from Arcadia and next door to Huxtaburger. Rara makes their Hakata style noodles in house and is pumping out steaming hot bowls of ramen with a carefully curated wine list. The menu is short and sweet with 3 different ramens- tonkotsu, shio and a vegan ramen.

The RaRa tonkotsu ($16.90) is made with a creamy and rich house pork tonkotsu shio base, topped with a slice of free range char siu that’s been grilled on their robata grill, a handful of seasoned bamboo, a free range Ajitsuke tamago (seasoned egg) with a perfect yolk, shallots and shredded black fungus.

I spring 90c more to get the black garlic, there’s also the house made chilli or miso paste but black garlic is the bomb yo and just what the doctor ordered for this wave of rainy weather that’s hitting Sydney.

While I loved the broth of the Pork shoyu ($16.90), you guys know my mad issues with bean sprouts haha but scoopsies to the side and it’s all better 😛 Like the tonkotsu ramen, there’s also black pepper, shallots, half an egg and a slice of grilled char siu. I need to add a special shout out to the noodles, they are pleasingly firm but bouncy, with a good bite to them.

On another visit, out of curiosity I ordered the Vegan soy shio ramen ($16.90), a soy based broth served with grilled tomato, black pepper, seasoned bamboo, shallots and a not so vegan egg. There’s a lil dab of a chilli, sesame (and I think ginger?) paste which gave the broth a nice oomf though I did add more chilli oil and grind more sesame seeds towards the end of the bowl when the taste of the soy milk got a bit much for me.

RaRa
66b Regent St,
Redfern

Trading Hours:
Monday: Closed
Tues – Fri: 12 – 2:30pm, 5:30 – 9:30pm
Sat – Sun: 12 – 2:30pm, 5 – 8:30pm

It’s been 8 long years since Rise Restaurant closed! Rise was one of my favourite restaurants, a tiny Japanese restaurant hidden in Darlinghurst that my family celebrated all our birthdays and milestones at and we were devastated when they closed. But surprise! Hideki Okazaki is back with his new restaurant Eiju, a Japanese and Italian fusion restaurant in Pyrmont. They currently have a special of $59 for the 5 course set menu which is pretty damn good for Sydney prices!

We begin with the salmon confit and if you know me at all you’ll know I can happily eat salmon every meal for a month and Eiju’s salmon just blew me away. Fat slices of incredibly tender salmon snuggle oh so demurely against curls of zucchini, paper thin slices of radish, seaweed salad, pops of briny salmon roe and dressed with a tangy yuzu vinaigrette. Definitely a last supper type of dish for me!

The spiced soft shell crab fritter was a great contrast to the salmon, the batter on the crab was beautifully golden, light and crisp, and surprisingly went well with the creamy guacamole and tangy yoghurt sauce layered throughout the jenga pile.

Next up was the spaghetti with barramundi ragu and scallops, saffron and artichoke. How cute is the presentation? Make your way past the foam, twirl up some spaghetti and dig for nubbins of salmon and scallop like your own personal treasure hunt where you are the lucky winner!

Gah can this photo be any more blurry… my bad! Our last savoury is the roasted quail lovingly wrapped in prosciutto with a yuzu milk foam. The quail is deliciously juicy and tender but it’s the cauliflower puree which has me frantically scraping the plate clean- it’s rich and creamy and just absolutely perfect.

Dessert is a green tea fondant with black sesame ice cream. The fondant itself is surprisingly fluffy and light with a rich dark chocolate centre and I absolutely loved the intense black sesame flavour of the ice cream!

Eiju Fusion Japanese Dining
196 Harris St,
Pyrmont

Trading Hours:
Fri – Sun: 11:30am – 2:30pm, 6 – 10pm
Monday Closed
Tues – Thurs: 6 – 10pm

Ah winter. How I hate the cold! I know Sydney’s weather is considered quite mild in comparison to other places around the world but mate, I layer up with thermals, jumpers, coats scarves and fleece lined stockings and I’m still bloody freezing! It’s little wonder that I constantly crave for warm, soupy foods like ramen! Spanish Sakaba is, like their name suggests, a Spanish and Japanese hybrid restaurant with classic Spanish dishes like paella, garlic prawns and chorizo alongside Japanese inspired dishes like tempura, yakitori and ramen at lunch.

Spanish Sakaba recently started opening for lunch on Saturdays so a jaunt over the bridge one dreary morning and we arrive in the lands of Willoughby. Every couple of weeks they do a ramen special and today’s offering was an Aburi pork belly ramen ($18.80). I liked the thick shio base but it was the pork belly that blew me away- thickly sliced, incredibly smoky, and meltingly tender.

The Wagyu Oxtail Ramen ($17.80) had a chicken and beef broth that was nice and light with a good peppery kick. The 6 hours slow cooked Wagyu oxtail meat was tender with gelatinous fatty nubbins and that whole mountain of fresh coriander was awesome because I friggen love coriander and it cut through the richness of the oxtail. This ramen came with thin noodles thought I must say I do prefer the wavy type?

The Black Mussel Ramen ($18.80) was awesome! The broth was a creamy white wine and chicken base and studded with shaved fennel, saffron, a generous amount of mussels aaand my favourite wavy noodles! I’m not even the biggest mussel fan but damn, I loved this ramen and would definitely order this again also lol you won’t be able to tell from the photo but the bowl is so massive you could totally bathe a baby in it.

Spanish Sakaba
537 Willoughby Rd,
Willoughby

Trading Hours:
Mon – Sat: 11:30am–2:30pm, 5:30–10pm
Sunday: Closed

I have many feels about the newly opened Wishbone in Enmore. When Hartsyard took off their famous fried chicken from the menu I was beyond devastated. And then owners Gregory Llewellyn and Naomi Hart decided their bar up the road, The Gretz would be making way for a new venture meaning their crunchalicious fillet o fish burger would also be bidding adieu. So while I’m sad to see that burg go, I was incredibly happy to hear that the fried chicken would be making a return at Wishbone AND that they would be serving poutine and biscuits!

Gone are the jeans covered stools, instead there’s a communal table running the length of the restaurant with smaller tables against the wall. Co-owners Blair Joscelyne and Marty Mulholland, creators of Mighty Car Mods have added their touch with car suspension parts holding up the tables, tow hooks and repurposed tool boxes scattered around the restaurant. The menu is short and sweet with fried chicken the featured event and a whole bunch of snacks/sides to go with it.

Chicken scratchings ($8) arrives first, the gnarled shards of chicken skin are the perfect bar snack, they’re crispy, salty and oh so satisfying. While kbrly and I liked the honey hot sauce, we would’ve preferred the sauce on the side to dip to control the amount on each piece as they got soggy super fast.

The Buttermilk Fried Chicken (4 pieces/$19) is just as I remembered, the golden batter all knobbly and gloriously crunchy and the meat incredibly juicy and tender. Sauces are a little steep at $3 per tub or 3 for $5 so our group of five order the Wish Bone hot sauce, unicorn ranch and smoked maple sauce. I enjoyed the hot sauce with the chicken (mad props to my taste buds for finally accepting a lil spice into my life!) but definitely preferred the ridiculously addictive smoked maple sauce over the unicorn ranch (not too sure what made this unicorn but I was glad it wasn’t a god awful rainbow colour).

Of course we had to get the poutine too! There’s a vego mushroom poutine that did tempt me because my, how I love mushrooms! But we decided to go for the Home style Poutine ($20), fries with beef gravy and cheese curds instead. The portion for this was so massive kbrly and I barely made it a quarter of the way through! The fries were perfect, golden batons of delicious fried potato soaking up the rich gravy and being the perfect vessels to scoop up globs of melty cheese.

And there were the sides! The Creamed corn with miso ($6) is a must order and is insanely delicious. Sweet corn nublets bursting with juicy sunshine, I love you! It is a touch on the sweet side (is that more honey I detect?) but it’s still bloody delicious and we all know corn is my favourite non digestible food in all the lands.

I’ve been craving for good, proper American biscuits for about 4 years now since my last trip the US. People generally describe biscuits as a savoury scone, and Wishbone absolutely nails them! An individual Biscuit with sausage gravy does sound a bit steep at $6 a pop but let me tell you, IT’S SO WORTH IT! The biscuits are baked to order with a light golden crust and ridiculously light innards and just begging to be used to mop up the slightly peppery sausage gravy.

I wasn’t too sure about the Biscuit with honey butter ($6) mainly because I’m so used to eating biscuits with savoury toppings but this was so damn tasty! Generous amount of creamy butter drenched in sweet sweet honey, perfect for slathering. Or for some people, eating with a spoon coughANGEcough

I probably should’ve ordered a vegetable or something but well, the Mac & Cheese ($6) was calling to me! This was awesome, creamy and cheesy with a delicious buttery breadcrumb crust that I may have swiped more than my fair share of 😛

Aaaand then there was dessert! A deliciously creamy peanut butter soft serve ($8) with caramel popcorn and a swirl of salted fudge in the center.

Wishbone
125 Enmore Road,
Enmore

Trading Hours:
7 days: 5pm to late