Edit: CLOSED Last night Merivale turned the tables and put four food bloggers into Bistro CBD’s kitchen to cook a dinner for 70 expectant guests. Billy, Fouad, Karen and Linda took up the challenge to cook one course each and what kind of friends would we be if we didn’t immediately book our places? Our group of 16 hungry food bloggers are bright and early and take our seats at our dinner table. Also a shout out to Sarah & Junior!


Cheers! A glass of sparkling is included in the $60 5 course dinner and we toast to our friends in the kitchen.


First course is a Sashimi of kingfish, avocado, wasabi, lime and soft herbs by Simun Dragicevich, Bistro CBD. Beautifully presented, the paper thin slices of kingfish are topped with dollops of avocado and wasabi puree and the zing of lime awakens my taste buds.


Second course is Shish Barak – a Middle Eastern- style dumpling by Fouad. The deep fried dumpling shatters into crispy flakes as I hungrily attack to get to the meaty lamb innards and dip into the yoghurt sauce.


The lighting is pretty dark at Bistro CBD that the industrious Yas whips out his iPad for an external light source haha


Third course was ‘Pork you!” twice cooked pork belly by Billy. The vivid pink paint stroke is the first thing to catch my eye followed by joyful glee that is crisp pork crackling and wobbly soft pork belly. I would’ve liked more of the apple gel mainly because I think I could’ve eaten a bowlful of the stuff. It was tasty oh yes. Give me moar! Moar!


Between courses we duck over to the pass to spy on the chefs hard at work


Deep in concentration


Fourth course was Braised beef in Pedro Ximenez sherry by Karen and it made me weep with happiness (sometimes when you cook i weep), the beef so tender that it practically fell apart with but a nudge from my fork. It was rich, comforting and Karen, it was SENSUAL I want your babies!


Dessert was ‘This and That’ by Linda, a chocolate brownie base with a super light chocolate mousse centre covered in chocolate ganache and topped with a sprinkling of salt; a scoop of smooth lemon olive oil ice cream on crumble and rhubarb jam and topped off with a brandy tuile. What can I say but awesome! Ice cream recipe please Linda!


Oh look humans!


Congrats dudes! You guys were absolutely fantastic and we can’t wait until your next adventure in the kitchen!

On Saturday I had the privilege of being Arlene’s bridesmaid along with the awesome Shirley and Lisa and we had an absolute blast! It was pretty crazy in the morning getting to Westin hotel to do our hair and makeup and some photos on the super sexy level 6 but unfortch no photos of us running around getting ready haha


We arrive at the Garrison Church to the sounds of bells ringing and get ready to enter. It was my first time being a bridesmaid and let me tell you walking down the aisle first is insanely terrifying especially walking in shoes that weren’t sneakers!


Erm I was more happy than I looked but was concentrating too much on not falling over haha


Made it to the altar without falling over woohoo and now the moment everyone is waiting for… Arlene and her dad!


Squeee


Apparently there was a no photo rule during the ceremony but there was an awesome candle lighting and the beautiful Amazing Grace was sung and I just about teared up when Michael and Arlene said their vows. I’m so happy for you guys!


Hullo family


Baulko crew- Soph, Jess, Kev, Ev and me


After some photos around the Rocks area the bridal party make our way to Ottoman (Pier 2/13 Hickson Rd, Dawes Point) where the sun streams through the entire restaurant and candles/lights are suspended in vases above our heads.


Instead of a well wishes sign-in book there was a mini chest of drawers filled with awesome old skool postcards to leave a message in the birdcage.


Each guest had a gorgeous sprig of flowers with name card at their seats and the bonbonniere were books of recipes provided by some of the guests


Michael and Arlene make their entrance


Arlene’s mum made her wedding dress and it was so freaking beautiful!


There was a tea ceremony for the family


BAHAHA I couldn’t resist!


My pretty bouquet


Aaand another shot


And now time for da food! Baskets of piping hot, fluffy pide bread arrive


Entree of King prawn with shitake mushrooms & baby spinach; salmon, cray & prawn wrapped in vine leaves and lightly battered; zuchinni flowers stuffed with goats fetta (not shown cos they came later). I loved the lemon and yoghurt sauce that was drizzled over the prawn and could’ve licked the plate clean that stuff was gold! I loved the zuchinni flower which was crisp, light and not at all oily.


Noods was given a vegetarian entree cos he can’t eat prawns and by the time I took a photo of my entree he’d managed to eat everything on his plate WITHOUT SHARING tsk tsk no love!


Alternate servings of Char grilled Wagyu beef served on potato puree, black cabbage and king brown mushrooms. Usually I dread getting the beef at weddings with more than 100 people but was pleasantly surprised that it had not been killed. The beef was cooked a little more than medium but was well rested, super juicy and pretty damn tasty. Wish there was more of it though cos Noods was very reluctant to part with half haha


Char grilled Kingfish served with olive oil braised leeks, carrots and preserved lemon mayo. I wasn’t a huge fan of the mayo and would’ve liked to have more of the lemon & yoghurt sauce from the entree haha but the kingfish was a pretty huge serving


Dessert was a quivering rectangle of kazandibi, a caramelised rice pudding; baklava drenched in syrup and a stretchy dondurma (Turkish ice cream).


Quick snap with my fav photographers in the world- Trish (and Vic) from Tealily Photography


The beautiful wedding cake was made by Shirley and isn’t it a beauty! It was a carrot cake with layers of cream cheese icing oh baby so good


Cutting da cake


Getting ready for the bouquet toss


Ribbons ribbons everywhere!


A cup of tea to end the night and our slice of wedding cake to take home


Uh no photo of Michael with us haha but congrats you guys! I <3 you both and hope you have a fantastic time in the states!

I <3 aburi salmon. Helen, Dave and I are at Masuya (Basement Level, 12-14 O’Connell St) and there’s just something about the smokey burn-y taste that makes me want to eat platefuls of this super delicious seared salmon. Though at $3.80 per piece it does make my soul cry. But the aburi is awesome. Go now.


The Misoyaki Oysters ($18.80) are baked and smothered in a layer of creamy miso sauce. They were also deceptively piping hot so resist the urge to shuck the whole oyster in one go or find out the hard way ahem Dave&#8230;


There is currently an ala carte tuna menu until 31st July and there is a slight pause as Helen and I glance at Dave after spying the otoro and chuutoro on the menu. Again the $50 pricetag for 6 pieces made me wince but fatty tuna! And medium fatty tuna?! I’d never had before and was surprised at the thickly cut slabs of tuna that arrived. Not sure if I got a dodgy piece but my otoro was surprisingly difficult to eat and I had trouble biting a bit off my slice. I was much happier with the chuutoro which had a more melt in the mouth texture


The Nasu Miso (large, $8.80) arrives and has Dave wondering where the other half of the eggplant went. He loves his eggplant and this is a hit with the table


The Beef Tataki ($13.80) are a bit dry but a dip into the ponzu sauce and all is good


The Jewfish Masuya’s Way (mulloway) ($23) arrives in all its spectacular golden glory, the fillet of jewfish wrapped in thin shards of potatoes and oven baked until crispy. I reckon this would be even more awesome if it were on a stick.


The Wagyu Beef Miso (230g) ($32.80) is a bit of a let down, the slices of beef a bit chewy for a marble score of 6.


By the time the Kingfish Wing Nitsuke ($16.80) arrives we are nearing explodey point. The kingfish is fantastic with sweet delicate meat and I wished I could’ve fit more in


Luckily there is a brief pause between our plates being cleared and somehow we decide to order 4 desserts to share because we can’t decide


The tofu and cream cheese cake ($6.80) is as intriguing in taste as it sounds. The cake is unbelievably light and fluffy, a slightly sour edge is all that i can detect of the tofu.


Zenzai – sweet red bean with rice cakes ($4.80). I am not a fan of red bean so I leave this dessert for the others.


The homemade green tea brulee ($6.80) was awesome with a nice layer of caramelised sugar that we gleefully broke into to reveal a smooth vivid green custard


I love green tea ice cream ($4.50) and Masuya doesn’t disappoint. Smooth and creamy it is a perfect end to the meal. Super thanks to Dave for dinner it was great to catch up and hope to see you again soon!

OH HAI! Like my tshirt? It’s from the awesome Billy. And look I’m Asian and holding a giant camera! So about the title of this post&#8230; I got this pretty idiotic comment the other day on this post from &#8220;Jackie&#8221;: Why are all the food bloggers always asian? Even when i went to Adriano Zumbo’s patisserie on the w/e, every asian that was in that line had a professional camera in hand and taking photos like lunatics in there … please note i am asian so its not a racist thing. I just dont get it. Its annoying. We need variety.

Um. WTF??? Immediately my rage was unleashed on twitter land where it spread like wildfire through the blogger community. Seriously does it matter than I’m Asian? Dude I was born in Australia and I love it here Aussie pride all da way! If you don’t like reading my blog because of my Asian genes then go away cos there are plenty of other blogs out there for you. Blogging is a personal thing for all of us so attack one, attack us all. Don’t say you aren’t racist just because you are Asian and saying you need &#8216;variety’ has got to be the stupidest thing I have ever heard. You want variety? Go to a freaking supermarket and knock yourself out with all the &#8216;variety’.

Edit: time out time out! Comments are getting a lil nasty so i’ve closed them. Play nice kids! Yes some of us hang out with each other heaps and will probably post the same thing a bit too often but when that happens feel free to check out the rest of my blogroll for heaps of other awesome food bloggers! Noone’s forcing you to stay here, that is the beauty of the internet. Jump on by.