Edit: CLOSED OH HAI! Omg you guys only 12 more days till Xmas! Who’s excited! I just love this time of year where there’s chubby Santas hohoho-ing and the smell of mangos fills the air. It’s the time to squish in dinner with friends and family, and Ocean Room (Ground Level of Overseas Passenger Terminal, Circular Quay West, The Rocks, Sydney) was the perfect place to celebrate the brother unit’s other half scoring a new job.

We squelched in from the rain and found ourselves lowering our voices when catching sight of the incredible bamboo arrangement hanging from the ceiling and its lowness forcing us to drop our heads and semi-bowing upon entering.

Uni Tamago ($7.50 each) is first off the ranks from the tapas section. BOOM hear ye hear ye I command you tastebuds to awaken! Awaken and enjoy the glory that is oozy soft egg and creamy sea urchin nubbins.

Oysters with champagne mignonette, fresh lemon ($4 each), oysters with with green shiso basil sorbet, salted konbu ($4.50 each). “Get the Pacific oysters,” whispered our waiter, “they’re plumper, juicier and well, BETTER.” Well now, how could we argue with that? Pacific it was! Generally I haz issues with giant sized oysters but these bivalve molluscs were true beauties esp doused with the accompanying dressings.

The Soft shell crab taco ($6 each) at Ocean Room puts all other tacos to shame, full of crunch thanks to the golden fried taco sandwiching crisp vegetable matter, glorious deep fried soft shell crab and topped with pops of briny roe. Genius.

Tuna cornet ($5 each). Oh how one cornet is not enough! The correct unit of measurement for my greedy stomach would have to be 10… The ruby red marinated blue fin tuna tartare was perfect but the nori rice cracker cornet was so freaking moreish I think I would’ve been happy sitting in the corner with a bag full of ‘em.

Calamari pops ($4 each), deep down in its guts was a smidgen of tastyness but it didn’t hold a candle against the deliciousness of the previous tapas. I guess for some reason we had expected the calamari to be on sticks and when we got over our disappointment we found the calamari to be pleasant enough, nubbins of calamari dusted in a green curry salt and flash fried.

“You won’t want to share the Tuna creation ($25),” our waiter warned and he was right. Each cube of tuna looked perfect, sitting on the insides of a piece of halved bamboo and balanced alongside the accompanying salt we raced each other to pick off the tuna that had jumped out on us on the description paper. I had zeroed in on the fresh raw tuna which had jalapeno and yuzu zest and Zing! The spicyness of the jalapeno matched perfectly with the citrusy yuzu dressing and the sweetness of the fresh tuna.

The Sashimi modern ($27) sure is impressive, 9 shotglasses filled with an assortment of fresh fish snuggled in a bowl filled with shaved ice. The seared ocean trout with finger lime was a favourite, along with the swordfish belly with soy salt and of course the seared scallop with yuzu gelee.

Moving onto mains and what’s this? Dinner and a show? Breaking open the salt crust to reveal…

Super tender and succulent Shiogama pork ($37). That was damn tasty pork!

The Fisherman’s tuna ($38) was ordered mainly because I love anything with cornflakes and the cornflake crust intrigued me. Sadly the tuna was one giant ass slab of fish that was pretty much cooked through and no amount of the tasty aioli could save it.

Of course we had to get the Aburiyaki Wagyu ($45) when we saw the miniature pot housing hot coals and a metal grill on other tables. The menu had said the wagyu would be served bleu so we were surprised to find the slices pre seared which I guess meant less time on our grill. Nevertheless the wagyu was freaking awesome and demolished in seconds.

Sadly thanks to my epic over ordering we couldn’t fit in dessert so we stumbled back out into the rain clutching our over-extended stomaches.

Sponsored by Nuffnang

OH HAI! What’s that? Is the crazy season getting you down? In need of a breather and just want to take a sec and enjoy life? Yeah I know how you feel, I can’t believe it’s already December! Sydney weather sure ain’t helping, last week was perfect picnic weather and then there was rain but I know we will have an incredible summer.


So the other day I received some bottles of Riccadonna Allegra to try out, this new addition to the family is promoted as being a ‘semi-dry Italian sparkling wine which is elegant and not so sweet.’ Personally I prefer my sparkling wines sweet so was curious to give it a try especially because I had something in mind…


A picnic in the park with just desserts! I admit, whenever I feel like having a picnic usually sweets will be on my mind and soft drink just will not do.


It’s been a pretty hectic year and it’s awesome to just take some time over the weekend to chillax in the park with some friends or even just your fav person in the whole world. That is, until that person manages to pop the cork off and spill half of it everywhere lol good one Noods!


The Riccadonna Allegra lives up to it’s tagline- the wine isn’t too sweet even with the vanilla cupcakes, chocolate mudcake and rainbow doughnuts we’d consumed and pretty refreshing which will go down a treat when the temps heat the 30’s. We give it a thumbs up so click here to check out your nearest stockist for Riccadonna Allegra!