Oh hello again Sokyo, I’ve missed you! Last time it was the a la carte, this time it was the omakase. Previously I’ve only had omakase at the Tsukiji fish markets, so I was excited to have one in Sydney!
Blog
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Kensington Street Social
First was Commune Social. Then, City Social. And the tidbit of gossip I got from there was that there was going to be a Jason Atherton establishment in Australia. And here it is, Kensington Street Social.
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Spice Temple Sydney
It’s Chinese New Year. I hate Chinese food. I’m glad to be home. I needed to find a nice restaurant to book….
Spice Temple. Sure, why not. I can’t even take anything that’s even remotely spicy, but where else would I book on such an occasion?
I couldn’t help but be concerned that I wouldn’t like/couldn’t handle the food there, but it was the most fitting restaurant choice for the occasion. Plus I’d always wondered what was behind those lovely digital silk curtains every time I’d walked out of Rockpool Bar and Grill. Behind the heavy door were some stairs down and down and down… into a lovely space with the standard Rockpool Group reception, bar area, then the main dining room. It was super dark, but there was lighting at each table so you could see the food.
We opted for the Chinese New Year Banquet, categorised by each of the fortunes of the new year. The only one I didn’t manage to take good shots of were the Wealth dishes – cabbage and radish, and Sichuan style pickled cucumbers and shitake. Both pickles were slightly spicy (the cabbage and radish had an extra mound of some super hot stuff that I avoided) and so addictive! Who cares about a slight burning when things taste this good right from the start!
Prosperity – Raw tuna ‘yu sheng’ with spicy orange oil
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Margaret River
Finally, an eventful Christmas! I got the opportunity to head down to the south of Perth and into the famed Margaret River region. Being about a 3 hour drive, the weather was significantly cooler which is why it’s a great fresh produce area.
Along the way, there lies the southern hemisphere’s longest wooden jetty – Busselton Jetty. It’s about 2k long with a train track running all along it. All along the jetty there are heaps of people fishing – we saw whiting and squid being caught. Squid make weird noises when they’re dying upon the jetty….
The place where I stayed had some lovely sunflowers, as well as a tea house and restaurant/winery attached. So very nice!
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(Early) Christmas Roast Duck
Several weeks I signed up to a local farmer’s duck mailing list – they had plenty of chickens, but were waiting for the ducks to grow up and had limited supply, so they said I could put my email address down to express interest for a duck. I really had no plans to fork out $$$ for a lovingly hand raised duck, but it turns out their ducks were cheaper than their lovingly hand raised chickens! So I said yes to one when I found that my inbox contained this wonderful news, and picked one up – an added bonus being that this one still had its head attached, how cute! I just wish it also had its feet… oh well.
I was a little disappointed that it came frozen instead of fresh, however, that turned out to be a good thing since I didn’t plan to cook it till the week after. I had spent the next 5 days agonising on how to prepare this delicious being – halved, and cooked two ways? Lightly seasoned and just roasted? But then I remembered one of my favourite restaurant brands had a gorgeous roast duck dish – and I decided to take a chance and make my own version.
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Darkness Witch
Finally made enough time to finish the picture. Omitted wings and tail though because I was lazy and time poor.
