Archives for March 2015

523 Pastizzi Café – The Italian local we wish was a bit closer to home

March 29, 2015 by Andrew Christie 4 Comments

Pastizzi. They make a mess sure, dropping crumbs everywhere, but they’re crunchy, tasty and obviously really good for you. Basically, they’re just Italian sausage rolls. With more flavours maybe.

Pastizzi Café, as its name implies, has made a speciality of them, and does a hectic take-out trade, selling a wide variety, including sweet ones as well as savoury. But the café is also a restaurant, a very busy one, as I found out when I arrived at 7pm on a Friday night. As I approached, I thought I was in luck. There were two empty tables out the front, but as I got closer it became apparent that the empty tables were occupied by nasty little Reserved signs. Inside the café, all the tables along the side of the narrow room were full. When I asked one of the busy looking waitresses if they had any tables, she said “Sure,” and disappeared so quickly towards the back of the restaurant that I nearly had to run after her. She went out a door at the back, and by the time I got there, I was just in time to catch a glimpse of her disappearing again at the other end of a very narrow passageway. It was so tight that my shoulder accidentally bumped the fence, which was immediately followed by a crash and some muttered swearing. It seems I had upset the neighbours, or at least something that had been balancing on the fence. When I finally caught up with the waitress she was standing beside an empty table in a makeshift dining area that had been created by putting a roof over the backyard. There were a couple of other occupied tables, and at least it was close to the toilets. When this Speedy Gonzales of waitressing had set me up with a menu, cutlery, and napkins, she put some music on and disappeared again. The music was a disco version of Sweet Child of Mine, which she must have like because she had it turned up really loud. When Strop arrived we could hardly hear each other until a second waitress, this one with tattooed legs, turned it down again.

The menu Pastizzi Café is fairly simple and very Italian as you would expect. Lots of fresh pasta options, some fish, chicken and beef. There were some specials too but we decided to stick with the basics. There is home made ravioli and, of course, pastizzi. Strop had the bright idea of topping and tailing the meal with pastizzi. So we ordered a couple of salmon, dill and ricotta pastizzi to start, figuring we’d have a couple of sweet ones for dessert. In between times, she ordered ravioli and a small salad, while I opted for chicken parmigiana. Having decided on the food Strop headed for the nearest bottlo for some wine and I looked at my phone. When she came back with a very welcome bottle of Pikes Clare Valley Riesling, she wrinkled her nose and muttered “I can smell dope.” Now this is a bit of a thing with Strop. She reckons she can smell people smoking dope nearly everywhere she goes, and especially in Newtown. There must be a lot of it about, either that or she has a very finely attuned set of nostrils because I can never smell it. These days I need to be actually handed a joint before I can smell it. When the waitress started pulling a strange face and mouthing something, which, after we gave her a series of bemused looks, turned out to be “Can you smell weed?” She had to whisper it because there were a couple of impressionable children at the next table. Strop was delighted to have her nostril’s accuracy confirmed, “Yes!” she exclaimed, “I think your neighbour is smoking dope.” It was at this point that it occurred to me that the thing I had knocked off the fence earlier, may have been their bong. It would account for the swearing.

Our salmon pastizzi were hot and crunch and tasty. They didn’t last long and were soon followed by the mains. Strop had opted for the entrée size spinach and ricotta ravioli, which was a smart move because the serves are generous. Her small salad was enormous, and my chicken was so big that there was only a bit of room at the edge of the plate for a splodge of mashed potato and a few vegetables. The ‘parmi’ was the best I have had in a long time. There was plenty of eggplant, the chicken was tender and moist, and the tomato sauce fresh, tasty, and abundant. Yum. The ravioli was good too, with a similarly tasty sauce.

Strop wasn’t able to finish the salad, so we decided to take it home, together with a couple of dessert type pastizzi – to have at home, or for breakfast in the morning. Either or.

512 Smash Sausage Kitchen – The comfort of food

March 28, 2015 by Andrew Christie 5 Comments

We normally avoid Tuesday outings because so many places are closed, which can lead to Out of Sequence Error messages. But one of our tribe has gone, leaving a big hole in the lives of those around him, and in these strange and sad days, normal rules make little sense. We are all fragile and in need of comfort and distraction.

And anyway this is our last chance to catch up with a flesh and blood version of Adrienne, who is in town on sabbatical from her home in the Bundaberg back blocks. Adrienne is of the Art persuasion and has been busy on a fortnight long gallery-gallivant around Sydney. Tonight, we are also lucky to be joined by Adrienne’s niece, the gorgeous Bridget, who is in town for a one-day only, birthday-mystery-junket. She turned up at Brisbane airport this morning, knowing she was catching a plane, but not knowing where she was going. Her Arty Aunt had arranged a surprise day out in Sydney, ticking off icons, generally larking it up, and finally reaching a climax of Sydney fulfilment by questing her way to Smash Sausage Express. But the visit is strictly a one-day event and, Cinderella-like she will be whisked away by a taxi after dinner, to return to her normal life of drudgery in Bris-vegas. We are also joined by the Stropolina to help even out the age distribution graph and because there is a new rule that she has to dine with us on Tuesdays.

Smash Sausage Express specialises in comfort food. Specifically, they dish up sausages and mashed potatoes in a variety of tasty configurations. They even have a Mash of the Day, a Sausage of the Day, and a Brulée of the Day. And I think I am in love.

Our comforting starters are Corn on the Cob with chilli salt and Garlic Bread. While we are munching our way through these, Bridget and Adrienne start on a bit of Quest inquisition, wanting to know all the history, the derivation of the Rules, and what the hell Number 37 has to do with anything. Hopefully, our answers made some kind of sense to the Queenslanders.

For mains you can pick whatever combination of sausages you want and match them with your choice of mash and sauce. I decided to go with the prize winning Moroccan Lamb and Raisin (on the manager’s recommendation), Wagyu Beef (Sausage of the Day), and English Pork (sausage classic), which I matched with the Mash of the Day (Curry) and Tomato Chutney. The others tried various combinations, including Parmesan Mash, Caramelised Onion Mash, Honey Chicken and Macadamia sausages, and Smokey Bacon, Pork and Maple, and Vegetarian. Bridget avoided the mash altogether, and went for a salad. Sometimes I think young people have their priorities all wrong.

Curry Mash. Get yourself some. That is all.

It was all lovely, as comfort food should be. The Moroccan Lamb and the English Pork sausages were excellent but the Curry Mash was a revelation. I am definitely going back for more of that. Smash get their sausages from some secret master sausage butcher. Whoever this bloke is, Mr Abbott should immediately snatch back Phil the Greeks superfluous knighthood and give it to this deserving butcher – for services to stomachs.

Dessert isn’t called dessert at Smash. It is called Pudding, and I couldn’t agree more. Whatever you call it, it wasn’t strictly necessary after we had polished off our snags and mash, but we don’t like to do things by halves, especially when we are trying to impress visitors from over the border. Strop and I went for the Brulée of the Day, because we can’t resist rhymes, and Adrienne went for the Eton Mess because she is full of curiosity and not easily put off. The young people opted out, which was probably the sensible approach. The Eton Mess was huge and stopped Adrienne in her tracks, the brulée was more modest but was still more than was strictly necessary. Oh well, there is always the long walk home (which is getting longer and longer) to help joggle everything back into the right places.

If you need some comforting, and these days who doesn’t, go and get some Smash.

I wonder if they do takeaways?

506 Europe Grill – Birthday besties

March 8, 2015 by Andrew Christie 6 Comments

I have been looking forward to visiting this place for a long time. There is something attractive in the look of it, an honesty, and in the straightforward name. You know what you are going to get: grilled things, from Europe. Eastern Europe to be specific: Macedonia and the Balkans. Meat and seafood is the order of the day, but first we had to get there.

Arriving early, I decided to have a quiet drink at Bench before the main event kicked off at Europe Grill. As I was settling onto Bench’s actual streetside bench, who should pull up in front of me in a big black ute, but that well-travelled pensioner John. He looked very comfortable in the role of the landed gentry come to town for a bit of business and a bit of a knees up.

We had a quiet drink and a chat outside Bench, trying not to let our legs poke too far onto the footpath in case we tripped up one of the passers-by. There were quite a lot of pedestrians hurrying up the hill in waves, released by the traffic lights at Alice Street, and eager to get to their Friday night assignations.

For once all of our party arrived right on time at the restaurant, so John and I were the last there, having first discussed guitar making in Wellington, the true meaning of Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing, WestConnex, Transport Police, Nazis, the problems with democracy, and John’s plans for a technocratic post-democratic democracy.

John and I slipped into the only seats left, at opposite ends of the table, which was just as well, as we had nothing left to talk about. There were seven of us for the evening: Strop of course, Roy and Jill, fresh from the decreasingly leafy Epping, Monica, soon to return to the Old Country, and Wendy from Pyrmont Heights.

Europe Grill is a bit of an institution at this end of King Street. It is located on a corner block, with the kitchen up front, so the grill chef can keep an eye on who’s coming and going, and so the smells of grilling meat can afflict the salivary glands of every non-vegan within a hundred metres. Being Newtown though, there might not be that many non-vegans. However I am one and I am proud, and by this time I was actually quite hungry.

But first there was chatting – quite a lot chatting. It happened to be Strop’s birthday, which was not the reason for the outing, just a happy coincidence, so there were lots of birthday wishes flying around, and not much attention being paid to the menus. Which became a bit of a problem when Roy and I ordered a couple of beers to start. Nearly everyone else wanted wine, but which one? Strop soon discovered that the wine list was full of varieties she had never heard of. The waitress, clearly exasperated by our lack of organisation, headed off to get the beers while the wine discussion was had. I was just glad that she had her priorities right.

While Roy and I drank our beers and discussed the growth rates of Moreton Bay fig trees when utilised in a revenge-planting scenario, we sensed a great disturbance in the Force, emanating from the other end of the table. Strop having first taken umbrage at the waitress’ assertion that of course all rosés were sweet, was now giving her both barrels of cold, hard logic, pointing out that, as the restaurant didn’t have our first choice of wine, we were going to have to refer once again to the wine list to choose another, and that this process might take a moment to complete. I don’t think the waitress subscribed to the same logic Strop did: she wasn’t seen anywhere near our table for some time afterwards. Which was fine as it gave us all plenty of time to workshop the exchange, choose a wine and decide on our food strategy.

After a protracted negotiation communicated by eyebrow raising, head nodding, and eye rolling between Strop, the chef and the waitress, a settlement was reached and we were able to place our order. Strop and Jill decided on herb and garlic bread to start, a grilled meat platter and two grilled seafood platters as well as salads and grilled peppers.

The herb and garlic bread was excellent and so were the salads. One was cabbage, kind of like coleslaw, but without the heavy dressing. The other salad was potato based. Both were very good and surprisingly light and delicate. The peppers were good too, with plenty of garlicky sauce, a point that Jill kept reminding us of throughout the evening.

There was plenty of meat and seafood on the platters, in fact a bit more than we could cope with. There were baby octopus, prawns and fish on the seafood platters and the meat one had chicken, pork chops, pork on skewers, cevapi, rissoles, and paprika sausage. Yumm.

The arrival of the meat triggered off a call for some red wine. This time the alpha females squared up to each other with mutual respect. The waitress was heard to refer to Strop as “Special for wine.” She was obviously no longer willing to trust the wine list, and arrived at the table with bottles in each hand and a couple tucked under her arms, offering a range for Strop to choose from. After a few trips back and forth we ended up with a Macedonian merlot, which slipped down very nicely.

The meat platter had stopped us in our tracks but it didn’t supress our desire for dessert, which was unfortunate because the servings were very large. Strop had now decided that she and the waitress were besties, and sought her advice regarding Tulumba, which was something none of us had ever encountered before.

“What are they?” Strop asked.

“Very nice if you like it,” her bestie replied.

On that basis, no one was prepared to take the risk. Instead we had strudels (apple or cherry), pancakes and baklava. As I said, the servings were large, more than some of us could cope with, and everything was drizzled with chocolate sauce. John and Roy had coffee – they would like me to record the fact that it was very good.

We had a great time at Europe Grill despite a few ruffled feathers. It’s a good place for a large group, as long as you get your ordering organised.

503-511 Bench – Leaving red flock wallpaper far behind

March 1, 2015 by Andrew Christie 9 Comments

I feel as if I am spending far too much time thinking about street numbers. Bench’s address is 503-511 King Street, so does it come before or after Europe Bar and Grill, which is number 506? And any way who gives a flying proverbial. Well, me really, because we are saving Europe B&G for a special outing with Monica who is heading home soon. So this week we visited Bench, accompanied by young Tessa, who is currently lodging in the penthouse suite (attic).

When I arrived, having first stopped for a refresher at the Botany View Hotel, Strop had occupied a seat in the window looking out onto King Street. She was busy perusing the cocktail list to celebrate Bench’s “Attitude Adjustment Hour”. Her first choice wasn’t available because some bastard had drunk all the tea-infused vodka. Her second choice might have been called a Lemon Fizz, while I chose a Day’s Thunder, which seemed to be missing a preposition. Despite its grammatical disability, my cocktail was excellent – white rum, grapefruit juice, lime, and ginger. Very infreshing. Unfortunately Strop’s cocktail turned out to be a bit of a fizzer.

Wine Bar always seems an old-fashioned term to me, a hang over from the 1970s. Maybe they are making a bit of a comeback, like fondu. I always imagine wine bars as having oak barrel furniture and red flock wallpaper, but that might just be because in the dim and distant past I worked on a television show called Number 96, which had just such a wine bar set.

Bench is nothing like that; the décor is a kind of industrial chic with lots of burnished metal to reflect the garishly coloured lighting. Despite the industrial look, the vibe is relaxed, and it’s not trying too hard to be hip, which is a refreshing change on King Street. It is a place where grown-ups can feel comfortable and more importantly, a place where they can hear what is being said. There is music of course (Shaft!), but it is not too loud.

When Tessa arrived we had a quick little frenzy of photo taking, then got down to ordering food. Bench has a tapas menu with lots of tempting sounding treats. although Strop reckons you can’t beat the classic tapas dishes (patatas bravas, chorizo, etc). The food on offer looked all right to me though, and Strop and Tess had no trouble choosing our first round of food: lamb cutlets, Peking duck, hand cut chips, and arancini balls. A half litre carafe of rosé was ordered as well, to replace our cocktails.

While we waited for the food Tessa regaled us with snippets of gossip from her school’s awards ceremony, which had occupied most of her day. Mindful of the serendipity and not much else, I bored her and Strop by telling them about a scene in the book I’m writing where a teenage girl getting an award from a government minister, squirts him all over with pig blood as he hands over her certificate. I was shocked by how un-impressed they were.

The Peking duck pancakes were small but tasty, with a nice piece of succulent duck in each. The three cheese arancini balls were crisp on the outside and gooey inside. The chips were just regular chips, nowhere near as good as last week’s (but then they did come a lot faster). The lamb cutlets were tasty and succulent but perhaps a little large. Mine flopped around dangerously, spilling the rich capsicum and tomato sauce, as I tried to eat it using the built-in bony handle.

I was left in charge of ordering for the second round of tapas. Tess and I had a long discussion about whether the ginger beer batter on the tofu was enough to make it edible. I reckoned that in the interest of science it was worth doing the experiment. Tess was sceptical, but I figured that Strop would eat them if no one else did. I also chose the other balls: zucchini and fetta; and nachos. The nachos got a big vote of approval from Tess even though she reckoned she wouldn’t eat much as she was now quite full. But I still wanted nachos.

The zucchini and fetta balls were tasty but not as crunchily satisfying as the arancini balls, and unfortunately the tofu was still tofu, despite the crunchy outer layer. The nachos were yummy though, but then when are nachos not? These ones came with shredded chicken and guacamole.

Despite the lurid purple lights I am seriously considering making Bench my regular pre-quest drinking hole. It is airy and pleasant, and doesn’t remind me of Number 96 at all.