96A Burwood Rd, Burwood NSW 2134
(02) 9744 2977

Momiji… what can I say.

This place unfortunately has potential, but doesn’t seem to have the finesse to execute it.

It is walking distance from the Burwood westfield shopping center.

I ordered the set ramen – which comes with a half egg, pork, some bamboo shoots, sea weed and beansprouts, and karaage chicken on the side. Now the broth is actually surprisingly good. Not the best I have had in Sydney, but no doubt quite competent, peppery and bags of hearty flavour to it. It then gets let down by the limp, soggy almost hospital food-like nature of the ramen. It is pretty bad and soft to the ‘nth’ degree. (I tried to give positive feedback to the owner, saying that the broth was great, but the noodles were a bit soft, and she seemed to not understand English and thought I meant ‘salty’ instead of ‘soft/soggy’ ramen. oh well – translation fail somewhere probably by me).

On the plus side the chicken was okay.

Next we ordered the tempura vegetable fritter on rice. The Vegetable fritter again had flavour and looked like it was cooked quite decently, then I am not sure what happened, whether they covered it in the mean-time whilst they were preparing the other main, but it had that steamed soggines to it… which again for a tempura advertised dish… is not great.

The third dish we ordered was the soft shell crab. No complaints with this dish. Competent. Not the best soft shell crab I’ve had… but not bad. Crispy, the crab was fresh and the sauce on top was a sweet/tangy mayonnaise. 

Sorry Momiji, not the worst experience I’ve had, but not the best either…

Food: 6.5/10
Value for money: 7/10
Ambience: 7/10
Service: 6/10
Overall Score: 26.5/40
$$

183E Burwood Rd, Burwood NSW 2134
(02) 9701 0055
sydneydumplingking.com.au/

I have been wanting to try this place for a while.

And yes, they do live up to their name. They have around 30 different varieties of dumplings to choose from. The most I have ever seen in any dumpling house.

I must say, sometimes I wasn’t entirely convinced about the cleanliness of the establishment, but I guess you can put it down to a down-and-dirty, no-frilled eating house.

The dumplings are everything you would expect. We choose:

• prawn, egg, chives and woodear mushrooms ($15)
• fish & corn (steamed)($12.5)
• pork & eggplant ($10 plus fried $2.5 extra) ($12.5)

Prawn, egg, chives and woodear mushrooms ($15). The wood ear mushroom adds a nice crunch and texture and the prawn pieces are fresh and succulent.

Next came the fish and corn. I was very surprised that the fish was still moist and tender and not at all overcooked. I was glad we got the steamed option. The fish is light, the sweetcorn has a juicy bite to it, and there is a hint of ginger through the filling.

Then thirdly, we ordered the pork and eggplant. I think the fried dumpling option did this one justice. The inside filling is moist and almost with an eggplant rich sauce to it. There is no crunch element to the inside filling, so I think it needed the crunch of the outside dumpling pastry to give it some texture and body. This is probably the saltiest out of the three dumplings. Very tasty.

Food: 8/10
Value for money: 8.5/10
Ambience: 6.5/10
Service: 7/10
Overall Score: 30/40
$

71 George St, Parramatta NSW 2150
(02) 9633 9926

Temasek – I have been here quite a number of times already. The service I have to say is a bit hit and miss. Sometimes it is okay and the wait staff are on the ball and quite quick and efficient. Sometimes the waiters and waitresses can get over-run, too busy and forgetful.

Their food though I have to say is always consistently excellent. They always deliver on this. I have noticed that they have raised their prices recently though.

The Hainanese chicken rice – is on the money. The chicken breast is so beautifully poached. Succulent, smooth and melt in your mouth. I think it even rivals Chatterbox chicken rice in Singapore, which is saying something. The chicken rice itself is great, full of flavour and the broth is just light and delicate to wash the pallet for the next mouthful.

Next on the the char kway teow, we always order it with chilli. It is pretty perfect. It has the ‘wok hey’ taste, which is the heated/slightly char taste of the high flame intensity on the wok.

The laksa is the also one of the best I have had in Sydney. I think the other ones that may rival this are Chinta Kechil in Double Bay and Laksa King in Melbourne. You can choose the noodles with the laksa, either thin rice noodles or thick yellow egg noodles, or a combination of both.

Last but surely not least, the mee goreng. The prawns in this dish are succulent, great creamy tomato base to the sauce. Full-flavoured and moreish.

Food: 9/10
Value for money: 7.5/10
Ambience: 7.5/10
Service: 6/10
Overall Score: 30/40
$$

210 Devonshire Street; Surry Hills
New South Wales, Australia 2010
+61 2 8933 1639

I visited Suzuya for the second time, since I enjoyed the first dining experience.

It was much similar to the first time, however I did notice the service was faster, the agedashi tofu was much better, and no glass noodles as an appetiser. I suspect now, looking back at the first time we went that the tofu was not as freshly cooked, resulting in the batter not being crisp and the tofu a bit too firm.

Again we had the Salmon and avocado sushi roll and sashimi plate for entrees:
Very enjoyable.

Mains: Katsu pork and Tempura prawns & vegetables.
Pork was just as good as the Katsu chicken.

Highly recommended!

Food: 8/10
Value for money: 9/10
Ambience: 7.5/10
Service: 7.5/10
Overall Score: 32/40
$

Surry Hills: Suzuya