Dome Restaurant ARTHOUSE HOTEL Sydney

Well..another day, another business lunch..but today is a nice treat..we are heading to the Arthouse Hotel Sydney. It was a rainy day, the downpour happened to increase as we ran down Pitt street to find the Restaurant. Neither of us being there before, we were meeting a client for a quick lunch. At 275 Pitt, we were surprised to realise that we had walked past it many times before, but never noticed the facade.

As the name suggests, the Arthouse Hotel actually occupies the old Sydney Art School building. The building is interesting for its old time charm, with fabulous old architectural details, fused with a modern bent. Two bright young things in high heels (how do they do they stand all day smiling in those things?) welcomed us at the door and directed us up the grand staircase to the Dome Restaurant. We did a quick look around the ground floor before we went up as there more than one intersting looking bars downstairs that have character and style, serving both food and cocktails. Your eye is drawn to the Art on each wall, some of the pieces are huge and spectacular.

Back to the Dome...we were seated on the plush chairs to admire the art and atmosphere..cool jazz playing in the background, to wait for our client. The attentive staff were easy going and informed - a nice combination. Our guest arrived, we were seated and the feast began. We were on a timelimit so main courses were ordered and we skipped dessert..pity as it looked sensational. Perhaps I might need another visit for recreation rather than work?

My vague eating out policy is to order something I wouldn't cook at home so I had the Five spiced duckling with snow pea salad and orange confit. SENSATIONAL, little bony thighs of duck, fried crispily to perfection. A touch of chilli and spice, the popping sensation when entering the mouth was to die for. My colleagues ordered Grilled Atlantic Salmon fillet with crispy pancetta and peppercorns, and Grilled Sirloin steak with fondant potato and eschallots bearnaise respectively. All were convesation stoppers .... read... happy quiet eating! And as mentined in previous blogs...I am fond of talking so it takes a lot to stop it! All were good sized servings, but at around $30 a main, I should hope so too! we had an interesting salad of danish fetta, tomato and rocket as accompaniement which added another interesting element to the meal. Crusty bread with olive oil, salt and pepper..and we were done.

Even being a work lunch, it was possible to take the time to enjoy the atmosphere. The Jazz set the scene, the padded panels on the walls all housed original artworks for sale. Each being interesting and different, and perhaps affordable depending on your fiscal position! The colours were a calming and cuckolding chocolate, making you immediately at ease. Above was a lovely stained glass dome which made me imagine a nude posing on a podium for art students many years before. Sometimes interesting places like this can be too showy where it is more about how you look than what is on your plate. I think this had a nice balance of atmosphere, good food, not exhorbitantly exxy...I thoroughly enjoyed the experienc and would welcome a return visit.

Chai

Some things give great comfort...warm milk on a winters night, a nice cup of tea when you need soothing. Chai has it all built into one. A friend mentioned chai, and it piqued my curiosity. Being of English origin, "a nice cup of tea" is the remedy for many ailments. Now, I can appreciate good coffee, but really, tea is more my drink of choice. I decided to investigate the chai option.

Off to Macro to see what I could find, I immediately recognised the Chai box from memories past. I don't know where I would have come across it, but I knew that I had seen it somewhere. Maybe my oldest sister, being a flower child in the 70's had drunk it? I just can't recall. But, as I picked up the box, I felt compelled to do as it said ....."smell the packet....enjoy the way it evokes visions of the maharaja's palace where chai was first brewed...bla bla bla". Being the good girl that I am, I always do as I'm told. Away I sniffed. Oh..the memories. Again, I'm not sure where they come from, when I've had it but the smell was a nice memory lurking in the back of my mind. It reminded me of the way the old fashioned health food shops used to smell..the suburban ones..not the shiny new macro styled ones.

I parted with $7.95 for a small box, a bit steep for tea..but I felt I was heading for good times ahead! I hurried home and did my best Polly..putting the kettle on. Actually, the method is more labour intensive...boiling water in a saucepan, adding chai, simmering for a minute before adding milk, but being sure not to boil it and scald the milk! Next step straining, into a cup, then onto the couch and sip sip sipping away.

BEAUTIFUL, CALMING, WARMING, REASSURING....Chai. I think I like it as much as a nice hot cocoa.

Chai is an Indian spiced tea made from a combination of Black Tea, Ginger, Cinnamon, Cardamon, Cloves, Nutmeg, Cassia Bark and Anise. Together it makes a nice combination. I've had it in cafe's with cinnamon on top...and frothy milk...hmmm. Both ways are nice and soothing. Apparently it can also be iced...but not my cup of tea I'm afraid!

Since my forays into the world of Chai..I have realised that it has been all around me, all this time! Even the local cafe serves it. T2 has their own blends, Byron Bay makes some so the choices are endless.

Now...this being my 2nd blog ... please excuse my horrendous spelling in the last blog...I was a tad overexcited by my first blog..and failed to check my typing. Anyway...hapi eating

Lunch on the run....

Fast....buzzy.....cheap.....TASTY! What else could you want from a quick work lunch? Chilli Cha Cha Thai Restaurant in Campbell Street Sydney has all that!

I'd noticed this restaurant on numerous trips to visit one of my biggest clients near Central. Walking quickly between appointments, it always caught my eye as a fun, bright place, standing out from the other dreary fast food joints in that area.

I had squirrelled away a menu on one trip a couple of weeks ago, meaning to go back when I had the opportunity. Well..today I had the chance. An appointment for a quick work lunch in the area, and the client, to my great delight, suggested....Chilli cha cha! I was cool, but firm in my agreeance! GOOD CHOICE.

The restaurant is tiny, it was 1pm and there was only 2 tiny seats with stools to choose from. Happy diners all eating away at delicious looking lunches. Then..the lunch specials list was given....aaahhhhhh. Such a choice for under 10 bucks. My client chose prawn pad thai...I went with the Kanar Moo Krob..ie...crispy pork belly, chinese broccoli, garlic with rice. All I can say is MMMMMMMM !

It came QUICK. It was a good size, certainly enough for a hungry gal like myself to feel satisfied with. Now, I'll admit, I'm not a small girl, and I do have a healthy appetite....yeah, it hit the spot alright.

Nicely presented by a happy waitress. A bowl-shaped dome of rice, small pieces of pork belly, next to a luscious pile of green (chinese broccoli). Not choi sum..but leafy greens. All topped with diagonal, vibrant red, cut chilli (more about that later).

I tried the pork belly first....oh....oh.....oh.....yum. Crispy, tasty, delicious! Rice..well, it was just nice rice. Greens...well, they were just nice greens...the combo of the three was delightful. Now, about those chillies. Anyone that knows the happy blogger, knows I could talk under water with a mouth full of marbles..and I was on a business lunch of sorts...so the talking was all up to moi. Now, I never shirk at my responsibilites..so talk away I did. HOWEVER, at a particularly pertinent point, I inhaled in excitement, and with it I inhaled a chunk of chilli! EEK. The repercussions were theatrical.

Water, tears, coughing, loss of voice. It took a minute to recover, a few more mouthfuls of pork belly more and I was right as rain.

As it is an eat it and beat it style of place..we finished our business, finished our lunch, shook hand and skipped of merrily into Friday afternoon. AND..only $9 lighter for the experience.

I can't wait to do business down that end of town again! There is always the Duck curry to try.........

Bacco Pasticceria

The girls at work brought some cakes and pastries in to celebrate a colleague's birthday and invited me to sample some of the treats. One taste and I knew I had to find out where these delectables came from.

The answer is a new coffee shop, wine bar and bakery called Bacco located on the ground floor of the office building at 2 Chifley Square. It actually sits in the foyer of the building and has quickly built up a large following, being extremely busy each time I've walked past. The day I bought one of their large rolls for lunch, I spotted one of the pastry chefs ladelling a filling into dozens of tiny chocolate shells, I wish I had my camera with me at that moment!

Today, I decided to sample some of their pastries, I selected a lemon meringue tart and an intriguingly named millefeuille (or whatever the Italian equivalent is called) that had been flavoured with lavender. They were both called much fancier names that I can't remember at the moment and their website is still under construction so I can't check up but regardless of the name, the quality stands out like a beacon.

The lavender in the custard of the millefeuille was very delicately applied, you had to concentrate to detect it but it was there and it made a difference. The pastry was crisp and delicate and not overly sugared so you could eat the treat without ending up with a sugar moustache!

The curd in the tart was rich and lemony without being too sickly sweet and the blowtorched meringue was creamy but roughened with the tiny grit of sugar granules which contrasted nicely with the creaminess of the curd, all sitting on a crisp pastry shell that indicated lots of butter and sugar had been used by an expert hand. All topped with a tiny shard of toffee...sigh.

Definitely a winner this round but haven't tried the Danish pastries, the beautiful delicate pots of tiramisu and zuppe anglaise (Italian for English trifle), the brownies, the chocolates that I haven't seen since that first sighting and we haven't even started on the range of lunchtime sandwiches, rolls and mini pizzas yet. I'll be back!

Central Coast Leagues Club Star Buffet

There's nothing more exciting than sussing out a new buffet especially as one as good value as
found at the Star Family Buffet Restaurant located inside the Central Coast Leagues Club in Gosford. Thanks to a recommendation from J's friend we decided to celebrate Mothers' Day a week early and took our mothers to check out the Star lunch buffet. $19.90 per adult on a Sunday ($13.50 during the rest of the week and up to $21.90 for the seafood dinner buffet).


The variety and quality of the food was extremely reasonable given that the fee was for an all you can eat experience! I'm afraid I'm not the type of person who tries to stuff myself at a buffet, I just can't do it and not feel nauseous at the end of the meal! However, I have no objections to trying a little of everything on offer, just a little or sharing something to taste and spread the calories around!

The clever restaurant managers have created half a dozen different stations representing various types of foods so there is no queueing and lots of room to move from one area to another.



I could see a drinks station, a huge dessert bar, a bar for alcoholic drinks, an enclosed Asian barbecued meats stand offering gorgeous roast duck and roast pork with crackling!

There were separate hot and cold entree stands with the usual spring rolls and cooked prawns but there were also deep fried crab's claws (okay, as soon as we bit into them, the level of crab detected was downgraded to just a trace of flavour additive), scallops mornay and mussels on the half shell.



You have to give them marks for trying, there were tiny halved avocadoes with prawns and a seafood sauce, individual barbecued prawns on a skewer, whole breaded sardines, sticky rice stuffed into bamboo shoots and a whole steamed salmon!

I'm afraid the cold weather led me to filling up on the forbidden carbs and my godson helped me to more pasta than I really needed so the plate was looking a bit beige but that's what happens when I don't find novelty and new taste sensations, I go for comfort!

The dessert bar held at least a dozen (healthy and sinful) choices, linzer torte, pavlova, bread and butter pudding, apple streudel, apple crumble, tiramisu cake, strawberry mousse cake, opera cake, fruit salad, tiny pots of pannacotta, a fudgey truffle cake and three different types of homemade biscuits!

And all in tiny portions so you can try lots without feeling too guilty so no one except the kids felt bad about the softserve machine not working.

Tea and coffee is included and you can purchase an endless cup of softdrink for $2.

On the whole, great value for money especially if there are a lot of mouths to feed and you're looking to satisfy a lot of different tastes.