Taste of Shanghai - Ashfield

I first went to Taste of Shanghai during the first 2 weeks it was opened. I thought the food was ok, but still preferred Shanghai Nights. Since then, we haven't been back. But we have noticed that they get more and more packed every time we walk past, and seeing all the different reviews on the net, I thought we should go back for another visit.

We arrived early, around 11:30am and all the tables were already full. Luckily, we only had to wait about 15mins to get a table. Their menu is quite extensive and offer a lot more main meals than the other Shanghainese restaurants around Ashfield. But being lunch time, we wanted more dumplings and noodles than a whole fish etc.

Pan fried pork buns

My must have at any Shanghainese restaurant is their Pan fried pork buns. Soft and fluffy on top, crispy crunchy bottom and a juicy, soupy filling. The Taste of Shanghai version isn't bad. Its crispy and fluffy and juicy and soupy. BUT, I find the juice/soup a bit too rich for my liking. Most places have a lovely clear, sweet, golden pork broth in the buns. Their version is actually a deep brown cloudy broth, as if they've put too much soya sauce and other seasoning in it. I also found it much fattier than the other places. Apparently the owners also own the butcher shop across the road with the same Chinese name, so we suspect they might also be using different cuts of meat from other places.

Steamed pork buns

The steamed pork buns suffered the same fate as the pan fried version. Too fatty and just not delicate enough in flavour. They were however, made really well.

Dried scallop fried rice

I loved the fact that its served in a wooden bucket like thing. The fried rice was quite tasty with a small mound of fried dried scallops on top. However, I found the rice really REALLY oily. When we got to the bottom, there was a pool of oil. Easily 2-3 tablespoon full, swimming in the bottom. I actually felt really greased up and ill after eating all of it.

Overall, the food is nice, but I find the food too oily for my liking and will probably be sticking to my other favourites for noodles, rice and dumplings. With that said, I do like the look of all the main meals that were served around us and will probably be coming back to try those dishes out.

Taste of Shanghai
264 Liverpool Road
Ashfield, NSW, 2131
Ph: (02) 9798 2877


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New Season - Burwood

Burwood Rd has become an eat street in my eyes. Every few shops in another restaurant or cafe, all clambering for your business. Back in my "younger days", Burwood used to be ma hood. Now days, I tend to go to Burwood mainly for Chinese Roast. So when a new roast shop opened up, we went down to check it out.



Unlike some of the other roasts shop in Burwood, New Seasons seem to cater more for the dinner crowd, with big family size tables available. The menu also offer a range of main meals rather than meat + rice, meat + noodle combos. They also had a few set menus available to the dinner crowd with offerings of fresh fish from the tank and other goodies. Being lunch time, we opted for the noodle and rice options.

First up, complimentary soup.

Sampan Congee

Oh yeah! This is one of my favourite congees, although not everyone likes it. Mainly because there's a combination of fried pork skin, cuttle fish and pork stomach in it. Meh, just means more congee for me.

Combination Stir Fried Noodles

Whenever I order congee, I always try to order a stir fried noodle of some sort. Most of the time its the dry fried beef rice noodles, this times its Combination stir fried noodles. Then I put some noodles in a bowl, then top the bowl with congee. Stir and eat. MmMMmm does anyone else do this?! haha I find the noodles "spread" their deliciousness to the congee, and the congee somehow mellows and spreads the taste all throughout your mouth. Hard to explain, easy to eat. ;)

Double stir fried noodles

We weren't too sure what this was when we ordered it. Turns out its 2 types of noodles stir fried together. In this case, its vermicelli and egg noodles stir fried with bean sprouts and various sliced meat. Its a simple dish, but very very tasty. Must be very bad for me...

Hokkien Fried Rice

If you've never had a Hokkie Fried Rice before (Sometimes called Fukkien fried rice, but I don't want to swear), its a plate of fried rice topped with a very saucey combination of diced meat, seafood and veggies. When I eat it, I stir everything together to make it into a clump of gooey goodness. I've converted many friends onto this dish! A must have.

New Season
Approx. 93 Burwood Rd
Burwood, NSW


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Happy year of the Tiger!

Finally Chinese New Year falls on a weekend this year! This means I'll be home for both CNY eve and CNY day! Usually my mum slaves for 2-3 days just to cook up a CNY meal, this time I'll be home to help!

CNY setup

The men of the family decided to contribute by going to the Fish Markets to pick up a lobster. They also grabbed 2 dozen oysters, sashimi and sea urchin (uni) to bring back as a snack. I guess they were feeling guilty because they went and bought a mixed seafood platter and pigged out on it before coming home!! Like what the!? I mean, we're only having a 13 course feast in 3 hours time!

Oysters

Uni - Sea Urchin

Salmon Sashimi

Our 3.7kg Lobster

This somehow reminds me of a scene in Aliens

Please don't eat me!

Cleaning the lobster

Luckily our family have all worked in a restaurant and was more then adequate in preparing the lobster. Firstly, you need to get the lobster to pee everything out. And the best way is to shove a chopstick up its hole. Doesn't look pleasant, but it happens every time you order lobster at a restaurant.


This baby was so huge our giant cleaver wasn't strong enough for it. So dad grabbed a hammer to help with the chopping.

Mystery stuff

We've only been chopping up lobsters for the last 15-20 years, but we've never seen so much yellow stuff in it. We were arguing what the hell it is. I'm saying its roe. Sister claims in brains. Cousin reckons its poo. Someone was saying hair. I've just never seen so much inside a lobster before! Anyone know what it is?

Dad basically scoped it up and put it aside. If its roe, we might steam it with some eggs tomorrow night. As dad was chopping up the lobster, it decided to fight back. The muscle reflex caused the leg to bend, which then caused one of the giant spikes to embed itself into my dad's finger. Blood comes gushing out when he pulls the spike out and my sister takes over whilst I clean him up.


Dad got revenge by cooking up the lobster in heaps of ginger and shallot sauce, which was then put on top of a bed of pan fried crispy vermicelli! No rice needed tonight since everyone was eating the lobster sauce soaked noodles on the bottom! YUMMM!!! Usually we get e-fu noodles, but every single grocery store around us was completely sold out! All 6 of them!

I decided to contribute by making gyoza / potstickers / dumplings for something different this year.

Pork, prawn and mushroom filling

Since you must have prawns during CNY, I half bashed, half chopped up a heap of king prawns. Then I added a little pork mince to help it bind, some chopped button mushrooms, wongabok and coriander. This was seasoned with fish sauce, sugar, pepper and sesame oil.

My babies cooking on the stove

Upskirt!

The Gyozas look a little burnt, but it was actually the starch water going brown rather than the actual wrapper. Luckily it looks a bit burnt, but didn't taste it! In fact, the gyozas had a lovely sweet juice from the prawns, mushrooms and wongabok. This was the only dish that was gobbled up! But then we had so much food!

Pigs trotter, mushrooms and black hair moss

Must have dish during CNY. We usually take the leftovers and add it to a congee or soup.


This dish has fish maw, mushrooms, dried oysters and dried scallops. Again, another must have. We usually freeze this dish and use it in stir fries, soups and other stuff for the next month or two.

8 treasure duck

Mum decided to try a different duck this year. The 8 treasure duck is stuffed with glutinous rice, dried shrimp, dried scallops, preserved meat, peanuts and a heap of other chinese herbs. This is then slowly steamed for 2 hours until the rice absorbs all the ducky goodness and falls apart when prodded with a spoon.

Sea Snail / Conch of some sort

For some reason my cousin was obsessed with these when he saw them at the fishmarkets. No idea why as our family never eats this. I tried 2, but my cousin ended up eating 90% of this dish! The kids refused to touch it! hehe

Hong Kong chicken wings

Its been a few years since we made this. Usually we would make it for the Moon Festival, but for various reasons, we haven't made it for awhile. Basically you take a aw chicken wing, carefully pull out the bones. Then you stuff it with a mixture of pork mince, prawns, mushrooms, water chestnuts and a heap of other stuff. You then steam them until its mostly cooked. Then you batter and deep fry these babies! Dad's contribution!

Steamed whole baby barramundi!

Stir fried lettuce

Fish and lettuce is a must have for CNY. We kept it simple since there were so many other rich and complicated dishes already.

Roast pork

Tong Yuen

This is a MUST MUST have for CNY. The glutinous rice balls signify the togetherness of a family. I know a lot of families make a sweet version. But where my parents came from, we've always had a savoury version. The broth is made of chicken stock, heaps of dried shrimps, dried scallops, daikon, dried squid, wongabok and other goodies.

The spread!

2 days of preparation, 13 courses, 20mins of eating

Happy Chinese New Year people! May the year of the Tiger bring you good health, wealth, love and happiness. ROARRRRR!!!

New Taste Noodle House (Lao Fu Qing) - Ashfield

Whenever I am eating in Ashfield, 8 times out of 10, I would choose to eat Shanghainese. Of those 8 times, I would say 7 times is with Shanghai Nights. I've tried atleast 3/4 of the restaurant in Ashfield, and I consistently go back to either Shanghai Nights or the local Kebab joint, Metro 1.

I was trawling on eatability awhile ago and noticed there was a restaurant in Ashfield called Lao Fu Qing that had decent ratings. I decided to try the place out and couldn't find it! I tried on 2 separate occasions! Today I made sure I double checked google maps before I decided to hunt the place down. Success!


Strangely enough, the restaurant seems to have two names? New Taste Noodle House on the menu, but Lao Fu Qing on the sign outside. Some things have both names on it.


I've actually walked past this restaurant a few times, never noticing the name and almost instantly dismissing it as the modern type restaurant with small serves and bad food served on square plates category. Boy was I wrong!


Before I get onto the food part, I must apologise for the dodgy photos. I only realised when I sat down that my camera had a flat battery! I was completely devastated when this happens, especially when I try a new place! I was almost tempted to leave the restaurant and come back another day with a fully charged camera! hehehe Luckily for camera photos.

Anyway, food! The menu has a entree section and a traditional snacks section. I wasn't too sure what the difference was, so I assumed the snacks section was small serves like the entree section. Based on that assumption, and the thundering noise coming from my tummy, we decided to order 2 snacks and 2 mains between 2 people..... *cough*

Spicy minced pork Dou Pi - $6.80

This came out looking like a murtabak. The chinese name is spicy minced pork in tofu skin. What came out seemed to be more doughy pastry than tofu skin pastry. Nevertheless, the pastry was crispy and oh so moreish. The filling was a layer of sticky rice topped with a spicy, garlicky pork mince. SO GOOD! I'm definitely hoping to try their other Dou Pi dishes.

Boiled Pork and chive dumplings - $8.20

If I thought snack meant small portions then I was wrong. For $8.20, you get 12 of these babies. Big, plump, juicy dumplings. These are definitely freshly made and not of the frozen variety. The chives were a fresh bright green and the pork had a lovely bite to it. And did I mention these babies are huge?

Taiwan beef brisket noodle soup - $10.50

This was a clean rich broth with big flakey chunks of beef.

Hu Nan beef tripe noodle soup with spicy minced pork sauce - $10.50

When this huge bowl came out, I automatically assumed it was a big bowl, lots of soup, not much substance. It wasn't until I dug my chopsticks in did I realise how much food we had actually ordered! The bowl had a huge wack of noodles, chunks of meat and heaps of tripe, pickled veggies, bok choy and........peanut butter. That's right....peanut butter. I had a WTF moment and then went whatever! If that's the way the chef made it, that must be what the dish is like in Hu Nan and bravely stirred the peanut butter in. And you know what? It works! The peanut gives a lovely creaminess to the soup and mellows out the chilli. Were the minced pork sauce was I have no idea. But I did like the chunks of meat! Not bad for $10.50. I actually couldn't finish this bowl and took home a huge container of leftover noodles!

The reason I didn't find the restaurant the first 2 times was that I assumed it was down Liverpool Rd with the other restaurants. Little did I know it was actually up near the quieter end of town. Quite unfortunately actually, because they have really good food! Its actually one of the few restaurants in Ashfield that I'm excited to have found! (I actually rushed home to blog about it, how sad is that?!). The restaurant is clean and comfortable, with plenty of seats for a large group of people. Certainly not something you find it a lot of other restaurants in Ashfield!

New Taste Noodle House (Lao Fu Qing)
243 Liverpool Rd
Ashfield, 2131
(Ph) 02 9716 6838

Tasty House - Ashfield

Tasty House has been in Ashfield for almost 10 years. For some reason we had stopped going there the last few years. I had a real craving for comforting noodle soup, and since a majority of restaurants in Ashfield are Shanghainese with limited noodle soups, Tasty House it was.

Combination seafood laksa

The seafood laksa is a generous bowl of creamy coconut goodness. The soup is rich and spicy leaving a nice heat on the tongue. My only criticism would be that its a too coconutty for my liking, luckily it wasn't my bowl and a few spoonfuls was more than satisfying for me. My friend who loves the creamy coconut milk taste loved the Laksa.

Wonton noodle soup

I couldn't decide between a pho and a wonton noodle soup. So I asked the waiter if I can get pho rice noodles in my wonton noodle soup and they happily obliged. The wontons had a nice bouncy texture and went really well with the slippery smooth rice noodles. I was one happy girl! Looks like I'll be visiting Tasty House again!

Tasty House
297 Liverpool Rd
Ashfield, NSW
(Ph) 02 9716 5668

Xin Jiang Noodle Restaurant - Ashfield

I'm sure you've all seen the Xin Jiang Handmade noodle truck around one time or another. For some reason I keep seeing it in the city? There really isn't any reason I can think of for them to be around Martin Place?

Despite being inundated with fliers and advertising, I never even thought of going even though its 5mins walk from my place. However, one cold freeeeezing and wet winters night had me craving shanghai buns. But all my favourite locals were completely packed out, leaving us the option of finding somewhere else to go.

Xin Jiang Noodle Restaurant is on the quieter end of Liverpool Rd near the public schools. There were 2 other tables when we arrived half way through their meal. I noticed everyone was having a huge bowl of steaming hot noodle soup, which was exactly what I needed!

Handmade dumples and noodle soup

This was so comforting. The chewy noodles, the crunch of the vegetable and the light clear broth. The dumpling filling is actually quite rich and very different to what I was used to. It was also a lot softer than what I was expecting. It was still delicious regardless.

Pan fried pork buns

When I saw these I was so excited! I could get my Shanghai Pan Fried Pork buns! But what came out was far from it. Firstly, these were small. These are about the size of a Xiao Long Bao. The little bite size steamed Shanghai Pork dumplings. The wrapper is also have way between a dumpling wrapper and a bun skin. The filling was the same as the soup dumplings. Rich and soft. But the biggest difference? There was no squirt of scorching hot liquid to give you 3rd degree burns.

Spiced Lamb Ribs

My friend was craving something meaty. We didn't really feel like ordering a hot pot or their sweet and sour meat balls, so we opted for this. This was spiced with lovely cumin, salt, pepper and other herbs. These were really tasty, except sometimes you will pick a piece that is 90% bone and 10% batter. But even when you do get a meaty piece, its quite fatty meat. I would probably order it again, but would want to try some other dishes first.

Xin Jiang Noodle Restaurant
205 Liverpool Rd
Asfield, 2131
(Ph) 02 9799 9989

(hehe That's such an asian phone number!!)

Wok 'n' BBQ

Whenever we feel like eating out on the weekend, we usually end up at Burwood for some Chinese roast and rice. Since the lovely name and shame of one of our regulars, we thought we should try out another place. Wok 'n' BBQ has been open for about a year. We had visited it when it opened during its first week. We probably would've visited earlier if they didn't have a blackout on the day we went. hehehe The shop is located on the corner of Burwood Rd, next to the train station.



I've been back a few times since as its a nicer and cleaner environment to enjoy lunch compared to some of the other roasts shops (Which is more eat and run type style).

Complimentry soup that's not in a brown cracked plastic bowl

BBQ Pork and rice

Soya chicken and rice

Roast pork and rice

Another BBQ Pork and rice

Roast duck noodle soup - seperated

The roast is really nice and fresh. Taste wise, its very similar to the other shops. The portion sizes are slightly smaller, but that's because they don't load you up on the rice. They still give you the same amount of meat and veggies as the other shops which is good. The price is also similar to the other shops, usually around the $8-10 mark.

All in all, a lovely Chinese roast lunch in a nice clean setting with real crockery. If you're starving, you might want to head up to some of the other shops where they give you more rice. Otherwise, a good place to catch up with friends.