Nuffield Street Mac's Brew Bar

Prelude:
Back in the month of June (the 12th to be exact), my 'Silly' friend and I went to watch the free screening of "Bridge to Terabithia" - which was based on Katherine Paterson's Newbery Medal-winning children book talking about friendship with a somewhat "unexpected" ending.

After the movie, with leftover popcorns, we decided to leave the popcorns in 'peace' (in the bin hehe :P as they were no longer fresh) and headed over to "Nuffield Street Mac's Brew Bar" which I have patiently waited a long long time to try it out!

Review:
Let me see....I quite like the atmosphere and the settings of the room! Right on Nuffield Street, with the lights up on the tree, we pushed open the door. We found ourselves a quieter area, towards the back of the room, sitting under the man-made 'wooden' tree, and enjoyed ourselves the night there. : P They also have a wood fire place with LCD in place, the room was dark-ish with tiny lights lighted up to glow around the room. So it kindda gave a 'classy' bar feeling!!!

On to the food, we tried (excuse the dark coloured photos, as the place was dark-ish hehe):

Pan Fried Fish, with rice cake and stack of green veges

Eye fillet top with (red wine?) chocolate sauce, mash potato and veges

To finish it off, we had the Beer ice-cream chocolate pudding!

To be honest, the food didn't really 'wow' me. It was decent and presentation was excellent! (The veges were stacked very nicely, the eye fillet has deep fried noodles stuff on top and the beer ice-cream sat on a candy-made basket). For me I definitely enjoyed the presentation and the creativity of the dishes (they have better description than mine in the menu).

But in terms of the tastiness of the food, it was only 'ok'. The portion are not big at all. They placed too much soya sauce at the bottom of the stack of veges, so that it was too salty. The chocolate pudding was as if it was bought from elsewhere and microwaved to heat it back up (and it was over-cooked too -.-"). And to my disappointment, I couldn't taste 'beer' in the ice-cream! ><" However, I did enjoy the eye fillet the most! The eye fillet was definitely soft and tender. This was the first time I had chocolate sauce on a 'main dish'. Amazingly the sauce blended quite well with the beef and it definitely made it quite special for me.

Conclusions:

All-in-all, I'll say the food are 'ok'. Will definitely give points to their creativity, a classy bar environment with lovely settings and artworks. hehe It was worth a try (go if you haven't, good atmosphere there). But I think if I do go back, it'll probably be for a drink + some lighter food rather than a proper dinner.

The Evil Devil Hell's Pizza

Food Review:
Let's see back in early April (8th April 2007) I purchased two snack size Hell's pizza down in the Quay Street branch.....and yip....these two pizzas were devilishly tasty! (Well actually one was special and the other was just vvv tasty!!!) @.@### It was probably one of the best pizza (not just Hell's) that my family had!!!!


First of all I have to add that the snack size pizzas just looked very cute!!! : P Inside the petite sized box you'll find 4 slices of pizza in a box. Although they are snack size, but the fillings on top of the pizza were well sufficient with enough melting mozzarella cheese spreading across the pizza's surface!!! mmmmmm.......@.@####



You probably wont' be able to tell the difference between the two pizzas in the photo, but on the left is Cursed and on the right is Serpent.

Cursed was a very 'different' pizza for me as it uses honey mustard and gherkins. So the pizza was sour and sweet in taste (but more tended towards the sour side). Not the kind of strong salty mustard sauce that I hoped for. If you like sour taste, you may like this pizza. It was an ok for me...let me give it a 3.

Next came the marvellous Serpent. Let me give you the description here:

"Smoked Salmon, Spring Onion & Cream Cheese. Optional : Capers or Caesar dressing"

We picked Caesar dressing....and basically the pizza was just NICE, FANTASTIC, GREAT!!! Even my dad said it was his best pizza ever!!! : P

The pizza had enough fillings, with the cream cheese melting and blending in with the melted mozzarella cheese and topping it with some caesar dressing!!! mmm..Delicious....definitely my best pick for Hell's pizza (but not that I tried too many)!!!

However I can't promise whether the fillings and cheese will be the same on a regular pizza...not too sure if the snack size of my pizza made any difference!!!??? But if you haven't try it...highly recommend it!!! Definitely giving it a 5+!!! My pick!!!

Choc Bilby: A Gift from Aus

Yeah my first Chocolate Bilby!!! A gift for me from my 'partner-in-crime' from Aus!!!! : P (Thx mate!)

You see coz the Aussies does not like 'rabbits' at all (as you know the battle between farmers and rabbits)....so during Easter in Aus....instead of having the traditional Easter Bunnies...they have Easter Bilby instead (Read here for more info on the 'Aussie' section)!!!! And this is my first!!!! : )

(Pic of my Choc Bilby before it 'disappears'...oh...the two eggies that came with the Bilby have disappeared ALREADY!!! ehehh they were very good tasting chocolate too!!!! : P)

My First Man-Made Espresso at Work

Since I left my part-time uni work around 5 years ago (which was my first real job in the workplace!!!), where I worked at a world famous coffee shop, I have never used an espresso machine to steam milk again!!!

And I have to say....I miss making a cup of hot and freshly brewed coffee on the espresso machine..and miss the sound of steaming milk too!!!!!!!

Luckily the espresso machine at work has been revivied...so one day last month...I finally made my first cup of espresso coffee at work!!!! : P Here it goes!


hahah it's not the 'perfect' cup of coffee...with small amount of tiny bubbles on the side! eheh oh well...but I'm pretty proud of it after 5 years of break! hehe and I realise how much I miss making a cup of espresso, latte, cappucino, flat white, caramel macchiato!!! haah one day, just may be, one day.....when I earned enough money and retired.....I should open that coffee shop at the corner of the streets.....ehhe one day....!

FYI - One interesting page on different styles of pouring and decorating the top of an espresso:
How to make a good coffee?

Pad Thai for a Work Day Lunch (Yippy)!!!

mwhaah today (due to some effects of S.T.M.L and M.D.), I had to go into Pakuranga to return and to obtain some 'goods' from a 'special person'! :P hehe
(p.s. and I'm laughing about this hehehe!!!)

Anyway so I was 'honoured' to be invited into the Eastern area for lunch and in particular to try out this restaurant "Thai Family Restaurant" in The Plaza (Dineout reivew).

For our entree, we each had a delicious, freshly made spring roll and a lovely chicken satay which was covered by grounded peanut sauce (hence the sauce was strong enough to be just right). Each of the spring roll and the chicken satay costed $1.70 each. So it was definitely real good for us as we can try some entree as well as a main dish!!!

(Unfortunately we forgot to take the photo of the dish beforehand....hehe so photos of the 'end' to show how delicious the food were! : P)

As for our main we shared a dish of Pad Thai. The tastes was nice and authentic! The balance of the sweetness and the sourness was just right....but the portion was just a bit small (but may be because I can never get enough of Pad Thai!!! eheh). The cost for all mains are $9.90, which is the same as East. Hmm haha I don't think I can decide between the two!!! ><" This is definitely authentic, while East is haha 'East' lor.....and their dish is bigger! So to be greedy I wouldn't mind having both of them! :P (The good thing is they both uses peanuts and provides a slice of lemon...which I reckon is essential to a good plate of Pad Thai!!!) :P

(A photo of the shop's name and logo on the front of their menu)

In summary, I thoroughly enjoyed the lunch (esp on a Monday...the start of another week of work -.-)! Thanks to the 'special person' (cough cough! j/k j/k : P) who introduced and invited me to this Thai restaurant. This restaurant is definitely in my 'to be back' list! : )

*P.S. - One thing I definitely want to try is their "Prawn Cakes"!!! I love eating prawn cakes and it is hard to find good prawn cakes in NZ! Looking forward to try their prawn cakes next time!!! : O