Grease Monkey

To celebrate this week of Christmas, I’m celebrating my favourite foodie thing – burgers! Welcome to #burgerweek! I adore Grease Monkey. I really do. When my friend came to visit from Adelaide I took her straight from the airport to Braddon for a solid Canberra burger experience. On my quest to try all of their burgers, I picked the Pitt Stop ($15), stacked full of BBQ pork brisket and apple cider coleslaw and spiced up with a habanero mayonnaise. As always, Greasy’s didn’t disappoint, with the food coming out quickly and obviously freshly prepared. There was a huge serving of their delicious chips, which I’m not ashamed to admit I devoured – yes they were salty, but man, that seasoning is so good! The burger itself was also perfection – the BBQ pork paired with the milk burger bun was surprisngly and delightfully sweet, and the pork just melted in your mouth. I’d added pickes to the order (an extra $1), and they were chopped up and mixed into the coleslaw, which was perfect. The coleslaw was actually really great to balance the huge amount of meat. Every mouthful was a bite of happiness, and I seriously wished for a second stomach to be able to eat more. Nom nom nom.

Grease Monkey, 19 Lonsdale Street, Braddon ACT, no website

Ginseng

I met up with friends at Ginseng for dinner before a night at the movies, and we each picked one dish to share. We started things off with a serve of the crispy duck pancakes (normally a serve of 6, we asked for 8 to split evenly). I was impressed with the service – they were prepared freshly on the table next door for us on individual plates and the duck pieces were plump, tender and generous. The pancake wrapper was thin and there was a slice of cucumber and a small sprig of spring onion, plus the hoisin sauce. Yum. The three mains came out shortly afterwards – honey prawns, Szechuan beef and sizzling Mongolian lamb. The sizzling lamb was really tender and the sauce was to die for – the right balance of sweet and salty. The beef had a great sweet and sour flavour and plenty of vegetables packed in, but I think the dish of the night was the honey prawns. Yes, I know they’re really unhealthy, but wow they tasted good! The batter was light and crisp and the prawns were so juicy, their seafood flavour enhanced by the honey. Yep, I’d definitely order like that again. Yum!

Ginseng, 15 Flinders Way, Manuka ACT, no website

Eightysix

Part One is here. We were served the prawns and the curried fish salad at the same time, so we left the cold salad until after we’d finished the delectable prawns (I scooped up every last bit of that heavenly sauce!). My only criticism of the night was that too many dishes came out at once, rather than being well-paced over the course of the meal. We had just started the salad when the chicken biryani was served. The salad was the dish of the night for me – the curried ocean trout was tender and flaked into perfect pieces, and the cucumber, celery, onion and green beans were incredibly refreshing after the spicy prawns. We saved a bit to finish with, then got stuck into the biryani, which had been cooked until some of the rice was crisped (like bibimbap). The chicken had some sort of yoghurt coating which was luscious and perfect, and the almonds, herbs and sultanas added hugely to the flavour. Finally, we decided to share a dessert – the coconut sago and mango. We loved the toasted coconut and sesame topping, the pops from the sago pearls, and then deliciously sweet, fresh mango. All in all another spectacular kitchen takeover. Come back again soon?

eightysix, 11 Elouera Street, Braddon ACT http://eightysix.com.au/

Eightysix

I couldn’t resist booking in for the second Christine Manfield extravaganza at Eightysix this year. Whilst her last ‘kitchen takeover’ was Asian-themed, this time is all about India and Bhutan, in celebration of her latest book, a travel guide to the two countries. We started out with drinks – I had the ‘strawpop’ minus alcohol, with pomegranate and lychee. It was lovely and sweet, served in a small glass bottle. On the waitress’s recommendation, we started with the beetroot roti entree – the roti was perfectly puffed and crisp, deflating into soft layers of buttery goodness and enhanced by the beetroot mix on top. I loved the slight hint of heat that lingered on the back palate from the beetroot. Next up were the cauliflower pakoras – they were super moreish, cooked in a lovely batter and served with a cool raita. The cauliflower was divine, but there were also parcels of spinach leaves with lentils wrapped inside. Yum! I was very excited to try the tamarind prawns with eggplant next – sitting at the bar, we could see the giant prawns being prepared. Everything about this dish was lovely – the thick, plump prawns, the tender but not mushy eggplant and the delicate yet spicy sauce that brought the whole ensemble together. Part two is here.

eightysix, 11 Elouera Street, Braddon ACT http://eightysix.com.au/

CBD Dumpling House

Oh dumplings, how I love you. There aren’t a huge number of restaurant offering dumplings in Canberra, but the CBD Dumpling House is (obviously) one of them. We went early on a weeknight and were seated in the window towards the back of the large, airy space. We started with a plate of prawn and pumpkin dumplings, which had a generous 14 dumplings in the serve. The prawns were whole and really tasty, with the tender pumpkin complementing the flavour nicely. The dumpling skins are a bit thick for my taste, but that was my only complaint. Dish number two was the steamed vegetables in a peanut sauce – I think this was actually the highlight of the meal, with perfectly crisp carrots, bok choy, mushrooms and broccoli that was so good it tasted creamy, doused in a heavenly peanut sauce. More please! We finished off with a plate of the shantung lamb, which is definitely not the sort of dish to have if you’re on a health kick. The pieces of spicy lamb are fried to crispy and sandwiched with fat – but gosh it tastes amazing! Reliably good food.

CBD Dumpling House, Scott’s Crossing, Canberra ACT, no website

Smoque

This is a public service announcement – Smoque offers 50c wings (yes, you read that right, 50c wings) on Monday nights for dine-in customers. Cue marching band celebratory music here. Three of us headed down to the Woden store after work to indulge – we ordered 25 wings, sides of Mexican street corn and coleslaw, and a plate of poutine (chips with gravy and curd). It was a merry feast, although my friend picked the spicy (not suicidal) wings and as much as I wanted to eat more I couldn’t – clever tactic dude, clever. The wings were freshly cooked and had a nice amount of batter without being super oily. I avoided the blue cheese dipping sauce but apparently it was great, and there were some carrot and celery sticks served with it too. The chicken was tender and fell easily off the bone – so good. The corn was a highlight, fresh and covered in delicious cheese and sauce and a bit of lime, it was a nice break from all the meat. The poutine was my favourite though – the chips were really tasty (must be made from flavoursome potatoes), and whilst I would have liked more gravy, it filled me up after I couldn’t eat any more spicy wings. Next time I’ll be getting the non-spicy ones and smashing plenty more!

Smoque, 10 Bowes Street, Phillip ACT,

XO

The egg added a richness to the utterly delicious ragout – Kent explained that this is one of his Mum’s dishes, which he knew he wanted to include on the menu here – I’d come back for this alone (once again, there I was scraping the sauce off the plate with my spoon!). We had two main plates – the crispy lamb ribs ($29) and the confit duck leg ($28). The ribs were a close second for my favourite dish – even my friend who doesn’t really like lamb loved them and has decided she can eat lamb if it’s cooked like this. The ribs are piled up in a tower, topped with corriander and Vietnamese mint, and coated in a gooey, sweet plum sauce, as well as XO’s housemade lemon oil, to cut through the richness. Whilst not elegant to eat, the ribs were tender and tasty – the herbs supercharged the flavours for me, elevating this into a really spectacular dish. Finally, we enjoyed the confit duck leg – this was a good last dish, given how spicy it was. The duck was perfectly cooked and tender, and I enjoyed the mushroom broth, but definitely needed some rice as a spice-balancer! XO ticks all the boxes, service included – absolutely worth a visit. Or two…

XO, 16 Iluka Street, Narrabundah ACT, http://www.xo-restaurant.com.au