Gogyo

I remember my first meal at Gogyo very well – it was first time I really fell in love with ramen. Here wasn’t just an oily or fatty broth, here was broth with some serious flavour. Years later, it was just as good as I remembered. After exploring the Nishiki Market, we lined up to be the first in for dinner at Gogyo. The service is quite excellent – the staff are attentive to your every need and are really professional. Dining on a weekend, we received a starter for ¥300 and had a choice between ‘radish’ or ‘chicken’. I picked radish and enjoyed the warmed little dish with its mysterious sauce (whatever it was, was delicious). Next up was a plate of fresh cucumber with a spicy sesame seasoning – a nice contrast between the heat of the seasoning and the cool cucumber. Then the main game – the burnt soy ramen. Yep, bring on the black broth and its rich, salty flavour. The ramen themselves have plenty of bite and the pork was lovely and tender. I adore soft-boiled ramen eggs and this was one of the best. All the ingredients combined to make a really special ramen unlike any other I’ve ever eaten.

Gogyo, 452 Jumonjicho Takoyakushi Sagaru, Yanaginobamba-dori, Kyoto Japan http://www.ramendining-gogyo.com

The Butcher’s Apprentice

Sometimes a meal just blows you away, and that’s exactly what happened at our shared dinner at the Butcher’s Apprentice. I started with the Butcher’s Mistress cocktail – gin, lychee, basil, citrus – it was well-balanced and very refreshing. We were offered the ‘dry chips’ as a snack while deciding on the rest of the menu (very classy upselling!) and enjoyed every bite of the crisp potato, sweet potato and taro, salted delightfully with paprika. Next was the ‘crackle and pop’ – pork and chicken crackling with popcorn and more paprika. The skins were served cold and crispy, in perfect bite-sized pieces. The chacuterie plate had a very generous serve of cured meat, with a creative tomato jam and slightly charred, oiled bread. Next came the main – pork cheek served with rainbow chard, pickle, watermelon rind and a mound of orange blossom floss. The sweetness of the floss went so perfectly with the melt-in-your-mouth pork cheek! The star dish had to be the ‘chocolate’ dessert – a chocolate panna cotta lined the base of the bowl, topped with dark chocolate pearls, white chocolate flakes, chocolate floss and marmalade. Heaven! The Butcher’s Apprentice offers just the right pitch of fine dining with friendly, welcoming staff and truly exciting, creative food.

The Butcher’s Apprentice, 17 Redleaf Avenue, Wahroonga, NSW, no website

Gumshara Ramen

My first visit to Gumshara was simply fantastic – I was amazed at how authentic the flavour of their tonkotsu ramen was, so on this visit I was keen to try one of their other broths. I picked the shoyu ramen, which is made with a light fish broth, with added soy sauce. Gumshara’s bowls are huge, but somehow always seem to be the right amount of food for dinner. Unlike many ramen places, here the noodles always have just the right amount of bite, and they’ve recently started offering thin noodles as an option. I picked the thick noodles and after a short wait sat down with my big bowl of happiness. The pork slices were lovely and thin and melted in your mouth, and the fresh spring onion added flavour and texture. There were plenty of noodles and the broth itself was light as promised, although that certainly didn’t mean watery – it just wasn’t as rich or fatty as the tonkotsu, which suited me fine. There’s no post-ramen-drink-three-litres-of-water saltiness, just incredible flavour. Whilst not the cheapest bowl of ramen in town (expect to pay around $13), I would have to say that this remains my favourite ramen in Australia.

Gumshara Ramen, Shop 211, 25-29 Dixon Street, Haymarket NSW, no website.

Eightysix

Part one of this review is here. My dish of the night would have to be the next plate – if you’re going over the next couple of days, please be brave and try the sichuan wallaby tartare! The meat was out-of-this-world good, tender and coated in a complex dressing that was elevated to a whole new level with the crisp garlic flakes. The garlic actually created a creamy coating in the inside of your mouth, which made each mouthful of meat just that bit better. Our last savoury plate was the sweet & sour lamb, which we ordered because we kept getting wafts of as it was plated in front of us! The flavour packed into the masterstock was really something else. I told Christine how much we were enjoying it and she summed it up perfectly with a knowing smile -“finger licking good!”. The lamb was amazingly tender and the perfect note to finish on. Well, until dessert! We picked the ‘sugar daddy’ – a chocolate praline mousse and candied cumquats. The mousse was inside a chocolate pastry tart shell, and overall the chocolate part of the dessert wasn’t as sweet as I expected, but that was ideal as the cumquats, both syrup and freeze-dried versions, added a great tart-sweetness. It was a real privelige not only to enjoy such a diverse yet complementary meal, but also to watch a real master at work in the kitchen. I stick by our comment in the guest book – “make her stay!!!”.

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

Eightysix

#icecreamthurs will resume next week; eightysix will be a double post today. You may have heard the buzz – Christine Manfield is in town, taking over the kitchen at eightysix. My friend and I booked bar seats with a kitchen view on her first night and here’s what happened. We started out with cocktails whilst scouring the rather long pop up menu full of Asian-inspired dishes. I picked the ‘Jessica Rabbit’, a lovely concoction of gin, strawberry, pickled ginger and prosecco that started out sweet on the front palate and grew into a warm gin flavour at the back. Our first dish was the prawn toast. This take was sophisticated and plentiful – the toast was deep fried but remained fluffy, and there was plenty of crispy prawn meat on top along with a delightful mayonnaise and sesame seeds. I am now wrecked for packet prawn toast! Our next dish was the enticingly named ‘strange flavour chicken noodles’ – this was an exciting mix of spice and flavour, definitely not for the faint-hearted. The chicken was delightfully tender and the somen noodles were cooked to perfection. The best mouthfuls were the ones with the micro corriander – absolutely perfect. Next up was the bulgogi beef steamed bun with kimchi pickle – we shared one, and found the bao to be light and springy and the beef to be nicely balanced with the kimchi. Part two to follow.

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

Meating Room

I met my friend at the Meating Room in Weston for dinner a couple of nights after their opening, and was immediately impressed with the fitout and the atmosphere. The place was full of all sorts of groups (families, couples, groups of friends) at 6:30pm on a Sunday. We were seated in lovely armchairs and ordered a few things to share. The tapas came out together – arancini balls with a garlic sauce and pulled pork sliders – and really that would have been enough dinner for the both of us. The arancini was the highlight for me – with a crispy panko crumb and full of veggies, parmesan and rice, they went perfectly with the garlic sauce and were great value with 12 pieces on the plate. The sliders (2 in a serve) were tasty to start but the flavour faded after a few mouthfuls (not enough BBQ sauce?) – the pork was tender but my friend’s slider was very oily. Finally our Meatingroom pizza arrived – it was clearly made on site as the shape was imperfect, but the base was lovely and crispy and the topping was full of meat – chorizo, bacon, salami, pulled pork and beef – so good. The staff were exceptionally friendly and I look forward to many more cozy evenings exploring their menu.

Meating Room, 45B Liardet Street, Weston ACT                        http://meatingroom.com.au/

Zootz

The reviews for Zootz were mixed, so when we went for a celebratory dinner I was a bit worried about what might happen. Zootz has a fabulous location right near the jetty, and we were one of many groups seated outside. I’d heard it was a seafood place, but on arrival the menu didn’t actually have a lot of seafood options, and I couldn’t go past the call of a good steak. My friends ordered drinks and they took a while to come out – we had to ask after them twice before they arrived, which was a bit poor, even for a busy night. Our food arrived at the same time though, and I was amazed at the large cut on the plate. I’d ordered it medium-rare, which to me means pink in the middle, but sadly my steak was overdone. However, the flavours were incredible – the caramelised onion on top went nicely with the rich, smooth mashed potato and the sweet balsamic sauce drizzled on top. The steak itself was lovely and tender, although not melt-in-your-mouth, and both of us eating it agreed we would order it again. Don’t expect perfection, but Zootz offers a good value meal.

Zootz Kitchen Bar, 257 Seaview Road, Henley Beach SA                 http://zootzhenleybeach.wix.com/home