A Awful Breakfast Experience to start the Vacation

Seated near Gate 16 while waiting to board A380 to start of my vacation. Decided it was a good time to write about the horrible breakfast we just had at Café Vue.

Mr. had checked their opening hours a few days before to make sure we were able to had our daily dose of caffeine before we were up in the air. As many know, there wasn’t much choice in Melbourne Airport. Café Vue might be the best choice as they served breakfast as well.

“Café Vue” was lighted in pink neon light; all passengers proceeding to the individual gates will not miss it. There were only 2 staffs when we walked in at 0715. A waitress on the floor and a male barista. Not a good sign as the crowd was starting to build.

I was in the mid of walking up to the counter to make my order when I saw the menu and grabbed two. The waitress did manage to get around taking our order with an expressionless face.

Mr. ordered an Atlantic Egg Benedict while I chosen Corn Fritter with 2 coffees and a glass of juice.

Both breakfast were served together followed by our coffee. I wasn’t impressed with the corn fritter on 1^st look. It looked like hash brown with very crispy skin and overdone. We also noticed both plates were stained, oil and water marks all over the plates.

When Mr. cut into his poached eggs, both yolks were way overdone! The buns were cold. His coffee was not even lukewarm and it tasted horrible! He says the coffee was way worst than what it’s served in hospital (worst than hospital food). He only had 1 sip and pushed it aside.

The avocado that came with the corn fritter was too sour. I can taste a bit of herb in the corn fritter (fennel/cumin) but I can’t taste the sweetness of the corn. Fitter was very crispy but also dry and oily. Did the chef deep-fried the corn fritter as a to re-heat? My soy cappuccino was so-so and with a ugly presentation. 

The best out of all was in fact the freshly squeezed orange juice. What a great way to start a long day ahead of us.

I’ll be catching a few flights during this vacation; writing might be the best method to pass time also to pen down this vacation experience.

2nd Chance?

Kumo Izakaya is the latest addition to Melbourne Food and Beverage industry. It was only 2 weeks old when I popped on a Tuesday night.  The building looks amazing and it stands out among all others along the street. The restaurant decoration in both interior and exterior looks very polish and grand. The designer cover every single detail regardless how tiny it is.



I like the tableware and it's available for purchase at the restaurant. It doesn't come cheap. Wonder will they feel the pinch when their staff breaks them? Or the staff have to pay for the damage?

We arrived 30 minutes early than expected but that wasn't a problem as it was pretty empty. Got seated and served really quickly.  Up to this point, the impression I had was good. But sadly it stop there.

Might be due to large number of serving staff available that evening, we were being questioned every 2 minutes whether were we ready to make some order. The over attentiveness being to irritate us.



Mr. was driving plus he doesn't drink therefore ordered a mocktail : Elderflower Cloud - Elderflower Syrup, Peach Bitters, Mint and Basil topped with Ginger Beer



The rest, we shared a bottle of Sake - Kizakura Nigori. It's very sweet but smooth. I like it.



To start, we ordered 6 dishes to share. Was advised that we might to double every dish as each potion was catered for 2. Lucky we sticked to our order.


Wagyu Beef Tataki with Tosazu
Beef tasted very average without much marbling and soaked with light teriyaki sauce. The attention to detail was poor, execution was lazy because it tasted like a very commonly prepared dish which can be done by anyone. It shouldn't command a premium price.


Seared Scallops with Butter and Soy topped with Bonito Flakes
The scallops were cold, bland and tasteless. It doesn't taste like what it claim to taste.


Sashimi Jo-moriawase Premium Chef's Selection (26)
Another disappointing dish with the half of the scallops wasn't fresh, tasting weird. In fact other than the scampi sashimi, all the rest of the sashimi wasn't fresh at all. This dish cost us $50!


King Prawn Fry Wrapped in Potato with Green Tea Salt
The potato was very crispy but the prawn was overcooked. It wasn't fresh, dried and had a fridge smell. It was frozen prawn that they used?


Assorted Kushimori Chicken Skin, Thigh and Breast Skewers
The chicken skin wasn't crispy. It tasted like it was boiled and then very lightly grilled. It wasn't pleasant to eat. The breast was way overcooked, very dried and tasteless. Even for the thigh, it was dried.


Housemade Black Sesame Tofu Tempura
The skin was very crispy but the black sesame tofu tasted weird. It wasn't smooth and with a slight hint of black sesame. Another disappointing dish.

To save the night, Golden Field was picked to continue with our night dinner. Before we left, we had to spend 5 minutes trying to grab any staff attention to get the bill.

Other than the drink, there wasn't a single dish we enjoyed. It was definitely over priced! Will I give it a 2nd chance 6 months later? Seriously no idea especially with so many restaurant out there to pick.

p.s. we did feedback about the food. he looked surprised by our feedback. maybe it was his 1st time receiving negative feedback?

Diving in Sipadan 2010

I know this is a food blog but diving is another passion of mine therefore decided to shar it here.

I finally got around to upload some videos taken during our vacation last year. Found them while clearing the memory card for our upcoming trip. As some of you might know. Mr. and me are both active divers. Mr. never fail to plan our annual vacation revolving around diving.

Last year, we managed to dive in Sipadan, Mauritius and Seychelles. Very soon we are departing for our 2011 diving trip. This time round I will try to blog as we travel. No idea how well I'm going to cope :P


School of Jacks



Turtle

Both video recorded on 15th Sept 2010 by Mr.

Izakaya Den

Our dining experience at Izakaya Den started with flying colours but ended unpleasantly. Continue reading if you like to find out why.

As we were attending a farewell drinking session later in the evening, we decided to grab dinner in the city before. We were counting on our luck as we didn't have any reservation made at.

1st pick was Izakaya Den as it had being on Mr. edible wishlist for quite awhile now. Mr. roughly know where it's situated. We knew it's underground and kinda of hidden but we still couldn't find it at 1st. We went onto google map using our iphone and realised we were actually standing right in front of the entrance. Oh man do I felt stupid :-/

There was already a line formed when we got to the restaurant. Was informed there will be about 20 minutes wait and was offered clean towel for refreshment and menu.



Menu was rolled up and bounded using colour rubber band. I mistaken the longer roll for food menu but it was actually drink menu.

As Mr. doesn't drink, he ordered Nettai Nippon - passionfruit, fresh lime, basil,shiso,dash tobasco. It was very refreshing with initial taste of strong basil and ending with tobasco. It also had a bit of crunch from the passionfruit seeds.



I started with Onoya no Kabosu - Kabosu is japanese citric fruit like yuzu, sweet and aromatic. It was very smooth, tasted both sweet and sour. In fact it doesn't taste alcoholic at all.

We were seated at the bar, in front of the grilling section. Bar section on the left and hot food section on the right. It was a good spot, I always loved to watched the chef going thru the docket and prepare the food. I could even see the bartender prepare every single drink order.










Sweet Corn Kaki-age
It was served with green tea salt? But do go easy on it. This dish was flavorsome enough to just had it by itself. It was filled with lots of sweet plump corn. It was deep fried till very crunchy but not oily.


Char Siu
I enjoyed this dish a lot more than Mr. He felt there was too much honey in this dish. But the pork slices were cooked till very soft and practically melts in the mouth.


Kingfish Sashimi
Mr. felt it was a very refreshing dish but I felt the dressing was too sour. It was a waste to cover the sweetness of the good fresh fish with so much citric.


Fried Black Rice
Although it was a very simple dish made up of a bit of oil, small serve of black rice, egg and a pinch of salt and pepper as we observed the chef frying every single plate. It was also a dish that surprised both of us. I like the individually separated gains of rice and the bite of it.


Wagyu Porterhouse served with pickled cauliflower
I loved the cauliflower. It was crunchy, fresh, sweet and sour.


This was a piece of meat! But can I complain that it was too small? It was 1st grilled and finished off in the oven wrapped in foiled.


Barramundi Fillet with Hajikami
It was grilled very nicely and juicy.

The chef in-charged of the grilling section was very attentative regardless whether was it beef or fish fillet or whole fish head or vegetable. She gave them all the same care and attention. I loved watching her cooking with love.

Up to this point, we both were happier with the food we ordered, the service but all went down hill from here. As we both still had tummy space to fill. We ordered two more dishes waited for more than 30 minutes and nothing in sigh. The kitchen had definitely slowed down as most of the guests were either all done with their meal or had most of their ordered dishes in front of them.

We began to feel puzzled and wondered whether did the waitress missed our order as she seemed very busy just now. We had a check with the waitress whether had the chef began preparing our dish but she only came back to us after 5 minutes and said we will need to wait for another 5-10 minutes if we still want the dish.

I wasn't very happy at that point because the table next to us placed their order after ours and they had all their 5 dishes served before us. How did that work? I suspected that the waitress didn't punch in our order into the system until we checked with her. But she still gave us excuse that the kitchen was busy which wasn't what we saw.


Mussels
Nothing special and felt the mussel wasn't fresh. The mussel wasn't fat instead it was pretty small.


Marinated Scallops
Presentation was pretty but that's about it. Scallops was a bit dry. I wasn't sure were the scallops cooked. The lotus roots were crunchy. But the whole dish was pretty bland.


Black Sesame Brulee
Lucky the dessert didn't disappoint us. There was a thin layer of burned sugar and strong flavor or black sesame. It was still soft and not over baked.

We were very disappointed with the last two dishes but lucky the grilled dishes made up for it. Did it live up to my expectation? I don't think so or because I read about them too much and had too high hopes?