Taste Gallery, Parramatta

Salted Duck

I feared for the fate of one of my favourite Asian cheap-eat joints in Parramatta when Taste Gallery opened right next door to it. Occupying the space that was previously a harmless Italian take-away, Taste Gallery offered a similar Shanghainese menu and had a much more modern design, and of course, a pricier menu to follow. And I didn't like the sound of it.

Interestingly enough, the restaurant caters to a much different group of diners, and its existence does not have as great of an impact on its neighbour as you'd expect. I know this, as I'm sitting at Taste Gallery, browsing through the menu, whilst a continuous stream of customers enter both restaurants.

Chicken in Chilli Sauce 

We're here to check out the competition, because of a great Groupon deal, though at $65 for the four of us, it's still more than what we'd normally spend next door. This offers much more than we'd normally order, with an entree, main and dessert each and we don't hesitate to pick our own favourites, starting with the salted duck, which is a little bland and boring.

The chicken in chilli sauce is the polar opposite, with a strong hit of flavour with every bite from the chilli sauce, which is not actually as hot as it may look.

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Chocolate Bavarian Cake

Having taken a break from any cooking for the past few months, I didn't hesitate to volunteer to take over the role of making lunch on Saturday, when my mum started complaining how difficult it was to cater to our tastes everyday. With all these saved links of delicious food ideas/inspirations I'd compiled during the exam weeks, you would have thought that it'd be a breeze, right?

We ended up eating instant noodles for lunch.

And I wasn't even the one who made them!

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Bunny Sushi, Chedi Thai

It’s this time of the year again!

Marked by the burning of books and notes (nah, I’ve never actually done that), crawling out of my shell for the first time in weeks (okay, so that’s not so true either) and doing basically everything fun that comes to mind........... it’s the holidays again!!

And it means that I finally have time to blog again, though I have to admit it's not the most exciting of all my post exam activities...

During this time last year, I got into sushi making, and was rather obsessed with the idea of making cutely shaped sushi characters. Though they looked alright (a far cry from the professional ones in the book I used), they tasted too bland for my liking. The latest addition to my (rather small) collection of sushi brings me a little closer to making a better tasting sushi, being the first of the character sushi rolls which isn't completely made out of rice!

The design itself is quite simple, with only a nose and mouth (as in the cat sushi) and some pretty straightforward crabstick ears to make. Oh, and plus two eyes which I was originally going to make with nori but didn't have enough time so I photoshopped them on instead

And onto my post-exam celebrations:

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