FoodieChat

My friend Annie highly recommends this restaurant and I have been wanting to try it for ages.  A quick check of restaurant review websites came back with surprisingly mostly good reports – and I am pleased to add my own to them!  It’s on the main street at Victoria Road, on the corner, and the ambience would be romantic and cosy – well that is, if we weren’t banished to the neon-lit, cold back tables near the kitchen!   Danny the host came and apologised that it was because we’re young and not whingy that he had to give the better tables in the heated front section to the oldies… not that we were given a choice, and we had also booked too!  Suspiciously, later tables were also escorted to the front when challenging the back tables!  Anyway – now to the food. Great value!! We had the garlic prawns ($17) – fresh king prawns in a thick sauce of tomatoes, basil, white wine and plenty of garlic.  I was upset that I wasn’t told that the pastas are in fact HUGE and main sized – so I ended up having the equivalent of two mains and therefore missed out on dessert! But hey. I’m not one to criticise value for money.  

The penne with calamari was a huge serve – tangy with capers, cubed potatoes and tender calamari strips – sssoooooo filling at $19 – warning: do not order pastas as entrees unless you are sharing!!

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This place is hard for me to get to as my usual brunch day is Sunday, and Bar Biscotti is closed on Sundays – thereby handing all the Sunday gym/shopper business to its rival, Cafe Zenja.  However on a rainy Saturday my usual plans were put aside and we gave it a go.

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For a five star indian dining experience, look no further.  Abhi’s has long been the best place to have good food along with first class service and fine dining surrounds – but be prepared to pay a premium for it.

We had Prawn Achari ($13.80) – 6 pan fried green prawn cutlets cooked with fennel and pickled green chilli and yoghurt,  Alu Tikki ($10.80) – lightly spiced potato patties shallow fried in sunflower oil, topped with chickpea masala and khatta chutney (tamarind and jaggery) were DELICIOUS. Two potato patties sat artfully on a chickpea curry – not too soft, not too firm, and just the right amount of spice.  I felt there was a bit of a clash of textures though as both the patties and the curry were simliar textures.  Not to mind – the yoghurty dressing was a cool complement to the spiciness of the curry.

Tandoori chicken tikka $16.80 for a main – boneless free range chicken pieces marinated in traditional spices and tandoor roasted.   It came with our entress and was similiarly sized.  The chicken was moist, not dry, and the coriander sprinkled on top added a great extra dimension.  We were satisfied with our entrees, until we saw the table next to us, and we just HAD to try also the Masala Dosa – light and crisp rice flour pancakes accompanied by lentil sambar and coconut chutney with a filling of spiced potato and onion.  $10.80.  This was the smallest dosa I’ve ever ever seen – doesn’t compare to others I’ve tried for example at Janani’s in Homebush ($5.80 for one that is bigger than a whole fish – and goes off your plate!) and also Vasanda Bhavan. They’re jumbo sized. But hey we’re fine dining here, so portions are not meant to feed the masses . Still, it was good and well presented.

For the mains, there’s a good selection of seafood/chicken/beef and one lamb, including traditional butter chicken and kormas and vindaloos. We ordered Beef Ambotik ($18.80) – “a variation on the famous vindaloo with a tangy sweet and sour flavour cooked in tomato, cumin, ginger and peppercorns.  It was very tender, but a bit too piquant for me – and very hot too! I would have preferred a saucier curry.  Prawns and Scallops Moily Curry $22.80 promised to be a “Coastal favourite cooked with cracked black mustard, fennel, turmeric, pureed coconut and fresh curry leaves” – it was our favourite – with around 5 prawns and 4 scallops. Not too hot, with flavours that work very well together.

  For something different, we tried the Adreke Pork – pork spare ribs marinated in ginger garlic, lime juice and served with ginger and tamarind chutney ($21.80).  Sadly, the perfect sweet and sour balance was compromised by the fact that it was deep fried dried and chewy – like jerky! If it had been taken out a bit earlier, and with some of the meat juices and flavoursome fat left there, it would have been an amazing dish.  You can definitely taste the lime juice and tamarind – reminiscent of Thai style dishes with an Indian twist.

We had a good sized bowl of vegetable pilau (2 serves) – packed full of veges, and top quality rice that wasn’t as dry as some of the cheap basmastic you can get – fluffly and great with the fried onion garnishes. ($2.90 per serve).  We also had two naans – one garlic naan and one aloo parantha (stuffed with vegetables and herbs) – $3.50 each.  I think if you don’t like coriander, you lucked out at this place – it’s quite dominant.  Can’t go wrong with naan – flaky and air bubbled and crisp at the edges.

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This is my second trip to this restaurant in Sydney’s inner/north/west whatever. The first time was for my friend Bec’s hen’s night (same Bec who took me to the amazing Dadong Beijing Duck restaurant in China!), where we feasted on course after course of Shanghai specialties.   Tonight was just a quiet dinner for two; and we feasted on handmade noodles with pickled vegetables and shredded pork. A huge mound of slippery al dente noodles came to our table, stir fried with plenty of bean shoots, and shredded pork.  The pork was quite fatty, but the noodles were surprisingly not too oily at all! Could have done with a bit more salted vegetable – because I love them – but at $8.80 you can’t complain too much!  The noodles were brilliant with the chilli oil I asked for too.  Then came my favourite dumplings of all time – wartip – or pot stickers as they are also known. These are crescent shaped dumplings wrapped with pork mince (and sometimes some vegetables), and then pan fried and steamed until the meat and pastry is cooked, and the bottoms crunchy.  They’re served bottoms up so they remain crunchy. We got 10 for $8.80. Bargain.

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