Wandering Fel

There are so many good restaurants in Sydney but it seems that whenever we are meeting our friends here, all of them jointly rave about the wonderful ribs at Hurricane's Grill. One of my friends say her experience there was so good up to the point she came back to Hurricane's to have another go at their ribs. Boosted by the rave review and our hungry stomach after conquering 6km of Sydney Coastal Walk, we made our way to Roscoe Street in Bondi, where Hurricane's Grill and Bar is located. The restaurant was pretty deserted around 5.30PM on a Friday evening with only 2 other tables occupied besides us but I suppose that's because 5.30PM is way way way early for dinner even for Australian standard.

Friday in Sydney is a huge chillaxing affair where a lot of people can be found lazing on the bench or even on grass on a summer day reading books or drinking booze. Some of the people who were sitting on the bench that day were wearing office attire, I kinda wonder if they really can go out from office anytime they want. After all, we have been hearing so many things about Australian's great flexibility on work life balance. Hmm, is anyone interested in working in Australia, then?

The concept of Friday Foodie Market offered by the Rocks is cool and relaxed. You don't see people rushing from one stall to another stall to get food. Even though there are some queue lines spotted at certain spot, people seem to just queue in a chill manner. A lot of homemade food is offered in the Friday Foodie Market from homemade jam, sushi, crusty bread and pastries, chocolate, condiments, oil, fresh fruit and vegetables to even, billtong sticks (which seems to be beef skewers). Lovely flowers for your beloved ones are also available at the Rocks Friday Foodie Market. Do note that the foodie market is only open from 9AM to 3PM so don't come here after 3PM to avoid disappointment. On the other hand, the Rocks Markets which is held on Saturdays and Sundays is open from 10AM to 5PM and it is held at the same place with the Friday Foodie Market.

Other than for the food market, the Rocks is an awesome neighbourhood to explore. The neighbourhood has many historic laneways in the shadow of Sydney Harbour Bridge. In addition, the area also have some of Sydney's oldest pubs and there are buskers performing along the busy harbourfront promenade.

 The creation of Pancakes on the Rocks' concept was inspired by a visit of certain Australians to America. Pancake is a popular staple of food in American restaurants and these Australians wanted to bring that similar love of pancakes to Australia. The first Pancakes on the Rocks was opened in Adelaide back in 1965 and now, the restaurant has many branches across Australia. The original founders separated with one and then moved to Sydney to open Pancakes on the Rocks. The restaurant is set like a family diner in America (based on the TV series that I watch since I have never set my foot in the land of freedom). Pancakes on the Rocks offers a wide selection of both savoury and sweet pancakes. Their savoury pancakes include Potato Au Gratin (AUD 16.95) and Mexican Potato (AUD 17.95). Despite the availability of the savoury pancakes, it seems that the most popular items from the menu are all the sweet pancakes (if the list is accurate) such as Strawberry Patch (AUD 14.95), Bananarama (AUD 13.95), and Chocolate Jewels (AUD 12.95). The serving portion of the pancake seems to be on the huge side, so be mindful when you only have two mouths to feed. Otherwise, you may have an overdose of pancake.

We decided to go for Coco Berry (AUD 13.95) which is described as chocolate pancakes with coconut, cream, vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate sauce and raspberry coulis (i.e. A form of thick sauce made from pureed and strained vegetables or fruits). My first impression of Coco Berry is definitely "what kind of a mess is this?" The pancake is a sweetness overkill because well if you work the combination in your brain, a chocolate pancake drenched with chocolate sauce alone equals to sweetness overdose in my opinion. Especially when it's not even made from dark chocolate. Thankfully, we only ordered a plate of pancake because I don't think I can eat a whole serving of the pancake by myself.

 Well, you can always go for other option than pancakes such as their gourmet pizza and grill items (e.g. Pork ribs, fish & chips, etc). But to be honest, what's the point of visiting Pancakes on the Rocks if you are not going to try out their pancake, right?

Pancakes on the Rocks is located at:

4 Hickson Road, the Rocks

Sydney, Australia

Opening hours:

Daily 24 hours

Cafes in Sydney opens pretty early everyday (usually from 7AM) but they close pretty early too (can be as early as 4PM). So I tried to make it a habit to start the day early. But sometimes, you cannot really believe your own standard of being early. As Lee and I have expected of our own capability, we were only able to get out from our accommodation around 9-ish. Not too shabby and yet, not significantly earlier than our usual waking-up time in Singapore when we are not working. But this timing works out to our convenience because by the time we were having our breakfast, the morning office crowd has dispersed and gone to their respective office buildings. This means we can easily find seats in any cafe for our breakfast fix. Woohoo!

For our first breakfast in Sydney, we are going to Bourke Street where the famous Bourke Street Bakery is located. Bourke Street is located in Surry Hills area and it is a quiet neighbourhood where you can enjoy morning/afternoon/evening walk peacefully.             

  

Before I went to Sydney for my birthday trip, a lot of my friends suggested to eat Thai and Vietnamese food in Australia because (a) they are pretty authentic and (b) they taste so good. When I did my google search for "best Thai food in Sydney", the name Chat Thai popped up quite a number of times in both Zomato and Tripadvisor. It receives a lot of good reviews from the netizens and hence, we decided to just eat Thai food there.

I always hear that Australia is the country to go if you are a brunch lover. After hearing so much about this fact about Australia, obviously the first thing that I wanted to do when I arrived in Sydney is...well, going to a brunch place. This is not withstanding that by the time we left our accommodation, it's about tea time. In the planning stage, I've stumbled upon a restaurant named Bills for quite a few times and read a lot of good review about the restaurant's food so we decided to just pop by and try a few of their items.

 We had taken into consideration the humongous serving size of meal in Australia so we decided to order one appetiser and one dish from Bills' Classic menu. My travel mate, Lee, is an avid fans of fries and there's no way he's gonna skip ordering fries at Bills. He told me that he enjoyed the thick and well-seasoned fries (AUD 10.50) served at Bills. Without realising it, we have polished the bowl to the last fries.