Eating out in Brisbane

We revisited Viale Canova in Clayfield to celebrate Bob's birthday as we had had a wonderful Italian meal there a few years ago, with very impressive service and tasters between courses.  Our host that day was one of the owners and we had really enjoyed ourselves.  This time, there was a mix up about the booking time at their end, and we were telephoned to see where we were.  There were apologies about the mistake, but this should have warned us that things were not quite controlled this time.  We treated ourselves to a nice bottle of red wine - beautiful but overpriced in my humble opinion.  We were given a free taster plate of what seemed to be a bacon and puff pastry slice.  Nice, but not outstanding, and not very crisp. We both shared bread with dipping dishes available of olive oil, balsamic vinegar and butter.  We were also given a grinder of sea salt just in case we wanted salt.  For main course Bob chose the rabbit and pasta and I had the seafood soup.  Both of us enjoyed our meals, but Bob thought his had a bit too much pasta and too little sauce.  Plus, he felt that the sauce was a bit too buttery.  I liked my soup a lot more, but it wasn't as outstanding as I remember the past meal.  Unfortunately there was only one serve of pana cotta with a berry sauce left - they had had a large party for lunch that day and they had eaten everything, which was a bit of a disappointment.  By that stage, the only other patrons had left, and the waitress told us she was leaving too, but that the chef was still theres , so we felt rather  encouraged to cut short our evening and leave too. The whole evening wasn't as lovely as I had hoped, but  I suppose our expectations after our last experience were very high.  No photos, I am sorry, I forgot.

Next door to the Viale Canova is Dolce Sapori, and, on another day, I really enjoyed the Italian experience there.  They do make wonderful Italian cakes there.

They were so wonderful, I knew Bob would love them, so got him one of their gift boxes.  I was right, he enjoyed it.

 

 

Bob and I also went to our local Thai restaurant, the Siam Pagoda Thai Garden Restaurant, for dinner one night.   It is a very welcoming atmosphere with a sweet little garden if you want to eat outside, though not grand. The food is nice suburban food and good value, though suited to Australian tastes.

 

 We had Thai fish cakes, which were nice, but not overly special:

 

 

We also had the beef Pad Thai, which was very tasty indeed, steamed rice, and the Pad Krapow, which was pleasant

 

We also went out to dinner with some friends to a restaurant which I have wanted to visit for years because of its dedication to Australian native food, Tukka.  I started the evening with a very nice mojito with spiced dark rum and finger limes.

Then, we all were given a taster of escavietched crocodile

 

I found that the tomato overpowered the crocodile a bit, and the crocodile is very chewy, but I did enjoy it.

Then, we ordered the sides as entrees. We had the damper with macadamia oil, and lemon myrtle dukkah. The bread was sweetish and the combination was quite nice, but I think it would have benefitted with some salt too.

 

the other side course/entree was a bunya nut and macadamia nut salad, which I really enjoyed.  I have never tasted bunya nut before and I loved it.

 

For the main course, Bob had the kangaroo, which he found a bit underwhelming.  I think he prefers the barbequed kangaroo the children have cooked him:

 

 

 

I ordered the sole, which I enjoyed, though some of my fellow diners found it a bit too bony a fish.I liked the idea of the paperbark, but it didn't realy add anything to the flavour.

 

 

 For dessert, Bob had the figs and pain perdu. He again was a bit underwhelmed by it.

I had the grilled grapefruit and mascarpone, which was pleasant but not overwheming.

 

So we enjoyed the meal, but were not blown away by it.  I think I would have liked to have  stronger tastes and probably more native foods than we had. Maybe I should have tried the emu. I was expecting , perhaps, a bit too much, but given the wide range of indigenous food we now have available, I think I would have liked a bit more represented in the menu.  However, the service was very good, the staff very helpful and efficient, and it was a nice evening. ( I am beginning to feel a bit like a sourpuss about being so negative).

 

As well as eating out, we have been eating at home.  One night, we had a seafood and chicken paella

 

with a dessert of floating islands.

We also had our first taste of kale, stir fried with pork.  I like it and will be trying it again.

Another night, we had grilled chicken, green papaya salad and chips made from purple yam, white sweet potato and taro.

We also had yam rice for the first time, which we aso liked a lot.

 

No recipe this week!  Sorry!