A couple of weeks ago, I was headed to Parramatta Westfields and decided to grab PappaRich with a friend.

If anyone wants to check it out, there are located just outside of Parramatta Westfields near Max Brenner and right next to Nandos.

Living in South-West Sydney, I drive past Canley Heights quite a bit. Canley Heights is sort of starting to build a reputation of becoming an area where little gems, restaurant wise, are starting to pop up. Through my numerous drives through the area, I noticed that a new restaurant 'Ryoma' was opening.


 I first experienced Japanese BBQ in Japan and really enjoyed it. The meat is cut a lot thinner and is more fatty due to more marbling than the meat that is served for a Korean BBQ generally. This makes for some great tasting meat as well as some great fire photos. The sauces are also quite different to Korean BBQs with the sauces given for Japanese BBQ being more oil based than the Korean sauces.

I visited Ryoma about a week ago with a couple of my friends. Tables were full but we didn't really have to wait for long - just long enough for the wait staff to get our table ready. Their menu is posted outside their restaurant so you can check out the menu and decide on what you want before getting seated. We decided to get Pork Ribs (it really looked like Pork Belly), Wagyu beef Inside Skirts and Rib Fingers (2 plates of the Rib Fingers), Ox Tongue, Mixed Vegetables, Baby Octopus, Karaage Chicken, Takoyaki and Lemon & Lime Bitters as a drink.


The Karaage Chicken was really nice but I'm not too certain if it's the best Karaage Chicken that I have had. The Takoyaki was really nice and quite bigger than what I have gotten at other restaurants. I found the inside quite nice and fluffy. The Lemon & Lime Bitters were served in a glass bigger than I'm used to so it seemed like I was getting more.


The Mixed Vegetables consisted of 3 types of mushrooms (that I can't remember at the moment), pumpkin, onions, eggplant and corn. The pumpkin took forever to cook and I wished that they partially cooked it to a degree so that the BBQ could just brown it and finish off the cooking process. The corn was just regular corn on the cob but I love corn so I found it really tasty especially with the meat and such also infused in ... but that may just be me.


My favourite meats had to be the Wagyu beef dishes especially the Inside Skirts. They were just so tender and juicy and when dipped into the soy-oil sauce (at least I think it was), it was just heaven on your tastebuds. I highly recommend that you get at least one Wagyu beef dish. I really liked the Baby Octopus as well since it was nice and tender when cooked. The Pork Ribs were okay, not the best but they were nice to eat. With every BBQ restaurant, whether Korean or Japanese, you will get frozen meat and for us that came in the form of our second plate of Wagyu Beef Rib Finger. It wasn't totally frozen but I could tell that they got it out of a freezer due to the hardness of the meat. However saying that, it still tasted great.


The wait staff at the restaurant were really nice and welcoming especially when we initially entered. However, when we ordered our second round of dishes, one of the wait staff forgot to finalise our order since it is all done via a tablet and this resulted in the kitchen not getting our order. So I would definitely check that orders are finalised when ordering more dishes after your initial order of dishes.

Ryoma is open between 5:30 and 10pm and is located on Canley Vale Road, Canley Heights. The pricing is pretty average, nothing too outrageous in my opinion. With all those dishes that I mentioned above, it came to roughly $28 per person and there was 4 of us eating. I would definitely recommend you visiting the restaurant if you fancy eating or trying out Japanese BBQ.

Like every Tuesday, Rosa and I meet up after I finish class and she finishes work for dinner before we head home. However, what we thought would be a normal dinner will now be forever known as one of the best dinners we have ever had. Let me introduce you to Macchiato Sydney.


We were greeted when we stepped in by some of the friendliest  staff that I have ever seen in hospitality. They made jokes about joining us for dinner and that we had to eat with them because one of them was dying. It was definitely a start to a meal that we had never gotten before. The customer service from then now definitely added to our experience. Our waitress made conversation with us, we were promptly served our food and any enquiries or requests that we had were quickly answered. And it all happened with a genuine smile on their face. The staff at Macchiato definitely added something extra to the atmosphere of the restaurant.


Once we sat down and saw the menu, we seriously starting salivating. I kept imagining all the different options in front of me and it seriously made the whole picking ordeal so much harder. We decided that we would each order one starter, one pizza and one drink each. From hindsight, that right there should have warned us that we were already ordering wayyy too much.

For our starters, we went for bruschetta and chips. The bruschetta was absolutely amazing. If you ever decide to go visit, you should definitely order one. It was unlike any bruschetta that I have ever eaten. It was served on a pizza base instead of a piece of toasted bread. The pizza base allowed for us to eat the entire thing while still tasting the sweetness of the tomatoes and the slight tanginess from the vinaigrette while the base remained crunchy. The problem I have with other bruschettas is that the bread after a while becomes soggy and it can be quite difficult to cut through when eating it bite by bite. You don't have that problem here. We were so amazed by it that we both became food critics and it was actually quite funny, thinking back on it. The chips were nice, crunchy and perfectly cooked. The outside had a nice golden colour to it while the inside remained fluffy and oh so delicious. You can't ask for more than that in chips.


For pizzas, I ordered the Pepperoni while Rosa ordered the Prosciutto with Rocket. I really enjoyed the thin, crispy crust. Another plus I found with the pizza was that it wasn't overloaded with cheese like I have found with other pizzas and therefore didn't leave me with a stomach ache. However, I wish we had the option of chilli oil since I like my food with a little bit of a kick.


For drinks, I ordered the Mango and Peach Mocktail while Rosa ordered the Lychee Mocktail. I loved the thickness of my drink and how it was sweet but not overly sweet. It was probably one of the best drinks that I have had in a while. Rosa's drink was really pretty with the layer of rosewater at the bottom and whole lychees floating and it tasted pretty good from the one sip I had but I didn't get the sweetness of the rosewater since Rosa drank all of it with her first sip.

Macchiato has definitely become one of my favourite restaurants for Sydney now with the great customer service and amazing food and drinks. I don't know why Macchiato isn't getting great reviews across the board but I will definitely be back for brunch or a coffee in the near future.

Last week, I decided that my inner hipster needed to get out and show herself. For this to occur, I travelled to Newtown with some friends and visited Brewtown Newtown.



The moment I stepped off Newtown Station, I could already feel the hipster coming out LOL. If you wish to visit, turn left once out of the station and keep walking straight until you see the store "T2". Once you reach the store, there's an alleyway right there and you just need to turn into the alleyway and you shall reach the cafe.

The cafe was actually bigger than I expected since I visited "Circa" in Parramatta and that place was tiny. I visited on a weekday at about 10:30-11am and the wait for a table was relatively small. We got placed at a side table which was actually quite bad for us since those tables were really high up. This made eating really difficult for us since we are all relatively small in comparison to the Australian population. Our waitress was really nice and friendly and I loved the overall feel of the whole cafe.

We decided to pick this particular place since we heard it was the only place in Newtown that served cronuts. I decided to try the chocolate cronut while my friends tried out the jam and glazed cronut respectively. The cronut was actually quite nice with a crunchy exterior but fluffy layers inside with chocolate dispersed between the layers of pastry. In addition to the cronut, I also ordered a hot chocolate to accompany it, which was probably a bad idea to begin with. The hot chocolate was pretty much perfect for me in terms of sweetness and creaminess so I would definitely go back for their hot chocolate. However, the hot chocolate combined with the chocolate cronut did leave me with a chocolate overload.

I would definitely come back again, in fact we plan on doing so, to try out their breakfast menu since we saw some plates and they looked absolutely delicious. I would however request to be seated at a table where bar stools are not used just for ease of eating.

On Monday, myself with two friends decided to go and catch-up at Macquarie Hotel Liverpool Bistro. What drew us into this bistro is that it offers 'Buy One Get One Free' with mains every night for dinner and the whole day on weekends. This pretty much results in a very cheap meal.

The meal was pretty good and the servings definitely made the money worthwhile. The mains pretty much range from high 10s to low 30s with the high 20s and low 30s being for different types of steaks. The seating was very relaxing with an interior and exterior option. The two are separated by bifolding doors and loungers (which looked very comfy).

We ordered the Inferno Wings and Chips, Portuguese Grilled Chicken, Salt and Pepper Squid and Creamy Boscaiola Schnitzel. I didn't personally have the Schnitzel so I can't comment on that but everything else was pretty good. The Portuguese Chicken wasn't as spicy as I would have liked but it was still delicious to eat and I really liked the Salt and Pepper Squid. The Inferno Wings were okay but to be honest, that may have been because I was getting full by the time I decided to have one. We had chips and salad with each dish but you have the option of mash or chips and salad or vegetables for the Schnitzels. I really enjoyed the chips but I pretty much enjoy all chips unless you really stuff them up but the salad for me was something that I could have gone without. I'm pretty certain that it was the dressing as I could eat some parts of the salad with no complaints but I would get to one portion of the salad and I just couldn't stomach it.

Overall, I would go back if I wanted a cheap but fulfilling feed - potentially trying the pizzas next time I visited.