wilted2000

Reviews

Restaurants, Takeaways, Indian, Fine Dining, Good For Groups

Overall 7.9 83

7.5 Recommended

Food 8 Ambience 6 Service 8 Value 8

We popped in for lunch last Sunday and having not been here for years, we had a great time. It was very quiet as you would expect for a January Sunday lunch ie: South Indian cuisine doesn't easily come to mind on a lovely Sydney Sunday.

The food was all great, the lady providing the service (from memory she was the host/waitperson last time) excellent and the photographs from a century ago (in India) kept us chatting for the whole lunch. Our favourite scene was the enormous wedding photograph, complete with elephant dressed to the nines, it covered an entire wall.

Malabar promotes itself as the Dosai Palace and we had not ordered it before, stoopid us, extra-ordinarily tasty. It all was.

The ambience was marked down due to it being a very quiet service period. Short of having an elephant perform or a band going through, not much to be done there.

Jan 10, 2012

Wasabi Bar & Bistro, Darlinghurst

Restaurants, Japanese

Overall 5.8 35

2.8 Not Recommended

Food 3 Ambience 2 Service 2 Value 4

I'm rather shocked by the 'excellent' reviews on here. How can it be so amazingly good on some nights and be atrocious like our experience? Like others, we were here on a 'voucher' and so was every other table ie: 6 couples.

Ambience? 2/10 None. This location has always performed poorly, hence, the turnover of restaurants. It is cold and ugly. Neon tubed soft drink cabinets in the dining area, do not make for ambience and neither do stacks of soft drink boxes nearby. Guys you are marketing yourself here, not a tip or loading dock. Up the stairs to the toilets and you find yourself on a kind of mezzanine, which is being used as the staff room.

This is a great look, not. Surely the left over tables and chairs + staff backpacks could find another location?

Food: 3/10 Tasteless Miso Soup, a huge lump of fish with edamame beans, unripe avocado and salmon bites as a salad and then a 'platter' of all taste the same sushi and sashimi. Even the ginger was bland, a hard thing to do.

Service: 2/10 Friendly but very hard to understand and be understood. More of the backpacker bring it and plonk it down variety.

Value: 4/10 due to it being a cheap voucher but have to say, this is giving it a full value for the voucher ie: it is not worth any more than that, something which is becoming increasingly apparent with these deals.

Definitely not worth going to at full prices and barely worth the walk at a discount.

Sep 07, 2011

Red Chilli Sichuan Hot Pot Restaurant, Glebe

Restaurants, Chinese, Restaurant Bookings

Overall 6.2 5

4.8 Average

Food 4 Ambience 5 Service 4 Value 6

Warning: Mild is not mild here. We ordered mild and it was destructively hot (Chilli). All in all not bad value but it is what it is. A Hot Pot restaurant, not high quality food.

Jul 19, 2011

Tre Viet Restaurant, Newtown

Restaurants, Vietnamese, American Express

Overall 7.3 67

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.3 Average

Food 5 Ambience 4 Service 7 Value 5

An early drop in before the movies and I like my viet food. Food is ok, goi cuon wrappers were a little gluggy but not too bad - dipping sauce was ordinary though. The tofu & vegetable stir fry was nice but the pork in hotpot (no hotpot here, just pork in pot) was very fatty - the no taste fatty kind.

Wines are reasonably priced by the bottle. Poets Corner for $20. Have to say though, this location has had more incarnations than I can count - is it jinxed? Service is smiling and attentive.

Overall: reasonable food, good service, no atmosphere (European classics in a Vietnamese restaurant? Maybe that relates to the Tre part of the name) but prices are a bit exy for this location and food.

Jul 15, 2011

Darbar Fine Indian Cuisine, Glebe

Restaurants, Indian, Fine Dining, Romantic and Intimate, BYO

Overall 6.9 245

4.8 Average

Food 6 Ambience 4 Service 4 Value 5

We have been to Darbar a few times now. It is convenient to home, reasonable food but the atmosphere is cold and staff, well crack a welcome and smile guys and girls. Darbar is not the place to go to on a cold night, the place is freezing. Rug up and take your own smiles to warm the place.

Jul 15, 2011

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Member since 2008

Last updated on 1st Jun 2012

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Displaying: 1 - 10 of 17 reviews

Malabar @ Darlinghurst, Darlinghurst

Restaurants, Takeaways, Indian, Fine Dining, Good For Groups

Overall 7.9 83

7.5 Recommended

Food 8 Ambience 6 Service 8 Value 8

Jan 10, 2012

Wasabi Bar & Bistro, Darlinghurst

Restaurants, Japanese

Overall 5.8 35

2.8 Not Recommended

Food 3 Ambience 2 Service 2 Value 4

Sep 07, 2011

Red Chilli Sichuan Hot Pot Restaurant, Glebe

Restaurants, Chinese, Restaurant Bookings

Overall 6.2 5

4.8 Average

Food 4 Ambience 5 Service 4 Value 6

Warning: Mild is not mild here. We ordered mild and it was destructively hot (Chilli). All in all not bad value but it is what it is. A Hot Pot restaurant, not high quality food.

Jul 19, 2011

Tre Viet Restaurant, Newtown

Restaurants, Vietnamese, American Express

Overall 7.3 67

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.3 Average

Food 5 Ambience 4 Service 7 Value 5

Jul 15, 2011

Darbar Fine Indian Cuisine, Glebe

Restaurants, Indian, Fine Dining, Romantic and Intimate, BYO

Overall 6.9 245

4.8 Average

Food 6 Ambience 4 Service 4 Value 5

Jul 15, 2011

Chinta Ria The Temple of Love, Sydney

Restaurants, Malaysian, BYO, Child Friendly, Entertainment / Music

Overall 6.6 224

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

5.5 Average

Food 3 Ambience 8 Service 8 Value 3

Had not eaten here in years and was quite looking forward to it but not again. The buzz, decor and service were all good (love the website) but really the food was below ordinary.

Entrée: The Golden Browns were doughy, almost cold and as to the description of "snap fried" no chance, they were chewy. The tofu entrée "Golden Browns" were very nice though.

Mains: Ayam Ria was supposed to be chicken fillets wok fried etc but really, this was a black treacle morass of chicken chunks. The sauce was so heavy it covered the other tastes and textures. Hokkien Char was better with the prawns quite tasty and noodles just right but not impressive.

The coconut rice must have been in the steamer from lunch. We asked about the lucky beer and was told it is a malaysian/local production but the bottle says it is manufactured in China and distributed via St Peters. Cool bottle though.

Acceptable from a lunch time takeaway but not from a chic eater at one of Sydney's premier tourist locations.

Jul 01, 2011

Pier 26, Summer Hill

Restaurants, Seafood, Air Conditioning, BYO, Restaurant Bookings

Overall 7.2 51

7.5 Recommended

Food 7 Ambience 6 Service 8 Value 9

A good value local seafood casual restaurant. We have been coming here since I lived in Lewisham and come back each year, even though we have moved out of the area.

Bit confused as to why the floor staff are never the same ones, obviously now that the visits are annual that could be it but even when we were more regular, never the same team.

Jun 01, 2011

Churras The Brazillian Barbecue, Darlinghurst

Restaurants, Brazilian, Serves Dinner, Serves Takeaway

Overall 7 43

5.8 Average

Food 5 Ambience 6 Service 7 Value 5

I love a nice dish of meat and was looking forward to visiting this restaurant after going past so many times. Not bad but not 'wow' either.

Greeted at the door by a bevy of friendly and very attractive staff - male and female. So was going to take a bit to beat the 'ambiance'.

The meat (of numerous) types started flowing quite quickly and while tasty, had a sense of same same about them. Maybe it was the nature of the racking for the BBQ?

Service was great, albeit with limited english but a smile always is good.

Biggest drawback? This is a casual format restaurant (note the noisy kids running around) on Oxford St, Sydney, no excuse for being licensed only ie: no BYO

Summary? I've often wondered in a huge BBQ owning city, how these BBQ restaurants would fare. Result: Not worth the price. Once you get a couple in, you can buy heaps of high quality meat and easily cook at home with your own wine, for far cheaper.

May 19, 2011

Terrace Thai, The, Pyrmont

Restaurants, Thai, Good For Groups, Romantic and Intimate, BYO

Overall 7.1 29

7 Recommended

Food 7 Ambience 6 Service 8 Value 7

I suspect that Terrace Thai reads these reviews or someone told them about William333's review. Our visit could not have been more the opposite. It is not world beating Thai but it was flavoursome, the servings good (plenty of veg), service excellent - all smiles and pleasantries - a buzz in the air (Friday 6.30-7.30) and lots of takeaway going out the door.

We have subsequently had a drink with a friend, who works near Terrace Thai and its main business is the lunch crowd (across the road from Channel 10) and definitely lunch and dinner takeaway.

NB: We had a 'voucher' and like with some packaged up menu/drinks, expected an average time/feed but we will be back.

May 19, 2011

Maya Tandoori, Surry Hills

Restaurants, Indian, Good For Groups, Quiet, Romantic and Intimate

Overall 6.6 63

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful

5.8 Average

Food 7 Ambience 6 Service 3 Value 7

Like a lot of people, we experience Maya Tandoori based on a spend $29 and receive $70 worth of food. With my internal abacus turned on, we were going to achieve full value, which surprisingly was going to be harder than we thought, with the prices being quite good and the servings much larger than expected. Now to why some ratings are low:

Food and value were good. We are rating the value based on $70 as that is the full price not the $29 as that would just be dumb. The food was plentiful and tasty, especially the Goat Masala, yummo and the Tandoori Chicken (a full chook here, which is not bad value for $16.90) was cooked to perfection.

While the service staff are friendly, they appear a bit sixes and sevens a lot of the evening and it is not that busy really (Friday night too). I think the kitchen was letting them down as I needed to go and find the mains after waiting 45 minutes from clearing of the entrees. My partner and I usually fill plenty of time chatting to each other normally but we were hungry and I'm testy when that is the case.

We were seated on the balcony, which in April is just lovely. A fan was nicely placed on the wall to sweep some cooling air about and a commercial grade and transparent blind kept the Cleveland St muck away. Cannot imagine being out here during summer or peak hour though.

Overall not too bad but over 2 hours for 2 people to eat 2 entrees and 2 mains (mind you heaps of leftovers brought home for Saturday lunch), not impressive guys.

Apr 09, 2011