RJIE Upstairs in Little Taipei: the One Taiwanese cuisine and Yahoo Sunnybank again!

I went on a date with someone and we decided to have a quick lunch in Sunnybank before he went to work one day! We had a bit of ponder and couldn't decide where we wanted to go for sure, so we wandered upstairs to Little Taipei and plonked ourselves down in the aircon to avoid the summer heat.

He picked this spicy pork cutlet bento box from The One Taiwanese Cuisine. I don't think he realised it was a bento box set because he was very surprised when it came out. There was a bowl of plain vegetable broth, a big bowl of rice, a tiny cabbage and carrot spring roll covered in tomato sauce, some candied sweet potato, steamed cabbage and carrot, a side salad of shredded cabbage covered in mayonnaise and then the pork cutlets! They were battered and super crunchy, the meat was still very juicy though. The sauce was odd, we were both expecting a super hot sambal kinda sauce but this was a mild chili and black bean kinda deal.

Aw yiss

Meanwhile I went to Yahoo Sunnybank and chose to get their Mie Goreng, it had pieces of tomato in it which I wasn't happy about not to mention the shredded lettuce component. The noodles had a good charry wok hei flavour to them and there were lots of fish balls and tofu in the noodles so I was happy in that regard.

Hmmm~

I also got us curry puffs to share. He said he liked them, so I got them for us, cause I'm cute like that. I made him eat all but one of them, as you can see they had a wonderful bubbly crust with a sweet filling that I can't recall. I remember thinking that I've had better in Mons Ban Sabai Thai though.

Ribbets

I got obsessed with going to Ribbetts one day when Mr W., mentioned it was one of the best places he had been to for a buffet in Brisbane and that we should go there together one day. So I did what any earnest food loving girl would do I went, without him, with my work friends. We were all delighted that it was so close to work as well so it was an easy drive. Z., Lu., and E., came along to try out Ribbetts.

The restaurant is directly across from the Dutton Park Police Station/Boggo Road gaol. If you're lucky you'll get a park in their very small parking lot, otherwise you'll have to risk Dutton Park's 2P zone!

Spot this from Gladstone/Annerly road!

When we went here they had this little toaster oven with free samples. I was super suspicious of it because the restaurant isn't located in a terribly busy street or road. How long had the samples been there? Why were they free? If I grabbed a sample, why do I get the feeling that a net would drop down on me and trap me? These were some of the odd thoughts going through my brain when I saw it.

It's a trap!

Their all you can eat requirements are pretty annoying, you have to call or book online to get a reservation, you have to pay at the beginning, it's one bill only but they begrudgingly allowed us to pay separately and it's a 90 minute time limit of eating. Here is their all you can eat menu.

We helped ourselves to these cups of water with lumps of ice at the bottle. Interesting.

Interesting

As soon as we sat down we were offered some freshly cooked cheese and garlic bread which we accepted and began to burn our mouths on. Except for me because I'm a grilled cheese pro who only gets burnt when I put in tomato, which I never do because molten tomato is a rookie error. I think its made out of pizza dough but its still delicious either way.

Cheese and bread is a match made in heaven

We started ordering straight away. It seems like there are lots of different amounts that you can order from snack sized servings for one, to a group size or family sized but this was quite unclear. When they explained to us, they basically said order whatever you want and we'll make it. I really wanted to just try anything and everything but didn't want to waste food so if I had known this initially I'd have been a lot happier.

These are the Hellfire chicken wings, they're coated in a tomato sauce and copious amounts of chili flakes that are pretty mild, truth be told. The meat was very tender and had a slightly charry flavour to them which I enjoyed.

Not bad!

We got two platters of their five hour slow cooked, then grilled to perfection pork ribs coated in their famous barbeque sauce. It was honestly one of the best ribs I've had, especially if you love tender, falling off the bone meat and a finger licking sauce that is balanced, sweet, fruity and tangy. They were super meaty ribs and I really enjoyed eating them. I'd gladly go here again for the ribs alone. We nearly filled up on ribs alone!

Highly recommended

Z., got a garden salad to help green things up, it consisted of tomato, lettuce, cucumber and a satchet of Heinz Italian style salad dressing. I didn't have any as I was too busy eating ribs.

Salad is for chumps!

I got the barbecue all meat pizza which was the family size pizza. At this point I still had no idea what size the pizzas were but I confirmed that this was to share so we got it cut into six pieces. The base was light, thick, think deep pan crunchy crust with fluffy interior, there only a small amount of sauce and there was a good amount of pepperoni, bacon and ham pieces. We were struggling a bit at this stage and had slowed down quite a bit. Not that it mattered because there was almost an hour gap between this pizza and the following dishes.

Tasty!

I got the bacon carbonara with fettuccine, this was a portion for one and would've just been over a cup worth of pasta and sauce. We all found the pasta sauce very cheesy and creamy, but also quite sweet from the sheer amount of onion in the sauce. The pasta was a tricoloured fettuccine that was quite good, a nice al dente texture that's for sure.

We had to remind our waitress twice about these onion rings, several tables around us had gotten seated and served food before we received them. We started eating them as soon as they got there, so that's why the portion sizing is abysmally small, there were actually twice that many in the bowl. It looks a touch greasy at the bottom but they were delicious! Golden brown, well crumbed and had a lovely sweetness from the onions.

Pretend there's more there

This Hawaiian pizza was in the tuckshop size and was the last thing we ordered to try. This was only four pieces and was about the 10cm in diamater. If I had realised that there was a size this small, I'd have ordered multiple tiny pizzas to try them! I always find that Hawaiian style pizzas are always good, you can't go wrong with the simplicity of ham and pineapple!

Classic

Ribbetts:
Atmosphere: 4, a dreadfully small converted Queenslander house turned dining room. I don't think the place could legally sit more than 20 people and that would only be if everyone was touching. If you put your chair too far back, you'd become a fire hazard cause no one could leave the premises if there was a fire. God forbid you bought a pram in there. There are stainless steel tables and chairs, and its quite an unappealing look.
Service: 3, absolutely abysmal. We had to remind multiple wait staff about our orders after the garden salad was the last to arrive, they stopped asking us if we wanted any more food after the salad arrived too, we had to get our own water on multiple occasions when the waitress forget, had to ask to get additional plates and bones taken away, we were given really disgusted looks when we asked for more food and they seemed stingy on information in general. I got the impression that I was being judged for wanting to eat more food. 
Food: 6.5, solid 80s style Aussie food where Italian and Chinese food was exotic and weird food combinations were king, especially with the weird chicken and banana pizza. I'd go here again for the solid pizzas and ribs. 

Genkotsu Ramen

GENKOTSU RAMEN! I have heard rumours of this place. VGirl told me that this place had just opened in Runcorn Plaza. Then JGirl and Shishi told me that as Japanese people, they felt this place was super authentic and as good as Australian/Japanese food would ever be. So I had to go, it was just a matter of time!

I tried to go here once before with A*., but it was the only day of the week they were closed! So we went to Bungle Bungle instead.

So little space >_<

I liked this tissue box. It was super cute, I don't think I'd ever have a tissue box cover because I run through so many tissues with my constant hay fever year round.

Swirly

That odd wheel condiment is a white sesame grinder! Then some shichimi togarashi powder and then other bits and bobs.

So neat

This is the kitchen area where they maniacally send out ramen!

I grabbed a loyalty card too, although I wasn't sure if I'd ever come back when I got it!

So many ramen

They sold crushed chashu here as well as this being the area where you could keep your loyalty card. Incidentally I have no idea what crushed chashu is, it just looked like jerkied charshu to me. It was only a dollar but I didn't grab it for some reason.

Interesting

I was number 1. Thought it seems many other food bloggers were as well haha.

Noice

I saw the mentaiko rice bowl and had to get it, mentaiko is honestly one of my favourite Japanese ingredients. Its a must if you like fishy tastes, like say with taramasalata or anchovies, things like that! It has strong fishy/spicy flavour and it goes wonderfully with rice. The creamy soy cooked egg was a nice counterpoint but I have to say the liberal usage of green onion was a bit off putting to say the least.

Less onion, more mentaiko!

I got the black garlic shio ramen. I thought the soup was initially tasty with the deep, savoury almost burnt flavour of the black garlic oil and the richness of the stock, but it became quite cloying towards the end and I couldn't finish it. The charshu was tender with a good flavour. The bamboo sprouts were good but nothing particularly amazing. The egg was my favourite part of the dish, with a creamy yolk and firm white.

Not bad

Jubi got the shoyu ramen which came with corn for some reason. Otherwise it was the same as my dish. Her soup was a lot sweeter especially with the little pops from the corn kernels. I much preferred her soup for its balance but she was unable to finish her soup either.

Solid

Genkotsu Ramen
Atmosphere: 6, super tiny, cramped Japanese hole in the wall ramen shop, its just like being in Japan!
Service: 8, impeccable, friendly and prompt Japanese service. What more could you ask for?
Food: 6, not bad but the soup, the veritable heart of the dish is not so good that I can finish it all. I'd go back here but only because Taro's is so far away being on the south side.

Bungle Bungle

It's no secret that I love fried chicken and Korean fried chicken in particular. I've had Bungle Bungle on my go to list for a long time but had quite a few problems deciding to go there. I didn't know where it was for one, the second being that the reviews for their service were a bit iffy and then also the fact that panned for having terrible interior as well.

Thankfully VGirl introduced me to Runcorn Plaza and I've been going here ever since.

Bungle Bungle is super easy to find, it's in the corner of the Runcorn Plaza shopping centre and will undoubtedly have large groups of people enjoying lots of Korean food in front of it.

This place!

Here is their menu!

My first visit was straight after we went to Mien and the Sweet Desserts Cafe, I decided to be a pig and get a snack for the drive home. I went with the honey soy chicken wings with chips! I think it depends on the waitress but sometimes I've been charged extra as per the menu for choosing a sauce, sometimes though I get it for free. If you're travelling any distance, open up the foil so that the wings don't get soggy from the condensation. There is a massive serve of chips that I didn't take a photo of but its equally the same size as this box of wings.

These wings were amazing! So juicy and with a gorgeously crunchy, bubbly and quite thin layer of batter on top of tender chicken. The sauce was quite sweet and I would have liked a stronger, saltier soy flavour but I definitely can't complain with how the chicken was cooked. 

Great wings

I came back here again, later in week with A*., and her boyfriend Mr D.,! While we were here, we were asking each other questions from a psychological study made to cause two strangers to fall in love with each other increased intimacy due to their deep, dark answers. They were things like what ability would you like to wake up with, if you could have dinner with anyone in the world - who would it be? There were a few head scratchers like what were you most thankful for, what would you change about your childhood and things like that. I think the questions were very interesting and I was really surprised at some of the answers I heard. If you're interested in the questions, you can find them here.

Anyway, here are our banchan! From top left going clockwise, there was candied sweet potato, what we thought was mayonnaise coated acorn jelly and then some kimchi. Out of the three items, the acorn jelly was the most interesting dish, we spent a lot of time trying to figure out what it was because it had such an interesting texture. It was a very crisp/snappy kind of texture with a very neutral taste, like crunchy vermicelli noodles?

Curious

We got a serve of rice each to help soak up the sauce for our later dishes.

The same size and depth as my camera case!

We decided to go with the Korean fried chicken with garlic soy sauce to share between us! Just like the wings, they were so deliciously crunchy and soaked in a still quite sweet sauce. We all agreed that it was an excellent first choice. A*., and Mr D., are both north siders and had driven about 40 minutes to get to Bungle Bungle and they both thought it was well worth the trip down to have this chicken again!

I love Korean fried chicken!

We chose the plain ddeokbokki aka spicy rice cakes with fish cakes as our second main to share. This one came with lots and lots of thin oden fishcakes cut into large triangles as well as the usual compact fish balls that you find in Vietnamese/Malaysian/Chinese cuisine. This one had melting cylinders of rice cake with a perfectly balanced sauce, enjoyably spicy, not too sweet and with a good level of saltiness. The fish cakes used were of good quality and A*., and I were trying to get as many as we could before the other one noticed.

So good!

We decided to get a hotpot as our main, we went with the sandcrab and seafood hotpot. I'm not particularly a fan of seafood with shells as I think its way too much trouble to eat when I'm hungry but A*., and Mr D., were super keen so I went along with it. It was a good decision as it would be something I wouldn't order otherwise. The broth was absolutely delicious! It sang of the sea, with a pronounced saltiness and sweetness from the usage of mussels, octopus, sand crab, tiny prawns, thin slices of rice cakes, giant bean sprouts, enoki mushrooms and soft tofu pieces. It was like digging for treasure and we seemed to find something different every time we dipped our ladle into the soup. I really enjoyed the giant bean sprout heads, they tasted very nutty like peanuts! I mostly just stole all the soup and the beansprouts since I don't really like seafood but I still enjoyed it. I think if you were a seafood lover, you'd be in raptures which A*., and Mr D., were.

That soup was amazing

We got given these free drinks for buying so much food. This one was an orange flavoured drink that tasted pretty gross.

Do not want

This one tasted exactly like Hubba Bubba grape flavoured gum.

Bungle Bungle:
Atmosphere: 4, pretty poor. It looks like a cheap takeaway shop, complete with sliding screen door. Save it for lunch/dinner with friends or family you don't want to impress with anything else besides food.
Service: 5, pretty average. Free drinks were nice though.
Food: 10, some of the best Korean food I've ever eaten. It started my drive to learn Korean dishes and I regularly go here to buy wings and chips to go. The portions are huge, cheap, cheaper still if you're a member of the Griffith/QUT Korean students association, and delicious. Everything I ate from here was delicious.

Gertrude and Mabel

Oooh, I do love cute little cafes! This was on my post night shift list for quite the while but we always found bigger, better and places with recent menus to go to! Gertrude and Mabel had a really old menu and a few reviews mentioned that the menu was always changing here. I love a seasonal menu, so that's what cinched it for me!

If you're approaching from the south side, it can be a bit difficult to get to as Gladstone road is quite a busy one. Watch out for the local school nearby and its right beside a laundromat!

This place!

The place is cute. I liked the flowers on the table and their large assortment of takeaway cakes!

Up top!

Their cute Christmas decoration

What on earth is this cute little plant! With its crinkly, light edged leaves! It's super cute.

Cuteeee

Anyway, here is the menu for the time that I went!

I was pretty delirious after nights when I went the first time. I said that I wanted a really, really strong coffee so I ordered a chai latte made with soy with a triple shot of espresso. I think they knew I wasn't exhausted/right in the head, and gently told me that chai lattes didn't contain coffee, but they could make me one anyway. It was delicious, albeit made on powdered chai.

Why do I love dirty chais so much?

The cutlery is really cute here, heavy, old fashioned silverware with an embroidered linen napkin!

Cute~

The first time I went here they were out of the loukaniko for the breakfast board so I went with my second choice of the house cured ocean trout, basil, avocado, tomato, buffalo mozzarella, olive oil, eight minute egg on top of black bread. I enjoyed every part of this breakfast, it was a touch on the small side but the ocean trout melted on the tongue, the tomato and basil were very fresh, the eight minute egg had a wonderfully creamy white and soft, slightly gooey yolk. I just wish it was a touch bigger!

Pretty as a picture

The second time around I got the berry iced tea. It was exactly as the name suggested, a cup of tea, with ice and berries. I was surprised at the plain taste of it, I thought there would be a simple sugar syrup to sweeten things up but nope! The berries used were among the best I've ever had, especially the blueberries which were super sweet.

Exactly as the name suggests

Unfortunately I had one bad raspberry. I gave it to my waitress and she whisked it away without a word.

Bleh

This time around I got the loukaniko on ciabatta, smashed peas, goats cheese, lemon mayonnaise and another lot of eight minute egg! The peas were steaming hot which surprised me, I'm not really sure why. They were also super sweet and complimented the strong fatty flavour of the pork loukaniko. The lemon mayo wasn't joking and had a very strong, pronounced lemon flavour to it which helped balance things out. I wasn't a fan of the ciabatta only because I felt like it became super soggy with the peas on top and I love crunchy foods to stay crunchy. If bread is going to be used as a plate, it better be soaked in something delicious not just getting soggy from steam! 

Gertrude and Mabel
Atmosphere: 7, pretty cute. I like the attention to detail in the place. Fresh flowers are always a lovely touch, not to mention the cute cutlery and napkin.
Service: 5, still sad about my dodgy raspberry. 
Food: 7, good flavours, great produce just small portion size, Since I lost weight I actually don't eat as much as I used to, so this was a decent size, but I felt like I could still eat!