PPP: Corner Shop Store

I really miss the PPP tag, I think I'm going to start using it for my not so impromptu post night duty breakfasts! So you'll start seeing a lot more of them!

This particular set of night duties, we were all debating on where to go to, there was A*., Maz, L., and myself on these nights and we couldn't decide where to go. Maz., never goes to brekkie with us and is not fussed with what she eats. L., notoriously only eats light and sweet breakfasts while disliking eggs. A*., never seems to be on nights with me so she and I were debating where to go. I never go anywhere north of the river, so when she started telling me about well known north side establishments.

We had a look at random menus and we ended up deciding on Corner Store Cafe! It's right behind the Wesley Hospital!

Bright white ol' Queenslander!

The cafe is really nice! I like the outside seating in a little undercover patio style area.

The back, where most of the seating is

The back of the cafe? Inside next to the kitchen is also interesting, but my pick is the front of the restaurant and the side where the patio is.

Inside, next to the kitchen

This is the front!

+_+ front

They sell a lot of random stuff used in their menu in the cafe's front counter.

Lots of stuff

Random drinks

I was fascinated by the cold drip coffee, I love watching the slow drip, drip of the coffee.

Cold drip coffee!

There is a nice little garden in the back of the restaurant which had thyme, parsley, peas and some other stuff I can't remember.

Ooh fresh herbs

So much rice in the salt shaker!

Here is their menu!  They serve Marvel Street Coffee here. Almost everyone ordered some type of coffee and they said it was damn good coffee, their coffee art was fantastic. They were uniformly perfect.

Pretty, pretty, pretty

I ordered the lychee, coconut water and kaffir lime as my drink. I'm not really sure what I was expecting, it was quite unsweetened and with a generally mild flavour. I think my ideas of coconut water always corrupted as growing up, I was used to the young coconut drink that you would get in Asian super markets which were like 40% sugar.

Mehhhh

I had no idea what I wanted to get for breakfast, I literally spent about 20 minutes debating the merits of spaghetti pan sandwich as I had never had it before. There were zero pictures of it on Instagram and I had to seriously consider if the only reason I wanted to order it was because I wanted to try something new and weird, and not because I actually wanted to try it.

In the end, I ended up getting bacon, potato and sweet corn hash with poached eggs, jalapeno aioli and chorizo stuffed jalapenos. I can't emphasise how simply delicious this was, the sweet corn was juicy and super sweet as well as cut fresh off the cob! D., and I made a point of pointing this out as it was so impressive compared to canned sweet corn. The potato had nice golden brown crunchy edges and had soft, tender insides. The bacon was salty and delicious, as bacon always is. The aioli wasn't particularly spicy or fruity as jalapenos tend to be but it was deliciously creamy and made a wonderful sauce with the runny yolks from my poached eggs. The chorizo stuffed jalapenos were amazing! Mildy spicy, fruity, sour and crunchy, I could have easily eaten another plate worth of the stuff!

Yum yum yum!

I love popping egg yolks. It's my favourite part of breakfast.

Mmm runny yolks!

I did such a good job of talking up the spaghetti pan sandwich that A*., and D., both decided to get it. They were both amazed by how huge the sandwich was, it was a good 20cm long doorstop chunk of bread, topped with two poached eggs and a great mess of spaghetti spilling out of the sandwich. I had some of the mince and I thought it would be much saucier, but I suppose that would've destroyed the structure of the sandwich. Neither A*., or D., finished their sandwiches, although they finished all the spaghetti.

+_+ feast your eyes

Oooh spaghetti

M., ordered the sauteed mushrooms with spinach, pine nuts, beetroot relish and fontina cheese toast. I had the second slice of toast as M., said it was too much for her. I don't ever recall having fontina cheese before and I have decided its now my favourite melty cheese, it has a strong yet mild flavour with an excellent melt. She said it was the perfect size minus the piece of toast I pilfered, and highly praised the earthiness of the beetroot.

Oooh fontina, delicious fontina~

Lastly L., ordered this blob, chia and coconut pudding with fresh blueberries, macademia nuts, honey and banana. I think you're of one of two distinctly separate minds when you look at this, you either think its looks fantastic or it looks really gross. I was of the, really gross mind but everyone else was fascinated by its appearance. L., really enjoyed it and said it was sweet but filling and quite similar to sago pudding in texture.

Corner Shop Store
Atmosphere: 7, a lovely little place to have breakfast. The side seating area has lots of heaters everywhere so even though you're outside, you still remain toasty warm. 
Service: 7, the service was quite good and gladly split the bill for us. They came back to ask us how the meal was and asked if we wanted a second round of drinks, which most places forget to do. 
Food: 8, delicious! Absolutely huge proportions with delicious flavour combinations. The menu is very inventive and I'd gladly go here again to try something else.

PPP: Soul Bistro

Time for another PPP! This time starring H., C., L., and myself. We were tossing up between a few places but we ultimately chose Soul Bistro because the breakfast menu at another place we were looking at wasn't as interesting as this place's menu.That being said, we ended up going out for lunch so that didn't really matter.

Soul Bistro is not difficult to find but it isn't too easily visible from the road. It's on the intersection of Baroona and Milton Road, but you can't see it as you're driving along. So when you pull into Baroona Road off Milton, take the next left into the shopping centre, find a park, and start walking back towards Milton Road! Then you'll see this shiny brown sign and realise where you have to go. H., and L., both said that they had to pull out their GPS to find this place.

Aha!

It was an open, cheery looking meeting place with lots of table arrangements and green plants everywhere.

Lots of places to sit

Here is their online menu! They have a lot of promotions going on such as a cheap $10-13 dollar lunch special that comes with a can of soft drink, iced lemon tea or a coffee, 10% off student discount and a 10% discount if you're going to something at Suncorp Stadium afterwards. These were the specials that were on the day that we went.

Drinks!

Even more drinks!

They have menus everywhere

Seriously

Not even joking

I got an apple berry crush, super bright red, lots of floating seeds and a strong berry flavour with a nice balance between sweet and sour flavours. It was quite thick with a tangy berry sorbet chunk floating in the centre. My only complaint was that it was full of seeds, and I had to chew a bit after every sip. H., tried some and kept sipping my drink when she thought I wasn't looking.

Mmm berry and apple

C., and L., decided to get lunch specials and after enquiring, decided not to upgrade to a fancy lemonade like H., did. So they just got plain lemon iced teas, it was sweet with a lemony tang. The tea flavour was nicely balanced, and not overly tannic or bitter in flavour.

Pretty tea

H., upgraded her iced tea/house lemonade to the fancy lychee and mint lemonade. It was actually a fizzy lemonade with lychee and mint pieces floating around! I was really surprised as for some reason whenever lemonade is mentioned, I always think they mean a lemon juice, sugar and water combo rather than fizzy lemonade.

Lychees, lychees, lychees!

I ordered these chorizo tater tots with blue cheese sauce to share between us, there were seven to a serve which is a bit of an odd number. Everyone else dutifully tried a piece and remarked that it was good although no one had a second piece, so I happily had it all to myself. It had a crunchy crumbed exterior and was full of creamy mashed potato as well as big chunks of a garlicky chorizo. I would've preferred a spicier chorizo but this was still pretty good, the blue cheese sauce was a mild blue cheese but still had a very noticeable flavour.

Chorizo tater tots!

I decided to get the buffalo chicken wrap which were two unevenly cut wraps containing baby spinach, battered chicken breast pieces, seasoned rice and apparently blue cheese sauce with a small side salad and drizzle of balsamic vinegar. I didn't really notice much of a buffalo chicken flavour, I was expecting a crunchy chicken piece with a hot and sour sauce tempered by a thick blue cheese dressing. That being said, it wasn't an unpleasant combination of flavours, just not what I was expecting. The rice was odd, but it reminded me of Mexican burritos I've had in the past.

Hmm

H, ordered the grilled haloumi and mushrooms, which came with a tortilla toast, charred eggplant and herb aioli. Once again, we were surprised by the presentation, there was a stack of golden brown haloumi slices, a little mixed garden salad and then these little wraps with all the grilled eggplant and mushrooms inside. H., was happy with her meal for once and said it was tasty if unexpected.

So many bits

C., got the special of the day, chicken fritters with a potato salad and lemon iced tea. She enjoyed it but I was somehow suspicious of the appearance of the fritters. We exchanged bites and came to the same conclusion, the chicken fritters were the exact same as the ones I had in my buffalo chicken wrap.

Dun dun dun

L., got the fish of the day, succulent grilled barramundi on top of pumpkin, with a lightly dressed salad and a glass of lemon iced tea. She said the fish was quite good and finished her meal before the rest of us.

Soul Bistro:
Atmosphere: 7, airy little shopping centre cafe. Lots of greenery surrounding us and lots of little tables for people to sit at.
Service: 10, super cheerful guy serving us who knew the menu intimately, he was very good with recommendations and seemed very happy to serve us. He also kindly split the bill for us.
Food: 7, the food was a bit hit and miss, with similar elements despite the interesting descriptions. The food was all polished off though and for the price, including a drink, I'd be more than happy to come here again. I really wish there was something cheap and cheerful like this near where I work.

PPP: Bamboo Basket

Lu., was back in town for one night and one night only! No additional shows available, cash in your tickets while you still can! Lu., always hits the town like a natural disaster, shows up out of the blue, tries to organise a get together and leaves before you realise what has happened. This time I managed to catch her! We headed out to dinner with Gill., Lu., my Boyfriend and I.

Bamboo Basket was picked seeing as it was a firm favourite of Gill and Lu.,s and I agreed since I've never been there. Something about the prices always throws me off . . .check out their menu to see what I'm talking about! What startles me the most is that they have a constant public holiday price besides their regular price, how often are these guys open?

Yeah this place!

I love a place with help yourself condiments, no matter how fancy it is. It has the usual cohort of soy sauce, chilli sauce and black vinegar. Perfect for sprucing up your meal!

Helpfully labelled

I was having a major month of inability to recognise food so when this came to the table I cheerfully dug in thinking it was what I ordered. Nope, it was what Lu., ordered pork wontons with spicy garlic vinegar sauce. These were delicious! Sweet, salty and slightly gingery, they had almost scary softness that just cooked pork has. They were slippery little suckers though and there were a few splashes where we struggled to pick them up. Although a little hard to share out with the four of us, we made it work.

Tasty!

Gill., loves their cumin lamb. I don't, mostly because I hate the taste and smell of cumin. It is the celery of the spice world, once it gets in something, you can't help but notice it. The lamb was crazy tender with none of that fattiness you normally expect of lamb. The capsicum and onion were cooked until sweet but still crunchy. It would've been a great dish except the cumin chased me off!

Bleh cumin

Gill., also ordered the steamed barbeque pork buns, super soft, white and fluffy buns with a mild sweetness to them. The barbeque pork was small pieces once you tore off the warm exterior. It was flavoursome and dyed a bright red, although a touch sweet. Very good if you're a fan of barbeque pork buns.

Fluffy little clouds

Lu., ordered their specialty of steamed pork soup dumplings! Not quite as pretty as the ones from New Shanghai with much less pleats, but still cute! I found these to be quite good, with a splash of soup on the inside. Half the fun as usual was trying to excise the dumping without losing any of the soup. Lu., was fascinated by them and thought them to be very tasty.

Mmm soup dumplings

My Boyfriend ignored all the food in favour of his roasted duck noodle soup and you can see why. Honestly, the best duck I've had in a very, very long time with perfectly deep brown crisp skin, moist flesh and deep salty, lip smacking, flavour to the bone. I kept eating his duck and passing it off to Lu., and Gill., to try whenever I could. I gave him puppy dog eyes to have the last piece when he sat back after nearly finishing his soup and duck. He reluctantly gave me the last piece after gallantly declaring it was only because he loved me.

Omg dat duck

The noodle soup was okay as well and served separately! It just makes it so much neater when the fried main is served separately, it ensures that the food doesn't get soggy! It also makes it much easier to share too. There were big halves of shimeji mushrooms, kai lan and fresh thick rice noodles like udon, the noodles had that fresh flavour were they are still amazing chewy and springy texture. The soup wasn't bad either but not great either, with a good saltiness and no oily finish.

Tasty rice noodles

I had a hankering for my own plate of noodles so I ordered these handmade cold noodles with peanut sauce, shredded chicken, onion and coriander. The noodles were absolutely delicious but I would have been happy with a lot more of that peanut sauce, I love the stuff! The shredded chicken tasted a lot like Vietnamese goi ga does, that lightly dressed with sugar and lime cabbage salad with poached/boiled chicken shreds. Its a really tasty and light tasting combination with the creaminess of the peanut sauce making it that little bit naughty so you remain happy.

I loves peanuts

This is actually the dish I ordered! How on earth did I mistake it for Lu.,'s!? Shangdong style pork dumplings, I'm not sure why they come with this super thin crust of pastry but it was pretty tasty! Crunchy easy to snap off, they hid six pork dumplings beneath it. When I googled Shangdong dumplings none of them looked anything like each other but none of them looked like this either! I didn't find anything particularly different about these pork dumplings compared to the pork wonton ones from earlier to be honest. I may have been too busy slurping up noodles and stealing duck pieces to really comment.

Why do you look like that? TSG you can't just ask why something looks like that

The last dish I ordered was salt and pepper calamari, crispy, tender tentacles with a mildly salty exterior. It was freshened up a little bit with green onion chunks.

Alright, would not reorder

Bamboo Basket
Atmosphere: 7, busy little place with a modern sort of take on Asian restaurants.
Service: 5, pretty average. We got our food but it was hard to get a waiter to notice us or remove plates.
Food: 8, really delicious. I would go back here again for a meal if I was feeling cashed up.

PPP: Bird's Nest Restaurant

H., chose the newly opened Bird's Nest Yakitori bar in West End to celebrate Miss Chatterbox's birthday. A., the Chocolate Monster, Z., B., myself and my Boyfriend also went along.

I'm really running out of available letters to use to anonymously describe my friends aren't I? My general code was always to give my nursing workmates a single letter, or a short nickname if they shared initials with someone else. My high school friends/sister's friends had their own nicknames and that's about it. Most of my university friends, who are also nurses derp, have moved far, far away in their searches for jobs so I haven't had to code them up for that reason.

Its pretty easy to keep track of everyone though, since I tend to go out with the same people. Jubi met H., a while back and she said she was excited to meet her cause she kept seeing her name in my blog haha. 

While there are about five A.,s in total at work, I only really go out with A., and occasionally Miss Chatterbox, who also starts with an A, there's also Little A, who I frequently carpool with, and another two A.,s unaccounted for, both of whom have young babies. Those hints are more for my friends at work who try and figure out who is who haha.

Anyway, my Boyfriend and I arrived at Bird's Nest very fashionably late, like an hour late! I was absolutely mortified! I'm normally the kind of person who shows up half an hour early and waits for other people to get there! I kept texting both H., and A., telling them I was on my way but no one responded. They all seemed very surprised when we eventually showed up. They were well into their meal when we arrived.

We ended up ordering the same food as everyone else out of sheer laziness. We both ordered the seven skewer set, which nearly everyone else had ordered. Here is a link to their menu.

Placements

There are large slabs of slate to rest the skewers on. On the table are several boxes to place used skewers, a pink Himalayan rock salt and pepper pots as well as more napkins.

Big slabs of slate

Everyone ordered chicken karaage as an additional side. We were eagerly awaiting our food and all my friends noticed my envious puppy dog eyes, they kept pushing the chicken karaage onto us. Beautifully juicy, golden brown crunchy and just salty enough, the free range chicken thighs they used were amazing. The blob of wasabi mayonnaise was delicious, creamy with just a hint of wasabi spice, I kept using it to spice up other things.

H., ordered these yaki onigiri, grilled rice balls brushed with their tare sauce. H., Miss Chatterbox and B., shared these rice balls, from the looks on their faces they didn't like it. I remember hearing an audible crunch when they bit into them and I also recall that they didn't enjoy the crunchy outside and mostly discarded it. I have a sneaking suspicion this wasn't to their taste.

I ordered an additional side of Leba pate, a house made chicken liver pate with little crunchy baguette slices. The pate was so delicious, I can't even begin to describe. If you like pate, this dish will have your taste buds dancing in ecstasy. The rich, creamy unctuousness of liver, it was light and fluffy and it just spread like softened butter onto those hard crunchy toasts. The utter smoothness of that pate was amazing, especially being used to Vietnamese style pate. The pepper was a sharp and spicy contrast to the pate. I offered pate to everyone but they refused, stating either that they didn't want to try liver, had been pressured to eat it too much as children or disliked it. Oh well, more pate for me then.

H., also ordered a shiitake skewer, a locally grown shiitake mushroom grilled with ponzu vinegar. I literally took a photo and then the skewer was eaten. I have no idea what they even though of this dish.

H., got atsuage, deep fried tofu, ponzu, shallots and a generous scattering of bonito flakes. Everyone seemed a bit surprised when I mentioned that bonito was dried, finely shaved tuna. The other odd part is that this dish is covered underneath their vegetable part in the menu. It lead to an interesting discussion on vegetarianism in different cultures. When VGirl, my sister, turned vegetarian, my mum had no idea what to cook. Vietnamese cuisine has a lot of vegetarian food, but she was very skeptical when my sister refused to eat things with animal extracts, refused seafood and certain soy sauces. Over time, she just learned to cook the things my sister allowed.

Pile of fluffy stuff

The next skewer we received was a chicken thigh with little shallots grilled together with a salt base. Tasty, a touch charry and surprisingly sweet once grilled, the shallots were an interesting choice. I kept mistaking it for leeks however. In the corner is a Japanese curry set that A., and the Chocolate Monster both ordered, they had tucked into most of it by the time we arrived, so it wasn't worth taking photos of it.

Charry shallots and chicken thigh

We then received cherry tomatoes wrapped in pork belly with cracked pepper. Be extremely eating these, as they will shoot scalding lava juice at you aka hot tomato seeds. More than a few people got mouth burns when these arrived at the table. The pork is tasty and was really the only non chicken thing from the 7 skewer set.

Beware!

This was free range tenderloin chicken pieces with wasabi mayonnaise. It was good chicken if a bit plain, the chicken was juicy and well cooked.

Tasty mayo though

Chicken meatballs! These had a good flavour from their tare sauce, soft, squishy meatballs with a slightly charry outside.

Not bad

These are chicken butts aka bishop's nose aka chicken tails, don't be fooled by the cute name! They are good for people who enjoy chicken fat and skin, cooked to a melting consistency. They are quite oily as expected of an area with such a high concentration of fat.

Not a fan

Bird's Nest Restaurant
Atmosphere: 8, lovely little restaurant with lots of little pockets to sit in. We sat the main large grouping beside their door. There were intimate little booths at the back as well as a constantly full main bar, the main bar area was seated right in front of the chefs who all seemed happy to chat while cooking.
Service: 9, the floor manager was polite, friendly, super efficient and was over in a flash as soon as you raised an eyebrow. The other staff members she worked with weren't as good, but still very polite. We had our backs to the wall and found that our water wasn't topped up as frequently as some of our easier to get to friends. When we received our bill as well, there was a mix up with the drinks we ordered and they were able to fix it quite quickly.
Food: 6.5, the food is very good quality, it is very well cooked, lovingly prepared and presented. I found the flavours to be a little plain and the price to be a little steep. Each of the skewers are around 5-8 dollars each and considering how many it would take to fill me up, its just not worth the price. It seems like quite a popular place to go for a get together, but for a real meal, I'd head elsewhere.