Artful Atelier

22 Glebe Point Road, Glebe, 2037

Ph: 02 9566 2112

Tuesday - Saturday from 6pm

Warm white bean soup, Tasmanian scallop with green olive powder


Wagyu Beef Tartare w Parsnip Ice Cream, Quail Egg & Pickled Mushrooms

Shaved summer Truffle, white onion fondant with Asparagus and Jamon

Roasted Boned and rolled White Rabbit with Kangaroo Island Marron Tail, Parsnip puree & Tarragon sauce

Roasted Queensland Squab Wrapped in Prosciutto, Shiitake Mushrooms, Salsify, Truffled Linguini

Roasted breast of Grimauld Duckling, Pressed Turnips, Prune Puree and Potato Gnocci

Tonka Bean Creme Brulee w Balsamic-Poached Strawberries, Vanilla Ice Cream

Zumbolicious! The Master's Gateaux Secrets Unveiled

The menacing sky, rain slicing sideways and forbidding one-way streets couldn't stop three girls marching (in their work heels) into Adriano Zumbo's industrial kitchen in suburban Rozelle. This was the night. The night where the pastry god's secrets would be revealed...

Us? make this? right!

I had only initially discovered the tiny wonderland of Zumbo's offerings weeks ago. Since then I've been gushing about the wonderful sweet creations to anyone who dared come in my path.


I literally jumped when I saw the ad for this cooking class in Good Living, and it didn't take much convincing to get M&M and Coco Chanel to come along - they probably heard me talk about it so much that they wanted to see what the fuss was about!

The events of the night are masterfully captured here. I'll only add that this was what we were greeted with:
Charming right. You don't want to know how much of that was left by the end of the night!!

So without further adieu, Tuk Tuk Nothing revealed:

Coconut dacquoise in the making...

...cooling beside the oven...

Sandwiched and coated by Dean ta daa!

Chocolate Modena revealed:

Making the flourless dark chocolate meringue biscuits. From this...

..to this
Raspberry ganache in the making
The magic touch...

...da da daaaaa

et voila!!

And as if we hadn't pigged out enough in Zumbo's kitchen, not letting a morsel of scrap (or ingredient!) escape our path...


...the exhausted trio ventured down to Buchanen Street in Balmain, to sample what is claimed to be the best pizza in Sydney!

Rosso Pomodoro Pizza - tastes better atop a BMW

Yes, what a night!!

Max Brennar Joy

This is my second trip to the new Max Brennar at the Met Centre, conveniently located minutes away from work! It remains to be seen whether it will serve as a regular bonding experience with some high school friends, tho a fortnightly rendezvous has been scheduled at this point ;)


The White Chocolate Chai ($5.50, centre back) is a new one from the bald man, it is rather sweet and lacks a strong chai flavour, or any chai flavour at all as any trace is overpowered by the white chocolate. The apparatus is a novelty tho - the pot comes separately and at first we couldn't figure out how to strain the tea leaves. We found out that the bottom of the pot sits nicely on the glass, and the glass rim pushes on the bottom of the pot to release the liquid, as shown in the photo. Novelty aside, my friend said she wouldn't order it again, and having tried a sip, I would agree.

On recent trips to Max Brennar CBD locations, I have felt the standard slip, compared to the flagship store in Paddington. The Mexican Chilli Chocolate ($5.50, left) I had this time seemed a little watery and really does not conjure up Mexican chilli hotness. But this won't drive me away (yet) - the joy of being in an all-chocolate environment is too great to ignore, and perhaps the standards would pick up in time...?

Cheap eats discovery: Bagan Burmese!

Shop 4, 41 The Boulevarde, Strathfield
Phone: (02) 8746 0666

What a gem discovery of a local cheap eats! Never noticed this before despite its flashing neon signs - think I previously dismissed it as another Indian restaurant, and the bright lights probably turned me off. But intrigued after reading a review of this Burmese restaurant, I followed the address and to my surprise found a bustling place, at least for a Tuesday night!

The first thing we noticed when we opened the menu was the prices - CHEAP as! Entrees were priced around $5, mains $10-$15!



The dish on the left is my favourite - fried pork intestines! It wasn't obvious from the menu. There were pictures for every dish, but most dishes had Burmese names, and descriptions were rare. When I asked the waitress what it was, she asked if I spoke Chinese - I said I did - and she told me what it was in Mandarin. I wasn't 100% sure I really understood, but decided to go for it anyway, and am I glad I did! (Aside - I used to order this everytime I went to Golden Century with my family for 宵夜 "siu yeh" - Canto term for post-midnight snack - tho it looked different to Bagan's. The skin of the fried pork intestines "juu dai cheung" from Golden Century is coloured a bright red, and doesn't look as deep fried as the above photo. Delicious!)

Oh, the dish on the left is grapefruit salad, which was also nice - different and refreshing.

Below was our mains. Must say I wasn't as enamoured with the Burmese curries - we ordered Pork and Mango curry (back, in bowl) - not anything special and couldn't taste the mango. Probably won't order curry next time. The spinach (front left) however was great! And I think it was something like $7?!


Not surprisingly, because it was so affordable, we ordered more food than we could eat, despite promising that we would save room for dessert. There was none. Dessert for next time!

Rocksalt - my fave Canberra restaurant!

Shop 4 ,78 Hawker Pl, Hawker 2614 ACT
Phone: (02) 6254 7865
If there's one thing I miss about Canberra, it's this restaurant. It is hands down the best restaurant in Canberra! This was my third time, and I really wanted to go for the 8-course degustation ($88/$120 with wine) which is just excellent value in comparison to some degustation menus in Sydney! Alas, no one on the table wanted one, and it was not possible to get a degustation for one, so I settled on ordering 3 courses...

First up the Half-shell QLD scallops with blue-cheese butter, saffron and pea risotto. The scallops were fresh and risotto delicious, tho I couldn't taste the blue-cheese butter. All up enjoyed it tho!

Now I never do this, but I couldn't help it. I ordered the same main dish here that I have on both previous occasions. Last time I had promised myself that I would try something new, but craved it so much that I said "next time". This time, I justified ordering it again as I hadn't been back to Canberra for six months. Et voila:

Rocksalt's double roasted duck on sweet potato bolongierre with duck sausage and rich duck jus. Need I say more.

The other highlight of this restaurant is it's delightful desserts board, which the waiter carries out to your table come time for this heavenly course, and explains the desserts of the day. It is always the hardest to choose which one, as all sound so unique and wonderful.

We settled on the Sticky date pudding with brandy icecream, to share, as we were all so stuffed (I don't know why I thought I could fit 8 courses, especially after having a lunch degustation that day).


Couldn't resist also ordering some of their home-made icecream - also do this everytime, as they always have new flavours to sample. They didn't have the blue cheese icecream this time, so we tried 3 new flavours - the brown sugar, cinnamon and choc-chip cookies. We also got to try their poppy seed icecream, which we didn't end up ordering, as it had more texture than taste.

Ah, heaven in Canberra - would you believe it's possible?

Delightful Cafe discovery @ Chifley Shops, Canberra

details coming soon!

Axis @ National Museum

Signature lunch (5 course mini-degustation, $36)
(description Coming soon!)

Bourke St Bakery & The Book Kitchen

My first visit to Bourke St Bakery - found the expected lines, but these did go quickly and I found out why when I stepped into the store and was immediately pressured to choose my pastry! Here tis: Ricotta, plum and almond tart ($4). Not anything amazing, but I did like the crisp pastry, just like that of a Portuguese tart!Thought I'd save it for after dinner, but look what mum brought home. Selection of cakes from 85 degrees - a Japanese cake shop near the George Street Cinemas. Now how was I meant to choose? Well of course I didn't - choose that is - I had a bit of each! :)
Oh and just for the sake of documenting it on my "food journal", and to remind myself to go back for the yummy-looking muffins - Y and I also went for some juice at Book Kitchen - if we weren't so full from Orange Grove markets, I would have ordered the ricotta pancakes also! I was happy with my "sunshine juice" ($5) - OJ with honey is quite a good combination. They took ages making it tho!

Organic Food & Farmers Market, Leichhardt

Leichhardt Farmers Market www.organicfoodmarkets.com.au
Orange Grove Public School, cnr Balmain and Perry Street, Leichhardt
1st, 3rd and 5th Saturdays of each month.

Having missed the Good Living Farmers markets, Y and I decided to check out the Balmain markets. As we turned onto Balmain Rd however, we saw these markets at Orange Grove Primary and decided to stop by. Hoorah that we did!

Y at the Malaysian food stall, where we had yummy char kway teow

The Farmer's Wife stall, where I purchased some wonderful elderflower cordial - apparently the elderflower came all the way from Romania!
The taste of elderflower - bringing back memories of Bar Europa in Copenhagen. I remember cradling a hot elderflower drink whilst looking out the cafe window onto the freezing pedestrian mall, relaxing after a day of hardcore touristing! Its funny how tastes and sounds can bring back such vivid memories...

Organic happiness

I used to scoff at organic food - how different can it be and why would you pay more for the same molecules of food? Not sure how I became so enamoured with 'organic', I think it was a cooking demonstration which compared dishes made with organic produce to supermarket brands and I was sold...

So I was really excited to hit a wonderful organic store About Life (605 Darling Street
Rozelle NSW) and here are my purchases:

Been eying out some truffle salsa for a while - refused to pay $25 at DJs, but happy to see it here for $20

Sparkling Elderflower drink with pomegranate seeds!















Easy breakfast for half a week for only $5!