(Circular Quay, MCA, Dumplings, Emperors Garden Bakery, 360 bar)
We woke up on our second day in Sydney, and it was gloomy and rainy. We decided to brave weather head on, and went for a morning jog in Hyde Park. It was a nice park as far as parks go. No magical elves handing out cheeseburgers and cupcakes or anything like that. But it did have a nice Anzac memorial, and it seemed to be in the center of a lot of hustle and bustle, and I loved it. It reminded me of home in Chicago.
It was still gloomy after our run, but we hopped on a bus and headed down to Circular Quay (pronounced Key), yet another harbor area in Sydney. We had a great view of the Sydney Harbor bridge, and of course, the Opera House, the two big Sydney landmarks.
But it was raining the entire time, which makes it a little hard to see and you know, not be wet. Thankfully we hooked up with some lovely people from a radio station who were handing out mini cans of Coke!
Seriously, if anything can bring a ray of sunshine in on my rainy day, it would be anything in miniature form. Cupcakes. Soda Cans. Midgets (or vertically challenged, if you will). All freaking adorable.
We also took a quick walk through of the Customs House, basically a library with random things around it like restaurants and a bar.
This was the floor in the center of the building, the entire city of Sydney miniaturized and under glass.
Here I am conquering the entire city of Sydney a la King Kong. Leena hungry, rawr!!! We had a quick lunch at the bar/grill type place at the Customs House. To put it nicely, the meal didn’t work out for us. So I won’t even bother writing about it here. It was still raining, so we walked over to the Museum of Contemporary Art and killed a few hours there.
The MCA and I went together better than Oprah and cake. I?ve been to plenty of art museums, but contemporary art just rocks my world a little bit harder than most. It is easier for me to interpret (sometimes)and I love seeing how creative and innovative the artists are when trying to get their message across. Its inspiring.
There were a lot of video presentations, and a huge South American Artists exhibit, which is where we spent most of our time. A lot of it was politically motivated, and the work ranged from funny to insanely aggressive. We saw a pair of male undies embroidered with the Nike swoosh. There were tires hand carved with music notes and dipped in ink then rolled over a giant parchment to create a large piece of music dedicated to people killed by cars. The strangest–an entire wardrobe (dress, shoes, bag, soccer ball!) made out of what looked like human skin and tons of nipples (and other, ahem, unmentionable spots I am way too classy to write here (but it might rhyme with nut roll). The best-
?a picture of the South American revolutionary, Che Guevara, called Che (Sopa de frijoles negros) made out of bean soup by artist Vik Muniz. This picture can be found in an interesting Sydney Morning Herald Article about the exhibit here. We met up with one of my partner?s work mates who happens to live in Sydney for dinner. He offered to take us to quote ?the best dumplings in Chinatown.? I am never one to deny the right to wonton wrapped packets of meaty love (which, consequently, is the EXACT definition of ?dumplings? in the dictionary), so we followed him to the Chinatown Noodle Restaurant, which is confusingly labeled Chinese Noodle Restaurant. I?ll be honest, I was just thankful it was so darn descriptive.
It had the typical large print menu pictures on the window, helping you to understand just what the heck you are ordering. Some mock this aspect of some Asian restaurants, but I quite like it. It’s good to be in the know. The restaurant itself was a bit cramped with tiny tables that seemed nearly on top of one another, but this was totally part of its charm. You could be with your group and still get a good look at what the guy next to you ordered, see if he liked it or not or if it made him burp. That?s cool in most cases. As were the fake grapes on the ceiling; this place was cheesy, but just enough to make me love it instantly.
There was a short wait before we got out seats, and as soon as we sat down, tea was rushed to our table, free of charge. We ordered the famed dumplings, opting for pan-fried pork and chive ($7.50 AUD for 12) and their pork and seafood steamed dumplings ($8.00 for 16) but they also offered them boiled and had vegetarian options. Here are the pork and chive :
There is a whole process to eating them. On each table they have these little bottles of soy sauce and vinegar, which I later found out was Chinese black vinegar from an Asian classmate of mine. You mix the two of those to your liking in a small dish, and they bring a small plate of chilies in oil to the table, which you also add to your dish.
This is what you dip the dumplings in, and I freaking loved it. I guess I’m just a sucker for interactive foods. It was salty and sweet and spicy all at once, a flavor so good it haunted my memories in days to come and begged me to come back for more. But it didn?t have to beg. I was already a whore for dumplings. We also ordered a plate of their hand-made noodles with Xinjiang stirfried chicken ($8.50 AUD).
As the name suggests, the noodles are made in the restaurant, and we were lucky enough to see the noodle maker in action that Saturday night. There was a small window in the corner of the restaurant where the noodle maker had his way with several dozen noodles at a time. He would quickly form the noodles from the dough, then stretch them individually.
When he had a large pile of them, he would wrap the dough around his arms and pound them on the counter top while stretching them even more at the same time.
It was great to watch, but most the pictures are blurry because he was moving so darn fast. I was fascinated with watching him work, especially since my mother used to tell me my stellar Playdough handling skills would never come in handy in the real world. Liar. The noodles tasted great, fresh and cooked perfectly, and sent steaming hot to the table. We also tried the mushrooms and Chinese greens ($8.80 AUD), which looked like baby bok choy.
These were also tasty, but we had ordered way too much food for three people and had trouble finishing everything. The total damange was only $32.80?seriously, you can?t even eat at Subway for that cheap anymore. This place kicked major ass. Good job, Sal!
We took a nice stroll through Chinatown and stopped off at Emperors Garden Bakery for cream puffs, or Emperors Balls to Sal. Yup. These balls were cheap and tasted great, quite possibly the most perfect balls ever,if such a thing could exist.
The outside pastry tastes like a pancake, and in the center was a rich warm custard. They’re tiny, but they are also 30 cents each, so you can be chunky and order a lot without breaking the bank. We walked through the CBD, and headed over to 360 Bar and Dining Room. This is a bar and restaurant roughly 80 stories in the air that slowly rotated in a circle, which gives you a panoramic view of the entire city. Yeah. Pretty cool. It didn?t move fast enough to make you sick or anything, just at a nice calm pace. You know, until you?ve had three fancy sounding cocktails and you try to go to the bathroom, but forget where your seat is because the stupid bar is moving! It was a gorgeous view, great drinks, and even better service. What can I say? We were in good hands with Sal. We were also a short walk from our hotel room, yet another bonus. It may have a lot of hills, but Sydney was starting to win us over. ~LTG Read More: Sydney Trip Day 1, 2, 3 Chinatown Noodle Restaurant TG7, Prince Centre 8 Quay Street Haymarket(Sydney), NSW 2000 02 9281 9051 BYO Open 7 days 10am-9:30pm Emperors Garden Bakery 75 Dixon Street Haymarket (Sydney), NSW 2000 02 9281 5989 360 Bar and Dining Room 100 Market Street Sydney NSW 2000 02 8223 3800 Open for Dinner 7 days. Open for Lunch Wed, Thurs, Fri, Sun. 360 Bar open till 1.30am
