Maisy's Cafe, Neutral Bay

Continuing the great catch-up night with my friends, from Rengaya we went to Maisy's Cafe in Neutral Bay. Thanks to my friend who recommended this place, she said Maisy's Cafe has the best mudcake in town. Mudcake is one of my favourite cake all the times :)


The mudcake was awesome, it's really really good. It's very moist and they served it with vanilla ice cream (it's best combination, mudcake and vanilla ice-cream) and melted chocolate or you can call it chocolate soup :) It's very yummy. 


Our next order was New York Cheesecake. It's good as well but you can find the same new york cheesecake in other places. The mudcake is still the best. 


The service is average, one of the guy was very stiff. When we finished our cakes, we were still talking, the guy came and gave us the bill. There was no queue; we were looking at each others ... did we get kicked-out again? :) And definately not because they were closing because Maisy's cafe opens 24 hours. Yes 24 hours!! I found this is amazing. Because I hardly find any places in Sydney which open 24 hours except Mc Donald. 


Overall, this is a good place for having cakes. 

the "famous" mudcake

blink ... mudcake gone :)

new york cheesecake

hmmm ... finish

Maisy's Cafe

1/164 Military Rd
Neutral Bay NSW 2089
(02) 9908 4030

Open Daily 24 hours

Rengaya, North Sydney

It was a wonderful time, catching up with friends for dinner at Saturday night. We went to Rengaya, Japanese restaurant in North Sydney. I didn't know this place exists before and apparently it's quite famous. We booked for 6.30pm and they said we need to leave at 8pm because the next people who booked the table would arrive. 


The food were really good although I think there are other Japanese restaurants which are better. However, I am happy with the food; however, it's little bit expensive. It costs us $48 each. My favourites will be the wagyu beef and pork ribs. Wagyu beef was awesome; however, the best wagyu beef that I ever had still the one in Hyatt Hotel Sydney. The salmon salad was very good as well, very refreshing. I prefer salmon salad than prawn salad; the prawn salad was little bit plain. 


The service was allright. When the clock was at 8pm, they came to us and asked us to leave because the next customer have come. We wanted to order dessert but we didn't have chance. We decided to continue the night to Maisy's Cafe. According to my friend, that place has the best mud cake in town :) 

mojito

prawn salad

salmon salad

wagyu beef

pork

pork ribs

sashimi and unagi

unagi on rice

sashimi on rice

Rengaya

73 Miller St
North Sydney NSW 2060
(02) 9929 6169

Open Mon,Sat-Sun 6pm-10:30pm; Tue,Thu-Fri 12pm-3pm, 6pm-10:30pm; Wed 12pm-3pm, 6pm-11:30pm

Khatta Meetha

I went to cinema on Sunday with my friend to watch Khatta Meetha. It has been a long week and I wanted to watch something funny and felt happy. So I decided to watch Khatta Meetha because the trailer looked very funny.

Guess what? It's all WRONG! The trailer totally mislead people's expectations. When you watched the trailer, you will think that this movie is going to be a very funny movie but it's not. The movie was so sad that when I came out from the cinema I felt depressed and unhappy. The movie is about a contractor who wanted to be success but kept failing. The whole family think he is a loser ... nothing but good. Brothers, brother in laws, sisters (except one), sisters in laws hate him (sounds like soap opera, doesn't it?). The youngest sister is forced to get married with a bad guy, just for the sake of marriage and business purpose. At the end, she committed suicide because she was tortured and raped. Jeezzzz this is too much for Sunday afternoon relax movie. The story is an old concept, I felt like watching 20 years old Hindi movie. The story is too depressing and too serious.

The only good thing about this movie, I guess, Akshay Kumar. He is good. He is playing good in this role. Overall, it's ok movie but too depressing (did I mention it before?). I won't never ever watch this movie again.
Rating: 1.5/5

Driftwood, Narrabeen

Back to Narrabeen this week for brunch :) On the way there, I started imagining how fresh and nice the smoothie will be ... the best strawberries banana smoothie in Sydney that I found so far. 


Apparently on Saturday, Driftwood was not very crowded. I didn't realize that we always went there on Sunday morning. We got our table very easily ... the staff as usual were friendly. They were very tentative this time because it's less crowded. I ordered fried eggs with toast plus chorizo (yummy ...), baked-beans and of course strawberries banana smoothie. 


hmm .... the smoothie tasted little bit different today and I realize they put caramel around the glass before pouring the smoothie into the glass. Those caramel made the smoothie tasted little bit weird. I will remember next time to mention "no caramel on the glass". I think they put caramel only when it's less crowded. I don't think they ever put it when I came on Sunday. 


Overall, the food and the service are still brilliant :)

you can see the caramel around the smoothie 

fried eggs, toast, baked-beans and chorizo

fetta cheese, mushroom omelette

fried eggs, bacon, toast and hash-brown

Driftwood

4/18 Ocean St

Narrabeen NSW 2101, Australia

(02) 9970 8911

Open Weekdays 6:30am-3pm; Weekends 6:30am-3:30pm

http://www.driftwoodcafe.com.au

Inception

I just came back from watching Inception with my friends in cinema. I don't even know how to start reviewing this movie. It's AWESOME and mind-blowing. I can't find the right word to describe this movie.


The story line is amazing, the script was well-written. It could be confusing in some parts but I guess I need to watch it again to fully understand the whole things. I always love Christopher Nolan's movies; he is such an amazing director. A lot of people remember him because of Dark Knight. I actually like Batman Begin more and Prestige. He always makes people amazed when they came out from cinema.


Leonardo Dicaprio (as Cobb) played very well ... I guess he is doing amazing jobs in any of his recent movies. Marion Cotillard (as Mal, Cobb's wife) is very convincing. I was scared watching her. Her acting is brilliant. I like Ellen Page (as Ariadne), she is cute. Everybody else does brilliant jobs as well. All the roles fit them very well.


Please watch this movie and you won't be disappointed ... but maybe you will do a lot of thinking :)


Rating: 5/5

La Buvette, Potts Point

La Buvette is one of my favourite cafe in Sydney. It's located in Potts Point, cool nice trendy area. When I was there, I always feel like I am not in Sydney. It's different. 


La Buvette has a long list why it's one of my favourite cafe. The service is always great, the waitress is always very nice and friendly, the food is brilliant and the food presentation is beautiful ... I can get great pictures in here :) The place could be very crowded sometimes and you need to wait. But usually it's quite quick ... just few minutes wait. 


The french toast is one of the best that I found in town ... according to my friend, the big breakfast is one of the best as well. The only place that they serve potatos (not hashbrown :) in big breakfast. Only one disappointment this week, the chai latte was terrible. I think I never ordered chai latte whenever I came to La Buvette ... I remember the smoothie was awesome. 


When I ordered, I requested to have less maple syrup on the french toast (I found the maple syrup is too much). The waitress was very nice that he put the maple syrup separately so I can decide by myself how much I want. It's what you call "great customer service" :) Always feeling happy after having brunch at La Buvette ...

chai latte

big breakfast

scrambled eggs, spinach with toast

french toast

La Buvette

35 Challis Ave 

Potts Point NSW 2011

(02) 9358 5113

Open Mon-Thu,Sun 6am-10pm; Fri-Sat 6am-5:30pm

Deus Cafe, Camperdown

Sometimes I wonder, how and why a cafe becomes popular when the food served are very common which you can find anywhere else? Location? marketing from mouth to mouth? Review? Maybe ... 


I went to Deus Cafe last weekend. When I entered the cafe, I was surprised because the cafe was pack of people. They were under staff so we were trying to find an empty table by ourselves. We found a table in the corner, shared with other 2 ladies. I looked at the menu ... nothing is unique or different, they served the same breakfast like other cafes; such as egg benedicts, big breakfast, toast, bacon, poached egg, etc. 


According to my friend, the coffee was bitter. The food was good but again nothing is extra-ordinary. The almond pastry was nice; egg benedicts sauce was good.  No friendly smile or small chat from the staff, I guess they were really busy. However, the waiter who brought our food was friendly. 

Deus Cafe, Camperdown

almond pastry

english breakfast tea

latte

2 poached eggs with toast

eggs benedicts

Deus Cafe

98-104 Parramatta Rd
Camperdown NSW 2050
(02) 9519 3669

Open Weekdays 10am-6pm; Weekends 10am-4pm

http://www.deus.com.au

Milenge Milenge

When I read about this movie few years back, I wasn't interested at all to watch ... because I don't like a movie pairing Kareena Kapoor and Shahid Kapoor. FYI, I don't like Kareena and I love Shahid, now you understand the reason. It's getting worse ... this movie is like 3-4 years old? and now they decided (producer? distributors?) to release it. Obviously, you can see the differences of their faces; they looked so young!!! I couldn't believe it ... Shahid looked like a college student, remind me of Ishq Vishk. And .... it's much worse, the songs are sang by Himesh *faint*. This movie is like a complete package of BIG NO for me.


Can you believe? I actually went to cinema on Sunday and watched this movie. Do you want to know the reason? This movie is copied from my favourite Hollywood movie all the times, Serendipity. I want to see how they make it in Bollywood version (from 1.5 hours movie to 2.5 hours movie).


Milenge Milenge apparently is not a bad movie at all; despite of, it looks old and Himesh's songs. Kareena and Shahid looked good together. If people haven't watched Serendipity (the original movie), people will like the movie because the story is very interesting and romantic. Surprisingly, this is bearable than I hate luv storys.
Rating: 1.5/5

I hate luv storys

When the trailer came out for the first time, I was really excited and watched it many times almost everyday. I was looking forward to watch 'I hate luv storys' because it looks funny and Sonam Imran were looking great together. I also said to myself and everybody that I am going to watch it on the first day only at cinema.


Finally, my long waiting ended yesterday. I went to watch I hate luv storys with my friends and was looking forward to see a great movie. I read the review; it got 3.5 stars (hmmm must be really good then). I was laughing at few scenes; after a while I felt this movie was very slow and almost no story at all. Things were getting worse when it became more cheesy and cheesy. I told myself "It's ok ... maybe first part is slow and second part will be great". There I was, waiting for some surprises for second part.


During intermission, all my friends started complaining that the movie is very slow, "give us back our money (joking)" and "can we go home now?" I tried to comfort them by saying that the second part will be better according to the review that I read.


Second part started ... after few minutes I felt hmmm still not moving, I started feeling uncomfortable. When I looked at the watch, I was shocked because there was still another one hour to finish. If I started looking at watch and feeling uncomfortable while I was watching Bollywood movie, it's really a big thing. Because I love Bollywood movies a lot; even the most crap movies according to other people will be still good for me. Then suddenly the pictures on the screen were up side down; we were looking at each others. Hey what's going on? Apparently, there was technical problem. Can you believe it? We need to wait for around 15-20 minutes for them to fix it. My friends started complaining again and asking whether we should go home. I said I still want to see the ending; all of them said "We know the ending, Jay and Simran will be together, so now we are going home."


The story of this movie is too simple for 2.5 hours movie. There is nothing new and it's getting slower and slower and slower. There are some scenes which quite funny ... at least made me laugh. Imran and Sonam have a very good chemistry. However, few scenes are too cheesy. Let me tell you, I am one of the cheesiest person whom you can ever meet and I love romantic movies a lot! Even me, I could't bear those scenes.
Rating: 1/5

Spicer Street Cafe, Woollahra

It has been a while since my last visit to new cafe for my food mission. I've never been to Woollahra before and apparently there are few nice cafes in this area. Once you enter Queen St, Woollahra; you feel like you are not in Sydney. Small shops and cafe surroundings made this are looks posh and expensive. Straight away, I said to myself, I love this place :)


Spicer Street Cafe is a small cafe at the corner of Spicer Street and Queen St. There are not many different food on the menu; mostly sandwiches, paninis. As I wrote before, I am not a big fan of cafe which doesn't serve hot food. But it's allright, anything new is good for me. Smoothie and juices are reasonably cheap; it's around AUD5.50. Other cafes usually sell it for $6.50 or more. My friends and I ordered hot chocolate, flat white, English breakfast tea with milk (yes, that's for me) and lentil tomato soup because the weather were extremely cold and windy. The staff was very friendly and nice too. 

spicer street cafe

english breakfast tea with milk

hot chocolate, I like the presentation ... and we noticed hot chocolate in Woollahra is always served this way (we saw at other cafes)

flat white

lentil tomato soup with bread

Spicer Street Cafe

2/128 Queen St
Woollahra NSW 2025
(02) 9328 2221