Toraya Sushi

I don't think I've mentioned that I have, like, THE best luck with parking infringements and lovely parking officers.
When I do break a petty law, they just...flock.
I can't sin for shit! They see evvvv-errrr-yyy-thinggggg.

I have been driving for a little under 2 years. That's all I need to go broke. Within that time I have gotten maybe 5 infringements, excluding speeding fines. Within those 5 infringements, 3 of them were in the same month. Within those 3, 2 of them were 2 days apart. Gawd they are CLINGY! Just won't LEAVE ME ALONE!

But really it's not my fault. 2 of those fines were successfully withdrew. Like the time I managed a fine for parking my ass on PRIVATE PROPERTY which was actually OUR PRIVATE PROPERTY?! What a joke >:(

This all leads to the tragedy that happened when we parked the car at Subi and found a broken ticket machine. Usually I'd be jumping for joy but you know, when you always get eaten alive by fines like all the FREAKING TIME, you develop abit of skeptism. I didn't want to leave the car without purchasing a ticket, it's just so naked without that scrappy ugly paper on the dashboard. It's developed to become my fear, a fear that everybody has always had when I thought I was just bloody invincible.

But even bloody invincible heroes get hungry, cause you just can't conquer all with an empty stomach. And I'm not bloody invincible because food turns me into jelly <3

Miso Soup

It was a stinking hot day and naturally one wouldn't go for hot liquidy type foods to match. But like, it's miso soup, and miso soup has always had it's own special place in my heart. I'm not sure why I have a soft spot for it ever since I can remember. When I was a little teeny tot, and...now...still a teeny tot...I'd always make sure I'll save my favourite-est foods til the end to savour it the most after I devoured everything else.

And hence, I've always known miso soup to be cold when I do eventually drink it.

But now I've learnt to not wait for so long, in case things don't stick around forever.

Cause mum always stole my damn miso soup! So now I down it while it's still hot with floaties inside and all, and love how that murky liquid burns the crap out of my mouth and scalds every tastebud. Gotta love miso soup.

Udon Noodle Soup - $5.50

Udon is good. Udon is super good when you get it in a big bowl like this for just the sweet price of $5.50. It's an inexpensive price tag for when you want a noodle fix. It's full of that Japanese Udon dressed with bean curd, spring onions, seaweed and tempura crumbs scattered on the surface of the broth. Adds to the visual aspect of things but not much to the taste side, as they're already all soggy and such.

I love bean curd in most dishes but the way it is done in Japanese dishes doesn't always tickle my fancy. They tend to take on a more sweet flavour most times than savoury and it's not something I am accustomed to so.........no tanks :)

In all genuinity, I happily and generously offered, "want some tofu skin?", took a bite, scrunched my face up - "ewwwwwwww!"
M: "Ye - ...no." after my "ewwwww!"
It wasn't ew coz it was yuck or anything, just way too sweet and un-beancurdy for me.

Large "Bento" Lunch Combo - $15.50

Because the udon was so...plain and healthy, we just couldn't do with that. We went for this yummy sounding lunch choice that was available in large or small. Large was the natural choice for us, naturally. With large, you're entitled to all the bits like your choice of meat with rice, mixed salad, miso soup, and an agonising choice of a deep fried item, out of the 4 or 5 you can choose from.

Here we have teriyaki chicken, the type that is panfried, the type that is thigh meat, the type that is abso-freaking-lutely delicious. And hey, even the rice comes from a shape moulder :-)

Chicken Karaage - $4.50

And because the large lunch choice only came with ONE choice of a deep fried unhealthy item, I was sad to be unable to try any of the other deep frys. Karaage chicken? Crab claw? Karaage? Claw? Chicken? Crab? Normal? Different? NONE?!

Then wait, it hit. DOUBLE OR NOTHING? Of course double! Why stop at one choice! So we got the Chicken Karaage also, at 4.50 which came with "marinated soybean sauce" but was very visibly and tasting like chilli mayo anyway. Bummer. Heck of a frickin good sauce, but a bummer coz I wanted this marinated soybean sauce. Even though it sounds suspiciously like soy sauce.

Judging by the batter, I couldn't eat it. LOL so crunchy and encasing some fine, hot chicken. So since I couldn't eat one thing on this dish, I ate everything else, which was the sauce and...the garnish. I know I know, some people are definitely against garnishes cause...you're not meant to eat decorations right?

"Is this garnish clean...?"
*Washes it in chilli mayo*
"It is now!"
^My thoughts verbalised out loud to eating companion
who then shook their head in utter disbelief and disapproval

Crumbed Cocktail Crab Claws

These little golden crab lollipops came with the large lunch plate. I guess these were the unique sounding things out of karaage chicken, crumbed calamari, etc etc even though they are all probably equally as golden and delicious. And that spicy chilli mayo dipping sauce...TIMES TWO coz we ordered 2 deep fries...dddrrroooolll. Even tho JAWS' version reigns as my favourite :-)

M let out a loud ARGH, SHIT and nearly choked to death and I immediately gathered that it was from a broken jagged part that had broken off from the crab claw shell. Eat these with caution. Ok, not choke to death but still choked and spluttered everywhere and gave the rest to me coz it clawed her throat out. Yay!

Enclosed within a layer of golden crumbs with a little protruding crab claw handle are thin threads of silky white crab flesh, still burning hot with a whiff of steam escaping when you bite into this ball of heaven.
M: "Man, it looks like white worms in here. Seriously, LOOK!"
*Shoves silky white crab flesh slithers in my face*
Ok. Heaven feeling gone. I was now eating worms.
 

Irish Luxury

With a belly full of food, it now cried out for a refreshing cold liquid on this dry, hot, sticky summer day. The coins that were saved because of that broken ticket machine now went to an especially expensive one on the Rokeby Road outdoor carpark. Sigh at ticket prices and SIGH at needing money in general to be able to live!

We ventured into Brownhaus and its surprisingly brown themed interior and got the Irish Luxury costing around $6.50 from memory. It's a delicious blend of espresso shot, irish cream, hazelnut, milk, cookies and cream ice cream and belgium chocolate in a delicious looking chocolate swirled cup, complete with a frothy top.

And if you're anything like me, you'll scurry about and scrape at the sides to get the solidified chocolate off and look like a loser.

...

I always thought Toraya was the place opposite Hans Cafe in Subiaco. Having been there once I didn't know what was so good about it, remembering the steep prices and small-ish servings that came with that big-ish price. So I never really went about looking for it, until this day. And it was only this day, where I got a bit excited and all woop-dee-doo about finding Toraya. Can't believe I thought a restaurant named Satsuke was Toraya. How much dumber can I get...

So yeah, I was glad I let my initial skeptism go and found this little beauty of a Japanese restaurant. I think its not like super in comparison to every other Jap place but because I've heard good about Toraya and upon trying it, it didn't fail my expectations, so I've given it thumbs up. Pretty much from the moment I lay eyes on it. Talk about judging a book by its cover :P

It was an epic hot day so naturally indoors is more attractive than the outside seating. Lunchtime meant pretty much all the tables were taken except for a lone one outside, which we also had to abandon because of the heat wave outside. Patrons are accomodating even inside a relatively small space inside, especially when everyone is dying from the heat and body heat all around makes it worse. I could probably recite the whole conversation from the next table if I needed to!

Staff work pretty quickly and came round to our table 2 or 3 times, ready to take our order when we weren't ready to make our order. Interior is simple and complete with Japanese screens on tiled grounds and packed seating. Takeaway orders seem to be the prominent choice here in the hustling, bustling suburb of Subiaco as the sushi fridge was close to being emptied at the beginning of lunch hour.

Serving sizes were pretty good and we ended up having to take away a few pieces of teriyaki chicken that we struggled to swallow but couldn't. But...that didn't stop us from heading to Woolworths next door and buying a whole box of Red Rock chips and Oreos and drinks and a load of other stuff to stuff ourselves with for the rest of the week day.

I was with the best friend at the time.
"I want something to chew on"
*Walks into pet aisle*
"Want Schmackos?"
Cause you know, a dog is a woman's best friend :-)

Tony Romas

When dinner was booked for 7.30pm, I told them sure, I'll be there.
When 7pm showed up, I told them nah guys, sorta have an exam tomorrow.
When it came to 7.30pm, somehow I was out the door on the way to meet with Tony, who always promises and delivers a good ass meal.

I always end up making bad decisions. Or...I just don't make any at all. War breaks out whenever decisions are involved. My academic side was like dude, pass your exam aye. But my pig side was like dude, eat, and THEN pass your exam aye.
Yeah ok. That side of me always makes the better decision. I want this, I want it bad, and...I got my satisfaction.
:D

In fact, all 4 of us were immensely satisfied with this. Who wouldn't be! Like come on.

Onion Loaf - $15.50

This massive onion flower thing was crazy. It was so awesomely crafted, with a circular wall composed entirely of giant hand cut spanish onions, breaded and THEN, deep fried. That could either delight some but would probably disgust many, because so many people have an innate, indescribable hate for onions and LOATHE them with a passion. This type of person existed on our table, but because the other 3 of us aren't hateful people and don't share that same hate towards onions, we ordered it.
And not just the half loaf, but the whole pretty mouthwatering full loaf package so it could shine in all it's glory on the table right in front of M, who hates onions. Suck on that!

It comes served with their original BBQ sauce which fits nice and snug smack bang in the hole down the middle. The onions are sweet and I couldn't help but sneak in a couple of rings without taking the batter off. This came out pretty quick, but because we were waiting for the last person to arrive, we couldn't touch it. That was a difficult time to sit through. I couldn't help it. I picked some rings off the top and touched up the empty spots to hide the evidence that I did.
And evidently, I am a master at food thieving.


You see how in awe I was when this was plonked on our table? My jaw dropped cause it was so damn huge! And a full loaf is definitely plenty to go around, as by the end of our meal there was probably still half left which very regretfully went to waste. So yeah. DON'T BE GREEDY!
Or, you could quite possibly consume this as a main and feel like crap afterwards.

I didn't want to destroy this composition. It reminds me of a king's crown. Who could break that? This is the stuff crowns are made of. It looked so perfect.
So golden..
So majestic..
So crunchy..
So damn bloody perfect.

Kickin' Prawns - $16.50

We stumbled upon this starter once, when I went to Tony Romas being only half hungry (WHAT?!) and ordered an entree to be my main meal. And I'm glad we did. Because it's yum-mehhh as! You make good discoveries and come across good things when you least expect it sometimes. When you discover the right things, you stick with them, and you fall in love.

Personally I don't think $16.50 is worth it for the amount you get. It gets served in a little delicate cocktail glass that makes it look good and all but unfortunately good looking things lack substance. Sometimes. To all you good looking people out there, I don't mean any harm. :-)

You may not get much, but what you do get is the good schtuff. A few lightly battered prawns fried to crispy golden brown, then tossed in a spicy, creamy sauce "exploding with flavour", or so Tony says. And the man is right! I can't get enough of it. The taste of the sauce is so good it might even make you eat your vegies.

Bread and Herb Butter

I really like it when restaurants surprise you with their generosity. They're not obliged to give you any more than what you pay for, or sometimes they will even give you less than what you pay for, so it's nice to see when they make the move to offer you something that you didn't ask for. Because simple gestures like that are what makes somebody's day sometimes, and they go a long way.

This cone shaped basket of fresh warm bread was delivered to the table, free of charge. It's easy to fill up on this before your mains come because you're already hungry and when it's in front of you like that, it's in our human nature to reach and grab for one, lather on the soft and creamy herb butter, savour every mouthful, make delicious sounds, and repeat the process multiple times before your actual food comes out.

So fluffy in the centre, such crusty edges on the sides makes for good bread. I got so into my bread that when the waiters came around to take away the basket after our meal, I jumped and exclaimed wait STOP!, there's still one inside :-) She went all apologetic for assuming I was done with the bread, and then proceeded to laugh at me. What, it was good bread.

Filet Medallions with Grilled Prawns - $38.90

I didn't try this. I would like to try this. The menu describes the dish as being two perfectly prepared filet medallions topped with cabarnet demi glace paired with grilled prawns. I forgot to ask for a taste of perfection, so I'm not sure how perfect the medallions were. I did have a prawn though, from that skewer that held 5 delicate little prawns sporting black, charcoaled (or as D insists, caramelised) tails. They were meh as one can imagine. Served also with coleslaw and the rounded ice cream lookalike scoop of mashed pohtahtoh.

I actually don't like how the meals are plated here, they look a little too spacious and looks a bit empty as a consequence. Food is sparsely spread apart and the two medallions are medallion sized alright. But Perth can get away with these relatively higher prices, presumably because people still go out and eat a heck of a lot, many with an appetite for delicious and saucy barbequed ribs.
 

St Louis Ribs & BBQ Chicken - $37.50

I shared this with M, thinking it would fill up 2 hungry tummies. Not so! Last time they ran out of BBQ chicken so we were determined to try it this time, being the chicken fanatics that we usually are. After having tried it, I think I'll give it a miss next time. Not that it was bad, but you can find tastier chicken elsewhere, in a place that doesn't specialise in ribs. We got the maryland part of the chicken, and even the usually tender dark meat section could save it from tasting a bit dry and overcooked.

The St Louis Ribs however, herrrrooo! Slightly sweet and always sticky, these sauce slathered ribs are always juicy, tender and tasty. I was lucky enough to be able to eat the meat, already deboned (deboned?...off the bone) for me so that I didn't end up with a sauce moustache like my 6 month old niece always sports. At her meal times she always looks like she got attacked by orange mash, although she rocks the pumpkin puree makeup look quite well :D

The dish came with a choice of 2 sides, to which we said yes to baked potato and coleslaw. Even though mash potato tickles our fancy more, M is picky and always dislikes the mash served at restaurants when they are "fake", ie. when powder is used and tastes gritty and floury as a result. You can't exactly find a fake baked potato, so instead would rather call for that and then go to all the fuss to make our own mash. I applaud you for that effort, I seriously cbf.
I say that quite a lot and it has become quite the line for me if you ask me to do anything. Regrettably it has grown on me to become my trademark.
I hope to be the proud owner of a CBF! number plate one of these days.

DIY mash

Oh, yeah that's the mash potato M attempted. This lump of moosh that resembles regurgitated food was like THE best tasting side of the night :-) Sorry it doesn't look as attractive as it sounds. The baked potato was scraped cleanly out of its jacket and mixed with the herb butter that came with the bread, which resulted in something called Success!

Potatoes are full of carbs and all and are probably the least useful vegetable out there in terms of benefits to health based on how much it is processed to become chips. Which are probably the only reason why people like potatoes. But they are so versatile and still taste good, if you fry, boil, roast, poke, prod, mash, whatever to it. And if you add a tonne of butter to it, it's pretty hard to make it taste bad. Unless you fail at life. I fail at life.

Half Slab Baby Back Ribs - $40.50

Horrendous photo. I have nothing to say.

Nexxxxxt!

Prawns Scampi Pasta - $22.90

With all the carnivorous activity going on around me, I went for something that sounded lighter and more...animal friendly. I decided on the Prawns Scampi pasta, which boasted a "generic portion of prawns" lightly sauteed with garlic, fresh basil, tomato pesto and a hint of chipotle, served over linguine and topped with shaved Asiago cheese. What the heck is a generic portion? I counted. Apparently this entails 10 prawns as a generic serving.

It was nice, but I can't think of any other word to fit as a better and more exciting description. You can probably judge by looking at it that it tasted pretty normal. I wouldn't be rushing to order it ASAP, and from this, I could probably sense that I wanted to join in on the beastly meat eating and be a carnivore instead. Protein is always more fun than, um, whatever the hell vegetables give you. A boring meal?

...

Tony Roma's enjoys pretty much full house seating capacity for dinner like every night. It's loud and it's rowdy as a result, but no one seems to care. You get down here and you are more than likely to get your hands dirty but it doesn't matter, cause you will most likely lick them clean again because the sauce is just too good to feed to wet wipes!

Because business is so damn good, they actually have a system whereby you actually can't make reservations for a table before you come, unless this has been removed. You get to the entrance, put your name down...and you wait. And wait and wait and wait and hope that your name is called before you starve to death on the pavement outside, or on their couch inside. There is a big screen projector playing to keep you amused for a while and to keep your mind off the delicious sights and smells wafting in the air.

Food options are plentiful but personally I would recommend coming here for the ribs and eat eat eat enough to risk death-by-meat. Vegetarians will shake their head at this place and all the sights of meat could also cause them death-by-meat. I don't remember too many Vego options but you can't blame that, should you choose to visit a place who specialises in meat and would probably have to sabotage a crap load of animals to keep up to their renowned famous ribs. 

Parking is also a frickin pain in the butt, as spots fill up quickly along the street and you're forced to park like, in a spot that isn't right in front of the restaurant LOL. I guess you are forced to walk a bit after the feast, which isn't a bad thing, but it is a bad thing, when you can't exactly walk after your feast. I'd say walk to the restaurant for dinner but definitely get picked up after it. Cause then you wouldn't have to walk up the street, turn a corner, walk down that street, get blown over by the permanently gusty wind on that street, cross the road, walk down another street, turn other corner, walk down that street to finally get to your car. A absolute waste of all those calories just consumed.

Staff are kept busy on their feet and running around like mad people, in order to keep up with such a busy environment. Despite this they can keep a smiley demeanour and are actually quite attentive with patrons. It was actually US who couldn't keep up with them!, as our waitress came round to our table a few times to take our order. But you know, with such a delicious menu, we could only finally decide on the THIRD time she came round. But no worries, this didn't bother her, or maybe it did and she could have been cursing us inside, but remained professional and is very very good at her job.
Cause hospitality is all about pleasing people, even if they are uncooperative, demanding a-holes.

We were not uncooperative, demanding a-holes.
Just indecisive a-holes.
:-)

Gonna party like, like it's 2012 (8)

It is the first day of the new year. It is now, and it is here. And it has not started well for me.
So many ups and down in life's big rollercoaster and I've had enough of that sickening downward rush. I want to chug back up. I want it to speed back up.

I didn't join in the countdown last night when everyone else around me was impatiently hurrying in the new year.
And when the final voices of 3, 2, 1 got louder and louder in my ear, I was still dazed in my own little cloud, seemingly still stuck in the past that is now 2011.

That was only last night. But last night was last year, but I still don't feel any different, this year.
I finally popped my party popper maybe, 30 minutes after midnight.
I got yelled at: S you're a bit late there!
I'm a bit slow sometimes...MOST times...but worry not, that's when I was ready to face the new year.
2012, I can take you on.

It's meant to be the end of the world and instead of being sombre about it, there is an indifferent feel about it. And there was a joyous cheer for the new year to come, no different to any other.
Because if anything happens, we are all in it together.
So what is there to be scared about?

Wishing you a very healthy, epic happy 2012 ahead, from wherever you are.
Supposedly that was the last "new year" we will witness, so live lots, laugh lots, and love even more than that.

Happy Delicious New Year! x