When I’m in Sydney, I try to eat what I can’t get in Canberra, foods like ramen, fresh sushi, good Thai and of course dumplings. So when I had limited time in Sydney and had only eaten ramen and sushi so far, there was nothing else to do but drag my friends for a progressive dinner to tick more boxes from my ‘to eat’ list.
To go to somewhere new, where over half the menu really excites you but you know you can’t order that much was really hard. My friend was telling me about Petaling Street, an awesome hawker restaurant and I was keen to make it the first stop during our progressive dinner in Sydney.
A few key dishes (and drinks) were chosen and enjoyed by everyone but my favourite dish was the roti canai with curry chicken. The roti was nice and flaky while the curry had lots of flavour with tender chicken.
Progressive dinner stop: #1
Venue: Petaling Street: Malaysian Hawker Food
Address: 760 George Street, Haymarket, Chinatown, Sydney,NSW
Amount per person: $10.00
Cheong fun, roti canai with chicken curry, char kway teow and Hainanese chicken rice.
This was an unexpected stop as a fellow foodie pointed out that we were in close proximity to a Thai place, which did cheap small bowls of noodles. It sounded like a perfect addition to the progressive dinner and I was keen for some Thai food anyway.
Do Dee Paidang have tom yum soups, all with different meats, a choice of noodle and different levels of chilli. I along with the other non-chilli eaters stuck with the tom yum soup with tender pork rib and fresh noodles. We enjoyed the sour taste of the tom yum with the delicious meatiness of the pork ribs, while the hardcore chilli eaters went with the level 3 soup (out of 7). Watching one of the chilli eaters sweat and struggle with the heat of the soup made me curious about how hot their bowl was. I coated my spoon in a little bit of soup (I’m not crazy enough to actually drink any of the soup) and licked it, immediately I could feel the heat on my tongue which quickly spread to the back of my throat. Whoa, that was intense, I wonder who actually eats level 7!
Feeling bad that we were taking up a table even though we just wanted noodle soup, I order entrée of chicken satay skewers ($8.90), which were more expensive than our noodles ($6.00) but were really really delicious and I don’t usually eat satay.
Progressive dinner stop: #2
Venue: Do Dee Paidang Thai Noodle Bar & Cafe
Address: 9, 37 Ultimo Rd, Haymarket NSW 2000
Amount per person: $4.20
We were told that they were no longer selling Papa roti for the day and my smile quickly turned into a frown. I was really looking forward to eating a coffee bun with a delicious buttery aroma.
Progressive dinner stop: #3
Venue: Papa Roti
Address: 663 George St, Haymarket NSW 2000
Amount per person: five sad faces 😦 😦 😦 😦 😦
Din Tai Fung was along the way of our progressive dinner and it would have been ridiculous not to stop. The hard part was not ordering any fried rice, although my friend couldn’t help but order a pork bun too.
We ordered 24 dumplings (and drinks) between the 5 of us and savoured each and every bite.
Progressive dinner stop: #3
Venue: Din Tai Fung
Address: 644 George St, Sydney NSW 2000
Amount per person: $13.00
You are wondering how we were able to eat more after 3 stops already, but remember we were sharing one delicious original Hot Star chicken ($8.50) between the 5 of us. We tore it into 5 pieces while it was still really hot and it was a few bites of heaven.
Progressive dinner stop: #4
Venue: Hot Star
Address: 96 Liverpool Street, Sydney NSW 2000
Amount per person: $1.70
TimmyC and I were all Aqua S-ed out as we had been there for the past two nights and had already eaten all the flavour combinations but it didn’t stop everyone else from enjoying it. I was surprised TimmyC preferred the pandan ice cream over the lychee (dairy free) but I think it was because of the creamy ice cream texture.
Aqua S change their flavours every Thursday.
Progressive dinner stop: #5
Venue: Aqua S
Address: 27/501 George St, Sydney NSW 2000
Amount per person: $5.00
A friend of ours popped into Black Star Pastry’s pop up store in the Kinokuniya earlier in the day and got some goodies to share. He got their famous strawberry water melon cake ($7.50/slice) and a caramel panna cotta ($9.00).
Progressive dinner stop: #6
Venue: Black Star Pastry (pop up)
Address: The Galleries, 2/500 George St, Sydney NSW 2000
Amount per person: $4.80
I had promised to take TimmyC to Messina and a promise is a promise. Everyone else had returned to their hotels and while TimmyC and I light railed our way straight to The Star.
We had chosen ‘Gay ol’ time’ which didn’t taste anything like a gaytime but TimmyC still really enjoyed it.
Progressive dinner stop: #7
Venue: Messina
Address: Cafe Court, Level G, 80 Pyrmont StreetPyrmont NSW 2009
Amount per TimmyC: $4.80
I was really impressed with the amount of stops we were able to make without being ridiculously full. We got to eat a lot of variety and the best of what every venue had to offer. Tell me dear reader, have you had a progressive dinner?
TALES OF A CONFECTIONIST 