Cafe brunch and a birthday lunch

I am nothing if not a woman of my word. So I meant it when I said we would be back at Zus & Zo. Sunday brunch and we were ready to take Hospobaby to our favorite cafe. If you haven't been to Zus & Zo please don't go there, we love it and its quite busy already, we don't want you to go there and make us wait for a table, do we?
Zus does amazing sandwiches. I love them because finally there is a cafe who can think beyond the eggs benedict. Nothing wrong with Eggs Bene but I just hate eggs, I have a childhood phobia - ovophobia (its a real thing) I hate their smell and texture.  I am not alone, Alfred Hitchcock hated them too.
 I have only just learnt to boil an egg for Hospobaby who likes them soft boiled. Also I think if you want eggs ,why go out? Just crack one open at home. Zus like I said goes beyond eggs, they make mean sandwiches. Sid loves the Croque Madame and I love the Black box Piri Piri chicken sausage sandwich.
They also have a selection of loaves,muffins and scones displayed, so while we wait for our order Zoya can tuck into something tasty.

Zoya eating her date and walnut loaf

This weekend they had an amazing date and walnut loaf. Although we ordered it for Hospobaby we ended up stealing rather big bites from it. Thankfully, our order arrived before Zoya could start screaming her head off. She ate all the cheese from her dad's toastie and made a start on my Piri Piri sausage.
Zus and Zo are generous in their portions my sandwich came with 3 sausages. I hate how I have to share all my food and drink now. I reluctantly parted with a whole sausage. Unlike Sid, Zoya loves red peppers too. I had to share those too. I am an only child and not used to giving up my food, especially as Hospobaby doesn't have anything to barter with.

Before Hospobaby attacked my plate it looked like this.

A couple of drinks, two sandwiches and a slice of the date and walnut loaf= $47. Ka Ching! money well spent, bellies full for the day and Hospobaby on her way to snooze land! We love Zus & Zo.

Monday we were invited to celebrate Paula's birthday with a 7 course lunch at TriBeCa. We have been to TriBeCa in Parnell before with Hospobaby. She loved it, Chef Hayden does a good job. On a nice summer's day you can sit outside and they even have a high chair. As we walked in Chef warned me that he had been reading my blog and he would be looking forward to it. After a sip of bubbly we sat in the courtyard. We were a good sized group, nine of us with some or the other connection to hospitality.

Please note the clean dress!

The first course arrived, it was a refreshing course with compressed melon and tomatoes. Chef was out to impress Hospobaby, he sent out a special portion just for her. She loved the flavors, especially the tagliatelle woven amongst it .

I can't believe it! I get my own...

For once I was very happy not to share. It was a taste revelation. Our second course was so simple, yet exquisite. Hayden's take on Prawn toast. It was a prawn on a puffed up pork cracker.  Hospobaby ate some of Sid's as I was too quick in scoffing mine. I could have eaten a whole plate of these delectable prawns.

Prawn toast

The third course was another crowd pleaser. The freshest salmon with a wee hint of wasabi and crunchy rice puffs. We skirted around the wasabi and fed Hospobaby morsels of the fish, which she devoured with no hesitation.

Salmon w wasabi

Duck is my favorite, I don't think Hayden knows that. I used to be a vegetarian for 17 years, then I came to Auckland and lost my virgin tastebuds to chicken. Later, fate had me bump into Sid and the rest is history. He had it tough though, he introduced me to duck and it has a special place in my tummy now.

 The duck at TriBeCa came with the most velvety pumpkin puree. Almost the consistency and color of American mustard. Hospobaby ate some of the duck and all of the pumpkin puree.

Duck w pumpkin, walnuts and figs

Our main course was Merino lamb with goat's cheese cream, some baby carrots and roquette. This is the second time I have tried eating Merino lamb (usually I just wear the wool), the first time was at Cru at Sale Street. I liked how the lamb didn't taste fatty as it sometimes does. I am a die hard fan of goat's cheese, the jury is still out on Merino though, the cut was a tad tough. Hospobaby had taken to gallivanting by now and was under the table playing with gift bags, meant for Paula. We couldn't cajole her back to the table. Our lovely waitress also offered to take her off our hands, but we had to explain that Hospobaby loves her food.

We were all a bit surprised and unsure of our refresher when it arrived. A tooth brush in a glass of fizzy liquid accompanied by a red and a green gel. Hmmm... was chef taking this a bit too seriously?

Where was the sorbet in a glass? Well I admire Hayden for trying something out of the box. 

The fizzy stuff turned out to be Aloe Vera and was supposed to be gulped down after one brushed their teeth with the mint and strawberry gels. Always one to try something new I started brushing away. The aloe was quite refreshing. The others were not as uninhibited as me... tooth brushing is quite a private ritual I guess. Most of us only knew Mark and Paula and brushing our teeth in front of perfect strangers was a bit daunting. Some were worried about the tooth brushes themselves. Were they new? The germ-phobes chimed in. The owner came and relieved us from that anxiety quickly and soon everyone was brushing away. Hospobaby was mesmerized by the commotion caused by the arrival of the tooth brush course and came back to give it a try.

I think we might have to make some special strawberry flavored gel to get her to brush her teeth as enthusiastically as she did that day, the Wiggles toothpaste just doesn't cut it.
Our last course was dessert and we were allowed to choose what we wanted off the menu. I ordered the "Crunchie Bar", Valrhona chocolates, honeycomb, honey and mandarin. Sid asked for the tropical fruits salad, which was compressed mango, pineapple, lychee, coconut and a licorice sorbet. The desserts delivered exactly what they promised. While we had been busy choosing desserts Hospobaby had found a long lost friend. Gabby had met Zoya at Mark's birthday and had arrived from school to join the celebration.

Gabby and Zoya

She donned her chef's hat and apron and ran into the kitchen to whip up a dessert for her and Zoya to share. Soon she had a platter full of blue berries, watermelon,ice cream, jellies and gooseberries. It was a sweet feast, Gabby proudly fed Zoya heaped spoonfuls. After the sugar rush of the dessert platter, Gabby went back into the kitchen and got two chocolate petit fours. Unlike me who is reluctant to share, even with her own child, Gabby was happy to give a petit four to Zoya. Hospobaby was on a definite sugar high, she and Gabby laughed as only children can. And so we all finished our lunch at 4.30 pm on a happy high and headed home. Chef Hayden gets a special thanks for keeping the little ones happy. We will be back for more once the menu changes.
Till next week... Live to eat like Hospobaby!

The After photo- beautiful dress is now full of chocolate stains!

Our Marathon weekends...

Of course I don't mean running a Marathon as in the Round the Bays last weekend... we are way too lazy for that. I mean marathon eating out with The Hospobaby. Sadly last weekend our permanent babysitter aka The Grandfather, went back to India for a bit so we are sans alone time and have to eat out with Zoya in tow all the time. Lets face it we had it good for a whole year. Now its welcome to real world of eating out with a bubba. It started badly 2 weeks ago, when we went for a casual brunch to what used to be Cafe on Kohi, the fact that it is now called Kohi Beach Cafe should have set off some alarm bells. The menu items were exorbitantly priced for the portion sizes. We paid $80 for eggs, sausage and mushrooms on toast, a glass of juice and a coffee. Still left hungry and feeling ripped off. They were also way too cool to have a high chair. Well we will stick to our local Zus & Zo next time.

Hospobaby tries to get the waitstaff's attention at Depot

Yum char at Grand Harbour was as always a welcome delight. On the following day, we went to Depot in the Sky City Grand. We have been hesitant to go there with Hospobaby as they only have bar stools as seating. However, we were surprised that Hospobaby didn't mind and sat quite comfortably on them, Sid had to have his arm around her though. Hospobaby was quite desperate for her food order to be taken, but all the staff seemed to be working at a real leisurely pace, it felt like they had all been out the night before.
Luckily we were served some  complimentary tortillas with Baba ganoush and Hospobaby seemed to love them.

Mmmm! Tasty baba ganoush at Depot

We ordered the Kingfish sashimi w oyster cream, apple and fennel which was more like kingfish cubes but hospobaby loved them nevertheless. The apple and fennel really added a zing to the fish.

Kingfish sashimi w oyster cream, apple and fennel

 The skirt steak fajitas w sweetcorn, guacamole and cumin soured cream were great in flavor but the tortillas could be a bit crispier, they seemed soggy. Hospobaby was so excited by them that she stuck her hand out and grabbed a heap of garnish and shoved it in her mouth. To her dismay, it didn't taste that good by itself.

Uhhh! what did I just eat?

Although our food had arrived our drinks hadn't and so we had to remind our sleepy waiter who finally rushed to get them.  Meanwhile our snapper w pickled lemon mayo and water cress arrived. They are our staple order at Depot. This time they were not up to scratch. They skimped on the lemon mayo and the snapper was slightly over done. Hospobaby didn't mind much.

The famous snapper sliders

Hospobaby also loved the zucchini flowers w Persian feta and Pinoli pine nuts. Sadly there were only two  pieces to share!

Zucchini flowers

 We ordered the grilled corn on the cob with chilli on the side for Zoya. She has been devouring corn on the cob at home, but she wouldn't have a bar of the grilled version. All the more for Sid and me.

Corn on the cob

Finally as we were still a bit peckish and yet we didn't want any dessert, we ordered the Grilled Peaches with NZ prosciutto, Kingsmeade blue and roasted macadamias. Hospobaby got stuck into the prosciutto and peaches.

Grilled peaches w prosciutto, kinsmeade blue and roasted macadamias.

All in all Depot didn't let us down but neither did it blow our socks off. Mexico on the other hand was a different story. Mexico is owned by the same people who own District dining. Warren and Mimi do a great job in executing concepts. Mexico looks and feels like a traditional cantina. The food is very reasonable and the service is quick if not super quick. We felt like the food genie was sitting beside us. One minute our order was placed and the next our food was in front of us.

Hospobaby checks out the menu at Mexico

I am quite sure I was Mexican in my last birth on earth. I find Mexican food intensely satisfying. Auckland has always lacked a good Mexican joint. The only one that has tickled my fancy until now has been Mexican specialities in Ellerslie. Mexican specialities is only open for a limited time each week which makes it almost impossible for me to go there, especially as we now don't live in Ellerslie.

We were quite aware that Hospobaby might not share our love for chipotles and ordered her a chicken quesadilla. The quesadilla portion was large enough for all three of us to nibble on and it came with a large jar of Guacamole, which was empty by the time we had our way with it.

Chicken quesadilla w guacamole @Mexico

We also ordered the house special fried chicken, which was extremely crunchy and delicious. I fell in love with the skirt steak taco and refused to share it with Sid. We loved the pulled pork taco as much as Zoya did, who pretty much sneaked all the pork into her mouth. The beef mole tostada was a little bit too sweet for our liking. A good mole needs to have a distinct hint of chilli which this one was sadly missing.

The prawns with corn and chipotle mayo were simple yet tasty. Zoya had most of the corn salsa. With a bill of $80 including 3 drinks we were pretty happy and have decided to go back to Mexico again and again.

While you can often get staff that are happy to have a little one in the restaurant, at other times you are served rudely and made to feel guilty for bringing a toddler along. Last weekend a couple of friends and I went to check out the Kingsland festival and ventured into Mekong Neua. We understand that Hospobaby can get all excited and messy, we usually try to clean up after her and apologize profusely. We were made to believe that they didn't mind us bringing Zoya along. They promptly brought us a high chair. They served her sticky rice just as promptly when I ordered it. Our food however was terrible. They got my friends' duck dishes mixed up. The one who ordered the mild chilli got the extra hot and vice versa.  I was sharing with another friend and our hot chicken dish was extra hot too. I guess they take their chillies seriously. I ordered a red chicken curry with mango and basil. Unfortunately it came out to be a weird sweet yet spicy concoction. The staff forgot to mention that the mango was actually in the sauce rather than in slivers through it as I had assumed. It still lies in its takeaway coffin in my refrigerator.
We gave up after a lot of futile sweating, crying and gulping water. Meanwhile Hospobaby had made a slight mess and had got carried away with her sticky rice. As we started to gather our belongings to leave, I apologized to the waitress who shunned me and started cleaning before we had even left the table. She shoved rice all over our belongings. Needless to say they never got a tip that day.

On Sunday night I heard of Kobe Sizzlers opening in Parnell. They are a chain of restaurants that are famous in India. Sizzlers are iron platters that sizzle with meat/veg accompanied by fries, mash etc. Sizzler restaurants are a common concept in India but a sadly lacking one in NZ. I was super excited to try Kobe.
We ordered the chilli cheese toast to start. It was good, cheesy not too spicy served with floury but fresh chips. Sid ordered the lamb seekh sizzler and I ordered the chicken shashlik sizzler.

Chicken Shashlik Sizzler

Of course the sizzlers were nothing like India but were not a bad attempt at re-creation either. I wished that they made the chicken out of thigh meat rather than breast. The usual vege patty was missing on the platter. Hospobaby was happy with the fries and carrot that came with the platter. Although the sizzling component annoyed her more than entertained her. The service was faultless and cheerful. We would take Hospobaby back if some changes were made or if a sizzler craving returned.

MooChowChow in Ponsonby is our favorite place for flavor packed mouthfuls of delicious Asian fare.
We went there with our restaurant manager Ismo Koski and his beautiful partner Leslie for an early dinner last night. Yes, Moochowchow is now open Mondays.

Son in law eggs @ MoochowChow

We ordered the son-in-law eggs with chilli jam on the side for Hospobaby. She absolutely loved the deep fried eggs. The pork rolls were also a big hit with her. She ate the pork meat out of the giant spring rolls.
We all loved the stir fried curried crab with coriander, lime leaf and lemongrass. The soft shell crab was packed with flavor that exploded in your mouth. Hospobaby ate the tentacles, we didn't want to risk the rest of spicy meat. The caramelized pork hock was to die for. This is Moochochow's best dish ever. It is consistently good. We had no problems eating two portions between the 4 and half of us. Although the little half ate almost a whole portion of the stick,fatty,crispy pork.
Hospobaby must be getting a hang of eating out by now. Her expert taste buds rejected the mildly flavored 5 spice chicken. It had been over done and was tough. It was the only dish which had a piece of meat left on it as it made its final journey back to the kitchen. The Beef short rib was yummy with its red peanut curry, it caused a heated debate on our table with respect to whether it should be reordered.

Moochowchow is clearly consistent, even when it comes to desserts. They were a let down the last time and they were a let down this time too. Dessert is something one can't resist ordering. We cautiously ordered 2 to share amongst the 4.5 of us.  We ordered the Moo Bar: a homemade white chocolate candy bar with pistachio and lemongrass nougat. The Moo Bar to me, should be served with coffee in a cafe not as a dessert. The coconut pannacotta had none of the characteristics of a pannacotta. It tasted like whipped cream flavored with coconut and Hospobaby was its only taker.
So the verdict is that Moochowchow remains chow worthy for repeated return visits, however we will stay away from the desserts until chef sorts them out.
Until next time...
Live to eat like Hospobaby!

Our little curry muncher

Lets face it, Sid eats butter chicken at least once a week (the guys at Calcuttawala expect our call every Sunday and have memorized our order), so its no surprise Zoya loves her naan bread and saagwala too.
We also love Trendy Indian for their lunch special and their high chair. They do a mean fenugreek chicken, that hospobaby can eat.
Hospobaby turned into a true curry muncher when we were in India. After a welcome home party in Mumbai where Hospobaby was not allowed to eat anything because everyone thought everything would make her sick, we headed to our hometown Pune. Hospobaby's first adventure was to Ramakrishna, an upmarket Udipi, south-indian eating house. To be honest, south indian food is my least favorite, I never let Sid take me to the popular Saffron for their $10 all you can eat, South Indian buffet. However, south Indian food is the safest for little munchkins.

Idli, idli that what Zoya wants to eat.

Idlis are made of fermented rice flour that has been steamed and are served with Sambar, a lentil soup and coconut chutney. So if you exclude the Sambar with its spices the meal is quite bland, a delight for young palates. I have a niece who used to call idlis- Moons, because they look like little moons. Hospobaby loved eating her little idli moons. My mum kept taking her back to Ramakrishna again and again. I do suspect though that it also had something to do with their free valet parking and location in the heart of the city.

India is the land of the buffet. They can turn any and everything into a buffet. After getting back on my feet post op (I had all four wisdom teeth pulled and its worse than labour) my friends were excited to take me to this new concept restaurant called BBQ Nation. Having a barbecue is a new fad in India. I love bbqs especially once summer hits NZ and one of our X'mas traditions is to have a BBQ on Christmas day. But in India they take their BBQ a little too seriously for my liking.

Barbecue nation has individual grills fitted into each table. The waitstaff bring out skewers of meat/veg and you grill and baste away.

After you are done with the BBQ you have a big indian buffet full of curries. I think they forgot that the concept of a BBQ has been in India forever its called a Tandoor! I would eat Tandoori food anyway over a BBQ.

Zoya fortunately missed BBQ nation, indians eat really late! But she couldn't evade the ever popular buffet. We had relatives stay at the local Holiday Inn and visited them for lunch. After the guards checked our cars and patted us down we ventured into the brand spanking new hotel and were told that only one of the restaurants was open- their 24 hr cafe. Guess what you could do a la carte there or a buffet for lunch all for the same price. Hospobaby could share my buffet. So I caved in to the buffet brigade.

It definitely is value for money at $10 a head plus taxes we could eat every cuisine under the sun. There were momos, dumplings from East India, noodles, pizza, baked polenta cakes, soup, curries, biryanis, tandoori fare, nachos, deli meats and cheese. Dessert had its own one foot table laden with pannacottas, mousse, pastries, cakes and ice creams. Hospobaby encounter her first high chair and was delighted with the familiarity of it.

Hospobaby checks out the Holiday Inn

Then she devoured a bowl of baked polenta, momos and then dessert.
The only travesty is that they throw all the food that is left over at the end of each buffet and there is a lot of it. Such a shame when there are poor people starving right outside the door.

Besides her staple idlis, Hospobaby also liked Upma, which is made out of semolina and is great for lunch at home for infants from 6months on. Hospobaby came across Chikoos in India.  Chikoo is known as Sapota elsewhere in the world, but I have never come across it in NZ. Its got a soft brown flesh that is sweet and chocolatey while the skin is thin and leathery. Zoya shovels them before you can peel them.

Chikoo fruit

Hospobaby with her bag of Chikoos

Hospobaby's last notable adventure in India was at Great Punjab where we went for dinner. Hospobaby quickly adapted to eating dinner at 9.30 pm like her hosts. She thoroughly enjoyed the chicken malai kebabs and lamb rara (minced lamb) curry with rice.

As I was down, knocked out by the heavy pain killers for most of our time in India and Zoya was in the care of my over-cautious mom, we both avoided the infamous delhi bellies. We almost thought we had avoided all travel bugs when they decided to combine forces and attacked Hospobaby two nights before we flew home. The doctors prescribed a cocktail of antibiotics, anti histamines and pain killers. We got onto the plane and Zoya had a fever of 39.6. With cold towels and pamol I brought a very sick hospobaby back to Auckland. We missed another week of daycare and paid a visit to the kind doctors at Starship who advised us that Zoya has brought home multiple viral infections with her and had to just ride through it all.

I brought home a baby who doesn't like sitting in high chairs or sleeping in her cot. A pampered bubba who now thinks she can have it all her way. We love India but we won't be going back there in a hurry!

Hospobaby and the Singapore Sling

No, I did not give her a cocktail! Though we wouldn't be surprised if she gulped it down. Zoya and I went on our first girls trip ever. First stop en route to India was Singapore. I had never been to Singapore, well not technically. Unless you count a two hour free tour while in transit during my student years.
Zoya was a dream on the flight. She slept all the way there, didn't even wake up for the jars of "Only Organic" baby food. The airport staff at Singapore are fab, they whip out their iPhones and make sure they help with everything they can.
We landed at 6.30 am Singapore time and were in my aunt's apartment by 8am, catching up. After a nap we sauntered off to a mall close by. Now the absolutely amazing thing about Singapore, besides its countless malls, is the fact that they are all open till midnight. Well we weren't really there to shop for clothes, just groceries and a quick bite.
We walked into the local "Giant", it was absolutely amazing. I have never come across so many varieties of gorgeous mushrooms and other fresh produce for such reasonable prices. Dairy however was horrifically expensive. A pottle of NZ CalciYum for $3! Most of the dairy in Singapore was imported from Australia and NZ. Zoya however was not so impressed, they do not have trolleys with a place to make babies sit in Singapore. Hospobaby looked tired and jet lagged, although she slept (horizontally I might add) all the way on the plane. So after half an hour at "Giant" we ended up going to Pasta Mania.

Pasta Mania in the mall in Singapore

It looked like a regular run off the mill chain restaurant. The service and ambience reminded me of La Porchetta. The food however was better. It resulted in Hospobaby's face lighting up.

I love Pasta Mania!

Cheesy Pasta was delish. I only ordered one portion between the two of us, what a mistake that was. Hospobaby didn't leave me any and I had to run and order a pizza. Which was good too and hospobaby ate all the salami off it.

Our next escapade was to the famous Tippling Club. Its located in Dempsey Hill, but its very hard to find.
Well after about 20 minutes and asking around we found it. Unfortunately their cocktail bar was closed for lunch. My bad, I didn't check and assumed that everyone must want cocktails in the arvo just cause I do. Luckily I met the chef Ryan Clift and he asked me to come back when they opened for dinner.
The Tippling club do a 27 course degustation. I was certain that Hospobaby could not sit through that.
So we decided to come back and have some bar snacks and cocktails. The Tippling club is voted top 20 bars in the world (asia pacific) and the restaurant is in the top 50 of Singapore.
The tippling terrace is outside the main restaurant and is a cosy spot with cushions to stretch out on.

We ordered the Duck Sausage w Brioche and Grape relish, Polenta Fries w truffle and house made ketchup and Fried Haloumi, lemon and rosemary salt. My cousin ordered  Van Gogh for her cocktail and I ordered the fruity, rum based  Don The BeachComber Zombie. The bar snacks were great, Hospobaby didn't bother with her jar of food and tucked into the cold duck sausage and ate the brioche. Zoya has always loved polenta it is one of her staples. We make it as a quick dinner option at home with some ham and grated parmesan along with her left over milk. Her dad makes polenta fries at the restaurant for staff dinner and she scoffs those. The ones at Tippling club were soft in the centre and crunchy outside. The fried haloumi was a hit amongst my vegetarian companions.
 Van Gogh came in a little glass bottle and the mixologist explained that he had been inspired by one of Van Gogh's paintings and wanted to reflect the colors of that particular painting in this drink through his choice of liquors. Don the Zombie came in his tiki glass and was more attractive and tasty than a Zombie should ever be. Chef Ryan came out and had a good chat with us, charmed the socks off all the ladies!
He told us of his new food initiative in partnership with the Singapore government; he plans to start growing some produce in a country that imports almost everything! He will also be opening another restaurant in Singapore shortly.
My aunty and cousin have declared The Tippling Club to be their new favorite haunt and vowed to return with friends. Sid was extremely jealous and we have decided to spend our X'mas holidays in Singapore. So we will be definitely coming back to do the degustation at The Tippling Club sans Hospobaby. Although by her photo at the club you wouldn't think it would be an issue taking her there.

Hospobaby up late for after-dinner drinks

Hospobaby passed out after a hard day of shopping

The bill was presented in a unique way, so I thought I would capture it.

 If you do end up going to Dempsey try out the other restaurants on the hill, especially Ben and Jerry's Ice cream which we are sadly deprived of in NZ!