Japan Nolstagia Trip

Continuing on the theme of reminiscing about my trip, we paid a visit to old Chinatown. I have to say, it has been awhile, but not much has changed. There's still a bustle of people, teenagers dressed in the latest Asian fashions, grandmas and grandpas wondering about, talking to shopkeepers.

First stop was for lunch at Ramen Kan. After we satisfied our tummies, we started off by exploring good old Market City, which I have to report, I haven't been to for years! The old hangout Mamma's Kitchen eatery is gone, replaced by some bargain shopping space. The discount outlet floors have spread, and I happily spent an hour here wandering around. Luckily, they had nothing good on offer, so I left without a purchase.

We wandered to the old Prince Centre, the site of the Chinese Noodle Restaurant, which I had fond memories of visiting back in uni days. The Dumpling House next door was doing a roaring trade because of their $5 afternoon tea special. Onto the old Burlington, which was desserted, and the first of the Chinese Bakeries we were to set foot in today.

Finding nothing of interest, we wandered to where the action is, passing the Emprerers Garden BBQ House on the way. Onto bakery #2, Emperors Garden Bakery, for their famous cream puffs, $1 for 5 tiny pastries filled with some very sweet, artificial tasting custard. They were very hot and very hard to eat without getting custard all over your face. Only worth it once.

Further up Dixon St, we stumbled upon a new shop (to us anyway) next to the Y2K cafe (yet more fond memories), Montagne Bleue Patisserie. This place seems to be following the concept of the cute and special bread shop that's been springing up everywhere. I tried a Sticky Stick ($1) best described as a layer of chinese pastry, coated in sesame, surrounding an air pocket with a sticky substance. The taste was... strange, I would only eat this for the novelty value.

Onto Sussex St, and the good old Thai Kee where we picked up some ginger as well as a Porky I didn't see in Japan (previous it was too old and been discontinued?). The Milk Porky (80 cent) was cheap enough to buy just for the heck of it. We hit the next wave of Chinese bakeries, first up, Helen's, which looked the same as always, except that they have introduced some new stuff to their lineup too. We were looking forward to St Honore for their famous Cocktail bun (90 cent) - a sweet bun filled with a mixture of coconut, and other unrecognisable fillings. They do a roaring trade, so as a consequence, their bread are always fresh. We weren't disappointed with our buns, still warm from the oven, the bread was soft, the filling sweet and satisfying. Eating too much though makes you really full.

Across the street, the old shop that used to sell Taiwanese lollies and dried meat jerky has expanded their business by hosting 2 franchaises in their front window. Colotako sells tataoki balls just like the ones from Japan. We ordered a mix of 2 ebi(pranws) and 2 tataoki(octopus) as part of the $8 deal, which also included a Jap pancake from hontou pancakes and a small pearl tea. The tataoki ball was sprinkled with bonito shavings and all manners of sauces. It tasted pretty much like other tataoki balls, except without the cherry blossom and park setting. I guess this is the next best thing to travelling to Japan for the same experience. You can buy them in packs of 4 for $4-5 or packs of 8 for $7-8.

We chose the green tea flavoured pancake, out of the possible red bean, chocolate, cheese and custard, and it was yummy! The dough was sweet, the filling satisfying. Yup, you can buy a pack of 3 pancakes for $5 as well. This was all washed down with our black sesame milk pearl tea drink, normally $4.50. This was also surprisingly good, one of the best pearl drinks I've had for ages, there's no artificial flavour taste, the sesame smelling divine.

By this time, as you can imagine, we were feeling pretty full, but on we trodded, to the newly opened Bread Story, the king of the new breed of bakeries. There were lots of people there oohing and aahing at the bread. We did the same, laughing at the names of the bread and the funny shape they were in, but we didn't buy anything as the prices were very very steep. Finally we made it to World Square to visit our beloved Bread Top and came away with a Taro loaf ($4.90). This one was not as good as the Pork Floss we tried earlier, but still pretty yum. My only complaint is that the taro flavour was not strong enough. After taste testing some dumplings at the Miracle Supermarket we agreed that our outing was over, and made our way to Town Hall for the journey home, our tummies full and our memories of Japan revisited.

Info

Market City
Cnr Hay & Thomas Sts
Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9212 1388
Website

Emperors Garden Bakery
Dixon St Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9211 2135

Montagne Bleue
45 Dixon St
Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9212 0929

St Honore
427-429 Sussex St, Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9281 1628

Colotako
406 Sussex St
Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9411 3647

hontou Pancakes
406 Sussex St
Haymarket
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9411 3647

World Square
Cnr George, Liverpool, Pitt & Goulburn Streets,
Sydney
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 8669 6900
Website

Bread Top
World Square, Shop 9,
680 George St,
Sydney
NSW 2000
Phone (02) 9264 1383
Website