I have some big news: I am no longer a Canberran! I have moved to the lovely state of Victoria and now live in Melbourne!
I have always loved coming to visit Melbourne, so when the opportunity arose for me to move to Melbourne, I was very happy to move.
I love when new Cafes or restaurants pop up in Canberra. I’m always excited to try them out and see what the fuss is about. It’s even more exciting when you are one of the first of your friends to find and try these new places!
Mayfair Espresso is one of those new cafes that is not yet well known. It has just opened up in the corporate central of Canberra at the bottom of the brand new apartment complex, Mayfair.
One of my favourite things about travelling away is eating out at new and exciting places. My recent getaway to the South Coast was no different.
It’s often super busy at this time of the year up and down the East Coast. Without a doubt, most of Canberra leaves the territory around Christmas Eve and will stay down there until New Year’s Day (or whenever they have to return to work). Because of this, the accommodation is usually expensive and you often need to book a year in advance. We were lucky that we have family we can stay with (and have the Christmas celebrations with too) so we decided to capitalise on that this year and stay longer than our usual Christmas dash.
We recently decided to have a last minute dinner at one of our favourite fine dining restaurants in Canberra: Rubicon.
Rubicon is a restaurant tucked away at the Griffith shops, near another favourite restaurant of mine, Aubergine. Like Aubergine, we like to go to Rubicon for special occasions, and have only been there a handful of times.
Click here for a review on Aubergine Restuarant
This time it was a double date night and the spot chosen was Rubicon. This wouldn’t be my usual spot for just any night out for dinner, because it is not a budget friendly dining experience, especially if you add a couple of bottles of wine onto the bill!
But it had been a while since we had gone out to a fancy dinner, so I was happy to go to this somewhat random double date dinner at Rubicon.
Rubicon is a small restaurant with intimate, dim lighting and pretty fairy lights in the back to give it a relaxed “starry night” feel. The tables a covered with white table clothes and many of the group tables (4 or more people) are placed closer to the back of the restaurant. This actually makes sense – the more talkative groups can be placed away from the intimate dining for couples.
There are no windows to look out of, and therefore no view to muse over when you run out of conversation with your date. But the relaxed feeling of the lighting makes it a beautiful place for an intimate or romantic dinner.
This was the first time that we went to Rubicon with more than just myself and my partner, so
The service is always fantastic at Rubicon. It’s not quite fine dining but fairly close to it. The service is a little more on the casual side, but they really know how to multi task being attentive to all tables, even when the restuarant is full.
I’ve never noticed any staff member looking stressed or like they didn’t want to be there. They also have exceptional knowledge of the wines on their menu – which is one of the reasons we like to go there.
We were given complimentary appetisers which unfortunately were not gluten free. The were some kind of pork bite on a mini toast crust. Everyone on the table enjoyed their little appetiser. When the waiter realised that I needed a gluten free option, he kindly brought me out some delicious marinated olives for an appetiser.
Atmosphere: 4.5/5 | Customer Service: 5/5 | Speed of Service: 4/5 | Presentation of Food: 4.5/5 | Taste: 4.5/5 | Value for Money: 4.5/5
Total: 27/30
Overall thoughts: Rubicon is a great fine dining restaurant with excellent attentive customer service. I will definitely be back to experience the delicious food and wine.
For more info on Rubicon Restaurant click here
Have you been to Rubicon Restaurant? What are your thoughts on it? Let me know in the comments section!
Bye for now,
All opinions in this post are my own. Unless otherwise stated, this post has not been sponsored and I have not been paid for this post
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Freakshakes are part shake, part dessert, part artwork and they have definitely changed the milk shake game! These are the milkshakes that literally brings the boys to the yard! People have lined up for up to 4 hours to taste these treats! The average waiting time at one point was 2 hours – there’s definitely been a lot of hype over these crazy looking milkshakes.
Aubergine is a quiet little restaurant tucked away at the Griffith shops in Canberra. It has a small outdoor garden area and many tables for two inside facing alongside the floor to ceiling windows.
Before December 2015, we had only been here once as a couple because it is a very popular fine dining restaurant (therefore expensive), and we have been attempting to try all of the fine dining restaurants in Canberra (without blowing the budget!) We decided to return to Aubergine for our anniversary so we could celebrate in style and with some delicious food and wine.
Little Brooklyn is a funky restaurant and bar in one of the restaurant suburbs of Canberra: Kingston. It has vintage posters spanning various decades plastered all over the walls. There are cute round tables with red and white checkered table clothes and larger booths up against the walls. It’s cosy yet spacious.
I actually had my “vintage inspired” 25th birthday party here just after it had first opened. It was lots of fun and I had been thinking that I should return again, but I guess I never got around to it.
This time my mum, my sister and myself happened to be in Kingston around dinner time, so we decided to grab something to eat at Little Brooklyn.
From memory, the menu has changed quite a lot in the last 18 months. There was no risotto like I remembered having for my birthday. There also did not seem to be many gluten free dishes available. What is in abundance is a good choice of burgers and lots of American style food.
We happened to be there on a Wednesday which was the $15 wings night. The deal gives you 1kg (that’s right a whole kilogram) of chicken wings, and a drink, for just $15. I was pretty tempted to get it, but no one wanted to share with me and I definitely wasn’t going to be able to eat 1kg of wings for myself… Or could I? Challenge accepted, pending the availability on a later date…
I decided on nachos, because, well, they are my favourite food. They were listed in the “Fingers” section, so I didn’t expect them to be a large serving. The menu didn’t say that they were gluten free, but I was willing to risk it for my favourite meal.
When it came out, I realised that it was creamy sauce-like cheese, not the grated tasty cheese I have come to expect from nachos. I think this is just the American style of food that this place offers, so I probably should have thought about that beforehand.
I’m not a big fan of these creamy sauce cheese. It reminds me of mayonnaise, and I’m fairly certain mayonnaise comes in a bottle… I don’t think cheese should come in a bottle. Cheese is not liquid and comes in a solid block – and I should know – I come from Bega, the land of Bega Cheese!
Anyway, enough about cheese.
So the nachos had a delicious bean and tomato salsa mixture. This was supposed to be mixed through pulled steak…but there was hardly any meat in my nachos. I’m actually perfectly happy with vegetarian nachos, but if I am told that I am getting meat in my nachos, I expect a good meat to chip ratio.
Speaking of the chips, they were not the usual corn chips that I am used to. They had a different kind of aoperance to them – they almost looked translucent. But they tasted pretty good!
There was nothing special about the presentation of food. The nachos and burgers my mum and sister bought all came out in woven baskets and gave it a casual feel. This definitely tied in with the restaurants rustic 1950s look.
My mum and sister both got the Big Brooklyn Burgers. I was surprised the burger wasn’t bigger when it was advertised to be a “big” burger. I was informed by my mum and sister that their burgers were alright, but nothing to special.
The burgers came with a side of chips and aioli dipping sauce. I had some of this with a couple of chips and it was enjoyable.
I left the restaurant not feeling quite satisfied with my meal, but I love the vintage quirkiness of the place, so I guess I would probably still come back… Actually, I do want to try the $15 Wings deal so I will be back to give Little Brooklyn a second chance.
Atmosphere: 4/5 | Customer Service: 3.5/5 | Speed of Service: 4/5 | Presentation of Food: 2.5/5 | Taste: 3/5 | Value for Money: 3.5/5
Total Score: 20.5/30
Overall: Little Brooklyn if funky and cute place to go for a casual dinner. I wouldn’t recommend the nachos but I am keen to return for the $15 wings!
For more information on Little Brooklyn go to their website by clicking here
Have you been to Little Brooklyn in Kingston? Tell me your thoughts in the comments section!
Bye for now,
All opinions in this post are my own. Unless otherwise stated, this post has not been sponsored and I have not been paid for this post
See you in the Social Media Atmosphere:
Instagram: @vintagebarbie17 | Facebook: Adventures of Vintage Barbie – Blog | Twitter: @vintage_barbie1 | Polyvore: vintagebarbie17 | Pinterest: @vintagebarbie17
Recently I went for lunch with a friend from work and we decided to try the $9 lunches at Treehouse. This little place used to be a dingy bar full of people in black clothes only, sticky floors and barely any lighting. It had an alternative type of crowd and it was sometimes fun to go on uni-night. A few years ago it was done up with the front windows opening up, a funky upstairs area, and a beautiful fairylight tree. It’s still a little dark inside, but definitely not dingy anymore!
I like the welcoming atmosphere of Treehouse and its a nice place to come for cocktails or a bite to eat when having Friday drinks. But lunch at Treehouse is definitely something new to me. I have walked past the $9 lunches sign so often, I would think that I would have dined here plenty of times!
When we came in for lunch, we were escorted to the bar-like-seating around the walls of the establishment. Once seated, two tall glasses of iced water were quickly brought over to us. This is something I hadn’t experienced before and was great to see that they already had the initiative to give us water – I hate having to ask for something as simple as a glass of water!
Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture of the lunch menu, but there were approximately 5 dishes on there for the $9 deal. My friend chose the linguini and I chose the chicken tenders. I forgot to ask if the tenders were gluten free but nothing stood out as containing gluten and I didn’t get sick afterwards so I am fairly certain they were gluten free.
The food also came out so quickly. The staff apologised for the wait but we were surprised at how quick it was! We actually finished our lunch with 15 minutes to spare before we had to return to work… Pretty sure the food was cooked in less than 10 minutes!
The linguini was a good lunch size – probably around an entree size. If I was eating this I would be pretty happy with this size because you don’t want to feel weighed down and sluggish when having to return to work later.
Mine dish had three smallish tenders of chicken breast and a few large pieces of Cos Lettuce. I’m glad there was the coconut rice with it to help fill my hungry tummy. There was also a generous serving of sauce next to the rice, and I didn’t get to eat all of it so there was definitely enough. There was also lots of herbs over the rice which gave the dish a fresh taste.
The combination of all the ingredients was like a fresh Asian inspired taste. The chicken was cooked well. It was still slightly juicy and definitely not dry. I really enjoyed this lunch, but just wish there was more. Unfortunately I left still hungry. I understand that it is lunch, but for someone like me who prefers to eat lots for lunch and less for dinner, I was a little disappointed with the amount of food on my plate.
I thought the presentation of the food was great, and I suppose more food would make the plate look crowed and messy. It is quite possible that the pretty presentation is the reason for smaller sized chicken tenders.
The service was great. The staff were friendly and I particularly liked that they allowed us to split the bill. I think we may have been talking to the owner about this – he was saying that he will often not go back to a restaurant if they don’t allow groups to split the bill. I think that is very true, and in today’s society were hardly anyone carries cash on them, so we need to cater for that and splitting bills should be a must.
Atmosphere: 4/5 | Customer Service: 4/5 | Speed of Service: 5/5 | Presentation of Food: 4/5 | Taste: 4/5 | Value for Money: 4/5
Total Score: 25/30
Overall thoughts: I would definitely go back to Treehouse for lunch, but I might have to order a side of chips to keep me from leaving hungry!
For more information on Treehouse Bar, click here
Have you been to Treehouse? Post your thoughts, comments and links to your reviews in the comments of this post 🙂
Bye for now,
Vintage Barbie xoxo
All opinions in this post are my own. Unless otherwise stated, this post has not been sponsored and I have not been paid for this post
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I’ve been to quite a few hens weekends. A lot of them have been in Sydney as well. I definitely had fun at the last one I attended, which including high tea at The Tea Salon.
This is not your traditional high tea. It is set right in the centre of shops in the Pitt Street Westfield mall, which I found a little strange at first. It also looks like it is permanently busy, especially if people can come in when they are in the middle of their shopping. However this gives it a casual, relaxed kind of feel. There is a secret little kitchen off behind some shops, with a large cabinet in the centre of the cafe for water and glasses. It is very cute, a little kitsch and fairly girlie. They had so many cute serving dishes and teacups that I would like to have at home myself!
We had a very group, I think around 20 people. Obviously this kind of place is not meant for groups this big and it looked like they had struggled to fit us all in the same area. Quite a few of the round tables were pushed together, which made the placing of food very squished, and also made socialising with others a little difficult. I often had my back to some of my friends because of how we were set up with the round tables.
Staff seemed a little overwhelmed at times. There was no coming to the table to make sure that our food was ok and no one coming to top up water. They didn’t even leave the water jug so we could top up our glasses ourselves, which was a little annoying considering I wanted water, not champagne at that time in the day. Although, the pink champagne was pretty nice… Just wish I felt like drinking it and it probably would have enjoyed it more..
The great thing about this place is that you can choose to eat a la carte, or select the high tea platter. There are also many options available for vegetarians, gluten free, dairy free and even pregnant women.
So for once, I was actually rewarded for my gluten intolerance – I got a whole platter to myself! It was amazing! There were so many pieces of food that I literally took a bit of everything but could not get anywhere near finishing my platter!
There were the standard scones with jam and cream, but also blueberry scones and raisin scones with orange marmalade. If you order scones off the al a carte menu then you can try a fair few different tasty treats.
I found the gluten free scones to taste extremely doughy and even with the jam and cream they were quite dry. I somewhat expected this of gluten free scones though as it would be difficult to make scones with the same texture and taste as your regular, gluten included scones.
There were lots of sweet things and I literally could not eat them all. However I made sure I tasted everything, even if it was only a little bite. There was this indescribable dessert in a shot glass. I think it was a custard of some sort with tea on top. It reminded me of camomile flower buds mixed with some other tea. As I said, it was indescribable, mainly because it have no idea what it was! I also was not a fan of the taste.
Champagne was fairly nice too. It was pink, sparkly and had a sweet taste to it. However it added on an extra $11 to the total bill, so keep that is something to keep in mind for next time.
There was a good selection of teas to choose from – There were a few regular black teas and green teas, rooibos, chai and then a good selection of flavoured teas. I can’t remember what it was called and I forgot to take a picture of the tea menu, but I do remember that it was kind of like an apple pie. It was scrumptious!
Atmosphere: 3.5/5 | Customer Service: 3/5 | Speed of Service: 4/5 | Presentation of Food: 4.5/5 | Taste: 4/5 | Value for Money: 4/5
Total Score: 23/30
For more information on The Tea Salon, go to their website: http://www.theteasalon.com.au
I would definitely like to go to The Tea Salon again to try out many more of their funky teas and possibly get some other delicious treats on the menu.
Have you been to The Tea Salon? Tell me your thoughts on this place!
Bye for now,
Vintage Barbie
All opinions in this post are my own. Unless otherwise stated, this post has not been sponsored and I have not been paid for this post
Instagram: @vintagebarbie17 | Facebook: Adventures of Vintage Barbie – Blog | Twitter: @vintage_barbie1 | Polyvore: vintagebarbie17 | Pinterest: @vintagebarbie17
I remember when Soju Girl opened a few years ago. It was considered a hip new place to go. I went when it was still in its early days with a small group of people. Back then I enjoyed quite a few cocktails as well as the share style meals.
I was invited to go recently, and whilst there certainly were no cocktails involved, it was a lovely dining experience with a group of people from my work.
A Zucchini Flower, as well as trying a prawn and lychee from the Spicy Prawn Dish
The kind of eating at Soju Girl is described as “refined Asian sharing plates”. It’s a similar experience to going to a Chinese restaurant and each person on the table ordering a different dish to be shared with the group, alongside steamed or fried rice.
There are more choices than would usually be expected at this hipster-style restaurant. Surprisingly there are plenty of gluten free options – about 75% of the menu. I love that on the menu it says “the menu has been designed with gluten intolerance in mind” – hooray! I actually have a choice this time and not a forced choice!
The menu also caters for vegetarians and even vegan.
My table consisted of a variety of dietary requirements: gluten intolerant (me), vegetarian, vegan, and two people with shellfish allergies. With that many dietary requirements, eating out can be difficult, often with people feeling left out or feeling like they are that “annoying person”.
It’s good that there is finally a place that caters for all dietary requirements! And I love that it’s a pass-the-dish-around kind of setting. It gets people talking, breaks the ice between people that don’t know each other very well, and truly allows everyone to fill their bellies with delicious food.
The friendly staff always make sure that everyone knows how it works at Soju Girl before they let everyone properly look at the menu.
Essentially there are the large plates and the small plates. You choose a few plates to share around the table, and you can add some sides on as well. The dishes will usually be staggered throughout your time there, so you are not overloaded with too many choices at once, and so the dishes compliment one another.
Crispy Pork Belly
Food reviews
Zucchini Flowers: I’ve got two words for this dish: absolutely delicious. The fillng tasted like minced turkey or pork mince, although it was completely vegetarian (and gluten free!). It came with a ginger, soy sauce and capsicum dipping sauce. They didn’t even need the sauce though because they were so tasty! My dish of the night!
Pan Tossed Prawns with Crispy Noodle Salad: whilst this dish technically not gluten free I ate part of it anyway. The prawns had been mixed with lychees which gave it a nice sweet taste. The prawns themselves had a delicious slightly spicy taste to them. The only problem was that my prawn had not been entirely removed from its shell, causing me to have an uncomfortable chunchy bite into part of my prawn. But the meat of the prawn melted in your mouth. The sauce had a tomato-style-tang to it. It came with a crispy noodle salad, which I obviously didn’t have as it is not gluten free.
Crispy Pork Belly: Not the best pork belly I’ve ever had. It was not a melting in your mouth experience like I usually have with pork belly. The crackling was thin but not too salty. It had a pleasant taste but it isn’t something I would choose again.
Lamb Shoulder in Massaman Curry: This dish was a lot bigger than I expected! There was a very generous lamb shoulder in the middle of the curry dish. It had a medium spice to it, delicious aroma, and was well marinated. We ordered some steamed rice to have with this dish.
Sizzling Asian Mushrooms: The sizzling mushrooms came out like the sizzling lamb dish at Chinese restaurants – in the same kind of plate, with the dish still sizzling away. It was mixed with fried egg, tofu and Asian vegetables. It was another winner dish for me. It was great that this dish could be eaten by almost everyone at the table – it was gluten free and vegetarian, but not vegan. Although the it was not entirely vegan, the vegan diner at our table still ate some of the vegetables out of this dish and it seemed that she enjoyed the taste of this dish as well.
Lamb Shoulder Massaman Curry
I was totally shocked that after all that food it was only $26 per person! And that was even after everyone put in money for the person the dinner was in honour for.
I would definitely recommend going to Soju Girl and I am already thinking about planning another dinner there soon. It would be great for groups of friends or work colleagues to catch up over dinner and share delicious food.
I would say Soju Girl is one of my top restaurants in Canberra.
For the full menu please click here.
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