The last weekend before going back to Holland Sally and I stayed in a hotel on Manly Beach in Sydney. A lovely location and with the ferry from Manly just a short and nice “ride” to the city centre, ending at Circular Quay, right between the Harbour Bridge and the Opera house. Easy as anything.

On Friday evening we ended up having dinner at a grill restaurant (can’t remember the name… “Something” Grill…) at the waterside with a view on the Harbour Bridge on the left and the Opera house on the right. Lovely spot for a nice dinner. And a nice dinner it was! I finally got to try some Kangaroo and Crocodile! After trying a barramundi in Port Douglas (really, really nice fish!!) those to were left on the list to try and didn’t think I would do so before leaving but when the opportunity came by at the grill restaurant I had to make a stand! Kangaroo and Crocodile it would be! :-)

And I did not get disappointed at all! They were both jammie. The Kangaroo very nice and tender, the croc … well… like a weird tasted chicken… :-) but nice as well! Still enjoying the moment a guy appeared on the terrace we were sitting, with a little flute and started playing a birthday song for the table next to us. We just smiled and thought the guy belonged to the restaurant and was just being funny on request… little did we know! Moments later he appeared at our table playing some annoying song! Leaving us feeling quite uncomfortable, but luckily after he played a bit a waiter came and asked the man to please leave the restaurant terrace…

And little we knew indeed! Because when the guy left and we saw that there were people with camera’s, Sal figured out the guy was from a ABC TV show called “The chaser’s war on everything“, and was just recording a little bit for next weeks show… And yes! We made the show! *LOL* well… made it… click here to see our 7 seconds of fame! (7.9 MB, © ABC TV). And you have to look carefully, because I am hard to spot, but Sal is quite obviously looking away in disgust! ;-)

[Ok, I will help a bit… it’s us between 0:57 and 1:04!]

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On one of my last days in Canberra, we felt like eating out and while driving through “the strip” at the shops in downtown Dickson we passed an Ethiopian restaurant and both being hungry we thought: “Why not! :-)”. And so it happened. We walked in, found a table and were ready to be surprised! We both never tried Ethiopian food before, so a true surprised it would be.

And a surprise it was. A very pleasant surprise! As with most countries in the world I would have no idea what people in Ethiopia eat on a normal day. So I tossed the menu card aside quite quickly. No point in looking for something, when you don’t know what to look for. As always in restaurants with an exotic cuisine, it’s best to ask the waiter. He suggested the combination plate. A little of everything, always a brilliant way to discover an unknown cuisine. Good choice. “For 2 please! :-)”.

As I already gave away by telling you it was a pleasant surprise, yes, the food was great! Bit of an Indian meets Asian, Middle East and Southern Europe kinda mix. As you can tell, it’s hard to describe… Guess the best way to describe it is by telling what it is: Ethiopian. ;-)

Anyway, if you are in Canberra, and ready to try something new and exciting, give this place a visit! It’s great food at a very reasonable price! And when you do go there, try it with an Ethiopian beer like I did, good stuff! :-)

Fekerte’s Ethiopian cuisine
74/2 Cape street
Dickson, ACT 2602
Australia
Telephone: +61 (02) 6262 5799
Internet: No… or at least unfindable!

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Don’t know what it exactly was… the fact I just got kicked off a project, the good company, the very nice tapas, the cold beer… well, it was most likely a combination of them all that made Ramblas such a great place!! :-)
Definitely a warm recommendation if you are in the area!

Ramblas
Långholmsgatan 3
Stockholm, Sweden
Telephone: +46 (0)8 669 25 36
Internet: No… or at least unfindable!

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It’s never that much fun to go out for dinner alone when staying at an hotel. Always feel kinda lonely sitting in a restaurant… Alone, no one to talk to, only the cuttelery to play with and a drink to zip on more frequent then you would like. Luckily there are always more fun options! Dinner with friends is of course the most fun, but I always enjoy my little Sushi picnic in the hotel room! :-)
So when I was staying at the Adlon hotel in the center of Stockholm some time ago, the Japanese Restaurant Onaka was the place to be! Their Sushi is really good! The best in the center area if you ask me! Oh, funny little thing… When I was searching on the internet to see if the restaurant has a website, I found out that Onaka means “tummy” in Japanese. Good name, as they sure please my tummy! :-)

Onaka
Bryggargatan 12b
Stockholm, Sweden
Telephone: +46 (0)8 24 10 85
Internet: No… although it looks like they had one, changed it and finally removed it… :-)

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If you like spare-ribs and happen to be in Holland for any reason, drop me a line and I will be more then happy to take you to the place they serve the best spare-ribs in Holland! :-) Yesterday evening we went celebrating my parents 31st weddingday anniversary with a little dinner at “De Resident” in The Hague, and their most popular dish are the spare-ribs. And it’s not weird they are, as they are really nice! They use some secret marinade sauce which makes them really “Jammie!” :-)
Oh, if you happen be so rude to go without me, don’t try and finish off the spare-ribs with the desert called “Soes Resident”… For the second time running I came, saw but didn’t conquer and stranded half way… For you who like deserts, “soesjes” are very nice little Dutch pastries. A little search on Google translated them as “Cream Puffs”. Well as this was a “soes” it was just one and big! Little Dutch language course: we add “je” for one or “jes” for multiple to words to make things small: book = boek, small book = boekje. So it was big (about 10 centimeter in diameter), filled with vanilla ice-cream, overflooded with chocolate sauce and whipcream on the side!! I should have known better, but I couldn’t resist! :-)

De Resident
Denneweg 58
The Hague, The Netherlands
Telephone: +31 (0)70 364 87 88
Internet: http://www.deresident.nl

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