Touch and go Japanese – Mizuya

Sometimes you just want to go to a restaurant and be totally left alone. Sometimes you just want to eat in peace, with no distractions and no annoyances. You don’t want to hear what offers are on, how exceptional the wine is, how you have the best seat in the house and how ‘you just made a very good choice maaaam’.

Sometimes, you just want the food and that’s that.

At these times, a plasma touch screen displaying the entire menu, which sits at the end of your table, is perfect.

Never underestimate how good it is to be able to simply touch an image of a dish that catches your attention and have it come over to your table in five minutes. And while you’re at it, never underestimate how your eyes will automatically become too big for your belly.

This may seem like a rather cold service but in fact, it’s efficiency to the extreme. You sit down, flick through the digital menu, order some drinks (by tapping on your poison of choice, of course) and then spend the rest of the time browsing through images of food and arguing with the person sat opposite you. It’s playful, it’s useful and it’s perfect for those who love to over-order and experience as many little dishes as possible.

There are a variety of extremely popular Japanese choices, such as the hot pots, which are brought to your table with clouds of steam following behind, not to mention some of the more unusual meats such as crocodile and ox tongue (apparently very popular). The way it works is to think of it as ‘Japanese tapas'. As if you are there to have a bit of fun with your food and to experiment a little. Order a few dishes, share them, see how you feel, then order more.

This is a great place to come with a small group of friends and feast yourself silly.

Click here to see more: Mizuya, George street

Uchi Lounge Uchi Blend

Walk down the side-streets of Surry Hills and you're sure to find something 'interesting'. For glutton and nuts last Thursday, this little something really struck our interest... it was of course, a secret drink (come on, as if you wouldn't be a little curious...)

What we discovered was a strong, sweet, sake-based secret drink, which no one to this date has been able to correctly guess the four key ingredients of (and that even includes some top Japanese master chefs).

It's called the Uchi Blend and is the creation of Uchi Lounge's bar manager on Brisbane Street - one of the most diligent bar tenders in Sydney and someone who treats his alcoholic creations like individual works of art. He has sworn that if someone is to guess all four ingredients at once he would reveal honestly if they are correct or not (maybe you'll get a free bottle too... but hey, that's not really our place to say.... and to be honest, you'll ever guess correctly anyway).

We had a stab at it - Watermelon...? Plum...? Grapefruit...? He just looked at us blankly and shook his head. No. ALL FOUR at once. You can't list ingredients. But it you tell me ALL of them I will tell you if you are correct. (we honestly believe he will...)

We were beaten. And even though we sat there sipping and tasting and trying until the bottle ran dry, we failed. However, we were still pretty satified with the drink... For fans of sake, this is heaven. The sake list includes a range of beautiful flavours from vanilla mix blends to cinnmon and even gogi... but this, this took the limelight. Secret drinks. Gotta love the taste of mystery!!!

If you do happen to go to Uchi Lounge and guess correctly please let use know on our facebook page!!! We;ll be back making a few more guesses... all in the name of research if course.

Uchi Lounge

15 Brisbane Street,

Surry Hills,

02 9261 3524

Sashimi-tini

Sashimi and martinis. Possibly God's two greatest creations. Put them together and you either have the most incredible gastronomic invention you can think of... or soggy fish in a glass.

Either way, the brains behind the drink menu at Tokonoma on Crown Street have certainly been trying their best to test their diners... and this is exactly what glutton and nuts is about.

It's hard to tell whether they thought raw fish in a (very) strong martini would be an increbible mix of flavours or if it had more to do with the fact that these two words kinda sounded similar - we're guessing the latter. We're also guessing it was the result of a pretty incredible staff party in which they were trying to out-shock each other with ingenious ideas - like the combination of the head chef and the bar manager putting together their favourite little ditties without thinking it would ever actually make it onto the menu...

Which it did. And is now in front of us waiting to be drank/ate.

It's an interesting, different and brilliant concept. And in all honesty tastes much like a classic (and very strong) martini. The fish isn't overpowering in the slightest (although we didn't really expect it to be) so in terms of flavours it's actually pretty easy to drink. This martini is certainly all about the flavour of the liquid rather than its garnish, it's sheer potency and the confusion that comes when you finish the drink and don't quite know what to do with the slightly swollen slice of salmon which is left over... we'll leave that part to you!

Order this drink if you have a curious nature as otherwise you'll always be left wondering. However, if you would normally drink things like lychee martinis then we'd avoid this one... it's for dirty martini drinkers who want things just a little bit dirtier...

Tokonoma
490 Crown Street
02 9357 6100