Restaurant Reviews

Maru Japanese and Korean Restaurant

- Alex 2 Comments

takeaway gyoza

date of visit: Saturday 26 November 2011

We actually had dinner more or less all lined up and at the last moment we decided we just couldn’t be stuffed cooking. What to do, what to do … pizza? fish and chips? Neither of those options was really taking our fancy but then I remembered seeing Maru from the bus one afternoon.

Maru (no website, but you can see the menu on UrbanSpoon) is a relatively new Japanese and Korean restaurant in the small group of shops just outside Flinders Hospital. It’s tiny which is worth bearing in mind if you’re planning a visit. In our case, we were planning on takeaway, which was very fortunate because if we’d turned up at 7pm on a Saturday night there’s a good chance we would have been turned away.

The menu does a good job of covering the Japanese and Korean classics: sushi and sashimi, tempura, bento boxes, noodles and (most importantly if you’re me!) bibimbap. We ordered steamed gyoza, bibimbap and the spicy pork stone pot – obviously not served in a stone pot for takeaway purposes! This came to the princely sum of $34.

Having been pleased with the cheerful phone manner of whoever took my order, it was great to arrive at the restaurant and receive the same level of service. Our food was ready (always a plus!) and off I trotted, my stomach rumbling away as I drove home.

The gyoza, which we scoffed quite quickly, were good. They look rather anaemic in the photo (blame that on being steamed, but we really didn’t think that fried would survive the take away journey) but they were tasty, with plenty of spring onion.

Main course wise, I ploughed through my bibimbap like a woman possessed. It was great – all the vegetables were fresh and crunchy, and the supplied chilli sauce (gochujang) was really hot. Of course, not being in a hot stone pot did mean the rice lacked its crispy base but if you’re too lazy to go to the restaurant to eat you can hardly complain!

Andy’s spicy pork stone pot was also good (I did try some but it was after I’d started slathering my bibimbap in gochujang so my taste buds might have been a little fried …). While nowhere near as spicy as my chilli sauce laced bibimbap it did have some heat to it and it was such a massive portion that he had the remainder for lunch the next day.

Hopefully you can tell that we really enjoyed our takeaway and actually eating in at the restaurant is definitely on the cards.

Maru Japanese and Korean Restaurant on Urbanspoon

Maru
3/4 Rupert Avenue (at the entrance to Flinders Medical Centre)
Bedford Park SA 5042
phone 08 8374 3668

Chesser Cellar

- Alex 4 Comments

The Chesser Cellar

photo by Stephen Mitchell

A guest review today – my father has put together his thoughts on The Chesser Cellar. I haven’t been there since a graduation lunch well over 10 years ago so I’d be interested to know what other Adelaide diners think. Judging by the 55% on UrbanSpoon perhaps my father’s experience is not atypical.

date of visit: Friday 18 November 2011

Having dined at the Chesser Cellar in the past and found it to be an excellent venue, I decided that my interstate friends would find it charming if not a little quaint. The food had been of a high standard and the prices would be a pleasant surprise for those used to the excesses on the eastern side of the island.

Whilst most of the above is still true, our food on this occasion was close to abysmal. The meatless goat curry was just the start of the problems and the half-hearted attempts to pacify one guest were less than satisfactory. Instead of taking the dish away and offering an alternative, a small dish of meat arrived a few minutes later. By this time the goatless curry was cold, and there was an obsequious “no charge for the meal sir”. One would hope not, as he went away hungry apart from an entrée of oysters.

There were five of us on this visit and apart from the goatless curry, one had a steak and pronounced it excellent, and three steak and kidney pies were ordered. One person thought the pie “alright” and one declared his to be so dry that no amount of gravy was going to improve it. Mine was less than “alright” in as much I thought it somewhat tasteless and the pastry was pallid and wan. I suspected this pastry had been made a long time before this lunch and had dried out before being heated. Maybe the pies are made
a week in advance and wait patiently in the refrigerator for Fridays. Who knows?

A disappointing outing for all but one of us.

Not on my list of places to visit anymore.

Chesser Cellar on Urbanspoon

Hotel Royal

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date of visit: Saturday 19 November 2011

A recent, quickly organised, family get together saw a group of 8 of us book ourselves into the Hotel Royal, on Henley Beach Road, for a late lunch/afternoon tea. Our main requirement was that wherever we went had to be close to my grandma’s house and capable of accommodating an age range from less than 1 to more than 90. So our focus was less than gastronomic!

The hotel advised it was best to book but when we arrived at 2pm the bistro was mostly empty and our table hadn’t been set up. Only one person was manning the bar and I felt a bit sorry for him because he seemed a little bit run off his feet. He apologised for our table not being set up and rushed off to get us a high chair, then taking the time to wipe it over in front of us (it already looked spotless).

We all settled in and got down to the important business of talking, followed by deciding what to eat. While the Hotel Royal doesn’t offer coffee and cakes, as such, if you are there during service hours (lunch is 12-3pm) you are more than welcome to order from the dessert menu. So you can sort of do afternoon tea. This flexibility worked really well for us – I ordered the sticky toffee pudding, two people shared the whiting, we had serve of chips, and some people shared dips. Quite a mish-mash!

The food wasn’t perfect – but then it was exactly what you’d expect from a reasonably standard pub menu. The portion of whiting was generous, if a little too heavy on the batter. The vanilla ice cream with the sticky toffee pudding was definitely the best part of the dish – the pudding itself was a strange combination of being a little too stodgy but also a little too springy. But it was also only $6.50.

While some aspects of the service were a little slow (for example, the menus took a little while to arrive) as a rule the service was very good. The young man behind the bar, who did most of the work, was pleasant and extremely helpful. Without prompting he brought out children’s and seniors’ menus and when unable to find a cushion for my grandma he offered to bring different chairs for her to try out. That kind of attention to detail makes me feel that even commenting on the wait for the menus somewhat churlish!

If you’re looking for a pub lunch just out of the city (or perhaps dinner, before going to Thebby Theatre), you could certainly do a lot worse than the Hotel Royal.

Hotel Royal on Urbanspoon