The Five Islands Brewing Company

It has a unique location, next door to both the WIN Stadium and the WIN Entertainment Centre. It is not far from the harbour of one of Australia's largest regional cities.  It has a catchment area of university and college students, surfers, young couples and growing families.  The sun seems to be always shining on most days here and it is surrounded by dramatic and scenic land and ocean scapes.
It offers night time diversions to weekend trippers, twenty something year olds and is walkable to the city's main food streets.  Tall standing Norfolk pines guard the roads that lead to its door.   Welcome to the Brewery.  And yes, it does stock Wollongong's own blends and brands of beer in house.

The venue is spacious and offers a variety of preferences - you can sit outside and take in the seaside breezes, daytime or int he evenings.  The beers are sourced from FIBC with no added stuff like sugars, preservatives and additives - ala natural, you may say!  It has a tradition of offering gutsy summer parties and easy lunchtimes gatherings since the 21st century began.   A recent addition, the Bar 1796, honours the year when iconic explorers Matthew Flinders, George Bass and William Martin sailed down the eastern seaboard of the Australian continent in their good old ship the Tom Thumb past this Illawarra Coast.  Ladies get proffered special cocktail deals on Friday nights at this Bar. At the other end from this bar is the BoardRoom, with private facilities and function spaces.

The restaurant has been the mainstay at this place as long as I recall.  Fish and chips on the outdeck, often with seagulls swirling around on lazy weekend afternoons. You may spot the real Five Islands out there in Wollongong Harbour when the ocean chooses to reveal them.  The venue was truly the first commercial brewery in this region.  I miss the Long Board, one of the most innovative and satisfying brews from this place.  Several of my mates say the grog is better than the food served here, especially if you are out on the town for special occasions and may perhaps have higher expectations. My advice is, if you approach the Brewery like a big pub in a place with rather casual lifestyles, then you manage to about nail it.  No stiff upper lips and fancy foodie speak. The best is to obtain seafood platters, tapas and finger food, dwell in the good company and conversation and chill out all that Sydney hype behind.

There is even no need to drive to and from this place, as the free shuttle of Gong bus service passes handily by, though do check the time tables for nights.  Like a tasting opportunity, you may even do degustation of the beer variety.  Prices have been adjusted for the food menu over the years though but I reckon the Brewery still sits well when we have communal consumption. In the end, the pleasure comes from huddling over tables, laughing over things we cannot do elsewhere and getting a chance to congregate with mates and loved ones.

The Brewery is one of those places on the route in a serious pub crawl - and Wollongong city is hell of a convenient place for such serious crawls.  It is integral to the spirit and climate of the NSW South Coast.  Summer is approaching - and so do make the most of it!  Local rugby league legend Michael Bolt started this idea and business of a restaurant and bar connected with a brewery. He still runs the now stand alone brewery, FIBC, and do ask for the Bulli Black when you next find yourself at this unique place.

Sedap, Chatswood Westfield - Northern Sydney

Juicy, tasty and uplifting - the roast chicken from Sedap.

For many in mainstream Australian society, the sight of white looking steamed chicken with skin on may not be priority, unless the potential consumers have been familiar to Singapore and recognised this significant dish so commonly available in many of the island nation's food courts.  This same dish is given a twist, served with an attractive looking and actually yummy roast chicken - your choice of breast or leg - at the level 4 food court at the Westfield in Chatswood, 20 minutes by car north of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.  Just the chicken itself is worth visiting Sedap, which gets busy at meal times and opens late till evening on both weekends and weekdays.  The roast chicken has oomph, a good bite on the palate and at the same time is moist enough below the skin. KFC better watch out!  KFC is only a shopfront away, with the nearby pet shop and Virgin Australia phone shops as triggers if you are looking for where Sedap is located.

Kopitiam or coffee shop selections from Sedap.

The decor at Sedap is colonial Penang, with shutter windows and white facades. The kitchen is not transparent to the public though, with freshly cooked food coming out of a small outlet.  The nearby Lang Suan Thai cafe is also owned by the same people who run Sedap, but the Thai place is made out with a  street side stall atmosphere, replete with zinc roofs, a rustic feel and more brown in colour impact.  Penang food traditions, especially with its Peranakan or Straits Chinese or Straits Indian  heritage,  can be a fusion and this is evident in Sedap - for example, dry served Cantonese inspired noodles are also made available with chicken curry, the same ones usually eaten in a nasi lemak combo.  There is a drink of three layers in tea, with the green bits of cendol as the main anchor.  'Sedap" simply means tasty.  Malaysia is currently the source of immigrants in the top ten list by country of origin to Australia ( at Number 8) and it can be no surprise to know that more than a few Malaysian food outlets have sprouted up in the past two years in Sydney.

The pork laden deep fried roll - lobak - an institution of Penang street food.

The ais kacang is said to be small for the asking price and the har mee may have more than a few finding the soup too sweet instead of just prawn perfect.   Most of the customers on the Sunday I tried Sedap with Joyce and Andre and their children were Malaysian immigrants of Chinese origin.  A mother and daughter speaking in Fujian ordered the chee cheong fun, more of a Hong Kong Cantonese domain, but in Penang this is served with some startling good sauces instead of just thin slices of char siew.  Apart from the outstanding chicken roast, I would highly recommend the tender and moistly grilled pork satay - a combination that would have made a great day in Sedap.  There are a variety of other deep fried stuff sitting beside the lobak I saw, more like snack happy crispy bite food on the go, more suitable if you do not want anything heavier and prefer to eat whilst walking along.  Sauces are charged by Sedap, but the chili sauce is worth trying.

Holding the kong kong, or the enamel coated mug, akin to the Aussie swagger's billy drink holder.  Photo credit to AM.

There are a few more dishes I aim for on my further visits to Sedap - another Penang iconic dish, the char koay teow, the mamak styled roti canai and the Kuala Lumpur signature Chinese street food - wanton mee, or soy-sauced mixed egg noodles served with veg, pork char siew cuts and steamed dumplings.  Sedap projects itself as a Penang food specialist - and expectations are high, with most Penangites, past and present, being very critical of the quality of their home island's hawker food, having been blessed with a variety of terrific street food. Those city dwellers who cannot bring themselves to Chatswood can now savour the same menu choices from Sedap and its sister operation Lang Suan in the CBD below ANZ Tower at 161 Castlereagh Street, as well as at Regent Place at the corner of George and Bathurst Streets in Sydney CBD.

Musings on Change

It does seem irritating that it has often been wet evenings when, for once a week, I have to take out the household garbage bin to place on the road kerbside. And yet, the lawn is showing signs of being parched, yellowing in spots and on the edges. At the same time, weeds and grass sprout up on garden beds where we had subconsciously earmarked the space for other flora. Winter is showing signs of having a cold spell before the season departs, as blooms appear on certain species and noon has such contrasting warmth when compared with the chilly middle of the night. There seems to be more laundry to do in this mid year season in the Antipodes but truly one can ask "Hey, what winter do you truly have in Wollongong?". Scallops and prawns are slow cooking into a warm and satisfying congee brew as I write. I am beginning to sense real questions of whether city, suburb or regional living environments are better - or which are worse. I reckon there is no blanket answer, like in things human, there is the positive and the negative, there is the preferred and the disdained, the light and the dark, the warm and the cool. I begin to compare how humans find their niche of physical community - and still I cannot help thinking of us like being limited by the fish in my aquarium tank. Human individuals, at different stage of their lives, need to be free to wander, relish in choice and yet later to embed into a cocooned existence. Philosophy, cyberspace and imagination have untied the boundaries of physical space to liberate those who wish so to savour and nurture in unlimited existence. Despite this, there is a certain comfort in the familiar, the nearby and the routine. The young may rebel but later find themselves repeating the joys and mistakes of their fathers and mothers. The music may be not the same, the food may have transformed but the reflections are the same. I still at times smile over the obsessed personifications of some characters in the university space and I do not mean the students - and how each of them, in the worst extremes and in different degrees, swirl around in their delusions, egotism and imagined world of comfort. And yet there are others from the same campus who remain human, become more civilised and virtually are shining examples of light, despite having to work with personalities we would not accept if they were members of our family. Is a campus a microcosm of the bigger world, the outside community and the larger human condition? In some respects, yes, but I do not concur that they mostly do. Universities as institutions carry a burden of both heritage and innovation. The inherent pitfalls of such a sector are to dwell in smugness, not be humane and not to embrace what the future portends. Outcomes from such businesses are not just merely financial or chasing some dubious rankings like in commercial sport, but more rewarding when you nurture and win minds and hearts. The model of providing higher education may have a long history, but also that of change. Twenty four years ago, protests and so-called people power mushroomed across the world, from Beijing to Rangoon to Eastern Europe. This year we see deja vu events, with some more ominous, in the Middle East, bursting with violent frustrations after many years of political control and undemocratic forms of governance. Communism took more than a serious and significant route to oblivion in 1989. It was also the Lunar Year of the Snake to East Asians. China was on the verge to break free to many aspects of capitalism, dealing with change management at its grassroots as never seen since the Cultural Revolution of the late sixties. The sheer force and beauty of change can be a two edged sword, cutting through convention, assumption and reluctance. Yet this very change at the same time allows seeds which you have sown to grow, opportunities you have waited for so long to become reality and for you to be free of your so-called comfort zone, with all its constraints and peculiar mindset. In 1989, East German youth tasted personal freedoms not known by their parents, party cadres in Shenzhen jumped on money making band wagons that were taboo not much earlier. If one accepts lower pay in exchange for employment stability and a lifestyle, these very things were questioned in 2013 when the Australian economy faced its demons again not since the early nineties. The pains which ordinary Aussies had to adjust to this year were minuscule when compared to the realities of daily life and livelihood faced by Greek, Spanish and Portuguese twenty somethings. In 1989, the average mortgage rate was the highest in Australian economic history and today it is the lowest in perhaps seventy years. Australians did already have a tradition of travelling overseas as a rite of passage or in retirement years, but growth in such numbers exploded in line with the rise in value of the Aussie dollar. Still, the nation continued to rely on its natural commodity resources and higher education exports without seizing the bull by its horns and transform its economy. Resting back on past patterns and choices may work for some occasions and strategies, but may not work in some pivotal corners and turns of history. The tiny island nation of Singapore, which critics describe as over planned, over anguished and under spaced, has turned out to do so well that it has now achieved what it has dreamed long about - to be the Switzerland of Asia in per capita income, savings levels and the quality of life. It is so ahead of its south-east Asian neighbours which have more potential in resources, population and development. Obsession can be a downfall, especially when leaders are fixed with a mindset that retards, discourages and wastes. Japan was in a long term economic limbo for over twenty years until the present government pressed for change. Australian suburbs have the fascinating reality of retaining things from the past and concurrently showing signs of the new and the untested. The ovals and play grounds for example can remain untouched, but now surrounded by new fangled high rise constructions. People do remain ensconced in the back portions of their houses lined against a seemingly quiet street but now the chatter in the backyard echo different ethnic cultures. The healthy state of expression by politicians is not unabated by the rising impact of political correctness in other spheres of personal and public life. The quality and integrity of food ingredients in Australia continues to be respected in countries facing contamination, pollution and degrading of essential components of life. Systems may work a hundred times faster, especially when trading shares, but the sheer sense of commercial greed is carried on regardless by another generation. Returning to the use of public transport by train, I cannot help but bask in the same processes and procedures when I first used the Epping line in north-west Sydney. Perhaps this hotch potch of possibly contrasting realities assists us to manage change effectively - I bask in familiar parts, have a passion for the new and keep asking "Why not?". The important thing about change is to seize the moment. Enjoy the wet, I tell myself, for it may soon be too dry. Soak in the winter, for soon it can be unbearably hot.

Albee's, Kingsford NSW

The wide variety of choices in Chinese Malaysian and Straits Chinese street food and cuisine, first consumed in Campsie,  is also now available in Albee's sister branch in the university precinct of Kingsford in greater Sydney.  This signifies a widening of options in the Malaysian food scene in Sydney. Previously options were confined to the north-west and there was much lament when compared to what Melbournians had. In the past several months, the variety was made more available in Sydney CBD and now in southern suburbs. When is commercial Malaysian food coming to Wollongong and the Central Coast - that can be a brave question.

Such cuisine can be construed around a five part meal, although any resident in and visitor to Malaysia knows that people there eat anytime around the clock.  With Albee's, I can have an entree of chunky vegetarian curry puff (with both potato and sweet potato mush inside and that distinctive one half of a hard boiled egg).  Another good starter is the good old reliable satay skewers with an uplifting peanut-based spicy and chili infused sauce. Then I sip my teh tarik whilst going into my mains - usually a clay pot of hot and aromatic noodles, Hainan chicken drumstick rice or a more exotic dish like fish head curry ala south Indian style.   Then it is time for some sweetening, and Straits Chinese fare (refer to picture above) are never regrettable. The only common thing about Chinese Malaysian desserts is its extensive use of coconut milk in the various petite creations.  I highly recommend the talam cake with its smooth white top and green underbelly. To top it all and then stagger from a Chinese Malaysian meal, wind up with ais kacang - laden with syrupy garnish and mixed with hidden bits of black jelly, cream corn and sago palm fruit.  At this juncture, I am thankful that Asian meals are usually communal based and meant to be shared with your fellow diners at the same table - so anyone does not have to eat it all and can sample more food for better variety.

My visit to Albee's in Kingsford for the first time gave me an opportunity to try their curry laksa. Any decent so-called Malaysian street food outlet has this iconic dish - perhaps popularised  by the Malay-Chinese chain around Sydney CBD in the  nineties, then with 20 cent paper bibs and all to ensure no staining of your corporate tie and suit.  I reckon this dish is a good measure of your evaluation of such joints on debut try outs, whether from Jackie's in Concord to Sambal in North Ryde to Temasek's in Parramatta.  The all important soup in a laksa should not be over rich with coconut cream but allow the other spices and ingredients to seep through and above any chili effect.  The next critical test comes with the texture, freshness and variety of the ingredients accompanying the noodles.   Diners should also be given options in what type of noodles and not just given the often standard mix of vermicelli and Hokkien yellow noodles. Personally I prefer Cantonese-fashioned egg noodles to go with my laksa.  Any al dente effect of the noodles you get on your bite from your served bowl is a bonus.

On this same visit, I encountered ice cold teh tarik, or latte tea with that cinnamon twist.  I took it as an ethnic milkshake, one that was both gratifying on the taste and also went well with the food at Albee's.
Service, as with the  Campsie cafe, was quick and friendly.  The overflowing number of menu items are also plastered on the surrounding walls but the read hand held menu has been modernised in graphics and presentation. This venue is a welcome place for a family or a group.  We did not feel people impinging on each other's space and Anzac Parade outside the door looked safe and suburban.
Albee's in Kingsford is accessible by easy bus routes from Sydney CBD.  Parking of your car is also more relaxed when compared to some inner city suburbs.  Why just go for yum cha meals on a lazy weekend arvo?  Try this Chinese Malaysian option when you can.

Papparich, Chatswood NSW

The kopi tiam of old Malaya has been revitalised into a modern setting, with dark brown panel surroundings, Australian sourced ingredients for classic dishes from street and home of another era, another place and another cuisine.  As immigration from Malaysia continues to flow into the Antipodes, the soul food of childhood and family for many of these arrivals are represented and repackaged for another generation.  Does this symbolise the infusion of more Asia into a continental island that is so close geographically and yet have remained for most years apart, culturally and politically? Australia offers a fresh start for the adventurous, disenfranchised and business dynamic from other lands - and in return it is enriched with new thoughts, new cuisines and new colours.

South Indian rotis, Cantonese noodles, Straits Chinese snacks, Eurasian cakes, Malay satay sticks, Indonesian nasi lemak, Western influenced breads, Hainan chicken rice and amazing drink combinations ( Ribena and water melon slices?) litter the interesting menus at Papparich outlets. The food is already a fusion from a few hundred years of demographic intermixing above the Equator - and now they arrive in another land of more than just a few racial groups. Australia will have a pride of its own evolving and distinctive cuisine in the future.  In the meantime, this nation absorbs, allows and experiments.  White coffee is mixed with milk tea (cham) and longans are dropped in soya milk honey.   Silken tofu is served cold and lightly laced with a palm sugar syrup.   Roti canai is provided  with chocolate, ice cream and banana cuts in a heady colonial era theme.  Bread slices coated with a coconut cream custard called kaya can be ordered at any time of the day and night, and not just at breakfast time.  The staff are mostly with East Asian and Indian faces, unlike those at Papparich branches back in the homeland.

On a cold weekend, I relished the comforts of a simple combo of soft congee with steamed chicken a la Hainan (photo above).  This most subtle of a meal requires great care in preparation, to ensure that flavours rise above the apparent plain look and that garnishings and sauces do not over whelm our palates but instead give us an overall warm feeling of satisfaction inside. Soothing, this can be looked forward by those sensing an impeding cold setting in or savoured by the elderly or their grandchildren without any hint of complications for digestion.

The plethora of street food familiar to most Australians these days - curry laksa, char koay teow and prawn mee - are available, but some with a twist.  How about curry laksa with cockles off their shell?
White coloured rice noodles can be served dry or stir fried in a wet rich gravy. Are you game for a Thai inspired dish utilising tamarind and flaky fish in the unusual soup - the assam laksa?  I am surprised that you can even order a plate of deep fried chicken skin, something so niche but great to accompany with beer.  And don't forget - you can have your yum cha offerings like dumplings and vegetarian rolls as well.  What a melting pot!

Kingsford NSW - Food Street

The Kingsford section of Anzac Parade, between the adjoining Middle and Meeks Streets, has in the recent few months become even more of a food hub for a variety of Asian food.  Sydneysiders know that Kingsford, which lies like a fifteen minute drive south-east of the city centre on a good day, is also a residential  focus for 18 to 25 year olds, mostly customers of the University of NSW in nearby Kensington and a mecca for the various nationalities from South-east Asia, China and Hong Kong.  Apart from English, the predominant languages you hear spoken on the streets are often Indonesian, Hokkien, Mandarin and Cantonese.  Above, a Japanese outlet with transparency, not far from the roundabout - there I was at the bottom right hand side, trying to take this shot.

Kingsford once had hopes of being joined to the Sydney rail network but that plan was dashed by cost cutting in the late 70s and the line terminated at Bondi Junction instead.  Today the theme is food, as illustrated by the view shown above, walking along the pavement towards the roundabout - a series of well known cafes specialising in yogurt, gelato and Malaysian street food.  The Petaling Street chain  is well known in Melbourne circles and refers to the main street in Kuala Lumpur's Chinatown. This outlet in Kingsford joins its Sydney Chinatown branch opened around two years ago.  The latter joint is narrow, crowded and has dining in a basement.  The one in Kingsford is spacious, offers so much better light inside and outside and sits on a raised floor overlooking Anzac Parade.  Lovers of KL Cantonese and street food
will check out what Petaling Street provides - my favourites there are claypot noodles, ice kacang dessert and chicken satay skewers.  Their competitor is only a few doors away along Anzac Parade - Albee's - with its unique chunky curry puffs, fish head curry, Hainan chicken rice, char koay teow and lobak (Straits Chinese pork rolls) counted as my preferred choices there.

Odea's Corner (above) now stands in contrast to the medium high rise apartment block behind it. On an early August Saturday, it was rather warm for a winter season but the sky was deep blue and the trees still bare.  Small groceries, service shops and newsagents dot the main commercial strip that is Anzac Parade, but behind just a row of shops are housing, mainly units, a lot perched on hilly land, many old and with a varied past.  Vehicle parking can be intensely competitive around lunch times. Eastgardens Westfield shopping centre is only a ten minute drive away and Coogee Beach beckons past Randwick to the east.

I came across a strikingly easy to read display of Indonesian street food - the dishes offered look more Sumatran than Balinese, but I loved the simplicity of it all.  Satay skewers from Padang, chicken slow cooked in yellow curry, the popular gado gado salad and hard boiled eggs served in a chili based sambal all sounded to me like what South-east Asian backpackers want and do eat!  Ayam Goreng 99 is not too far away, offering deep fried chook in various cuts and styled servings from Java. Indonesian food outlets have been operating for more than 20 years in Kingsford - some are halal, others are not, some run by ethnic Indonesians and others run by Chinese families with Indonesian names.   Buck-Me Jellico restaurant takes a pun on the name of one of its main dishes ( bak-mee). Ubud offers Balinese fare, Palembang Pampek Noodle is from Sumatra and there are two Rasas to choose from - Indo Rasa and Sedap Rasa.

The Greeks used to dominate Kingsford, and they came mostly en mass from the Mediterranean island of Castellorizo, as symbolised by the Castellorizian Club along the very winding and long Anzac Parade itself.  It is interesting to note that the UNSW has been graduating many international and domestic students of Asian  heritage for the past 50 or more years - and it is no surprise to know that over a fifth of Kingsford's residents claim Chinese ancestry, whilst those with Greek background now number less than 9 percent.  There are more residents in Kingsford of Asian origin than those with English roots or true blue Aussies.  The suburb, part of the Randwick Shire, is close to the Sydney Airport, otherwise known as Charles Kingsford Smith Airport.

Dong Dong Noodles (picture above) has been my fav easy and casual Hong Kong styled cafe, where for more than 15 years I get to gobble endless egg noodle strands mixed with a sweet yet savoury sauce and served with bits of char siew, duck cuts, roast pork with crispy skin or soy flavoured steamed or roast chicken.  Here, in a narrow spaced shop with seating in front and also at the back, customers, mostly youngsters, couples or family groups, enjoy soul food from southern China without fuss and with a relatively quiet sense of contention. There are condiments concocted from cut ginger, pounded garlic and vinegar, but rarely a chili can be seen, unless you specifically ask, and then it is just a chili sauce and not fresh cut chili strips.

Shihlin offers Taiwan street styled snacks, to resolve the need for a hunger pang at any time of the day or when you may not want a full serve meal.  Modelled like a fast food outlet, and named after the Shihlin markets in Taiwan, with earlier opened outlets in Indonesia, Subang Jaya in Malaysia and Somerset in Singapore, the business seems ethnocentric.

It has signature dishes like crispy floss egg crepe, sweet plum potato fries, seafood tempura and hand made oyster flavoured mee sua (thin noodles), reflecting the melting pot of influences from Japan, Fujian and native Taiwanese itself.   Its focused market is clear - the next branch in Australia is at One Central Park in the southern end of Sydney CBD where Chinatown meets Broadway. Even Simon Reeve of the BBC production on Australia today could not help to remark how Asian the streets of Sydney have become, although he did not get to see Kingsford.