The Dragon Peking, Parramatta NSW

My cousin Sooi Lin and her hubby Joseph introduced me to this northern Chinese restaurant, located along Parramatta's bustling food street section of Church Street. It is not difficult to find it if you turn out from Westfield and follow the crowds going for Asian grocery shopping. Northern Chinese can be a catch-all term for the variety of cooking styles from Beijing to Shandong. This cuisine seems to be spreading over the greater Sydney area, even with an outlet in Wollongong CBD.

For Sunday lunch starters, we had a traditional cold dish, comprising of jellyfish stir mixed with cooked chicken strips and garnished with a chili aftertaste. It was just the perfect thing for a hot Australian summer's day.

Joseph chose the above dish of Beijing egg rolls. I found it a bit over the top in saltiness, but otherwise it was a crunchy bite into the ingredients wrapped inside - bean sprouts, minced pork and veg all fused with a delicious gravy.

I found the above pictured hotpot, tofu braised with hints of salted cod fish (ala Portuguese and Norwegian

cooking) and garnished with bite-sized chicken cuts, reminding me and Sooi Lin of home cooking in Penang Island, Malaysia.

We did not go for the full blown Beijing crispy skin duck, but opted instead for the crispy fried version, still served to us with small round-shaped flat wraps. The fun was to smoother the flat warps with hoi sin sauce and place thinly cut strips of sweet tasting cucumber and lettuce before topping the emerging small pile with slices of the duck. Then we folded the wrap around and bit into them.

Christmas In The City

City bells, city sights, you know it's Christmas time in the city......these are selections from across the greater Sydney area in 2010.

A simple but elegant Christmas wreath hangs above a walkway at the Rocks Village (above) while

more decorations surround the Santa photograph opportunity corner at Bankstown's Centro shopping centre (below).

Sydney Town Hall at night (above) and Dora The Explorer performed for children and their parents at Wollongong's Crown Street shopping mall (below).

Lower East Cafe, Crown Street, Wollongong CBD

The very name provides the clue as to where to locate this place - lower east side, towards the ocean, of the straddling Crown Street in Wollongong CBD. Blake runs an outfit that can only be described as very Bondi, with lots of offerings on sourdough and with an understated kind of atmosphere to suit relaxing breakfasts and non-fussy lunches. Detail can be appreciated in the line-up of drink bottle varieties on an upper shelf, together with the choice of seating arrangements inside or outside and in the placement around the cafe of various types of coffee culture icons and utilities.

My choice of smoked salmon slices and slices of hard boiled eggs on toasted sour dough (above) complemented well with the coffee on brunch with mates on a lazy Saturday morning.

There are alternatives in cosy wood based decor (above) for regulars, but my attention was diverted to the

espresso machine (below) that serves as a much loved part of the household. When you finish your meal, you turn right to head for retail therapy or turn left to soak in the summer at the beach.

A NSW South Coast Spring

Jeannie and Grant Hemphill brought their children Jasmine and Joel to spend a few days in the Wollongong area in late October 2010. They saw and soaked in a world so different form north-west Sydney, where they reside, and here are some of the captured impressions, covering Austinmer Beach, the UOW Wollongong Campus and the Wollongong Botanical Gardens.

Whirlwind in Wollongong

Many parts of Planet Earth had witnessed a flare up in climate related natural disasters

in recent times.  The Illawarra coast of New South Wales experienced one in early spring this year when a combination of high winds, quick temperature changes and its locational vulnerability to the open oceans

caused a bit of havoc. Above, the UOW Wollongong Campus saw tree branches being brought down half blocking an inner circuit road.

The metal sheets on top of the fitness equipment specialists tore over from another building across Keira Street in Wollongong, but not before destroying the windscreen of the petite black coloured car which happened to be parked in their path.

An example of uprooting near the freeway from the Gong towards Sydney.

The roof tiles of this shop house at the southern end of Wollongong CBD could not withstand the

gusty winds.