Chomping My Way Through Brisbane

Oh, how wrong was I when I thought this pizza place could be anything like New York Pizzeria in my hometown of Houston. It should have clued me off that it was right down the street from a couple pub/hotels, but still, I decided to eat there—mainly because I was wearing some tall heels that were getting to me and I didn’t feel like walking to Queen Street Mall and back to work by 2!

The place is a little hole-in-the-wall right next to Azra Kebab and Magic Kebab on Edward Street. My advice: eat a kebab. You walk in, and all the choices for pizza are sitting in the case right in front of you to choose from—because apparently, reading what is on the pizza isn’t enough. There were two other people buying pizza there, but only just leaving, so I didn’t realize until I had ordered my pizza that the pizzas sitting in front of me were actually the ones customers got to eat, instead of them having warmer, less old ones made in the back. For some reason, even though it said a drink and a slice were $7, I got mine for $6…and even that was too much.

The slice was put in the oven for entirely too long, making me wonder exactly when the pizza had originally been made. I thought the guy had actually forgotten about me, since he chucked it in and then walked to the corner and started talking to his friends. Five minutes later, I had a slice and wandered down to the seating area next to Magic Kebab.

I bit into the pizza and nearly spit it out. It was absolutely disgusting—the cheese was slimy and nearly tasteless, the ham was limp, and the pineapple nearly devoid of moisture. I continued trying to eat it, since I had paid $6 for it, but gave up halfway through. It was a rather large slice—supposedly “New York size”—and I just couldn’t stomach it all. I really didn’t want to spend half of the afternoon in the bathroom. So, the pizza ended up in the trash and I ended up walking to Queen St Mall after all, in search of something cheap, filling, and most importantly, edible.

I think the New York Slice is open til very late, since then I told my boyfriend about where I had eaten, he said, “Yuck! I only eat there after I’ve been at the Vic all night!” I’m sure there are other places, like the kebab place, open at that time too, so there is absolutely no reason to eat here. Ever.

When my boyfriend came to meet me in Brisbane’s CBD for my lunch break, we didn’t really have a clue what we wanted to eat. We started wandering down Queen Street, looking for something good, when I remembered about Pancakes on Broadway. The restaurant was one of the few Brisbane establishments I remembered being advertised in the YHA discounts book and I wanted to test whether I would actually get the 10% discount or not. Plus, crepes sounded really, really good.

I had seen the sign for Pancakes on Broadway many times since it is hanging out on Queen Street Mall. However, I had only been in the little shopping centre in which it is located once. The centre itself is a curiosity: Broadway (its official name) is definitely upscale, and has no less than four bridal stores. I thought this might be overkill and slightly too much competition, but apparently not. I hate the way the centre is designed—there is a sign as you go in advertising Pancakes on Broadway on Level 2, yet when you go up the first escalator, you find you are on Level 1 with a great view of the café, yet with no real way to get there. You can also then see the escalator further into the shopping centre that goes directly between ground-Level 2, but that isn’t really much help at this point. So, you are left with the choices of either using the elevator or going up another escalator and struggling to the exit of Harvey Norman, which the restaurant sits just outside of.

When we finally got there, there were very few other diners and we got to choose the booth of our liking. The menus we were handed surprised me a bit with their prices—$10.50 for entrée (appetizer) size crepes, and $17 for mains. I stuck with an entrée-sized seafood crepe, while James chose potato pancakes he thought were entrée-sized, but turned out not to be. The waiter was a bit slow at taking our order, which agitated me slightly because I was on a schedule.

The crepes/pancakes arrived in about 15 minutes. Mine—one crepes—had an interesting taste, like it was stuffed with fish ‘n’ chips and covered in white wine sauce. Nevertheless, it was quite good, but not as good as my homemade sweet chili chicken crepes. James enjoyed his heaping plate of potato pancakes and fried eggs, which even came with a fried banana—surprising, since after Cyclone Larry, bananas have cost $10 a kilo. Maybe that’s why his meal cost $17.

Overall, it was a decent, tasty meal that we finished just in time for me to make it back to work within my allotted hour. We even ended up getting the YHA discount—the waiter checking us out wasn’t so sure but another waitress confirmed that yes, we do get 10% off. Not bad for having been given the YHA card for free!

By May, the fourth month of our study abroad experience, my friends and I were all craving Mexican food. Not homemade burritos from the few Old El Paso products found in Coles supermarkets, not food from New South Wales (since Queenslanders call New South Welshmen Mexicans—because they live south of the border), but real Mexican food. We found a little restaurant called Pepe’s in Milton, which was a short train ride away, so off we went.

Pepe’s wasn’t in the heart of the Park Road restaurant area in Milton, which is on the river side of the train station and the XXXX brewery, but instead is just past the brewery in the opposite direction. It is in a tiny strip centre and visible because of the brilliant colors the entire place is coated in—there are oranges and yellows everywhere!

The menu didn’t have a whole lot of choices, but seemed better in general than Montezuma’s, Australia’s largest Mexican chain. Sadly, they did not have quesadillas—which I had really been craving—although this is probably a good thing because nothing can beat a Taco Cabana chicken quesadilla at 2am! I ended up ordering beef nachos and my friend ordered a burrito. She was a bit curious when they gave her a list of toppings, most of which normally come on a burrito as a standard, like corn or sour cream, and asked her to choose one. She just ordered beans and hoped for the best. I don’t remember what my other friend ordered but it was one of the limited choices for people allergic to wheat.

Boy, did my friend get a surprise when her burrito came out. It truly was a bean burrito, consisting solely of refried beans and a tortilla wrapped around them. She managed to eat it—somehow—but point out that not only did she feel like she was eating a can of refried beans, but she could have eaten this exact same thing for much cheaper at home (I don’t remember the exact price, but it was at least $9 vs. a $2 can of beans). She ended up going home and not eating beans for quite some time.

I enjoyed my nachos. They were a heaping pile of chips, shredded beef, sour cream, and other condiments that cost me around $10. With a bit more Southwestern flavor, they would have reminded me very much of Hard Rock Café nachos—some of the best I’ve had (its odd to say that about any food at the Hard Rock). They were really quite tasty and satiated my Mexican craving for the time being, even if I did order the hottest salsa (on a scale of 1-5) and it was still barely a Texas medium.

The service was decent—not terribly quick, but not slow either. We can’t blame them for not knowing anything about Mexican food because, well, they were in Australia. We paid our bill and headed out, at least two of us happy with our little taste of home.

The Raj Mahal is a tiny Indian restaurant in the Brisbane suburb of Taringa, which is squished between the much larger western suburbs of Toowong and Indooroopilly. Because of this, I probably wouldn’t have found the restaurant, located at the top of the hill on Moggill Road, next to the Pool Shop, had it not been down the street from James’ house.

By tiny, I mean this place wasn’t even built to be a restaurant—it is actually inside an old house. This makes it look a little sketchy, especially when you walk through the entryway hallway and nearly hit your head. When you reach what must have been the old dining room, you are generally greeted at the counter and seated at a table of the appropriate size. Since the restaurant is BYO (not licensed to sell alcohol but you can bring your own), they also take your drinks and open them/put them in the fridge. This is about the extent of the service you will receive for the entire visit. On one trip here, we actually had to get up and go through their refrigerator trying to find our drinks because everyone working there had disappeared.

In regard to food, the waiters eventually remember about you and take your order, generally after much waving to get his/her attention. The food does come out rather quickly and is the polar opposite to the service—actually quite good. I especially like their medium butter chicken, which has an amazing taste without being too spicy. The food is not the hottest Indian I’ve ever had, but some of the medium curries still had me reaching for the naan bread to cool off my mouth. Unfortunately, on one visit here, we ordered chicken & chili naan, so when my mouth started burning and I reached for the nann, it just made it worse! James’ sister actually ordered cucumber yogurt (so much better than water or any juice), and she was eating mild!

Having been here quite a few times, and even having a favorite dish, I still think the best way to dine here is with a group (the larger the better) so everyone can choose something and share. Plus, this way you can try lots of different naan breads as well. The only one I would not recommend is the dried fruits naan—it just tasted a bit odd.

Everything is priced in the average range for restaurants in Brisbane—$12 to $16 for a main, and about $4 for a bowl of fresh naan bread. The service is abysmal, but this has not deterred me from eating here multiple times—I just don’t expect it to be the fastest restaurant around. If you want good food minus dealing with the service, you can always order takeaway—if your order is over $20. This rule is a bit of a downer because it has stopped us multiple times from stopping in and grabbing naan to go with our homemade curry!

Just down the street from the Vic and the Exchange hotels on Edward Street, there are three eateries: a pizza place (NY Slice Pizza, which I have reviewed in another entry—in short, don’t go there), and two kebab shops. Magic Kebab, which seems larger because of the big shared eating area next to it, has, without fail, many more people in it every time I walk by. Since I feel that this might be a barometer of how the two shops compare, I always jump in the longer line at Magic Kebab, and therefore, I can’t compare the two shops.

Even though there tend to be a fair number of people in the shop, the numbers are nothing like what you will find a couple streets over on Queen St Mall during lunch hour. The milling people have normally already ordered, so I’ve only ever had to wait a minute or two to be served. The staff are friendly, but many times difficult to understand.

Like all kebab places, you have full control over what gets put on the kebab. It’s kind of like an eastern Subway, for all those that haven’t experienced the wonders of a kebab before (I was one of those people until discovering Origin Kebab, since closed down, in the basement of the Myer Centre on Queen St). The meats to choose from are lamb, beef, chicken, and doner (although I’m not sure what this is—it might not be a meat for all I know). There is also a vegetarian option. The standard veggies to choose from are lettuce, tomato, and onion, with optional extras (that cost a bit extra as well) of capsicum, mushrooms, pineapple, tabouli, and cheese, among other things. There are plenty of sauces to choose from, including garlic, chili, sweet chili, and sour cream. All of this is wrapped up in something tortilla-like and heated. The end result is absolutely delicious—I am especially fond of chicken, cheese, veggies, sour cream, and sweet chili kebabs.

The prices obviously vary depending on the meat and extras, but a small is in the $6.50 range and a large is in the $7.50 range. The servings are much more liberal than at Sunshine Kebab in the Myer Centre, with Sunshine’s large being about a Magic small, for the exact same price. I couldn’t tell a difference in the taste, with each of them being just as good. The thing both of these places get you with are the drinks, which cost around $2.50 each.

The seating area next to Magic is decent and a good place to sit if you like people watching/gazing at giant world maps next to you on the wall/watching bad soap operas with no sound/listening to popular music. There are always plenty of seats available—much better than anywhere along Queen St. Plus, it's one of the only places to sit and enjoy your kebab while it's hot. Overall, this is one of the best kebab places I’ve found in Brisbane.

Two days before my departure for the first time from Australia’s fair shores, James told me we were going out for a nice dinner. The only problem was, he didn’t have a clue where. We asked around and finally decided to head into the city to Eagle Street Pier.

I had been to Eagle Street Pier once or twice before, when my friend and I got off at the Riverside ferry stop and wandered through town. However, that was during the day—the place is completely different at night. Bars and fancy restaurants abound, all of them packed and full of life. We wandered around the Pier, picking one restaurant after another only to find that they, too, require reservations on Friday nights—well, at least, if you want to stand a chance at eating. We arrived at Il Centro to find that there was quite a substantial wait, but after investigating our choices further, we decided that the hour or so wait wasn’t so bad.

We got a couple beers at the bar and eventually got a seat in the bar area, squished up with others waiting for a table. Our table didn’t take quite as long as they said—probably because there were only two of us. We had a nice, small table near the walkway into the restaurant, but I surprisingly didn’t get jostled by people walking on it nearly as much as I thought I would. Even though we weren’t near a window, I could still look straight out at the lit up Story Bridge, the iconic bridge of Brisbane that appears on nearly all postcards of the city. It’s not quite the Sydney Harbour Bridge, but its as close as you’ll get 1100 kilometers north of Sydney!

The menu boasted some of the higher prices I had ever seen for restaurant food (at least on my student budget). For a full main, the average price seemed to be around $35. The choices weren’t all limited to Italian—there was also a selection of steaks and chops, especially on the specials menu.

James went for the lamb, which looked very good on a diner’s plate next to us, while I went out on a limb and tried the sandcrab lasagna. It sounded mildly odd, but it said it was the restaurant’s specialty, so I figured why not?

The waiter asked me whether I wanted an entrée (appetizer) or main portion when I ordered it, and warned me that if I got the main, I would be eating it for breakfast. When the meal was served, both James and I thought he had been pulling our legs. Compared to James’ heaping plate of an entire lamb shoulder, I had a tiny square, floating in orange-ish goo in my bowl. This didn’t matter though, because after the first bite, I was in heaven. I don’t know what made the concoction so brilliantly delicious, but it most definitely was. It wasn’t lasagna in the normal sense—there were no tomatoes or cheese or beef, but rather, an amazing sauce coating lots and lots of crabmeat, somehow layered and shaped into a stack. There is no way I can really describe it, other than absolutely delicious. It was worth every penny. The waiter was right—I had to give up a little more than halfway through and watch James, who had already eaten a great, large meal of his own, devour the rest of the lasagna. There was no point taking it home and wasting such a good meal in the microwave!

Even ignoring the food, the restaurant was still great. It was buzzing with the Friday night crowd, yet it was one of the more romantic places I’ve dined in. However, that could be attributed to the occasion as well. Contributing to this was the Pier itself—afterwards, we took a stroll along it, and found a couple of perfect places for pictures in front of the lit-up Story Bridge. The pictures aren’t quite as perfect—mainly because we were attempting to take them on our own and couldn’t agree on who could hold the camera better—but hey, that just added to the fun. I recommend Il Centro as a great treat—although more than one visit here might break the bank!

At the end of our studies abroad, my friend’s whole family came to Brisbane for the beginning of their yearly family vacation. During their week in Brisbane, which was also my last there, it was her parents’ 25th wedding anniversary. By this point, possibly a whole 5 days after leaving Texas, her dad and brother were already craving Texas-sized steaks. So, we ended up eating at the most Texan joint in Brisbane—the SSS BBQ Barn on the corner of Queen and Ann Sts.

It was a rather dismal night—sprinkling enough to be annoying. Very unlike Queensland, since it had possibly rained five times since we arrived more than 4 months previously (ok, I exaggerate, but still). However, the inside was the complete opposite. The place was lit up with the neon roadsigns I am accustomed to seeing in places like the Texas Roadhouse, and the minute we all stepped in, we couldn’t stop laughing—not at the restaurant itself, but just fits of giggles. My friend and I laughed all night, which earned us a lot of odd looks from her brother and James, who were sitting at the end of the table, having their own conversation and, I think, trying to ignore us.

The meals were quite expensive and ended up being the first of the gourmet-priced meals I ate during my last week in Brizzy. However, for what would also be the first of two times that week, I did not have to pay, since Cristina’s parents were awesome and treating us. I ended up ordering a plate of baby back ribs that was in the $30 range. The entire table ordered a range of steaks and ribs—what else at a BBQ place?

Amusingly enough, when we ordered our drinks, the three girls got white wine and the three boys got red. I don’t remember which wine we got (but there’s a good chance it was from the Barossa Valley in south Australia), but it went quite well with the meal. This meal, my absolutely heaping plate of ribs with plenty of side salad and yummy sweet potato chips (definitely choose these as your side!), was great. The ribs were perfectly cooked—you could tell this when you picked up the bone and all the meat fell off. I barely managed to make my way through the plate, but I was triumphant in the end. James had an even bigger plate than I did, with a mix of steak and ribs, so we pretty much had to roll out of the restaurant and into the cab. The person I’m most surprised about finishing was Cristina’s brother, since not long before he had taken up the XXXX brewery on their promise of four free beers with a brewery tour and had inhaled them in record time.

The SSS BBQ Barn was definitely a “great feed” and I highly recommend it—Brisbane certainly does real Texas BBQ better than it does real Texas Mexican food!

On a positively ugly afternoon in Brisbane, James came into the CBD to meet me for lunch. We didn’t particularly want to walk very far, especially since our umbrella couldn’t cover both of us at the same time. So, we wandered down Charlotte Street—two blocks east of Queen Street—until something struck our fancy. That something ended up being Union Jack’s British pub, and what irony in the fact that the ominous low clouds were sprinkling rain in a very British fashion as we went in!

The place really did remind me of a British pub—any light that may have been filtering in the door quickly disappeared about a meter inside, absorbed by the dark décor. Everything is a dark brown, yet not in an ugly way—just enough to make me wonder that if I stepped outside, would I be back in Lincolnshire?

When you first walk in, there are plenty of tables around the central bar. We sat down here and grabbed a menu off the bar, but soon realized that the actual restaurant area was up a short set of stairs in the back of the room. We were quickly seated, since the waiter wasn’t all that busy, with only one other set of diners to look after. We ordered immediately, having already perused the menu and having a time limit on our dining. James attempted to order a XXXX, which was surprisingly not on tap (possibly the only place in Brisbane where this is the case). Other Aussie beers were, but the lines were empty due to the fact that the Socceroos had played Brazil in the World Cup a couple days before. He ended up making a very good choice and going for the pot of Newcastle Brown.

I was a little dubious when I ordered about how the roast beef and Yorkshire pudding would stack up to my grandmother’s, but I went for it anyway, since I was a lot more dubious about ordering haggis in Australia. James went for the full English breakfast. The meals came out very quickly, and James definitely won in the size department—he had a massive plate covered in 2 fried eggs, sausages, heaps of bacon, and baked beans, among other things. He was definitely full by the end, but very content as well. I enjoyed my roast beef as well—while it didn’t look big on the plate, there was still plenty there. The meat was nice and tender and the gravy just thick enough. This sat on top of a pile of vegetables which I didn’t mind eating (doesn’t normally happen), since they were all dripping in gravy. The Yorkshire pud sat on top, absolutely drenched in gravy. I normally have it with some gravy, but not quite that much, but it was still quite good and definitely authentic pudding.

I know “authentic British cooking” isn’t tops on people’s food wish list, but I definitely think Union Jack’s is worth a stop.

When James, whom I had only been dating for a couple weeks, casually suggested Mexican as a joke for dinner one night, he was quite surprised when I jumped at the idea. There are two Mexican restaurants in Indooroopilly, a large western suburb of Brisbane, which quite surprised me since I hadn’t seen a single one throughout Brisbane in the 4 months previous. Unfortunately, the one he wanted to go to was closed for some odd reason on a Friday night, so we ended up at Montezuma’s, a couple doors down, instead.

Many things about this restaurant amused me. Being the largest Mexican food chain in Australia, I thought they would have a reasonably normal menu. I was wrong. Everything was named after random places in Mexico, California, and Texas. Rather than just looking and seeing “burrito” or “enchiladas”, I saw “Texas” and “San Antonio” and had to read the fine print to figure out what each was meant to be. And one meal—the “Chihuahua”? I know that’s a place in Mexico, which fits in with the naming convention—but how could that possibly be appetizing to anyone? Even if the Chihuahua dog is annoying and yippy?

Another thing that caught my eye was that everyone in the restaurant seemed to be drinking Corona, which was being sold at a premium—between $5 and $6 for a bottle. It seemed a bit ridiculous to pay that much when, for half that price, you could actually buy a decent beer. And finally, why would you name your restaurant Montezuma’s? Again, yes, major Aztec character—but who wants to associate “Montezuma” with eating? Just the thought of it makes me want to put Pepto Bismol in my purse.

James got the enchiladas and I got a burrito, which fortunately was not stuffed with only beans (see my Pepe’s review). The odd thing was, I could have confused our two meals—the burrito was covered in sauce and rolled/baked like an enchilada would be. Still, it was decent food, although nowhere near the best Mexican I’ve had. It was incredibly bland—none of their sauces seemed to have much flavor, much less than the Mexican fire that I love. This really got to James—I think he was really looking forward to the spices. The lack thereof is the first reason he will give about why not to eat at Montezuma’s.

The service was good and the prices about average--$12 to $15 for a dinner, plus $3 for local beers. I had no major problems with Montezuma’s, but their food has the look of authentic Mexican minus any real taste. I found that Pepe’s was a better deal and reminded me much more of Mexican food from home.