Originally published by Two Thousand in 2015

“I remember when I drank my first avocado”, I’ll say to my grandchildren 30 years from now, sipping a cold green beverage through a gigantic straw from styrofoam cup. “Back in my day most of us used to only eat avocado in guacamole, or we’d pay nine bucks for half an avocado smooshed onto toast with a bit of lemon drizzled over the top! Nobody even imagined it could be a dessert.”

Eating avocados is just one of the many things they do better than us in South Asia. Never will you see a thin smear of avocado hidden beneath a few layers of cheap ham. Instead an avocado is a decadent dessert. In the Philippines it’s common to slice one in half after dinner and fill the hole left by the seed with condensed milk. Simple, sweet and rich – this combo is made even better when blended with ice and poured into styrofoam, as is done on the streets of Vietnam, Thailand and Bankstown.

An avocado shake is one of the smoothie options available at Nhu Y Juice Bar but if half a litre of thick green caramel seems a bit much, maybe selecting four different fruits to be buzzed until they become a fun shade of browny pink is more appealing? My go-to fruit combo is strawberries, rockmelon, lychees and pineapple, and you’ll be pleased to see that there’s no kale in the mix. They keep smoothies fun at Nhu Y.

Where
45 Old Town Plaza, Bankstown

When
Mon-Sun, 9am-5pm

How much
$4.50

Originally published by Two Thousand in 2015

I’ve whinged about the state of Sydney’s food trucks before. Something that should’ve been so easy was made to be so hard, life sucks, woe is us etc. The only food truck we’ve written about in the past year is in the middle of Burwood, surrounded by darkness. On the rare occurrence that I hear about a new food truck in Sydney, my immediate reaction is “ugh! Too hard!”, then I crawl under my desk and eat an entire box of Jatz.

Yang’s Malaysian Food Truck must’ve been reading my LiveJournal, because they’ve started parking out the front of our office and sending alluring laksa smells directly to my desk. You win this round, food trucks.

Where most food trucks offer a bakers trio (four) items, Yang’s tiny truck is a clown car that pumps out ten different dishes and six different drinks. Taking your entire office with you and insisting they each order something different so you can try everything is highly recommended.

Make sure you start with the Hainan hot wings, battered and fried with a side of ginger, cucumber and ginger. Move onto a roti dahl which can be eaten like the messiest taco of your life. Six dollars is an absolute steal for the nasi lemak, a hot box of rice, egg, sambal, peanuts and crisp anchovies. Avoid the Ramli beef slider, a little burger that tastes more like an old sausage and egg McMuffin than it does Malaysian. Everything is cheap, cheerful and served in nutritious styrofoam boxes. Best enjoyed on the grass in Harmony Park while dogs look on with jealousy.

If only all food trucks would make an effort to operate next door to where I am most of the week. Instead of the hard to navigate Sydney Food Trucks schedule, can I suggest the City of Sydney put up our own weekly schedules so that the food trucks have to find us?

Where

Throughout Sydney CBD, see their schedule here

How much

From $5

Originally published by Two Thousand in 2015

Originally published by Two Thousand in 2015

Things that are in Matraville:

-The high school that our former Premier Bob Carr went to
– 100 years of ANZAC history
– Brooklyn Boy Bagels

You may have eaten a Brooklyn Boy Bagel at the markets over the last few years. A labour of love for ex New Yorker Michael Shafran, who decided to fill Sydney’s bagel shaped hole by perfecting a true NY style bagel at his kitchen in Matraville, then selling them each weekend at markets around Sydney, including Marrickville, Manly and Frenchs Forest. After boiling and baking some ten thousand bagels from his boarded window commercial kitchen, Michael installed a shopfront and opened the Brooklyn Boy Bagel cafe earlier this year.

A stencil of Travis Bickle is somehow more welcoming than the anthropomorphic spray can out the front of the shop but once inside the aroma of hot baked goods is all the welcome mat you need. On the shelves are bagels topped with various seeds (when in doubt, always order the ‘everything’ bagel), which can be cut in half, filled with ham, salmon or variations of the word ‘schmear’. There are also pretzels, rye and challah bread, sandwiches, celery sodas and salted caramel babkas: irresistible sticks of dough, sweet and sticky with caramel.

Earlier in the year I’d be hard pressed to come up with many reasons to visit Matraville (and I’m a HUGE Bob Carr buff) but I can think of at least ten reasons to visit now – and all of them come out of the ovens at Brooklyn Boy Bagels.

Where
448 Bunnerong Rd, Matraville

When
Mon-Thu 7am-3pm, Fri-Sun 7am-4pm

How much
Bagels from $4.50

A lobster roll? In Sydney? I’ve been burned before and spend most of my nights crying myself to sleep over our city’s inability to cram a bunch of cold lobster meat into a hot dog bun and charge me twenty bucks for it.

Someone’s been listening to my midnight sobbing, as the last few months have seen two new lobster-roll-dominant menus launch in Sydney. One of them has a fun name and will be featured in the future, the other has the considerably less fun name that you can see above.

“You know it’s imported, right” barks a disgruntled Potts Point resident as she walks past my lobster-roll-chomping co-worker, before flying into the night while cackling about the success of the lock-out laws. The lobsters at Waterman’s are sourced from Maine, home to a sweeter lobster than the ones that swim in the Pacific. It’s just one of the many steps the restaurant takes to ensure their rolls are as authentic as possible – showcasing the quality of the lobster meat without overpowering it with the other ingredients. You’ll find just warm lobster, butter and a little lemon in the Maine style roll, while the Connecticut option boasts mayonnaise and celery. Much to the surprise of the others at my table, who spend most of their nights being surprised at boring tidbits, I found the Connecticut style lobster roll to be the better of the two, the creaminess of the mayo allowing the cool lobster meat to shine a little brighter.

Did I wish there was a little more meat on the roll? Did I wish they baked a New England style bun, the perfect buttered vessel? Should I spend less time obsessing over pointless minutae? The answer to all those questions is yes. But! Did I spend that night crying myself to sleep? No. The lobster rolls at Waterman’s are the real deal, and just one of the many marine creatures worth eating on the menu, which includes rolls filled with scallops and pork floss and fish rillettes served with pickled carrots and saltines. Washed down with a truly great spritz from the bar (sparkling wine with peach, orgeat and lemon), and Waterman’s Lobster Co. gives you more than enough reasons to chase down that disgruntled local and cram a lobster roll down her mouth (just ask if she’d prefer Maine or Connecticut style first).

Where
5/29 Orwell St, Potts Point
When
Mon-Sat 12pm-late, Sun 10am-6pm
How much
$18