Gracie’s Life Experiment

Decided to go out to the Intersection Tavern in Ramsgate tonight for dinner with all the UK visitors. We’ve been there before but decided after all the eating out at Chinese restaurants it was time for a change (esp for my English hubby who isn’t enamoured with rice for every meal). We like the place as it feels a lot like an English pub/bar (think Wetherspoons/Llyods Bar type thing). We’ve not really found anything that feels like a traditional pub here (well, why would we expect to) and I guess the closest thing is a “hotel” (I wonder if they actually do have rooms these days or if they are just bars with gambling sections). Anyway we ordered the BBQ Pork Ribs, Lamb Shanks, Ribeye Steak and the Steak n Guinness Shephard’s Pie.

BBQ Pork Ribs – These were extremely plentiful (think of the Brontosaurus ribs in the title sequence of The Flintstones). They had a slightly spicy taste too. They were quite soft, not jawbreaking and very finger-licking. Only thing that would have been better if they had been a bit warmer (they were a little tepid by the time they brought the dishes out to the table). Came with some yummy wedges and salad.
Lamb Shanks – 2 whole lamb shanks. My poor Mum is only tiny and she ordered this. To be fair to her, she did manage to eat most of the meat (mostly by ensuring she piled various bits of it on everyone else’s plates to “try”). The meat was very soft and fell off the bone. I think this dish would have been better on a cold Winter evening as it was quite stodgy with all the mash and gravy.
Ribeye Steak – wow this was meant to be 300g but it looked like it was 300g excluding the massive bone sticking out over the edges of the plate!!! It was ordered rare and came just medium rare (not bleeding or “mooing” as hubby would say). Looked good though.
Beef and Guinness Shephard’s Pie – no idea why it would be called a Shephard’s pie (not even Shepherd’s). Traditionally Shepherd’s Pie is made with lamb (i.e. sheep) and this was blatantly a Cottage Pie (made with minced beef) – though perhaps this recipe is named after someone called “Shephard”??? Hubby’s verdict was that it needed more Guinness and more crispiness of the potato topping.

Overally we had a great time. The food was a little slow, but then there were 8 of us so expected it to be a while (I suspect it was the Lamb Shanks that took the longest as they were the hottest when served). The meals were around $20 each, but currently (till end of Nov 2009) they are doing 2 for 1 on mains at www.hotdocket.com.au. You need to print out a new coupon for every 2 meals (i.e. we needed 4 coupons with different serial numbers on) – no worry though as you just press refresh on the website and print out again.

Another pretty soggy day again!!! Poor Mum and Howell have had such rubbish weather all holiday. Not only has it been wet, it’s also been cold too. Brrrrrrrrr. There was a short break in the rain in the afternoon so we decided to get out of the house for hubby’s last day off work. We went down to Gymea. First stop – the Hazelhurst Galleries. Bugger – they’re changing the display tomorrow so the gallery itself was closed. Decided we didn’t really just want to go to the gift shop and cafe so moved on. Went down to the Camelia Gardens. As we got there the weather became glorious. As usual, I totally forgot that it closes at 4, so we whizzed round in less than an hour. Actually the nicest part was the part at the bottom just outside of teh park. There’s a lovely waterfall going down into Gymea Bay with loads of ducks (and really cute fluffly ducklings at this time of year). The weather changed again and pissed it down as we got back to the car. We made a quick stop at Nina’s Chocolates and spent ages deciding what chocolates to get. They were all so beautiful, but expensive ($8.60/100g) so we had to really agonise over which ones to pick.

As it was a fabulous day (weatherwise) we decided to go out for another little explore with Evie and the doggy in tow. We went to Poulton Park which is near Hurstville Grove. It took us a little while to find the entrance (hubby didn’t bother to find out which road it was on and the GPS had no idea it even existed). There’s a really cool playground there. There’s a younger toddlers play equipment area and an older kiddies (and parents ) set of equipment too. They also have plastic slides rather than metal ones. I’m not sure however which I prefer. The metal ones get way too hot in the sun for little bottoms and the plastic ones seem to generate huge amounts of static (not a nice surprise when you catch your offspring at the end of the slide). Wandered off across the playing field and found a lovely mini bushwalk. It’s being regenerated and it very well laid out and maintained (proper wooden steps and paths). There’s a lovely creek/river running through and lots of little weirs/waterfalls. Mocha got absolutely soaked and muddy jumping in and out of the water.

My friend Melissa from way back (must be about 20 years ago when we first met) was visiting Oz with her family and she came to meet us for the afternoon. We headed up to Mr Chou’s for Yum Cha (it was a bit pants though as it was around 2pm and there wasn’t much variety left on the trolleys) then down to Ramsgate for some chilling at the beach. Evie enjoyed making sandcastles and I enjoyed catching up with Melissa. Was lovely to see her again, but also a bit sad as I know it’ll be a while before we meet again. Ah well, internet’s a wonderful thing for keeping in touch.

So it’s the last night of my twenties! Decided to have a quiet dinner with family and chose the local Italian restaurant. It has good reviews on the net and I looooove Italian food. The food was great. Especially the Caesar salad (it had chicken fillets, not just tiny microscopic cubes), a whole bunch of anchovies (hubby’s fav) and the veggies were crisp and fresh. The antipasto plate was good too and Evie enjoyed munching on all the cheese from it. Hubby had a pizza (which was massive and probably would have fed all 4 of us) and I had (surprise, surprise) lasagne (my fav). It’s a bit of a running joke in my family that I am Garfield. It’s my benchmarking stick to try out the lasagne. I quite enjoyed it, but would have preferred it baked and presented in the dish rather than a portion cut from a larger tray. I really like those gnarly bits that get stuck to the edge The pasta sheets were nice and thick and it had bits of bacon in as well as the bolognaise. I would have liked a little more bechamel though as it was just a very thin speckling on top. I’m no expert in Italian food so no idea if this is the authentic style or not – it was very tasty though. Was a bit meated out after all that. I usually hide veggies in the ones I make (it’s the only way to get hubby to eat them). The ambience was absolutely rubbish tonight though – you could hardly hear yourself think due to all the noise. Unfortunately there was a private party upstairs which consisted of about 20 8 years olds screaming and throwing food off the banister and running up and down the stairs. The poor staff had to mop the steps as some kid threw their drink down the steps (no doubt trying to recreate a waterfall). I felt really sorry for the couple who were sitting at the table next to the stairs as they ended up with someone’s used serviette landing plumb into their main course (yucky). It was very busy, but the food did come fairly quickly.