Chaco Bar - Darlinghurst, Sydney

Chaco Bar is Sydney’s pride when it comes to ramen and yakitori. Keita Abe (owner and executive chef) and the rest of team Chaco has impressed Sydney-siders since opening in 2014 with their Fukuoka-style yakitori and modern take on ramen. They have recently announced that the yakitori side of Chaco will be moved at a new location on Victoria Street in Potts Point sometime in October 2019. 

The current Chaco site will still be around but will be become Chaco Ramen where they will be serving ramen for most likely 6 days a week (good news for ramen geeks like me).

Fat soy ramen (available during ramen service hours)

Here’s what we recently had at our last visit to Chaco:

Sashimi is normally available and we had some beautiful Kingfish. The fish had a clean taste, firm texture and accompanied by a ponzu-like sauce.

The gyozas ($18 for 6 pieces) here are plump and the pork filling is so damn flavoursome. It also has that perfect crisped caramelised bottoms.

There’s a good range of yakitori dishes on the menu (ranging from $3-$7 each). This includes spicy lamb, chicken thigh, chicken tail, gristle, chicken gizzard and even pork belly. All skewered meats are laced and grilled with umami rich tare (seasoning marinade). You’ll find nothing but smoky and deep flavoured meats with an array of flavours. I particularly love the fatty chicken tail and crunchy gristle.

Chaco Bar does Fukuoka style yakitori, which means they offer more than just skewered meats. They also have sharing plates and I recommend looking at their “specials” board. We tried 3 dishes from the Special menu:

The uni wagyu ($29) had thinly buttery slices of +9 grade Wagyu. There were also bursts of umami from the creamy uni (sea urchin gonads), parmesan cheese and lovely WA truffles. The serving of egg yolk added a nice extra texture to the whole dish.

The baby corn dish ($13) with Chaco butter was also amazing! The corn was so smoky and the butter sauce with squid ink added extra umami and sweetness.

The highlight for me was the M9 Wagyu steak with shiitake mushroom, housemade mustard and bone marrow ($32). The beautiful marbled Wagyu steak slices was amazingly tender, nicely seasoned and accompanied with a beautiful tare. I also loved the buttery marrow.

Chaco bar never ceases to amaze me with every visit. It is everything from the moody Japanese style tavern interior, the excellent service and the amazing food on offer. It’s an authentic piece of Japan in the heart of Sydney.

  

Chaco Bar

238 Crown Street 

Darlinghurst NSW 2010

(02) 9007 8352

Hours:

Yakitori

Tue-Sat 5:30-10:00pm

Ramen

Mon 5:30-9:00pm

Wed-Sat 11:30-2:30pm

Sun 11:30-2:30pm 5:00-8:30pm

Brewristas 2.0, Darlinghurst

We see some of our favourite restaurants and cafes come and go. One of those places was Brewristas in Glebe almost a year ago. It was a sad day for all of us who loved their creations like the Brewmonade and Porky Pig’s hotteok. Guess what folks? The boys are back!

Kevin Ly and the team have recently re-opened at a new location in Darlinghurst. It’s a smaller space compared to their 1.0 joint but their new pocket rocket shop delivers quite a punch. They got your espresso and filter coffee needs sorted along with a new minimalist style menu and some pastries from Brickfields. There’s a good combination of usual café-fare to Vietnamese inspired dishes.

The beans are sourced from Savant Roasters. The espresso-roast blend is a bit on the darker side. Even through a latte, the dark chocolate notes are quite defined. I’m more of light to medium roast kinda guy. But for those of you who like your coffee strong, then you will dig this. The Colombian coffee on pour over was quite juicy and nutty. The filter coffee was more of my jam.

I’m a fan of cheese toasties in general but I’m a bigger fan of the Gruyere cheese toastie ($10) here. I added ham for an extra $3. The sourdough bread was well buttered with the cheese nicely melted. It had a nice balance of sweet, sour and umami flavours.

Their Brewristas banh mi ($10) was next level! It had the classic banh mi thit salad like pickled veggies, coriander leaves, shallot, chilli and well buttered baguette-like roll. You get a choice of pork, chicken or mushrooms & tofu. I went with their extremely tasty and tender honey, shallot and black pepper pork. The bread was amazing! Quite similar to a baguette, which was flaky crisped on the outside and super soft on the inside. Seriously, this was the best non-traditional banh mi thit that I’ve had.

Last but not least is the Lunch in a Bowl ($16). It’s their take on a Vietnamese noodles salad with with vermicelli noodles, pickles, herbs, peanuts, and fish sauce dressing. You also get to choose between chicken, pork and mushroom with tofu. I opted for a perfectly cooked lemongrass and chilli chicken. The whole noodle salad dish was so flavoursome and fresh. I could have this for lunch everyday!

Version 2 of Brewristas might be smaller than its predecessor but the quality of coffee, food and service is more than ordinary. Congrats Kevin and to the rest of the crew!


Brewristas 2.0
2/303A Liverpool Street
Darlinghurst NSW
Open 7 days, 6:30am – 4pm

Rey's Place, Darlinghurst - Sydney

I can’t help but feel proud when a Filipino restaurant opens in Sydney. I love the comfort that I get from Filipino food with every bite. I was so excited when I found out Rey’s Place opened in Darlo.

  

The place is owned by Jon Bayad and named after his dad, Reynaldo. Some of you may remember Jon from Osaka Trading Co. The man behind the delicious food is Chef Shaun Oligo. Rey’s Place takes a modern approach to beloved Filipino classics. It was all familiar flavours but done in a very innovative way. The restaurant has a ground and basement floor. The space has a moody “en casa” style interior that’s also reminiscent of classic Spanish tapas wine bar with some touches of Filipiniana.

The inihaw na pusit ($18) is a chargrilled smoky squid stuffed with delicious chorizo paella. It also comes with a refreshing sweet mango salad. This was amazing! It’s pretty much a tapas style Filipino dish that you can easily pair with a fruity rosé or Sauvignon blanc style wine.

Another tapas style dish is their sisig bao sliders($14)! Braised and chopped crispy pork belly with ginger, garlic, and onion dressed in smoky adobar sauce in a soft housemade bao bun.

The lechon ($22) is their take on slow roast suckling pig. It comes with sweet liver-based housemade sarsa (sauce) and soy calamansi dipping sauce (toyo mansi). This is probably one of the best lechon-style dishes I’ve had in Sydney with it’s crispy crackling and tasty tender meat.

The kare kare ($25) is not presented in a traditional way but the main components and flavours are very present. It had chunks of braised buttery and tender oxtail with thick flavoursome peanut annatto sauce, umami packed shrimp sauce, braised eggplants and greens.

For dessert, we tried their modern take on turon ($10). It is a sugar glazed fried banana in filo pastry with ube parfait, shards of toffee and jackfruit. The turon was crisped on the outside with sweet soft banana on the inside . The housemade ube parfait was smooth and tasty. It was a great way to end our dinner.

It’s about time that refined-style Filipino food is introduced in Sydney. There are no gimmicks here. Just quality dishes, excellent service and a good range of booze.

Rey’s Place
163 Crown Street
Darlinghurst NSW
Ph: 02 9631 5938

Hours:
Tues to Sat 12:00 to 11:00pm