The Carvery - Lamb and Veg

For a change of pace today's dining choice was "The Carvery". I have not been here before but was gastronomically seduced by the pictures displayed behind the counter. The concept of hearty home cooked style meals was the main point of appeal. "The Carvery" sells roasted meats (lamb, pork and beef) along with your choice of veg or salad and a range of gravies. My choice was the small roast meal (lamb) with veg for $9.00.







Presentation

Filled the plate in a balanced fashion with good vege colour all round. I chose no gravy for health reasons. Not perhaps a good choice for a hot summers day when a warm and potentially heavy meal would be a bit of a turn off. (9/10)


Size

The options available are small and large. I chose small today to match my apetite. The serving staff are not shy with either the meat or the veg and fill the plate to capacity. No complaints here. (9/10)


Health Factor

The staff carve the meat in front of you and are at pains to remove excess fat and gristle. The meat used is actual meat - not those bullet shaped processed things passed off as meat by other food court operators. I chose to avoid the gravy as this is likely to be fatty and full of artificial and salty flavourants. This did however make the meat quite dry and I did struggle towards the end of the meal. (8/10)


Overall impression

I would have to score this meal highly for its good size and healthy real meat and veg. The only small draw back is the price - coming in at $9.00. But then again I guess we all have to pay for our health.


Overall it is worth it - "The Carvery" beats kebab!

Blog Stats/Map

Considering that this blog is solely advertised by word of mouth/people telling people to come here, we have a good variety of traffic throughout the world. ~70% of hits are from first time visits, and then 20% from up to 5 visits. This leaves the last 10% from returning visits of 5-10 or 10 times and more. Not a bad effort after...19 blog posts, (or just under 2 months).

4 hits have come from Google blog search, and one from Google itself, so we're slowly moving up in the search engine stakes.

37% of the people who have come to this blog have stayed for longer than 2 mins and on average they look at 3-5 pages each visit. Now if they all just start clicking on our Google Ads we might be able to afford a kebab in about.... 3 years.

Foolok - Small Combination

For a change today, I went to Foolok. Purchasing the small combination $7.70 (I didn't want to slide down into a Chinese food coma during the afternoon at work), gives you the chance to fit as much food as you can on a small plate, with about the area of 3750mm squared.

Starting with a base of fried rice and egg noodles, I added chicken curry, BBQ pork, seafood things, sweet and sour pork balls, and satay vegetables.

Presentation: I am unable to judge this on presentation due to the self serve nature of the establishment. (N/A)

Size: The size of this was good, I probably piled the plate a little higher than I should have in my attempts to see what would and wouldn't stay on top of my food hill. Due to purchasing the small, the repeat factor throughout the afternoon (as bain-marie Chinese is want to do) was minimal, and I didn't feel bloated. I had enough so I was full, but it didn't sit too heavy in my stomach as it would have it I had eaten any more. (7/10)

Value for Money: At $7.70, this was a little more expensive than I feel a small plate of Chinese is worth. (5/10)

Quality: The egg noodles and BBQ pork are some of the best I've had from a food court Chinese shop. The fried rice and chicken curry were standard. Of interest were the seafood things, more of interest because I wasn't sure what was in them and I'm still not. (7/10)

Overall: Overall this was a good lunch for what I was in the mood for. The self serve nature means that you can't complain about the amount that you eat, or the lack of choice (unless there's nothing left to serve yourself with). For the price I paid the Iced Tea I got to wash all the food down with should have been included. (6.5/10)

Winner: KEBAB! beats Foolok

Guest post from "The Travelling Kebab"

For those that haven't been to the exciting metropolis of Adelaide, you won't know that the humble kebab (otherwise known as the 'Yiros') is up there with square white bread and vegemite at the top of the list of essential daily food requirements.

Featuring on every street corner, in every workplace cafeteria and food hall, the Yiros is traditionally created by close relatives of Con the Fruiterer, all indistinguishable by their matching year-round Movember efforts. (Corporal Kebab, I have business cards if you would like to discuss growing technique).

On Jetty Street in Glenelg, there is the upmarket establishment of Souvlaki Bros - Charcoal Yiros, from which I choose a Cypriot Yiros aka Kebab with grilled Haloumi Cheese:

Presentation:

This Yiros is handed to you in a foil-lined paper bag for heat retention and is wrapped in the standard grease-proof paper. It was not very tightly rolled, nor was it toasted (! shock, horror!) but it did not fall apart or make a lot of mess. No greasy fingers at the end, either. (8/10)

Size:

At $11.00, the Cypriot was more expensive than the standard Yiros at $8.00 but it was still a good value and well-proportioned lunch. (8/10)

Health Factor:

I now draw your attention to the 'Charcoal Yiros' part of the name. Instead of the vertical towers of processed meat that is usually used in kebabs, Souvlaki Bros have horizontal spits turning over glowing red coals. The lamb (I had lamb) still highly resembled lamb, not processed stuff and wasn't fatty at all. And, because it is constantly grilling, they did not have to re-fry in a little pan. Thumbs up! Lots of fresh, crisp lettuce, tomato, onion and LOTS of chopped parsley made this a very healthy lunch. The grilled haloumi cheese was far superior to grated cheddar and must be tried if you ever get the chance. Sufficient amount of very garlic sauce didn't detract from health factor. (8/10)

Overall:

I haven't had a kebab for so long that I can't remember the last time but this was a great meal. Compared to the standard WA kebab establishment offerings, I think I will have to wait until I go back to Adelaide to try one again. By the way, the picture above is from the Souvlaki Bros website and does, in fact, look pretty much like my lunch. (9/10)

Fujimore - Veggie Tempura Set

This week saw me approaching Fujimore, the Japanese outlet in the food court for lunch. After a positive review by both foodcourtguru and Corporal Kebab, I had good expectations for the impending gastronomic delights. Feeling like something light and healthy, I decided to go with the tempura. Yes. Healthy. Vegetables in fried batter. There was Sweet potato, Zucchini, and an onion/carrot fried cake thing. A good tempura batter, it was very light, and hardly fatty.

Presentation: As with each of their sets, a whole meal is served, and you don't need to look for sides to go with the main, making a positive impact upon the entire presentation of the purchase. Salad, Miso, Sushi, White fluffy rice, sauces, and the tempura battered vegetables, all, in true Japanese style, separated into their little sections of the box set. 8/10

Size: A very good lunch size. I was full, but not to the point of feeling full. Also because of the assortment of sides, you could mix and match your whole way through eating, pacing yourself. 8/10

Value for Money: At $6.50 you can't go wrong. unless you want meat. 9/10

Quality: 9.5/10 A very impressive meal

Overall: 9.5/10. Kebab or Fujimore? Fujimore wins.

I think it would be fair to say that after three independent reviews, each time Fujimore has beaten the kebab. It will be well patronised in the coming year.

Chicken Kebab with Cheese

Grasshoppers, you will be happy to know that FOODCOURTGURU is back from his 2 week hiatus and ready to review.

Today's first pearl to be cast is a brief commentary on the growth of prices in the West Perth food court relative to the growth of the share price of the averge West Perth based resources company.

It would appear that the "Point of Unreasonable Exploitation" has recently been reached where food court businesses are now blatantly attempting to profiteer from the resources boom by charging over the top prices for their wares. This point is well illustrated by recent reviews on this blog where it can be seen that a burger at Jandakot costs $5.50 while a similar burger from the West Perth food court will cost up to $9.50. No apparent quality difference and no better service. Very disappointing.

Today's choice of chicken kebab with cheese ($7.90) was a return to the roots of the Kebab Thursday philosophy. This meal was chosen to refresh my memory as to what the yardstick is all about.

Presentation: Kebabs always fare around the middle of the road here due to the limited amount you can really do with a kebab. This particular kebab was not tightly rolled and proved difficult to eat in the end. It also had a few too many greasy windows for my liking. (6/10)

Size: Always good value for money. The more you pay the more you get - kebab with the lot will give you a lot but also costs a lot. (7/10)

Health factor: Despite the recently posted sign at the kebab shop suggesting the the chicken is low fat I am not convinced. Perhaps chicken is low fat but the bullet shaped hunk of lightly coloured stuff they put on your kebab certainly does not look or feel low fat. (6/10)

Overall: Like a conversation with an old friend, the chicken kebab with cheese brings back lots of memories and is comforting in a non-homo-erotic kind of way. Today's refreshing of the kebab yardstick will be well remembered. (7/10)

Rockmelon Smoothie - Beetle Juice

For something different, I tried a smoothie after my lunch, in order to wash down the dryness of the bread from MYO. The rockmelon baby from Beetle Juice, is a standard smoothie. Rockmelon, banana, and a few other fruits/fruit ice creams/juices are blended together for a beverage.

Beetle Juice have recently (past 3 months) come under new management, and since then the speed with which you are served has drastically got slower. The new manger has had a sign saying that the new menu is coming for the last 4 weeks now, and we're still not any closer to having any idea as to what it is.

The shop has a loyalty program that gives you every 5th smoothie free (assuming you grab a card and get it stamped). Also selling fruit juices, blends and some muffins, yoghurt, other drinks and average coffee, Beetle Juice is a favourite of many for the 'red bull smoothie' it serves for that extra caffeine hit.

Presentation: 7/10 It's a drink in a cup, not much you can do with that.

Size: 8/10 A large smoothie I can walk down two blocks, back into the office and drink it down over the next hour, getting my sugar fix and keeping me awake after a big food court meal.

Value for Money: 6.5/10 for an extra dollar you get another 250mL or so in the cup for the upgrade to large. Timeliness is an issue, I'd be happy paying what I pay for a drink made a minute or so faster, or for one with fresh fruit in the same amount of time.

Quality: 5/10 Mostly frozen fruit or icecream is used, In my fruit drinks, I have a preference for fresh fruit (which would take a little longer to prepare, but the final quality in my opinion would be worth it).

Overall: 6.5/10 Sometimes you just need a liquid pick-me-up.