I Would Love Your Input

I Would Love Your Input

 Every now and again i have a look where people look at my blog from and find it interesting that i get more views from U.S.A than Australia. I understand that there are more people in U.S.A than Australia but my blog features a lot of our local Cafe's so i am curious.
Please leave a comment on how you came across this Blog and what City you are from?
Do you have a Blog? Please leave a link so i can have a look.
Kind E-gards

Curious Dale ;)

Wagaya

Wagaya

You know it is a strange location when it takes longer to find the restaurant than it does to find the parking. I walked down Little Bourke and could not find the entrance so then walked up Bourke St,it took me about 30 minutes from when i left the car to find the building and it is on level 3. You take the escalator to Level 2 and then the lift to Level 3

Once you leave the lift you see the name behind the cherry blossoms and the place looks very fancy.

At the end of the table they have a touch screen and that is how you order your meals. They have a big selection of food and it is a mixture of Japanese and Korean. It is pretty cheap to eat at.

The alcohol is cheap beers range from $6 to $10 so i was pretty happy with that. I had read about Kimchi pizza but never seen it anywhere is Melbourne so i thought i would give it a go.

The pizza base was crispy and the kimchi was a little bit spicy but juicy as well. The cabbage is soft and had a lot of garlic so i was happy. The pizza was a bit cold when i received it but i think because of the way you order, the food gets made in that order so i think it was probably sitting there while the other items got cooked. I was still happy with my pizza.

I really wanted some eel so i got the Eel Skewers and i ordered them last so i was just about done when they arrived so it was perfect timing.

The outside was crispy and the inside was soft and tasted like the teriyaki sauce. It was amazing and probably the best eel i have had in Melbourne.

The others ordered a selection of sushi and some pasta. It looked good but i was saving space for dessert.

Here are some more Instagram pics

I enjoyed it and may be back another time to try some more random meals.

Have you been here?

kind E-gards

Dale Stewart

 

Deko Boko

Deko Boko

This is my 100 Blog so i am really happy as i have persevered this long... Anyway  Deko Boko has only been around for 7 months. We had been invited to go try this place so we thought why not. I would not call it completely traditional but it had that aspect to it. It is a narrow restaurant that is long and can fit a fair amount of people. It was very quiet when we arrived but got busier when we left.

 I normally worry about parking in the city / Richmond but after 6:30pm parking is free out the front so we had no problem at all.

It is a very clean restaurant with random displays to which i did not expect.

I ordered a Japanese rice lager beer which was very light and not bitter so it was easy to drink. Kim ordered a Whisky Sour and i was impressed with it as it tasted like a Whisky Sour should,  as some places use cheap alcohol so it not sweet or have that Whisky taste.

For Entrees we ordered the Pork Gyoza and it came with three sauces, light soy sauce , chili mayo sauce and a sesame sauce. The gyoza skin is light and the filling was juicy. I love chili so i added it but it did not really need sauce as the flavours inside were perfect.

We also ordered a Bao to share We ordered a vegetable croquette and the bao was light and fluffy, the croquette was crispy and that sauce added a bit of sweetness. Normally we would order Pork but we wanted something different and we were happy with our choice.

 

For my mains i ordered the Wagyu beef curry and it was not a spicy but a sweeter curry and the beef was cooked really well as it melted in your mouth and was an amazing dish.

We had a concoction of a dessert that had green tea ice cream, red bean ice cream and black bean ice cream i think. It had fresh bananas and strawberries, it was a very refreshing dessert and the ice creams did not have that icy taste like some that have been defrosted then refrozen.

 

The staff are very pleasant and i was happy with the restaurant overall i will go back in the future.

Kind E-gards
Dale Stewart

Shooting Range

Shooting Range 

We bought a friend a voucher for a shooting range near us for Christmas last year and because she is only free on Sundays it has taken us this long to organise a get together. The shooting range is about 10 minutes from us and has been around for 50 years. Raymond was our trainer / make sure we don't do anything stupid supervisor to which we all survived so he did a good job. He is a funny guy and made sure we enjoyed ourselves. 

When you walk in they have rifles and then they have a separate room for hand guns so that was where we headed.  The distance for the targets was set to 25 meters. normally they start off at 10 meters and then go 25 meters. 

Raymond instructing what do and what not to do, I had to ask him about shooting the gun sidewards and said it was called "Gangsta style" and he mentioned "modified gangsta style" 

When the red light was on it meant you could shoot and they had another on the outside to warn people to be careful.

The first gun we got to shoot was a 9mm Luger  which was a smaller gun and was good to get a bit of a feel with it. We had 25 shots with each gun.

The second gun was the 38 Special - S&W 686 Revolver which had a bigger kick to it but was a lot heavier so after a while your hands get tired.

I could not see the target very well so they had a telescope to see how you shot.

The third gun was the .22lr - Beretta 87 Target Semiauto Pistol  ( the one on the right ),

After we collected our targets he said we could each have a shot with the big gun so we all got super excited.

I think the gun was a .357 Magnum and it packed a punch, that adrenaline rush you get for a split second that makes you feel alive and excited. 

It was fun to do something different and i will do it again in the future.
have you ever been shooting?
Kind E-gards
Dale Stewart

Trial Editing

Trial Editing

I have always wanted to do something a bit more awesome with photo editing but i did not know what to do or how to do it. I came randomly came across this blog and these pictures by Ben Cochran and thought I want to do this. The next thing i did was Youtubed  a video on how to do it and it is called Selective Colour.

This was my first attempt and i was happy with how it looked but i needed something that would "pop out" at you

 

The Bike popped out better but i still wasn't completely happy.

It needed a bit more, as i looked at all my old photos i found the perfect car.

I really like the contrast in Lamborghini so i will be on the hunt this weekend for some sport cars but i will see what happens.

Do you like the pictures? What would you take a photo of?

Kind E-gards

Dale Stewart

Poppy's Thai

Poppy's Thai

You know when you want to go to a restaurant and it is empty but fully booked and then you have to find some place else. This was one of those times and i forgot to check the reviews. As you enter they have a door in the middle which was a bit odd but the decor' was cute and they tried to give you that feel you are in Thailand.

 

The staff are polite and they gave us some prawn crackers to start with. The prawn crackers tasted like they had been freshly deep fried whereas some places give you old stale ones.

For mains i ordered a Beef Gang Dang which had Beef, red chilli curry, coconut milk, bamboo, zucchini and pumpkin. The beef was not the best cuts but still tasted alright, the pumpkin fell apart  so i could not complain about that but the curry was a bit bland. It was not a thick curry but a bit watery but i did enjoy the bamboo as i don't think i have had it before. If it had better meat i could have ignored the curry consistency. Was it the worst curry i have ever had...No it was not but not the best by far. Melbourne has such an amazing selection of Thai restaurants that if it is not up to scratch it will get left behind.

My wife ordered a whole fish with hot and sour sauce. We still are not sure what fish it was and i don't think she knew as well but we did not get sick or die so it could not have been that bad.  The fish was cooked well and fell apart but it was not De-boned. I don't knoq what i could tell you about the flavour because it was nothing mind blowing but as i said the fish was cooked well.

Thank goodness the staff are friendly and the place is clean.
Kind E-gards
Dale Stewart