noodlies Cabramatta Food Tour, May 2011

noodlies Sydney food blog's Cabramatta Food Tour came and went today and it was a wonderful success.  We met at a local temple and were greeted by the nuns.  Walter gave everyone a brief tour of the temple and read an exerpt from his book Destination Saigon.  And the lovely nuns and their volunteers whipped up a storm in terms of wonderful vegetarian food.



We were shown how to make our own Vietnamese rice paper rolls (goi cuon) adding our own filling which included several types of home made vegetarian 'meat', vegetables, mint, vermicelli and more!

Saigon Bay, Vietnamese, Darlinghurst

Last night I dined with two authors, well actually they were friends and family so nothing itimindating, Geesche Jacobsen, author of Abandoned: The Diane Brimble Story out this month and Walter Mason, my partner, author of Destination Saigon.

Bau Truong, Cabramatta

Taro spring rolls

We headed to Bau Truong for a quiet, private birthday dinner.  Bau Truong has been around for around 20 years but in a different location in Cabramatta.  Now it's on both the main street, John Street as well as Canley Vale Road in Canley Heights.  Both are riotously popular.

These spring rolls might look like any other but they have the added ingredient of taro; the neutral starchy taste contrasts brilliantly with the spicy meat filling.

Lime leaf chicken salad

The chicken salad is the sort of dish mum always makes, and like Bau Truong, she makes it with heaps of onion, delicious - just make sure you're not having a big night out with friends.  The thin green strips are lime leaf, tart and tangy, they lift the chicken perfectly.

Salted squid

Usually I'm not a fan of salted squid, but these were light and extremely tasty when dipped in the clean, lemon salt and pepper sauce.

fish in fish sauce

Another home style favourite is canh chua or sour soup. Today we ordered the fish version.  I did what we would do at home, take the cooked fish out and soak it in undiluted fish sauce.

Excellent food!

Temasek Malaysian Restaurant, Parramatta

My partner's sister introduced us to this place and we fell in love with it at first sight.  Not that they need our custom because it's always busy.  This Malaysian eatery looks like a family run business, but they seem to know what they're doing - front and back of house.

An Lac Vegetarian, Cabramatta

Haven't been here much since Phuoc Hue temple sold it to new owners.  Today we took some friends who came to visit from Roseville.

Walter had spring rolls in vermicelli noodles above.

I had the combination egg noodles above.  Not my favourite, the servings were big, but couldn't taste much beyond the oil in the egg noodle.  Not sure what went wrong, heaps of fresh ingredients so it should have been fine.

Maybe I should have had the vegetarian Pho option, it looks good.