Too kool for skool - gah!!!

One thing we discovered this weekend is how 'hip' restaurants in Sydney don't take reservations. Not even on Saturdays. Not even for big groups. And you can expect to wait for 2.5 hours.

We were perhaps a bit unreasonable as 15 of us from work (all transfers with no lives, obviously) turned up at Toko in Surry Hills on a Saturday evening thinking we would get tables. The izakaya-style Japanese food they serve is excellent (particularly the robatayaki duck with preserved pear), but I hate these establishments which make its patrons feel like they don't deserve to be there. Why open a restaurant if you make it so darn difficult to eat there??!! We had tried booking, we suggested splitting into 3 or 4 tables, but no. We had to eat on tinny tables at the bar.

London colleagues will probably know my distinct dislike of Asia de Cuba in St Martin's Lane Hotel in London. A classic establishment which makes you feel like they are doing you a massive favour for letting you eat there. And they hammer it home by charging £55 (yes, £55!!!!) for a mediocre pad thai, and then charge you twice on your credit card and then refuse to have anything to do with it. My least favourite place I've had the displeasure of eating at in London. Gah.

Another slightly too kool for skool place was Jimmy Liks in Potts Point. I loved the food here, good chilli kick to their take on Thai and SouthEast Asian street food. The eel in betel leaf in particular was creative and yummy and moreish. But as you sit in their uber-cool bar, they offer you a little light to read the menu as the whole place is steeped in darkness. The prices are not exactly representative of street food either.

But! Tristen did manage to chat up the rather hot waiter. He's called Dane apparently, and has offered to buy Tristen drinks next time we're there ;)