Being Mr. and Mrs. Smith

The main highlight of the week following our last post, was our visit to Le Cirque. Deb had formed a mild obsession with the place after seeing it featured in the tango scene of Mr. and Mrs. Smith. As budding fine dining afficionados, we both were keen to go indeed. On top of this, in the coming weeks, there were live Jazz bands playing. Jazz music is another one of our part time interests, we needed no more a reason to go.

Like a fine wine...
 

I'd like to think you can tell a lot about a place by looking at the cars parked outside, but that's only because I'm an enthusiast. On the other hand though, I do believe they can help characterise a place. This little gem was parked right outside the door so I assume it's owners were dining inside. As a matter of fact, a more modern 7 series was also parked across the courtyard, it would have made a nice photo, but I didn't want to look like too much of a tourist, trying to arrange the photo, as I was dressed up for fine dining. That and it was a public roadway I should probably not be in the way of.

Ah yes, the restaurant...

We actually went to Le Cirque cafe that night, as that was where the Jazz was being played. It had a more casual atmosphere which fit in more with the music. The decor was quite quaint, with a dimly lit and romantic atmosphere, did I mention we brought our parents? With the hope that we could share what we enjoy with them anyway, as they were only here for another week or so more, and we were staying.

Enter... stage, uh, cafe right?

The Avalon Jazz band was playing that night, we'd only heard of them from picking out which night we wanted to attend, we sampled their music on YouTube and thought we would enjoy it. Their music was sweet, playful, cheeky, just very french. The only thing missing was an accordian and a mime, I didn't look in the kitchen for rats cooking. They seemed to have a large support group in tow though, as that took up most of the casual seating area with acquaintances drifting in through the whole night. It leads you to wonder how many people actually turned up on a whim like us, not invited, but that's the challenge really, getting a leg up in this densely populated city.

Being french of course they place a great emphasis on their wine, as is apparent by the backdrop of the last photo. Which neatly brings us to...

The wine tower, as opposed to the cellar.

This was at the centre of the cafe floor, a wonderfully eyecatching wine tower, with traditional library style revolving ladder. A few times that night the head waiter would climb up and select a bottle for their customers. A beautiful feature. Deb was so inspired that she immediately placed one in the dreamspace of our future dream home, but for books of course. One wonders how much the net contents of the tower is worth.

Ok, so with the scenery firmly set, I can finally tell you about the food we ate. To be honest we are at such a surplus for good food here that we've been a little spoilt. Mainstream food is just at a better quality than back in Sydney. So unfortunately we were not blown away by the food, but then again, this was only the cafe, so maybe Le Cirque just doesn't splash out on it's lower class demographic. Flavours were strong, but dishes were a little one-note at prices, but I guess I might be expecting too much of a two course dinner at $35+tax. The best illustration of this was the Lobster Bisque which, although smoky, and containing actual chunks of Lobster, ends up being quite rich, and heavy. We resolve to find out whether or not the restaurant is better, but that we can save for a date night.

 Monkeying around.

Aside from the front of the menu, and this specific piece of crockery, there is little else to create the atmosphere of whimsy that they would suggest. It's a little out of place to me, in what otherwise is a place that seems to pride itself on the finer things.

What did leave a sour taste in our mouth however, happened as the night drew itself to an end. Although the band was still playing, our adventures the previous day (the shopping trip to Woodbery) was just too draining, we were still tired, so we resigned ourselves to paying the bill, and retiring early. One of the nicer details about New York is that in restaurants you can (pretty much) throw a bunch of credit cards at the waiter taking your bill, give them some general instruction, and they will work out the rest. I think this has something to do with their compulsary tipping culture, a generally higher quality of service is expected of the waiters. Unfortunately the two dealing with us were asleep during that lesson. Everywhere else we have tried this at, this does not faze the waiters. I will forgive the first waiter we first addressed, as he looked young, and was probably new. Our directions were along the lines of, split the bill on these two cards, please, (ours, and our parents) and put the glass of wine on this one (our card)". You could see on his face that it didn't compute, but he assured us he knew what to do anyway.

It was abit of  wait, and then a more senior waiter came along. I think you know how the rest goes.

"So you want the drink on this card?" as he points to our card.

We confirm that yes, this is what we want, and he goes on his way.

This was the waiter that already insisted on giving us dessert menus, instead of asking, and didn't really seem on the ball when we told him we already had ordered one at the beginning of the meal.

This waiter then comes back with the bill indeed split. But with the drink only on our card, stiffing our parents with the rest of the bill, when we tried to tell him this was not what we wanted, he passed the buck telling us that he merely did what the junior waiter asked. No offer to fix it.

I feel like I need to mention this because otherwise, the service was very courteous, and friendly. So it is even starker the contrast, the level of service offered at the end of the night.

But I digress, there really are more important things in the world to worry about. Here's another photo showing the wonderfully diverse atmosphere present around this neighbourhood. I wouldn't have been surprised if one of the band members owned this.

You'd think there were more songs about little red Vespas

Life is a Highway/Let's Go Shopping!

Thanks to Deb's corporate discounts, Avis had the best deal for us, it's clearly culture shock when the lady behind the counter makes sure that you want a "compact" for four people. I guess if we were American sized, we would have conceded. Their idea of compact was a Mazda 3 Skyactiv sedan, which back home is a perfectly adequate means of transportation for four average to below sized adults.

Squee~~~!!!

Within the city, it's as good as everyone makes it out to be, nippy, nimble, compact even, but as it reached the highways, it was out of it's element. This is most likely down to it's Skyactiv namesake. Being engineered with fuel efficiency as paramount, doughy throttle response, and reluctant kickdown are par for course. The moment you want to overtake, or go up a hill and keep that car you just overtook from catching up embarrassingly, you need an excessive amount of throttle travel before the electronics give in and finally give you forward thrust. Because of that, you labour the engine, and end up consuming more fuel. Really it's a case of square peg round hole.

Anyway, my small car review over, back to the road trip. We started the trip mid morning, about 9:30 after all the paperwork was signed, so the voyage out of New York was relatively uneventful. Relaxing even. We wound along the landscape and were greeted by beautiful vistas of small cottages covered in snow, quaint suburban towns that you only see on TV as an Australian. Pedalling our way up a slight hillside, I finally experienced pea soup, a term I've only ever come across in literal terms.

I... can't... see!

It was only a brief point where visibility dropped to this level, maybe less than a kilometre, half a mile or so. It was funny as there was no sign that we would have this heading out of an otherwise clear New York.

Where am I???

After that brief spot there was no need for any more trepidation. It was very clear (cold) sailing ahead. Hovering around 40 degres fahrenheit the whole way (that's about freezing, sydneysiders). We reached Woodbery Commons shortly after they had opened, so it was still relatively quiet. It was a very oddly arranged complex, if you're used to shopping centres in Sydney anyway. More akin to a small scale village, where each shop is a house, large numbers of shops were arranged into "towns" with the Information stand and Food Courts being the quasi town centres.

Today we visit the state of Shopping, New Jersey

Because of this, the place has it's own map that they hand out at the information centre, shopping here requires military co-ordination, so see below the destinations I wanted to visit circled in black (see if you can spot 8). The shops circled in red are the ones Deb wanted to see/we ended up wandering into (find 16 + 1 for lunch).

They're all there, just take my word for it...

After a brief morning of shopping, it was time to stop in for lunch. I saw Philly Cheese Steak and my mouth started watering. Deb would never say no to something like that, especially because we hadn't been eating that badly up until that point.

Yes, that is my normal sized hand in the background... why do you ask?

It wasn't actually that big, blame perspective. They were roughly smaller than a Subway Foot long / 6 inch respectively. The "regular" drink is considered "large" in Australia though. What was beneath the wrapping however was a revelation, Philly Cheese Steak is actually more akin to our kebab meat back home, how this came to be described as such I don't know. I guess "Philly Shredded Beef" doesn't sound that appetising... not to say that it wasn't, it's just a misnomer, so adjust your expectations accordingly.

With our calorie reserve sufficiently brimmed, we continued to conquer the shopping outlet. As Deb would often put it she was "in a happy place".

 

$7.50 Jeans? How can I lose!

Conquer we did for the rest of the day, we eventually left at about 6pm as daylight was slowly leaving us. What started out as a relatively empty parking lot as customers slowly filtered in, ended up full of cars sleepily waiting until their owners had their fill of shopping.

Warning: Children left in car may be middle aged when you lose you them

The drive back home was relatively peaceful, so much so that Deb would occassionally nod off into a light sleep. And as soon as I was getting anxious about upcoming road directions, surely enough the GPS would chime in as it was needed.

What we came back to however was quite a spectacle. 6:30, everyone squashing into Manhattan.

Everyone in this photo is in the way

Next stop, the mines of Moria... I mean Manhattan

Gas, brake, honk. Gas, brake, honk. Honk, honk, punch. Gas, gas gas!

Needless to say it was very slow going from then on. I think it took us about half an hour of the one and a half hour trip to cover the last few miles. We had wanted to keep the car for the night for dinner, but quickly resolved that going anywhere in this mess would take us far longer than what was sensible. Who knows if this had cleared itself by the time we finished dinner too. So we dropped the car off early, as it didn't matter being daily rental. It had done it's duty for us, and we were thankful.

As we hadn't shopped that crazily, we caught the train back up to the apartment before heading back to dinner. Below are the spoils from our voyage that day. I don't think we spent much more than $150 on all this either, disregarding the set of boots that were ordered for home delivery as they weren't in stock at the outlet.
Final count,
1 Corningware,
2 sets of boots,
1 pair of jeans, 1 hat,
1 fancy yet sensible dress,
1 jacket,
1 pair of khakis.

Taking up too many seats on the subway

Everyone was starving from the walking around in the cold, so we quickly decided on a place to eat. Never mind the fact that it was back where we had rented the car, just an avenue over. Since we had dropped it back so early it was just past normal dinner time when we sat down.

We settled on a place called Citrus, a funky little place full of cuisine described as Asian/Latin fusion. Interesting I know, but it worked. The clientele was an interesting mix of young and old, so it was hard to peg the demographic. But generally the food took on an asian shape, with sushi, and seafood. The Latin part was usually the sauce or other such trimming giving it a spicy kick. We all thoroughly enjoyed our food, of particular note was Deb's Sushi combo, with 4 different variations. Two were the normal sushi and sashimi staple of kingfish, salmon, tuna and exceptionally tasty scallops, another was a seaweed roll that somehow unified spicy tuna and a slice of mango, another was a very french spicy tuna tartare with a layer of refreshing guacamole with added cucumber to combat the spice.

An Asian and a Latino enter a bar...

A special mention for the dessert I had, which was an evolution of the humble Apple Pie/Crumble. Inside along with the baked apple, instead of the sugary syrup was a cinnamon cream/mousse like filling (in texture anyway), this added a soft, sweet and creamy complement to the toasty apples. The cinnamon vanilla ice cream on the side was one of those flavours you could happily nurse a tub of on a wintery night, while curled up in a blanket on the couch.

I won't refuse a slice of this humble pie. (Yes that is a vial standing in for a teapot)

So all in all, that day was the closest thing we've had to a real holiday this trip, with shopping, a brief culture clash, a road trip, family and delicious food all in one. So that's it for us from this decidedly mass market post. Next week you see what our largely finished apartment looks like, and we visit Le Cirque for Dinner and French Jazz!

Yay, No blink!

And now we resume normal programming

Hopefully that little break has served you well, as it's time to go back to what I've been doing all along, that is filling you in about our daily life in this city.

We never got anything like this in Sydney

So a major even has occurred in that Deb and I have moved into our new apartment. Over the course of the last week the dream of having our own living space in New York has been realised. Thanks to alot of hard work put in by our friends (thanks especially to Dewi, Dawen and Andy) and family, (mum and dad) we've been able to do so quite quickly.

Three trips up and down 24th street to 93rd street later, this is what our apartment looks like. 

We had slowly accumulated little bits and pieces at our temporary apartment, ones that we thought we'd be able to manage with Dawen's minivan move, and obviously, big ticket items had to wait until we had the keys to the new place.

 Box sweet box?

Deb and I have now formed an unfailing tradition of not having mealspaces when we move into new places. It happened at her first apartment, it happened at mine. And as the photos of those memories look on on the shelf nearby, we couldn't break tradition by having furniture to eat on. Don't worry, we have since procured a dining table through the wonders of craigslist. One stressful subway trip later with our mum and dad, we finally have space to eat. Updated photos will come soon.

Next up was a couch, well this actually came a few nights before. But in order of importance a couch is arguably further down the scale. The impending visit of Deb's parents however made sure the couch forced it's way up the list.

NOW you stop to think about it...

We knew we weren't staying for long so there wasn't much use in getting furniture that we could lose out alot on when it came time to go back to Australia. The unfortunate by product of purchasing cheap furniture is of course, production methods having corners cut. Because of this, a leg wouldn't screw in properly as it was covered by a particularly thick layer of paint. So I waved my mechanic's wand over it, threw it at the gas burner cooktop, and manhandled it into place with my manly manliness. After that ordeal, we finally had a sofa bed.

Something that you would expect, and not expect at the same time of cheap furniture makers, was a little inventiveness on their behalf. I'll leave it to you to figure out what this is about.

The little tag says "leg inside"

As we lifted the couch out and discovered no extra pieces, we did wonder for a minute. At least there were no embarrassing phone calls to suppliers to figure out that the legs were hiding in that neatly hidden zip up pouch.

No trip to America is complete without a day dedicated to Outlet Shopping. Those of you that know me best know that in my happier moments I am behind the steering wheel of a car, so the past month being stuck on trains and on foot would of course, leave a longing. With outlet shopping it's just too difficult being at the mercy of public transport. So we rented a car!

Next post, come along with us for a road trip to Woodbery Commons!

Bonus Round!

You go half way around the world trying to escape this infernal feline, but she'll still find you. Granted we were in a store that originated in Japan it was bound to happen, but still. Evil geniusses aspire to take over the world the way this cat has.

This was obviously the mother's idea because the child was scared witless. A nightmarish blend of snowman and kitten head on what otherwise looks like a person would do that to you too right?

Here are some more silly things to share with you all on our voyages around this crazy city.

Homewares shopping can be the bane of your existence if you do it enough, thus finding ways to amuse yourself is necessary to make the time bearable. Enjoyable even.

To everybody else I'm sure this isn't the idea you have when you're looking for a "fish plate" to steam fish with in a wok, at the same token, I'm sure this is what Deb had in mind all along.

Bed Bath and Beyond is a dream come true for you home furnishers out there. It can also be one of those unending nightmares you just can't seem to escape as we managed to miss a scheduled call home with our parents. We didn't think we spent that much time in there... the sun shone and dissappeared in the time we were inside trying to pick matching kitchenware and what not.

You know how you're always told that trolleys aren't allowed on the escalator? In places like Bed Bath and Beyond there are always multiple levels so you accomodate customers by helping them avoid the, buy a bunch of stuff on this level shuffle.

So here's an escalator that people aren't allowed on. With some elegant geometry it will stay upright while it's in transit. Can you tell it's the first time I've seen something like this?

Hopefully this post has served to lighten what has otherwise been heavy reading on this blog in recent times.

Here's a teaser of just some of what will be shared in the next post.

The stowaways finally find their new home.

Just a few more sleeps...

My metamorphosis into a true New Yorker is well underway, I write this post as I sit in a Starbucks around the corner from our new place, mooching off the free Wi-Fi. I suggest you do similar, sit down with a nice hot drink (well... for you Sydneysiders, maybe a cold drink) and a comfortable chair, because this will be one involved post.

So I pick up after Chinese New Year. One of the great things about New York is how their comedy clubs are where some of the biggest names in comedy found their feet. Tipped off by friends about a free show at Gotham Comedy Club, we thought there was no reason not to visit as it was across the street from our temporary apartment in Chelsea.

We all had a good night, my jaw ended up hurting from laughing so much, most of it was genuine, some of it was to avoid being on the sharp end of a roasting, and some of it we really shouldn't have been laughing at. But we were at a Comedy Club, and the atmosphere just takes a hold of you.

Later that week we picked up the keys to what would become our new home for the coming year, we savored it in its blank canvas state before set upon it the mess that moving in will inevitably bring. Before we left that morning we had housekeeping stumble in on us at breakfast at our temporary place, wanting to stay out of their way as I headed back to Chelsea, I decided to go for a little walk, and soak up some morning sun despite the cold morning air. I headed to Union Square as it was only two avenues over. I knew there was a little park there to serve as refuge in this busy city, so there I sat and waited.

For a city with so much going on, there was a suprising amount of people doing the same, just sitting, taking time out from their busy lives. The facilities that the city provides do the best they can to assist you in putting your feet up. Really.

My wanting to not be too voyeuristic kept me from taking a closer photo, but those are wooden loungers you see surrounding the sculpture at Union Square.

We walk to the N,R, subway frequently as it's a convenient way downtown, so I've walked past this a few times, this time I had time to take a photo.

Upon first glance, it's quite an excellent way of advertising a restaurant. The presence definitely adding to the Italian-ness. Look at little closer however and you can see it's merely a fixture, the poor little Fiat 500 is sadly derelict, with one flat tyre, bodywork slowly being eaten away by the salty water that inevitably coats a snowy city. The enthusiast in me wants to buy it, restore it to it's former glory, so it can continue its life running around the city as it was always meant to. When everything settles down.

As a born and bred Australian, I have no knowledge of this phenomenon known as Chicken and Waffles. I sat and watched a TV ad confusedly while my wife, more learned of American culture, informed me that it's one of the more ingrained of their food culture, a staple of Soul Food. For my benefit, and education therefore, Deb resolved to take me to a soul food restaurant on the weekend.

Amy Ruth's is where we ended up. Our first voyage to Harlem since being in this city, and if you were wondering what soul food is, this place will give you a good idea.

A big hug, a big smile, just the things that make you feel nice inside. Deb had had Chicken waffles before, so she wasn't afraid to order them. Me on the other hand went with the Yelp recommendation of the Fried Whiting... with waffles (yeah, fish is far less adventurous with waffles). I had to try it right?

While I may look dissappointed, I'm really not. I'm just very confused because all I know of waffles are the with Chocolate, with Strawberry and with Ice Cream kind. I dig in tentatively, and find the fish tasty, very very tasty. Not the heavily salted "my brain is telling me to like this" kind of taste, but light, and fragrant, and not too oily. The fish had a few bones, but being from Chinese heritage, this fazed me not. I did try a few bites with waffle, but my brain just couldn't compute... I'm very black and white like that. Though, that doesn't mean they weren't nice in their own right. They were plain, with none of the sweetness I came to expect, so for a more open mind, they could work together. For me however, I treated them like dessert, and proceeded to draw liberal squiggles of Maple Syrup all over them. And then I knew what it was to eat a sweet cloud, they were just that fluffy.

The walls were decorated with mirrors, and on those mirrors were some squiggles of a Jazz/Swing band playing, and lovers in an embrace. I thought it was very special and unique.

We had bought some cheap homewares in Chinatown as we knew we weren't here for the long run. We didn't expect to get a chopping board so poorly made that it would split after the first wash... we tried our luck returning it that morning. Unfortunately no dice on an exchange. Them making excuses about us having dropped it or other bologna. I don't know what we were expecting, but needless to say we won't be going back there...

Either way it must have been destiny that brought us there because try as we might to avoid Chinese New Year celebrations in the city, (Deb having experienced and as a result warned against the crush of people), we still managed to find our way right into the middle of it. We stumbled across two small lions, blessing (taking money from) nearby stores;

You can probably just make out the second one on top of Deb's head. We would also run into what we guessed was the main Lion making it's way through the street. This one was quite impressive, as you see this one is still some way away.

Anyway, this feels like an appropriate place for a break. Tune in for the next post as we gear up to move into where we will live for the rest of our adventures in New York.

Getting ready to move again... again... again?

Well, this will be our second move for 2013. But it's not as big a deal as last time when we up and moved country, this time we're just moving from our temporary accomodation to what wil be our home for the next year and a bit.

So my Chinese New Year post left abit of a gap in our diary entries, as it was big enough to warrant its own post. So this one serves to fill you in on what happened up until then.

Friday we had organised to meet up with friends at Grand Central to participate in the centenary celebrations. When we arrived we could never have expected this:

I've been told Grand Central is busy, but this? The big draw of the day was that the businesses in Grand Central Station were offering items for sale at the prices they were 100 years ago, and it obviously worked. "New Yorkers will queue up for anything!" a crotchetty old guy exclaimed. Just happy to be part of the novelty of it all, we had (a few) 12c Cups of Gelato, (also a few) 8c packs of French Fries, and attempted to pick up an 8c loaf of bread, but that just ran out way too quickly for them to have enough supply.

Dewi and I enjoying our food from the early 1900's

Later that night we also were due to meet up with friends for a free music act at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, or the much more catchy, BAM cafe. Unfortunately the music wasn't really to our taste so we left our seats to other people who might enjoy them more and went for our first late night snack with friends.

Right across from the academy, was a place called Berlyn. As you can guess, it served German cuisine, with Wurst and Pretzels being the main events. As we went in, we were greeted by possibly one of the cuter things we would see in our stay here.

That's right! A plushie pretzel. The place was very nicely decorated, with tonnes of little knick knacks for you to visually sort through. Unfortunately it was a little dark to take some nice pictures so, on to the food.

As Deb and I had had dinner earlier, we decided to share a pretzel, the sweet potato chips and a bowl of mussels.

The pretzel was a little on the salty side, as you can see it was liberally salted. But after brushing off a little excess, it was deliciously fluffy and still toasty on the inside. The sweet potato chips were very tasty, with the kick of paprika melding well with the mellowness of the blue cheese sauce. The mussels with white wine and cheese sauce was one of those "damn, there's none left?" dishes. We just wanted more. Our friends also had a nice selection of dishes that tasted just as nice. Overall we heartily recommend Berlyn for comfort food that's also classy.

The rest of the weekend was concluded with a trip to the Columbus Avenue street markets on the Upper West side. And my first visit to Shake Shack! Somehow it had gotten in my head that Shake Shack was a mass market, Wendy's or Donut King type of joint (well, how they are in Australia anway). But as with a lot of things here, they sometimes take a different meaning when they move abroad.

We had a Shackburger, a Smokeshack, and smothered it with a Peanut Butter Milkshake. The Shackburger was a nice step up from your typical fast food burger, not too greasy with a flavoursome patty. The Smokeshack built on the Shackburger but added some spiciness via a spicy sauce and some chilli, and how could one forget the smoky bacon. The Peanut Butter shake was a revelation and is definitely recommended, just make sure you leave room in your stomach as it's quite thick. The Smokeshack was a very nice way to warm up on an otherwise cold cold day, it just didn't seem enough for Deb.

Chinese New Year!

Chinese New Year is very dear to our hearts, having grown up in households that were very proud of our chinese heritage, we would celebrate every year with family without fail. With new surroundings come the opportunity to start new traditions of our own.

With no family with us, we invited some friends over to dinner to celebrate New Year the way only Chinese people do, with a feast!

But let me start at the beginning of the day because it started with abit of a spectacle. The day before we went to Bowery st. to help outfit what was to be the kitchen we would cook with for the next two years.
Contrary to what anonymously authoritative internet advice will say, the humble wok forms an essential element of the kitchen arsenal that is arguably on par with cups and plates. At least for Chinese people.

There is a certain rite of passage for the budding chinese chef, and that is the "seasoning" or "opening" of the wok. As it was Chinese New Year's day, we thought it would be auspicious, fortuitous, and probably necessary if we wanted to cook for our friends that night.

The particulars of this process are plentiful, as Deb will attest to, so if you'd like to find out more a simple google search should sate you. For us, after various incantations, holding her tongue the right way, and hopping on one foot, beseeching the correct heathen god, the job was complete. Even with the door ajar a little, and the window open to -7 degree ambient temperature, the process generated enough smoke to warrant attention from neighbours and a security guard. Said security guard decided to visit our apartment and at the same time, the concierge buzzed up to see what the other residents were complaining about. It was just a little smoke...but we were more than a little red-faced.

We hadn't done anything very holiday like in New York city as we were busy taking care of the administrative stuff. After the ordeal we decided to visit Central Park as it had snowed heavily on the preceding nights making it one of those things that you could miss out on as it quickly melts away.

It was a boiling pot of activity with the Manhattanites taking advantage of the snowy scenery. People jogging, strolling through the park, kids being dragged around on toboggans, budding photographers thoughtfully snapping away, all mixing with the tourists, enjoying the spectacle of snowy central park.

Here's us by Jackie Kennedy Onassis Reservoir, a big area of it had turned to ice.

With that ticked off the list, we headed home to prepare dinner for the night. Now, with the wok suitably prepared, Deb could could steam us our new year fish. To make the proper chinese new year feast, we also roasted a belly of pork, and steamed some veggies. Our friends brought a portion of roast duck, and ice the metaphorical cake, a box of egg tarts.

We think we did pretty well, because we polished most of it off, add a bottle of fine wine, four cups of tea, and a crash course in eating/drinking Tim Tams the aussie way, our Chinese New Year feast was done.