The Kendo Club Christmas Dinner was held at a Korean restaurant at 36 Glebe Point Rd, Glebe. Our party originally had a headcount of 43 people, only 38 turned up in the end. One person completely had no mention of why they weren't there and no-one had their contact detail, while another person didn't turn up because their car apparently broke down somewhere in the middle of no-where and caused them to not be able to make it.
It was a set meny for $30/person and while the food was good, the problem came in quantity and timeframe. I have been to this place before and while the food was decent, I don't think their kitchen was designed to handle such a large group. Our set menu was three entree, three main and a dessert. We also had a bar tab too. For the entree we had a manju (dumpling) of sorts, a salmon sashimi salad (which was not even Korean haha) and Chapchae (a Korean sweet potato flour noodle dish). For mains we had Bibimbab (which is a rice dish with vege and stuff "cooked" inside a hot stone bowl that you stir through quickly when you get it), a beef and chicken dish with rice. For dessert it was a plate each with three slices of kiwi fruit (rather hard so not yet fully ripe), half a strawberry (of decent size), a green tea powder coated, redbean icecream filled mochi (soft rice flour cake) and then a sponge wrapped home-made green tea icecream which was done by the chef.
While the dishes in themselves was really nice, the problem with quantity (with exception for dessert) was that the portions served were normal portions served if you had been ordering for yourself. While if you consider that six dishes (three entree and three main) for one person is enough, and that it would be enough for two people, starting to push it with three, the actual sharing size was for four. So we had one plate of each between four people. Now while I was not hungry by the end, I was not full. This was further compounded by the delay between all of the dishes, which no doubt was caused by the fact that they had to cook twelve tables worth at the same time, and bring it up together. It really isn't their fault since the kitchen is quite small, but it just made some people a bit testy and grumpy about the wait between dishes. We started with entree at about ten past seven and we finished at just after ten, so three hours later.
It was fun, lots of people, noise and talk. A brief speech or two and raffle draws for lucky door prizes of chocolates and biscuits (which I didn't get any). Afterwards some people wanted to go clubbing, some wanted to go Karaoke and some wanted coffee. The nearby coffee places were all shutting down so we took a very long walk downtown and ended up in Darling Harbour, and going to Lindt Cafe. We were the coffee group if you hadn't noticed.
Someone said that Lindt had closed by the time we got there but I remembered they opened until 1am so I heard, we got there just before eleven thirty. They were still open and we got our drinks and a table and enjoyed ourselves. As we were leaving about quarter past midnight in the morning, it appeared that they had shut their counter but customers were still inside and outside, so perhaps they stopped selling at midnight but opened until people finished up.
For me, I had a hot dark chocolate. I really like dark and it was wonderfuly decadant and rich though very sweet in how I made it, so I had milk as my chaser haha. I bought my kouhai and a friend their drinks and would have bought another person who was there one too but they didn't come up to the line in time. I felt like a spontaneous act of generosity, and I guess I could label it as my "Christmas" present to them for the year since I had nothing really else to give, and while I didn't say anything, it's just a nice thing and way to say thank you for the fun I've had with them and training together. It wasn't very much, after all, it's just a hot (or cold) drink at a cafe right? So, they should put away their wallets and stop trying to shove cash at me.
We took a slow walk to the train station and managed to get the near-last train home.
That in itself is a separate post LOL.
I did have some drinks in the night at dinner but they didn't affect me in any noticable way that I knew of. I had a champagne, two shotglasses of souju (korean rice wine) but not as shots, as sips through dinner, and then a glass of sweet white dessert wine. Over the period of dinner and the food, I think it didn't do much at all. The white wine was actually very nice, and the champers was very similar to the non-alcoholic sparking grape juice I used to get from the supermarkets, but just that slight warming effect from the alcohol. Cheers to David for the champers and white wine.
It was a set meny for $30/person and while the food was good, the problem came in quantity and timeframe. I have been to this place before and while the food was decent, I don't think their kitchen was designed to handle such a large group. Our set menu was three entree, three main and a dessert. We also had a bar tab too. For the entree we had a manju (dumpling) of sorts, a salmon sashimi salad (which was not even Korean haha) and Chapchae (a Korean sweet potato flour noodle dish). For mains we had Bibimbab (which is a rice dish with vege and stuff "cooked" inside a hot stone bowl that you stir through quickly when you get it), a beef and chicken dish with rice. For dessert it was a plate each with three slices of kiwi fruit (rather hard so not yet fully ripe), half a strawberry (of decent size), a green tea powder coated, redbean icecream filled mochi (soft rice flour cake) and then a sponge wrapped home-made green tea icecream which was done by the chef.
While the dishes in themselves was really nice, the problem with quantity (with exception for dessert) was that the portions served were normal portions served if you had been ordering for yourself. While if you consider that six dishes (three entree and three main) for one person is enough, and that it would be enough for two people, starting to push it with three, the actual sharing size was for four. So we had one plate of each between four people. Now while I was not hungry by the end, I was not full. This was further compounded by the delay between all of the dishes, which no doubt was caused by the fact that they had to cook twelve tables worth at the same time, and bring it up together. It really isn't their fault since the kitchen is quite small, but it just made some people a bit testy and grumpy about the wait between dishes. We started with entree at about ten past seven and we finished at just after ten, so three hours later.
It was fun, lots of people, noise and talk. A brief speech or two and raffle draws for lucky door prizes of chocolates and biscuits (which I didn't get any). Afterwards some people wanted to go clubbing, some wanted to go Karaoke and some wanted coffee. The nearby coffee places were all shutting down so we took a very long walk downtown and ended up in Darling Harbour, and going to Lindt Cafe. We were the coffee group if you hadn't noticed.
Someone said that Lindt had closed by the time we got there but I remembered they opened until 1am so I heard, we got there just before eleven thirty. They were still open and we got our drinks and a table and enjoyed ourselves. As we were leaving about quarter past midnight in the morning, it appeared that they had shut their counter but customers were still inside and outside, so perhaps they stopped selling at midnight but opened until people finished up.
For me, I had a hot dark chocolate. I really like dark and it was wonderfuly decadant and rich though very sweet in how I made it, so I had milk as my chaser haha. I bought my kouhai and a friend their drinks and would have bought another person who was there one too but they didn't come up to the line in time. I felt like a spontaneous act of generosity, and I guess I could label it as my "Christmas" present to them for the year since I had nothing really else to give, and while I didn't say anything, it's just a nice thing and way to say thank you for the fun I've had with them and training together. It wasn't very much, after all, it's just a hot (or cold) drink at a cafe right? So, they should put away their wallets and stop trying to shove cash at me.
We took a slow walk to the train station and managed to get the near-last train home.
That in itself is a separate post LOL.
I did have some drinks in the night at dinner but they didn't affect me in any noticable way that I knew of. I had a champagne, two shotglasses of souju (korean rice wine) but not as shots, as sips through dinner, and then a glass of sweet white dessert wine. Over the period of dinner and the food, I think it didn't do much at all. The white wine was actually very nice, and the champers was very similar to the non-alcoholic sparking grape juice I used to get from the supermarkets, but just that slight warming effect from the alcohol. Cheers to David for the champers and white wine.
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