I have been to a couple of events since the last one I wrote about, and have reviewed these on my musical blog as they were an opera and a couple of chamber music concerts. So, if you're in Wellington and musically inclined, or just interested, you can read about them there.
Otherwise, just a quick note to remind everyone (and myself!) that I haven't quit blogging, and also have a bit of a muse about eating out, and the price of service.
Before my audition on Monday night (not yesterday but a week ago yesterday!) I went out for Thai food at Aroy's, a less-fancy and therefore cheaper Thai restaurant. As you can see despite the blurriness of the photo, the seating was of the hard, plastic, uncomfortable variety and although the food was brought out to your table, there were no "waiters" as such who you could call on to bring water or other needs. The menu was just on the wall behind the ordering counter, and prices were around $10-12 for main meals.
As with any restaurant, it has hits and misses on their menu. From my experience though, there are more successes than failures here. Pictured below are our two "starters", the roti with peanut sauce and curry puffs with chili sauce. The curry puffs I'd pass on, I mean they're "all right if you like that sort of thing" as my dad and brother like to evasively answer, but the thick, pasty filling wasn't to my taste. the roti though was much better than it looks, and the peanut sauce was excellent. I'm a big fan of roti and naan breads, and this stuff was surprisingly good.
For mains we ordered Pad Thai and a fish curry. Pad Thai is a favorite of mine, and although the stuff I've had is undoubtedly not as authentic as the real thing, I've never really had Pad Thai that I haven't enjoyed! The portion sizes here are generous, especially for noodles, and I had enough from my order to provide me with a decent lunch for the next day as well. I had a taste of the fish curry as well, which was delicious, and had vegetables and pineapple along with the fish, and the dish had rice included (rather than ordered separately for an extra cost) which was nice.
 |
| Fish curry |
 |
| Pad Thai - chicken |
 |
| Leftovers! |
Is the added cost of the food at these places worth the price of the service? Of course when you're talking about comparing McDonald's food to a restaurant hamburger and fries then that's a different story, but the food comparison here was much narrower. If all you really want is a good meal then it would be in your interests to have more places like Aroy's, cheaper prices for good food without the extra service, and still no dishes to do afterwards.
But obviously, an interesting atmosphere and good service is part of the reason to eat out. It's also why Mongolian grills and sushi trains exist, because it's a feast of fun for the other senses in addition to taste. It's all part of the experience. And even if a restaurant is charging more for atmosphere and service rather than the actual food you're getting, paying for the experience of eating food there is better than buying more stuff to hoard in any case.
Finally, for another interesting experience I had recently - this is a juice I was treated to at a cafe awhile ago (in addition to a delicious chicken cannelloni for lunch) - called "Chia". It's blueberry and apple flavored, this stuff has seeds in it! Lots of them...it kind of looks like frogspawn, and it was a bit weird to be able to chew a beverage, but it was still pretty tasty and definitely out of the ordinary. I would have it again if I saw it around. This stuff was made in Nelson according to the bottle, which is where I first lived (and finished high school) when my family moved to NZ. And it's supposed to be very healthy...haven't researched into this, but chia seems to be growing in popularity due to its supposed health benefits.
 |
| The juice of a new experience... |
No comments:
Post a Comment