Little Sista, my current favorite spot for breaky

So I've mention this place as part of my review of The Rabbit Hole and mentioned it was one of my top 3 places for breakfast. Tucked away in Coorparoo is Little Sista Café.

We originally stumbled across it thanks to the recommendations of our friends Will and Kylie, and I think we have been back around 5 times in the last 2 months.

So we dropped in nice and early before we hit the shops for Christmas shopping the week before Christmas.

The best thing about this place is the varied menu with some great menu items for vegetarian and those doing low carb diets plus some naughty sweet breakfast, there are a so many things on the menu that say eat me it does make it hard to choose. They also have a great selection of fresh juices:

Check the menu out and tell me your not drooling already

 I went with the Roasted Vegetable Stack which for being a card carrying carnivore is a big thing, I've ordered it about 3 times now.

Both the husband and Uncle Ad's ordered the "Little Sista" breakfast, which is basically a build your own breakfast.


 I can also vouch for the Scrambled Eggs which were yummo and for the kids the hungry caterpillar pancakes is super cute.




Blackout Belissimo

It is not often that we head out on a weeknight for dinner, but the Thursday before Christmas we were hit with a  afternoon storm knocking out our power. It appeared our street was the only one around with no power so what else is there to do in a blackout but head out for dinner.

We kept it local and familiar and headed to Sugo Mi on Oxford Street, Bulimba.


We ordered fries to start, I know this sounds strange but I think I could go to Sugo Mi and just eat bowls and bowls of these fries. I think they must season them with some sort of garlic salt and they are divine.

The Aioli is similar I could just lick the bowl.

 

 

 

 

For the main course we ordered 4 pizza's to share, as we had the full crew tonight. All 4 kids, the husband and uncle ads.

 

 

Kids choice - Margherita with  Sugo, bocconcini, fresh basil & evo

 

Uncle Ad's Favorite - Quattro formaggi  with Mozzarella, parmigiano, gorgonzola, bocconcini, & fresh sage

 

My husband's usual order - the Pomordorini  with  smoked sugo, mozzarella, sopressa, cherry tomato, olives & basil 

 

 



 

My order was on the unusual side but all I can say is  wow. The Arrostita, with slow  roasted pork, caramelized onion, mozzarella, aged balsamic  & rocket



The verdict on the evening , service was very slow. Miss Chloe is well behaved when out and about, but the mains took so long  to come out she lost it. They weren't that busy so I'm not sure why the delay?

But the food, no complaints at all, a goo d solid YUM, this is one of those meals where one minute you have a table full of food and then next thing you have this:

Not a drop off food left.

Will we come back. for sure and Sugo Mi isn't all pizza, according to hubby and brother in law the other mains are also good, so I will just have come back again to give it a try.

POST NOTE

If you are looking for a great and easy dessert.

They also have great Gelato for eat in and have a little take away outlet at the back of the shop, my recommendation is salted caramel. I'll never eat Baskin Robbins again while I can have Sugo Mi gelato.

Simple Scrumptious American Food...without a passport

I don’t know if you have noticed but a whole lot of American places seem to be popping up all over town along with a couple of food vans, one of our favorites is The Smoke BBQ at New Farm, but it was Sunday afternoon and we were just looking for something simple.

My husband had managed to stumble across the The Carolina Kitchen while googling American food and we were pretty interested as it was quiet close to home, about 5 minutes away at Coorparoo.  It was a bit of a late lunch just after 2pm and it seemed that we were lucky we got there when we did as the place seemed to fill up after we ordered.

Now the reviews on the usual review sites were mixed, but I decided that some people had unreasonable expectations….for example one reviewer went there as a special dinner and therefore I can see why it was a disappointment.

The example I will give is you can go to a great seafood restaurant or a little seaside fish and chip shop and have great seafood…but its all about the atmosphere. This place isn’t somewhere for your anniversary dinner or you may not make the next one bit it does have some pretty cool theming and plenty of outdoor seating.

So we ordered a chilli dog each, a serve of buffalo wings and some New York Fries.

 

Now who would have thought a hot dog could be so good, it was so full of flavor, topped with chilli bit then a great freshness from the coleslaw. All for the bargain prince of $5.95.

 

The wings were a different version than what I had previously tried, they ones had been “crumbed” or “coated” and then dipped in the sauce. I tried my first wing early into before I was full from the hot dog so I think I enjoyed the wings more than my husband and “uncle ads”.

 

We were pretty stuffed by the time the New York fries came out, topped with chilli, cheese and sour  cream they were very “moreish” and even though we were full they were polished off pretty quick.

So scores all around were solid 8/10 , a great place to try some authentic American style food without breaking the budget.

 

 

A new entry in my top 3 places for breakfast in Brisbane

So yes we are out and about again for food….see I told you.

This morning it was just my husband Clint, my Brother in Law “Uncle Ads” and Chloe. So this morning we went a visited a place that came highly recommended by a good friend of ours Julian called The Rabbit Hole Cafe in Seven Hills.

 All’s I can say is Thanks You Jules, and I now have a new entry in my current top 3 breakfasts in Brisbane, with the other two places being  Little Sista Cafe  and Foxy Bean.

The menu had so many options, even with me being back and picky avoiding carbs:

 

 

So what did we have:

 

I had the Savoury Mince, which came with a poached egg, smashed avocado and roasted tomato, and 2 pieces of toast that my mouth was screaming at me to dip into the scrumptious mince. I also had a side of haloumi which was the only disappointment as far as the food goes, it was tiny tiny tiny and needed some more cooking.

 

 

Uncle Ads had the Potato Hash Cakes, which came with what seemed like a whole pig’s worth of bacon and a really tasty herbed sour cream. I had a tiny taste of the potato cakes and they reminded we of potatoish arancini balls. I think they would have been scrumptious to dip in the savoury mine

 

 

 

Clint had the “build your own breakfast”, with scrambled eggs, bacon, haloumi, potatoes has cake and a gorgeous onion jam chutney. His verdict on the haloumi was the same as mine…need a bit more cooking. He raved about the onion jam…I had a taste but it had nothing on my favorite which is at Cirque at New Farm.

 Miss Chloe – had a bit of everything, as you can see enjoyed it all and insisted on feeding herself which meant a quick shirt change after breakfast.

 

 

Score….now up until now you would be thinking this is a 10 out of 10…..

I gave it a 9/10 – the Haloumi brought the score down for me.

Uncle Ads and Clint both gave it a solid 8/10 and the reason why was the coffee. I skipped a coffee this morning, which was probably a good thing, both coffee’s which were Campos blend were very strong, even bordering on bitter.

So  we will definitely be back, so many more things on the menu that we would love to try, but maybe this time we will skip the coffee and try one of the frappe’s on the menu.

 

 

Spizzico at Kangaroo Point

A last minute decision to go out for dinner and a night of from my current “low carb diet” led us straight to this family run Italian restaurant located in the unusual location as part of the Southern Cross motel in Kangaroo Point Spizzico. Dinner with the usual suspects, my husband, brother in law and my 3 youngest kids aged 12, 10 and almost 1.

 Friendly service throughout the evening and we were seated in a nicy cosy corner which suited us given we had the bub was with us. Like most restaurants in Brisbane they have one of the great Ikea high chairs for bub. We were also given a complementary bread and olives to get us started. Food came out very quickly despite the place filling up quickly

They didn't have a kids menu but told us they could do any of the pastas in a kids size, but miss 10 is a bit of a pig when it comes to spaghetti so we just ordered off the main menu. 

So what we ordered:

Starter:

Ciabatta con Olive - toasted italian bread w/balsamic/extra virgin olive oil and olive tapenade”(the tapenade was wow, and had bits of mint in it that added an amazing freshness to it)

Mains:

 Tropicana  Pizza, with Smoked ham and pineapple ( had a great thin crunchy base, the sauce and toppings were average)

 

Spaghetti con Polpette -Spaghetti tossed with homemade meatballs in a garlic, basil & tomato sauce (Didn’t get to try this but my 10 year old polished it off)

 

 

Fettucine con Pollo- Fettucine with chicken, spinach and semi-dried tomatoes, mushrooms, in a cream sauce ( Pasta was fabulous, but would have liked a bit more sundried tomatoes to add a bit more flavor)

 

 

 

Gnocchi con Ragu di Manzo -Potato dumplings with slow cooked beef ragu in tomato topped with parmesan (Gnocchi was lovely along with the tomato ragu, beef was so so)

 

 

 

Overall probably a 7/10, home style food that was satisfying and enjoyable and I would eat there again. But nothing that have me raving about it and putting it one my “can’t wait to go back again” list..

 

Scores from the other diners:

Brother in law 7/10

Husband: 7/10

12 year old daughter 6/10

1 year old – Can’t count yet so can’t give a number, seemed to enjoy everything she tried and most ended up on the floor, I don’t think this is a reflection of the food more her fascination with throwing food.






 

About Me

So I'm a full time working mum with 4 daughters, who are aged between almost 1 and 17. For most that may me that nights out are now restricted to Macca's or Sizzlers and the closest thing to a holiday is a week on the Gold Coast at a Big 4 Caravan Park.

But not us, food and travel...and often a combination of the two make up a big part of my world, and kids were not going to change that.

In the past 5 years I have taken the kids to Thailand, Hawaii, L.A and New Zealand, and a few sneaky trips to Africa and the Caribbean without them. Next year in April we have over a month in the US, Mexico and 2 Caribbean cruises planned with the 3 youngest kids in tow.

As far as food goes I am a terrible food pornographer... most of my face book friends can attest to this. We often go out for breakfast a least once on the weekend and out for dinner once a week and we like trying different places and I love a good check in with a nice piece of food porn.

So basically given this I decided why not go to the next step and start writing about my food and travel experiences and sharing them.