Temasek
71 George St
Parramatta, NSW
We were going to a show at the Riverside Theatre in Parramatta so it gave us a great opportunity to try out Temasek, which had been on our wish list for a while.
Its a little bit hard to find as its down a laneway, but having spotted the name on the sign (shown) it was then a lot easier.
Whenever you're eating Malaysian or Indonesian it's hard to not order roti - so we did order it. Two serves of roti were the first thing to arrive with a dipping sauce. I have to admit to being a real roti fan - good roti that is. This was certainly good roti - nice and flaky with rich full flavours. Very nice. The roti canai cost $2.20 a serving - so $4.40 for the two we had.
We decided on a mixed entree. The mixed entree comes with two spring rolls, one curry puff and a crumbed prawn. As there were four in our group we ordered four mixed entrees - so we certainly had a lot of these things to eat. They were nice too. Good flavours, nicely crisp without being cremated and they all disappeared - always a good sign. At $7.50 a serve it cost $30.00 for the batch of four.
Why wouldn't you order nasi goreng when eating Malaysian/Indonesian? It was tasty - a nice mixture of flavours that combined well - with an egg on top to - well - top it off. This dish cost $14.80.
The beef rendang was certainly a good sized serving - but was actually a huge disappointment. The meat was extremely tender - not a bad thing - but the cuts of meat were full of fat. In fact some pieces were almost all fat while others were at best 50/50. If it had just been one or two chunks of meat like this it would be understandable or at least excusable. However there weren't any pieces that lacked huge chunks of fat. It was a huge pity. The flavours of the sauce were actually nice too - such a let down. The beef rendang was $19.80
The lemongrass chicken (or Serai Chicken) was a bit hit and miss in the sense that some liked it while others didn't. Personally I thought it was decent but most of the others didn't see it this way. Maybe it was a taste thing but we all have similar tastes so it was hard to understand. This dish cost $18.80.
All in all Temasek was ok. I wouldn't rave about it but there were some decent dishes and some average ones and one dud. It may be better on another occasion but who knows.
