Fat Noodle, Treasury Casino, Brisbane CBD

October 12, 2013

Fat Noodle, now occupying the previous Cafe 21.. Sadly no more 24 hours a week restaurant for this particular new asian restaurant.. Known as to be Luke Nguyen's restaurant, widely known for his TV Show on SBS and also his guest appearance in Masterchef Australia...

The menu has a variety of different dishes and they're surprisingly not all vietnamese which I thought it would be since it was Luke Nguyen's.. It had pad thai, mi goreng, laksa, viet salad, pho, spring rolls, wagyu beef and so on.. It has been refurbished since they changed former Cafe 21 to Fat Noodle.. The interior now has changed and I quite liked the interior now than how it was before..

Chopsticks and woks on the ceilings as decoration does give it that asian authenticity in a modernised way.. in the side of the restaurant, infront of the kitchen, there's a round cupboard which stores their different tea pots and chinese teas..

The bar has been transformed into a bar/dining area where one can dine and also have a beer as well, maybe a more relaxed area for some.. The decoration on top of the bar is quite lovely, showing the lions and the alcohol bottles through a paper screened with lights shining from the inside.. You can also see a part of a dragon's body, if that's what it is supposed to be in the middle of the restaurant, basically where the bar and the dining area seperates..

Private function rooms are also available if you have a group, and outdoor seatings are also available but they seemed really empty during lunchtime so maybe not a popular spot to have a meal..

Upon your arrival, you are given a heavy teapot with the teacups.. This is their special house tea which all diners are given when they take a seat.. A good way to make them feel welcome and to be able to sip down some warm tea as they look through the menu..

For entree, we wanted the viet rice paper rolls and sadly, they only had one on the menu whereas the rest of the entrees were edamame beans, salmon sashimi, grilled pork skewers, salt and pepper tofu etc.. So we had the 'Roast duck and Enoki rolls' ($12) that comes with a plum dipping sauce..

It was an okay dish for an entree, but I think it could've been better.. the plum dipping sauce didn't go as well as I thought it would be with the roast duck, as it had that sweetness that just didn't match.. I found the duck to be rather dry as well and I would rather dip my rice paper rolls in hoi sin sauce.. They give you a sauce plate at each table which consists of hoi sin sauce and chilli sauce so I used the hoi sin sauce instead..

It wasn't long till the dishes came out after we ordered.. Not sure whether it's just because there wasn't many people in the restaurant or maybe they actually made the dishes quickly, which is nice to see in an asian restaurant.. We ordered the 'Hainan Chicken' ($16).. the must-have to eat dish in Singapore.. It had chicken thigh, fragrant rice, ginger & green shallot salsa...

Presentation wise, pretty and neat.. The way that they had set out the hainan chicken was presented well, however, the chicken looked as if it was getting squashed in between the sauce and the rice.. The sauce is the two main sauce needed if you buy hainan chicken, the chilli sauce and the garlic, ginger, onion sauce.. My favourite is usually the garlic since it gives that zing to the chicken and it usually blends in well with the hainan rice as well..

Unfortunately, I was quite dissapointed with both sauces.. As the chilli was more towards a sweet taste and the garlic/ginger wasn't as strong as it usually is.. Maybe it's their own version of it, but I still prefer the classic and original version of the sauces.. We ended up asking for chopped chillies and soy sauce.. Also, the rice was not hainan rice either.. it didn't have the hainan chicken broth taste and flavour in the rice.. It just seemed as if it was just normal rice and they poured a bit of the broth over it to give it that smell..

'Fat Pho Noodles' ($18).. Luke Nguyen's signature dish in the restaurant, the classic vietnamese pho noodles.. I've tried from the southside to the northside and so I was quite excited to try this... Presentation wise, it looked elegant and I noticed that the beef still had that redness in them and the noodles were quite different than the other pho noodles I've eaten..

The pho came with Chef Nguyen's signature beef broth, thinly sliced angus sirloin & brisket, bean sprouts, fresh thai basil and chilli and rice noodles... It wasn't the best pho I had, and the beef was alright but I found it abit dry and hard to chew, the noodles was alot which I didn't finish and the broth was abit bland but it also had that sweetness to it, but it definitely didn't taste like the authentic pho that i've tried before such as in Inala or in Sunnybank's Vietnamese restaurants where the owners and chefs originated from Vietnam themselves..