Ribs and Rumps - Fortitude Valley

Ribs and Rumps holds a special place in my heart. Every time we travel to Sydney (which isn't enough) we share a meal with a long time friend and his wife at the Ribs and Rumps in North Ryde. To learn that there is a Ribs and Rumps, not only in Brisbane but in Fortitude Valley and walking distance from where we live was just too much. We had to go.

Ribs and Rumps are well known for their great steaks and amazing ribs. If I wasn't doing this blog I would certainly have gone with a Ribs and Rump combo but there is a chicken parm on the menu, and that's what I had. Picture below.

At $19.95 it was a middle of the road priced parm. While we got there just as it opened the service was very good with the drinks coming out shortly after ordering and the food coming out not too long after that. Was also nice to get a 568ml Little Creature Pale Ale for less than $10 to go with the chicken. Not my favourite beer but still very nice.

How was the parm though?

Size: Medium sized chicken parm. Good amount of chips. Salad just right too. I was completely full at the end of the meal.

Chicken: Good thickness to the chicken, consistent over the whole piece. Was cooked really well. The chicken was juicy and the crumbing was just right.

Cheese: A lot of cheese on the chicken, and it was very oily. Could have done with either a little less cheese or a bit more time under the grill. The cheese (and sauce) didn't reach the edges of the chicken either. Kind of pooled up a bit in the middle of the parm. Tasted good, although I don't think my heart will be too happy at all.

Sauce: Nice sauce, chunks of tomato in there, great flavour. Not enough of it though, and was overpowered by the cheese.

Ham: I'll let this picture do the talking...

Chips: Good chips, crunchy and well cooked. Though probably not exciting enough for a chicken parm. If they were paired with a juicy steak and gravy or ribs with BBQ sauce they would be perfect, but there just wasn't enough sauce with the parm to bring them the extra flavour they need. Certainly serviceable and they were all gone at the end (though I did steal some of my partners tangy BBQ sauce).

Salad: Surprisingly I really enjoyed this salad and aside from some strips of carrot at the end I ate it all. A really sweet sort of honey like dressing on top. Really tasty.

All in all, the parma at Ribs and Rumps was good. If they got the balance of cheese and sauce right it would have been amazing, oh and something extra for the chips. Not sure what, just something to bring them up a bit. I had a bit of edge chicken with the tangy BBQ sauce and it was amazing. A parm with that instead of napoli sauce, and maybe some bacon would be awesome.

Lastly, they have a massive red coloured bull out the front. I wanted to start the blog with a picture of its face and end it with a picture of its arse but didn't have the balls to take the second photo. Here's the head.

Until next time.

-Dave the Mega-Parm

Beach House Bar & Grill - Brisbane CBD

For the office secret santa last year I was lucky enough to get a $20 gift voucher for the Beach House Bar & Grill. After sitting in my drawer for the better part of two months it finally got used last night at their Brisbane CBD restaurant.

It's always busy at the Beach House Bar & Grill so we went after work during the week. The service was good and the food came out pretty quickly. Jugs of beers are dangerous at $13 and we were lucky to get one of the raised up stool tables giving us a nice view over the railing. It's a pretty open place, even had a small bird fly past our heads during the evening.

The Beach House Bar & Grill do a few varieties of parmas. I went with the "standard" parm however others at the table had the Green and Gold (chicken with cheese, avocado and sweet chilli sauce) and the Sand Castles (chicken with salt and pepper squid on top). By all accounts both alternative parms were pretty good.

I can only comment on my own parm though. Picture below.

At $20.90 it's a fairly well priced parm. The meal is much larger on the plate than it looks in the photo. Certainly large enough to not be hungry at the end and pretty good value overall.

Chicken: Looks a little burnt but didn't have a burnt flavour, nor was it too dry. Not a very thick piece of chicken but it tasted very nice. Worked well with the other ingredients (which were the star of this show).

Ham: No ham on this parm, nothing to see here.

Cheese: Excellent cheese and a lot of it. Could have done with a little bit longer under the grill but worked perfectly with the sauce. Would have liked the cheese to go all the way to the edge though.

Sauce: Great sauce. No, amazing sauce. Chunks of tomato in there, tasted home-made like nonna used to make. As mentioned above it could have gone all the way to the edge of the chicken but it did spread out pretty easy once I started eating. The sauce was the highlight of the meal.

Chips: Nice chips, but I've had better from the Beach House before. Maybe they needed more seasoning. There were so many under the parm too, it was like a little mountain.

Salad: Avid readers will know I'm not a huge salad fan, but this was pretty good. Definitely in the top 5 chicken parm salads I've had (not that I really keep a record). Huge amount of salad too, and most of it got eaten.

All in all, the chicken parm experience from Beach House Bar & Grill was a good one. It's been a long time since I've eaten there and it lived up to the memory.

-Dave the Mega-Parm

The Tempo Hotel

Tuesday was a busy day, we're currently in the process of moving house and after spending a solid six hours in packing stuff up, moving and putting stuff away I decided it was time for something to eat (and to drink). So I walked up to The Tempo Hotel at about 12:45, hoping they had chicken parm on the menu. They did. I was happy.

Picture below.

At $16.50 it is a pretty reasonably priced parma. And the meal came out very quickly, but how was it?

Size: Good size meal, certainly enough to be full at the end. Actually to be honest I wimped out and didn't eat all the chips (or salad). For $16.50 it is great value.

Chicken: Crumbed very nicely, and was nice and juicy. The only gripe with the chicken is that it was very thin. Could have done with being a couple of millimetres thicker all over.

Cheese: A good amount of cheese on top, and it was tasty. Could have done with a bit more cooking of the cheese though, it wasn't oozing and kind of held itself together.

Ham: My goodness, there was a lot of ham on this parm. It was tasty and nice shredded ham but there was so much. I had to take an extra picture of it. See below.

It wasn't bad though, actually worked really well with the sauce.

Sauce: Very mild sauce, had chunks of tomato in it that were delicious. The saltyness of the ham turned the mild sauce into something really nice.

Salad: Boring, dry and uneventful, but who cares about salad?

All in all I was pretty happy with the parma from The Tempo Hotel, plus they had Miller Draught on tap so that was pretty good. Will certainly go there again!!

-Dave the Mega-Parm