The staff immediately attended to you once you stepped in and we were seated pretty much in the middle of the lower level. The upper level has more tables and a bar.

The menu was perfect with not too much variety, but just enough to make your selection easy from 6 options for each course.  In fact, you can view it here - http://www.tabourestaurant.com.au/menu.pdf

We ordered some white wine, and if memory serves me right, I believe we a 2006 Andre Kientzler, Pinot Gris - actually, we had 2 of those!

To start, I had the cheese soufflé - which was perfectly cooked. I was told prior to coming to Tabou, that this could be quite a heavy dish. It wasn’t too heavy, but then again - I had a good appetite built up before leaving home. With each spoonful, the cheese just melted in your mouth and the taste was exceptional, I could do it again for mains.

My mains contained slices of roast lamb loin served with aubergine (eggplant), courgette (zucchini) and anchoiade (?). The lamb was cooked really, medium-rare - just how I like it. The vegetables and sauce however, was quite bland - a bit too simple in my opinion. The vegetables had a nice bit and complimented the lamb well - without them, it would be a plain meat dish with tomato paste. Might try the pork next time.

To top it off, I had another soufflé, but this time it was chocolate and I can’t say that this was my favourite dessert. While the soufflé itself was very nice, the surrounding chocolate sauce was quite bitter - almost tasted of coffee, not what I expected (or maybe I didn’t read the fine lines of the dessert description). But the dates flavoured ice cream served beside it, saved my tongue. We also had a bottle of dessert wine to leave a sweet taste on our palates.

Overall, I enjoyed dining at this restaurant. Yes, it is expensive - especially when 4 of us order 3 bottles of wine at $60 a bottle. If you get a 3 course meal alone, be prepared to fork $70 out. If you have French bottle of wine or two, you’ll soon be looking at 3 digit figures per head. Overall for the quality of food, I may have preferred elsewhere (like Vamps). But the overall experience in itself, was well worth it.

Atmosphere - 8/10
Food - 7/10
Wine/Cocktails - 9/10
Staff - 8.5/10
Value for money - 7/10

Gordon used a rack of lamb while I used individual lamb cutlets.

So I’ve outlined my version of the recipe below, and you can have a look at Gordon’s video further below.

So here goes:

Ingredients
Lamb cutlets (says 3 - 4 pieces per person)
Continental Parsley
Rosemary
Bread (stale is fine, just something that makes good breadcrumbs), I used a baguette
French Dijon mustard

Method
On a plate, lay out the lamb cutlets and season with salt and pepper. I like Gordon’s style of doing this on the plate, because any of the seasoning that is outside of the lamb bit can be swept up and absorbed as you move the pieces of lamb around - so make sure you use every bit of season on that plate!

Start the oven at 180*C. On a pan, drizzle some olive oil and place the lamb on medium heat just to give it some colour. Once you have colour put the lamb on a wire-rack and place it in the oven for 10 mins.

Meanwhile, in a blender tear bits of your bread (I used half a baguette) with some parsley and rosemary. Drizzle in a bit of olive oil - not too much. Blitz the mixture until you have some a nice texture of herb breadcrumbs.

Take the cutlets out and brush each side with Dijon mustard and coat it all over with the herb breadcrumbs. Do this for each cutlet and place it back on the wire-rack. Put it back in the oven on the top shelf so that the heat crisps the breadcrumbs. Do each side for 5 - 7 mins.

You can serve this up with mash potatoes, green beans (which I love to cook with garlic and Marsala wine) and some wilted spinach.

Enjoy!

Here is Gordon’s video:

This would mean giving Telstra’s BigPond the rights to even more music, raising their inventory from 20,000 to nearly a million.

The advantage they stand with, is the ability to download the music to almost any portable device including media centers or your Xbox.

Each downloaded song will not have any restrictive copy protection limiting it against a single device. This gives the iPod owners an alternative from iTunes and “puts consumers in the driving seat”, says BigPond MD, Justin Milne.

It is estimated that the inventory would grow up to 1 million by Jan 09. However, in the meantime it shouldn’t be too long before BigPond users get access to more than just the current 20,000.

Sheraton New York has been mesmerized by Microsoft and have adopted the Surface application in their lobby.

Take a look at the clip below.

But that they should let all of us know with a big focus image on the headline news, that some woman, 3 months before her wedding was told by her fiance that he had 4 kids - a secret she was never aware of during their relationship.

Great News!

After spending most of Saturday at home, it wasn’t surprising that my appetite had hit it’s highest point by dinner time. So, what better way than fill it up with some Mexican food?

Located on Alexander st in Crows Nest, this restaurant has chains all over Australia.

My first experience was in the Gold Coast during university days, and I expected the food to be the same. I wasn’t disappointed.

It has Mexican style deco making it friendly and feeling a bit of video. The quality of food matched that of my past experience.

They have a 3 page menu with a wide variety to select from - or so it appeared. Because they have similar style food, they would have one combination menu called ‘San Francisco’ that may have beef and chicken varieties, while another called ‘Colorado’ might have both beef varieties - but cooked the same way as the ‘San Francisco’. I wish they had made it a bit simple by giving you the option of selecting 1 or 2 meats and the style in which you would like both cooked - also if you prefer rice or salad.

After 10-15 mins of confusion, and avoiding to over-order, we started off with a full plate of Nacho’s to share. I recommend you to get a side of guacamole when you order this. In fact, not many entrees come with this condiment - which adds that extra flavour of Mexican tradition (or at least what we all assume).

The drinks were good - but not the best. First, you have to go to a bar to make your order, and then tell them your table number to put it on the bill (or pay for it up front if you like). Interesting concept, but if I’m out for dinner, I’d expect that a waiter can take my order, walk 10 steps to the bar and back with our drinks ready. Nevertheless, it didn’t bother me. Second, the flavouring was all wrong, we ordered a Pina Colada, and it had too much cream. We ordered a Aztec Warrior and I felt like I a tablespoon of sugar shoved down my throat with every sip. We made do with sparkling water.

Dessert - well, this was probably the lowest part of our meal. While we anxiously waited for the Creme Caramel from the start of our meal - it was probably one of the most disappointing one that we had.

Look, all up - if you’re really hungry, grab yourself a combination dinner and stick with the mineral water. For about $20, it’s a cheap feed, and it will fill you up quickly. It’s a good place for family dinners or a catch up with friends, it’s not overly noisy, and the staff were quite friendly.

Atmosphere - 7/10
Food - 7.5/10
Wine/Cocktails - 4/10
Staff - 7/10
Value for money - 7/10

From a new article that was on Google News, I recently read that Marissa Mayer (Vice President Search Product and User Experience, Google - pictured) stated that Google News generates US$100 million in revenue.

I scratched my head going - “A hundred mil? How?”

Surely she had accidently slipped her tongue with that figure. Google simply directs any one who clicks on a new link straight through to news publisher’s site.

Also the News section is an ad-free area so Google isn’t making any ad-revenue which the company is ever so famous of normally doing.

But then I used Google’s search engine to begin my research - I found this - http://bigtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2008/07/22/whats-google-news-worth-100-million/

The figure comes from a referral technique, where it is assumed that Google News funnels readers to the main Google search site. So while we don’t realise this, it’s one way of Google’s free service, that somehow in the background makes money.

And this article is a perfect example. I read about the news headline at Google News (an ad-free environment) and it took me to Forbes. I read the article there, but I was intrigued. So what did I do, I went to Google search to get my research results (an ad-full environment).

This sort of ad-free service at one side to somehow lead us to the opposite end with ads, is a how Google News makes it’s US$100 million revenue referral.

So if Google is making $100 million from its News service, will the news publishers ask for that extra bit of cash? Clearly they already get traffic from users through Google, but if it wasn’t for them, Google wouldn’t have had the content in first place.

The same will come about when Google launches it’s digital consumer health records, a service that allows people to store and access their medical records online. At first there were thoughts of having ads around this service - but it was later decided that they are better off. This is because Google is hoping that the Google News strategy flows through - where it assumes that someone using Google to store medical records, will likely use Google Search when it comes to finding medication, doctors, hospitals or even to just general research.

The above almost defines the Google ecosystem.

I can’t remember the first time I went to this restaurant, but I can never forget the way it’s food taste. One thing about Chinta Ria that I love, is consistency!

They always have that same great flavour and aroma, and never have I felt the need to return a dish back. Overall, it comes with a reasonable price tag - a little pricey, but reasonable.

The menu stocks a good variety of Malaysia style food, and it appeals from vegetarians through to seafood lovers. The curry puffs, tofu quartets and fried Lohbak (mince chicken wrapped in bean curd) are great entree choices. For mains, I have previously had the Red Temple chicken (red curry), Curry lamb, Ayam Ria (stir-fried chicken with spices and veg) - and they all taste amazing. I suggest you try them with coconut rice for a change. I hear the Beef Randang isn’t bad either.

The wine list isn’t short and it gives you a good variety of reds, whites and sparkling. My favourite from their list is - Juniper Crossing Margaret River Chardonnay (Margaret River) and Boat O’Craigo ‘Rob Roy’ Pinot Noir (Yarra Valley).

I haven’t had dessert at this restaurant, because I don’t know if they actually have a menu for that course.

Located at Cockle Bay wharf, near the Darling Harbour in Sydney, the ambience hasn’t been sacrificed in order to provide good food. Their interior is dim lighted and calm, and a large Buddha statue at the entrance almost amazes everyone who comes in for the first time.

One thing that I noticed when I last went to Chinta Ria, was the background music. It’s not pop, nor techno, nor anything commercial - instead it’s repeated chants that Monks listen to when praying. I think it subliminally calms your mind.

Now there are couple of things that disappointed me:

1) You cannot make a reservation. It’s first come, first serve
2) The place can get very crowded and you can end up close to another table
3) It can get loud depending on where you sit, making it a little hard for friendly conversation.
4) A busy night means lack of service - we waited a while before we could place our order and another again before we received our glass of wine
5) The food came out very quick, almost too quick where I felt we were being asked to eat up and leave

Overall, I love dining here and its always had great memories. It is a great experience in itself and I would highly recommend it.

Food: 8/10
Wine: 7/10
Atmosphere: 8/10
Staff: 7/10
Value for money: 8/10

This is beginning to take the piss. Since I got the IQ2, I have started to record TV shows that I can’t see at it’s broadcast time, to then later watch at my own convenience.

Gordon Ramsay’s The F Word was scheduled on Channel 9 at 9:30pm. So I decided to have it recorded and watch it later on.

At 11:30pm I started to watch the recorded show. At the start of the recorded video, I noticed that the first 10-15 mins was of the previous show “The Farmer wants a wife” - who bloody cares!

So I fast forward through that, and start watching the beginning of The F Word.

Now you have to remember something about the IQ2, it only record’s a few mins before and after the show ends - I am in no way blaming them for that. The IQ2 is not smart enough to know exactly when a show starts and stops other than relying on the TV guide provided by the broadcasters.

But if Channel 9 is running late on one shows (”Current Affair” always runs over time), then all the later shows are also delayed.

And no, Nine doesn’t cut any ads to ensure it’s following programs all start on the time that it provided to the IQ2 TV Guide.

So my recording from 9:28 to 10:32 included 15 mins of some shepherd looking for love (go smack your sheep!!), and it therefore meant that I lost the last 10 mins of the F Word - where I missed the result of final cook off and the result of the brigade’s performance.
   
Surely you readers think that I am crazy to complain and you think that I absolutely adore The F Word, but it’s a matter of principle.

What if you recorded a movie and then missed the last 10 mins of the ending - disappointed?

When a network is in control of what they broadcast, surely they can control their content and ads to ensure that their programs start on the time it provides to the TV guides.

If it’s running late, then cut your ads back! Channel Nine, pick your socks up!