ASEAN games: DOTA and FIFA15

The ASEAN games is on again this year and it is bigger and better than ever. This time the committee has decided to have some online gaming activities as well as the usual sports.

The online games were held in the city. The FIFA was held at RMIT and the DOTA was held at MC Internet café which is a small, old, run down café.

The FIFA game has about 36 teams each of them playing for about 4-5 mins and then changing over. Here they had about 6-7 volunteers all manning a table each and recording the score. Players pick their teams and their countries and played well.

At the DOTA game it is playing until one player is dead and then after that the game ends. Here it is all about dragons and creatures killing each other. All the volunteers converged in that area. The café was quite small hence it was really noisy and crowded. Maybe they could have limited the amount of people or ask them to pay an entrance fee which can include food.

We got to try the broad beans. They were not spicy at all. However we didn't end up trying the lychee drink. A lot of drinks were sold that day at the Internet café especially Red Bull as players need that for their energy and spirits.

Stay tuned for part 2.

Myer's Home and Living festival

Myer want to promote their electrical appliances and kitchenware over one weekend and they decided to do it this weekend. Naturally as a student blogger I was intrigued by this and wanted to see what all the fuss was about.

Affogato

Making the coffee

The signage 

It was held in Myer in the city.

Upon entering we were greeted with a Nespresso cart and an affogato dessert. The coffee was a grand cru and was really strong.

Here there were many product demonstrations and I got to see the nutribullet for the first time. The nutribullet works a treat but it is $199. The nutribullet gets rid of all the bad stuff inside the raw fruits so that there are more nutrients.

Then we were treated to a coffee decorating class and I tried my hand at decorating the coffee. Geez I am bad at coffee art. I can't even do mine as perfect as the baristas.

Cupcakes

pizza

Then there were other demonstrations such as the pasta and pizza. Everyone was wowed by the fact that there is even now a machine that can cook pizza in five minutes. You don't even get this outside at an Italian restaurant. It takes about fifteen minutes to do.

The kids were enjoying movies such as Avatar and Toy story upstairs.

Do buy at Myer if you can and thanks Myer for a great day out.

Mid Autumn festival at Crown

RNIS was invited to visit the Mid Autumn festival by Leandro, but they paid for all of their own food. Leandro was a volunteer there and he volunteered at the info booth. He was happy being there and getting the free food as he always is.

As for RNIS, we didn't mind paying. However we minded the crowds as the space was too small for a huge crowd. Perhaps like the Flavour exchange they could charge an entry fee for this and then you'll get some tokens to spend on food and stuff. We spent $26 in total on food. As for drinks we had our own water bottle

For the memory game

the puzzle game

At the mooncake stall I saw this pretty sign

Food

Grilling calamari for people

At the dessert stall

Bao

roti

Some of the Asian drinks are too sweet for our liking.

To start off with we had the BBQ pork bao (2 for $6). It was not too bad and the buns were big and fluffy.

Then we went to Mabrown and got a roti for $4. This was nice and fluffy and I remembered that Gastrology said a lot of good things about this place so we would like to give them a go. But they are only open for dinner on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.

Then we joined in the fun on stage and played a memory game where we had to remember the sauces and the order in which they went. We did not go home empty handed; we won a goodie bag full of sauce, noodles, chopsticks and drinks all thanks to Yeos.

We also took a break and took a look at the kids table. The lanterns were expensive to make and inconvenient for us to take home. They were $15 but the money goes to charity.

The last thing that we bought was noodles from YES Taiwanese food. The noodles had waaay too much msg in it. But the good news is that everything there is vegetarian. Oh and we did like the sweet potato fries that we sampled. It was waaaay good.

We then received a complimentary cookie like everyone else to end the night on a sweet note.

Do come to next years one as it is set to be bigger and better than ever.

Mid Autumn Festival

Mid Autumn festival is a Chinese festival which is celebrated in Melbourne as well as China. Here people love to eat mooncakes and in Melbourne you can find them in Chinatown as well as Breadtop. You can also find them in Box Hill and elsewhere in Melbourne such as Springvale.

It is a family affair which falls on the 15th day of the 8th month in the lunar calendar. This year it is on the 25th of September. Families share mooncakes and fruits. But for those overseas Chinese they just look up to the sky and think of their families.

The story behind the Mid Autumn festival was when the gods flew to the moon and back. It was full moon. In China this is the harvest period where the food is plentiful for everyone

RNIS went to the one at Couch as they were invited by City of Melbourne to partake in the mooncake eating and enjoy some performances. And they did that. There was the usual party foods but they only took the spring rolls and the samosas. The other things were not really Asian as such.

The plain sweet lotus one

The salted egg one

But the costumes were spectacular and so was the music. There should have been a lion dance as that would have been enjoyable.

Fanta

The mooncakes were good too. They loved the lotus one the best.

They had a good Mid year festival this year both at Crown and at the Couch.

Zimari

RNIS bought a $12 Groupon for this and did not spend in this place.

Zimari is a Greek cafe which specialises in Cretan food. Here they specialise in eggs and I have read a few good things from Eat and be merry and Gastrology.

Artwork

Food for people to buy and take home

The coffee bar

Other greek drinks

The staff there are accomodating and they didn't mind that I didn't book the Scoopon.

They had been opened for about three years, but no one knew about them as they are on a quiet part of High street.

And they were right. Everything here was homemade and there was no heaviness to the food. Everything is just like what my mum would make at home. Here I had the Builder meal which had pita bread, feta, eggs any way you like, mushrooms and spinach with a lovely tomato relish. This is normally $18.

The eggs were fluffy but bland. Some chives would have been nice. But the tomato relish worked well with it. Normally I don't like relish but this I did not mind.

Then the piccolo was served in a cute little glass and it was very strong. It worked well with the freshly baked biscuits which tasted like gingerbread.

Rating: 18/20- enjoyed the goodness of homemade food and fresh pita bread. You can also buy goods to take home as well.

North East China family

North East China Family has been around for quite some time, but I don't go down that laneway much or that side of the city.

The table-nice and simple

A welcoming note 

So one cold night after Fitclub I wandered in. Here at 7:30pm it was dead quiet but I did not receive food until about 8pm. Which was fine by me as I was happy watching them make the food and the noodles. I remembered reading Sweet and Sour's review and Eat and be merry's review and whilst Ming didn't like it much, Eat and be Merry did. Gastrology hated it for the service.

The service was so-so. The waitress did not smile one bit even though she said she had a fine day today. When one guy asked her about the different oils that they cooked the dumplings in she did not know either.

But personally I really liked it for their handmade noodles with the eggplant sauce ($10). The meal was cheap but filling. The bowl was huge.

On the other hand the Spring onion pancake was not that great. It was really doughy. For $4 I can't complain too much. There was a puddle of oil down the bottom.

Rating: 11/20-not bad. Go there for the noodles though not the spring onion pancake.

Mr Ed

Mr Ed is a café which is focused on Health food. Primarily people all wanted salads at 2:30pm when I came. It is on a tram line and right near Newmarket station. I have seen this place numerous times and a lot of other brunch places popping up all over this place.

Here they have outdoor and indoor seating and some people bring their pets along.

It was almost late afternoon so me and the two girls were keen for cakes and drinks. And drinks it was by the name of flat whites and Phoenix juice for me. I wasn't feeling that great after just getting that monthly thing.

Ginger cake (left) and rocky road (right)

The ginger cake was really good and the rocky road was almost too sweet for me.

The girls enjoyed their flat whites. It looked really good.

We'll be back for sure.