Australian Food- Aussie Café

It has been a few weeks since I got out to do one of these, general rainy weather and end of the year stuff has made it a bit hectic so not had chance.

So to Australia now. Australia has a strange place in my psyche, brother Bao lives there and I have never visited for one thing. I find that more and more these days as we are spread around the world that is a familiar regret that us ex-pat types have: there are family members we don’t know very well because of distance. I’m no different, and feel I wish I knew my nephews a bit better.  I’m a honorary uncle to many of my friends’ kids here, and being called “uncle” (su-su) in Chinese is often not about family but as a term of endearment/ friendship. In fact, the day that I got upgraded from waiguoren (foreigner) to su-su by the kids who ride in the elevator, I knew I had been accepted into the fold. A red letter day to be sure. Maybe I’m getting a bit sniffy and nostalgic because of the time of year, or maybe it is common among us people living overseas I dunno.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes Australia. In the late 80’s and early 90’s the TV landscape of the UK was very different.  The kids TV schedule on the BBC after 5pm would run as follows:

Newsround 5-5:10 every day, then typically:

Blue Peter  (Monday and Thursday) 5:10-5:35

Grange Hill  (Tuesday and Friday) 5:10-5:35

And then the same slot on Wednesday was usually a godforsaken drama that was supposed to be serious like Moondial.

5:35-6:00 just before the news was Neighbours. As a young person going into high school around that time, we believed Neighbours to be one of Australia’s premiere exports, and thought it was watched by every household in Australia. I dunno how aware we were of how crap it was, but it had a massive impact on us. I remember one particular episode that showed Jim Robinson and Doug Willis stranded in “the Bush” and after eating mushrooms they were both tripping balls. Hilarious.

ITV was weird because during the 5:10-5:35 slot in some regions Home and Away was shown. In others you had to wait until 6pm. You were unlucky if you lived in a Home and Away at 6pm region, because that means you would miss The Fresh Prince of Bel Air which was shown on BBC2 on Mondays at that time. A simpler time indeed.

Now somewhere in there came a piece of Australian cake making that I’d never eaten until yesterday. I remember that “lamingtons” were often on the menu in Australian soap operas and everybody in the UK was baffled about what they were. The bloke that played Harold Bishop (who was evil in Prisoner Cell Block H) even fielded a question about them when he was a guest on some chat show, that I witnessed. They were a true mystery. So after a 30 year gap, I finally found them in real life.

There are a few Australian places in Taipei, I was going to go to Woolloomooloo but they hadn’t updated their website in a while and it was a bit expensive, plus there was nothing there that actually inspired me. Then I found out about Aussie Café and gave it a shot.

Me and Prof. C who was dining with me, both agreed it was a lovely place. It is themed around Aussie backpacking holidays, which is a bit weird, but kind of made sense. So we got there and realized that unfortunately there was nothing on the menu that the Prof could eat as she has dairy and gluten allergy issue thingies. Real ones too, not the attention seeking kind. That was all OK, as they were able to make a salad that was not on the menu and she had oat milk coffee. All very nice, service excellent and so on.

I had a flat white coffee, I drink a lot of coffee these days and it was good. I had a tuna and mayonnaise pancake, not particularly eventful or Aussie probably, but I was more focused on the main event. Lamingtons.

I have to say, it is nobody’s fault that they weren’t as great as I’d hyped them up to be in my own mind. It was nearly at the same level as when a mate of my brother’s named Bammy had sold the end of the terrible 1985 action film Remo Unarmed and Dangerous  (also known as Remo: The Adventure Begins)  as cinematic genius. The end came and Remo could walk, unconvincingly, on water. The lamingtons came and they were sponge, with coconut outside. They were nice, but not worth a 30 year wait.  The Prof was living vicariously through my eating of chocolate sponge as now she cannot indulge but also commented “Oh, my mum makes those, they’re common in <her non-Australian country’s name here>” .

Bugger.

It is a really nice place, and I would definitely go again. The people are lovely, service is great and worth it if you are in the area. Just don’t hype up cakes in your head for 30 years, it won’t end well.

Menu:

Address: No. 33, Lane 115, Section 2, Zhongshan North Road, Zhongshan District, Taipei City 104

 Best way to get there: It is between Minquan W. Raod and Zhongshan Elementary School MRT stations on the orange line. I went via the elementary school MRT and she went from Minquan- I feel mine was quicker.