The French House, Dank Street, Waterloo, 17/02/13

Sacre Bleu!

They say looks can be deceiving but 'The French brothel House' is more deceptive than Eddie Obeid on holidays in The Hunter.

Teasing us with her seductive setting amid uber-urban chic Dank Street, and shaelessly boasting of her outrageous feaux French Imperial decor, this Gaalic concubine lady promised nostalgic cuisine from the Continent but failed to deliver on all levels.

The lowlights included:

*  A ridiculous system (and that's a generous term) of ordering, paying and delivering the meals. Not even the staff knew how it worked.

*  Staff who were as slow as a bowl of escargots (and I mean already cooked!).

*  Argumentative, humourless and inexperienced staff.

* Ghastly coffee.

The food, well,.... indescribably bad. If our readers can bear it, try reading our individual comments below:

BRAD:  I thought I'd be safe and have the French toast. Well, it was a stodgy, chewy, flavourless flour-based concotion of some form but forensically impossible to identify.

SAL:

ANDREW: I'm so sorry!

And in a fitting postscript to our morning. We couldn't even escape this nightmare after we had setlled l'addition because the heavens opened with appropriate apocalyptic force and poured flooding curses upon this abomination of Sydney eateries. It was worth getting drenched just to get out of this place. (Brad: Come to think of it, I should have used the French Toast as a bouyancy vest to flaot to the car. Tht's all it is good for!)

Never again.

OVERALL SCORE:  1 (soppy) Egg

Tapeo, Redfern, 10/02/13

Another wet summer Saturday morning - and this day found us in Redfern at Tapeo.

Six of us this morning and plenty of chat, from politics and art to religion and internet dating. Lots of laughs today.

The Coffee was good and the food was okay - something went wrong in the kitchen though the staff were being reprimanded for something which made for some tension - coffee spilling etc.

We were all enjoying each others company today though so the tension didn't spoil our fun.

I can't remember but I think we had full marks for the Quiz which we almost forgot and it happened very quickly at the end of brunch.

Sal:  2.5 eggs the ambience was ruined by the cranky owner and it was cold - food was okay but  not one I'd rush back to

Andy: Good company, so happy to be reunited with Susan Jane and Ian Powell (long time since he came to brunch). Thought Brad's reaction to having coffee spilt on him by a totally oblivous waiter was completely hilarious & worth the price of admission alone. 3 Eggs

Brad: Can't talk now, too busy trying to get the coffee stains out of my pants!