taverna greek psistaria …

who knew there was such a place tucked away in brompton (about 4km out of the cbd).  a few must do because at the moment the restaurant is ranked 8th best out of 20 for ‘north of adelaide’ restaurants on urbanspoon.  not bad for a place that re-opened in february this year.

it’s called taverna greek psistaria on 28a hawker street, brompton.

it took me a while to find a place to park (and that’s probably the only bad thing that i’ll say about this night).  i walked in and the place was packed! i struggled to find the tempting palates group until i was told we were upstairs.

a majority of the group chose the banquet option – a 10, yes 10, course banquet which consisted of:

dips and pita –

dolmades – (parcels made from vine leaves) stuffed with long-grain rice, toasted pine nuts, fresh herbs and seasonings –

whitebait (tiny, immature, silvery members of the herring group that are deep-fried) –

saganaki (fried cheese) –

keftedes (meatballs) –

calamari (batter coated deep fried squid) –

pickled octopus –

greek sausages –

chicken and lamb souvlaki (pieces of meat grilled on a skewer) –

served with sides of:

greek salad –

potatoes –

that is one heck of a banquet! let’s drink to that!

3 of us ordered a souvlaki dish as our main course.  2 of us had the lamb souvlaki –

and the other had the chicken souvlaki –

don’t let these pictures fool you.  that is a lot of food (high on carbs).  i didn’t finish my meal.  what was left over i got to take home as part of my doggy bag.

after all that food, if you can believe it, dessert was next.  the bougatsa (custard parcel) was absolutely delicious –

and so was the baklava –

some dared to have the greek coffee –

i love my coffee but if i had that coffee i would have been jumping off the walls for days after …

this restaurant is family friendly.  there was a mix of old and young out on this night.  there’s seating outside if you wish to dine al fresco.  because we were seated upstairs we weren’t exposed to the ‘busy-ness’ of the place.  but we did have background music to make some of us feel like dancing on the tables.

i didn’t think to take a photo when we were inside (maybe for fear of being told off) so i snuck a photo through the glass outside.  doesn’t the wall decor remind you of santorini?

the bill was brought to us in a glass.  apparently that’s how they do it in greece.  cute.

this tempting palate’s dinner was brought to you by the letter o – opa!

tempting palates’ overall rating score >> tempting palates

“so, what happens is my dad and uncles, they fight over who gets to eat the lamb brain. and then my aunt voula forks the eyeball and chases me around with it, try to get me to eat it, ’cause it’s gonna make me smart. so, you have two cousins, i have 27 first cousins. just 27 first cousins alone! and my whole family is big and loud. and everybody is in each other’s lives and business. all the time! like, you never just have a minute alone, just to think, ’cause we’re always together, just eating, eating, eating! the only other people we know are greeks, ’cause greeks marry greeks to breed more greeks, to be loud breeding greek eaters.” – my big fat greek wedding