Kazbah Breakfast Banquet

If you haven't been to Kazbah, you're missing out. This place has to be one of the most blogged about restaurants in Sydney, and their breakfast banquet being the main star attraction.

A Moroccan, Middle Eastern theme, the breakfast banquet is available to groups of 8 or more. Their first location on Darling St. in Balmain was such a hit that they recently opened up at Top Ryde City in January and then in February in Darling Harbour.

We're really not this pale, I swear! 

It was my birthday weekend and the only thing I wanted to do was EAT! So I invited a bunch of my diving buddies, some family and family friends along to have breakfast with me to celebrate my quarter century milestone.

There was a small mix up when we arrived for my 10.30am booking at the Darling Harbour restaurant, I'd booked via email but the restaurant didn't have my name down. But they were quick to give us a table, as the next table wasn't arriving until 1pm.

Gaffa drinking Turkish coffee

We started off with drinks: coffees, juices - watermelon and ginger, and pineapple and mint - and water from these funky jugs. Then the eating feast began!

Rice Pudding

Sweet Couscous

Porridge

First course was date and banana porridge with stewed rhubarb, warm rice pudding with saffron poached pear, cinnamon and hazelnuts, and sweet couscous with nuts, dried fruits, stewed rhubarb and warm cardamom milk. Don't be fooled by these starters, go easy and pace yourself because there's loads more food to come. They are all nice starters to line your stomach ready for the main stuff. Mwahahaha!

Brown Sugar

Stewed Rhubard

Cardamom Milk

Next up were the poached, scrambled, and fried eggs on turkish bread, murguez sausages, bacon, roasted tomatoes, hash browns, mushrooms, halloumi, spinach, and baked beans. The only bad thing I have to say is that the poached egg yolks weren't running. I like my yolks runny. The baked beans were a nice surprise with a spicy taste. I didn't try any spinach, why eat greens when there's so much more nicer foods to fill your stomach with!! The roasted tomatoes and hash browns are also yummy, too bad there's only enough for one each.

Tasty tasty food

EGGS!

Then came the tagines: lamb mince, sucuk, feta, spinach, roast capsicum, caramelised onion, roast tomato and egg, and the pumpkin, feta, spinach, roast capsicum, caramelised onion, roast tomato and egg, and one with half half. These are probably my favourite dishes in the banquet. The lamb mince tagine tasted like nachos, and the vegetarian one is just a treat - pumpkin and feta always go nicely together. The eggs in the tagine are runny, and the whole dish is full of flavour.

Vego Tagine

Meat Tagine

Finally for dessert, (incase we were still hungry) there were the pancakes: banana and strawberry with maple syrup and double cream, and chocolate and raspberry with butterscotch sauce and chocolate fudge ice cream. These aren't your usual pancakes, they're the size of your head and almost the thickness of your fist. After all the other food you can only sample a bit of each, but they are worth a taste for sure.

Choc & Raspberry pancake

Banana pancake 

Strawberry pancake

This breakfast is best had over a lazy Saturday or Sunday morning running into the afternoon. Invite some friends along and enjoy the view from the Darling Harbour restaurant. I'm not sure what the lunch or dinner menu is like, but if breakfast is anything to go by, it's well worth the visit.

Gaffa's plate of food

I was so happy that my good friends came along to help me celebrate my birthday. Shrimp Dog and Shrimpette travelled 2.5hrs to Sydney, I was so pleased that they did. But I felt bad because Shrimp Dog is a lactard (lactose intolerant), but still managed to eat abit of everything. Poor Shrimpette had to deal with his tooting all the way home! Fabio and Princess were there too. It was the first time we'd seen them since they told us all the good news of their engagement! The story of how it happened was just so cute. Princess and I share the same birthday but exactly one year apart, and the funny thing is that we both bought each other the same thing. I swear we didn't discuss presents beforehand! Maverick and Quiche were there too. And lucky for them they didn't get a parking ticket even though they were 2 hours over parked. In true diving style, they were filling out their logbooks after breakfast, trying to clock up 60 dives before Gaffa and I head off, so that they can be signed off as Divemasters. I'm so devastated that we probably won't be able to make it back in time for their wedding... :(

Love you guys! 

Our attempt at a silly photo....

And who could forget my family and family friends: Rave, Ms. Tjark, The Banker and Coco (and Spot who couldn't make it because she'd rather rave to RnB music out west than eat breakfast with me :P jokes) It's always great when we get together. Our families became close family friends because of a weird double connection. My mum was moving to Australia and her school friend's sister-in-law was living in Sydney. So since my mum didn't know anyone, she got in contact with her friend's sister-in-law. And weirdly enough the sister-in-law's husband went to to school with my mum... what a small world. And then my parents bought a house 2 streets away from them. They have 3 daughters which are like the sisters I never had, except they're too skinny to share clothes with...

Oh how I miss our Monopoly days!! Let me explain to those that don't know. We went through a phase of playing Monopoly once a week after dinner and drinking Easy Way tea together. Between us we own about 5 or 6 Monopoly boards. Yep, that's not a typo. Original, Disney, Simpsons, Tycoon, City...too many to remember. And at breakfast we got a bit excited about The Banker's news of her new boyfriend, teeheehee. She says he'll be invited to the next Monopoly night... hahaha, better organise one soon then! :P

Coco, me & The Banker

Sorry about my rambling. Back to Kazbah. Nom nom nom... food is good.... Definitely go if you haven't been before, it's worth the $25. But watch out, if you've got over 10 people they charge you a service fee of $3.50 each.

Thanks to Gaffa (& Coco) who took these photos. The DSLR is just awesome, if only i knew how to use it off auto mode...

So, off the topic of food, do you have any weird traditions with your family or friends?