The menu reads: “hemingway’s manly is a small bar and casual dining spot with it’s tongue planted firmly in your cheek… He (chef Ben Pichon) wishes to acknowledge his influences: the colonel, mr. mcdonald, school canteens, ikea hot dogs & carnivals across the globe.”

If there’s one thing I appreciate in any human being it’s a sense of humour. I just cannot bond with you unless you have one. So when I read the above line about the chef’s influences at Hemingway’s in Manly I was tickled pink and had to laugh. It also made me settle right in.

It’s a menu housed in a book, a volume of “Collier’s Junior Classic: Harvest of Holidays” to be exact. The liquor and food are earmarked and the pages feature a neat selection of eight entrees, seven mains and three desserts. There are spins on childhood classics such as “chip degustation”, “2 minute noodles” and “pb &j”. Cocktails features Cottee’s lime cordial and aeroplane jelly and there are drinks from Passion Pop to “rap-video-level champagne” while bar snacks include chip buttys.

Open for eight weeks already Hemingway sits right on the beach facing the water so it’s at a scenic location. Downstairs is the bar which is already abuzz at 7pm on a Saturday night. Upstairs is the restaurant, still noisy, where Louise and Viggo are waiting for us. There’s a warm, homey and quirky atmosphere and black and white pictures of Ernest Hemingway line the walls including a picture of him and his cats. And why Hemingway’s? Did Ernest Hemingway have a bent towards Antipodean childhood food? No, it’s because the three owners admire Hemingway’s lifestyle-he drank, he loved women, he survived two plane crashes and he was a very masculine sort of guy.

‘c o r n ’ charred sweet corn cob, lime butter & manchego cheese $6

We enjoy dining out with Louise and Viggo because they are also of the same thinking-try as much as possible and share. So we go a little wild with the dishes which the waitress explains are meant to be playful and shared. The kitchen is very organised and all of our entrees come within a few minutes of each other. The corn comes as two corn cobettes blanketed with tangy, rich manchego cheese and rolled all over with a delectable lime butter. The corn has just the right amount of char and yet the kernels are still plump and soft and the manchego cheese and lime butter give it a tangyness to offset the sweetness of the corn. If you are a corn freak like I am, order one plate for yourself because it will hurt giving your other half the remainder.

‘c h i p s ’ daily chip degustation, matching sauces $12

How could anyone resist the chip degustation and from watching the other tables, it looks like this is a popular order. Here there are three types of chips (which can change daily) paired with three types of sauces. Today the chips are potato chips, sweet potato chips and onion rings and the three sauces are a tomato & date, home made ranch and a home made bbq sauce. The potato chips that come in a cup are home made and more of a softer wedge variety and aren’t super crisp although they aren’t bad, the sweet potato chips have some soft edges but the onion rings are juuust right. The three sauces are excellent and cover the spectrum of tastes and it’s hard to choose a favourite although the garlicky ranch dressing is a favourite as is the bbq. Louise and Viggo note that the sauces have improved from their first visit here when it first opened.

‘ s c h o o l’ crispy school prawns, green tea salt, citrus mayo $9

I make fast work of the school prawns which come well seasoned, fried and crispy. They’re moreish little buggers and I like the slightly different green tea salt and citrus mayonnaise on the side.

‘ t i n n e d f i s h ’ salmon ceviche, angostura bitters, avocado $12

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Sometimes you ring a restaurant and are told “No need to book, just come in”. Then you come in and the place is so busy there is not a single table free for another hour and you wished you had insisted that you had booked. Sometimes, if you are lucky, your Plan B ends up being better than your Plan A. This was luckily one of those cases.

I was meeting my darling friend The Second Wife and we exited the place of Plan A when we told that there wouldn’t be a table for the rest of the afternoon. So when we were left without a Plan B The Second Wife, in her infinite wisdom suggested The Norfolk. The magic words? “They have awesome soft tacos”. Now I need to admit one thing, I’m not a pub girl – a pug girl perhaps but not a pub girl. My low tolerance towards alcohol means that nursing three glasses of sparkling mineral water while everyone gets progressively happier isn’t my idea of good fun. However that said, beer or wine can be very happily substituted with good food.

We’re standing at the bar and it is 3:30pm. We’ve only had a lemon tart between the two of us and of course this leads to some crazy ordering.

“Let’s just get each of the tacos!!”

“OMG sliders!”

“Chicken wings! Do you like wings? I looove wings!”

“Ceviche-yum! I looove ceviche. Let’s just get one of everything!”

and in unison

“DEEP FRIED PICKLES!!!”

The menu has bar snacks and mains but even to our hunger crazed eyes the bar snacks look more interesting. The main menu has items like schnitzel, fish and chips, a burger, linguine an smoked trout salad. The bar snacks menu has more Mexican and North American fare. Also, it turns out that just yelling out every item in the menu won’t net you everything so I would suggest ordering in a calm, efficient manner as I realised that we didn’t get the chicken wings…

“This place used to be so dodgy” the Second Wife whispers to me. “We came here drunk with a bottle of wine and we just drank that here and nobody cared” she giggles “this was pre zhushing”. It certainly has changed and we make our way to the sun drenched courtyard where Surry Hills folk frolic and play musical tables and chairs. Zhushing involves Thomas Lim, ex of Tetsuya’s taking control of the pub menu and revamping it.

Ribena $4

I told you I’m a tee totaller didn’t I? Well I am when I’m driving as I’ve got a 0 alcohol limit and I’m too in love with my license to risk it. So Ribena with sparkling mineral water it is for me

Deep fried pickles with ranch dipping sauce $7.50

Now if anyone said to me that deep fried pickles were a) a good idea or b) so damn good you’d forget your diet instantly then I wouldn’t have believed them. But here they are in all of the deep fried glory, a spongy crispy golden batter on the outside and a pickle inside with a ranch dipping sauce. The Second Wife nails the description after just one bite “It’s like a fillet o’ fish but better.”

Fish taco $5.50 each

Tacos can be bought for 4 for $20 and come in five different iterations with pork, fish, chicken, beef and vegetarian. Beef is not available currently though so we settle for two of our favourite: the fish tacos. Having had fish tacos both here and overseas some have contained deep fried fish and some haven’t. These marinated grilled whiting pieces have an anchiote chilli paste, lettuce, pico de gallo and of course the lime wedge that all of them come with. It is packed full of flavour.

Pork taco $5.50

The pork taco has braised pork beck, onions, cabbage, apple, mojo verde sauce and coriander and although nice enough, it didn’t really appeal to me as much as the fish or chicken tacos.

Chicken taco $5.50

The chicken taco is delicious with grilled juicy chicken thigh, red onion, guacamole, lettuce, chipotle mayo (love this stuff!) and cucumber. It is my favourite along with the fish taco as it had a great balance of flavours.

Vegetable taco $5.50

The vegetable taco is tasty with fried mushrooms, braised red cabbage, almond pico de gallo and pickled cucumber which all helped to give the taco a robust flavour.

Salt N Pepa Squid with Jalapeno aioli $14

The salt and pepper squid is a generously portioned dish and the squid is tender and lightly battered but there is an absence of both salt and pepper so we dunk it in the hot sauce and the jalapeno aioli which reminds me of a tartare sauce.

BBQ’d sweet corn with chipotle mayo, queso cheese and lime $5.50

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I recently asked a question of my readers that read “have you ever toyed with or have become a vegetarian or vegan?” and I was amused to read that a couple of readers had but that a cheeseburger was the item that they clearly remembered had broken their resolve. It’s understandable really – a good burger is hard to resist and I rarely do. This afternoon we were in need of a burger and I had heard that there was a Hamburger place that had been churning out delicious old skool burgers since 1957.

I admit I don’t visit the Shire very often. So much so that I tweeted “Going to the shire…I don’t venture there often!” and people tweeted back things such as “Good luck with that!” ( @fionalaughton) and “Make sure you get your vaccinations first!”(@TudorGrrrl) and “got your passport?” (@vitav). Then there were people that grew up there like @OohLookBel and @pathologic_kt.

Paul’s Famous Hamburgers is located on the Princes Highway in Sylvania and if you’re coming by car, it’s slightly tricky to get to in that there’s only a short merging space so if you miss the merge, you can turn left at a later stage and loop back around. Inside, it’s pure retro with the painted text menu with a list of variations but essentially it’s what you add what you want to the beef burger i.e. egg, bacon, cheese and pineapple. All burgers comes with tomato, lettuce, sauce and onion. As for the thoroughly Australian addition of sliced beetroot? You have to specifically ask for that.

They’re all made and assembled fresh to order and there’s also traditional milk bar milkshakes as well as their equally as famous Pineapple Crush drink. On a wall and outside there are plenty of framed newspaper clippings acclaiming these as the best burgers in Sydney. We decide to split some burgers and grab a 2 litre bottle of the Pineapple Crush ($6.50) from the small fridge on the counter. They give us 4 cups for the drinks even though we’ve only ordered 2 burgers to split among us which is nice and the servings are enormous. If you put the burger next to those incredible shrinking burgers of the well known burger chains, it would dwarf them.

Hamburger with The Works $7.20

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