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https://www.theguardian.com/food/2023/dec/20/best-petrol-station-food-places-australia>
"In south-west Sydney, there’s a small diner serving a beef phở so rich it’s
the colour of rendang. Along with the usual sidekicks – bean sprouts, Thai
basil, lemon – it comes with pickled garlic and chilli sauce, both made
in-house. Customers will tell you this is one of the best bowls of phở in
Sydney. The restaurant is called 2 Foodies and if you’ve never heard of it,
that’s probably because it’s hidden between a petrol station and carwash in
Mount Pritchard.
The location of 2 Foodies is unusual, but it isn’t unique. Incredible food can
be found in carwashes, car parks, convenience stores and all kinds of
traditionally less desirable urban Australian locations – you just need to know
where to look.
In a concrete car park in Melbourne’s CBD, Soi 38 doles out Thai street food,
including some of the best boat noodles in the city. In the Gold Coast suburb
of Mermaid Waters, the car park of a 7-Eleven petrol station houses Beun
Modern, a tiny Japanese eatery where you can order a bowl of miso ramen
alongside a Black Angus steak with truffle soy butter.
Increasingly, cheaper frontier locations in Australian cities are being filled
by great chefs, community-focused eateries and creative entrepreneurs. Peter
Nguyen, the owner of 2 Foodies, was already looking for a new restaurant when
he stopped to refuel at a petrol station which had a vacant Subway store
attached. “The place was deserted. I liked that it was a bit unusual and very
quirky,” he says.
That’s not how everyone else thought. His family thought the restaurant would
die there. “I had a bit of doubt too but … I said, if our food is good enough,
they will come.”
It worked. Not just for 2 Foodies but also for Soi 38 and Beun Modern. The
owners of all three restaurants say their customers rarely discover their
restaurants by chance – they’re not petrol station customers or car park users
who happen to be hungry. They’re coming specifically for a meal that’s so good,
it doesn’t matter how far the restaurant is, or that it’s located next to a
clutch of petrol bowsers. Nguyen even has regular customers who drive for more
than an hour to eat his phở."
Share and enjoy,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
