The Three Monkeys Coffee and Teahouse, West End

After my Thai meal last night, I went to The Three Monkeys for cake.  The Three Monkeys is a reliable destination for such an indulgence.  The cake is always of a very high standard.  This makes me wonder how the Three Monkeys, and similar cafes and bakeries can make cake so good.  I'm no slouch when it comes to baking, but it is only on rare occasions that my cakes can even begin to compare with The Three Monkeys and others.  This time I ordered a slice of mud cake.  Cream was complimentary, but ice-cream cost extra.  If I had my time again, I would have forked out the $1.45 for the ice-cream, but I didn't.  Despite this, the cake was almost exactly what I was expecting.  It was dense, moist, and rich and the cream worked well as an accompaniment.  Sometimes, cake is served with an insufficient amount of cream to blend with each bite of cake.  This was not the case on this occasion.  The other potential pitfall when ordering a rich cake, such as a mud cake, is that the icing can be unnecessarily richer than the rest of the cake.  However, this time, the icing was just about right, and was consequently a very satisfying conclusion to an evening out.

Thai Patcharin, West End

Prior to last night my last Thai dining experience was a positive one and as a result I wanted to try other Thai restaurants.  This, coupled with the fact that Thai Patcharin is directly on my route home from work, was my reason for dining at this restaurant last night.  I perused the menu and there were a few dishes that seemed appealing to me, but I decided to go with what I know and ordered the beef massaman with satay chicken skewers as an entree.  I am consistently amazed that a dish as simple as satay chicken skewers can have so many different interpretations, and I was very happy with Thai Patcharin's take.  First of all, the entree consisted of four skewers, when two is usually the norm.  Under regular circumstances, four skewers would have been too much for me (unless I was particularly hungry), but I was dining with a friend, so we shared them.  The chicken was cooked really well, possibly the best I've encountered in such a preparation.  Had I sampled the satay sauce on its own, I might have thought it to be slightly sweeter than I would like, but it was used sparingly and complimented the chicken nicely.  As for the main dish, my first concern was that the menu described the massaman as containing onions (something I tend to avoid whenever I can).  However when I asked for the meal to be served without onions, I was pleased that the waitress indulged my eccentricity.  When the massaman arrived I noticed that the chunks of potatoes were on the large side.  In my experience, sometimes this is an indication that they are not thoroughly cooked all the way through.  However, I was wrong, and the potatoes were cooked very well, and the flavour of the potatoes managed to assert itself and mixed with the massaman sauce in quite a satisfactory fashion.  The sauce itself was a little on the thin side and I would have appreciated some dipping bread to accompany it.  However, Thai Patcharin offer no such bread.  The flavour was good, but I would have liked it a little spicier; in fact it wasn't spicy at all, but I suppose proprietors of South-East Asian restaurants have to accommodate the Australian palate.  The beef was of a good level of tenderness; I've had more tender beef massaman dishes, but I'm not complaining.  While this was not a perfect beef massaman, it was worth sampling.

Wordsmiths - The Writer's Cafe, University of Queensland, St Lucia

On Monday, I felt like treating myself, so I went for all day breakfast after work at Wordsmiths, the largest cafe at the University of Queensland.  I have previously mentioned in this blog that I am a big fan of the concept of all day breakfast.  Wordsmiths are a little unusual with their all day breakfast.  They offer breakfast options up until 10am.  After this time, there is just one all day breakfast option.  This is a little unusual because their all day breakfast is not all that dissimilar from their pre-10am offerings.  I don't understand why I can get their all day breakfast, which contains bacon and eggs at any time of the day, but I can't get a bacon and egg roll after 10am.  This was not a major issue on this occasion as I was content to order their all day breakfast.  Wordsmiths all day breakfast consists of bacon, fried eggs, hash browns, toast, and onion rings.  I know of no other cafe that includes onion rings in their breakfast menu.  However, I don't like onion rings, so I went without.  I do like the fact that hash browns are a breakfast consideration at Wordsmiths.  Many breakfast places offer hash browns, but not all of them, and always appreciate them as a breakfast option.  Wordsmiths hash browns are possibly the thickest and crumbliest that I've encountered.  This is neither a positive nor a negative, merely an observation.  Anyway, the hash browns were fine.  When my meal arrived, the first thing I noticed was that there were four slices of toast, when I was really only expecting just the regular two.  The toast was made from nice Turkish bread, and I honestly would have been contented with Tip Top white bread, so this was a nice touch.  The were two problems associated with the toast, however, and these both related to the butter.  First, instead of coming pre-buttered as much cafe toast does, Wordsmiths toast is accompanied by those single-serve tubs of butter.  This is not necessarily a bad thing, but the butter did not come at room temperature, so I had to wait for it to melt into the toast before I could spread it.  This is a pet peeve of mine.  If you own or work at any sort of eatery that serves butter, the butter should come at a spreadable temperature.  Second, there was not enough butter for the four pieces of toast.  I know I could have asked for more butter, so I can't really complain.  The eggs were fine.  Some cafes have perfected the art of frying eggs.  It appears that Wordsmiths is not one of these cafes.  However, the eggs were cooked to the quality I was expecting from a cafe, so again, I can't complain.  As for the bacon:  I asked for it to be crispier than usual, as is my liking.  I suppose there is a skill to frying bacon to an optimum level of crispiness (lord knows I don't do it well).  However, whoever fried this bacon had not mastered this skill.  Parts of the bacon were about right.  Whereas other parts of the bacon were more tough than crispy, which made cutting it with a bread and butter knife difficult, but overall, it wasn't too bad.  I think one more thing that is worth mentioning is that bacon, eggs, hash browns, and toast is a lot of food:  so much so that I had to take the toast off the plate so I could perform the necessary mechanics of cutting up and eating the other elements of the dish.  Finally, I had a pot of tea with my meal.  It was proper leaf tea and the pot contained a good three cups worth.  However, by the time I got to the third cup, it had drawn to a point that it became too bitter to enjoy, owing to the amount of time needed to tackle the mountain of food that was in front of me.  On the whole, this was a less than excellent, but still reasonable all day breakfast that minor changes could have made noticeably better.

Lefka's Taverna, West End

Lefka's Taverna is a Greek restaurant very close to my house.  It is not usually my first choice destination for food in West End, but I went there yesterday for dinner because it was convenient.  At first I was planning on dining in, but when I discovered that their takeaway food was significantly cheaper, I opted for takeaway.  I ordered fish and chips.  I wasn't sure what to expect as I don't normally associate fish and chips with Greek cuisine, and I seemed to recall that their chips weren't excellent.  My reservation continued as I watched them grill the fish:  it didn't look particularly appetising.  Anyway, when I finally got my meal home, I was pleased.  The chips looked quite good and were seasoned with what appeared to be barbecue salt, but not actual salt (I believed I have expressed my feelings towards chips and salt previously in this blog).  This fish also looked a lot better than it appeared as it was being cooked.  As for the taste, everything tasted as good as it looked.  Either my memory of what their chips were like was faulty, or they've changed how they prepare the chips.  Either way, they were good chips, certainly not excellent, but up there as far as takeaway chips are concerned, and their were plenty of them.  The fish was some sort of white fish, perhaps cod, I'm not sure though.  It was coated with herbs, and although technically speaking, it wasn't battered, but there was a thin film of something coating the fillet, which I liked.  It tasted fine, but did require a little bit of salt, but that's not unusual for takeaway fish.  Overall, this meal was definitely better than I was expecting, and although it was by no means gourmet, it was a good culinary investment at $10 or so.  Anyway, this experience has renewed my faith in Lefka's, and if I'm ever in the mood for fish and chips, I will likely consider this Taverna.

As I side note, I also took home some halva.  I don't know if they make the halva themselves or if they get it from somewhere else, but it was a completely standard halva, which is a good thing.

Merlo Coffee, University of Queensland, St Lucia

As mentioned in the previous post, On a Roll Bakery is shut this week which has forced me to consider other options for my work break snacks.  Yesterday I was at UQ too early for U-Sushi (and indeed a lot of other food outlets) to be open.  I eventually came across Merlo Coffee, where I have had tea and coffee on a number of occasions, but I can't recall ever sampling the food.  In my experience the food has always looked and priced to be of high quality.  Yesterday I was pleased to see a ham and cheese croissant sitting in their display case.  I ordered this and made my way to work.  When my break time arrived I was looking forward to this croissant, and all that I can say after eating it is that it was average.  It was soft.  Most croissants are soft, but this was particularly soft, but not too soft.  The croissant itself lacked the slight sweetness I have come to expect in a croissant.  The ham, standard but not bad, and the cheese, which for some reason I expected to be Swiss, turned out to be regular, block cheese.  However, a standard ham and cheese croissant is not a bad thing and it filled a hole.

U-Sushi, University of Queensland, St Lucia

On Monday I arrived at work expecting to pick up my usual bacon and cheese sausage roll from On a Roll Bakery.  To my dismay I discovered that it was shut for a week due to renovations.  I searched around looking for something simple I could enjoy on my break and finally arrived at U-Sushi.  I have only had sushi a couple of times before and am not I entirely sure why:  I have no fundamental objection to the concept of raw fish.  Anyway, I looked at the various types of sushi available and settled upon two salmon and cream cheese sushis (how do you pluralise sushi?).  When the time came I ate my sushi.  I was pleasantly surprised.  There was nothing I did not like on the sushi, just rice, seaweed, cream cheese and salmon which are fairly basic flavours, but when I bit into it I was not expecting it to be so tasty.  I did make use of the included little plastic fish with soy sauce in them, but even without it there was a good amount of flavour.  A note on those little plastic fish things:  I think they're great.  They dispense soy sauce one drop of a time and this really allows you to control the amount of soy sauce on your sushi (or whatever).  I enjoyed this sushi so much that I returned there today, and this time ordered satay chicken.  I have never heard of satay chicken sushi before, but then again as I have previously admitted am not a sushi expert.  This was also a pleasant experience, perhaps not as good as the salmon and cream cheese but still satisfying.  The satay sauce was a little on the sweet side, which is not how I prefer my satay sauce, but it wasn't too sweet.  The use of soy sauce here really offset this though.  The chicken was crumbed which could have been great.  There was a small amount of the chicken sticking out of the sushi, which, when bitten into was crunchy.  However, the chicken inside the sushi was rendered soggier.  This was not a bad thing, but had the chicken maintained its crunchiness it would have been noticeably better.  What I can take away from these experiences is that U-Sushi has made me a believer in sushi and I am likely to partake of it more often in the future.

Physiol Eatery and Cafe, University of Queensland, St Lucia

Last Thursday I had a dagwood dog from UQ's Physiol Eatery and Cafe.  The purpose of this blog is to evaluate food prepared by various eateries, not food that they merely provide:  a meat pie from 7-11 does not count.  This being the case, I am not sure if my dagwood dog qualifies as I am unsure who prepared it.  Do Physiol make their own dagwood dogs, or do they just heat up dagwood dogs made elsewhere?  I don't know, but I suspect the latter as this dagwood dog seemed to me to be too perfectly shaped to be homemade.  Nevertheless, I'll review it.  The only thing that could be said about it was that it was a standard dagwood dog.  Perhaps the only other thing worth mentioning is that it didn't automatically come with tomato sauce.  You had to get your own little sachet of tomato sauce and apply it yourself.  I liked this as it put me in control of my own sauce distribution.  Sometimes, when you order a dagwood dog you regret your decision seconds after biting into it.  This was not the case on this occasion and it was more filling than I was expecting.  That's about it.

Roast and Toast, Toowong Village Shopping Centre, Toowong

The Tuesday before last I found myself in Toowong.  I had a hankering for a roast turkey sandwich so I went to Roast and Toast, the obligatory carvery in the Toowong Village food court.  Hardly to my surprise I discovered that they did not serve roast turkey, so I perused their other offerings.  The most attractive looking thing to me at the time was a pork sausage, which came on a roll.  I placed my order and got a little surprised as the guy made it.  I was expecting a hot dog type roll, but instead saw a hamburger style roll.  I was worried that this type of roll would not be the best vessel for my sausage.  However, the guy cut the sausage into several pieces, so it fitted into the roll quite well.  He asked me if I wanted gravy, which I did.  Then he asked me if I wanted salt and pepper.  I was not expecting this question and replied that I wanted both.  Had I thought about it, I probably would have said no, because normally I think sausages are salty enough on their own.  However, I'm glad I didn't because the salt and pepper really complimented the sausage quite well.  The sausage itself was fine:  certainly not the best pork sausage ever, but far from poor.  The gravy was exactly the sort of gravy that every carvery in the country serves; not as good as the kind you'd get at a restaurant or even a pub, but better than gravox (and I like gravox).  Overall, this was about as good a pork sausage on a roll from a shopping centre carvery you could get.

Donini's Pizza, West End

Most of last week, I was planning on going to Pizza Capers for dinner on Friday night.  I like Pizza Capers because it offers the convenience of Pizza Hut or Domino's except that the pizzas are actually good and I don't mind paying extra for them.  On Thursday however, I happened to be walking down Boundary Street and discovered that the old Pizza Capers is now a Donini's Pizza.  I picked up a menu and examined it.  Many of the pizzas looked to be much the same as those that Pizza Capers used to offer, but there were some new and interesting additions to the menu including a bacon and egg pizza.  I love bacon and egg pizzas and wish that more pizza places would offer them.  However on this occasion I passed up on the opportunity to have a bacon and egg pizza in favour of a more traditional pepperoni pizza with anchovies.  Not much can be said about this pizza.  It was a standard, albeit quality offering.  The pepperoni was tasty and plentiful.  The sauce was particularly "tomato-y", but not overly so.  The cheese was tasty and served the purpose of binding the dish together in such a manner than when I bit into a slice not all of the toppings came off at once.  The anchovies were good as usual but there was barely one anchovy per slice.  However I was expecting this.  Overall this pizza was virtually indistinguishable from what one would get from Pizza Capers, but in this instance this was a good thing.  I am likely to sample Donini's other offerings in the future.

Physiol Eatery and Cafe, University of Queensland, St Lucia

Yesterday, I went to Physiol Eatery and Cafe (the University of Queensland's second refectory) on my break from work.  The one thing I like about this refectory is that unlike the Main Course Food Precinct, Physiol often stocks ready made sandwiches of the ham and cheese variety.  It was this that I was hoping to find on my visit.  I was in luck and purchased my ham and cheese sandwich and happily sat down to eat it.  There is really nothing spectacular about this sandwich:  it is exactly the sort you would expect to find at an Australian university refectory:  ham, cheese, butter and wholemeal bread.  Would I have preferred butcher quality ham off the bone with Swiss cheese and mustard on sourdough?  Yes.  Was I unsatisfied with this sandwich?  No.  Sometimes a simple ham and cheese sandwich is all you want.

On a Roll Bakery, University of Queensland, St Lucia

This evening I had a pepper steak pie that I bought from On a Roll Bakery.  I have described pies from this bakery in the blog before, and this pie was much the same.  It is noteworthy that the pie was spicier than you'd think the Australian palate could handle, which I certainly appreciated.  I have also expressed in this blog my suspicions that On a Roll are not baking their own pies.  Tonight my suspicions were confirmed.  After eating the pie, I decided to check out the website written on the pie tin:  www.gottalovealorries.com.au.  After doing so, I discovered that On a Roll are sourcing their pies, and perhaps even my beloved bacon and cheese sausage rolls from a company called "Lorrie's".



It's not that big a deal because all I'm interested in is taste.  But there I was all these however many years thinking that the bakers at On a Roll Baker are a talented lot and admired them for their creative pie menu, when all along these products were in fact the work of Lorrie's.  So the moral of the story is your local baker may not in fact be the actual baker of their products, and that if you happen to come across a bakery to which Lorrie's provides their wares, you will probably find good quality pies.

Little Malaysia, West End

Last Friday for my traditional end of the week dinner went to Little Malaysia.  This is a good establishment in my opinion.  They serve a variety of tasty food, with good portions at competitive prices.  I had been looking forward to this meal for the latter part of the week and when Friday came around I was unsure of what I wanted to order.  I was tossing up between Beef Massaman (my usual dish at Little Malaysia) and Beef Rendang.  I have had the Beef Rendang there once and couldn't quite remember what it was like, other than I liked it.  So I decided to try it again.  It usually comes with coconut rice but I passed this up in favour of Roti.  When the dish arrived I thought for a second that I might have made a mistake because it smelled more heavily of coconut than I would have liked.  However, when I first tasted the Rendang I was very pleased with my decision.  I can't really describe the flavour other than that it made its presence very well known, which I appreciated.  The only critique of the flavour that I could offer is that I would prefer it to be spicier.  But other than that, the melange of strong flavours worked extremely well.  Another shortcoming of the dish that I could point out is that the beef itself could have been more tender.  It was by no means tough, but the beef in Little Malaysia's Beef Massaman is more tender.  However, this mild lack of tenderness was more than compensated for by the taste.  The Roti was your standard roti; a good dipping bread (something I really like), but not as good as, say naan, at soaking up the sauce.  One day I'll try something a little different from this restaurant, but based on the strength of their Beef Massaman and this Beef Rendang, this might be a difficult decision to make.

Swiss Gourmet Delicatessen, West End

Last Thursday I had some errands to run in West End and I felt like something light to eat, so I paid a visit to the Swiss Gourmet Delicatessen hoping to get a sandwich or something of that ilk.  I spent a long time looking at the menu because there were so many different combinations of fillings to choose from and wasn't quite sure what I felt like.  I finally decided to have toasted salami and cheddar on a plain focaccia roll.  The focaccia was of good quality and well toasted:  slightly crisp, yet soft.  The cheese and salami were good too:  afterall this is a gourmet deli.  There's really not much more to report.  I had a good toasted salami and cheese sandwich, but at the end of the day, it was just a toasted salami and cheese sandwich.

Top In Town Indian, West End

The Saturday before last I had dinner at Top In Town Indian in West End.  Top In Town is one of the two casual Indian restaurants in West End.  Naturally, it is not as good as a typical a la carte, table service restaurant, but it still provides quality food at reasonable prices.  What is interesting about this particular Top In Town (which is a chain) is that there is no set menu, so customers are left with the whims of the chef on any given day.  I have been there a number of times and on each of those occasions there has been a curry that they call "Chicken 65".  I don't know where that name came from but it was my reason for dining at Top In Town that day.  Chicken 65 is a dry curry, which is something that I normally avoid as I consider one of the joys of Indian cuisine to be dipping bread in the sauce.  However, Chicken 65 makes up for this with its great flavours.  Usually, Chicken 65 is red in colour, but on this day it was yellow.  This had me concerned that they had changed the recipe, but I ordered it anyway.  At Top In Town they serve the food on trays, which are sectioned off; one section for rice and other sections for each curry ordered (one of the appeals of Top In Town is that one can order up to three combinations of curry).  Anyway, it seemed to me that the amount of curry I was served was poxy, so I asked for another serve.  I soon discovered that the section of the tray that carries the curry is actually deceptively large, and I was left more food than I could eat in one sitting.  This wasn't necessarily a bad thing, as there were enough leftovers to furnish me with a satisfying dinner a couple of nights later.  As for the curry itself, my concerns about the unusual colour were assuaged when I experienced the taste I have come to expect from Chicken 65.  If anything, it might have been a little bit more spicy than usual.  This was by no means a bad thing.  Chicken 65 is a tangy, spicy curry that delivers big time in terms of flavour.  It also has the welcome property that the flavours of the curry manage to permeate the rice, despite it being a dry curry.  While I have had mixed experiences with other curries served by Top In Town, Chicken 65 is possibly the best cheap meal one can get in my neighbourhood.

Viet Hoa Restaurant, West End

Last Saturday was my birthday so I met with some friends in West End for lunch.  We had not made any specific plans other than to go wherever we felt like on the day.  So when the day came I happened to be feeling like Chinese food, so we decided to go to Viet Hoa, one of the many Vietnamese/Chinese restaurants in West End.  I had been there once or twice before and found it to be comparable to its numerous competitors.  When we got there I felt like something spicy and was disappointed to find no Szechuan dishes on the menu, so I settled on pepper beef with mushrooms, and prawn toast as an entree.  The prawn toast was really quite good.  I'm struggling to think of a time when I have had prawn toast that was as "prawny" as this.  When the pepper beef came, I noticed a distinct lack of mushrooms.  This normally wouldn't be a problem, but the menu specifically stated pepper beef with mushrooms, and I like mushrooms.  There was plenty of bok choy as well as some baby corn.  As for the beef, it had a good level of pepper, but unfortunately lacked any deeper flavours, but was tender and quite palatable.  Anyway, at some point during my meal, I found a small cockroach on one of my pieces of beef.  I think that the proprietors of Viet Hoa should consider themselves lucky.  I could have chucked up a big stink about this, but that's not my nature and to be honest as long as my food tastes OK and doesn't make me sick, I really don't care.  When I pointed out the cockroach to the waitress I felt she was not as apologetic as you would expect in such a situation, but that didn't bother me, as I did not have to pay for my dish.  So for my troubles, I got some great prawn toast, a lackluster pepper beef (supposedly with mushrooms)....... and a cockroach.

A Salt and Batter, St Lucia

A Salt and Batter is a fish and chip shop that I have been wanting to try for some time.  It has a reputation as a "high end" fish and chip shop.  The prices and decor are certainly not high end, but as I was soon to learn, the food is.  So, two Thursdays ago I went there and ordered battered cod, a potato scallop, and chips; my go to order whenever having fish and chips.  When my meal arrived, it looked great.  Usually at fish and chips shops, the batter on the fish and scallops look a little uneven and broken:  not so on this occasion.  The chips weren't as thick as I was expecting, but this was not a shortcoming as they were great and there were plenty of them.  Most chips are great, but these were particularly great.  The potato scallop was probably as close to a "gourmet" potato scallop as you'll ever find.  The batter on the fish was a very good level of crispy, yet light and not overdone.  It was also sturdy enough to keep the fish together while eating it.  I've had a lot of battered fish over the years and this is not an easy thing to accomplish, so it was very much appreciated.  As good as this meal was, there was a minor, yet notable flaw.  It did not come with salt.  In my opinion, whenever you order chips from anywhere, it should be assumed that they come with salt.  At the very least, they should ask if you want salt.  The onus should be on the person who doesn't want salt to say so. Anyway, when my meal came and I noticed there was no salt, I asked for some salt and vinegar.  I was expecting to get a salt shaker and a bottle of vinegar.  Instead I got these two, small, plastic tubs with salt and vinegar in them.  This made it very difficult to evenly season my meal.  Some parts were too salty, and others lacked flavour.  If A Salt and Batter could solve this salt and vinegar situation (which to me, is an intrinsic part of the fish and chip experience), I would say it's about as good a fish and chip shop as you can get.

Hakataya Ramen, Myer Centre, Brisbane City

I have been wanting to try ramen ever since seeing the movie Tampopo.  That was in high school.  I don't know why I've never had ramen since.  Anyway, a friend of mine has been raving about this ramen place in the city for some time.  Two Tuesdays ago I had a day off and decided to finally try this place.  I met my friend at Hakataya Ramen, and never having partaken of ramen before deferred to his recommendation that I try Char Siu-Men (Japanese pork noodle soup with extra pork).  I was in the mood for one of the spicier dishes but trusted my friend's judgement.  When my meal arrived I was disappointed.  This was not because it tasted bad, but because it was virtually indistinguishable from the pork noodle soups that I have had at Chinese and Vietnamese restaurants over the years.   For some reason I had it in my head that there was something unique about ramen that separated it from other Asian noodle soups.  Now that I know this is not the case, let me explain my dining experience.  It was a standard pork noodle soup:  noodles, pork, and broth.  It's pretty hard to go wrong with such a combination, and this occasion was no different.  The bar at which we were seated was supplied with chilli oil and powder.  I took advantage of this, but was not really certain how much of these condiments to add my dish, so I erred on the side of caution.  Consequently, my dish wasn't as spicy as I would have liked, but that was preferable to ruining the meal with excess chilli.
It also came with a small tub of what looked like seaweed to me.  My friend explained that it was used to cleanse one's palate.  I'm skeptical of its palate cleansing properties, but whatever it was, it was tasty.  Overall, this was a good meal, but as previously mentioned, I was hoping for something I've never had before.  On a side-note, the plastic spoon they provided me with was a little sharp and I got a slight cut on my lip.  This wasn't a big deal until afterwards when I had a ginger beer which really stung this cut.

Nando's, West End

I recently discovered that Nando's do burgers, so two Sundays ago I decided to try one.  I ordered the classic chicken burger,which is chicken, lettuce, tomato, and mayonnaise (I ordered it without the tomato though).  When I placed my order the guy asked me how hot I wanted my perri perri sauce. This took me slightly aback as I thought that the classic chicken burger had no perri perri sauce. Anyway, I asked for it hot.  When my burger arrived some of the perri perri sauce spilled onto my finger.  When I licked it off I got a surprise.  It was a lot hotter than I was expecting and I began to regret my decision.  However, when I bit into the burger it was a lot less spicy.  It had a decent level of spiciness but not overly so.  The most notable thing about this burger was that the perri perri sauce really overpowered the mayonnaise.  This was a slight shame as I was not anticipating perri perri sauce in the first place and was expecting mayonnaise.  Having said this, the perri perri sauce was quite tasty, just not what I was hoping for.  Another thing I noticed about this burger was that the sauces were somewhat unevenly distributed.  Some mouthfuls were spicier than others.  Some were tangier, and some were sweeter.  The chicken itself was generally good but a little tougher than I would like in some places.  This is only a minor quibble though.  Finally, after the burger was gone, the flavours lingered on my palate for quite a while: a welcome conclusion to a reasonable burger.