Two Sticks

After an amazing eating experience at Lost Heaven in Shanghai, I arrived home hoping Yunnanese food would be Sydney’s next big thing. Enter Two Sticks: a small, fast-paced eatery housed under a bright yellow ribcage, bustling with diners and black-clad staff sporting caps and scout-style yellow neckties. Lying close to Myanmar and Thailand, China’s Yunnan region is famous for its use of mushrooms, flowers, salads, cold noodles, individual hotpots and Xuanwei ham. Dai Style Enoki Salad ($3.80) is spicy (as most dishes are) but very representative of the cuisine. The best way to eat here is to order cold appetisers alongside one of their hotpots, like Yunnan Signature Rice Noodle Soup ($11.80). The smooth pork and chicken stock accentuated by quail eggs, noodles cut from bean curd sheets, bean sprouts and slivered beef and chicken interspersed with silky rice noodles, put your mouth back together between slices of Hot and Numbing Beef ($4.80) – cold garlic poached beef slices drenched in spicy chilli dressing – and Deep Fried Spicy Beef Jerky ($4.80). Coconut Juice ($4) is your friend, though I’d kill for a TsingTao beer, especially with the Yunnan Signature Fries ($3.80) that take ordinary crinkle-cut fries somewhere extraordinary by stir-frying them in chilli and a sauce featuring fermented black beans.

Two Sticks
694 George Street, Sydney
facebook.com/Twosticksaustralia
Chinese $