Perth’s Night Noodle Markets

Perth has been inundated with festivals, exhibitions and cultural experiences of late. The most recent from March 18 to 29 was the Night Noodle Markets in the Cultural Precinct. Foodies flocked to first Perth event of Night Noodle Markets and the flavours of Asia were abundant.

Part of the Good Food Month and Eat, Drink, Perth these markets have been a huge success and record crowds waited patiently to smell and sample the morsels on offer.

The Cultural Centre was split into three precincts, Central Square, Museum Plaza and the Urban Gardens, all within 100 metres of each other. People were not deterred by the long queues or crowds as they reached capacity, for a serving of affordable dishes from the city’s best Asian restaurants. These included Apple Daily Bar & Eating House, Low Key Chow House, Lucky Chan’s Laundry & Noodle Bar and Melbourne’s Hoy Pinoy.

The Asian Hawker style, pop up market is a 12 day free event making its mark with themed bars and entertainment providing a relaxed outdoor dining experience. Comprising of 25 pop up stalls including three bars, the event showcased cuisines including Filipino, Vietnamese, Japanese, Chinese, Thai and Korean starting at $10 each.

The stalls were divided into the Museum Plaza with Waffle on a Stick, Fu Manchu, Teppanyaki Noodles, Turban Chopstick and Apple Daily Bar & Eating House. The Central Square has Hoy Pinoy, Low Key Chow House, Let’s Do Yum Cha, Serendipity and Spanthai. The Urban Orchard had Masak Masak, Banana Leaf, Pasar Malam, Lucky Chans, Shallot Thai and Kiuamachi-tei.

As the dumplings steamed, curries simmered and the woks fired up, the hordes gathered to find their foodie groove. Hoy Pinoy and their Filipino fare is strongly influenced by Spanish, Japanese and Chinese cuisine.  The unique flavours of their BBQ pork belly skewers, marinated in banana ketchup glaze worked so well together and a proven crowd pleaser when they sold out after having prepared 20,000 skewers.

Some of the bite size offerings for sale were: Let’s Do Yum Cha – BBQ Pork Bun, Prawn & Chive Dumplings, Chicken Dim Sim, Prawn Har Gow and Spring Rolls. Low Key Chow House offered Manton Buns, Kari Ayam (Chicken Curry) and Chilli candies peanuts. Masak Masak had Charcoal grilled chicken wings, Crispy prawn wantons, Beef rending with coconut sticky rice and Pork belly with pickled vegetables, noodles and palm caramel. Pasar Malam served Nyonya lollipops, Chilli soft crab w/ golden baos and Sweet potato balls. Apple Daily Bar & Eating House had Linley Valley roast pork belly and kana moo grob, Spicy chicken wings with marm phrik pao caramel and puffed rice and Smoked ocean trout with coconut, green paw paw, cashew and nam jim.

It seems Perth is besotted with all things giant, first a visit from Lilliputians and the Giants, then 7 metre rabbits intruded. Now in keeping with the Asian theme of the Night Noodle Markets was the presence of a huge inflatable Maneki-Neko or fortune cat. These cats with their wide grins and flapping paws are ever present in Asian restaurants, believed to bring good luck and attract customers.  In keeping with theme were two beautiful geisha girls towering through the crowds posing for photos as they balanced on their stilts.

The city of Perth invested $50,000 to bring this event here following the overwhelming success of our Twighlight Hawkers Markets in Forrest Place. This was proof that with Perth’s cultural diversity we have a healthy crowd of foodies, with an appetite for this kind of authentic contemporary hawker experience who are keen to chow down on some unique tucker.

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