Mad Jack: Wild wild Aussie experience

November 25, 2008 | 21 Comments

Cuisines like European, French, Italian food are always popular choices when we dine out. But have you heard of Aussie cuisine? And how exactly do you classified that? There’s a great influence by traditional British cooking brought to Australia by the first settlers. Consisting of pies, roasted cut of meats, grilled steaks and chops, and other form of meat generally accompanied by vegetables.

Mad Jack restaurant started back in 2005, with their original branch at Jalan Kayu a familiar sight with patrons to the area. Within a short span of 2-3 years, they have expanded with another 3 branches, with the newest located right in town, Paradiz centre.

The restaurant owner, Jack who have stayed in Australia for some years, decided to bring the Aussie cuisine back to Singapore. But if you make it into a fine-dining setting, not many people will have be able to try the food, therefore he came up with a causal dining cafe, serving his definition of good Aussie food at affordable prices. The steaks and chops are all air-flown from Australia/NZ, and it is their style of cooking that made the term, Aussie cuisine.

I was invited for a food tasting session at their new outlet, Paradiz centre. A 5 minutes walk from Dhoby Ghaut mrt station, the restaurant is right within distance in town, so who says there isn’t cheap and good food in Orchard?

Mad Jack’s interior consisted mainly of white furnitures, which gave a sleek and clean look to the whole restaurant. Coupled with the transparent glass which invited the sunlight in, the whole area was brightly lit up.

We started with their doctor juices. Therapeutic juices made of 100% fruits and vegetables with “healing powers”. Mad Jack actually did their research, and experimented with different combinations of fruits and vegetables to produce different effects. There’s cholesterol buster (in green), complexion enhancer, blood pressure reducer, sports energy booster (in yellow), just to name a few.

I had the cholesterol buster ($4), which like the name implied, was meant to bust cholesterol. Green apple, celery, capsicum and cucumber. The taste was very “healthy”, and although I didn’t really like celery, but well for the sake of busting some cholesterol.

The other drink we had was the sports energy booster ($4). The ingredients were much less exotic, and pretty much the fruits you eat everytime, lemon, organge. pineapple and apple.

There was crispy butter, fresh juicy & chunky fish fillet which made the taste so good. Crispy on the outside, fluffy and soft on the inside. And the apple peach salad also gave the fish & chips ($8.90) a healthier tune. I had this before at PK xpress which is also under the Mad Jack group.

Mad Jack’s menu is very comprehensive, with so many variety that we actually didn’t know what to order. In the end, we decided to settle for the common and simple chicken chop, like they say, food taste good when they are simple.

But to be frank, other than the generous portion of the chicken and the sides, i thought there was nothing special about the grilled chicken in black pepper sauce ($7.90). Nonetheless at $8, there’s nothing like a safer option if you want some familiar food in town.

And how can you say that you have eaten Aussie food when you haven’t try their steaks? Air-flown from Australia, the Rib eye steak ($13.90) was big in size, tender in meat and juicy on the inside. One meat, three vegetables, like the usual way.

If you are going in a large group, the cheesy mix fries ($6.90) is definitely a good option to order for sharing. Mixture of spicy and plain fries topped with cheese sauce and mayo, it reminded me of the cheese fries at KFC, with a bigger serving.

Now, get ready for the highlight of the show. The desserts column was the one that i was looking forward to, since they had quite a variety of choices available. Triple shots of espresso sponge sandwiched between freshly whipped cream, sponge, and chocolate flakes, i give you the tiraMADsu ($4.50).

All the desserts creation came from Jack’s wife, you could get them at slices, or as a whole cake (reservation one day in advance). While some preferred their tiramisu to have a strong liquor and espresso taste, i like Mad Jack’s rendition for their light, and not-so-overwhelming flavour. The big slice was also an bonus.

Another dessert which would give you the sugar-rush, the OZ brown ($4.90). Like most brownies, when eaten alone they might come across as overly-sweet, but when you had an scoop of ice cream to go along, it’s a completely different story. The chocolate walnut brownie had bits of walnuts to give the crunchy bite. Warm sweet brownie & cold ice cream, a prefect blend.

Overall, Mad Jack served their take on Aussie cuisines at real affordable prices. Being in town, it further provided an additional incentive. Otherwise, if you dare to jump around like a Kangaroo at the counter (just for laughs), they will be more than willing to give you a free dessert on the house.

To be honest, their food didn’t exactly “wow” me, but given their reasonable pricing and accessible location, i’ll probably revisit them again. And not to mention there’s quite a few other desserts worth noting too!

Mad Jack
1 Selegie road
Paradiz centre #01-04
Tel: 6338 9771
Open: 11.30am-12 Midnight daily
Disclaimer: This was an invited review

Comments

21 Responses to “Mad Jack: Wild wild Aussie experience”

Evan
November 25th, 2008 @ 3:47 pm

wah, nice pics all of them are so well taken! looks like your macro lens is doing a really great job hehe. i wanna try the fries, it looks so good!!!
ladyironchef
November 25th, 2008 @ 4:05 pm

hahaha thanks. not all well taken la, i don’t like the first few photos of the steak and chops. but the dessert photos came out quite nice.
sgfoodlover
November 25th, 2008 @ 5:20 pm

Wow that ice cream dessert looks so nice!

sgfoodlovers last blog post..Relax have a Ya Kun toast set (at the right outlet though)
sp*
November 25th, 2008 @ 5:46 pm

lovely!
the tiraMADsu REALLY is tempting!
Yuki
November 25th, 2008 @ 7:41 pm

hii, may i roughly know how much would it cost for a meal for 2 (desserts included). im planning to take my bf there for dinner on his birthday=) Can reservations be made:)? thanks
ladyironchef
November 25th, 2008 @ 8:05 pm

hello yuki: how much is your budget? i can help to recommend some restaurants too. for mad jack, the prices are very reasonable, main courses are in the range of 10+, and desserts will be around 5 bucks each. yes definitely make yr reservations first to prevent any upset, you can call their number 6338 9771
foodiegymmie
November 25th, 2008 @ 10:58 pm

i had the worst burger there! the so claimed talles burger… =( will review in my blog soon…

foodiegymmies last blog post..Personal Steamboat @ Arts
Foodies Queen
November 26th, 2008 @ 12:09 am

I felt all the pictures were very nicely taken…except for the chicken chop which the focus area was quite small. :X

Your macro lens is like a woohoo ! Haha
lotsofcravings
November 26th, 2008 @ 8:25 am

well im sure there are more authentic “australian cuisine” then chicken chop rite? things like pie floaters should have featured maybe?

lotsofcravingss last blog post..Lin Yuan Steamboat Kitchen @ Jalan Shelley
email2me
November 26th, 2008 @ 10:47 am

Nice pix taken on the dessert …

I thought kangaroo meat are served in Australian cuisines …. hahaha ……

By the way what camera model and lens you are using?
Yesong
November 26th, 2008 @ 11:51 am

hi,

i was at MAD JACK last Friday at Paradiz. I really liked their Blur Rings. You should have tried that and yes, their TirMADsu was delicious, hahaha.
ladyironchef
November 26th, 2008 @ 1:19 pm

foodiegymmie: ahh the blue montain burger. how come?

foodie queen: yeah the steak and chops photo not nice. the desserts are better

lotsofcravings: haha yeah there are. but my friend order chicken chop, o well.

email2me: thanks. kangaroo meat is kind of exotic, and i dont think they are imported to Singapore? haha. i’m using Nikon d40 with macro lens

yesong: glad you liked the food, blur rings, alrigt will try it next time : )
His Food Blog
November 26th, 2008 @ 1:32 pm

My office is near there. Tried it for lunch one day – wasn’t impress with the chicken chop I had – I think some market/kopi tiam western food stall can match it easily.

I think their positioning can be better. I can’t really see how “aussie” Mad Jack claimed to be. I studied in Australia and a number of aussie food are missing. Besides since when is Tiramisu an aussie dessert?

On a different note – Nice pix on the fries!

His Food Blogs last blog post..The BEEFY Series Part 8 – Cheng Kee Beef Kway Teow
ladyironchef
November 26th, 2008 @ 1:56 pm

hfb: ya i’m also not impressed with the chicken chop. hmm, i guess it can be better, will pass on the feedbacks. tiramisu isn’t aussie dessert, but the owner’s boss can make desserts very well, so they included it in i guess. yeah thanks, i like the fries and dessert photos. haha
foodiegymmie
November 26th, 2008 @ 9:56 pm

the patty was “wet” and is not even meaty at all… i dunno what was added to the patty… =( tt was my first time there and it was a dissapointing one. hopefully it was an isolated case?

foodiegymmies last blog post..Personal Steamboat @ Arts
ladyironchef
November 27th, 2008 @ 2:47 am

foodigymmie: ahh.. its supposed to be one of the “largest” burger in town i heard? i’ll try it the next time i go to find out. haha
Yesong
November 27th, 2008 @ 3:36 pm

foodigymmie: guess, you ordered the wrong burger – hahaha. I took my friend there today and ordered the tallest burger. It had chunks of meat which my friend helped me to finish – sigh…
ladyironchef
November 27th, 2008 @ 4:39 pm

yesong: i thought foodiegymmie also order the tallest burger? the blue mountain burger, so should be the same one? have to wait for his review to come out then we will find out
Waffle
December 10th, 2008 @ 6:09 pm

Cool they close at midnight! Thats great.
Sakuma Classic
December 5th, 2009 @ 12:06 am

Visited Mad Jack’s @ Paradiz with a couple of friends in October. I would say that the food is far from impressive. The fish and chips that I ordered were virtually tasteless and the batter tasted literally like flour mixed in water. We couldn’t bring ourselves to finish it and it’s not because the serving is big. The apple crumble we ordered was very strange-tasting as well. However, a friend who ordered the blue mountain burger said it was good.

Overall, I don’t think I will come back here again. Didn’t expect it to be this bad considering how much I love PK express.
ladyironchef
December 6th, 2009 @ 3:10 pm

sakuma classic: the food wasn’t wow, but given the price i guess it’s pretty affordable. nvm, go to pk express the next time u have a craving