Bagan, Strathfield

Bagan Burmese Restaurant

Bagan Burmese Restaurant is one of the few non -Korean restaurants in Strathfield. It is a small and cosy family restaurant that always packed with customers from different nationalities. Mocha, Herby and I arrived at 8.30pm, the restaurant was busy as usual, and we were lucky to be sat at the last available table at the back of the restaurant.

The colourful menu

So, where is Burma located? According to the map on the menu, it is located in between India, China, Laos and Thailand. How about the food ? Here is an introduction on the menu;


" The food of Burma reflects the influences of her many neighbors especially the two largest; China and India. China's influence can be seen in the use of noodle and soy sauce. While Burmese curries are Indian in origin, through not as highly spiced. They are flavoured with garlic, ginger, turmeric, chilli, onion and shrimp paste. "


The lovely menu is full of pictures of their dishes; it is mouth watering even just reading it. The place was neat and decorated with some South East Asian statues and paintings.

A statue of a Goddess, flowers and a golden ox.

As soon as we settled down on our table, the waiter brought us the menu and asked us would we like some tea or water to start with. We chose the tea, a cup of hot mild black tea. It took us a while to go through the menu, as it contains quite a number of dishes and so many pictures to study. After 10 minutes, we ordered a couple of drinks and 6 dishes to fill our hungry belly.

Black Tea, Burmese Iced Tea ($3.50) , Durian Shake ($4.00)

The Burmese Iced Tea had a very strong tea flavour and it was silky smooth. Unfortunately, it was extremely sweet. The Durian shake's texture was quite thin, I was expecting it to be a thick thick-shake. But the taste is quite nice, milky and full of tiny pieces of Durian. At the back of the restaurant, there was a small bench full of different type of sauces, customer can help themselves for some extra flavour. We tried the pickled chillies and the dark and aromatic chili paste. The pickled chillies was tangy and mild, where the chili paste was extremely hot. Just a tiny amount of it would blow you away.

Pickled chillies, The big jar of Chili paste

The two entree followed shortly after our drinks. We have ordered the "mini crab meat spring roll" and the "Laphet salad". The mini crab meat spring roll was a golden deep fried spring roll full of crab meat. The spring rolls was dipped into some batter before it was fried, which made them extra crunchy. They were accompanied by some slightly tangy and spicy red sauce. The Laphet salad was a salad of pickled tea leaves, fried beans, onions and tomatoes. We had the mild version of it. It was an interesting salad, instead of using the usual sour type of dressing, it was a "salty" dressed salad. The beans are crunchy, but I could not taste much of the pickled tea leaves.

Mini crab meat spring rolls ($5.50)

Laphet Salad ($ 5.50)

The mains we have ordered are "white sauce hor fun", watt thani", "chicken wings in peanut sauce" and "fried mo nyinn". The white sauce for fun was a flat rice noodles with a gravy like white sauce with seafood. It was full of prawns, fish cake slices and squids. The white sauce was made by some light stock and egg white, it was very delicious, and the pickled chillies we took earlier added some depth to this dish.

White sauce hor fun ($ 10.50)

The Watt Thani was Burmese style soya pork. It was a bowl of juicy and tender pork belly pieces stewed in a rich and fragrant slightly thickened brown sauce. You could taste the soy sauce in it, as well a lot of herbs and spices. It was kind of like a curry, but used soy sauce in it. The sauce was so yummy on steamed rice.

Watt thani ($ 8.50)

The chicken wings in peanuts sauce was aromatic and slightly tangy. Maybe they used some tamarind in this dish ? The chicken wings was fried before they were cooked in the sauce. The sauce was tangy, full of spices and crushed peanuts. The cauliflower in this dish was delicious, the floral part of the cauliflower absorbed the sauce nicely. This is quite a unique dish, nothing like your average Thai style peanut sauce dishes nor the Malay style satay sauce dishes.

Chicken wings in peanut sauce ($ 12.00)

The last dish for the night was fried mo nyinn, which was stir fried bok choy with shrimp paste. The veges were pipping hot and deliciously sweet and salty at the same time. It was a very satisfying dinner, with plenty of food and the minimal price tags, Bagan is truely a bargain in Sydney.

Fried mo nyinn ($ 5.50)

Bagan Burmese Restaurant

Shop 4, 41 The Boulevarde,
Strathfield,
N S W 2135

Phone: + 61 (2) 8746 0666

Opening hours: Tuesday to Sunday ~ 11 am - 10 pm, Monday close