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Coco Mar, Dee Why

F and I were invited by Michael and his girlfriend, Deb, to a dine with them and a few friends at an authentic Brazilian restaurant. Only knowing about the Brazilian restaurants that offer barbecued meat on skewers, I thought this restaurant was of the same.

I was pleasantly surprised when I saw the menu – it wasn’t just all barbecued meats. In fact there were a whole variety of dishes that seemed like it would pique the taste buds.

We weren’t sure which dish to choose, but were thankfully helped along by Deb and Michael, whom both have been here numerous of times (and loved it).

Entrée

I know this doesn’t look like much, but the dumpling was scrumptiously crunchy and filled with perfectly seasoned and soft shredded chicken. A little squeeze of lemon added a really lovely, refreshing touch to the creamy, mash-like potato that lined the inside walls of the dumpling.

I was a little bemused by what looked like a huge, square fried wonton but the taste could not be any different. The pastry was thick at the sides, but quite thin at the top, as though it was blown up like a little bubble… and in that little bubble housed well-cooked and well-seasoned minced beef… or cheese (you get to choose which to fill the pastel with).

You know a dish is good when by the first mouthful it brings a smile to your face. This was one of my favourite dishes of the night, making me smile as I crunched my way through it. Deep fried goodness!

The mixed entrée plate consists of 5 dishes and due to the confusion of all the dishes that arrived and me being unfamiliar with which 5 dishes were part of the mixed entrée plate, there’s only four dishes in the photo. The fifth dish is detailed below.

Michael loves the mixed entrée plate, saying everything tastes really good… except for the Caldo de Sururu – the thick shellfish soup with peanuts and coconut milk. He reckons it tastes too much like the sea (accompanied with a slight grimace). I didn’t quite mind the strong sea-salty flavour in thick, chunky creamy soup.

I thought the rest of the mixed entrée plate was delicious. I particularly enjoyed the crunchiness of the Farofada de Calabresa (salted cod and potato dumpling) and the Aimpim Frito (chunky cassava chips, which has almost the same texture as potato chips, only a bit more fibrous). I think I see a trend going on here hehe, can’t get enough of that fried goodness!

This was one of the highlights of my night. The cassava puree was almost like mash potatoes, which meant I already adored it. The stringy melted cheese was a natural pairing with the smooth, creaminess of the puree and both were perfect accompaniments with the shredded sun-dried beef. It was oh so yummy!

This dish was the other highlight of my night. The puffs were chewy, cheesy heaven and somehow even better with a little dab of herb butter. After my first bite (mouth still full), I turned to F urgently and demanded more than asked, “Can you make this for me!?”

Apparently he can. We were told by Michael and Deb that there is a deli store nearby that sells a Pao de Queijo mix in a box and tastes almost like the ones we had. F wanted to buy the mix straight away, well after dinner since we haven’t had mains or dessert yet, and Michael laughed. In our eagerness to reproduce these gorgeously scrumptious cheese puffs we had forgotten that the deli would be closed at such an hour. Michael offered to buy it for us and we quickly took up on his offer. I can’t wait til F gets his hands on that box!

Mains

I didn’t have this dish myself, but I was told that it was really delicious, but quite filling. She was practically stuffed by the end.

In a purely strategic move for stomach real estate, I chose this dish over the steak. It worked and it was really tasty too. Win all around, yay!

It surprised me a bit how similar it looked to a Thai curry, though like the pastel, it tasted not quite as it looked. It wasn’t spicy (mentally I was preparing myself for the heat) and it had a strong, creamy coconut flavour that was something like curry (but not). The dish wasn’t thin like gruel nor thick like stew, but somewhere in-between, more towards the thin side. On its own, it could be a bit too much, but together with the rice, it was perfect.

I’ve had quite a few variety of stroganoffs before and they’re all slightly different to each other in thickness and flavour. This version of stroganoff was similar in density as the bobo, though a little thicker, and I found it to be a lot more creamy and less dense (or hearty) than the previous versions I’ve tried.

The chicken strips were really tender and I really liked the mini French fries on top. F thought it was the weakest dish of the night, but there were some really strong dishes out there for it to compete with for our taste buds.

This dish is Brazil’s national dish (as claimed on the menu) and one of the dishes Michael and Deb recommended. It wasn’t as thick as the previous two dishes, but it was surprisingly hearty and robust in flavour. We shouldn’t have been surprised though, seeing what was in it – all that meat!

When paired with one or two side dishes, the Feijoada would taste slightly different and it was a lot of fun seeing how the side dishes would affect the final taste.

This was easily F’s favourite dish of the night.

Dessert

We were really quite full by this stage, but I overheard a couple of customers chatting about the cheesecake, where one of them vouched for its deliciousness. The cake in itself sounded interesting (who would think to pair ricotta with guava?!) and overhearing the praise for it made me want to try it even more.

F favours cheesecakes that are more cake-like than cheesy (which this one was, cheesy I mean), so it didn’t quite tick all the boxes for him. For me, I thought it was delicious as promised/overhead – being light, not overly sweet, but then again I’m a bit of a cake ‘ho and I don’t really mind what flavour it is, so long as it’s some sort of cake.

Throughout our dinner, we saw plates and plates of this dessert stream out of the kitchen and onto tables. “I must have one!!” I thought each time I spied one emerging from the kitchen, so I was quite excited when I finally got to taste it.

I loved how soft, smooth and creamy it was and the caramel wasn’t unbearably sweet. I couldn’t help but order an Earl Grey tea to go with it and mmm, it was a sweet end to our fantastic dinner.

Coco Mar is located on the main strip in Dee Why, right next to the beach and is quite small in size. They had a few tables outside in the chill and pretty much all of the tables (inside and out) were full. The wait staff are quite friendly and the food was of wonderful quality.

So… Ben and Jerry’s is basically down the road from Coco Mar and being opened til 1am, who could resist from going for a quick visit?

Some of our group were quite surprised we had any room left for ice cream (not to mention that it was also quite cold), but there’s always room for ice cream… and never too cold.

Coco Mar
11 The Strand
Dee Why, NSW, 2099
Ph: (02) 9984 7792
Web: http://www.cocomar.com.au/