Eating in Brisbane

September 13, 2011 5:10 AM

Heading to Brisbane for a week - Where are good child friendly places to eat? Staying in Toowong if that makes a difference - will have a car. Do I head to the valley for asian supermarkets?
posted by the noob to food & drink (4 answers total)

The Valley is great for Asian supermarkets, but depending on how extreme your requirements are, you can get a lot of stuff in Coles. Toowong has a big shopping centre (Toowong Village) with a big supermarket. The Valley definitely has more charm value!

Great that you've got a car -- don't rely on public transport, which is generally expensive, slow, unreliable and infrequent. :(

I can't help you with child-friendly eateries, unfortunately. I suppose it depends on the age of your kids... but Toowong Village has a family eatery called Sizzler's which I used to go to as a kid. Plus lots of other cafes and restaurants close by. Not a bad place to stay.
posted by FrereKhan at 7:34 AM on September 13, 2011

Where are good child friendly places to eat?

Seconding Sizzlers. There's also a McDonalds nearby, but whether that's "good" or not is debatable.

"Do I head to the valley for asian supermarkets?"

Yes but since you have a car you'll be paying through the nose for parking there. Rather, plug in "156 Inala Avenue, Inala QLD" into your GPS or Google Maps and take a 20 minute drive down to Inala. There's a lot of asian shops there, and cheap too!
posted by Effigy2000 at 3:16 PM on September 13, 2011

Another good place for Asian supermarkets (again, you'll need a car) is Sunnybank Hills - about a 20 minute drive from Toowong across the river. Sunnybank also has some awesome Asian restaurants, although I'm not sure on the "child-friendliness" factor.
posted by fresh bouquets every day at 7:22 PM on September 13, 2011

I don't know if you'll check back on this, but there are a couple of small Asian supermarkets (convenience stores, really) at and near to Toowong. There's one next to Blockbuster on Jephson St - Hanaro Mart. The other one that comes to mind is Chai's / St Lucia Supermarket on Sir Fred Schonell Drive at St Lucia, which is just around the corner in a car.

For child-friendly places to eat at Toowong, yes, Sizzler is still there. There's also an OK food court in Toowong Village and loads of little restaurants/cafes around. If you have a car, Hawken Drive at St Lucia has loads of great, informal cafes and restaurants that are pretty child-friendly. It's only a few minutes drive from Toowong too.

If you're picking between Sunnybank / the Valley / Inala, though, I'd go Sunnybank. It's super easy to get to from Toowong - straight down the River Expressway, basically to Sunnybank Plaza. It has looooads of great supermarkets, super cheap, plentiful (if somewhat chaotic) parking, bubble tea, yum cha... super-dooper all-round awesome. I lived at Taringa (next suburb to Toowong) for about a year and used to drive over to Sunnybank regularly for bubble tea, cheap grocery and yum cha fixes. The Valley is way expensive for parking, and more expensive (though still cheap) for food and groceries. It does have Chinatown and fun markets on a Saturday though. Inala is OK, but it's a bit of a trek.
posted by t0astie at 11:08 PM on September 14, 2011