Kevin La aka @sydneyfoodboy: Changing minds, one bite at a time
He’s the young social media star who is using online platforms and food to challenge negative stereotypes one tantalising bite at a time. Plus, find out ‘Sydney Food Boy’s’ top five suburbs for the best food and flavour in Sydney’s south west.
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A burgeoning social media star from Sydney’s south west is divulging the area’s culinary secrets one mouthful at a time, challenging his followers to ‘grab their passports’ and take more than just their tastebuds out of their comfort zone.
Sampling the wares at Hawker Centres across Singapore late last year, self-confessed food adventurer Kevin La returned home to Canley Heights with a niggling question.
“I’d had these food experiences overseas and I thought to myself, how come we can’t travel like this in Sydney?” La said.
“We have all this amazing food, and all these people from all walks of life have come to call this place home. Why not start writing about it?”
And so @sydneyfoodboy was born.
A mixture of unadulterated food porn with a side of ethnographic insight – the 24-year-old travels across the city serving the latest and greatest food experiences to his followers, with no place (or taste) off-limits.
But it’s the dishes in Sydney’s south west (and stories behind the hands that make them) that are closest to La’s heart, with the optometrist come influencer using Instagram to challenge negative stereotypes about the area.
“There’s been a bad rap about south west Sydney and western Sydney for the longest time,” La explained. “And so a lot of the food that I post is concentrated on bringing people out here.”
“As my Instagram has grown, I think a lot of people have seen how amazing coming out this way is – how rewarding it is to venture outside their comfort zone and come to our homes, our areas that we grew up in and taste the food here.”
Becoming a tourist in his own backyard, La chose Afghan restaurant Kabul House in Merrylands as his first food adventure in November last year after hearing the suburb was home to migrants from Afghanistan, Syria and Persia.
“A lot of the places I love to visit are more low-key, they’re more mum-and-pop style and have been there for years but not many people know about them,” La explained. “But the people that do know about them are complete regulars and they just go back and back again and again.”
About 140 restaurants and almost 6500 followers later, La recently expanded his social media presence to include YouTube and Facebook.
And as the year sloths towards the finish line and borders tentatively start to reopen across the country, the proudly Chinese/Cambodian Australian is looking forward to continuing his food journey in 2021.
“I want to get people to love their city and have people that come to Sydney and travel to Sydney in the future to be able to share in these same experiences I’m sharing,” La said.
“I’d love to travel and eat full-time. Why not chase the dream, right?”
@sydneyfoodboy’s TOP 5 ‘FOOD ADVENTURE’ SUBURBS
1. CABRAMATTA
“The Vietnamese food in Cabramatta is some of the most authentic that you’d find,” he said.
“Different people when they think of Vietnamese food they think of Phở. They think about Bún bò Huế which is a Vietnamese spicy noodle soup. There’s heaps. There is really a lot in Cabramatta.”
2. BURWOOD
“I love Burwood because it has some of the best Chinese handmade noodles you’d find anywhere in Sydney, no question,” La said. “I’ll give you three restaurants that I love to frequent in Burwood and I pretty much just have them on rotation even though i’m a food explorer.
“One is Xi’An Eatery. They do an amazing biang biang noodle which is like a really wide thick chewy noodle. I actually have a video coming on my YouTube for them.
“Second restaurant would be Yipin Handmade Noodles. Very similar handmade noodle, but this time instead of having wide thick curtains they have more ribbon with butter and garlic and chilli all just lathered all over. It’s really delicious.
“Xi Bay Handmade Noodle Restaurant. They sell handmade noodles as well but this one, they do one where there is grilled lamb and onions and the noodles just soak up all of the lamb juices. So you can taste the charcoal taste and the grilled surfaces and the juices coming off the lamb.”
3. BANKSTOWN
“The Lebanese community brings together some really amazing food that a lot of people don’t know about,” he said. “We’re talking mixed shish plates. We’re talking manoush. We’re talking knafeh.
“There’s this little tiny joint called Sea Sweet in Mount Lewis and they do amazing knafeh with cheese just fresh out and the cheese melts and you have the syrup over the top as well.
“And they actually do this type where they put it into a warm bun – I want to do coverage of that one at some stage.”
4. STRATHFIELD and EASTWOOD
“If you want Korean street food, Strathfield or Eastwood is your place,” La said. “Both of them have really strong Korean communities and they do a lot of Korean style snacks and street food and that sort of thing. There is this one place in Strathfield called the Basak and they do some of the best Korean street foods you’d find anywhere. We’re thinking Kimbap – Korean style sushi.”
5. AUBURN and MERRYLANDS
“Previous to this whole food adventuring thing, I didn’t go to Auburn too much,” he said. “But if you walk down Auburn’s main strip you’ll find some really ridiculously amazing food.” Whether it be Afghans, Pakistani, Chinese – you name it, you’ll find it in Auburn.
“I recently went to an Uyghur restaurant and they do some really nice handmade noodles.
“You can imagine the taste of their food to be a bit central Chinese, northern Chinese. A little bit Arabic and Muslim type of food as well. All their food is halal.
“You’ll also find Pakistani food – I’ve had patients of Pakistani descent tell me that there is this place called Student Biryani which is really good. Really solid authentic flavours.”
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