Sometimes it's good to be a regular

As much as I enjoy trying new restaurants and bars I can understand why some people go back to the same favourite haunt week after week. There is something very comforting about being a "regular", whether it's at the local pub, Thai or grab-and-go coffee venue. As far as I'm concerned the greatest asset any cafe can have is a barrista who knows your order without asking it and starts making it as soon as you step towards the counter. Extra points if they ask and remember your name.

For several years in the early "noughties" I was a regular at the historic Hollywood Hotel in Surry Hills, stopping off every Friday after work with the same group of people, and often during the week as well, and getting to know the bartender Mark quite well. We'd chat as he poured our drinks and I'd put my David Jones Foodhall booty in the fridge behind the bar until it was time to dawdle the few blocks home. Other regulars would stop by our table and swap a few words, and if we were lucky the owner Doris - a fabulous old dame who'd been a Hollywood D-lister in the '50s and whose main claim to fame was playing a woman trying to kidnap Bob Hope in the movie The Iron Petticoat - would emerge from her apartment above the pub and sing a few raspy show tunes. Doris always dressed in original '70s floor-length gowns and an elaborately coffuired wig and would hold court from a stool at the bar, glass of "bubbles" at hand. Fabulous!

These days the only place I'd say I'm a regular at is Tre Viet, a Vietnamese restaurant in Newtown I often end up at with my friend Annabel. Tre Viet doesn't have a lot in the way of "frills" but the staff is invariably friendly, the food is excellent and prices are exceedingly reasonable.

Most recently Annabel and I stopped there for a quick bite on Monday night after seeing The Arrival at the Carriageworks, the first of several Sydney Festival shows we have lined up in the next few weeks. After handing over our bottle of  BYO wine to be opened, Annabel and I settled in the discuss what to eat. Two minutes later we'd decided on the Nem  Tre Viet rolls, spicy squids [sic] and caramelised fish hotpot - which, when we stopped to think of it, is our "usual". Oh well, we said happily, at least we know we'll enjoy it.

And that's essentially what being a regular is all about: finding comfort in familiarity. I wouldn't want to only ever eat the same food in the same restaurants but every now and again, yep, that's exactly what I want to do. Bon appetit!