Lakemba Ramadan Night Market 2019

Is this Sydney's best night market? I reckon so. The month-long Ramadan Night Market in Lakemba is one of our city's most authentically honest and community-driven events, providing a communal iftar from dusk til dawn as Muslims break their fast. You won't find commercial sponsors, chain eateries or ticket sales. This is purely about food cooked by the people, for the people.

It's no wonder then that the night market now attracts a stream of food tourists. Never been? Get yourself on the train to Lakemba. Follow the crowds along Haldon Street and your stomach can travel the world for cheap.

I've posted previously on the Lakemba Ramadan Night Market. Here's a whirlwind tour of my first (but not last) visit at this year's event.


Curries and crowds


Chicken tikka skewers


Paratha roti


Making martabak, paratha filled with beef, chicken or egg


More martabak


Jalebi fried dough coils soaked in syrup


Beef and camel burgers


Kaak bread filled with cheese $5

The grilled kaak cheese bread is my favourite snack. The bread is basted with butter on both sides and then grilled over charcoal so the sesame seeds become even nuttier, the bread crisps and the cheese melts to a stretchy lusciousness.


Sandpit coffee

Watching coffee being brewed in hot sand is mesmerising. It's also a great way to stay awake until dawn!


Knafeh


You'll find half a dozen stalls selling knafeh, each one cooked to a different recipe. This needs to be eaten straight away so the white cheese is warm and gooey, otherwise heat it again at home if you're getting takeaway.

Knafeh $7

Stretchy cheese, rosewater syrup and the crunch of string pastry and pistachios. The sweetest way to end your night.

See more Lakemba Ramadan Night Market photos from 2018 and 2016.



The Lakemba Ramadan Night Market in 2019 runs every night from 5pm (sunset) through to 3am. Crowds tend to peak 8pm-10pm. Saturday nights are the busiest with Haldon Street closed to traffic. The final night will be Thursday 6 June 2019.

Food stalls are set up along Haldon Street near Lakemba rail station, between The Boulevarde and Gillies Street. Some nights you will also find stalls along Railway Parade.

Due to the popularity of this event, street parking tends to fill quickly so take public transport if possible. A free park and ride shuttle bus to Haldon Street will run on Saturday nights, running every 30 minutes from Campsie (Shakespeare Street carpark) and Roselands (opposite Lantern Club) between 6.30pm and 2am.


Related Grab Your Fork posts
Lakemba Ramadan Night Market 2018
Lakemba Ramadan Night Market 2016

Lakemba Ramadan Food Festival 2018

Four nights. That's how many nights you have left to visit one of Sydney's most vibrant and family-friendly night food markets. The Ramadan Food Festival in Lakemba is a community iftar, the breaking of the day's Ramadan fast at dusk.

The markets kick off at 5pm, as the sun sets, with festivities running until 4am. It's a delicious event, and incredibly cheap. Rug up, bring a pocketful of cash and travel around the world via Lakemba.


Ful medames fava beans, a traditional dish to eat for iftar


Grilled meats on the barbecue


Boiled corn


Cooking saj flat bread


Spreading Nutella onto saj flat bread


Flipping paratha dough


Adding beaten egg and onion to paratha dough

Filled paratha folded into martabak

Cooked chickpeas, fava beans and lupin beans


Camel burgers being cooking over charcoal

The queue for camel burgers is always hectic.


Fresh carrot juice stall


Carving chicken doner kebab


2 Smokin' Arabs

It's worth checking out the pop-up by 2 Smokin' Arabs, a BBQ competition team who have temporarily taken up residence in a former newsagency on Haldon Street.


Carved beef brisket


Brisket box $20 
Hot wings 

Chicken tikka skewers cooked over charcoal

Caramelised chicken tikka skewers


Barbecued corn skewers grilled over charcoal


Knafeh served in kaak

For dessert, it's hard to go past a serve of knafeh. At this stall you can get your knafeh served in kaak bread...

Knafeh

but we had ours served straight onto a plate. It's a textural party of warm cheese, crunchy semolina and sweet syrup drizzled across the top.

Palestinian knafeh

The Palestinian knafeh comes with saffron-tinted kataifi pastry and a sprinkle of pistachio nuts.


Oozy cheesy Palestinian knafeh

The Palestinian knafeh is much cheesier in flavour with a more noticeable stretchiness. Guaranteed fun when you're hovering on the footpath with a plastic fork!


Palestinian knafeh for one


Kaak bread with cheese grilling over charcoal

Still hungry? Do what we did. Get a grilled cheese sandwich, Lebanese-style. Kaak bread is stuffed with a haloumi-like cheese and toasted over charcoal.


Melted cheese inside kaak

Oozing hot cheese. Nutty toasted sesame seeds. And crisp and toasty bread that's slightly smoky from the charcoal.


Turkish coffee 

And if you still want to party on, get a Turkish coffee brewed in hot sand. You'll be going all night!

The Lakemba Ramadan Food Festival runs every night from 5pm (sunset) through to 4am. Crowds tend to peak 8pm-10pm. The final night will be Thursday 14 June 2018.

Food stalls are set up along Haldon Street near Lakemba rail station, between The Boulevarde and Gillies Street. Some nights you will also find stalls along Railway Parade.

Due to the popularity of this event, street parking tends to fill quickly so take public transport if possible.


Related Grab Your Fork posts
Lakemba Ramadan Night Market 2019
Lakemba Ramadan Night Market 2016

Paddy's Night Food Markets with Sydney food trucks

Sydney's newest food truck jam? It's now happening every Saturday night at Paddy's Market Flemington. It's a clever use of the giant multi-storey car park that sits unused after dusk. The covered car park makes for one enormous food truck arena that offers both shelter from rain and plenty of parking. Win win!


Chef's Kitchen food truck

The Paddy's Night Food Markets are still in soft launch mode, running through a series of different food trucks each week. The space is huuuge with about a dozen food trucks parked in a square around a casual dining area of pallet tables, chairs and stools.


Chef's Kitchen food truck menu

Crowds weren't too bad when we visited on the weekend but we expect queues to become a lot more hectic by the official launch on July 1.


Wholly Schnit food truck

In any case, it's worth doing a quick circuit to figure out what you want to eat for dinner.


Blumont Chicken food truck menu


Retro Rosie food truck 


Baby back ribs, smoked chicken thighs and pulled pork


Smoked chicken thighs on the barbie


Dirty Bird food truck menu


Shiso Fine food truck menu


Maverick Wings food truck menu


Maverick Wings food truck crew


Maverick Wings: Multi-pack of 12 crispy chicken wings $24.95
with fresh lime and chilli; Frank's Red Hot buffalo; and garlic and parmesan 

We start with a twelve pack of crispy chicken wings from Maverick Wings. They're normally $21.95 but pay an extra three dollars and you can get three sauces instead of one. Sauce options vary from the mild glazed honey soy to the totally wild sounding salted caramel popcorn and Nutella chocolate (why?).

We can confirm that the Frank's Red Hot buffalo wings will set your tongue a-tingling, ideally matched with the creaminess of the garlic parmesan. We also ordered the fresh lime and chilli but presume this was garnished incorrectly as it was missing the usual coriander and red chilli.


Blumont Chicken: Cajun potatoes $5
Baby chat potatoes tossed in signature Blumont Cajun spice

Cajun potatoes weren't quite what we expected, especially the tangy sauce in the tub. The potatoes themselves had a good golden colour to the edges, although they had lost their crunch some time ago.


Dirty Bird: Crack burger $12
Crispy rice battered chicken

The Crack burger from Dirty Bird delivered with a hunk of juicy chicken encased in a batter that looked like it included rice bubbles. The dill mayo wasn't overpowering either.


Cheese and spinach gozleme $8

And just like every other food event in Sydney, there's always gozleme. We were surprised that the yeeros truck seemed to be doing a brisk business all night.


Chef's Kitchen: Meaty menage $14
House made patty, bacon, cheese, 14 hour smoked brisket and special sauce

Dirty Bird: Roasted chicken gravy with silky potato mash $6

One of the big winners of the night was the meaty menage from Chef's Kitchen. It's a juicy burger with crispy bacon and a pile of 14-hour smoked brisket. It all worked brilliantly together, especially the smokiness of that juicy brisket.

At the back of the photo above you can see the roasted chicken gravy with potato mash from Dirty Bird. We ended up dipping our Cajun potatoes in that for carb-on-carb action.


Dinner


Bulb drinks $7


Free arcade games

Anyone who remembers teenage years spent at Timezone will weep at the free arcade games set up in the middle.


Arcade games for young and old

Relive your youth with Pacman and Space Invaders.

Sega Rally

They even have Sega Rally!


Me Meli food truck serving loukoumades Greek honey donuts

We line up for dessert at Me Meli, a food truck that translates in Greek to "with honey".


Loukoumades Greek honey donut cone with Nutella $10

Here they make loukoumades, a traditional Greek donut.


Frying the loukoumades Greek honey donuts 

On the side of the truck you can watch the batter dropped into hot oil and fried, a process that takes several minutes and lots of stirring so they don't stick.


Golden loukoumades fresh out of the fryer


Loukoumades Greek donuts rolled in cinnamon sugar

Loukoumades Greek donuts are traditionally served with honey and walnuts but here you can also get them rolled in cinnamon sugar...


Loukoumades Greek honey donuts with Nutella, crushed hazelnuts and strawberry

or drenched in Nutella and crushed hazelnuts.

Loukoumades Greek honey donuts with walnuts, honey and cinnamon $15

We go classic. We've had loukoumades at festivals before but these are particularly impressive, with a super crunchy shell to each one. There's a generous amount of honey too, as well as a liberal shower of crushed walnuts.



The Paddy's Night Food Markets officially launch on July 1, 2017 but you can still sneak in a pre-launch visit next Saturday June 24 when the Knafeh food truck joins the line-up for the night.

Grab Your Fork visited the Paddy's Night Food Markets anonymously and unannounced and paid for all food featured. If a blog post is an invite, it will always be clearly marked as such.  



Paddy's Night Food Markets
250-318 Parramatta Road, Flemington, Sydney
Every Saturday night - check their Facebook page for times
Jun 24: 6.30pm-11pm
Jul 1:  5pm-10pm

Enter from Centenary Drive via the toll booth (Sydney Flower Market entrance)
Park in the multi-storey Western car park