A friend of my Bro’s came to visit over New Years, and during his visit we gave him many good eating experiences. One of those was to experience the wonder of a parma, as he had never eaten one before. Those who read superparma.com (sadly, it looks like the domain hasn’t been renewed) will recognise the Palmerston Hotel, a pub that held the #1 spot for a while.
The key to a good chicken parmagiana is a juicy chicken breast, topped with ham, a flavoursome sauce and melted cheese. At the Palmerston, a large crumbed chicken breast is topped with Virginian ham, Napoli sauce and melted mozzarella ($16). You can choose between chips and salad or mash and vege.
The parma is gigantic! The chicken breast was juicy, and the Napoli sauce, although there wasn’t much, was decent and even had real basil in it. The edges of the parma that weren’t underneath sauce or cheese went nice and crispy. The mash was good too – mostly smooth and buttery, and the boiled vegetables were acceptable. I didn’t eat much of the sides though, because I was trying to focus my efforts on the large slab of chicken in front of me (ultimately I was defeated). The boys had chips with their parmas, and these were good pub chips, thick and crispy.
There was some debate among us as to whether this was the #1 parma in Victoria due to the lack of sauciness. However, #1 or not, it would be hard to go home hungry or unhappy after eating this parma.
Palmerston Hotel 51 Palmerston Crescent South Melbourne Phone: (03) 9690 5749
Yum cha early on a Sunday afternoon was a common occurrence for our family. Wellington may be a terribly long way from Hong Kong, but there is a Cantonese community, as well as several good yum cha restaurants. Yum cha was always a busy, bustling affair with trolleys full of steaming baskets being squeezed past packed tables. Ordering dim sum off a menu and cooking to order may ensure fresher food, but the atmosphere just can’t compare.
Yum cha in Cantonese literally means “drinking tea”. It’s the custom of eating small servings of food, dim sum, and is a tradition on weekend mornings. By the way, dim sim, is different from dim sum. In Australia, a dim sim is a Chinese inspired dumpling style snack. Dim sum is the Chinese cuisine which involves a wide range of light dishes served alongside Chinese tea, and yum cha is the term that is used to describe the dining session.
In the years we have been in Melbourne, we have been on the hunt for good yum cha. Gold Leaf was recommended by a friend of my Bro’s, and it turned out to be a good recommendation. I booked a table for 11am, and when we rocked up around 10 minutes before this time, they hadn’t started seating guests yet. We waited in the entrance with a couple of other groups, where live seafood gulped unhappily in tanks off to the side. Above us was a huge crystal chandelier suspended below the gold ceiling that Alastair contrarily said looked like the chandelier at my parents’ house.
Not long after we were seated at a table, trolleys full of food started coming past and our table filled up quickly with plates of steamer baskets.
Chicken feet / fung zao
In this dish, chicken feet are fried, marinated and then stewed. The end result are feet that are puffy, rich and the sauce is generally a slightly spicy, black bean sauce. The texture is very gelatinous. There’s not much meat on chicken feet and it’s mostly skin and tendons. The trick to eating them is to take the foot into your mouth and slurp the skin off the numerous small bones, spitting them out as you go.
Scallops on bean curd
This looks like minced scallop meat sitting on tofu. I’m sure I ate a piece, but I don’t actually recall it.
Deep-fried crescent dumplings / ham sui gok
In these dumplings, seasoned ground pork is covered in a wrapper made with sweet glutinous rice They are then deep fried, resulting in a crispy, sweet and salty morsel.
Shanghai pork buns / xiao long boa
I’ve spoken about Shanghai pork buns before. Traditionally the bao are eaten with ginger infused vinegar, so we received a little dish of vinegar as well. There didn’t seem to be much liquid inside the bao but the filling was tasty.
Fried pork buns
The buns were pan-fried crisp on the outside with a soft layer of meat underneath. We got another little dish of vinegar to eat with these as well.
Beef rice noodle / cheong fun
These are thin rolls made from a wide strip of rice noodles, that are usually filled with shrimp, pork, beef, and occasionally, fried dough. The rice noodle sheets are made from rice flour and water, which is then steamed. Sweet soy sauce is then poured over the dish upon serving. I always order the beef version. There’s also a fried version of cheong fun that I like where rice noodle sheets with shrimp are pan fried, and then covered with a thick, hoisin type sauce.
Tripe
My Bro said yes to a bowl of tripe. I think we were the only ones at the table who ate it. It was flavoursome and not too chewy.
Prawn dumplings / har gow
Har gow are a very standard yum cha dish and I reckon that if a restaurant’s har gow are good, then the rest will be good too. These dumplings have a thin, translucent rice-flour skin cloaking baby shrimp and some minced meat. The wrapping should be tender and silky, and the filling should taste fresh. These were good.
Dessert tofu / dou fu fa – silky tofu
After all this food, we were starting to get full. But when the cart with the wooden bucket of dessert tofu / dou fu fa came past, I knew I could fit a bowl in! Dessert tofu is a silky tofu served with a sweet ginger flavoured syrup. Silken tofu has a high moisture content and the texture is similar to a custard. It’s delicious.
Egg tart / dan tart
We waited for ages for the egg tarts and basically we weren’t leaving until we got them. After waiting all that time, the tarts were just okay. The pastry was very puffy and flakey, but the egg custard wasn’t as sweet and eggy as I like.
There was also other desserts on offer – a whole cart was dedicated to items like mango jelly and coconut jelly.
Unfortunately we missed out one of my most favourite dishes – lou mai gai / sticky rice and chicken wrapped in a lotus leaf. I don’t recall it being on offer, but it may have come past at a time when we had a lot of dishes on our table. We kept waving stuff away so we could eat what we already had.
Prices of the dishes ranged from $4.30 for small, $5.40 for medium, and $6.40 for deluxe. Reasonable prices, along with the best dim sum we’ve had in Melbourne so far, might make yum cha a more regular occurrence for us.
Another hot Friday night lead us wandering the streets of Melbourne in search of Laksa Me. I had a vague idea of where I was going, but unfortunately it was a bit too vague. We overshot the laneway that Laska Me resides in, which meant wandering around in the heat for longer than necessary. Damned Melbourne and its laneways!
After a bit of backtracking, we found Liverpool Street and the restaurant. I was a tad disappointed to find that there was no air conditioning in the small room. Instead, several fans whirred busily away to keep diners cool, which admittedly did an okay job. Our table was directly outside the kitchen, under the gaze of a maneki neko and giving us glimpses of the chefs through a cut out in the wall.
Service seemed a bit confused, but quite sweet. We ordered beer and water, and only the beer showed up. Rather than laksa, we opted for starters and shared mains. We started with three items, ordering two portions of each and sharing them.
Sliver of Beef Wrapped in Wild Betel Leaves ($3.50 each)
This starter was a sliver of beef, pan fried with peppercorn infused olive oil, and then dressed with coriander and roasted coconut vinaigrette, wrapped in a betel leaf. We found the beef slightly chewy but it was okay. I was quite amused by the flower garnish, which was actually made from a chili.
Vegetarian Triangle ($2.50 each)
he triangles were filled with wok tossed shredded daikon, crunchy yam bean and Asian chives, then folded in a Chinese white pastry. These were then pan fried and then drizzled with a dark sweet soy sauce.
Succulent Grilled Thai Sausage ($3.50 each)
The thai sausage was minced pork mixed with rice wrapped in a cornhusk, then grilled and served with diced cucumber and crushed peanuts in a tangy Chinese salted plum sauce. The sausage was the best of the three starters – heavy with garlic and flavour. We found the starters slightly underwhelming but this was most likely due to us sharing and only having a small bit of each.
Nonya Pork Ribs – stewed Asian style pork ribs in a complex sweet, spicy and sour reduction. Served with Jasmine rice. ($22.00)
We perked up when the mains started arriving. The first to come out was the pork ribs. The tender meat swam in a dark, sweet caramelish sauce with a small hint of spiciness. The pork was delicious, but the sauce… I would’ve been happy to push the meat aside and just eat the sauce over a steaming bowl of hot rice.
Khao Soi Gai – Burmese influenced Northern Thai curry noodles ($9.00)
The next two mains arrived almost at the same time. The khao soi gai was a dish of thin, slightly crisp egg noodles topped with chicken in a rich, creamy, red curry gravy. The sauce was fairly spicy and had strong Thai flavours and fish sauce.
Dry chicken curry noodles – a hot and spicy dry creamy chicken curry on Hokkien noodles ($10.00)
We all loved the dry chicken curry noodles. A Malaysian style curry sauce smothered the thick egg noodles and boneless chicken. It was the spiciest dish on the table, and we couldn’t get enough. Another round of beer was necessary after this came out.
Sonny’s fish curry – fish of the day slow poached with green bean, eggplants and okra in Sonny’s secret curry recipe. Served with Indian pickle, yoghurt and Jasmine rice. ($22.00)
The last main was Sonny’s fish curry. The fish curry was a large slab of salmon was smothered in a tangy, sourish curry that was flavoured with Indian spices and topped with yoghurt. In the context of the meal, this dish felt a bit strange. All the flavours of the other mains felt complementary, and this dish just didn’t seem to fit with everything else that we had eaten. This isn’t an actual complaint about the dish – the fish and vegetables were cooked well and the sauce was tasty.
After our hearty and sweat inducing meal we peeled ourselves off our chairs to pay our bill at the counter. The monetary damage was a reasonable $33 per person, (if sticking to laksa the bill could be much lower). We had an enjoyable meal and one day I will need to return to check out the laksa.
Laksa Me Shop 1 / 16 Liverpool Street Melbourne 3000 Phone: (03) 9639 9885
Like a lot of people who enjoy cooking, I own a few cookbooks. Over Christmas and my birthday, I got given several to add to my collection…. plus I did buy a few myself!
I tell myself that I don’t need to feel guilty about my cookbook collection since I do read each one I own. I’m sure I’m not the only one who takes cookbooks to read in bed.
The other weekend it was just Alastair and I at home for brunch. I had seen a recipe for pancakes or fritters using chickpea flour, but couldn’t remember where I had read it. I tried flicking through a few of my newest cookbooks and online through my usual recipe websites but with no success. Gaaah! Don’t you hate it when that happens? In the end I couldn’t track down the recipe and had to wing it. That’s the problem with reading so many books and food magazines – you get ideas and inspiration but then you can’t remember where those ideas came from.
I ended up with corn and chickpea flour fritters. I bought the chickpea flour from an Asian grocery store to make onion bhaji and have used it a few times since. Plain flour would work as a substitute, but the chickpea flour gives a unique nutty depth of flavour.
On a side note, I have discovered that indian style chickpea flour is made from chana dal, which is a cousin of the chickpea, not an actual chickpea. There’s lots of alternative names for this flour: chana dal flour, gram flour, dal flour, or besan flour to name a few. Actual chickpea flour (ie made from actual chickpeas) is popular in Italian cuisine and is called farina di ceci.
1 cup of milk (add a tad more if you think it’s too thick)
Pepper
Oil spray
Cream cheese
6-8 cherry tomatoes, quartered and tossed with a dash of olive oil
Extra chives to garnish
Instructions
Put all the dry ingredients together in a bowl.
Mix together the eggs, milk, and chives, season with pepper, then stir in the dry ingredients and mix lightly until combined.
Allow to stand for 10 minutes.
Heat a nonstick frying pan on medium heat, and lightly spray with oil.
Drop 1/4 cup measures of mixture on to the frying pan, allowing room for spreading, and cook over medium heat. Turn when bubbles come to surface, and cook another minute.
Put a dollop of cream cheese and some cherry tomatoes on top of the fritters, and garnish with some extra snipped chives.
Has this restaurant been around forever? It certainly feels (and looks) like it. Even despite closing for “renovations” last year. Perhaps this is code for something else, as when they reopened, nothing had changed!
Eating here is like being part of an efficient factory line. Get in, order, eat, get out. There’s no niceties here, no waiting for you to digest your food over a drink and conversation. As soon as your chopsticks have been put down, you’ll be asked if you’re finished. Yes? Then what are you still doing here?
Let’s be honest. Camy does not make the best dumplings in the world. But they’re quick, and they’re cheap and there’s something about the place that’s good despite the daggy décor, and the abrupt service. Most occasions that we eat there, the bill comes to less than $10 per person (this occasion we were slightly over, $13.50 each, because we ordered beer). And sure, you may wait in the queue for 10 minutes, but you only wait a couple of minutes for dumplings to start arriving once you’re ordered. This time, I swear, it took one minute for our first plate of dumplings to be delivered. Obviously they’re not cooking them all to order!
Fried pork dumplings (15 pieces – $6.80)
Ahh… good old fried dumplings. With a slightly chewy skin, they’re usually not too oily. These are quite popular and they’re favourites for many people I know.
Steamed beef dumplings (12 pieces $6.80)
If you’re not that keen on fried dumplings, there’s also steamed dumplings. These ones are beef. They’re not bad, although I seem to prefer pork dumplings.
Steamed chicken and prawn dumplings (have forgotten the price!)
As you can see, there’s not much prawn in the chicken and prawn dumplings. I don’t find them as tasty as the other ones.
Chilli oil dumplings (15 pieces – $6)
Now we’re getting to the good stuff. These are pork dumplings floating in a soup slicked with chilli oil. There’s only the hint of heat in the chilli oil, despite the red slick.
Mushroom and vegetable dumplings (10 pieces $4.50)
The mushroom and vegetable dumplings are my second favourite ones at Camy. They’re chock full of garlic and onion and are a little sack of dumpling goodness. Mhmm hmmm.
Shanghai pork mini buns (8 pieces $6.50)
And finally the best is last – the Shanghai pork mini buns (also known as xiaolongbao in other places). The mini buns are little dumplings that are filled with meat and soup. The soup inside is made by placing a little bit of jelly inside prior to steaming. Once they are steamed, the heat turns the jelly into a liquid. Eating them can be a bit of a challenge – first, trying not to pierce the dumpling skin so you don’t lose the soup inside (hint: roll them on to a spoon), and second, trying not to burn yourself on the scalding liquid!
Although we didn’t have it on this occasion, the pumpkin cakes are also really good. They’re small, sweet, deep-fried morsels. We always order two plates and save them for dessert, managing to fit them in despite the plates of dumplings we have ingested!
Camy Shanghai Dumpling and Noodle Restaurant
25 Tattersalls Lane
Melbourne 3000
Phone: 9663 8555
While some people crave chocolate, my cravings tend to be for savoury items like hot, fat chips or alternatively for spicy food. Food Safari the other night claimed that spicy food is perfect for hot, humid countries, as all the spices help stimulate the appetite. I don’t know if that’s true, but last Friday it was unseasonably wet and humid and all I wanted the entire day was spicy food. Lunch was with colleagues at a Korean restaurant, which kept me happy for a couple of hours. After work though, a few drinks with my Bro, Alastair and a couple of his colleagues started up my craving again. I had read Mellie’s review of Oriental Spoon a while ago, and it had been sitting on my list of places to try for months and months. Everyone seemed happy with my suggestion for Korean food, so we braved the heavy rain and headed to Latrobe Street.
Once there, everyone glanced at the menu, but they were happy to let me pick the food. I love doing the ordering, because I get to pick things that I want to try! After conferring with my Bro, we decided on three dishes to share amongst the five of us.
Jap chae
We didn’t wait long for things to start arriving. Soon the wait staff was filling up our table with rice and banchan, and we had to shuffle things around when the mains came so we could fit everything on. The first main to come out was the Jap chae – clear potato noodles pan-fried with thin slices of marinated beef and assorted seasonal vegetables in a sesame oil sauce ($16.90). Yum, yum, yum. The noodles were light in texture and carried the flavour of the sesame oil and the slightly sweetish sauce.
Soft tofu casserole
Next was the soft tofu casserole with seafood ($35.90). This was soft tofu with mussels, pipis, prawns, squid and vegetables prepared in a spicy soup. Alongside the seafood were enoki mushrooms, carrots, zucchini, spring onions, green chilli and a good dollop of spicy red chilli paste. Also sitting grandly in the broth was a raw egg. The casserole came out on a little gas burner, which was turned up at our table to let the soup heat. We got a bit distracted by the jap chae and other items arriving on to our table, and the egg quietly disappeared, slipping into my Bro’s stomach. Apparently he was doing us all a favour, as the egg had overcooked by the time he got to it.
But the star was the tofu, hidden underneath the seafood and vegetables. It was magnificent – so silky and smooth, and the kind of tofu that could even win over a tofu hater (not that I am one!). The soup was spicy and fishy and well worth the eating sweats that everyone got. Mhmm, finally my spicy cravings were sated. <
Meat cooking on the stone
Last was the combination marinated set – a combination of marinated beef, pork and chicken, stone grilled ($37.00). The stone was bought out to our table on a portable gas stove along with a small basket of red coral lettuce and sauce (that tasted like a slightly spicy hoisin sauce).
The waiter turned the stove on, returning later with a plate of meat that he laid onto the stone, along with two mushrooms. The mushrooms looked sad and lonely next to all that meat!
You’re supposed to smear some sauce on the meat and then wrap it in the lettuce, but the lettuce leaves were a bit small and not really suited to rolling. I preferred the meat and the tangy, salty banchan eaten with rice.
The remnants of the meat and marinade caramelised into a sweet, sticky sauce. We scraped as much off the stone as possible!
We rolled our way out of the restaurant to find that the rain had finally stopped. With my craving finally satisfied, I was a happy gal.
Last week was my b-i-r-t-h-d-a-y. I felt a teensy weensy bit glum about getting older but knew that dinner at a restaurant would perk me up.
Seamstress is located in a four-storey building on Lonsdale Street. In the building’s past, there used to be an undergarment manufacturer, guilders, and a sweatshop. Nowadays, there’s a basement bar, a ground floor kitchen, a first floor dining room and a top floor bar. We arrived around 8pm on a warm Friday evening and wandered upstairs to the first floor. I was a tad confused about where I was going (upstairs? downstairs?) and fortunately we were greeted by the staff on the first floor. It was still fairly quiet at that stage (it filled up later) and we were given a choice of two tables in the long room.
Excuse the terrible photos – I have a new toy and am still trying to get used to it!
As we perused the menu, we were bought a broth to sip while we decided on what to eat. I believe it was a lemongrass, ginger and chilli broth. I loved the little cups that they were bought out in. Too cute.
Service was very friendly and funky – and obviously kiwi. Our waitress was very chatty and recommended food and wines and explained how the menu worked. We took up a couple of her food recommendations and happily went with her wine recommendations.
Crispy calamari
We started with the crispy calamari ($14), the silken tofu treasure box ($14) and the pork belly ($16.00). The calamari was covered in a tempura style batter and served with a little bowl of five spice salt. It was presented on a piece of Chinese newspaper. The batter on the calamari was beautifully light and pale. I tried the salt but left it because I found it too salty and overpowering. In hindsight, it would probably have been a better idea to sprinkle the salt rather than dipping the calamari into it… duh.
Tofu treasure box
The tofu treasure box was a little hot pot of tofu and shitake mushrooms. I love those meaty shitake mushrooms. I liked it, but I would’ve liked the dish even more if the tofu was more silken than firm.
Pork belly
The last item we had before our mains arrived was the pork belly; long boneless strips that had been braised in a dark, sweet/savoury sauce. The sprouts sitting under the pork had absorbed some of the sauce from it and they were soft and tasty.
After our starters, our chopsticks were taken away and we were bought a knife, fork and a spoon. We ended up asking for our chopsticks back. :p
Braised beef cheek
Our mains were the braised beef cheek and the red duck curry. Rice came with the main meals. Now I know that the photo looks like a brown plop (must have lost my photo skills there) but the beef was gorgeous. It had been cooked for five hours with star anise and cassia (and possibly more spices) and was very tender, dark, sticky and fragrant. I grew up eating a dish similar to this, gnul nam, and it has always been one of my favourite things to eat. It was the first thing that I asked my parents to teach me how to make.
Duck curry
The red duck curry was served on a bed of beans and broad beans. The beans still retained some crunch and the duck was very tender and rather spicy! Fortunately, for this non duck lover, the meat didn’t taste very gamey.
At the front L-R: Ginger jelly, pannacotta, pineapple jelly. Middle: rose petal fritters
We finished with a dessert tasting plate of desserts ($25). There was a pineapple jelly, ginger jelly, a pannacotta, rose petal fritters with mint cream and wild rice and coconut cream parcels in banana parchment.
At the front L-R: pineapple jelly, rice and coconut cream parcels in banana parchment, mint jelly.
By the time we got to dessert, we had downed a couple of bottles of wine. So my memory of dessert? Not that great. So, what can I dredge out of memory to tell you… I preferred the ginger jelly over the pineapple, the pannacotta was smooth and silky, the rice and banana parcels were creamy and the parchment was strongly banana flavoured (strangely enough). My favourite was the rose petal fritter which looks like a brown plop in my photo. I hope this brown plop photo phenomenon of mine isn’t becoming a trend. It did look better in person!
All in all, I ended up having a good birthday dinner. It even made me feel better about getting older (the wine helped a lot).
We went to IMAX the other week to see Beowulf. Like Thanh, I think that the movie is worth seeing just for the 3D. It was quite an average movie, but the 3D was amazing and made it much more engrossing than a regular movie (despite the weak storyline).
Before the movie, Alastair and I had dinner at De Los Santos on Brunswick Street. We arrived around 7:30pm, and the restaurant was buzzing. The restaurant has exposed brick walls and hard floors, and with almost all tables full it was fairly noisy. As we hadn’t made a booking, we took a seat at the bar to wait for a table. Fortunately we only waited about 10 minutes and it gave us the opportunity to peruse the menu and decide on what we were going to eat. Despite our short wait, the staff still took time to stop by to give us an update on the table.
Croquetas de Espinacas
Once we were seated at a table near the back of the room, we ordered two plates of tapas and the seafood paella to share. The first dish to come out was the Croquetas de Espinacas – Crispy spinach & cheese croquettes served with red pepper relish ($10.00). We got 4 largish croquettes – they had a crisp golden crust, with a very soft almost gooey centre. The red pepper relish was slightly sweet and spicy. Very delicious.
Costillas de Cordero
The other tapas dish was Costillas de Cordero – Roasted lamb ribs marinated with rosemary & cumin salt, served with a lemon & yoghurt sauce ($12.00). The ribs were salty, slightly smoky and fatty but the lemon helped cut through some of the fattiness. This was another good sized serving – there were 9 small ribs on the plate.
Paella Marinera
After the tapas there was a short wait for the Paella Marinera – paella with mussels, prawns, pippies, fish, caramelized onion, fresh green beans & roasted tomato finished with a Seville orange glaze & fresh herbs ($24 per person, minimum 2 people). It looks quite impressive with all the seafood laid out on the top. The paella was generous with the seafood and was quite a large serve, particularly after the two plates of tapas we had eaten! Some parts were a tad salty and some of the pippies seemed slightly bitter, but I really enjoyed the occasional bits of crunchy rice I came across.
All in all, it was an enjoyable meal. I was impressed with the size of the tapas that we had. I would like to go again but would skip the paella and instead just order tapas so I could finish off with dessert. I had wanted to have churros that evening, but unfortunately we didn’t have time nor space in our tummies! De Los Santos 175 Brunswick St , Fitzroy 3065 Phone: 9417 1567
I started a new job when I got back from my holiday, so I’m now one of those people who work in the city. Yey! Access to new shops and restaurants is very exciting. My credit card is a bit scared, but I’m very excited.
The other week I had a lunch date with a friend, and her lovely 7 month old daughter at the European. The European is located on Spring St, next to the Princess Theatre. It’s a moody little place – a long narrow dining room, black and white chequered floor, and dark wood panelled walls. As we were toting a pram, we were seated at the front of the room which meant a bit more natural light for pictures. Grand.
Freshly shucked oysters – slurp
We started with one of the day’s specials – freshly shucked oysters. These were served with a little dish of a vinegary sauce. They were very hard to eat gracefully with the little garnish on top. Good thing we weren’t trying to impress! The oysters were fresh and sweet.
Manchego and fig salami
We shared another starter – Manchego with fig “salami”. Manchego is a sheep’s milk cheese from Spain (as I have discovered). The slightly salty, creamy cheese was lovely with the fig (and on bread, and by itself).
This was fish, prawn, clam, mussel, and a scallop surrounded by a tomato based broth. The seafood came out in the bowl by itself, and then the broth was poured on top. It was slightly tangy and seafoody. I also got some toast, which you can see in the background.
The food was presented nicely and the other plus were the little touches. For example, the lemon half that came with the oysters was wrapped in muslim to prevent lemon seeds from falling in. There was nice bread with a good quantity of garlic aioli. And the staff didn’t bat an eyelid when cutlery and napkins got thrown to the floor or when my friend’s lovely little daughter got a bit grizzly because she needed a nap. Thankfully it was fairly lively (noisy) in there so we didn’t seem to disturb other diners.
This might be an ongoing series. My friend has gone overseas but we have a lunch date for January when she returns. It’s my choice of restaurant this time; recommendations of good eating places around the top end of the city would be welcome (as long as they’re pram friendly!).
The European 161 Spring St, Melbourne Phone: 03 9654 0811
There’s a number of reasons that I like cheap Asian food joints. One of those reasons is, well, it’s cheap. Sure, I enjoy going to fancypants restaurants and blowing money on a meal, but I can’t afford to do that all the time, so cheap = good. Another reason I’m fond of the cheap Asian places, is how fast you get your food. As soon as you put your order in and sit back, food starts to arrive. So that’s all good, but unfortunately it’s not without a compromise. The main compromise you make for cheap and quick is that generally the décor is a bit lacking….
When I say lacking, I actually mean a teensy bit gross! The tables might be sticky, and the chairs wobbly. But never fear – there ARE cheap Asian places where you don’t need to compromise.
Hung Vuong is one of many Vietnamese restaurants along Hopkins Street in Footscray, but their point is difference is that it doesn’t look like it was last decorated in the 80’s. It’s bright, with a large mirror lining the wall on one side of the restaurant and a large window at the front. The chairs and tables are non wobbly, and sitting on the tables are the obligatory condiments, thermos of tea as well as chopsticks, spoons and napkins. The menu is very limited – your food choices are rice paper rolls, spring rolls, broken rice, vermicelli and phở. In fact, the drinks menu seems longer than the food one! Not that limited choices is necessarily a bad thing. It means that you can decide on what you want to eat in 1 minute, have your food arrive in 5 minutes, and the bulk of your time there can be spent slurping up your noodles and chasing out any scraps of food in the murky soup.
I particularly love the special beef phở – a mix of sliced beef, tripe, beef sausage, tendon and brisket with flat rice noodles in a rich beef broth. Buuuut, if you’re not into offal there is normal sliced beef as well as a chicken option. As with other places, the phở comes with a plate of fresh bean sprouts, fresh chilli, Asian basil and lemon and you can add them to your liking. I also like to add some of the chilli sauce that sits on the table – not the one that’s in the bottle, but the one in the small container that has a hint of shrimp paste. That stuff is so awesome.
The rice paper rolls are better at other places, so if you’re hungry, I would recommend ordering a large phở instead. A large one will cost you $9 and you won’t regret it.
Also good is the vermicelli. You can choose from pork, chicken, prawn, or spring rolls. I like their vermicelli because it’s not just a big bowl of noodle with a tiny bit of other stuff. You get pickled carrots, lettuce, Asian basil, cucumber, and chopped nuts along with the meat and a little bowl of vinegary sauce with a touch of fish sauce.
Avocado smoothie and three colour drink
The thermos full of tea might satisfy you drinkwise, but if you do feel like something a bit different there are other options. If you’re feeling like something sweet, almost to have as a dessert, go for the three colour drink. This is a drink with red beans, green jelly and coconut milk with crushed ice. There’s also several fruit smoothies such as an avocado smoothie, which is avocado blended with condensed milk. I like avocados but have only ever had them as in savoury dishes and found it very, very rich, very buttery and unbelievably thick. It’s filling so don’t order a large phở and an avocado smoothie unless you have a huge stomach. Just go the large phở instead. Like I said before, you won’t regret it!
Hung Vuong 128 Hopkins St , Footscray Phone: 9689 6002
