suburb

The European: Ladies who Lunch

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.

The European: oysters

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.

The European: cheese

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).

The European: fish soup

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


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Hung Vuong

Pho

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.

Vermicelli

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.

Drinks

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


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Horoki

We went to see the Priscilla musical the other night and it was fabulous! If you enjoyed the movie you will love the musical. The singing was magnificent, particularly by the three main female singers (who sang all the songs that Bernadette, Mitzi and Felicia lip sync to). The costumes were gloriously OTT. I couldn’t believe the amount of work put into some of them, particularly when several were only shown on stage for less than a minute. I was also happy to see that they had included the bus, Priscilla, on stage!

As we were going to be hanging around the city after work, we decided to go to Horoki for dinner. Horoki has been extensively reviewed, and considering what everyone has had to say about it, I have wanted to go there for quite some time. Even though it was still early when we showed up, all the tables were reserved, so we nabbed two of the red stools at the counter.

Not knowing the size of the dishes, we started with three.

Horoki

Tuna carpaccio – tuna sashimi served in a light soy dressing sprinkled with a good parmigiano reggianio topped with a touch of mayo ($13.80)

The tuna was nice but I wasn’t sure about the cheese. I tried a couple of pieces with cheese but ended up brushing it off for the remainder. The combination of cheese and soy didn’t work for me.

Horoki soft shell crab

Crispy soft shell crab with lemon sour cream mayo ($13.80)

The crab was fried in a very light batter and was beautifully crispy. This was probably my favourite dish. We squeezed the lemon juice over it but I think we could’ve done without – there were a couple of patches that were a bit too sour. I still loved it.

Horoki

Beef Tataki

The Beef Tataki was a special that night. The meat was seared, thinly sliced and then covered with the sauce. It was brilliant.

After our three dishes, we still wanted more. So more we had!

Horoki steak

Diced scotch fillet steak and potato with onion and wasabi sauce ($14)

Scattered amongst the tender morsels of steak was little pieces of fried garlic. When I ate a bit of steak with some garlic and wasabi – whoa! Hello flavour explosion!

Horoki pancake

Korean style pancake. Calamari and garlic chives mixed in Korean pancake batter and lightly fried. Served with a sesame and soy dipping sauce ($11.60)

I am a lover of crispy deep fried items (which partly explains my hot chips obsession) and this didn’t disappoint. The pancake was crispiness punctuated by moments of calamari.

Horoki duck

Roasted duck and eggplant. Slices of oven roasted duck and a bed of eggplant smothered in a delightful miso and honey sauce, with a hint of Japanese mountain pepper ($16.80)

I’m not a big fan of duck, but as duck goes, this was pretty good. It was tender and moist and I loved the eggplant, which was soft but not mushy. However, I thought the sauce was a tad salty, although if we had been eating it with rice it possibly would’ve been perfect.

Alastair was quite keen to keep ordering after all this (I think he’s come back from our trip with worms) but despite the speed of the service we didn’t have enough time.

Horoki dessert

We asked for the bill, and with it came a small serve of mango mousse. A little bit of sweetness to send us on our way. We were sweet on Horoki already, but what a lovely gesture.

Horoki
19 Liverpool St
Melbourne 3000
Phone: 9663 2227


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Caffe Panette

Pannette coffee

If you’re in the South Melbourne vicinity, stock up on some fruit and vege at the market, then head across the road to Caffe Panette to replenish your energy. The coffee is good, and there is one dish in particular that blows my socks off.

We were in the area last weekend as I had a voucher to spend at the Coventry Street Bookshop. The voucher was a farewell gift from work and naturally I bought cookbooks! I was terribly indecisive, flicking through most of the cook books there while the Boys waited patiently. We were all starving by the time I decided and headed to Panette for some lunch.

Panette gnocchi

The Boys had the homemade gnocchi bologna veal and pork sauce with red wine, tomatoes and fresh herbs ($15.90 for the main size). This is what I tend to eat when I go to Panette. And seriously – it’s the best gnocchi (the Boys agree). The gnocchi is light, delicate and fluffy plus the bolognaise sauce is rich and meaty. God, I could rave about it for ages. I didn’t order it on this occasion but I kept stealing pieces from Alastair’s plate. I should’ve just ordered my own, really.

Panette chicken salad

Instead I had the white chicken salad with poached and sliced chicken breast with saffron kipfler potatoes, taragon mayonaise and salad greens ($14.90 for the main size). The potatoes were hidden under the salad greens, and as you can see there was no skimping with the chicken! This was a good salad – a little bit too much mayo for my liking, (and it wasn’t the gnocchi) but I soldiered on and enjoyed it anyway. :p

If you order lunch, they bring you bread and butter, which is a nice touch. Service can seem a tad abrupt during busy market days, but one bite of that gnocchi and any minor quibbles are forgotten.

Caffe Panette
144 Cecil St, South Melbourne 3205 VIC
Phone: (03) 9690 2803

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Baba House (closed) : Hainanese chicken rice and more

My parents used to work a lot – they would regularly work 12+ hour days. The exception to these long days was Sunday, when the shop didn’t open until 3-4pm (depending on how my dad felt). On Sundays we usually went out as a family for lunch.

It was during these Sunday lunches that my Bro and I were introduced to Hainanese chicken rice – white chicken served with rice that has been cooked in chicken stock. We always had it from a stall at Wakefield Market foodcourt (in Wellington). The rice from this small stall was heavily impregnated with the flavour of chicken – it was very oily and fatty. Eaten with the silky cold chicken, it was a real treat, but fortunately for our arteries we only ate it occasionally!

Hainanese Chicken rice

This version from Baba House ($8.50) was not as oily or fatty as the dish I remember from Wakefield Market but still tasty. The only downside was the MSG thirst that persisted for several hours!

Baba House is our “outside kitchen” – that is, when I can’t be bothered cooking, Alastair heads there to pick up dinner.

Char Kway Teow

I’m always on the look out for a good char/fried kway teow as it’s on my (rather long) list of favourite things to eat. Baba House do an acceptable version ($9.20) with well seasoned wok fried flat rice noodles, prawns, fish cake, dried mussels, calamari, egg, crunchy bean sprouts and a hint of chilli. Personally, I like more chilli and would love that hint of chilli to be upped, but that’s a personal preference.

I should also say that the last time I had this from Baba House it gave me an MSG thirst like the chicken rice did. It seems that only recently there has been an excess MSG problem. I’ll have to remember to ask for no MSG for future visits.

(By the way: If you know of a place that does an outstanding char kway teow, please let me know!)

Nasi lemak

I have saved my favourite Baba House dish (and unfortunately, the worst photo) for last. Although it looks a bit like poop in a bowl in my photo, I can assure you that the Nasi Lemak ($9.20) is good! There’s so much to love about nasi lemak. Coconut rice. Tick. Dried anchovies. Tick. Sweet/sour crunchy pickles. Tick. Spicy, tender beef rendang (there’s also chicken or lamb if you prefer). Tick. Crunchy peanuts. Tick. Hard boiled eggs. Tick. Fortunately, there was no MSG thirst when I ate this one. :p

Alastair has the laksa 90% of the time ($9.20). The soup is fragrant, spicy and creamy and it’s chocka with noodles, chicken, fishcake, beans, eggplant and fried tofu. He loves his laksa and says that it’s better than Laksa King.

Baba House – so much food to love. What a great outside kitchen to have!

Baba House
34 Errol St, North Melbourne
Phone: 9329 1762

KitcCh

Last weekend Alastair made a small bet on the NZ versus France rugby World Cup game. He bet on France (what a bad kiwi!) so we headed to Kensington Village to pick up his winnings. We stopped for brunch at KitcCh, which is across the road from the TAB.

The Boys and I have our own jargon that helps us recall things and places. We call KitcCh “the dark one” due to the dark wood panels and the painted black floor. The walls are lined with artwork that is available for purchase.

During the weekends, KitcCh does breakfast all day, but there is also a lunch menu. Since we’re late risers in the weekend, I generally have breakfast even when it’s closer to lunch time.

Kitcch

I had the Black jack cheese and baby spinach wrapped in a double smoke ham served with poached eggs, basil oil and hollandaise on english breakfast muffins ($12). It looks like eggs benedict – the cheese and baby spinach were hidden in the ham. Despite one of my eggs not being as runny as I like, it was still good. The spinach and basil oil helped cut through the fattiness of the hollandaise and egg yolk.

KitcCh coffee

Good breakfast, but the coffee was only average – mine was rather sour. I finished off with a raspberry smoothie (that I didn’t bother taking a photo of). Very yogurty, with a bare amount of sweetness, it made me happy and made up for the sour coffee.

KitcCh
512 Macaulay Rd, Kensington
(03) 9376 5694

Soul Mama (closed)

Soul mama

Last year, Alastair got the opportunity to go to Mumbai for business. While there, he was kindly shown around by a couple of his colleagues in the Mumbai office. This weekend, he finally had a chance to return the favour, when two of those colleagues came over for a visit.

On Sunday we took them on a little tour of Melbourne, and after a lot of walking and tram riding, we decided to have a late lunch. As both his colleagues are vegetarian, we opted for Soul Mama.

I’ve heard plenty about Soul Mama but had never been there before. I suppose that’s why I was surprised by the buffet and bain marie arrangement! The way it works is that you choose your desired size bowl or plate, and that gives you a certain number of choices from the buffet.

We all choose the medium bowl, which was $15.50 for rice and 4 choices from the buffet. I’m glad we didn’t go any larger, as the medium bowl was very filling.

I choose saffron rice (you could also have jasmine or brown rice) with a tempeh and vegetable curry (front right), some kind of pasta (front left), tandoori vegetables (back left) and a vegetable and pesto gratin (back right). I was starting to get choice overload looking at all the options, so my brain was too busy to take note of the exact names of the dishes!

The pasta and the gratin were pretty good. The pasta had a lovely creamy sauce, and the gratin was delicious and also creamy. Most disappointing in my selection was the tandoori vegetables. There was no tandoori flavour AT ALL. It was basically plain vegetables, with minimal seasoning. I also wasn’t impressed with the curry. There was a strange edge to it – I didn’t like the flavour much.

All in all – the food was okay. Not bad, just okay. If you’re after a place with interesting food that might convert a meat eater to a vegetarian lifestyle (or even just convince them that vegetarian food can be really tasty) then Soul Mama isn’t up to the job. But if all you’re after is a filling vegetarian meal with average food but a gorgeous view, Soul Mama is perfect!

Soul Mama
St Kilda Sea Baths
10 Jacka Boulevard
St Kilda
Ph: 9525 3338

Cafe Plum revisited (closed)

Another weekend, another visit to Cafe Plum. This visit, there were a couple of interesting specials on the board. My Bro and I went for the specials, while Alastair had ricotta hotcakes with bacon and maple syrup.

Cafe Plum

Durkah crusted poached eggs on white bean braised with mint & chili oil

This was my Bro’s brunch (I copied the name straight from the board – a rather long title for a meal!). He said it was, “Awesome!” and gave it two thumbs up. Apparently the beans were very soft, and the mint and chili went very well together.

Cafe Plum fritters

This was my brunch – rather than vegetables cooked with mashed potato it was actually a vegetable fritter. It had diced potato, peas, pumpkin and spring onions. The poached eggs were wonderful – I wish I had taken a photo of the yolk running down the fritters. That, and I wish I hadn’t screwed up the focus. Gaah.

Another visit, another mostly good brunch. I say mostly, because one of Alastair’s hotcakes were still gooey and uncooked in the middle. Maybe the assistant cooked those!

Cafe Plum
193 Flemington Rd, North Melbourne 3051
Ph: (03) 9329 8867

Cafe Plum (closed)

Cafe Plum

Every few weekends, you’ll often hear a conversation in my house that goes something like this:

“Should we go to a café for brunch?”

“Okay! Where should we go?”

“Let’s go to our favourite.”

“Our favourite….?”

“You know! Our favourite café!!”

“Ummm…”

“OUR FAVOURITE! Plum!”

“Plum! Oh, that’s my favourite! Let’s go there!”

Plum is our current café of choice, and yet the Boys never know what I’m talking about. Sigh. It can be hard being the smart one in the house (haha).

Located across the road from the Royal Melbourne Children’s Hospital, Café Plum is small, but it’s cookin’. While I do enjoy a good poached egg on toast, when I go out for brunch I generally feel like something a bit different. There’s only so much eggs and toast that you can stomach before you get bored.

That’s one of the great things about Plum. The menu has more interesting things than just bacon and eggs and there’s always a couple of specials up on the board. A couple of specials that I’ve seen (and eaten): Ricotta hotcakes with smoked salmon and horse radish crème fraîche, Cuban fried eggs with fried banana and chorizo, and Mozzarella in Carrozza (fried mozzarella sandwich). For sweet brunches, there’s items like pancakes with banana and French toast with a touch of orange blossom syrup. (I can’t recall the sweet brunches as well because I prefer the savoury ones!)

The regular menu has a couple of interesting items beyond the usual big breakfast, such as marsala potatoes with sausage and spinach, and soy scrambled eggs with chinese sausage.

If the cafe isn’t too busy, often the chef/owner will come out and have a chat. From the conversations we’ve had with him, it’s obvious that he is someone who is passionate about food, and loves to see others enjoy his cooking. That’s a quality that I adore, and it’s just another reason that I love his café.

Cafe Plum
193 Flemington Rd, North Melbourne 3051
Ph: (03) 9329 8867

Tiba’s Lebanese Restaurant

Tibas Lebanese Restaurant

In celebration of my Bro’s birthday in August, we took him out to dinner. Because it was a weekday, I didn’t feel like going somewhere too fancy, so I picked Tiba’s Lebanese Restaurant.

Well, it was a good thing I wasn’t looking for fancy, because Tiba’s certainly isn’t! The atmosphere was…… what’s the best word? Functional comes to mind! It was a bit like having dinner at someone’s house – someone who hadn’t decorated for a couple of decades. Still, we weren’t there for the atmosphere or interior design – we were there for food.

After perusing the menu, we decided on the set menu and chose Tiba’s House Special. I assumed that the price was per person, but it wasn’t – it was per serve. After a bit of confusion where we got the feeling that we only had ordered one House Special (we had), Alastair went to the waiter to clarify and settled on two serves of the set house special. He was told that three would probably be a bit too much for the three of us and that was good advice.

I really needed to eat – a strong coffee in the late afternoon had been churning my stomach and I was still feeling a bit nauseous. I kept being teased by the sight of food being bought out only to disappear around the corner. So when food arrived (after a couple of quick nasty photos of course) I started stuffing myself.

Because I was so focussed on eating, I don’t really remember exactly what we had… I know there was pita bread, and dips (hummus, tzatziki, & baba ganoush), dolmades, chickpeas, parsley salad (I’m still not sure if this was supposed to be tabouleh as there was no visible signs of burghul), garden salad, pickles, Lebanese pizza and falafel. While I was eating stuff individually, Alastair had the brilliant idea of sticking stuff in pita bread and wrapping it up. Just like a bought one!

Tibas Lebanese Restaurant

Then the meat came out – lamb, chicken, beef, sausage, some random meat on a stick, sitting on a bed of rice.

Tibas Lebanese Restaurant

And that rice – OH MY GOD. All the juice from the meat had soaked into the rice and it was so tasty. It was oily and meaty and delicious – I could’ve eaten a bucket of it. My only wish is that the rice had been a bit warmer. There is nothing like steaming hot rice straight from the pot or rice cooker. Mhmmmm.

It didn’t feel like I had eaten that much, but by the end of the meal we were all completely stuffed. Not that my full stomach stopped me from taking a small pack of pastries home to savour on the couch…!

Tibas Lebanese Restaurant

Tiba’s Lebanese Restaurant.
504 Sydney Rd Brunswick 3056.
Phone: (03) 9380 8425

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