Recorded Music Salon

11 Collins Street, Melbourne
Phone 03 9650 3821

Waiting for public transport (which, by the way, is fast becoming a Melbournian pastime) is not such a bad thing occassionally.

I was catching up with some mates for a Laotian dinner over in Bridge Rd, and patiently waiting for my ride to arrive at the corner of Collins and Spring Street tram stop. My eyes wandered to the left. Urgh...cowhide cowboy boots are so not cool. My eyes wandered to the right. When is this bloody tram going to get here? My eyes wandered upwards. Hmm. Funky people drinking it up in a rather innocuous second story window, above which the sign, Recorded Music Salon, catches my eye. What the?

Okay, yeah. I may be a little slow on the uptake here, as apparently this one has been around for a wee while (see here and here). But it's newish to me, so I returned a few days later to sample their lunch.

It's one of those places that instantly feels "cool". I hate ascribing to that tenet, because such "feeling" is so overtly contrived. But the designers got it bang on - it is sophisticatedly retro in a seventies kind of way. Think polished timber, earthy walls, natural vinyls (no pun intended), bronze features, and the most kick-arse pottery light features (are they vases and plates?).

But on to the food. EG went the pizza with jamon and manchego. Just look at it. Does anything else need to be said how good those two ingredients on a pizza can be?

I went with a more sedate toasted ciabatta filled with chicken, rocket, roasted peppers and manchego cheese. It too was pretty good with solid ingredients, although at $12ish perhaps a little on the pricey side (for a regular weekday lunch anyway).

I'd like to come back and check this place out at night - but I fear I may be overrun with the-too-cool-for-school crowd; an unfortunate side-effect of such funky places.

Sake Bar Kura

1 Malthouse Lane, Melbourne
Phone (03) 9654 7454

Sake Bar Kura is quirky little hidey-hole restaurant located at the end of a derelict laneway (Malthouse) which runs off another lane (Flinders). The industrial/rustic Japanese entrance, complete with sauna-like cladding and kooky sake barrel, seems kind of surprising in the environment. Which I guess is one of the reasons this eatery is quite popular with the white collar lunch brigade.

The lunch set menu ($15) consists of pickled vegetables, entree of the day, grilled or fried fish, miso soup, main dish (13 to choose from) and fruit. I think that $15 is a reasonable price to pay for such a selection, but perhaps it is just a tad over what I would normally spend for lunch on a regular work day (I usually aim in the $6 to $10 bracket).

The venue itself is rather funky. The timber cladding on the outside follows inside to some very rustic (and extremely heavy) tables and bench seats. A certain amount of design has been influenced by Japanese aesthetic, partnering clean lines with natural elements such as a faux slate walls and bamboo featurettes. A little technosavvy device on the table will alert staff when you need them, which I initially thought was rather neat, yet felt reluctant to exercise. Call me old fashioned, but I like the game of catching the waiters eye when they wizz past.

But let's get down to it - the food. Today the lunch set included pickled zucchini and daikon, a meat ball with braised fennel, and deep fried fish/prawn ball. Of the three, the deep fried fish/prawn ball was probably my favourite, but then that old adage of "deep frying leading to goodness" is never far wrong. Personally, I think the pickled veg could have had more pickle about them - the flavour just vaguely dabbled in sweet and sour.

I chose the Katsudon for my main - a panko crumbed pork fillet served with a demiglass (sic) sauce on cabbage and rice. The pork itself was wonderfully tender and juicy, but what really added interest was the demi-glace. Past experience of katsudon sauce has been a dark brown worcestershire-like brew. But this one was full of the taste of tomato and was very very picquant (vinegary?). It really was quite interesting. I don't know how traditional it is (and to be perfectly honest, this sauce was far from being demi-glace as I know it), though I have read that the Okayama version of the dish uses this style of sauce.

EG went the attractively plated Sashimi don - slices of fresh salmon, tuna and kingfish with wasabi, ginger and soy on rice. As you can see it was attractively plated (...though I still think you can't beat the ridiculously cheap sashi don at Don Don), and the fish was wonderfully fresh. The warmth of the rice beneath went to warming the raw fish on top.

To finish, we were given a quarter of an orange. Yup. One quarter. Obviously $15 doesn't allow for much more than that ;-). Oh, and another puzzling thing. We ordered green tea and were given two western style cups with a green tea bag in it. What the?!? This just didn't make sense. Once again, call me old fashioned, but what the heck happened to teapots?

So whilst the food was somewhat interesting, I think it misses the mark in some areas. It would do well to foster the location with some more interesting, inventive and value for money food. And teapots. Yeah. That would do it.

Movida

1 Hosier Lane, Melbourne
Phone 03 9663 3038

Friday. 8.30pm. EG and I were already half tanked after boozing it up at Hell's Kitchen following a particularly hard week at work for the both of us. By this stage I had sunk four pints of Coopers and was well on my way to feeling oh-so-good, more so because I had a dinner reservation with friends at Movida, which unbelievably, I had never been to before.

I anticipated my first Movida experience to be a little different to how it actually played out. But I guess the fact that I was a little drunk helped me (us) deal with what you are about to read. But I'll get to that in a tick.

Movida was not at all how I imagined. I thought it would be a little more Spanish; more dark wood, more cramped, more intimate. What I found was a rather arty industrial space - high ceilings, white plaster, tiled floor, bronze, a bit of wood, subdued lighting and a wicked bar-to-roof wine rack. It did feel a tad aloof though.

The rather extensive menu had been uhmmed and aahed over, but by this merry stage I was having a hard time focusing on the words (many of which were in espanol). Alas I knew they did a degustation/set menu, which is a convenient way of handing over the ordering reins. We all concurred this would be a great way to proceed ;-)

Whilst we waited for our first dish to arrive, it gave me the opportunity to spy on the surrounds. On a table just to the left of us were what some would term "the dining dead", a rather glum looking couple who didn't say a word to each other all night. I was transfixed. They ate their meal in complete silence. This would be in stark contrast to the couple who would next fill their seat (keep reading).

The first round of dishes arrived, starting on the left with the Ortiz, a Cantabrian artisan anchovy on a crispy thin crouton with a quenelle of smoked tomato sorbet. I am SO bummed I didn't get a better photo of this, as it really was the prettiest dish. The crouton was as long as your finger, and running the length was a sexy plump fillet of anchovy. I picked it up and bit halfway, getting a mouthful of crunchy fried bread, salty to the extreme anchovy, and the most stunning smoked tomato sorbet, which is up there with the essence of tomato at VDM. Friggin awesome.

Next up was the vieira y espuma, an oven baked half shell scallop, dressed in a herby oil and topped with potato foam. The menu actually stated this came with jamon, but it wasn't in the dish that came to us. But we didn't miss it at all, cause dang, this had us all aaahing again. The potato foam was surprisingly potatoey - I don't quite know how they captured the soul of the spud. It was partnered superbly.

Little deep fried croqueta, flavoured with smoked eel and horseradish surprised us with their very salty smoky flavour. Ms.P actually thought they were a little too salty and smoky, and perhaps it would have been helped with something creamy or tart to dip them into.

Okay, this is one dish I was quite surprised to find - the famed jamon iberico. Served on a lukewarm stone dish with home made grissini, the intramuscular fat had started to melt ever so slightly, making for a sumptuously smooth mouth feel. It was savoury and salty and deliciously meaty. The grissini too were wonderful, and tasted of olive oil.

The caball ahumado, or smoked Spanish mackerel with pine nut gazpacho sorbet was rocking. It was very salty (...are you getting the gist), but the fish was divinely unctuous. What surprised me was how well the pinenuts partnered with the smoke flavour - a real culinary marriage. The sorbet acted to counteract the salt somewhat, venturing down the creamy tangent. I always thought gazpacho was a cold tomato and bread soup, but originally it was a just a cold bread soup made of stale bread, garlic, olive oil, salt and vinegar. No tomato. Hence the tomatoless pine nut gazpacho sorbet.

At this point our friends, the dining dead, had vacated their table. The next peeps to fill their seats were a very fashionable thirty-something couple. They were rather full of themselves, making much ado about the place, ordering and drinking MUCH of the expensive wine, being very demanding of the staff etc. Hmm...I wonder where this will lead?

Okay - now for the devestator. Are you sitting down? This is cecina, voted "dish of the year" by The Age Good Food Guide 2007. It is air cured wagyu beef thinly sliced with a truffle foam and poached egg.

This is what cecina looks like when you enthusiastically stab it with your fork. OMG. I cannot begin to tell you how wonderfully amazing this dish is. Okay, it is salty, but cripes, the air cured wagyu is so voluptuously rich and savoury, the perfectly poached egg yolk coating it like thick cream, giving a mouth feel that is deliciously naughty. And if that wasn't naughty enough, a heady truffle foam grabs both the wagyu and the yolk by the hand it leads it on a merry little dance to your tastebuds. Mr.Camorra needs to be spanked for this one.

And yes, there is still more! Perfectly cooked frenched lamb cutlets, pink on the inside and nicely charred on the outside. Topped with a salsa verde (well, it wasn't a typical salsa verde, but it was a sauce and it was green, so heh!), it was amazingly vinegary and vibrantly green. I couldn't quite figure out the flavours in this one (by this stage I had a couple more cervesas under the belt), but it was great.

To go with our lamb cutlets was the espinacas con garbanzos, or sauteed spinach with chickpeas and spices. I have a real soft spot for chickpeas, and found this dish to be rustically satisfying. The gravy was heady with cumin, and I guess shows the wonderful Moorish influence on Spanish cuisine.

These little bruschettta-like bites are not on the regular menu, so I don't have a nice swanky Spanish name for them. Basically they were an olive oil infused crostata topped with a herby/oniony/tomatoey salsa and a strip of jamon. They were good, but interestingly they arrived more towards the end of the meal than the start.

Finally (...yes, we got there) was a lip-smackinly salty loin of wild boar, sitting on a salty (!!!!) silverbeet and raisin stew. By this stage I was really quite over the excessive use of salt in the food, it really was WAY too much. It didn't stop me eating the boar, cause it was bloody fantastic and a shame to waste. But I was somewhat put off by the extreme sodium overload. For one thing, it just made me want to keep drinking beer *light goes on* ;-)

Dessert doesn't come with the $48 degustation, but how can one not try the churros? Sadly, this was one of the very reasons I wanted to come to Movida - for the damn churros! So were they as good as I imagined? Well, the churros were good - nice and donutty and covered in cinnamon sugar. But the rich drinking chocolate served alongside was a little, er, mysterious. I was thinking it would be pure melted chocolate, when in fact it was more like a dark chocolate floury custard. I dunno. The "chocolate" tasted watery almost - it wasn't creamy or milky at all. Hmm...perhaps I don't know what I'm talking about, but it just didn't really do it for me.

The fashionable dining couple by this stage were looking a little worse for wear. The lass had her head on the table, and her partner was patting her back, trying to rouse her to leave. My glance kept moving from them, back to my friends, back to the waiter pouring our drinks, back to my friends, back to the fashionable couple stumbling (literally) towards the front door, back to my friends, back to their table and a big pile of vomit on the ground, back to my friends.....WHAT THE?!? This chick had vomited all over floor!!!!!

We all gasped simultaneously and then burst out laughing. I guess having had a few ourselves, this otherwise icky situation turned out to be one that proved extremely amusing.

Between guffaws, we managed to wave STOP to the waiter when he was almost about to walk into the nastiness. He dropped the f-bomb (as I'm sure I would do in a similar situation), grabbed a napkin off the table and placed it delicately onto the pile, and then scurried away for some help. He returned with the maitre'd, who shook his head in disgust confessing that the fashionable couple didn't even have a booking, and had "name dropped" to get in to the place. I asked who's name they dropped (I wanted the goss!!), but unfortunately he was not very forthcoming ;-)

They offered to move us to the bar, but we decided at this point to call it a night. How could you top that?

Pushka

20 Presgrave Place, Melbourne
get there from Howie Place running between Little Collins and Collins street
Phone 0408 173 892

Pushka is a mouse hole of a place off a lane that's off a lane (although it does runneth over into the lane). It has all the hallmarks of somewhere cool and funky - it is slightly grungy, a little bit arty, it serves excellent coffee with kitschy teaspoons (Lady Diana from the royal family series is particularly popular), does good bagels and select range of patisserie, and it has crazy toast. It functions as part cafe, part bar (cheap beer!) and part art space. And it has fish. Yeah. Funky.

Half consumed excellent coffee with kitschy spoon. Actually, has anyone else noticed the number of places that are doing kitschy spoons at the moment? It seems to offer a bit of street cred these days ;-)

This is one of the toasted bagels - from memory called the King. Whilst they don't use the traditional dense New York style boiled bagels, these ones are good. And their fillings are top notch - a sprinkle of maldon salt for the tomatoes, good prosciutto, fried egg, excellent cheese.

They also serve a range of baguettes, and as mentioned previously, crazy toast. Actually, I have quite fallen in love with crazy toast, and am now doing crazy toast at work for lunch on my days in. It is a split bagel (or Burgen is a good choice too), smeared thickly with vegemite and avocado. Mmm. Whilst it won't have the men in white coats knocking at your door, it is a slightly ingenious take on adding salt to your avo's. I love it.

And this is how Pushka spilleth over into the lane. Don't be scared by the guy who looks so pointedly at you from the window directly ahead. It is a cardboard cut out, and it has freaked me on a number of occasions ;-)

Sister Bella

End of Snider Lane (off Drewery Lane), Melbourne

Is it me, or has the hidey-hole laneway bar been done to death in Melbourne? I applaud people for creatively using space in the CBD but it seems these days that bars get a good billing simply for being difficult to find. Where are the new ideas?

Sister Bella is the brainchild of the same crew who brought us the grungy St Jeromes. Some ideas are carried over: cheap drinks ($4 for Coopers Premium Lager), casual vibe, young and suitably 'alternative' staff, and eclectic music. Bella, though, aspires to be a little bit more grown up. Spread out over two levels, the leather chairs, ornate frames, fancy tiles and tealight candles hint at sophistication, while lashings of pine panelling, quirky religious iconography, and a rickety stairwell are geared towards maintaining street cred.

However, it all feels a bit contrived. Jeromes was naturally happening by virtue of its reclaimed concrete space. Whilst Bella is indeed difficult to find, it seems the owners are trying to push the shabby-chic envelope a little too hard, especially since this idea has already been done in more established places like Troika and Rue Bebelons. Granted it's early days, with sawdust still fresh in the unisex toilet cubicles, and we did visit on a quiet Tuesday evening. With time and more crowd buzz, it may become, as Threethousand enthuses, "too awesome". I did like the Virgin Mary statuette near the toilets and the seating poofs with innards of synthetic grass. However, I thought that such a space needed fresh ideas. Maybe I'm just getting too old.

Mrs.Palma's

25 Little Bourke Street, Melbourne
Telephone: 03 9639 2269

If you like your parmas and schnitzels supersized, then Mrs.Palma's is definitely the place for you. Not only does this restaurant/bar/pub/bottleshop specialise in a dizzying array of crumbed chicken/veal topped with copious amounts of cheese and other stodgy products, they also serve an impressive range of Victorian microbrews, such as Grand Ridge, Mildura, Holgate and Red Hill.

Frankly I couldn't go the parma, despite it being the signature dish. So I decided on the traditional Weiner schnitzel topped with a piquant German relish. It was a tad on the oily side and absolutely gargantuan on the plate. But I must admit defeat - I was only half way through when I had to pull out in fear of rupturing an artery. And to be quite honest, it wasn't an entirely pleasurable eating experience. It was just waaay too much - I felt defeated before I even picked up my fork.

Alas, the big burly blokes on my table practically inhaled their parmas, swilling a couple of microbrews to boot. This is perhaps a place for the lads, which was approximately 95% of the clientele on the day of my visit too.

Just ensure you make a booking, as this is one very popular spot for the ol' parma and pot (on a Friday especially).

Comfortable Chair

98 Lygon Street, Brunswick East
Phone 03 9387 1246

A rather kooky comfy place to rock on is the Comfortable Chair. Yes, there are lots of comfy chairs available (although I must admit I feel somewhat icky reclining into a public velvetine couch that has god-knows-whatever spilt on it over the years), some arcade style coin operated computer games (think Galaga or Astro Blaster), retro newspaper covered walls, cheap beer, funky lighting and music that can tend towards the too-loud-to-hear-you-clearly category.

But it's cool for a drink or two. And if you're so inclined to venture somewhere a little more sexu and subdued, then Plan B, as its name implies, is a better option (and frankly, one I preferred).

Hairy Canary

212 Little Collins Street, Melbourne
Phone +613 9654 2471

Hairy Canary is a place where some of the too cool for school set go to eat, drink and be merry. Don't let this put you off though. The food is pretty darn tasty, despite the fact you may have to wait a wee while to get it. And don't mind the surly vacant icemaiden waitress either. Like the atmosphere, it offers one something of interest to look at and experience ;-)

EG went the Spanish omelette with chorizo, olives, capsicum and manchego cheese. Cooked in a teeny paella pan, the filling was generous and bursting with flavour - almost juicy with it. His verdict = very good indeed.

I went the corn fritters with roasted roma tomatoes and spicy avocado, with an added side of goats cheese. The corn fritters were good, although upping the corn ratio would have seen them spectacular (nb. for uber "roasted" corn fritters try Mart 130). The spicy avo, rocket and tomatoes sat high atop the stack - a good picquant compliment to the fritters.

Verdict: worth it for the food, but not so good if you're in a hurry.

Baraki Upo Mezethes

168 Lonsdale Street, Melbourne
(cnr Russell & Lonsdale Sts)
+613 9663 1002

When a menu offers the following advice "ask for lots of our own made peasant bread and feel free to make a mess", well, I know I'm in the right place. Baraki Upo Mezethes is a funky little bar/restaurant located in the Greek precinct of the Melbourne CBD. It offers one a calm respite from busy streets that is not unlike walking into a church (...and don't scoff at the analogy - a wall of saintly deities will bless you as saunter on by).

Meze (singular) or Mezethes (plural) are similar in theory to tapas; small plates of food designed to share whilst being convivial (drinking and being merry) with your mates and loved ones. So don't expect big plate meals - there aren't any! At present there is a $25.00 special - three mezethes and a small jug of retsina, which is a Greek white wine infused with pine resin (hmm...interesting).

The table setting is quirky and welcoming. Individual serviettes adorn each plate, and a table runner of baker's paper allows one to "make the mess" they were referring to on the menu. Speaking of which, you are presented with a menu on a clipboard, and told to tick the items you want with a big blue pencil. Quirky. I guess it is a good way of ensuring one's pronunciation of Greek words does not cause undue embarrassment or incorrect ordering ;-)

The peasant bread that accompanies all meze is just magnificent. Baked on the premises using a low salt yeast dough, it reminded me of the bread the old Greek lady down the road used to bake for our family; and the old girl was as Greek as they come. I figure their recipe has got to be pretty authentic. Your hunk of bread comes with a dish of peppery olive oil for dipping. Just a warning - even though it may taste amazingly good, remember to keep some room for the meze and whatever sauce they come in for your dipping pleasure later!

So on to the mezethes...

Smoked trout with braised leeks and prunes was a wonderful combination of smoky, savoury and salty flavours paired with the sweetness of plump prunes. I must admit that I didn't see any braised leeks, perhaps being replaced with braised carrots instead (which were good anyway!). There was also some sort of grain / couscous, which added a nice bit of texture. My only criticism was that the dish was rather heavy on the prunes - a sure fire guarantee to have you running for the can a couple of hours later ;)

The pastourma with beetroot, halva and pistachio dressing was an interesting choice. The pastourma on its own is quite robust; it is a cured beef fillet rubbed with fenugreek and spices. Yet when paired with the sweet halva, tart beetroot or pistachio pesto - it transforms into an earthy savoury beefy taste sensation. I don't think I've had anything quite like it before. Very scrumptious.

Unfortunately I didn't take photos of the other dishes - I guess my stomach got the better of me. So you'll just have to follow the words here...

Okra in tomato with skordalia was just that - a small plate of skordalia, which is a garlic and olive oil potato mash, topped with about six ladies fingers poached in a sweet tomato sauce. A generous glug of olive oil to garnish added something to dip your peasant bread into afterwards.

The baked kataifi prawns with tomato and clotted cream were just magnificent. Kataifi is a shredded wheat phyllo pastry, which is mostly associated with dessert type dishes. In this case, shelled king prawns were wrapped and baked in crispy kataifi, their little tails poking up offering a convenient handle on which to take hold. A clotted cream infused concasse of cooked tomato and onion was spooned on top - the cream making the dish taste eerily like a dessert (in an extremely pleasant way of course).

The pork and beef wrapped in silverbeet was the homely homage to a dolmades meatball. Spiced mince was hand-moulded into little rounds, wrapped in silverbeet leaves and cooked in a rich tomato sauce. This dish offered another excuse to ask for more peasant bread - the sauce was reduced to the consistency of a stew - testament to a nice long slow cook.

My favourite dish (and the last to come out) was the Cypriot haloumi with red apple sorbet. A mound of superbly sweet red apple (or to be more precise, a chilled red apple mush with little bits of skin and everything!) was adorned with three thick slices of grilled salty haloumi. The trick to consuming this dish is to eat it quickly before the haloumi cools and becomes teeth squeaky. Either way, the superb marriage of salty and sweet is pure bliss.

Service at BUM (haha..just realised that acronym!) can be kind of scratchy and breezy around the lunch rush, so if you are after a quick feed, go elsewhere. BUM is about kicking back and sharing food, wine and conversation. So just relax, make a mess on the table and bloody well enjoy it.