Revisiting Mrs Parma

One weekend, we decided to have a walk about the CBD area.  And the first thing we did when we arrived, was to have a nice cup of cappuccino at Brother Baba Budan.

I still find this to be the best cappuccino ever in Melbourne.

After walking about, shopping around, it was time to lunch.  We had first considered Chin Chin, but on second thought found that rather expensive.....and decided to leave that for another day, and went to one of our favourite spot - Mrs Parma.

I decided to try their parma of the day, which was Smoked mozzarella and jalapeño.  It was superb!  I had always avoided jalapeño in any of my food, since my tolerance to hot food was not that great.  But this day, I found that I loved this parma!!  The chicken was moist, the cheese was melted just right, and the jalapeño was hot but not too much and it just totally made me want to stand up and dance!!

Every time we went to Mrs Parma, we were always so full after the parma and just couldn't have anything anymore.  But this time, we decided to save up some stomach space by not finishing the parma and take it home as lunch for another day, so that we can share the sticky date pudding.  Ever since my sister introduced me to this lovely dessert, we have been trying it at various space.  So, when we saw on Mrs Parma's menu that they have this dessert, naturally, we wanted to try.  And so we did this time.  The pudding was very moist and nice, we was a plus.  However the sauce was not what we thought it should be like.  It was overly sugar milky like, but absolutely lacked the butterscotch taste that is required.  Umm, a bit of a disappointment...  Guess we'll just stick to parma when it comes to Mrs Parma.

Noodle Kingdom @ Preston

Preston market is a kind of close by place where we usually go to when we can't be bothered going far, but want things other than cafe or pub food.  Of the few choices we have there, we often go to Noodle Kingdom for some generally nice noodles.  Why is it only "generally" nice?  Well, the quality of the food here depends on your luck.  There had been several occasions where the food was very nice for it's price - nice soup, superb noodles.  But there are other times where, well, it's just no up to par - cold soup, soggy noodles.....

One afternoon, me and mum decided we don't really want to go far, so we went to Noodle Kingdom.

Since there were only the two of us, we decided to go simple and order two dishes to share.  One of which was the beef noodle.  Seems like we were in luck that day.  The soup was hot and tasted good, and the noodle was very good too, not soggy, not sticked into one bunch.  The beef was also very tender, although maybe a bit too much fat, but I can live with that.

The second dish we ordered was Xiao Long Bao.  This was the first time I had Xiao Long Bao at Noodle Kingdom, and I was kind of surprised that it wasn't bad.  The skin was perhaps too thick to my liking, but it's acceptable.  The fillings were good, and did contain soup in it, which was good.

So, Noodle Kingdom isn't a place that I would say that I love it, but for something close by, it's definitely a favoured choice.

Pho Dzung Tan Dinh

Last Saturday we went to Richmond to have some pho, one of our favourite of all time.  

This has to be the best pho tai ever.  Well, we always knew that, which is why we always comes back here.  The soup was superb.  But, I must say that I was a little disappointed this day as the soup was not as hot as it should had been when it was served.  Otherwise, it was still the best and I still love it.  

A day at Westfield Doncaster

One lovely Sunday, me and my sister decided to go to Westfield Doncaster for some shopping.  But knowing how crowded the food court would be at lunch time, we decided to first have some lunch.

When we got to the food court area, we noticed that Schnitz was now opened, and so we decided to give that a try to see how that's like.  After going through the very much confusing menu, we decided to go with the simplest, Schnitzel and Chips.  Since the server was so nice and keep suggesting we should have a sauce to go with it, we got the Sweet Chilli Mayo sauce as well.  So, how was it?  Well, it was, umm, nice.  But not great.  The schnitzel was real chicken meat, not those schnitzel that you normally get at food court, so that was a good thing.  But it just wasn't special.  The chips were nice, but again, just nothing amazing about it.  I had better else where.  The sweet chilli mayo sauce was just too sweet, not really worth it.

We also got a Pork Curry rice from Hanaichi to share.  We had already had this many times and had liked it every single time.  True, it was not the best Curry Katsu, but for what it's worth, it's a good enough meal.  One reasonable sized fried pork, lots and lots of nice curry sauce, and loads of rice.  For a food court meal, it was real good value.

After completing our shopping, we decided to have some afternoon tea at Koko Black.  At first, we were just going to get coffee and hot chocolate, but once I saw the menu, I just couldn't stop myself and ordered the Belgian Spoil... As usual, it was absolutely delicious, every aspect of it.  Heavenly.  There's just no other word.

And as usual, I just couldn't stop myself when I see desserts and sweets, so I also ordered a Soy Hot Chocolate, and my sister had a cappuccino.  The soy chocolate was actually quite nice, not as rich as the normal hot chocolate, but I guess that's just right for me that day.  I might have this again next time.

Sensory Lab

On the same day me and mum went to have pork ribs, we also went to Sensory Lab for a coffee break once we met up with my sister.

We have walked passed this place many many times, but never stopped here for coffee.  One reason was we always loved BBB, and it is more or less our standard coffee place whenever we go out to the city.  Another reason is that this place always seems to be so full and busy.

This day, we decided to try this place out, since we planned to do some shopping around David Jones and Myer and didn't want to keep walking back and forth, and also, my sister wanted to have a danish and we saw that they had this nice looking blueberry danish on display.  So here we are, a Blueberry Danish.  The danish itself was quite nice.  The pastry was crispy and the blueberry was nice too, not too sweet, just right.  However, I did find it interesting(?) that the waitress only gave us a knife with the danish, when I see that right opposite us, the couple that had a cupcake and something else, each had a little fork with their cakes...

Since it was so busy there, we didn't want to spend time looking at the menu, so we just picked the safest option of coffee for us, three cappuccino.  It was not bad coffee, but still, it was no match for BBB.  Maybe we should just go back to BBB next time...

The Meat & Wine Co

One fine Saturday, I took mum out to The Meat & Wine Co for lunch.

We were quite early that day, basically went in right after it opened, so it was quite empty as expected.  But there were already two pairs of people there.  Wow, and I thought we were early walking in before 12pm.

We were seated on the far side of the restaurant, where the beads were.  I just could't resist taking a photo of the beads decor. ^_^

Since we were also going to have dinner out at a Chinese restaurant that day, we decided to go light for lunch and just share one full rack pork ribs between the two of us.  So once we ordered, we were supplied with usual tools for having ribs - paper aprons and a small bowl of water for washing our fingers.

Ah! Here comes our pork ribs.  God I love this.  I must say that it was a little difficult or next to impossible to eat this and show good table manners at the same time, but really, when you see this in front of you, you'd just through all thinking of table manners away.

The ribs was absolutely delicious.  The glaze was tasty, the meat was moist.  Oh and those chips.  I love those chips.  Nice and crispy, and well seasoned.  Gotta love this place just for this dish.

Degani Bakery Cafe @ Plenty Valley

One day, some time back, I took my mum to the local shopping centre - Westfield Plenty Valley for lunch.  We decided to go to Degani Bakery Cafe.  Simple and cheap, food not too bad.

It's been a while since I was last here.  Ever since RMB opened next to it, we had been going to RMB a few times to try out the menu, but we have come to the conclusion that RMB is a little more fancy, but it does not justify the higher price.  Especially when it seems that each time we go, quality deteriorates.

We ordered two dishes between the two of us.  One of which was the usual Chicken Parma.  We already established that no parma can be better than that of Mrs Parma, but from a local cafe, it was not bad.  It was moist, the chicken was thick, the crust was crisp.  The only let down was the cheese.  There was not enough, and could be a little more golden.  The good thing this day though, was that we told the waitress we'd be sharing and she brought us two plates, so we were able to move the parma to another plate so that the chips didn't get soggy.

This day, I decided to try their wood fried pizza.  Out of the list of choices, we decided to try the salami, virginia ham and olives pizza.  When it was fresh from the oven and hot, it was quite good to eat.  But I kind of think the virginia ham was tasting a little weird.  Also, since we didn't get to finish the whole pizza, we took it home, and when the next day when I slightly microwaved it as breakfast, it had a very VERY oily taste to it.  Not very pleasant.  Maybe go back to Salt and Pepper Calamari next time.

Burch & Purchese Sweet Studio

Last weekend, while lunching at South Yarra, I went down to Burch & Purchese Sweet Studio to get some cakes.  

When we got there, it was quite full of people, which was never the case when we previously went there.  

When we looked a little closer... Surprise! Surprise!  Hey! Aren't those two girls there from MasterChef??  Kylie and Julia, I think.  Apparently they were, well, doing something there.  Kylie seems to be talking to people around, offering tasting ice-creams, which unfortunately, I didn't get to taste.  And Julia, seems to be making some desserts in the kitchen area.  But there were so many people there, we decided we didn't want to stay long to see what they're doing, so we picked our cake, and left.  

This is the Smoked white choc, coffee, aniseed, lemon cake.  

As always, it came with a sheet of paper with the description of each part of the cake.  To tell the truth, I have always loved B&P's cake, but this one, I did find it, well, good, but not that good.  Maybe it's the sour components of the cake too overpowering for me, but I just didn't enjoy it as much as I did with the previous cakes I had there.  

This is the Salted Caramel & Chocolate Eclair.  

I really liked this Eclair, but with the salted caramel cream filling inside, it was actually quite filling, especially when you try to finish it all by yourself.  Also, I did found that the salted caramel cream filling seems to be too buttery in taste.  The butter taste kind of overwhelmed the whole cream filling...

I have always wanted to try this meringue thing they put on a stack on the counter, and this time, I decided I am going to try it.  This is called the Strawberry cloud.  The outside is crispy and the inside is kind of chewy.  It's a bit sugary, so a bit sweet if you eat it alone, but if you have it with coffee or tea, it's actually quite a good match.  

Chez Olivier

This saturday, we went to a French restaurant in Prahran for our weekly lunch, and to celebrate my sister's birthday, which, was back in May...

Chez Olivier is very closed to the Prahran market, only a few minutes walk.  It's a nice little cozy restaurant.

The decorations are simple, but with a french touch.  The waiters also all spoke with a french accent, which was interesting.  I think we even overheard them speaking in french amongst themselves.

The complimentary bread was very nice, had a crisp outside with a very soft center.  The butter was a bit hard and difficult to spread, but otherwise tasted very good.  And the sea salt that came with the bread add a very nice touch as well.

For entree, I had the Seafood Bisque Soup.  It was very thick and creamy, and full of seafood flavour.  This is the first time I had bisque soup, and sure this won't be the last time if this is what bisque taste like.  Pity that we had already finished the bread, or else I would definitely have used the bread to soak up every little last drop of the soup.  The soup also came with one mussel and one large prawn.  The mussel was quite small, but the prawn was large and cooked perfectly.  Cooked, but still very juicy.  Loved that prawn.

My mum and my sister both had Soup a l'oignon aka Onion Soup.  I had a little taste from my sister's soup, and it was quite nice, but a little to the sweet side.  It's still very good, but I have had better else where.

After the three serve of the entree came out, the waiter then bought us something we didn't order.  He explained to us that because the cheese souffle that my dad had ordered will take a little longer (which was only another five minutes), they are giving us this little dish for free.  I forgot what exactly this dish was, but I think it was sardine on red capsicum with a piece of biscuit on the bottom, and some greens on the side.  It was fresh and simple.

Dad chose the Entree of the Day, which was a Goat Milk Cheese Souffle with Pumpkin coulis and greens on the side.  OMG!  This was MAGNIFICENT!  It was very cheesy but without the goat milk taste that I dislike.  And sooooo soft, fluffy and light.  Absolutely what souffle should be like.  ARGH! I should have had this!!  I should have had BOTH!

For main, I chose the Boudin Blanc - Chicken Sausage with caramelised apple and creamy mash potato.  I had always wanted to try boudin blanc, but never had the chance.  The dish didn't disappoint. The boudin blanc was very moist and soft, unlike normal sausage.  It's a little like those japanese fish sausages I had when I was small, only more moist and even softer.  The mash, oh the mash.  It was so soft, so creamy!  I always love a good mash, and I love this mash.

Dad picked the Main of the Day, which was braised lamb with vegies and creamy mash potato and bread.  I didn't taste this dish, but it did look very good.

Mum had the Brochette de Boeuf Grille - Grilled beef skewer with pomme frites and Salads.  I tried a piece of the beef, and it was quite nice, but I suppose, not really special.  And it did seems that, although the overall serving was not small, it would have been better if there were more meat.

My sister had the Salmon of the day, which was seared salmon with capsicum on a skewer with Cauliflower coulis.  I tried a bit of the salmon, and it tasted very nice.  But the highlight of the dish was definitely the cauliflower coulis.  It was very creamy and tasteful.

For dessert, dad once again picked the Dessert of the Day, which was poached pear in chilli red wine sauce.  It looked very amazing, but the pear seems to be not poached enough.  It wasn't as soft as I would like it to be.

I have never had poached meringue before, and this Ill Flottante definitely made me want to have it again.  The meringue was light and fluffy, absolutely amazing  And the sauce, the vanilla custard sauce was such a perfect match to the poached meringue.  Not too sweet, but just right, and not overpowering.

Overall, it's a very nice restaurant that I would go back to.  We had the set course lunch and the price and serving size was a good match.  Not extraly expensive, but definitely enough to make you full.

However though, next time we go there, we must remember to have tap water rather than mineral water...  We did realise that we do need to pay for the mineral water, but no idea it was $11 for a bottle...and we had two...  And probably we would do fine without having extra sides as well, since the set lunch is already quite enough.

Movida Next Door

I have heard of a lot of things about the Movida series of bars and restaurants, but never had the chance of going to any one of them.  Last Saturday, finding Hardware Societe already pack full, and didn't want to wait, we decided to wait a little longer for Movida Next Door to open and dine there.

Knowing that this is a place that will be packed soon after it opens, we decided to more or less wait outside its door for it to open at 12pm.  Looking into the alley way, between Movida Next Door and Movida Bar De Tapas Y Vino, there are around 8-9 people waiting around for both to open.  So I guess we made to right move to be there early to make sure we do get seats.

More or less right at 12pm, we walked into the place and were greeted and lead to the seats facing Flinders street in the corner.  After briefly looking at the menu, the waitress came by, and introduced us to the lists of specials from for today.

There were so many options!  And she speaks so fast that after she finished, I can only remember those few ones that I thought we might order...

Rather than just having water, I decided to go for something different, and went for the Grapefruit drink  the waitress suggested.  It was not too sweet and very grapefruit-y.  It's a shame that the photo didn't do the drink justice.  It was actually a very beautiful pink colour.  But because the lighting wasn't quite good, it came out quite light and dull in the photo... Oh well.

This is the complimentary bread that was served after we ordered our meal.  To my surprise, it came out with olive oil rather than butter.  Well, Spanish place, I suppose.  It was a nice way to start a meal, since we were so hungry by that time.

The first of our tapas to come was the Croqueta - Fried Croqueta of Wild Mushrooms.  This, is ABSOLUTELY the highlight of the meal.  I so wish I had order more of this.  One each was definitely not enough...

It was so crisp on the outside and so smooth and rich of mushroom flavour on the inside.  Ah, I can still taste of the flavour even at this moment.  The mushroom filling inside was just, so smooth and creamy and... just amazing!

Then there was the Bomba - Chorizo-Filled Catalan Potato Bomb with a Spicy Sauce.  This came out so cute, with its round shape and the blob of sauce on top.

Basically, it was a potato ball with a bit of mashed chorizo in the center with a bit of spicy sauce.  I must admit that when it came, I had already forgotten that it's filling was chorizo and did wonder what the filling was.  Like the Croqueta, it was very crispy on the outside and the potato and chorizo mash is absolutely lovely on the inside.  And the sauce!  I made sure I use the fork to scrape every bit of it and ate it all.

Interestingly, it seems everyone that came to the place will either order at least one of those, or both.  I guess this must be the most popular dish of the place.

The next to come was Pollo - Chicken Skewer Grilled on Charcoal.  This came as a bit of a disappointment.  Taste-wise it wasn't bad, but the meat was too dry.  We were glad that we only ordered one rather than one each.

Then came the special, Gamba, which are pan-fried(?) Tiger Prawn with some kind of aioli...I really don't remember.  The menu was actually for three prawns only, but the waiter, seeing that we have two person sharing the meal, suggested that we can increase it to four prawns so that we can have two each.  The aioli sauce was very creamy but seems to lack a bit of bang to it.  The prawns also feels like they lacked a bit of salt.  But it did taste fresh and it was nice.

The other plate we ordered from the special menu was the Pato, which was a confit duck leg with some sauce with some vegetable...again, I really don't remember what it was exactly.  The duck leg was very nice, with crispy skin, and very tender meat that is literally off the bone.  The sauce, although I don't remember what it was, had a bit of a plum taste to it, kind of sweet, but not overpowering.  It was a very nice compliment to the duck meat.

Last to come was the dessert.  I was torn between this, or Churros Con Chocolate - which is Spanish Doughnuts with Rich Drinking Chocolate.  I was SO tempted to order the Churros, but thought that it might be too much with the rich chocolate.  So instead, I chose something lighter, the Blood Orange Sorbet.  I forgot what exactly it was called, I think it was something like Sorbet Sanguine.  Basically it was Blood orange sorbet, with Orange gel, mandarin, and Almond crumble.  As I imagined, it was a very light dessert, a very good finish to the meal.  The sorbet have a blood orange taste to it, but not too sweet or overpowering.  And oh I loved that almond crumble.

Overall, it was a satisfying meal.  I think I will come back for more, especially the Croqueta and the Bomba.  But one thing to keep in mind.  Better to come early than late.  Movida opens on Saturday at 12pm, and it was already packed full by 12.30pm...