Shark Fin House

Shark Fin House

131 Little Bourke St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9663 1555

P went back to Sydney last weekend and had yumcha there - made me really crave yumcha so we decided to go this weekend =) Out of the many yumcha places in the city, Shark Fin House wins by far. I actually quite like New Shanghai with their extravagant decor and relatively inexpensive food, but they don't do yumcha there anymore =(

We got there at 11am and I was surprised there was only about 15 people waiting outside. Last time I went with about 10 friends we booked a table for 11am and there was a massive line at least 20 meters outside - but that was 'cause we were waiting for the restaurant to open. This time, people had already started moving in by the time we got there =) The manager asked us if we had booked and we said no and got worried, but he told us to go in the lift up to level 1 straight away =)

We were the first table to be seated at level 1, think we had just missed out on ground level =( We got our tea and had to wait about 15mins before any food came out - and it was all very random dumplings and untraditional dim sims. This waitress kept bringing carts of food over (about 3 times) and we kept saying we didn't want anything 'cause we were waiting for the traditional dim sims! We felt bad we kept rejecting her, but we knew since we only had 2 tummies to fill, we couldn't order anything we didn't really want =(

Finally P was so starving that at 11.25am he ordered a fried har gao - he said he felt like one so it wasn't a random dish, but it wasn't that awesome. And we had to ask the manager for mayonnaise 'cause the fobby waiter boy didn't know what mayonnaise was lol.

Har gao, siu mai

At last the har gao and siu mai came! Although P ate all 3 har gao's 'cause I'm not a fan of prawns =P

Spareribs

And our favourite spareribs! <3 Before I met P I wasn't such a crazy fan of spareribs, but today we were fighting over this dish =) with its little bits of taro soaked in sparerib and blackbean sauce - delicious!

BBQ pork bun

The bbq pork buns here are the best - the bbq pork is so tender and leaking with juices, while the bun is soft and fluffy and just absolutely delicious =)

I ordered the runny sand bun (流沙包) 'cause I knew you need to specially order it and takes about 15mins for it to come - you know its freshly steamed =)

Runny sand bun

This has got to be my new yumcha favourite <3 I had it last time I came here and fell in love with it - it's so different to all other buns, and definitely surpasses my ex-favourite lotus paste bun =)

The bun is filled with an egg custard and sweet salty egg mixture, while the bun is slightly eggy (I think? They're not normally yellow but the ones here are - can't really taste the bun 'cause the insides have such a distinct taste). The sweetened salty egg paste is so unique - a taste of sweet then salty then sweet then salty... ahhhh <3 The texture is very unique as well - slightly grainy but yet so liquid! It's so runny that you have to be very careful when you eat it, can't pour it over your mouth 'cause it would burn you, but can't open it up to cool either or it'll run down your hands =P I could seriously eat a dozen of these myself, kinda regret not ordering an extra basket of it and taking it home haha

How can you end a yumcha without a tofu dessert, I would have ordered egg tarts as well but I didn't 'cause 1. I don't really like the egg tarts here (they're very small and they use the flakey pastry which I'm not a fan of) and 2. me and P had decided to make our own egg tarts tonight anyway =)

Tofu dessert

The tofu dessert here was a little disappointing though - the waitress (it's actually that nice waitress who kept trying to bring us food at the start, so we didn't have the heart to complain about her =P) didn't manage to scrape all the top layer off before serving it so there were bits of the solid layer in our bowl - kinda like when you warm milk up and there's that layer of solid milk on top. The actual tofu dessert was very good though - smooth and silky, and the syrup was not too sweet and slightly gingery =)

Definitely still my favourite yumcha place in the city!

8.5/10

C.
xo

See Part 2 for dinner here..

Caffe Esc

Caffe Esc

ANZ Centre, 833 Collins St, Docklands

(Ph) 9614 5555

☆☆

I read that Peter Van Haandel opened a new breakfast hangout at the ANZ Building in Docklands, after his very successful Mr Tulk at the State Library. And since it's got ☆☆ in the Cheap Eats Guide, thought I should check it out with J =)

It's actually literally 5mins walk from my apartment, but I still got there late - woopz! Sorry J =P Why is it that the closer you are to a place/work/uni, the later you arrive (true for me anyway =P)

It's literally located on the ground floor of the ANZ Centre, how convenient for the workers there to get awesome coffee in the mornings =)

The food menu is not very extensive, and I guess most people go there for coffee, 'cause the waiter asked us if we wanted breakfast or coffee when we got there at 10.30am.

I went for the breakfast classic of Eggs Benedict. J was tossing up between Eggs Benedict as well, or the Mushroom and Goats Cheese Bruschetta on the lunch menu, in the end she got an Eggs Benedict too =)

Eggs Benedict

Delicious! The eggs were perfectly poached - the yolk still slightly runny =) The hollandaise sauce was very tasty - not too salty, and just enough creamy-ness. I was very satisfied, and I know J was too 'cause she finished it before I did =P

J ordered a Latte as well which she gave the thumbs up for =)

Will definitely come back since it's so close to home!

8/10

C.
xo

Ghin Khao

Ghin Khao

242 Swanston St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9663 3345

☆☆

P had his uni awards night which I went to watch, and at first we were planning on eating there - as in eat a dinner's worth of canapes =P But the canapes were not very nice and most were cold, and P wanted to go celebrate, so we decided to go get some proper food =P 

Since this was very spur of the moment, I hadn't planned anywhere to go. P wanted to go to one of the Vietnamese restaurants on Swanston St but I refused to eat Pho yet again =P Then I remembered seeing Ghin Khao in the Cheap Eats Guide with ☆☆s. I hadn't tried this restaurant either the past 5 years I've been a student, funnily enough it's another Thai restaurant (see Your Thai).

I told P we shouldn't have Pad Thai again, but of course, he wouldn't listen to me =P We decided to get one entree, a main and a dessert and since I was choosing the entree and dessert, I let P choose the main. 

They gave us fancy cutlery, which looks nice but is actually very heavy! And since the cup is metal as well, it made the water very icily cold! I don't remember cutlery being like this in Thailand hmm =P

I ordered the Son-in-Law Eggs because it had 2 stars next to it and it sounded very interesting - Deep fried" boiled eggs garnished with minced prawns and tamarind sauce - $7.50.

Son-in-Law Eggs

It wasn't what I expected - I didn't know what I expected actually, but not really a salad. Nonetheless, it was very tasty! The eggs were slightly crispy on the outside but not fully deep fried, and went very well with the tamarind sauce. I didn't realise the little bits were prawns because they were sweetly marinated and deep fried as well. The only downside was there wasn't enough salad leaves - well, P ate most of it and I still had half an egg to go, which I ate with the main...

For the main, we were tossing between the Duck curry or the Thai Calamari stirfry, but P decided to go for the typical Pad Thai, and chose prawns 'cause it had 2 stars against it, even though I don't like prawns.

Pad Thai with Seafood

Don't know why but the last 2 pad thai's we've had, the bean sprouts are not cooked and are just placed next to the noodles (re Your Thai). This pad thai wasn't that spectacular - well in my opinion anyway. The noodles were really thin - I like thick rice noodles, makes each bite more substantial. And maybe 'cause it was prawns =P It came with 5 large prawns which I thought was pretty decent given the dish was only $12.90. Even though I say it's not "spectacular", I still liked it very much, dunno why but we really like the pad thai sauce - I guess 'cause it was such a fail when we tried to make it at home =P


To end the night, we had the Set of Three Desserts. They sell a fourth dessert here (Black sticky rice with longan & coconut milk) but they had sold out of it =(

Set of Three Desserts

So the set comes with a Toddy Palm Cake, a Coconut Dessert and a Banana, Sticky Rice & Black Bean.

Coconut Dessert

The Coconut dessert is a two layer dessert made from rice flour and coconut cream. The top layer was more liquid and was more like just coconut cream, while the bottom layer was more solid and jelly-like. It doesn't look very appetizing in the picture, but it actually went very well with the Toddy Palm Cake! 

The Toddy Palm Cake is a fluffy "toddy palm" flavoured rice flour cake steamed in a banana leaf and garnished with shredded young coconut. It kinda just tasted like a sponge cake - I guess 'cause I don't really know what "toddy palm" is =P I just looked it up and it's the name of the species of palms used to make palm wine... hmmm... =P

Banana, Sticky Rice & Black Bean

The Banana, Sticky Rice & Black Bean was my favourite - banana and sticky rice wrapped and steamed in a banana leaf (pretty straight forward from the name =P) I actually don't think there was any banana in it, could not taste it, and I wouldn't be surprised if they left it out given bananas now cost $13/kg at the supermarkets =O But anyway, it was very delicious despite having no banana taste. The black bean tasted very much like red beans, and looks kinda like it too =P I really like sticky rice - sweet or savoury (like 粽子 / zong zi) =) I don't like rice normally, but sticky glutinous rice is definitely an exception! <3


No disappointment at all, from yet another Swanston St restaurant =)


7.5/10


C.
xo

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

28/11/12

I found a Shop-a-Docket voucher for Ghin Khao - buy-1-get-1-free =) I'm such a sucker for vouchers so we came here for lunch one day.

I was craving some Pad Thai so we got it again - really would have liked it if they had slightly cooked the bean sprouts slightly but still not bad overall.

P ordered the Red Duck Curry this time - was surprisingly really tasty! Creamy and coconuty with lots of tender duck meat and some lychees as well =) And it wasn't spicy at all which suited us very well =)

Food~

8/10 - think will go for some of their other curries next time they seem to do them really well =)

Service~

3/5 - food came promptly and waiters weren't hush rushing around the restaurant unlike the other typical Asian restaurants

Atmosphere~

3/5 - not bad for a Swanston Street restaurant =) and relatively clean in comparison too =P

C.

xo

Cacao Green

Cacao Green

285 Swanston St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9654 9674

I had seen people sitting outside Cacao Green for a few months now and had always wondered what they sell here. I thought they sell Asian dessert, given I always see Asian students there =P We walked inside and surprisingly, they sell organic frozen yoghurt!

We just walked inside to check it out, when we saw the waitress put some frozen yoghurt in a sample cup with some toppings for herself, and then she asked us if we wanted to try some after seeing we were watching her :P It was surprisingly very tasty! I don't like yoghurt normally. Even though I love icecream, I really don't like frozen yoghurt. I think it's because most frozen yoghurts are berry flavoured and I'm not a fan of sour berries. But this was very tasty! We tried the Italian Original flavour and the Strawberry flavour. Tastes like soft serve but even better! 200% of the price though haha :P

There was a pamphlet advertising a Facebook offer of 2 free toppings if you like their Facebook page. P asked them if they could just give it to us, and the waiter tells us to go on the page on our phone and just like it right there and then =P so we did =D

P ordered a regular mixed Italian Original and Strawberry frozen yoghurt with 2 free toppings of blueberry and cookies n' cream cheesecake bits (which of course I chose :P) $6.70 for quite a large bowl of frozen yoghurt =)

Mixed Frozen Yoghurt

I wanted to try the Gourmet Waffle (even though I can make quite awesome ones =P) since the pictures of it looks so tasty! 

It was either blueberry or raspberry or just almond + walnut, and since P had already ordered blueberry and I don't like raspberry, I just ordered the Crispy Almond and Walnut Waffle for $8.50.

The waiter said we would have to wait 5mins for it, but it felt so long! We wanted to save part of our frozen yoghurt to go with the waffles (if we had ordered frozen yoghurt to go with the waffles, it would have been extra $2.50 =P), but the frozen yoghurt was so tasty that we ate most of it before it came - lameee!

The waffle looked a bit disappointing when it came. It really lacked the berry colour! I should have really ordered it with blueberries as well - would have been only 40c extra ($8.90) haha oh well =P 

Crispy Almond and Walnut Gourmet Waffle

The waffle was very delicious! Went very well with the frozen yoghurt! Should have really saved more for the waffle but it was melting (in the freezing cold Melbourne weather!) as we waited =( The waffle was crispy but very fluffy on the inside - very different to the Belgium waffles that I make at home. I love waffles of all kinds <3<3<3 

The only downside about this place was the lack of toppings the trainee waiter gave us. When he brought the waffle in, I told him there was meant to be walnuts there too and he points to the shaved bits in the centre and said that's it... ohmygosh =_______= And when he gave us our frozen yoghurt, P asked for more blueberry bits and he said he's not allowed to, when the head waiter said it's alright to give us more. How stupid is he doesn't he want more business?! How much does a few more bits of toppings cost to you?! Actually, toppings would have been $1.00 each if we didn't have the Facebook offer - bit expensive hmm =/

Will definitely come out here to chill with friends next time, maybe on not such a cold night =)

8/10

C.

xo

Dumplings Plus

Dumplings Plus

269 Swanston St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9663 8181

It was after our tango class again, and initially I was planning to go to The Metropolitan Hotel on William St 'cause I got a Shop-a-Docket buy-1-meal-get-1-free voucher for here. We trammed to William St x Bourke St then walked all the way up to Little Lonsdale St, it was 8.30pm by the time we got there - and they tell us they're closing at 9pm!! Arghh! :(

I was so angry, this happened the other day as well! I should stop picking places and let P choose instead :( We were going to walk to Hardware Lane and eat there since there is nothing to eat around William St x Little Lonsdale St, but by the time we walked there P said he didn't want to eat on Hardware Lane 'cause food there is generally expensive. So in the end, we walked all the way back to Swanston St - lame huh =_____=

We weren't very hungry by then, but we still had to eat, so we just decided to go to Dumplings Plus since P said he wanted Pho noodles but he knows I hate it, so we settled for him getting Chinese noodles :)

They're famous for their hand made noodles here so P ordered a stir fried one, since he wanted Char Kway Teow.

Fried Hand Made Thick Noodles with Seafood

The noodles were quite chewy - very different to normal rice noodles, but it gives more texture to the noodles :) The only regret is ordering seafood instead of pork. Pork would have made the noodles more tasty whereas seafood (consisting of prawns, calamari and fish cakes) doesn't give much flavour to the noodles. Presentation's not great either, but what can you expect for a Swanston St restaurant - actually Your Thai wasn't too bad.

I ordered the Marinated Lamb Wrapped with Veges - it came like 10mins after the noodles came, so that was a bit lame since this is supposed to be an entree! What's with these Swanston St restaurants giving us mains before our entrees?! (re Your Thai again :P)

Marinated Lamb Wrapped with Veges

This entree was very big - I was very full after eating only 1.5 wraps. The lamb was surprisingly soft, like braised lamb - the meat fell apart without any vigorous cutting :) The veges was only shredded cucumber haha, but it went well with the pancake - I love spring onion pancakes (the Chinese type, not the Korean type LOADED with spring onions :P) Considering this entree cost $8.80, which is only slightly cheaper than P's noodles ($10.80), I guess you'd expect it to be reasonably filling :)

The waiters here are very enthusiastic - P was leaning over his finished plate to try my lamb wrap and the waiter took his plate from under his arms =/ And 2 seconds after I finished my plate, it was taken from me already haha. I think there's probably too many waiters here lol

I had planned to order a Red Bean Pancake after we had finished, but I was just SO full after my lamb wrap could not fit anymore in :(

Quite satisfied given we paid less than $20 for us both to be stuffed full :)

Oh and next time I'm not choosing the place we eat at after our Tango lesson ><

6/10

C.
xo

Ikea Restaurant

Ikea Restaurant

Victoria Gardens Shopping Centre

Corner Victoria St and Burnley St

Richmond 3121

(Ph) 8416 5000

P and I had been coming to Ikea soo many times this year since we moved in together, and each time we had eaten at the Ikea Restaurant - I think we've eaten here at least 4 times since the start of the year :P Nonetheless I thought I should blog about it, seeing as we seem to like it so much haha

The restaurant apparently only serves Swedish food (since Ikea was found in Sweden). Their most famous dish is probably the meatballs - I don't know why but they are very tasty! I'm still not sick of them after having them 4 times in the past few months =) 

Meatballs

Soft on the inside, drenched in a cream gravy and a blob of lingonberry sauce with a side of buttery mash - yummmm! :D Last time we only ordered a medium but this time we ordered a large 'cause we know we can't have enough of them! And only $12.50 for this much stuff :D

We ordered a Chicken Schnitzel just 'cause it's reduced from $7.95 to $4.50 - though I don't think chicken schnitzel is Swedish :P

Chicken Schnitzel

I'm not a fan of chicken breast, but P liked it, and for $4.50, what can you expect :)

The star of the meal is always the Daim cake - An almond tart with Daim; brittle butter almond centres with a milk chocolate coating! :D

Daim Cake

Something about this cake just makes it soo tasty! Layers of almond meal amongst a buttery layer, topped with milk chocolate and crunchy almond bits - daim. Sooo delicious for only $2.95 (down from $3.95 'cause of the Ikea Family card) <3

Almond Cake

The Almond cake - An almond base cake covered with butter cream and decorated with roasted almond sticks is not as awesome as the Daim cake, but it's basically the same thing, except without the milk chocolate layer over the top. Creamy buttery layer between the almond cake - for only $2.95 as well :)

Oh how much I love Ikea food <3 Still haven't had a chance to come here for breakfast - really want to try the Hot Big Breakfast for only $2.95!

8.5/10

C.
xo

See Part 2 for breakfast here..

Earl Canteen

Earl Canteen

Shop 5b, 500 Bourke St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9600 1995

☆☆

P had been coming to this place a few times with his friends and I kept bugging him to take me there so he finally did today =)

Its address is Bourke St but you actually go in either from William St or Little Bourke St - weird huh. The cafe looks out to a very nice courtyard, along with many other delicious restaurants like Movida.

P said the Trout Nicoise and Pork Belly's were really good - but after watching Food Safari on SBS this morning talking about all these exotic lamb dishes, I really felt like lamb, so I ordered the 12 Hour Lamb =)

The cafe was packed at 12.45pm so we ordered take away and sat at the tables outside - their takeaway boxes even have their name stamped on it haha.

P ordered the Trout Nicoise - Seared ocean trout, tomato, beans, potato, olive mayonnaise, butter, lettuce focaccia. He said he didn't want to order 2 baguettes and I realized why afterwards.

Trout Nicoise

The salmon was cooked perfectly - crispy skinned but soft on the inside. The olive mayonnaise goes very well with the salmon, but I thought it was a bit strange they put potatos in it. Either way, definitely a thumbs up!

12 Hour Lamb

I ordered the 12 Hour Lamb - Slow cooked lamb, honeyed carrots, gremolata baguette. The lamb was so tender - definitely tastes like it's been cooking for 12 hours! The baguette was SOO crunchy that it kinda hurt my mouth after a while - now I understand why P didn't want to order 2 baguettes :P but I'm not complaining - I love crunchy foods :D The honeyed carrots complimented the lamb very well - sweet with the savoury. I just looked up with gremolata is - "chopped herb condiment made from lemon zest, garlic and parsley" - so that's what was on top!

I really enjoyed this meal even though it cost $14 and $15 respectively. P said he was still slightly hungry after his focaccia - but I gotta admit, these sandwiches are a bit smaller than what they are generally.

Next time I want to try the Pork Belly! :)

8.5/10

C.
xo

Your Thai Rice & Noodle Bar

Your Thai Rice & Noodle Bar

255 Swanston St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9663 8010

☆☆☆

At first I was so shocked to see this restaurant in the Cheap Eats Guide, let alone have ☆☆☆! It seems like one of those cheapo crappy Swanston St restaurants we used to go to as a uni student. I haven't tried this restaurant before though - I've always wanted to 'cause the menu looks so colourful on the walls but P always wants to go to the Vietnamese restaurant next door. And after yesterday's failed Thai experience - I really wanted to have some genuine Thai food =)

We knew we wanted to get Pad Thai and maybe a curry or something - searched the whole menu twice and we were shocked we couldn't find Pad Thai on it! Turns out they call it "Phat Thai" here - lol wth =P

Chicken Phat Thai

Tasted just like normal Phat Thai! =) Dunno what it is but last time when we tried to make pad thai at home with those "Asian Meals at Home" sauce packs - it was terrible, wasn't like pad thai at all (the noodles were soggy and our sauce was a bit too sour or something =/). So I was craving genuine pad thai and we got it here :D Though I don't know why they don't cook the bean sprouts here though - it's raw and you just mix it in yourself. And thank goodness they put the chilli bits separate or I would have hated this place as well (re Cookie). I wish they don't make chicken pad thai's with chicken breasts though - chicken thighs would have skyrocketed this dish =P And I don't know why but we ALWAYS order chicken pad thai, I don't even know what beef pad thai tastes like - should really order that next time!

P was tossing between ordering a Chicken Claypot dish or the Shrimp Paste Fried Rice. On the menu it looks very interesting with so many different parts to the dish (see below) - so we decided against the typical Chinese chicken claypot dish.

The actual dish looked a bit different... lol.

Your Thai Shrimp Paste Fried Rice

After we ordered it we realised this dish was probably more Malaysian than Thai - oh well :P It wasn't very aesthetically pleasing - the fried egg looks quite fail haha. The shrimp paste rice didn't really taste like shrimp paste - it looks and tastes like Vietnamese tomato rice, but it was quite tasty mixed with the stir fried pork and chicken mince with mushrooms. I actually think the shrimp paste was fried with the mince, maybe that's what it was - either way it was quite a nice combination. P really liked the fried strips of spam - he keeps saying how crap spam is but here he is enjoying it haha - I knew I could eventually convince him enough to like all my favourite foods :D He said it reminds him of those wrapped cured sausages you can get in Asia which I totally don't agree with but I give up arguing with him over spam :P

We ordered a Satay Chicken entree which came a few minutes after our mains came hmmm =P

Satay Chicken

Very tasty but I don't think it was worth $7 for the 3 skewers though - I really love the peanut satay sauce. Every time I try to make it at home it's such a fail =( and we were thinking we could make our own chicken skewers by roasting the chicken over our gas stove - P's idea, which I think will be very stupid and successful.

Anyway back to this restaurant - bill ended up to be $25.80. Very reasonable - we were soo full afterwards! Though they don't take card here - dodgy asians haha.

Next time I want a cheap Swanston St meal will definitely come back here =)

8/10

C.
xo

Cookie

Cookie

1/252 Swanston St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9663 7660

One of my high school friends, H, came down to the conference as well over the weekend. She told me very last minute that she was in Melbourne, but we wanted to catch up, given we hadn't seen each other since 5 years ago! She asked me to come to Cookie to meet her and her uni friends there - at first we thought we were just having drinks there but then they decided to have dinner there as well. I had never come here for dinner before, always just came for drinks. It's a pretty cool place though - 7 levels with restaurant, bar, dance lounge etc.

There's a choice of small meal, medium meal and large meal. We thought we should get a medium meal since we were quite hungry, and assuming large meals are for hungry men :P 

The menu was full of fusion dishes - there was just too much to choose from and all sounding kinda strange. I ordered the Stir fried sweet potato & eggplant with coconut and kaffir lime. 

Stir fried sweet potato & eggplant with coconut & kaffir lime

For some reason I read the "stir fry sweet potatos" thinking it was deep fried sweet potato and I thought that would be an interesting fusion dish. Turns out it was like a vegetarian curry - 90% sweet potato with many slices of chilli =/ The plate was very small and I thought I wouldn't be full from it. But turns out I was very stuffed from a whole plate of carbs - ugghhh. And they put too much lime and basil and spring onion and herbs and bayleaf... so regret ordering this.

H ordered a Chilli Beef Stirfry with beans and thai basil with extra rice for $3.00 (so expensive!). Omg it was sooo chilli! We knew it'd be chilli but not THIS chilli =/ so chilli that you can't taste anything else!

Chilli beef stir fry with beans and thai basil

One of H's friends (who I had actually met at a work function earlier this year - small world indeed!) ordered Pad Thai (medium meal) which was also quite small but he said it was quite tasty, so I guess it's not totally thumbs down.

But seriously, the plates were very small given they were "medium meals". One of H's friends ordered a small meal and it was TINY! It was in a bowl about 5cm wide and her dish cost her $13.50! Our medium meals were $19.50 each, which I think was totally not worth it!

Don't think they've mastered the fusion concept here yet - especially when it's meant to be Thai fusion and there are Chinese stir fries on the menu... hmm..

The company was great though! I find out I actually went to primary school with one of H's uni friends there! I hadn't seen or talked to her for 10 years now! What a reunion! =)

Probably wouldn't come here for food again, but it's a nice chill out place - drinks are about $8-12 which is very reasonable I think =)

5.5/10

C.
xo

Gami

Gami

100 Little Lonsdale St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9671 3232

A was back in Melbourne for the conference so we had a catch up with a few others since we hadn't seen each other since uni finished last year! We hadn't picked a place yet but I was going to bring along my Cheap Eats Guide and pick a place from it. A then said he felt like Korean so R suggested coming to Gami. He told us it wasn't like traditional Korean food, but it was famous for it's Korean fried chicken and beer.

R ordered for us, trying to practice his Korean, but the waitress couldn't really understand his Korean - I think she would have preferred if he ordered in English =P He ordered a plate of Korean fried chicken and a seafood pancake to share.

Korean Seafood and Spring Onion Pancake (with side salad next to it)

The pancake was quite nice - I like how they crunched the edges =) But I think there was a bit too much spring onion in it, I'm not a fan of spring onion, not excessive amounts anyway 'cause it was spring onion >>>> seafood - but overall quite tasty.

Half/Half - sweet chilli and sweet soy garlic

The plate of fried chicken was soo big, no wonder R said that would be enough for us :P Tasted kinda like KFC but flavoured quite nicely - I liked the sweet soy garlic one better. I wonder how they deep fry it yet soak it in sauce and still remain crunchy =) I thought the whole plate was chicken drumlets so I was a bit disappointed when I picked up 2 pieces of chicken breast - so not a fan of chicken breast =( But yes, very tasty but it was a bit too much overall :P They provided a small plate of side salad, which was just chopped lettuce with some mayo and tomato-y sauce over it - wasn't really a salad but it was good to break up our mouthfuls of chicken... a bit =P

We also all got a small grape drink - I think it was only about 200ml so didn't really quench my thirst after all the fried food but was quite nice with little jelly bits at the bottom =)

The company was better than the food, but it's a nice place to chill out (we sat for about 3hrs) - a bit far away from the main city though. But very cheap overall - only $12.50 each =)

7/10

C.
xo

Stellini Bar

Stellini Bar

198 Little Collins St, Melbourne

(Ph) 9654 5074

☆☆☆

I was going to come here for brunch with J about 2 weeks ago but something came up and we cancelled our catch up - this week she had clinic in the morning so we were gonna go for lunch instead. Stellini bar had ☆☆☆ in the Cheap Eats Guide for breakfast, but in the caption, they were mentioning "big-flavoured southern Italian fare such as pork and fennel lasagne with home-made pasta and double-layers of bechamel". Even though I had lasagne only 2 days ago at Pelligrini's, I knew I had to try this one out =)

We sat at the long communal table 'cause all the little tables were taken at 1pm - but we didn't mind since the small tables wouldn't have fitted all our food very well and the long table was empty when we got there :)

We both wanted pastas 'cause it was such a cold wintry day and a nice pasta would definitely warm us up!

Pork and fennel lasagne with insalata mista

My lasagne was definitely worth ☆☆☆. Pork and fennel sounded like such a weird combination but after reading so much about it I had to try it! It came just the way the Cheap Eats Guide described it - big flavours =) They were such clashing yet complimentary flavours! And I absolutely love the bechamel sauce between the layers of pasta - I'm such a sucker for sauce as well (as you can probably tell from my previous post of Pelligrini's :P)

Gnocchi

J tried the Gnocchi with pomodoro and pecorino (I think it was - I forgot to take a photo of the menu again so tried to look for it online - don't think they've changed the menu, though when I tried to look up what 'pomodoro' was, no ingredient came up =P). Nonetheless, she dug in straight away - I could tell it was super delicious the way we both stopped talking for a few minutes and just ate and ate :P

Complimentary bread with REAL butter :)

I love receiving complimentary bread, especially with real butter! Crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside - I'm such a sucker for bread! :P And it was perfect for dipping our pasta sauces with <3

We sat for at least an hour after our plates were taken away - I was waiting for my stomach to settle so I could try the Tiramisu but really could not fit it in after the bread and the lasagne! Customers started coming in for coffee instead of lunch and that was when we realised the time had passed so quickly :P The door to the cafe doesn't close by itself so you have to manually close it after you. So many customers didn't do that so we were frozen by the freezing Melbourne wind - that was a bit annoying. After a while we couldn't stand it anymore so we paid and left - and that was when we realised there was no handle to the door from the outside so it's no wonder people didn't close the door after themselves! That really needs fixing =P

The lasagne was $19.50 which I think was definitely worth it - but it had gone up from $15.50 since 2010 (which I found out from various blogs). Oh well, that's what happens when delicious foods becomes famous!

8/10

C.
xo