Restaurant - Melbourne Restaurants and Bars - Eat Drink
From morning to midnight and back again, EAT/DRINK is ThreeThousand's guide to cafes, bars and restaurants in Melbourne. We know the best coffee because we drink 20 a day (each), we know the good restaurants because we can't cook, and we'll tell you where to find hidden bars and other places that still let you smoke so that we can ask you for a cigarette when you get there. EAT/DRINK is as voracious as our appetites and a much better filter than our livers, which stopped working a long time ago. Email your EAT/DRINK suggestions to: talk@threethousand.com.au
An Evening of Offal
Offal, as far as culinary tastes are concerned, is deeply divisive. Melbourne, by a combination of empirical reality and a smug sense of multiculturalism, prides itself on the diversity and quality of its food. But there are so many people who, despite otherwise adventurous eating habits, recoil in terror at the idea of a "variety meat".
Izakaya Den
Ahead of a trip to Tokyo a lady once told me that I would begin to view my life in terms of 'before I went to Japan' and 'after I went to Japan'. I thought she was just drunk (and she may have been) but she was right: Japan is a lesson in how an entire population can appreciate personal space and the value in constantly refining the things in your life.
Happy Kappa
Last week we took you on an unlikely gastronomical journey to the wrong end of Sydney Road, this week we're venturing to the Brunswick Street badlands between Bimbo and the Moroccan Soup Bar - showing that seeming geographical wrongs can make a delicious right. I had hang outs with wrong-end local and afficionado of Fitzroy (eating) dens, Ping Morgan, to find out about Happy Kappa.
Melbourne Hwaro Korean Barbecue
There's something in the air near the corner of Little Bourke and King Street, and its not the scent of impending violence. It's the thick clouds of smoke reeking of Umami.
Wikipedia says that Umami is a loanword from Japanese meaning roughly "tasty", although also "brothy", "meaty", or "savory", which is exactly what brought me into Melbourne Hwaro Korean Barbecue.
Little Lamb
Mary had a little lamb. That was before it was frozen, thinly sliced and dipped it in a delicious combination broth alongside sweet potato, bamboo, mushrooms, bok choy, something else we pointed at on the menu, noodles and even a couple of prawns.
Chinese Hot Pot, or Chinese Fondue if you're a Swiss colonialist, sits, in spirit, with the D.
Quince this, Quail that
Quince: get it right and it's lovely; get it wrong and - as with Tiger Blowfish, skydiving or auto-erotic asphyxiation - you could be in for a nasty surprise. Quail, on the other hand, pose far less of a threat to your wellbeing, unless of course, you're an insect.
Dispelling any such worries, the folks at Provenance are using the two Qs to offer up an alliterative feast this Saturday featuring delights such as seared quail breasts with roast beetroot, confit celeriac and quince microherb salad - and a ‘very special' cocktail.
Rice Queen
Rice Queen is the new Asian kid on the block, in Smith Street below Panama Dining Room. Previously a Latin American dance studio, it is the progeny of restaurateur James Langley (of aforementioned Panama Dining Room and also St. Judes).
Like Panama, the room is light and airy, with cheap and cheerful Asian restaurant touches: cane furniture, vinyl chairs and Formica tables, in fact if they threw in some wall-mounted TVs and a gold cat waving its paw at the till you could be mistaken for thinking you were in the exotic east or at the very least Victoria Street.
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