Universal Restaurant (Lygon St, Carlton)

Huge chicken parma. A value for money joint.

 

At the suggestion of my dinner partner, we headed down to Universal along Lygon Street. There was a short queue, but it moved pretty fast, and we were soon ushered into the restaurant within 15 minutes.

What caught my attention was this brown statue which I thought was St Clare, and after enquiring turns out to be that of Mary.

My dining partner and I order a Chicken Parmigiana and a small Meat Lovers pizza to share between the both of us.

 

The pizza wasn’t fantastic. It was dry. The only saving grace would be the amount of processed meat slapped onto the pizza.

The size of the chicken was a bit of a nice surprise. It was my first time eating chicken parma in Australia. It was crispy. The meat was still tender and wasn’t dry, but it somehow lacked juice. I probably enjoyed the beer battered chips more.

Based on these two dishes which came to about 26 or 27 for two, Universal is one of those value-for-money places where you could enjoy a hearty meal without bursting one’s wallet.

The Tippler Co (Wellington Parade, East Melbourne)

Might be pricey. Nice place to chillax. Glad I didn’t go with wait staff’s recommendations.

Number One on Tripadvisor's list of Restaurants for Melbourne.

97 percent likes on Urbanspoon.

This has to count for something right?

The menu looks fairly interesting when I checked out the website. And I was dead set that this had to be one of the places I just wanted try in the immediate future.

And when the opportunity to have dinner with James on Friday, here I was with him, at The Tippler Co on Friday night at 58 Wellington Parade.

It wasn’t crowded when we arrived there at about 7.15pm. I had a reservation for about 8.15pm but we were promptly shown to our seats – at a high table with a view of the outside street (Wellington Parade). 

We took a while to peruse the menu. James began to strike off some options. I would think that rather certain options didn’t quite appeal to him.

As The Tippler and Co is a bar cum eatery, food options are similar to tapas – mostly small plates for sharing. Meanwhile the ambience is very laidback and inviting – with high stools and tables, industrial lighting (which might explain why my photos are blur/dim or I am just a bad photographer), with wooden fittings. James remarked that this place seems to be a good place to chill out, and without a huge crowd that evening, it made for a relaxing mood.

I’m not so much of a wine/alcohol person, so I won’t be able to comment on the drink offerings. Browsing through the little booklet did yield a good selection of drinks. James decided on the cider and I followed suit. It was my second time having cider that week, after the JD mentor-mentee evening drinks when my mentor kindly bought me a cider. Thanks Angus!

 

Back to the menu, both of us were none the wiser after poring over the options for some time and we asked the wait staff for recommendations. He suggested a small duck liver pate, the cauliflower salad and the gnocchi.

 

I wasn’t impressed. My dining partner probably felt the same way. So in the end, we decided on the prawns, and considered the fries or patatas bravas to go with the cider. I chose the lamb as the main. But in the end we decided to skip the fries and opted for the arancini.

And boy, are we so glad that we just ordered blindly, based on intuition, rather than on the staff’s recommendations.

The Pumpkin and Three Cheese Arancini (rocket, walnuts, pepitas) kicked off the meal on a wonderful note for me. The balls were crispy and cooked to a nice golden hue. Taking a bite off each morsel led to an explosion of savouriness and gooeyness of the melted cheese. However James complained that the batter was a little too salty, but washing the arancini down with a gulp/sip of cider was an excellent pairing as the acidity/alcohol content of the cider somewhat tees off the savouriness/heaviness of the arancini.

      

I must say that the Kataifi Prawns (tomato and eggplant kasundi, coriander) (IN THE FIRST PICTURE)was my favourite dish that night. The prawns came served in a bright yellow-golden hue. The prawn meat was moist, juicy and had some bite. The little threads that encased the prawn were fried to a nice crisp so much so I could hear them crackle in my mouth. The prawns didn’t turn soggy even though we left them for a good few minutes as we partook in the arancini. This dish would put a few less than skilful dim sum chefs out there to shame. 

Meanwhile the accompanying tomato and eggplant kasundi lent a nice spicy, exotic lift and touch to what would probably be an ordinary dim sum-esque dish. The use of the coriander in the accompanying sauce evoked thoughts of Indian-vegetarian cuisine.

There was an aromatic fragrance when the slow braised lamb shoulder with chickpea stew (almond and raisin couscous, green chilli yoghurt, coriander) was served, evoking fond thoughts of nasi biryani. Once again, it was probably due to the spices. Chunks of the meat were mixed in with the couscous and stew. This dish was rather satisfying and hearty for an autumn/wintry evening but nothing too memorable to rave about a few days down the road.

 

Overall, The Tippler Co provides a nice place to chillax, knock down some drinks and bar food

Sofia Restaurant, Burke Road, Camberwell

Not gourmet food…

  

When I suggested to my Korean hyung Eric that I wanted to eat Italian/pizza, I really had no idea that we would end up at Sofia Restaurant in Camberwell which started in 1969, and used to be a pizza parlour.

Heck, I didn’t even know what Sofia Restaurant was as I had my heart set on some choices that I read online. And when I checked out the reviews for Sofia’ Restaurant on Urbanspoon (50 percent likes), I really wanted to suggest another alternative, but since he was helpful enough to suggest, I thought, “Whatever, let’s go with it.”

Let’s just say I went in with little expectations and came out feeling something like this, “This isn’t too bad. I probably could have worse.”

The menu is pretty standard, probably what one can get in Pastamania back home in Singapore. No surprises. Eric hyung ordered a large spaghetti marinara. He told me he used to do takeaways or something like that when classes finished late for him and Sofia Restaurant was the only eatery still open in the late hours. Some nostalgia there.

Meanwhile, I ordered a large Sofia Special (pizza) with tomato, mozzarella, mushrooms, green peppers, shredded mild salami and anchovies. Frankly, I didn’t give it much thought into my order as I wanted gourmet pizza, and the options didn’t look too appealing so I just randomly picked one option which had meat.

As I studied my fellow diners, I couldn’t help but notice that people were packing doggy bags. This is probably in testament to the humongous portions they serve. One couple I saw practically had their two pastas left half unfinished. Meanwhile the Indian diners next to me were tucking into their meal with gusto [they had three dishes…some seafood main, lasagne and fries]…the daughter’s girth is probably a testimony to her appetite…Sofia also serves a large gelato/ice cream which I didn’t feel appealing to the unnatural bright colours.

The only good thing I could say about Sofia Restaurant is that the portions are huge enough to make you feel that it’s worth the buck (that is…if you’re not a fussy, picky eater). The portion of the spaghetti marinara was enough to feed two people. And it came with a generous amount of medium-sized prawns (maybe 20 or more) and a few scallops…of course I don’t think the prawns are fresh…probably frozen or something when I tasted. The pasta wasn’t too bad, just a bit bland and lacking oomph…nothing that a sprinkle of parmesan or chilli flakes couldn’t fix.

 

The Sofia Special was huge…cut into eight slices…it costs about $15.80, probably about $2 a slice. If one isn’t a huge eater, one could eat this whole pizza over four meals (Oh! The horror). It wasn’t too bad, just that it looked kind of messy, but I liked that the crust had some burnt cheese…and the crust wasn’t really that thick or doughy. However, hyung complained that it was a bit salty due to the anchovies. Well, at least it balances out the rather bland pasta. *Smirks*

Anyhow, both of us left with a doggy bag from our unfinished meals. As of this time of writing I still have one slice of pizza left in the fridge.

Overall, what Sofia offers not an elegant or fine dining or gourmet experience, but rather edible and value for money grub for the untrained palates.      

HELLENIC REPUBLIC AT LYGON STREET, EAST BRUNSWICK

I am so in need of dining buddies/makan khakis

 On the City Circle tram Route 35, you would hear the announcement that Melbourne is said to have the largest Greek speaking population outside of Europe after Athens and Thessaloniki, which is corroborated by the City of Melbourne’s website. According to the said website, many Greeks immigrated to Melbourne after WW II all the way till 1982.

It is against this backdrop of what I hope for would be authentic Greek food that led me to crave for it ever since I had arrived in Melbourne. And coupled with the pleasant experience I had on my birthday at Blu Kouzina, I was definitely looking forward to the clean, elegant flavours of this Mediterranean-style cuisine.

It sucks not to have a job yet in Melbourne, and not to have [foodie] friends like Dominic, Vernon, and some others that I can go out with to explore the city and its food offerings. [So far I had eaten at some place in Chinatown called Shark Fin Inn/House and a Korean place Han Guk Gwan – sorry no photos – wasn’t in the photography, blogging mood] that offers Yum Cha So I was glad to meet an acquaintance, James, through Jack’d, who is from Hong Kong. He has been in Melbourne for about two years and seems really knowledgeable [as well as critical] about some of the food establishments in Melbourne.

I was thinking of hotpot, but I think James doesn’t feel Chinese food is worth the while in Melbourne. So he suggested Greek instead, which was kind of to my liking.

So off we were to Hellenic Republic in Lygon Street, East Brunswick. To be honest, it’s such a drag to get there. And fortunately James drove so it wasn’t too bad after all.

After getting parking along the road relatively easily, we headed to Hellenic Republic and the place was full except for the counter seats. Note: always make reservations.

HR is ranked #12 on TripAdvisor and has an 85% like rating on Urbanspoon. It is not so much offering classic homey Greek cuisine, but rather a modern take on Greek cuisine by Australian TV chef George Calombaris who is a judge on Masterchef Australia.

To be honest, we weren’t sure what to order. I know that it is probably essential to order one of the dips with pita. So my dining partner – who might or might not be foreign to Greek cuisine – started scouring Urbanspoon reviews for recommendations. The wait staff did offer some recommendations. In the end he decided to order the lamb Ami Sto Fourno – slow roasted lamb shoulder on the bone. His reasoning – Australia rarely does wrong with lamb. Anyway, this dish is probably not traditional Greek, but I enjoyed it.

 

Lamb meat has a rather overpowering smell which some may not like. Personally, I don’t like it. But there is nothing a squeeze of lemon won’t work wonders for. And to be honest, the smell wasn’t really bad. I had a bad experience of having lamb shank at a particular restaurant in Singapore – fatty meat and the usual smell. But this one was different – the skin had a nice crisp to it. The meat was tender fell of the bone easily and easily pulled to shreds. Even the fats under the skin weren’t off-putting and yummy.

Meanwhile for starters, I ordered a Taramosalata or Taramasalata [the first picture], a traditional dish/spread/dip made from fish roe. Hellenic Republic’s advertises theirs as a white cod roe dip. According to research, it is made from bread crumbs/mashed potato, lemon juice, vinegar and olive oil. It was rather savoury and creamy and went well with the rather charred and smoky flavour of the pita bread.

Meanwhile James decided on the Kipriaki Salata Dimitriakon – a Cypriot salad of grains, pulses, nuts and yoghurt. The salad was refreshing and rather earthly and herby – it reminded me of the Burmese tea leaves salad I had in Inle a few months back except that this wasn’t as spicy as Inle’s salad.

  

We declined dessert. Overall, we spent about $59, that works out to about $30 per person which I felt was well spent.