EC Pot is my staple food in the city. I go there at least once a week! For a small place hidden in a corner of the food court, it is damn busy. Who’d thought people actually go to a food court restaurant for dinner. EC Pot is absolutely fantastic. Their signature dish is easily the Hainanese Chicken Rice. There is no better Hainanese Chicken Rice in Melbourne. The rice comes out in a claypot with ginger and spices. The Chicken comes out nice and warm. And the serving is generous. What more can you ask for?
Went to Milk & Honey on Thursday for a quick dinner with two mates from work. I had heard good things about this place so was keen to try it out. It’s located in Canberra ‘City’ area, and being a Thursday night, it was quite busy, the ‘youth of canberra’ was out in force (apparently Thursday night is party night in the capital..).
Anyway onto the food… We started with a ‘trio of dips’ with bread and ’scallops with three sauces’ to start with. The bread and dips were pretty standard fare (nothing compared to what we had at Ottoman two days earlier). The scallops (pictured) on the other hand were awesome! It came in three sauces; tomato, sweet soy & shallot and a creamy sauce. Each one was very well done, the scallops were cooked to perfection and the sauces complemented them well.
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As you know, I am currently working in Canberra during the week, and the one thing that’s been mentioned to me numerous times since arriving almost 5 weeks ago is… “youve gotta go try Ottomans”. Well, 4.5 weeks after arriving I finally found an excuse to go, and I have to say it was definitely worth the wait!
A group of 9 collegues from work got together and headed to Ottomans to farewell one of our number who was returning to Melbourne for good. We arrived in two taxi’s from our hotel to this retaurant seemingly in the middle of nowhere. I had booked ahead, so we went straight in and were seated promptly. We decided (after a small amount of confusion with our waiter) to go for the Dinner Banquet. This involved a series of six entrees, four mains and one dessert being served to us one by one over the course of the dinner.
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Went to Mesh the other night. It’s located at the Crown Promenade Hotel. It so happens that on Friday nights they have a $34.90 “quasi-buffet”. It’s buffet entree, your choice of main (if you don’t fill yourself up from the seafood entree) which is stuff like steak, chicken or fish… then followed by a buffet dessert. On top of that you get 3 drinks per person. So all up I reckon it was a pretty good deal. Oh and you get a basked of steamed oysters at your table. But I’m not an oyster fan. ;p
Service was a little hard to get the attention of at times, but other then that it was pretty good.
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Went to Koko Black for an after-brunch dessert with a mate today. After the customary wait to get a table in the upstairs area (actually only had to wait about 10 minutes which is pretty good for Koko), we sat down and both ordered the Ice Cream Martini.
The martini (pictured) consists of two scoops of vanilla ice cream with caramel sauce and bresillience nuts and was, as usual, very nice. While it may not have the variety of Max Brenners, it more than makes up for this by the quality of the service and product.
Link: www.kokoblack.com
Quirky name. Came across this restaurant when walking around Manuka looking for a place for a nice dinner with a couple of work collegues. The place was well patronised, and the menu looked ok, so we went in. Service was very friendly, the waiters/waitresses seemed well trained and even managed to give us the specials without having to refer to their notes (it’s always comforting to know the staff have a decent memory, odds of stuffing up your order are reduced). They even brushed the breadcrumbs from our table when clearing the bread plate.. something I’ve only experienced at other ‘high class’ restaurants like Circa and Ondine (both excellent restuarants btw).
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Where would a place named ‘Alley Bar’ be but in the dodgiest, darkest alley you can find? Located in the AC/DC lane off Flinders Lane, I felt more like I was wandering towards some seedy swingers joint as I made my way towards the bar. The lane walls were plastered with posters of half naked women, even the stairwell up to the bar was filled with some sort of 70s porno music. But once inside the bar, the atmosphere was surprisingly modern and relaxed.
This smoke-free bar (a rarity still in Melbourne) has a dim red glow. leather couches and small wooden tables, with little gatherings seated here and there on a Friday night, when the waiters bring two for one chocolate martinis together with free wedges. This place is the opposite to the likes of the mosh-pit meat markets Longroom and Lexington. Instead, it is uncrowded, understated, in short, the perfect place to relaxed with a few friends after work without having to yell over the music and queue half an hour for drinks. The chocolate martinis themselves are a mysterious blend that really packs a punch. While it wouldn’t qualify in the top ten melbourne martinis list, it will certainly get you tipsy real quick. Not a place to go to pick up or boogey down, but a highly recommended place for winding down after a long hard week.
Went to Fat Arnie’s on Monday (on Flinders Lane). Ordered the Ceaser Salad with Smoked Salmon (pictured)… Was very tasty, not too much dressing and the Salmon itself was quite nice. The bread and 3 dips was massive though, not sure how anyone can be expected to eat that much bread!!
Service was very friendly, though for some reason the salad seemed to take a long time to make and didn’t come out until a good 10 minutes after everything else (I mean really, how long does it take to toss a salad?). The only thing that really annoyed me, was the Lemon Lime and Bitters came with no straw. As I’m sure you know, Lemon Lime and Biterrs is a layered drink, without a straw or stirrer, I was unable to mix the drink and had to consume it one layer at a time!
