Pulse, Pyrmont by Bureaucrat

During a recent trip to Siddeny for work, Mr C took Ms C and I to lunch at Pulse.


Pulse is an upmarketish feel-good hamburger/salad/fresh juice/soup sort of place. Both Ms C and I felt that Pulse was akin to the Grill'd burger chain in Melbourne.

What I liked about Pulse is that in addition to gourmet-ish hamburgers (with gluten-free bun options), they have the aforementioned salads, fresh juice and soups on offer.


For her lunch, Ms C went for the Middle Eastern inspired baked salmon and pearl barley salad. It came with toasted shards of pitta bread and had a tangy dressing. I didn't try the salad, but I'm guessing the tangyness came from a sumac dressing. Ms C quite liked her salad and said it was a very generous serve.


Mr C went for the spicy beef burger, which came with an organic beef patty, tomato, beetroot, lettuce, aioli, spicy capsicum relish and coriander pesto. It got a bit messy for Mr C as he attempted to eat the hamburger with his hands. In his view, Mr C felt that a good hamburger shouldn't be a messy exercise. I, however, would disagree. For me, a sign of a good hamburger is that it has so much filling that it spills out of the burger and leaves you licking your fingers.


I went for the basic organic beef burger on a gluten-free bun. As Mr C has family members who are gluten intolerant, he was interested to know how the burger tasted. My verdict is that this GF bun was as GF as you can get. That is, it's slightly dense, crumbly and leaves you feeling virtuous in eating it. In my quest for GF alternatives, I've come across GF breads, cakes and pastries that are so light in texture that you wonder how they made it without using refined wheat and sugar. The GF buns at Pulse lie in the other direction. Still, having said that, it was still a tasty burger, and I liked the fact that the burgers come with a side salad.


To go with my meal, I got a fruit juice made up of mango, pineapple, lime, orange and passionfruit. A very tasty concoction and a rather generous serve, too.

Verdict
Food - 8
Ambience - 7
Service - 7
Price - 8

Overall
Love the food and the range on offer. Thumbs up for the GF alternatives. As with Grill'd, if they decide to open this chain up in Melbourne, I'd systematically eat my way through the menu.

Address
Pulse
Shop T05
The Atrium
60 Union Street
Pyrmont NSW 2009
Telephone: (02) 9518 9422

Dean's Cafe, Thornbury by Big Fil

There is one group of my friends who are known collectively as the cats. Not because they look like cats, chase after balls of yarn or like to leave small dead animals at my door, but because organising them for any outing is like herding cats. The moment you think you have them all heading in the same direction, that's when it is guaranteed to all go wrong.

To help sort out the herding problem when deciding where to meet before Christmas we settled on Dean's café, located near to home for the hardest to herd cat who I'll refer to as S1. Funnily enough, despite this concession it was of course S1 who was last to arrive. Those cats, they're wacky that way.


Dean's café is a small, nondescript looking café on High Street Thornbury that sells a mix of Thai and Singaporean style meals. To be honest, it's pretty nondescript on the inside as well, white walls, plain tables and Sesame Street playing on the TV behind the bar during our visit. Our waiter, who I assume was also the owner, indicated that the chairman of Air Asia ate in his café when in town. Looking around I was surprised that he couldn't afford somewhere more upmarket to eat. But then again Air Asia airfares are pretty cheap.


So what sort of food would attract the Air Asia chairman? To be honest, it's alright. Three dishes were quite good, one ok and one a little disappointing.

First up were the spring rolls. We weren't going to order entrees planning to leave the room for dessert but were talking into them when giving our orders. I was glad that we were. The were very nicely fried so as to be crispy but not hard or dry, and with quite tasty filling. They made a reasonable start to lunch while waiting for our main meals.


Also perfectly acceptable were the gado gado and the mee siam. Now I have a problem with some gado gado. Its effectively an Indonesian vegetable salad with egg and topped with a generous amount of a peanut based sauce. My major issue is usually with the sauce. I like this quite thick and many places sell it quite runny. For this version the sauce was nicely thick.


The mee siam was also something I'd order again. A fairly new dish for me came with what at first appeared to be carrot but which turned out to be thin orange flavoured noodles. A little bit sweet, mildly spicy, quite tasty and a dish that I am now going to have to order elsewhere. Btw, check out the weird double yolk in our egg.


Slightly disappointing was our curry noodles. A mix of noddles and vegetables in a sauce very similar to that used for laksa, the main problem was the lack of punch to any of the flavours. Mediocre and a bit disappointing.


But the only dish we struggled to finish was the baby squid. This had been specially recommended but I found the squid a bit rubbery and tasteless.



Overall
I've never thought of Thornbury as one of the great locations for foodies in Melbourne and Dean's did nothing to change my mind. The décor a little dull and the food nothing to write home about, its major selling point is the price. With most dishes around the ten dollar mark it does represent value for money and an acceptable option if looking for this style of food in Thornbury but I won't be making a special trip all the way out here again. I can't make my mind up about the service, the guy was amusing but it doesn't really help us when ordering if we ask what is good the response is 'it's all good' and he proceeds to name about twenty dishes.

Verdict
Food - 6.5
Ambience - 6
Service - 6.5
Price - 8

Address
901 High Street
Thornbury VIC 3071
Tel: (03) 9480 3824

Hien Vuong 1, Footscray by Big Fil

Given that Snooze and I work in the city and live in the south east we tend to visit places in those areas. It's not that the food is better around there, quite the opposite in fact for some styles of food, it's just more convenient. However, when we have time we like to go exploring in other parts of town and hence our latest Sunday venture out to Pho'tscray.



Not really having anywhere in mind and with a lot of places yet to open we settled on the first likely looking place we came across, Hien Vuong 1 on Leeds Street. Other than a fair number of cheap eats stickers on the door looks wise there isn't much to distinguish it from many of the other places selling pho around town. White mirror lined walls, big glass windows at the front, menu in English and Vietnamese up high and an atmosphere that always reminds me a bit of an old school cafeteria.


But the most important thing of course is always the pho. Both Snooze and I headed for a beef based soup, beef with sausage and beef brisket with tendon.



What were they like? Well, as you'd expect for somewhere which has obviously lasted a while in a very competitive area pretty good. Nice delicate but richly flavoured soup, thinly sliced meat just past medium rare and considerable kick available from the accompanying chilli.

There were a few things which could have been improved. At other places the beef sausage used has come with a peppery kick which always goes down well but was missing here. The beef in my brisket was quite fatty, and both soups could have been a bit more generous with the meat. However, certainly better than anywhere we have tried in the city, generous in size and reasonably priced at $9 for a medium sized bowl (which was as much as we could eat).

There are also an interesting range of drinks available and as usual I made a beeline for my favourite three colours drink.

Overall
Good pho, reasonable prices, polite but very friendly service from what I suspect is a family run business, while we haven't tried any of its nearby competitors we were certainly happy with Hien Vuong 1 as a quick Sunday morning option.

Verdict
Food - 7.5
Service - 8
Ambience - 6.5
Price - 7.5

Address
37 Leeds Street
Footscray VIC 3011
Tel: (03) 9687 1470

Naked for Satan, Fitzroy by Big Fil

The name 'Naked for Satan' always takes me a little aback. While many bars take slightly 'naughty' names to titillate and bring in the punters this one goes a bit further with its religious and sexual connotations. It's all quite playful but I'm not quite sure what sort of image it is supposed to provoke - nuns in suspenders doing the can-can? We'd always meant to check out Naked for Satan though for its cheap pintxos and finally, on a Friday afternoon just before Christmas Bureaucrat, Snooze and I finally got around to paying a call.


First thing you notice when entering is this fairly large space with tables on one side, a bar on the other and an enormous copper contraption (still) in the middle. For weekday lunches and dinner early in the week the numerous pintxos are only 80 cents each and this attracted a fairly disparate crowd of office workers out for a workday drink, university students after a quick feed and on our visit a surprising number of mums with kids.

The pintxos are lined up along the bar and you can select as many or as few as you want. There's quite a variety of both meat and vegetarian options, with a small dessert available as well. They come served on toothpicks and after you have finished you simply take your toothpicks up to the bar to be tallied up.


At that price we were all keen to sample as much of the range as we could. While I wouldn't describe the pintxos as amazing we all had our own personal favourites - the chorizo, the asparagus, the mussel - and at 80 cents each they are much better than you've really got the right to expect. Best of all are the hot ones brought around by staff, there aren't so many of these so it's best to keep your eyes open for them wandering around. Winner of most pinxtos sampled on the day by one toothpick with 15 was Bureaucrat, although I pleaded my excuse of having had a late breakfast.



As I understand it the food is meant to be a complement to the bar and is partially subsidised by the drinks, so if not an impoverished uni student it's probably good form to get a drink while you are there. After forcing Snooze and a sensible shoed but sockless Bureaucrat to walk out from town I felt guilted into buying a carafe of sangria. Even if not the best I've ever had still one of my favourite drinks and felt like an appropriate complement to the food.


Overall
Naked for Satan fulfils probably the most important criteria for a good bar. With good food, good company, an interesting setup and unpretentious staff and patrons it's just a lot of fun and a much cheaper alternative to the fairly pricey tapas places around town.

Verdict
Food - 7.5
Service - 7.5
Ambience - 8
Price - 8.5

Address
285 Brunswick Street
Fitzroy VIC 3065
Tel: (03) 9416 2238

Bun Bun Bakery, Springvale by Big Fil

Being from the wilds of Minnesota and then Arizona, Tucson Trevor had only ever tried bahn mi once. More surprisingly despite spending the best part of three decades as a Melbourne girl Snooze had never tried them before at all. To remedy these deficiencies, the three of us plus surprise special guest Mr H headed off to Springvale to indulge in one of Vietnam's finest exports.

There are a number of bakeries selling these Vietnamese rolls scattered around the shopping centre and without sampling each it's hard to be certain which is best. There is a place nearer to the train station where I normally head, dragged in by their very generous way with the crispy pork rolls. But I'd been interested in trying Bun Bun Bakery for a while, mainly because of the write-ups pasted on the window where The Age named it one of Melbourne's best 10 sandwiches.

So what is a bahn mi? Well, Vietnam was once a French colony so some of its food shows this cultural mix. Think of a fresh baguette, sliced length ways and filled with a mix of European salad (sliced carrot, cucumber...), Asian style herbs (coriander and chilli) and meats (sliced pork, lemon grass or grilled chicken...). The result is a punchy flavoured sandwich, filling but not something which will weigh you down and these days generally priced at around $4 a roll.


Bun Bun bakery offers a variety of rolls including sliced and crispy pork, lemon grass chicken and the chicken kebab. My choice de jour was the lemon grass chicken, just for a change from my normal pork. So what was a sandwich classified as one of Melbourne's 10 best like? Well, as you'd expect it's a pretty good sandwich. Nice crispy crusted but softly fleshed bread, fresh salad and herbs and much better quality meat than you'd expect for a generic $4 sandwich. I'd have liked it to be a bit more generous with the meat though, as it felt like it was at least 80% salad.


I didn't get to try any of the others choices, whether the pork or the chicken kebab, but we were all impressed by Mr H's ability to deal with a large amount of the fairly fiery chilli he asked for with his roll.





Overall
It's good, but I don't think it's the best Bahn Mi I've had in Springvale. It did seem to be pretty popular though, even more so than the place I prefer. And that moral of that is I think that its good we don't all love the same places, otherwise we'd never be able to get a seat!

Verdict
Food - 7.5
Service - 7
Ambience - 6
Price - 8

Address
288 Springvale Road
Springvale VIC 3171
Tel: (03) 9547 8289

Wildflower, Canterbury by Bureaucrat

Following our respective trips into Europe, Mrs B and I caught up for lunch in her stomping ground - Canterbury. Canterbury isn't normally a place where I visit - to me, it feels rather uptight, socially conformist with a generous whiff of old money.


However, I take any opportunity to try out restaurants and cafes in areas that I'm not familiar with. On Mrs B's suggestion, we had lunch at Wildflower. Wildflower is located within the Mailing Road shopping precinct. It has a lovely timeless feel to the place, with the sun streaming through the trees in the courtyard where Wildflower is situated.

We opted to sit outside. I couldn't help but notice that the restaurant was very popular among the 'women of a certain age' demographic. I was probably the youngest person there, and during the two hours or so that we were there, there were only two men dining there...the rest of the patrons were the grand dames of Canterbury doing lunch.


For mains, Mrs B went for the Frenched lamb cutlets, with new potatoes, petit pois and garnished with watercress. The two generous plump cutlets were served medium...I was quite envious of Mrs B's choice.


I opted for the tuna steak, and asked for it to be cooked well done. Despite it being served well done, the tuna was still quite tender and juicy. The tuna steak came with these very cute root veg that was sculpted into a miniature pear. There were also baby beets, sweet corn (off the cob) and peeled mini tomatoes. The fennel salad added a nice sweet and crunchy contrast.


For desserts, Mrs B and I both went for the same dessert. It's a pity I can't quite remember what it was... I remember the flavours, but that's about it. One of the components was made from blood red oranges and passionfruit. I think it was a pannacotta with sorbet. I can't remember what the biscuity 'topping' was. We both liked the taste - it was sharply acidic, but very smooth at the same time.

Verdict
Food - 9
Ambience - 9
Service - 9
Price - 8

Overall
I quite liked the fact that Wildflower has a prix fixe option. I have to say, European cities tend to offer this option, which I find is lacking in Australia.

The food was excellently executed - I loved the contrast in flavours and textures. And visually, the food was well presented. The service was attentive and friendly. I'd definitely would revisit this place.

Address
Wildflower
1 Theatre Place
Canterbury 3126
Telephone: 9888 6662

Macarons anyone?

I’ll ‘fess up now … I love macarons.

Their crunchiness comes to mind first, followed by their pretty colours. But what totally sells them to me is the multitude of flavours they come in. Salted caramel is my absolute favourite: that hit of salt, the crunch of the meringue and the chewiness of the caramel. I’m such a fan I had to rush out (in the interests of a balanced article, of course) to compare salted caramels from three CBD locations.

Da Tong Chinese Restaurant, Melbourne CBD by Big Fil

Da Tong seems to have a bit of a superman thing going. By day, a mild mannered Chinatown restaurant providing cheap lunches for business men (and women). By night, it changes into its fancy duds and the meals are much more upmarket (and a bit pricier).


We've only visited the once, for a quick lunchtime meal, but our meals certainly justified a return visit or recommendation for someone looking for a decent meal at a reasonable price. With a variety of selections including drink for $7.50, it's even cheaper than food court food but better than many lower end restaurants in quality.

Our choices de jour were the minced beef with egg and the chicken with onion sauce. While not qualifying as fine dining both serves were very generous and very nicely cooked. Tender beef and chicken, not overpowered by overly strongly flavoured sauces and nice fluffy rice, given the low prices it would have to be one of the best value for money lunches in the city.



The set up is nice, well lit with neutral colours. It's also busy without being full or overly noisy, mainly people enjoying a quiet meal before re-entering the office world. Even service is better than you'd expect with our waiter being attentive, appearing quickly with menu or bill when we were ready to order or pay.

Overall
At lunchtimes anyway, not a special occasion place put somewhere you could happily eat a couple of times every week. Good for both the stomach and pocket. In fact, I can feel a team lunch coming on...

Verdict
Food - 7.5
Ambience - 7.5
Service - 7.5
Price - 8

Address
11-15 Waratah Place
Melbourne VIC 3000
Tel: (03) 9663 9878

Bentoya, Melbourne CBD by Big Fil

I'd been to Bentoya before, but only for the Bento boxes. But with the Groupon Gang needing a sixth for their visit it was a chance to indulge in an Izakaya style banquet.


Izakaya food is upmarket bar food, food to eat while chucking back on beer or sake. There are quite a few that have appeared recently around town, producing food that’s often fried, sometimes a bit salty but generally tasty. Bentoya's offering was for eight courses with a glass of wine or sake for $59 for two people, down from the usual $140.

First course, a generous bowl of Edamame, salted soya beans. They strike me as a slightly healthier version of the complementary peanuts sometimes provided at bars, food that makes its way from bowl to mouth without much thought, and salty enough to inspire the purchase of a few more drinks. While surprisingly only one of the ladies who groupon had tried these before, they were a definite success, tender and flavoursome.


Second course was a plate of fresh sashimi. A mixture of salmon, tuna and white fish, for some reason this didn't quite hit the mark with me. I think it was because it was served slightly more chilled than I would have liked so that the full flavours of the fish didn't come through.


On the other hand I did love the gyoza. Great flavour and excellent texture, pan fried with a nice crispy shell on one side, tender on the other.


Next up was the soft shell crab. This looked slightly weird when it hit the table, like some giant mutant spider. It was nicely crisp and not overly battered, the crab of a decent size and the meatiest soft shell crab I have ever had. If I had to pick on something it was slightly oily, but then soft shell crab typically is.


My favourite dish though was the Karaage Chicken. A lightly seasoned batter, perfectly fried on the outside and juicy on the inside, just so much better than the typical takeaway shop or KFC. However, if deep fried chicken isn't unhealthy enough on its own, being dipped in the accompanied mayonnaise made it taste even better!


Least successful of the mains was the wafu beef. This was made using char grilled porterhouse steak - not my favourite cut - and served nicely pink in the middle. I found the meat a bit more chewy than I'd expected, but the main issue was that the others preferred their meat medium or well done. The accompanying sauce was good though and the seaweed on the side disappeared rapidly (more for the texture than the taste).


To finish it off mochi dessert and green tea. Mochi are a slightly chewy dessert and these were green tea and red bean flavoured, making in interesting contrast to the more typical western style desserts. They also matched well with the green tea with toasted rice.

Overall
A nice meal, very friendly and quite efficient staff in a nice surrounding, at $30 per person a good group luncheon option but I would expect a little more for $70 each. From previous visits the bento boxes are/were probably the best near Melbourne Central but are priced accordingly. Actually I thought the best thing about this restaurant was the staff, cute and funny enough to make you smile no matter how bad a day you might be having.

Verdict
Food - 7.5
Ambience - 7.5
Service - 8
Price - 7.5 (5 at full price).

Address
115 Hardware Street
Melbourne VIC 3000
Tel : (03) 9642 1136

Giraffe Cafe, Melbourne CBD by Bureaucrat

A few years ago, Ms B introduced Ms C and I to Giraffe Cafe, which is a little cafe tucked away in Little Lonsdale Street. Back then, the cafe was only known by the little picture of a blue giraffe. Nowadays, it seems that they've christened this place as Giraffe Cafe.


When you walk past it, it doesn't seem very special - kinda dark, small and pokey. But once you step inside and walk through to the main dining area, it's a different story. Light and spacious. Cutesily decorated in an ecletic mix of second-hand furniture and knick knacks and items from Ikea.


The thing I like most about GC is that it has a faux tree and a wooden giraffe in the middle of the room.

Before I left for London, I had eaten at GC a few times, and have sampled a few of the menu items, including the chicken and spinach rice bake (which has a pumpkin puree on top) which is my favourite dish on the menu. The hot chocolates and milkshakes are also better than most cafes around the area. Snooze and Big Fil have previously reviewed GC back in June 2010.


This time, however, Mr I and I were both feeling the need to be virtuous and wanted to go relativley low-carb. So we both went for the chicken pot pie with salad. On this day, GC had a special offer, which was the pie and a juice for $10. This was a pretty good deal, as the juices on offer were the fancier stuff (and not them reconstituted bottles of juice).


The pie had a crispy puff pastry lid, and underneath were piping hot diced chicken and veg in a cream sauce. While we both liked the pie, we both agreed that it could have done with some slices of nice bread to mop up the runny, but very delicious, sauce (which had a perfect hint of fresh rosemary).

Verdict
Food - 7
Ambience - 8
Service - 7
Price - 7

Overall
GC is a very lovely spot to take a break from the world. You definitely get a sense of being a bright and warm cocoon - away from the dreary reality of work life. You could (and I have) easily while away an afternoon, sipping on a hot or cold chocolate, and gossiping with friends.

Address
Giraffe Cafe
302 Little Lonsdale St
Melbourne 3000
Telephone: 9640 0889