Göz City, Melbourne CBD (by invitation) by Big Fil

Gozleme seem to be appearing more and more in the streets of Melbourne, whether it's a stall at a street fair or a more permanent spot at your favourite local market.  They are generally fairly rustic in style, hand rolled dough filled with assorted good things and then cooked over the grill.  Goz City kicks this concept up a notch, putting in the additional time and effort to make a product that will appeal to the burghers of Collins Street.  And to me as well.



How do they do this?  Well firstly the casing itself is very different.  Generally the dough is folded over once, typically into a half moon shape.  Goz City fold theirs over four times and cut their gozleme into strips.  So what difference does this make?



Rather than a dense, fairly bready product you get a lighter, crisper option.  It's filling but not overly heavy, with one gozleme a good sized lunch for one reasonably hungry person, if not that hungry you could probably share.



There are four options offered each day, spinach and cheese, lamb, vegetarian and chicken.  Personally I thought the chicken and spinach and cheese were clearly the best of these.  I am not always a great fan of cheese and spinach pastries, which commonly use cheap feta and old spinach past its prime, but the combination of the crispy casing and well balanced cheese and spinach filling is a winner.  I was a little concerned that the chicken could be a bit tasteless but was very pleasantly surprised, with the nicely seasoned chicken mince giving a real mouth filling flavour.



Once a week (Thursday I think) one of the 'special' gozleme is available.  We were given three to try - a Moroccan Lamb, prawn and sujuk.  Compared to the regular offerings I thought these were a bit of a mixed bag.  Goz of the day, even better than the chicken and spinach and cheese was the deliciously moist and meaty Moroccan lamb.  Both of the others though I thought had some minor issues, the sujuk didn't have the real flavour kick that I was expecting, the prawn was a little 'messy'.



Overall
Less like your regular gozleme and more like roti paratha, with some great fillings and reasonably priced (although our's were complementary), I was quite impressed with Goz City.  They also offer borek and salads which we didn't get to try.  Seating is limited though, so it's likely to be an early or late lunch, or alternatively takeaway for back at the office.

Verdict
Food - 8
Ambience - 7.5
Service - NA*
Price - 7.5*
*Scores are notional as I was a guest of Goz City.

Address
502 Little Collins Street
Melbourne VIC 3000
Tel: (03) 9041 5667