Merchant Osteria Veneta, Melbourne CBD by Obelix

The Rialto is one of the iconic buildings in Melbourne and Guy Rossi's Merchant is situated right as you enter.  It is an Italian restaurant with a Venetian slant as evident by the life sized gondola greeting you before the front entrance.


In an environment which potentially could be viewed as 'posh', it is surprisingly casual.  It had a warm ambience and guests are encouraged to take a texta and graffiti the walls. We sat in a rustic little booth. There were plenty of young kids running around on a Friday night. So maybe this is pseudo-casual or nouveau-posh.  The prices were definitely in the fine dining arena.  The service was impeccable as one would expect in place like this.

For starters we ordered a selection of little plates to share:


...marinated olives...


...Folpo in the foreground - marinated octopus in chilli, lemon, olive oil, coriander.  It was soooo tender.  Polpeta in the rear - veal meatballs in sugo.  This is by far one of the yummiest meatballs I have ever tasted.  It melted in the mouth.


Warm sourdough to sop up the delicious juices of the above.

For mains I ordered:


The Bisteca which was the scotch fillet (250g).  It was a good size for me.  So lovingly charred and perfectly medium rare. The pesto and lemon sure beats the usual mustard accompaniment.


There was unfortunately no kid's menu here.  Kiddo had the Tajadele which was the handcut tagliatelle with veal ragu.  I figured since the veal meatballs went down so well for starters, she would love the veal ragu.  I figured right.


Kiddo's daddy had the Buo in Squaquacio which was the braised wagyu shin in red wine with porcini mushrooms.  Just looking at the pic, you know the meat would just dissolve in your mouth.  The verdict was that it was divine.  I think he was secretly wishing for a second serve...


Our friends ordered the Tastasal which was the risotto with spiced pork sausage.  The feedback was the rice was one of the creamiest she had ever tasted.


The Spedina di Tarzo was perhaps a bit underwhelming.  It sounded great on paper - chargrilled Trevisan chicken and pork skewer and the feedback was that it tasted amazing.  However there was so little of it.  For $36, I would have expected two skewers.


At the suggestion of the very helpful waitress, we ordered a few vegetable sides to share. This is the Trida - Venetian chopped salad.


And my pick - the Faxolin e Noxeta which was string beans with sprinklings of hazlenut.  This was so beautiful in it's simplicity, I think I will replicate this at home.


For desserts we got the gelato to share...


...along with the cake of the day which was a cheesecake of sorts.


And a digestive green tea to wash it all down...


Graffiti is strongly encouraged here



Verdict - we loved it.

Overall
Merchant has an inviting, kid friendly ambience which would have me definitely going back.

Pho Flinders, Melbourne CBD by Bureaucrat

With rumbling tummies, Big Fil and I shuffled from place to place inside the Emporium trying to find a place that was befitting for our lunch.  Sadly, the Vietnamese place inside the Emporium was packed out and none of the other places were taking our collective fancy.

Venturing out into the sunlight, we joined the fast-moving queue at Pho Flinders on Elizabeth Street (the original PF is on Flinders Street).  The PF on Elizabeth Street has taken over the now defunct Cajun Kitchen.  I had tried some of the rice paper rolls there when PF first opened up a few months ago.  I liked it and made a mental note to come back.

The set-up is squishier than its predecessor – tiny tables are a bit sticky and are lined up in a sort of higgledy piggledy fashion.  You’re mindful of your neighbours elbows and backsides in your face as they get in and out of their tables.

Big Fil ordered the stuffed crab claws as an entrée.

He also got the medium sized beef pho with guts tripe. 

I got the small beef pho.  First thought was that small was actually quite big.  Lots of noodles, which was a good thing but sadly they were a bit mushy from being overcooked.  Quite a reasonable amount of sliced beef.  There was a lot of noodles and I couldn’t finish it off.

Verdict – we liked it.

Overall

Our order took a while to come out – to the point that I think other diners who arrived after us got their meals first.  The place is a cheap eats type of place – great value if size is important to you.  The service is friendly but a tad frantic as the staff rushed to and from the front to the kitchen to get and place orders.  They could definitely do with another person on the floor during peak times.

The pho is okay for the CDB standard (I’d rate it as ‘good enough’ if you’re need a pho fix in the city).  In the future, I’m going to stick with the rice paper rolls instead.

Old Kingdom, Surrey Hills by Obelix

Quanjude Peking Duck has always been top shelf, gold standard Peking duck for me (see Bureaucrat's review in Feb 2012).  But sometimes has lovely as it is, we can't always go top shelf (monetary restrictions apply, shucks).  So a good mid range-feed-a-horde Peking duck place would be Old Kingdom.

They do a Peking duck meal for $55 which includes one duck and a stack of accompanying pancakes, soup made with the duck carcass and noodles with duck meat.  We had a crowd of 16 people (10 adults and 6 kids).  We ordered three of the duck meals plus additional pancakes (each additional pancake is $0.50) and other dishes as shown below.  

It's a help yourself affair.  The duck is carved in front of you but you assemble your own pancake. The duck skin is not as delicate and crispy as the one at Quanjude but you are paying a lot less.  

The pancakes are more the eggy crepe variety versus the wheat based almost tortilla style ones encountered elsewhere.  I'm not a big fan of the eggy crepe variety as they are so thin, they tend to break through when you are wrapping.  Also they are not as filling.  

The duck soup is more like a consomme.  It was slightly spicy which I think is from the picked vegetables used in the broth.  It was lovely and clear.  Kiddo had three bowlfuls.

Stir fry noodles with duck meat and bean sprouts.  This was really yummy and the noodles were crispy.  

The additional dishes included lemongrass prawns.  They were well made and a decent size.

Clams in a blackbean spicy sauce.  I only had one clam as it was a bit overloaded with cornstarch and was claggy.

Loved this.  This is the spinach with garlic.  Nice big serving size.

Gong chicken.  This is chicken and prawn mince deep fried in a loaf shape.  What's not to love?

I love this - soft shell crab.  It tasted amazingly wonderful with an eggy batter as all deep fried soft shell crabs should.  I was a bit horrified when uploading these photos to notice the oil on it.  Oh well, it was yummy, even if it was very unhealthy.

Verdict - we really liked it.

Overall
Old Kingdom is a good family restaurant that does reasonably affordable Peking duck.

Mount Fairview Dining Room, Alberta (Canada) by Bureaucrat

Before our walk around the glacial beauty of Lake Louise in the fading summer dusk, we had dinner in our hotel’s restaurant, the Mount Fairview Dining Room.  It’s a fancy restaurant with super friendly and attentive staff.  We eschewed entrees as we both wanted desserts. 

A nice warm basket of bread came out. 

I decided to go vegetarian/vegan and was quite impressed with the roulade.  The tender slivers of sliced roasted beetroot wrapped around the cashew and goat's cheese filling.  The earthiness and heftiness of the beetroot was a good simile to meat, while the protein from the cashew filling was thick and creamy and made the dish feel like a proper main dish (as opposed to just a plate of veg).  It was served with wild mushrooms, squash, baby eggplant and asparagus.

The Lawyer picked the dish that I wanted to try – wild caribou!  It was delicious.  Wild caribou medallions served with a yam and leek gratin a red current glaze. The caribou was tender and tasted like a cross between beef and deer.  The gratin was made up of thin slices of yam and leek, and it beautifully buttery and soft.  This is definitely worth a try.  Although, we did feel a wee guilty in eating the caribou since it’s quite an endangered species (due to the logging of the trees that have the lichen that they eat, which is their primary food source).

We were full but couldn’t pass up the opportunity to try desserts.  These were really good but just didn’t match the same excellence of the main dishes.

I picked the bumble berry pie based on its name – bumble berry.  How could I pass up the chance to try some that has such a cute name?  Bumble berry refers to a melange of berries.  A warm pie with buttery, flaky pastry, and it’s packed full of berries.  

It wasn’t too sweet and you could taste the berries.  It was served with a good quality vanilla ice cream.

We also go the peanut souffle w salted caramel and raspberry mascarpone.  This was quite good even though I’m not much of a peanut fan.  This tasted like a sophisticated version of a Reese Peanut Butter Cup.  

The souffle wasn't served warm.  Instead it resembled like a light-as-air cube of ice cream.  The roasted aroma of the peanuts really came through.  

After dinner, we took a much needed walk around the blue beauty that is Lake Louise.

Verdict – we really loved it.

Overall

A very enjoyable experience here.  The food was excellent (especially the mains) and the service was impeccable, knowledgeable and super friendly.

Waya Japanese Restaurant, Glen Waverley by Obelix

I stumbled onto Waya quite by happy accident.  I was practically hallucinating with hunger and I was cold and being rained upon.  It was like a beacon in the night beckoning to me.  Waya is a Japanese restaurant.  I'm a bit of a purist when it comes to Japanese cuisine.  However, here is where I admit my hypocrisy.  Waya is a Japanese restaurant run by Chinese and guess what?  It was good.


I ordered a teriyaki beef bento box.  It came with sushi, omelette (tamago), a chicken skewer (yakitori), salad, seaweed salad and the teriyaki beef with rice.  It was a very substantial serve and kept me going until dinner time, no afternoon snacking required.  The teriyaki beef was probably a wee bit on the salty side but that's me being nit-picky.

Verdict - we liked it a lot.

Overall
The order came quick which was fortuitous as I was about to pass out with hunger.  The water was complementary and you had to pay for tea.

Definitely a good option for a eat and dash meal.  It situated near the cinemas in Glen Waverley so not a bad option for a pre or post movie feed.

I'd most definitely come back.  It is so much better in terms of food quality and service than Ajisen Ramen which is a few doors down.

Smitty's, Jasper (Canada) by Bureaucrat

Food invokes childhood memories.  I remember thinking having lunch at Denny's (located inside Kmart near its tyre and automotive section in Brandon Park) as a kid and thinking it was the most amazing and delicious meal that I have ever eaten.  I don't know whatever happened to Denny's but I do think back to it from time to time.

So when I saw Smitty's, which is a family style diner, it made me think of Denny's.  The uniformed staff, the booths, the Americana vibe, wallet-friendly prices meant that the place was filled with young families, golden oldies and tourists.

By this point we had been in Canada for about a week and we had yet to try poutine - a national dish of sorts.  The Canadians are onto a good thing here - a plate of chips laden with gravy and cheese.  While this was an okay rendition of poutine (it was a tad too salty for me), I'm sure there are more gourmet versions of this all across the country.  I like the idea of smothering my fried carbs w gravy and cheese - all it needs on top is a runny fried egg.  

For dinner, the Lawyer got the steak burger which came with onion rings and a choice of side - in this case, he chose the fruit salad.  Topped with lots of fresh salad, to offset the slightly greasy but delicious steak and onion rings, the Lawyer wolfed down the burger.  The fruit was pre-made but still fresh.

He also got a glass of iced tea.

I decided to go old school and ordered liver and onions.  I don't usually like offal but I do like liver - something about the creamy texture about liver is very comforting.  Two slices of beef liver pan fried with proper bacon (my god, the Canadians really know how to cook their bacon) and onions.  It was a bit over cooked but I'd much rather my livers to be over cooked than under cooked.  The livers were delish with the gravy, a serve of rice, steamed veg and a light-as-air slice of garlic bread.  Simple but really good.  

We also got a slice of a deep dish apple pie for dessert.  A thin pastry loaded with chunky apple slices and drizzled with caramel and served with whipped cream.  

Verdict - we liked it a lot.

Overall

We really liked Smitty's.  The food was good, the service was good and the price was good.  Some of the reviews have noted the poor service and food but we had no issues with either.  Granted, the food ain't gourmet but it's homely, filling and done pretty well.