Seven Seeds

114 Berkeley Street, Carlton; 03 9347 8664

The coffee pedigree of Mark Dundon must be the envy of roasters around the city. Dundan ran St Ali, the venerated South Melbourne cafe, before selling up and opening Brother Baba Budan in the city, an outlet so confident in the allure of its brews that it put its seating on the ceiling. And now, there is Seven Seeds, a shrine to the bean.

The warehouse space, slotted among the light industrial of the un-chic side of Carlton, hosts roasters, cupping sessions, a retail outlet and an excellent cafe. It's pumping in there, and not just with students and nurses from the closest institutions. It goes without saying that the coffee is worth crossing town for, but the food is playing just as big a part in keeping bums on seats.

The menu is a simple A5 page of delicious things on excellent bread (from Dench), augmented by some fine baked goods on display at the counter. A vivid snack at any time of day is their hommous on sourdough, with a superb dukkah and cherry tomatoes. The hommous itself is extraordinary - rich with oil and perfectly creamed chickpeas.

For lunch try a top-notch ham sandwich, with brie, rocket and onion jam.
But, if it's your first visit, don't try and resist the most delectable item on the menu: Middle Eastern 'nutella', served on sourdough with mascarpone and sesame seeds. My God. The nutella is precisely the consistency of golden syrup, and just as sticky. It's not as sweet though, and paired with the mascarpone it makes for a grown-up, indulgent, but not at all excessive brunch.

Cafeklatsch II: North II, Gingerlee IV, Cavallero

North: 717 Rathdowne St, Carlton North; 03 9348 1276
Gingerlee: 117 Lygon St, Brunswick East; 03 9380 4430
Cavallero: 300 Smith St, Collingwood; 03 9417 1377

It's not breaking any ground to say that Melbourne has a surfeit of cafes. It's also established that in certain parts of town, a certain style of cafe has become de rigueur. So what do they all do to differentiate themselves from each another?

In most cases, it's down to the menu. Innovative combinations, stand-out ingredients, or a signature dish are to the key to successful trade amidst the inner north's glut of relaxed dining options. In Carlton, the cafe called North has made extra certain by adding a particularly effective feature wall - seemingly drawn on in texta and featuring hundreds of cartoon-style, framed portraits. It would be endlessly arresting if their menu (also wall-mounted) didn't already give patrons enough to ponder.

Many are drawn to North, however, on the promise of a particular menu item. Hence, while they may be distracted by huevos rancheros (pictured right...and let me tell you, you won't eat for the rest of the day if you make it through that plate), or the house (cannelini) beans, they read only as far as: Reuben sandwich - grilled corn beef on an open sandwich with Swiss cheese, dill mayo and sauerkraut.
It doesn't look like much when it comes out, but it does the job. Look at the perfectly grilled cheese, just turning black at the edges; check out the corned beef slices overhanging the edges of the bread. And did someone say sauerkraut? They're as generous with the cabbage here as the bratwurst stand at Queen Vic Markets. I've soft spots for both corned beef and for old-school, open-topped sandwich-type arrangements, and this particular example made for a fine, filling and fulfilling lunch.

Grab a $2.50 gingerbread man on your way out the door.

Gingerlee doesn't seem to have skipped a beat since it opened almost two years ago - it's consistently packed, and its Syrian French toast is frequently written up. The cafe sits squarely in a concentrated eating zone, with Small Block, Poached, Sugardough and La Paloma all nearby, not to mention Rumi immediately across the street. Gingerlee's original menu seems to have held pretty steady, with Middle-Eastern touches on their breakfast and lunch dishes their signature. The French toast (with orange-blossom water and labne) is a case in point, along with their breakfast tagine. There's also the option, for those seriously in need, to order a Bloody Mary with breakfast.

Even their poached eggs come with something a little exotic, in this case one of my all-time favourite indulgences, Persian fetta (last featured on this blog in the creamed spinach from Greg Malouf at Stones). The poached eggs and fetta are accompanied by sourdough toast (of the bring-me-a-steak-knife-to-cut-this-crust variety) and avocado. Half an avocado to be exact - happy for them not to skimp on that! What I loved about this dish was building taste combinations on my fork - eggs, avocado, toast; creamy fetta and buttery bread; toast, avocado and fetta; and, more often than not, everything piled up together and manoeuvred with no small amount effort to my waiting mouth, followed shortly by a little squirm and a smile as all the tastes blended together.

Over Collingwood way, what does a cafe do among the bevy of Smith Street options to let everyone know they're both worthwhile and safe to try? At Cavallero, they start at the front, with elaborate wrought-iron gates across the front of the shop. A stag-head behind the linear, understated bar is incongruous amongst the otherwise bare walls housing booths and communal tables. By day, oodles of light flows in from front and back, but at night, funky light fittings keep the mood low-key.

Cavallero is succeeding at being different things to different crowds, achieving status as both a cafe and a bar. On the eating front, they've done interesting things when divvying up their menu, picking times of day rather than style of dish. One can choose from Early, Middle or Late, roughly equating to breakfast, lunch, dinner/tapas. Only roughly, however. Under Early there are also Extras, that really don't match the expected bacon, mushroom etc, but instead offer more obtuse mixed options, featuring avocado and gremolata, for example. It's a frequently changing menu as well, so a winning dish may have been usurped if you go back for a second try.

A subsection on the menu, under Middle, offers Bread, but goes much further than just a house-style, including filled options such as pide, or a combo of bread and olives. It's the Bread section luring many a customer, either for the Carolina-style pork sandwich (with roasted pork belly and a barbecue sauce fashioned on site) recently featured in the age (melbourne) magazine or their fried chicken and coleslaw sandwich.

The pide on this occasion came with spiced vegetables and a lively labne. It was certainly hearty and offered enough flavour kick to keep things interesting. I'm never so sure about putting potato into a sandwich, however. The eggplant, onion and labne were very welcome, and the potato was pretty tasty on its own, but a less starchy veg would have been preferable.

An honourable mention in the interesting menu stakes to El Mirage in Brunswick East, where a recent visit saw me making a win-win choice between rare beef salad with haloumi and basil, or poached eggs with fig chutney and ricotta, while others at the table went for an accomplished penne ragu, as well as $6 fruit toast with honey. Great with a T2 chai.

Venue challenge;Tiamo 2

Tiamo 2: 305 Lygon St, Carlton; 9347 0911

I recently found myself challenged for a suitable dining location: friends from out of town, looking for somewhere in easy reach of the city, not too pricey, not too adventurous, not too loud. Does anywhere spring to your mind immediately? My additional criteria were that Hardware Lane and the bottom end of Lygon St were both out. It was for a Saturday night too, which can wipe out some suitable weekday options, and the first couple of phone calls I made to book somewhere made it clear that we'd also be in for an early dinner.

The challenge, as I see it, is that within the city, most restaurants fall into one of two categories: $10 noodle bars, or $30+ serious restaurants. That is a generalisation, but given we wanted a Sit-down Talk on a Saturday night many of Melbourne's signature venues - ie the bar-cum-restaurant and restaurant-cum-bar - were excluded from the search. I'm also always anxious to give interstaters a Melbourne Experience: preferably the restaurant should be unlike anything readily available to them in their hometown. When I don't know their tastes very well, though, it can be doubly hard to find a restaurant that serves immediately interpretable food. I'm not knocking the food scene - all the things I excluded from this search are in fact exactly what I love about eating in Melbourne.

Maybe I was making things harder for myself than they needed to be. Interestingly, after putting the challenge to a couple of friends, the three of us independently came up with the same options: Tiamo 2 (on the less-scary stretch of Lygon St, between Elgin and Faraday Sts) and the Hotel Lincoln (on Cardigan St). I haven't been back to the Lincoln since the unfortunate whiting/whitebait incident, and wasn't sure how pubby it would get on a Saturday, so Tiamo 2 it was.

It turned out to be a great choice, suiting all concerned, and having the earlier meal meant we had plenty of space and atmosphere in which to catch up on the last couple of years. Given this was also the night Melbourne decided to hit 10C in November, it was great to be cosied up inside and upstairs, with dishes like lamb shank on the specials board.

The dining and aesthetic highlight was this tiramisu, a generous serve to say the least!
Afterwards, we realised another advantage to our eventual dining location of choice: it's proximity to Percy's Bar. I've only written up a cheap pub meal on quiz night from this venue (also known as Astor Hotel), but it is a fine establishment. Beers are truly cheap, and it's a takeaway alternative to entering the bowels of the nearby shopping centre to go to Safeway. It's got a proper English pub feel of conviviality and homeliness and, without doubt, the tallest barstools in Melbourne.

A tale of two burgers; Birdie Num Nums and Northcote Social Club

Birdie Num Nums: 745 Nicholson St, Carlton North; 03 9380 1950 Northcote Social Club: 301 High St, Northcote; 03 9489 3917

Not a likely pairing, I admit, and, while I'm conceding points, I'll say up front that it's actually a tale of one burger and one steak sandwich (with an omelette thrown in).

Birdie Num Nums did not follow the Brunswick Model when it opened in 2006. Rather than opening in a former milkbar, the shop's earlier incarnation was as a butcher. Hefty, twisty, dark metal pillars still support meat hooks, under a ceiling easily high enough to give a full bovine carcass swinging space. The floor is timber, rather than concrete. There's a communal table, window and outdoor seating, and a gorgeous lounge-room nook hidden at the back, replete with recliners and fireplace.

The menu reflects Greek influences, and the gimmick here is to offer a range of pre-prepared lunch options from a display - picture meatballs, lasagne, layered savoury pastries - along with cooked-to-order breafkast dishes. There's some flair on the menu, such as the Egyptian baked eggs - poached eggs in ground coriander and cumin, served on potato, pumpkin and almonds -, but it was the olives in an omelette, along with chorizo and red capsicum that grabbed me.It just wasn't an exciting dish. The edges of the omelette, where it had stuck to the pan, had that crispy-cooked egg texture that I forgive at home but don't want plated up when I'm out. While it wasn't dry, it wasn't nearly moist enough - perhaps they hadn't sloshed in cream as plenty of places do, but then a lighter cooking touch would have retained some runny egg (and maybe avoided the crisp edges). Even the toast - a dense, mealy sourdough from nearby Natural Tucker - came unbuttered. I respect a cafe that doesn't mistake richness/oiliness for guaranteed flavour, but then at the very least offer the customer the chance to splurge or skimp on butter to their own liking!

On the other side of the table, we had a $14 steak sandwich, which defeated even SG's carnivorous longings. The photo's perspective isn't crash hot, but this thing was huge - you can see how tall it is against the pile of chips! A juicy slice of minute steak couldn't weigh down all the lettuce, tomato and cheese that came with it. Almost as incredible as SG leaving about a third on his plate, was the price comparison: $13.50 for my omelette, fifty cents more for the sandwich. With the price of free-range eggs, I have a good appreciation of what a lot of the omelette cost covered, but the sanger definitely presented better value.

The music carried a very eighties flavour - no, not the 1780s of the Dickens' novel played on in the post title - but quite defiantly 1980s. Bonnie Tyler followed by 'We Built this City' isn't everyone's cup of Giancarlo coffee, but it got my dancing feet warmed up for our afternoon engagement: a Guild League gig at the Northcote Social Club.

Meeting friends in the pub afterwards, we sampled a couple of Cricketers Arms Lagers, a fine, dry beer made all the more refreshing by some subtle fruit notes. The NSC does a crafty job of disguising itself as a seedy pub, but its menu dispels the myth. Having already seen burgers delivered, I insisted we order one between the two of us - a good call.
Again, not great photo perspective! The roo burger comes with peppered meat, lemon myrtle and wattleseed mayo, tomato, spanish onion and mixed leaves on toasted Turkish pide. The meat had been perfectly handled and oozed its own juices to mingle with the slightly-citrusy, slightly-tangy mayo. Rocket cut across all that with its sharpness and the super-fresh bread was spot-on toasted to be crisp and soft all at once. At $15, and feeding two, this was great value.

So, all three dishes within $1.50 of one another. Which would you choose?

www.northcotesocialclub.com

Taste of Melbourne

Royal Exhibition Building, Carlton; 21-24 August 2008

To attend a progressive dinner at The Botanical, Circa the Prince and Interlude would present a variety of hindrances, not least being the awkward distances to travel between the three restaurants. Taste of Melbourne presented the opportunity to achieve just that, with no further impediment than navigating a crowd of foodies (some of whom I think were only moonlighting as food buffs) within the finite and fantastic surrounds of the Royal Exhibition Building.

The Taste Festival comes to Melbourne via London, having spread its wings through several cities in the UK, to Johannesburg, and landing in Amsterdam, Brussels, Melbourne and Sydney in 2008. On paper, the setup distinguishes it from other, more familiar food festivals: a select range of restaurants offer three signature dishes, in reduced portions. The Festival operates its own currency of Crowns - $1 buys one Crown, and most of the dishes are between eight and ten Crowns. A $50 ticket gets you the $30 entry fee, plus thirty Crowns - a saving of five dollars.

Therein lies another distinction - it's not the cheapest food event on the calendar! Once inside though, things became a little more familiar. Just as one would expect at the Good Food and Wine Festival, or any number of events at Fed Sq, the festival space was filled with exhibitors offering samples of their produce, so the fiscally savvy visitor could easily garner three reduced-sized dishes with their thirty Crowns and satisfy any residual hunger with tastes of Bultarra lamb, puddings, brownies, Jalna yoghurt, or vincotto from Enoteca Sileno.

But what of those signature dishes? I gave careful consideration to the menu, ensuring I picked from restaurants that were of interest, but perhaps in a price bracket that made an imminent visit unlikely.

First up was a dish from the Botanical, which had grabbed my attention from the moment I perused the dishes on offer: Macleay Valley rabbit and chorizo terrine with quince aioli. It's those two words at the end that turn my head.As with several of the dishes on offer, the presentation wasn't going to win any prizes for aesthetics - paper plates don't help, and these were 'sample size', so morsels, smears and smidgins were the order of the day!

Secondly was an intriguing mix from Circa, the Prince: slow-cooked sher wagyu, braised meat pie, truffled coleslaw and licorice-spiced pumpkin.This plate served up more than a morsel of meat. The too-cute pumpkin pie was only ever-so-slightly tinged with the licorice spice, but just as well since there was also the unmistakable kapow of truffle in the coleslaw, and all that nutty fattiness in the wagyu. Something I was quite pleased to eat such a delicate amount of, giving its constituent parts.

Lastly, I was thrilled to be able to try Interlude's bacon and eggs.Your first thought is understandable - that bowl of darkish liquid looks more like miso than a breakfast fry up. This is true. What this version of bacon and eggs actually involves is an egg baked in its shell for hours at 63C. When it comes out it has a silky texture and a still-runny yolk. The egg sits in a consomme with dehydrated pancetta and puffed wild rice. It is certainly a texture journey as much as a flavour trip.

Seasons broadened by the bean; Gerald's Bar

386 Rathdowne St, Carlton North

It was fitting perhaps that the year's first sighting of 'fresh' broad beans on sale came from a blogger by the name of Fatty McBeanpole. Certainly more fitting than the availability of a spring speciality in the deep of a Melbourne winter.

The broad bean season is tantalisingly short. For just three good months can devotees take them home, to first break the beans out from their implausibly fluffy cocoons, then squeeze the inner bean free after blanching. The end product - a bright green, fat crescent of legume - teams to great effect with lemon, artichoke, paprika, chicken, white wine or stock and in risottos.

On the first evening in months that lacked the bite of southerly air and instead encouraged hope for warmer gusts from the north, the Bean of Wonder showed up atop a hunk of braised pork with apples at the super-groovy Gerald's Bar.

The bar itself is long, curved and supported by a weave of wooden slats. Tables and chairs sit under lace-curtained windows; a meat-slicer is overseen by a huge David Bailey portrait at the far end. Vinyl remixes spin smoothly and quietly. A shelf running the length of the bar stocks a formidable range of spirits; vodka and gin are kept chilled in an ice bucket for expert handling with mixers and in cocktails. The first sparkling and first three reds and whites ordered for the evening become that day's by the glass, a policy that can be a blessing for patrons feeling short on decision-making power. Gerald's has a superb wine list, with potential by-the-glass prices ranging from around $8-$40. There's an international range of beer as well.

The day's menu is scrawled on butcher's paper then clipped to a ladder on wheels that you might expect to see in a library, so that it can be wheeled to customers' vantage points along the bar. While Gerald's is definitely a drinker's bar, this succinct menu offers perfect accompaniments. Half a dozen small plates come at $10 each: maybe Polish sausage, wagyu prosciutto or a welsh rarebit - an appropriately hunky piece of sourdough, with rich cheese, just a touch of English mustard and a good dose of pepper. The pork main meal, at $15, is superb value. A hefty, thick piece of meat has been braised, retaining tenderness and texture, and served in a sauce of its own juices with an understated apple sauce.

It's an incredibly comfortable place, one where you want to settle in for a couple of wines, switch to cocktails and maybe finish with a brandy, having also worked your way through the menu. Sure Carlton is our own little Italy, but this bar mixes the best of Melbourne and Europe as naturally as the seasons change.

North

717 Rathdowne St, Carlton North; 03 9348 1276

The folks at Where's the Beef posted a good review of North a little while back, on the back of which I'd added it to the 'must try' list. Stories of throngs of like-thinkers over weekends meant I took up a Monday mid-morning opportunity to check it out.

As with so many cafes in this area, North offers a small space. White features strongly, both on the furniture and the walls, offset by black stencilled artwork. The cafe features a great window seat, which is at normal height (rather than a bench with stools), providing an extremely comfy place to sink into a bowled chair and swivel between perusing the blackboard menu and the goings-on of Rathdowne St outside.

On offer for the morning meal is their Champions Breakfast, involving boiled eggs and soldiers. Oh yes, that's a trophy eggcup! I was tickled pink by this arrangement. The eggs and toast come with a fine, sweet tomato relish; the mushrooms are my own addition. There were plenty of soldiers to go around, and to be honest I was a little overwhelmed by two eggs; as a home-cooked dish it would never occur to me to make two. The only downer was that Egg #1 seemed stuck in the eggcup, so I couldn't take the shell out and start over with Egg #2. Happily I had been provided with a little spoon to tap the eggs open in the appropriate manner, so sufficed with doing that on the plate. A big plus about this dish over baked eggs is that the yolk stayed runny, so there was still plenty of dipping action even with Egg #2.

For a good precis of some of the other tempting dishes on offer at North, check Breakfast Out.

Hotel Lincoln II

91 Cardigan St, Carlton; 03 9347 4666

Bernard: 'What did you order?'
Manny: 'Ah, a pint of lager'
Bernard: 'I got you....creme de menthe'

Our evening at Hotel Lincoln didn't feature quite so much imbibing of alcohol as in the average episode of Black Books, but, like Manny in the extract above, we were a little surprised at what was served up.

The Lincoln has two eating options: the bar menu or a high-end restaurant menu. It has two eating locations as well - the bar and a fine-dining room - and in between the two is an extra space that accommodates diners from both. On Monday nights the bar menu is reduced to $12, and by booking you find yourself with table service, good cutlery, bread and imaginative food at a budget price.

Beef involtini - normally $18 and hence one of the better-value dishes on a Monday - comes with a buttery parmesan and polenta mash. The meat is cooked to softness but holds its rolled shape well.
My meal order was for the whole grilled silver whiting, with fennel and avocado (normally $17). When our plates arrived, the involtini was served, then the waitress turned to me, plate in hand, and said 'I'm really sorry, but we were out of the whiting, so the chef has prepared the whitebait for you.'

...

There's a pause there to represent my momentary speechlessness. I still struggle to believe that a chef just decided to whip up a completely different dish (yes, they're both seafood, and indeed even share a similar name, but a whitebait pattie with chilli jam is a long way from a whole whiting). Disappointment was added to my shock, since this was a dish I'd already eaten. I won't write it up again - it was very much the same, but this time stuck a little on the way down as I kept harrumphing with incredulity. The photo did come out rather nicely, however:
I don't discredit the Lincoln's food at all: both bar and restaurant menu offer excellent meals, the latter in particular making great use of seasonal food (how good does chestnut and mascarpone ravioli with sherry mushrooms sound?). Having eaten there twice before I know this was an aberration in service, but one I've never heard of before and still has me shaking my head, asking 'what were they thinking?'

Markov Place

350 Drummond St, Carlton; 03 9347 7113

A laneway entrance; leather banquette seating interspersed with tall tables and bar stools; giant-size posters spruiking revolutions; Melbourne's funkiest light fittings (large, rectangular shades pasted with newspaper cuttings); and extremely fine food and wine service. Carlton's Markov Place has got it going on.

The bar/restaurant is a cross between a gallery and a cellar: it's only one room, so the whole atmosphere, in part set by the poster'art around the walls, is appreciable in the way of a suburban artspace. The tall ceilings and stone floor, as well as the fact that it's downstairs from the adjoining (recommended) cleanskin shop that faces onto Drummond St, gives its patrons the feeling of being underground.

Amongst all that atmosphere is the chance to sample a succinct, thoughtful menu and a very sophisticated drinks list. The menu extends from sides such as fries and aioli for $8, through to snacks around the $15 mark and mains in the mid-$20s. Late on a Friday, our order, to share, served our post-pub pre-gig hunger well: aforementioned stringy fries with a serviceable aioli; pan-fried scallops with chorizo, lemon thyme and chilli, served on sourdough bread; and autumn mushroom bruschetta with manchego.

The scallop and chorizo dish was every bit as good as its description sounded. The bread - soft and pliant in the extreme, with a knife-challenging crust - could only have been made that morning. It soaked up the oil running from the sliced chorizo and bulked up each bite of scallop, an annoyingly bite-sized type of seafood (in that it tends to disappear all too quickly!)

The mushroom bruschetta was a triumph - a mound of seasonal fungi spilling off yet more sourdough (we'd had two complimentary slices with oil as well), out of which also tumbled some spinach. Slippery jack, shiitake, swiss brown and pine mushrooms had all soaked up a generous amount of oil and butter and the variety lent a wonderful delicacy to the flavour, set off by the creamy Spanish cheese.

Along with the food menu came a list of today's drink specials. Conveniently divided into 'before', 'during' and 'after', they offered an intriguing diversion from the usual. Cocktails are all too often out of reach of the frugal consumer, but many of these drink specials were well under $10. While a mojito with vanilla and aniseed was hard to turn down, a mix of cachaça, ginger, lime and chilli won the day. Each ingredient was immediately distinguishable in every mouthful, yet at the same time it delivered one, united flavour.

Particular notice needs to be made of the service at Markov Place. The waitstaff were knowledgeable, friendly and interested. They were keen to talk about the specials and offer recommendations. Not long after we'd been served a waiter came over to let us know the kitchen was closing in five minutes and ask if we wanted any more food or desserts - it wasn't pushy, only helpful. A curious inquiry as to the range of mushrooms had the waiter, unprecedently, offering of his free will to check the list with the kitchen. They were receptive to feedback and generally looked happy to be there; as were we.

www.markov.com.au

Tiamo 2

303-5 Lygon St, Carlton; 03 9347 0911

Tiamo 2 has recently undergone an extensive renovation and their downstairs dining area is now a lot more spacious, in the main part due to the fact that they have taken over the shop space next door. While a range of antipasto is still on display, diners no longer have to squeeze quite so tightly behind its late-night perusers to get to a table. The new interior features a lot of dark wood and red tones - the red being mainly employed in the various subtle ways they have incorporated their heart logo into the fitout.

They've refined the choice of main dishes, but also now have a dedicated pizza-making area in the reclaimed space. There were some tempting pizza specials on offer, but it's a dish that had featured a few too many times in recent days to make it feel 'special' enough to order. Instead maccheroni della zia got the nod: pasta with mini meatballs, eggplant, napoli sauce & basil. The eggplant was not a particularly strong presence; the napoli sauce was delicate and clung to the pasta, which I was particularly impressed with.
A quick aside: For any pasta afficionados amongst the readers, would you agree it's fair to say that 'maccherone' refers to any small tubular pasta, and that food cultures outside Italy have popularised one particular form - elbow maccheroni - as part of the dish maccaroni and cheese?)

The basil and meatballs partnered one another well, the sweetness of the herb contrasting against the slightly peppery rounds of meat. It's always pleasant to experience a carb-and-meat dish that doesn't sit too heavily.

SG's choice was the chicken florentino special.Fillets of chicken, bracketed by bacon, had been rolled around ricotta and spinach and baked in a white wine sauce. The chicken had retained plenty of moisture, so was quite succulent and against the softness of the cheese and saltiness of the bacon a mouthful became quite decadent. It was accompanied by a fine range of al dente vegetables and some suitably oily, seasoned sliced potatoes.

We experienced very helpful service, the staff perhaps being spurred on to offer friendliness to the diners by the fact that there was quite a loud, vocal, bell-slamming conflict going on between them and the kitchen staff! One minor point: the restaurant also features an interesting toilet arrangement - one door, three cubicles, two marked for women and one for men.

Brunetti

194-204 Faraday St, Carlton; 03 9347 2801
Now at: 380 Lygon St, Carlton

First it was Stalactites, now Brunetti: I'm hitting the classic Melbourne destinations this week. The reasons have been a little different. With Stalactites, it was to introduce interstate friends to 24-hours-a-day-accessible Greek food in the city. With Brunetti, it was in order to find a cheap but varied lunch option, and to celebrate a friend's impending transition from Carltonian to Fitzroyite.

I hadn't previously investigated the savoury offerings from Brunetti. It is rather difficult to get past the pastry counter, after all. But venture further and you are rewarded with a stocked display case of piadinas, sfogliati and tramezzini. When choosing sandwich filling, Brunetti knows their market and stick with Italian favourites: popular fillings include proscuitto, eggplant and parmesan.

The sfogliati are similar to the Greek spanakopita: pastry sandwiches. A spinach and cheese option is available; however, I went with the melanzane, zucchini, mozzarella and feta ($8.80).The pastry isn't as flaky, or in as many layers, as on a spanakopita. The filling is simply delicious: each of the vegetables contributes strong flavour, so it has obviously been made with fresh ingredients. Cheese and pastry is always a wonderful combination and the mozzarella wraps everything in its gooey care and holds the whole together. The saltiness from the feta lingered a bit longer than I would have liked, though maybe only because I found it so enjoyable that I scoffed the whole slab.

www.brunetti.com.au

La Luna

320 Rathdowne St, Carlton North; 03 9349 4888

La Luna is known for its quality meat dishes. The restaurant houses its own drying room and the dining room provides ample food for thought while you wait to order or eat, with chalk drawings of a pig and cow, with the various meat cuts labelled, etched above the bar.

On this sunny, yet below-average cool, first Saturday in autumn we were there as part of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival's Express Lunch series. Several highly-regarded restaurants around Melbourne offer a two-course lunch (chosen from entree, main and dessert) plus a glass of wine, for $30.

For entree, La Luna offered a lamb and lentil soup; baked figs; or house-made gnocchi in bolognese sauce. For mains, those not hankering for a meaty dish had the option of a silverbeet and two-cheese filo pie; or if after aquarian meat, house-cured salmon with chickpea, zucchini and tomato. Both of our mains, however, featured meat of the redder variety.

Firstly, the bull boar sausages, served with potato aioli, jus, roasted pepper and capers. The plump sausages had the coarse, dense texture of cured meat and were almost bursting against their skins with both fullness and flavour. This was offset by the moist aioli and the peppery and garlic flavours were balanced by the capers.

My main (my second preference after the bull boar sausages, to be honest, but where's the fun in ordering the same thing?) was chargrilled beef, dry-rubbed with sumac and chilli, served with green beans, fetta dressing and jalapeño dressing. The waitress had enthusiastically told us it 'packed quite a hit' (hence it's unsuitability for SG!) and she was quite right! It made for a great contrast, however. The meat was more grill-kissed, than chargrilled, so the spicy outer layer stood in for the crisp, sticky exterior of a longer-cooked piece of meat, and added grunt to the chewy flesh.

The desserts were just exquisite. A white chocolate and raspberry parfait had SG moaning in delight and threatening to establish a life long relationship with his dessert and even just looking at it I didn't blame him. I was experiencing similar feelings of devotion to my chocolate pudding, with ganache and espresso ice cream. It was so indulgent, with the cold creaminess melting into the chocolate sauce and both soaking into the spongey pudding, creating a fusion of those two great beans, cocoa and coffee.

A thoroughly civilised, enjoyable afternoon, spent in the company of notable food, happy diners and helpful staff.

www.lalunabistro.com.au

Filou's Artisan Patissier

Cnr Lygon and Fenwick Sts, Carlton North; 03 9347 4029

Filou's has the look of comfortable suburban cafe, somewhere that, should you live nearby, would mean you had no need to keep fresh bread or coffee in the house. The homey feel comes from the hand-painted signage and residential locale; it stays in vogue with its sassy burnt-orange concrete and aqua wrought iron paint job.

Filou's does a fine line in artisan breads, particularly sourdoughs. The baking smells that have wafted over to me on a late-night ride home have kept me eager to try it in the daytime. On weekdays they serve filled baguettes, which was actually exactly what I felt like on this sunny Saturday. However, weekends are for decadence, a time to throw aside the lettuce and tomato extras and embrace flaky pastry!

To that end, I plumped for the savoury baguette, avec jambon and fromage. They had cheekily sneaked in some veg within the darkened, buttery folds of pastry: tomato and leafy greens no less! The ham had kept its flavour and the cheese wasn't so stringy that it took over from the pastry as the dominant texture. Paris is, alas, many moons behind me, but I was satisfied with this Melburnian version of the ubiquitous Gallic baked good.

The beef and guinness pie was a little less exciting. Perhaps it was more in the French style; I can't profess to sampling them there. Then again, one does expect 'beef and guinness' to come in the style of a particular country. Vegies had again been snuck in amongst the sauce, and it was the sauce where care had been taken with flavour, more so than with the meat. Which, particulary for brunch, may be for some more acceptable.

There's much more to be had from their bakers' oven: quiche, eclairs, muffins, tarts. Save time next time you're riding to a friend's and stop to fill your basket with some tres French goodies.

Percys Bar (Astor Hotel)

418 Lygon St (cnr Elgin St), Carlton; 03 9347 1715

The notion of a Carlton pub would probably make most think of a designer interior, a too-cool-for-school drinks list and clientele to match. The Astor Hotel could hardly be more central to Carlton - tram passengers certainly get ample time to look at it during the interminable wait to woggle around to/from Melbourne Uni - but it certainly doesn't fit the Carlton mould.

Inside, it's a country pub, a place where locals sit at the bar and use everyone's names as they chat to each other and the staff. (Sitting at the bar does in fact take some getting used to, since the bar stools are incredibly high). The drinks list comes in a plastic sleeve and makes no pretensions to be anything other than serviceable.

Counter meals are available, in addition to a bistro-restaurant at the back of the pub offering a commendable array of dishes in the $15-20 range. On Tuesdays the bar menu is unmissable: $10 steak and pot or, even more affordable, $6.50 for a Percy Burger.

It's great value. The pattie is solid and genuinely mincey. The tomato is fresh and holds its form. The cheese clearly comes from a cow, not a plastics factory and the bread is toasted on the inside, soft on the outside, as it should be on a burger. It's definitely a pub burger, but it's not overly-salty nor too heavy.

In the background of the shot is the answer form for Percys Trivia: if you don't have occasion to exercise your body after polishing off the chips at least give your mind a workout and take it to the Melbourne Uni academics who come as regulars!

Land of Siam

121 Lygon St, Carlton; 03 9349 1999 77 Inkerman St, St Kilda; (03) 9534 9909

It's always nice to go to Lygon St for something other than Italian. Land of Siam provides an authentic Asian taste experience and on this Thursday was buzzing with three separate Christmas party groups as well as a handful of dining duos.

The restaurant fitout draws strongly on stone: the walls are a dark grey, the floor is bare and with a large urn water feature there's almost a cave-like effect. A bigger effect of all those exposed hard surfaces, however, was a problematic noise level. Some wall hangings or other soft furnishings could go a long way to helping facilitate lunchtime conversation.

Lunch is fabulous value at Land of Siam. 15 or so dishes from their more extensive dinner menu are offered at the bargain price of $9.90 including jasmine rice. I was thrilled, as it meant I didn't have to limit myself to a noodle dish. Happily my dining partner opted nonetheless for the Pad Thai: the yardstick of Thai dining and the quickest way to determine restaurant quality.

In this case the verdict was better than average. The dish came liberally sprinkled with nuts and the peanut sauce was not too cloying. Most importantly there was some subtly of flavour - lime, tamarind and onion all came through.

My choice was the Wok Basil Beef, with snake beans, red capsicum, chilli-garlic puree and Thai basil sauce.

It was hot! Luckily I had a Singha beer to quench some of the heat. The chilli didn't overpower the dish, however, as all the ingredients had been well-prepared and made a contribution to the overall effect. There was ample sauce, its dark colour mirroring the aniseed flavour from the basil, the vegies were fresh and al dente and the beef was tender.

An excellent value, satisfying lunchtime meal.

Animal Orchestra

163 Grattan St, Carlton; 03 9349 4944

Located close to Melbourne University, Animal Orchestra does a good service to its staff and students, serving up a variety of pides, daily specials and all-day breakfast.

Handy too, at this time of year, that it's ample footpath seating gives options of sunny or shady, in addition to the tables inside. For those avoiding both sun and wind there is an extremely cosy interior: low lighting is offset by brightly collaged walls and lots of mirrors.

The all-day breakfast features a range of baked eggs, with meaty and vegie options. There are also three daily soups ($9.90). The cafe is licenced and offers a range of teas, including their own mint tea.

The best student fare are the pides, priced between $8.80 and $9.90. There are seven on offer, including chicken with bacon, thyme and pesto mayo and cheese, as well as Viet-pork with veg and hoi-sin sauce. The mushroom pide comes with chilli, garlic (great start to an ingredients list), roast almonds and fontina cheese. (For the sake of customer expectation I would call this a focaccia, or even toasted sandwich, but I'm assuming they're using Turkish bread, and hence the 'pide' moniker). The mushroom pide had visible chopped chilli but its flavour came overwhelmingly from the funghi, rather than the accompaniments.

Animal Orchestra is in a great spot: relatively quiet, although within a spit of Swanston St, and is guaranteed a good passing trade from the Uni. It's also a far preferable alternative to the two franchise outlets visible from its footpath seating. For a post-lecture drink, or quiet study inside over freshly-brewed tea it achieves good marks.

Rathdowne Tavern

184 Rathdowne St, Carlton; 03 9348 1133

Peeling paint, faded signage, scrawled writing on chalkboards. That's the exterior of the Rathdowne Tavern. One of those chalkboards advertised the $10 Tuesday bar special - a particular dish each week plus a pot of beer. And hence we discovered the interior: fresh, bright paint, oodles of sunlight, friendly bar staff and a turnover of happy patrons.

The selected dish was roast chicken:

Half a bird in fact, squashing an ample pile of very sharp (endive?) greens, and dwarfing a handful of fries. The chicken was marinated with thyme and lemon and was impressively moist throughout, with a bit of crisp on the bits of skin closest to the cooking element. The flesh was still quite pink, perhaps inevitable if you're going to turn out a hundred or so birds in a night in quick time - given it was of ample size, juicy and had been looked after with a decent marinade, something had to be cut short, and presumably its cooking time.
For $10, including a pot, a convivial atmosphere of customers happy with quality food at a great price, and friendly bar staff, it represents excellent value.

Mark's Pizza

Corner of Grattan and Swanston Sts; 03 9347 0474

Mark's is a great option for a cheap feed, close to the CBD. Most of the pizzas are around $8-9 for a medium size (example below). There's a set menu of course (with selected extras, including chilli and parmesan, at no extra charge), the option to create your own, as well as blackboard specials. The set menu is quite generic - margherita, capricciosa, that curious entity that is the 'Aussie' pizza - but the specials branch out a lot more, with options such as tangy satay chicken. There is also a limited range of pasta dishes, and gelato is available for dessert. The wine list is brief and cheap - mainly Rosemount and Lindeman style wines.

The pizzas have quite a thick base, which was a little on the doughy side. It could just be because I'm so used to the thinner style, but with the cheese cooked almost to crispiness, it was a bit of an inbalance. The toppings are generous, but the heavier dough overwhelms them a bit so each doesn't stand out individually. Regardless, the pizzas are freshly and attentively made; are far, far superior to franchise pizza; and they are served by genuinely cheery staff.

Sippers

164 Rathdowne St, Carlton; 9348 2808 now closed

Sippers specialises in stocking wines and beers from smaller producers, as well as sourcing the ingredients for their extensive tapas menu from local suppliers. It's a very commendable aim (though for the drinks 'small' doesn't necessarily equate to 'local'). The downstairs bar space features lots of dark wood panelling, red velvet couches, gilt mirrors and barrels with stools. Footpath and upstairs dining are also available.

The Sippers menu is divided into tapas and tascas. The latter actually means 'bar' in Spanish, but as Sippers explain on their website, their tascas are their smaller portions (though prices are fairly similar), so perhaps they mean them as bar snacks. In any case, tapas actually derives from the Spanish for 'lid', and there are few venues outside Spain (indeed, outside Andalucia) that actually serve genuine tapas, rather than just small portions of 'themed' food.

There are some great beers on offer - St Arnou on tap, Hargreaves Hill, Red Hill and a raspberry ale. I tried a Yarra Valley Gewurztraminer, which was a little on the straightforward, fruity side. Excited by the food menu, we picked our top four plates, but decided to stagger the order, to save over-ordering. First up was calamari and octopus in besan flour and tomato jam (not sure why they use the Indian name for chickpea flour, rather than the Spanish, gabanzo).
The octopus was particularly tasty and had retained good texture and the calamari was giving rather than chewy. I thought the chutneyish tomato jam was the wrong flavour match for seafood.
Just as well the food tasted good, since we had waited an hour for it to come out. We were regretting our decision to stagger, and were quite bemused that tapas - ie small, lightly cooked portions - could possibly take that long to prepare.
The second dish we'd ordered was pork sausage with chimichurra (a South American sauce of oil, parsley, garlic and lemon). Points for innovation with this dish: I love a make-your-own restaurant dish. In this case one puts some chimichurra in the hollowed-out breadroll, sprinkles some parmesan around, then wedges the sausage on top. The pork sausages were dense and meaty and while parmesan may seem an odd addition the whole combination worked very well.
During our interminable wait for food we'd decided not to order Round 2 in protest, however we were quite impressed with what was eventually served up. So we ordered again, this time lamb and rosemary meatballs and patatas bravas.

They hadn't been shy with the rosemary and it complemented the softly cooked lamb wonderfully to make a richly flavoured dish. The potatoes were spot on, crispy and salty with a curiously green, gratifyingly garlicky aioli.
There were many other dishes we could have chosen, and they do have banquet options that would satiate a fierce hunger. The wait on the food though was really inexcusable and removed the option for us to pace our way through a tantalising menu, which is how good sharing food should be enjoyed.

Hotel Lincoln

91 Cardigan Street, Carlton; 03 9347 4666

The Hotel Lincoln is one of Melbourne's best value eateries. In what can at times be a slightly confusing setup, they offer both bar food and a restaurant menu, with both available, via table service, in a kind of in-between room 'twixt the bar and glossier restaurant. The bar menu is under $20 and on Mondays is extraordinary value at $10 for each dish (this Monday just gone, however, was the last such Monday for the year unfortunately). The restaurant features slightly more glamorous dishes between $20-$30.

We savoured three samples from the bar menu. I'd tossed up against the chicken risotto with asparagus, but went for the whitebait hotcake with avocado and chilli jam. The visual presentation of this dish was wondeful. 'Hotcake' undersold this burger of whitebait, cunningly perched on a layer of avocado, then showered with mung beans, red chilli and fistfuls of fresh and refreshing coriander. The dish provided an ample amount of food, but without leaving a residual heaviness. Astonishing at $10.


The salted cod fritters took third place in the looks department, but they more than made up in flavour. Wonderfully cripsy balls (which took us all by surprise after the description as 'fritters) were filled with a creamy cod mousse. As a staple pub food, one would hope the bangers and mash at a place with a kitchen as commendable as the Hotel Lincoln's would be something special. These didn't disappoint. Two incredibly meaty pork sausages, studded with fennel seeds, were served on a wodge of spot-on creamy smooth mash.

In addition to this fabulous food is an extraordinary wine list. They offer six or so reds and whites each by the glass, and they are both carefully chosen and competitively priced - a Hugel Riesling blend for $6, Innocent Bystander Pinot Gris for $6.50, a Marlborough Sav Blanc and Gewürz for around $7. They also do Te Whare Ra Gewürztraminer, which is one of my favourite wines. The staff are friendly, knowledgable and the crowd, not surprisingly given they're in a place of good food and drink, are happy.