Lady Lunchalot

O and I have found Yarraville’s best breakfast cafe. Strangely enough, it’s at the place I have been avoiding since moving here - The Cut Paw Paw Cafe in Anderson St. It always looked so empty and forlorn every time I walked by it that I never felt compelled to step inside (I’m always a little suspicious of places that look like they struggle to attract a clientele), but O and I decided to give it a go on Saturday morning and we were pleasantly surprised.

The menu is big on hollandaise sauce, which is never a favourite of mine. To me, hollandaise is one of the most sinful foods you can eat. And not in that deliciously wicked chocolate mud cake kind of a way. It just makes me think of heart attacks, which is not exactly what you want to be contemplating over your Eggs Benedict.

I had the poached eggs with Bubble and Squeak (sans Hollandaise), and O ordered the bacon and eggs. I have got to tell you, this chef REALLY knows how to poach an egg.

A decent example of a poached egg is one of the hardest foods to find. It seems that Melbourne has a dire shortage of chefs who can poach an egg properly. Most poached eggs I come across are either little rubbery balls that would bounce back onto your plate if you dropped them on the floor, or soggy vinegary splodges that soak the toast beneath them, generally ruining a perfectly good slice of sourdough.

So on the whole, I never fail to be disappointed by poached eggs. Until my eggs arrived at the Cut Paw Paw Cafe.

This was the most masterful display of egg poaching I have come across since the last time O cooked me breakfast. (O took to perfecting the art of egg poaching with an almost religious zeal when we first met). The eggs at the Cut Paw Paw were two perfect eggy globes sitting atop a block of Bubble and Squeak which, unfortunately, was nowhere near as good as the eggs.

They had been cooked for the perfect length of time - long enough that if you wiggle the plate they still wobble like a woman’s breast (without implants) - and had been drained to ensure that no sogginess from the cooking liquid seeped onto the other items on the plate. I knicked the top of the egg with my knife and a small frown of runny yolk oozed out, as though my egg was poking its tongue at me. The best part was that there was not a trace of vinegar souring the egg white, which many chefs use to prevent the white from straying too far from the yolk.

And as if my perfectly poached eggs weren’t enough, O’s bacon was sublime. Not too crispy, not too soggy - just bacon cooked to salty heart-stopping perfection. I think I’ve found my new brekkie haunt.

I know I’ve got a bit of a thing about parmas, but check out the size of this one! (Just spotted at The Vine Hotel, Wellington Rd, Collingwood).

Now this is good honest pub food at its best.

As if the great name and fantastic atmosphere weren’t enough, Cookie’s bar menu really melts my chocolate chips.

I’ve been popping in at Cookie for a few sneaky drinks for quite a while now. I’ve always loved their cocktails and the way the bartenders put so much care into even a simple drink, like vodka soda and lime.

But amazingly, it wasn’t until the other weekend that I’d ever tasted the food there, and now I am kicking myself for having wasted so many opportunities for a great meal.

The Thai-inspired menu is divided into three sections: small, medium and large dishes. It’s the perfect way to order when you’re out having a few drinks with friends.

With eight of us there on a Sunday afternoon (celebrating O’s and my engagement the day before!), we had the chance to try lots of different dishes. Chicken maryland, taro dumplings, massaman curry and tapioca dumplings. Mmm mmm.

Strangely enough, the best Thai food I had that week was at Cookie. Why was this strange? Considering I’d spent the week on holiday in Phuket, it was a little weird. I love Thai food, but a tourist hot-spot is not the best place to find authentic cuisine. Next time we’ll have to get a little further off the beaten track.

If you’re into Italian food and plenty of it, you’re stepping through the gates of paradise the moment you enter Brunswick’s Mediterranean Wholesaler.

This place is a catalogue for the confirmed Italophile, and is a nostalgic step back into the smells of nonna’s kitchen. Any place that has an entire aisle dedicated to pasta is alright by me.

O and I made the pilgrimage to MW on the weekend to stock up on some supplies. I tend to go a little nuts when I visit this supermarket, so it was a good thing he was there to rein me in. We did the obligatory bulk purchase of all the staples in my kitchen: cartons of tinned tomatoes, olive oil, pasta, and we threw in a few goodies for fun. I found some mozzarella di buffala which promptly became a couple of calzones for dinner on Sunday night (with salami, anchovies, olives, garlic, various herbs) . I had a little trouble with the dough and it didn’t rise the way I wanted it to. I think the kitchen was a little too cold for the yeast (bloody Melbourne), so I took the dough into the living room to rise next to the heater for a while.

My pizza stone has been baptised now - one of my calzones had a Vesuvial eruption of cheese, leaving a burnt stain across the surface. O loves it. He gave me that pizza stone for Christmas, and he likes that it looks a little more worn (like most of the things in my kitchen).

As a Mediterranean Wholesaler virgin, O was quite gobsmacked at the range of items the supermarket carried. He was particularly impressed with the pasticceria, so we ordered a tray of biscuits that tasted so much like my dearly departed nanna’s that I wanted to hang her rosary beads back on my kitchen door. The biscuits didn’t last long. Once we had loaded all the food in the car there was a frenzy of glace cherries, almond paste and chocolate buds and it was all over before you could say “mangi!”.

I always look upon the world a little more softly when my pantry is full of pasta.

Thought I’d jot down a few of my favourite Melbourne restaurants, in no
particular order:

Best Wine/Food Match in Melbourne
Mrs Jones
312 Drummond Street, Carlton
Even though I’m never one to turn down a glass of wine, I’m not that much of an afficionado, so this one is a toughy. I think the best example of wine and food matching I have come across was at Mrs Jones in Carlton, a restaurant that sticks by the principles of cooking with seasonal food – the menu is small and changes weekly. This is one Melbourne restaurant you can’t miss. I ordered a flawless chocolate tart that was as bitter as it was sweet. When I ordered a port to go with it, the waitress suggested a Pedro Ximenez. It was dark, sweet and tinged with sin. Perfect against the chocolate intensity of the tart. A spectacular end to an outstanding meal.

Best Breakfast in Melbourne
Pearl
Church St, Richmond
I’d almost forgotten about this place as I haven’t been there in ages. Pearl in Richmond serves a heart stopping coddled eggs with caviar. Imagine a big cube of bread hollowed out and filled with eggy buttery breakfasty goodness. Mmmm…

Best Pasta in Melbourne
Cicciolina
Acland St, St Kilda
After much thought, I’ll have to go with Cicciolina in St Kilda. Last time I was there it was cold and wet outside and I had a hearty ragout with orichiette. Cicciolina never misses. Best pasta of all melbourne restaurants. That’s quite a claim.

Best Winter Stodge in Melbourne
Tolarno
Fitzroy St, St Kilda
This one has to go to the king of hearty cooking, Ian Hewitson. His restaurant, Tolarno, has always been my first pick for dinner out on a cold winters night. Think lamb shanks, bangers and mash, and a host of rib-sticking classics. Sadly Tolarno is closing down in 27 May after 15 years. This is one Melbourne restaurant I will be very sorry to see go. Thanks for some great meals Huey!

Best Tapas in Melbourne
Movida
Hosier Lane, Melbourne
I can’t go past the scallops (heaven on a half shell) and the stuffed capsicum. I just love tapas. It’s perfect for someone like me, who is never satisfied with just one dish! Movida’s secret weapon is the churros at the end of the meal – long batons of Spanish doughnut dunked in velvetty chocolate. *Drool*

Little Collins St, Melbourne

I’ve heard about it for ages, but last Friday night was my first visit to Tony Starr’s Kitten Club. O and I met Kathryn and Tim for a few drinks before moving on to dinner at Grossi Florentino and then on to see Arj Barker’s Comedy Festival show.

Sounds civilised, doesn’t it?

Well, we never made it to Grossi Florentino. Dinner consisted of some UNBELIEVABLE chicken nibbly bits at the Kitten Club (it was after quite a few drinks, so I am not quite sure how amazing they actually tasted or whether my tastebuds were too inebriated to know the difference. Let’s face it - chicken usually tastes pretty good to me), before gorging ourselves on KFC while waiting in the Arj Barker queue outside on Swanston St.

From the lofty ideals of Grossi Florentino, to drunken Zinger burgers on the street. Yes, my range is astounding, I know.

I did, however, make an excellent discovery at the Kitten Club. It’s called a Bunny Girl, and it’s a very frou frou mixture of rose petal infused 42 Below vodka, lemon juice, manin rose syrup, Frangelico, lychee juice and pink grapefruit.

I was so pleased with this discovery that I rediscovered it again and again about three or four times in a row.

After a while I felt like I should have been wearing false eyelashes and a feather boa.

In fact, looking back on that blurry night, it’s possible that I was.

They claim that Young and Jackson is Australia’s most famous pub, but other than being home to a famous nudey painting, occupying one of Melbourne’s busiest street corners and having an excellent refurbishment, I’m not sure what it is so famous for.

It certainly shouldn’t be famous for its parma.

I went there today to meet Zarina for lunch as she had ducked back from Bangkok for a week. I’d never actually been to Young and Jackson’s before, despite having lived in Melbourne for 6 years. It’s been a miserable cold day, and Zarina and I had planned to meet at our usual lunchtime haunt, Brunetti, but I was in the mood for a warm cosy pub meal so we ended up at Young and Jackson.

By 12.30 I was ravenous. Given Young and Jackson’s reputation as one of THE pubs in Melbourne, I was hoping for a monster counter meal. You know, one of those lunches that make you wish you were wearing your fat pants. I was tossing up between the fish of the day in a naked ale beer batter, with chips, salad and kaffir lime mayonnaise. (Not exactly sure what a naked ale is, but it sounds a bit saucy). But I figured that as I felt like eating proper pub food for lunch, I should go with the parma.

(For any international readers out there, a parma is a chicken parmigiana - chicken schnitzel topped with ham, napoli sauce and melted cheese. It’s a staple in Aussie pubs, especially in Melbourne. Check out www.superparma.com if you don’t believe how big it is here).

After a reasonably lengthy wait, the meals arrived. Zarina had ordered a chicken curry, which looked a lot more ladylike than my plate. But I needn’t have been too embarrassed about having a monstrous plate of parma delivered to the table. It wasn’t that big at all, so there was no need to worry about my fat pants which were hanging at home in my wardrobe. In fact, I know many red-blooded parma lovers who would have wolfed that parma down in a split second.

And strangely enough, it had … a chicken bone sticking out of it. I kid you not - a bone! I don’t know whether they were trying to be particularly fancy-pants, or whether they were just reassuring their patrons that yes, their parmas are made from real chicken breast. But I’ve got to say - it threw me. And I am not particularly a traditionalist when it comes to food, but, as I discovered today, when I order a parma, I want comfort food with no suprises thank you.

Even I can forgive a scrimpy schnitzel and an unexpected bone, but unfortunately Young and Jackson committed the unpardonable parma sin.

They skimped on the cheese and napoli sauce. Big no no.

So I don’t think I’ll be going back to Young and Jackson’s for a parma any time soon. I think I’d have more luck with some of the other items on the menu.

Lucky for them the chips were great.