flower shop with glorious light

Vic Market is known for it’s size, useless junk and touristy crap, cheap produce and if you chose properly, some really good quality produce. In particular, Sardes meat shop just to the right of the entrance on the corner of Elizabeth and Victoria st have some amazing cuts of meat at very reasonable prices. When was the last time you saw 4 different cuts Wagu beef cut to order?

Sardes meat

Photo by Matthew Bates

This place is a meeting of minds. Whenever I don’t organize to meet people there, often coffee geeks, food loving or photo mad friends just sprout from no where. This was cupping at 7 seeds on Saturday. Again, a wonderful place to learn about your palate as you taste coffee side by side. Unfortunately on halt for a few weeks as Mark is off to a trip to US.

Morning was A Minor Place. Henry’s beans, poached eggs, bacon on sourdough with a good cup of coffee. Love the atmosphere. Wood everywhere, quiet on a suburban weekday morning (cus everyone is working!) and just so comfortable.

Lunch: My friend recommended St Jude Cellers after finding The Commoner not open for weekday lunch. It is a beautiful, brightly sun-lit space with white walls, floor boards and climber plants growing from pots inside. Wine racks are dividers here, though I hope they get drunk before much sunlight get into them. We had the burger. The menu looks promising and definitely worth a return.

5 Hours later it was dinner time. I didn’t book anything (disaster) for a Friday night. Upon walking into Movida Next Door, we were offered 2 seats at the bar without a minutes wait (how is that possible, but disaster averted). Firstly we ordered stuffed calamari, artichokes, prawns, broad-bean tuna salad and Moritz beer. Then our neighbours and us ordered what looked good on each other’s side. We had their spiced potatos and the finished with churros. I was very happy and work is still 24 hours away.

Mmmm…I will cook tomorrow night

A little eccentric about spuds. But if you owned a shop that specialized in potatoes since 1891 your mind is probably not running the same track as most people do. The shop at Prahran Market was first opened by Michael Mow’s grandfather Daniel Wong Mow. However, it was not until the early 90′s when Michael starteed bringing a variety of potatoes from all over Australia. His stock may not be consistent but there is always a good variety to choose from. Micheal is helpful with advice to match the right potato with your cooking ideas or if you want to try some spuds you never seen before.

I was so happy with the food that I went 3 times in a month last year. After work today, I didn’t want to cook and I needed something good to cheer me up. Ramen just wasn’t going to cut it tonight. We walked past Movida Next Door and it was a 20 minute wait. So be it. I think Movida is getting too much hype and just to proud to be ‘so melbourne’ these days I was happy to give it’s neighbour a miss too. on our walk to Cumulus, I was thinking about the dinner at Svago a few weeks back. Oh, that really was good.

Off to to a cloud
(Photo from their website)

A Tempranillio (plum, smokey/tobacco, fruity) to start

3 pacific oysters: Kumoto SA (small tangy), Coffin Bay SA (creamy sweet) , Moutling Bay TAS (large, sweet and slightly tangy).

Scallops with speck, rasin dressings (salty, sweety, savory and bacon flavours with a well seared scallop)

Cured venison with horseradish cream and smoked tomato puree (a sashimi of a good cut, nice balance)

We happend to bump into a friend my mine, also a frequent visitor, foodie and well informed with wines. He recommended the soup of salt cod with parsely (creamy salt cod soup with a dense textured but lightly flavoured green foam of parsley – surprising combination)

Shredded confit duck leg, roasted and pickled beetroot, watercress, radish and walnut dressing (a stand-out of the night. I could eat a carton of this stuff. I need to get a packet of walnut and blended it now.)

Cassoulet – white beans, smoked Lyonnaise sausage, roast pork strap (a nice, home and rish dish to finish with. Love slow cooked beans)

The dessert recommended by the waiter was excellent. He took our dilema of the lemon jelly versus chocolate souffle and said that the weather commanded the chocolate and also he think that my friend likes the chocolate. Fine, it was good – twice backed chocolate souffle with penut butter ice cream. This souffle has the stamp of AWSOME-NESS. A little denser than a normal souffle, light in texture but so rich and just ‘Oooh, give me another bite’. I will endever to make this. The ice cream was excellent also. not very sweet and just a good clean peanut flavour.

Sherry: blend of Palomino and Pedro Ximénez. Recommended by the waiter to go with chocolate. Some sherries are too sweet but this had a good acidity/fruity character to really compliment the rasin-like sweetness. Give me more! Spain here I come (minus the pig flu).

I walked home. Happy.

On that note… I am off to sleep.

My oven ran a full marathon last weekend. For my birthday, I (and some helping hands) made pizza for everyone and I think the damage was around 14-15 pizzas (including 1 calzone and one accidental calzone). The plan was simple enough: one continuously running hot oven with lonely pizza stone.

3 base flavours + additions
Tomato, onion, bay leaf + (combinations of) tomato, brown mushroom, peppers, parma ham, bocconcini
Thick bechamel with onions + seafood mix
Tuna, peppers, parsley, tobasco sauce

It was fun. Thanks all for the drinks, presents, help and coming along.
And if anyone else has photos, let me know! I lost some from my camera! thanks.

My espresso machine is waiting for spare part so I have been drinking filtered coffee for the past month. With some awsome-ness certified coffees being offered during cupping by Brother Budan, I am certainly not running out brew.

The Ethiopian Aricha is one not to miss. Picked from an wild variety in the Yirgacheffe region, these cherries  are at their peak ripeness and sun dried. The taste is dominated by fruit, strawberry, berry jam with a creamy mouthfeel. No sign of ferment. Right-fist in the air = awesome-ness.

More informed coffee-minded people, correct any details I missed.

Since the tentacles of the ramen touched my heart in Japan, I have been craving for that hit of tonkatsu. I’ve walked past this shop many times, and sometimes dining next door at Kenzan at GPO. It wasn’t until that after a cupping session on Saturday that I hear a local Japanese barista/foodie vouched for this ramen. He thinks this is the best bowel in Melbourne. I try. I nod.

The stock was creamy and definitely packed a good,and refined porky/bone flavour. Noodle was well cooked. Instantly satisfied. At $9.50 a serve, it is a bargin. Try making that stock and you will know what I am talking about. And compared to the benchmark I had in Japan? Pork by Ramen Ya was soy based. I prefer the original, rolled pale slices of pork. I also prefer the thinner versions of ramen. And the stock I had in Japan just tasted a bit more potent yet more elegantly clean. Am I just dreaming?

Oh, and I just booked my flight to Barcelona in June. I have 2 weeks of annual leave and I just can’t think of a better and further place from my first year of work