Eater – Page 29 – Dani Valent

We’ve all got to eat so it might as well be good! I’ve been a restaurant critic for almost 20 years, and have been writing a weekly restaurant column in Melbourne’s Sunday Age since 2006.

My approach is to always take a restaurant on its own terms: there’s no point slamming a burger joint because it doesn’t have white tablecloths. I try to be constructive in my criticism and I’ve always got the diner in mind: there are many places you could choose to go. Why should it be here?

 

Thaiger Rabbit

Victoria Street mainstay Ying Thai has been serving fish cakes and red curry in a clattery shopfront since 1996. Last month Ying and her family upped sticks, moved their restaurant 300 metres eastwards and refashioned it as the cool, fun Thaiger Rabbit, complete with a dad-joke pun for a name. I like the place, even though the radio was almost tuned to Smooth FM while I was there, so we had to listen to Spandau Ballet static while eating fragrant pandan-wrapped chicken morsels, and distorted Adele accompanied the stir-fry. Even so, the flavours won through.

Shyun Ramen

It’s easy to do a soup test. Wait until you’re feeling groggy, grey and brimful of winter. March unerringly – zombie-like, impelled – towards a bowl of soup. Sup, slurp and spoon it in. A good soup will act as a culinary hug to prod you towards health. Many soups do the trick: Jewish penicillin (chicken soup) is a winner, Vietnamese pho rocks and Polish tomato soup with a shot of vodka promotes healing and keeling over in equal measure. Also good is sustaining, nutritious Japanese ramen (noodle soup).

Bistro Guillaume

I’m not sure what your idea of heaven is but I just ate mine. It was a savoury soufflé at Bistro Guillaume and it was as jiggly, fluffy and intensely cheesy as my wildest dreams dared posit. A jaunty side salad of cress, green apple batons and walnuts was a sprightly, crunchy counterpoint to the Roquefort richness. It’s the sort of classic French cooking you get here. Souffle, steak frites, snails and confit duck are all wrought well, ticking the boxes without doodling all over the page.

Serotonin Dealer

It’s not just a cafe. Serotonin Dealer is a “happiness educational institution” with a three-pronged attack on blah. There’s the eatery with its colourful, health-focused vegetarian food. There’s exercise: trainers in the adjacent studio would love the opportunity to turn your body into a toned temple. And coming soon, there will be seminars offering tools to smooth the path to happiness. You can’t knock the project, especially when the cafe is so bright and shiny, with exuberant yellow flowers, sunny cushions, la-la-land swing-seats along one window and gleaming gold cutlery. The waiters are similarly beaming. You’ll think I’m making it up but, while I was there, the sun refracted through the windows and covered everyone in rainbows. Karma, hey?

Omni

I’ll always have a soft spot for Keilor Road. I was sent here to review Franks seafood restaurant for the Good Food Guide 15 years ago, took along a bloke for our first date, made each other laugh over an improbably tall seafood platter and later shacked up with him and had a couple of kids. Franks is still there, Keilor Road is busier and Omni is helping keep the strip buzzing and fed.

O.MY

They had me at ‘Would you like tap water or sparkling?’ because the mundane query was murmured with such solicitous care. It was the first signal that O.My wasn’t going to deliver the kind of meal you might expect on Melbourne’s fringe, 50 kilometres south-east of the city but easy to zoom to on the M1. This two-year-old, degustation-only 30-seat restaurant is run with uncompromising enthusiasm and delightful geekiness by three brothers, Blayne and Tyson in the kitchen, and the youngest, 21-year-old Chayse in the dining room.

Dad and Dave’s

Of all the ways to gain a good impression of a cafe, I rank spying the chef making tomorrow’s vanilla slice very highly. Even more so when today’s vanilla slice is standing proud in the cake cabinet, its flaky sugar-dusted pastry encasing smooth, sturdy custard that’s a happy shade of yellow. You’re just as likely to see the crew here making croissants, sausage rolls, spinach pies or gooey caramel slice with coconut biscuit base, because they make pretty much everything here, apart from laying the eggs. The kitchen is tiny – indeed the whole cafe is small and homespun – so I love the fact that they make it hard for themselves and manage to look so happy about it.

Five Points Deli

The key characteristic of a classic American deli sandwich is that it’s impossible to finish it. If you can’t get your mouth around it at all, that’s even better. Legend has it that this enthusiastic overdoing it sprung from well-remembered scarcity among Jewish immigrants, a post-ghetto gluttony that turned sandwiches into towering, victorious constructions, albeit built with humble meat cuts such as brisket (from the cow’s lower chest). But do more digging and you’ll find that the massive sandwich probably had more to do with mid-century New York deli-preneurs looking for bragging points.

Delhi Streets

“It’s a puri and it’s also a party,” said our friendly waiter at Delhi Streets, a new Indian street food eatery that’s all about festive fusion. Puri is puffed dough – the Indian version of choux pastry – and it’s usually a palm-sized snack. This version is a petite shatter-crisp globe containing curried potato, chickpea and tamarind chutney. That’s a party in itself but the real revelry is the vial of spiced broth to be tipped into the puri. It’s a one-bite fiesta and a fun, zingy introduction to a cheap, casual, light-hearted restaurant.

© Dani Valent 2024