Spatula, Spoon and Saturday

Momotaro Rahmen is a small Japanese noodle bar on Bridge Road that is well known by the Richmond locals for serving up cheap, tasty and massive bowls of ramen. The cafe is not terribly big and I’m told it suffers from overcrowding at the peak dining periods but luckily, as a MOLWL (mummy of leisure who lunches) I have always managed to get there very late in the afternoon of a week day and never had trouble trying to fit a pram in there. The staff had also been very lovely at accomodating Mini Me.

I have already made a few visits to Momotaro Rahmen who, judging by their logo, seemed to be named after the famous Japanese folklore about a baby boy who was found floating down a river in a giant peach (and you thought Roald Dahl was being original when he wrote James and the Giant Peach) and kept going back for its serves of satisfying bowls of tonkotsu broth and their homemade noodles.

(Ramen with tonkotsu broth – a milky white broth made from pork bones – $13?)

Momotaro Rahmen’s menu consists of largely of ramen and a few Japanese favourites such as Japanese curries, teriyaki and salads. Momotaro offers their ramen in five different broths – shoyu (Japanese soy sauce), miso, shio (salt), tonkotsu (pork bones) and vegetarian with various selection of toppings such as vegetables, chashu (roast pork), boiled egg and seafood. But what is really special about Momotaro Rahmen is that they have a dedicated vegetarian menu and serve their ramen in vegetable broth when requested. Now we know how rare this is for Japanese cuisine where almost everything contains dashi, a stock made from dried fish and seaweed. This makes my vego friends very happy indeed.

(Vegetable ramen – $12?)

On this occasion, I arrived at Momotaro with Mini Me in tow to meet with my friend, Nat who I have previously introduced to Momotaro and has become a regular.

Nat orders her usual of vegetable ramen – I had a taste of the broth. It was lovely enough as far as a vegetarian broth goes. But let’s face it – if the folks at the Momofuku lab can’t make a great vegetarian broth, I can’t really expect it to be as good as my order of tonkotsu broth.

(The bowl is bigger than the baby! Okay, not really.)

Momotaro Rahmen’s rendition of this famous Japanese porky broth is rather light compared to the usual thick, gelatinious version served up everywhere in Japan. Which, to be perfectly honest, is just as well since the bowl is so eye poppingly big (and I am from the ‘you must finish the broth’ school). It comes with a large slice of roast pork which I found to have improved since my last visit (I didn’t like it very much the first few visits), half a boiled egg and lots of vegetables. The whole dish felt very healthy and rather light. Yes you will be rather full but it’s not that terrible sick feeling that you get after a very large bowl of traditional tonkotsu ramen. That’s not to say I don’t love the traditional tonkotsu ramen. I really do but I appreciate Momotaro Rahmen’s version despite its lack of traditional tonkotsu characteristics.

(Vegetarian gyoza – with a mixture of chick pea, cabbage, spinach, etc. – $7?)

The vegetarian gyoza on the other hand was just disappointing. The filling combo just simply didn’t work and neither of us enjoyed it. I think it’s safe to say no chick pea belongs in a gyoza.

Having visited Momotaro a few times, I have tried their miso and shoyu broths as well as curry and teriyaki. I have to say I have exceeding preference for their tonkotsu ramen and will happily go back for my ramen fill there. It is a nice little place for a hearty, healty large bowl of soups, if nothing else.

And let’s face it, if it’s noodle and it’s in a decent broth? I’m there.

Momotaro Rahmen
Address: 392 Bridge Rd Richmond VIC 3121 [ Google Map ]
Phone: (03) 9421 1661

Terrific Vietnamese coffee. Very average pho. Lovely staff. That is all.

Maybe I should have just tweeted it. Ah well.

Picking which pho restaurant to go to on Victoria Street in Richmond might be a daunting task for those who don’t frequent the street, but I am here to recommend to you Pho Dzung as a great starting point Victoria St. has to offer.

Pho Dzung, like any good pho joint, concentrates on their two dishes of beef pho and chicken pho. Unlike its CBD sister, it only offers very few rice dishes and no vermicelli salads. The simple, rich goodness of the pho makes up for the lack of choices.

The decor is rather like any other pho restaurants on the strips, rows of minimal laminex tables with just the bare essentials. But let’s face it, you don’t hit a pho joint for a date or a hip-and-happening ambience, you’re there for the soup.

That particular afternoon, Josh and I took our friends from London, Doug and Diane, to experience the Victoria St. Vietnamese eating culture.

(Vietnamese spring rolls – $9)

We started off with prawn spring rolls. The crunchy rolls were well balanced between the skin and filling. The sides of various mints and lettuce were fresh and generous. Not all pho joints do this and it is very disappointing when the quality, and quantity of side vegetables are left to be desired. Read the rest of this entry »

Note: This is a scheduled post. I am off having a baby!

I have visited the Pacific Seafood BBQ House twice. Both times just for a quick lunch or a very early dinner on week days so I can’t comment on what the service would be like when the place is packed. And from all that I have heard, this place does get rather packed and it is one of the more popular restaurants on the Victoria Street eating strip in Richmond.

(complimentary broth day #1)

The dining room is sparse, no frills decor with a roaring takeaway on the roast meat selection that hang just inside the glass window. A waiter came by and deposited a little bowl of broth and a pot of tea for me before taking the order.

(complimentary broth day #2)

As the roasts seem to be the goer around here and there is usually a line of people queuing to take away the roast meats home, I decided on the roast duck and roast pork belly noodles (dry). Read the rest of this entry »

Nat said she would take me to her favourite local, Kojo Brown. And so we went.

I can’t say I hang around Bridge Road a lot. Never a good shopper, I prefer to skulk around op shops so I can buy yet more crockery to fill my ridiculously full kitchen. But I digress. Suffice to say that I rarely end up in that part of town for food. Except on our wedding night when we stayed at Vila Donati. But I digress.

(Oxtail stew – $12)

Anyway! I ordered one of the specials which was the oxtail stew. Mainly because I was curious what $12 would get you. Turned out, quite a fair bit. The stew had bits of rich oxtail meat, lentils and other vegetables. It was rich and lovely and went with the slices of bread that accompanied it.

(Raviolio with sun-dried tomato sauce – $17?)

Nat went for the ravioli with sun-dried tomato sauce. She found it a bit too one dimensional and too tomatoey and wanted some bread and butter to go with it. I did offer her one of mine but because it rested on the meaty stew, she wasn’t interested. The waiter disappeared with our bread order for a while and we had to keep asking for the bread. What came was a large order of toasts and margarine. Strange, considering she asked for bread and butter.

Kojo Brown
Address: 294 Bridge Rd, Richmond, 3121 [ Google Map ]
Phone: (03) 9428 9800

We wanted a nice dinner out before hitting the pub with the boys from Josh’s work and Church St. Enoteca has been on our to-do list for a while and since the pub we were going to in the area, there was no better place to be for our little dinner.

(Church St. Enoteca, Richmond – its dining room)

We got there a bit early at about 7pm and the dinging was still light-filled (this was January, by the way). It was still sparsely populated for the night and we got a table near the kitchen, where we could see the entire dining room in action.

(sea salt focaccia with olive oil, salt and pepper)

Our waiter brought us some nice salt focaccia, olive oil and salt and pepper. The bread was lovely and fresh and the oil was grassy. I loved it. We pondered the menu for a while and we settled on on an entree to share, a main each, a side salad to share and leave room for dessert. Read the rest of this entry »

It was Sunday night and I feel like going out for dinner. We figured since we had a very expensive night out at, um, well I can’t remember where anymore, we wanted something cheap and tasty.

So I had a quick look at Very Cheap Eats and decided on an interesting sounding place called The Rasoi so we hopped into a car and drove ourselves down to up to Bridge Rd cornered Church St. We got there and guess what? There was no Rasoi! In its place, there was an Indian restaurant called ‘Curry King’. Frankly speaking, I hesitated. I mean, wouldn’t you? I generally tend to stay away from restaurants whose names bear zero creativity and I happened to think Curry King falls into that category.

We went in anyway and I’m glad we did. I’m really not too sure why the place is called Curry King now but it seemed like it was still the same restaurant as the menu printed all of the restaurants under its chain. There seemed to be quite a few of them and one of them (not this one) was called Gujarati Rasoi. My guess is that they renamed themselves somehow. The restaurant was rather nice with old brick walls and minimal decorations. It was almost empty saved for a couple of other tables. It had a big flat screen with Indian music videos playing of course (as you do) but overall it was quite charming. Read the rest of this entry »

(Vietnamese broken rice – $8.50?)

I can’t remember how we ended up there one night. We usually popped into a restaurant on Victoria St. due to being out late in the city and just needed some food. I do believe this occasion was one of them.

I have been to Co Do once before and was reluctant to go again, not because the food or service was no good, but because I have this misguided notion that I should try every restaurant on Victoria St. at least once so I shouldn’t go back on the one that I have already been to.

(complimentary side salad)

Unfortunate (or fortunately), we went in there because it was the first restaurant we went past that had an EFTPOS sign. Good thing we did. We had some really good food on the night.

I felt like a bit of noodle soup but I didn’t feel like the usual pho (which I love) so I ordered rice vermicelli with duck and bamboo shoot soup. Now, most Vietnamese noodle joints give you a bit of beansprouts, lemon slice and some basil, if you’re lucky, but Co Do goes all out with a heap of fresh yummy-looking beansprouts with a tonne of mixed lettuce and cabbage. The salad was very nice and fresh.

(rice vermicelli with duck and bamboo shoots soup – $8.50?)

The soup was beautifully mellow. The bamboo shoots were different types to ones you’d get in your usual Chinese-style stir-fries, it was a bit softer and just different. I know (being a Thai and all) that there are at least 4-5 different types of common eating bamboo shoots but this wasn’t one of the ones I was familiar with. The duck was tender and well cooked. I have this strange notion that duck pieces in a soup should be stewed until it falls apart but this one didn’t but it wasn’t tough and it was just right. It also came with a bit of duck’s blood cube. I’m never a really big fan of blood cubes anyway so I took a tiny bite and decided that it wasn’t any special worth bothering with.

(Vietnamese broken rice with fried egg, grilled pork chop and other goodies – $8.50?)

Josh, bless his cotton socks, went and ordered the Vietnamese broken rice. So predictable. Mind you, it is a really good Vietnamese dish. Whoever invented it was a genius. Basically, using ‘broken’ rice i.e. rice grains that were broken during the husking process i.e. second-grade, cheaper rice, they managed to make it a very special dish by serving it with grilled pork chop (marinated Vietnamese-style with lemongrass), fried egg and shredded pork rind (I think flavoured with toasted and ground rice – really I don’t know how. It’s one of those things that’s good so you don’t bother questioning it). Some restaurants also serve it with Vietnamese egg/pate/meatloaf type thing (again, don’t question it). Co Do’s broken rice is an example of a typically good Vietnamese broken rice dish.

(stir-fried mixed vegetables with tofu – $11?)

I was also desperate for some veggies (I suppose if I had remembered that the side salad was huge, I might not have bothered) so I ordered stir-fried vegetables with tofu. It was yummy but nothing special.

All in all, it was a good meal but I still have to go through ALL of the restaurants on Victoria St., damnit. How much can one eat!?!

Co Do Vietnamese and Chinese Restaurant, 196 Victoria St., Richmond, VIC

We went to grab a quick dinner the Grand Hotel’s Lounge Bar before heading out to a party in the area. The Grand Hotel also has a dining room but we thought we might save that for a more special occasion.

I have been to the Grand before and the food was always fantastic. It is definitely one of my favourite Melburnian gatro-pub.The menu wasn’t overly large but everything was done really well. I was actually looking forward to sampling their Nicoise Salad but sadly on the night, it wasn’t on the menu. The place was quite packed on the night and we grabbed the last table available (it was Saturday night, 7-ish) but the tables did start to become free a bit after. There were a few people just having drinks but many of them were there for the food. I recommend a reservation if you want to go there on Friday or Saturday night.

(Veal meatballs with semolina gnocchi – $18.50)

Josh was a bit more decisive and went for the Veal Meatballs with Semolina Gnocchi ($18.50) The gnocchi was awesome. It was creamy and went perfectly with the meatballs and the sauce. Definitely a must-try. When I went there last year, it was served with something else which was equally yummy. But the gnocchi was definitely the highlight.

(Braised Lamb Shank with Mash $24.00)

I couldn’t decide what I wanted (I was so set on having the Nicoise Salad) so when the counter person recommended the Braised Lamb Shank with Mash ($24.00), I went for it. The mash was beautifully silky and buttery and complimented the melt-in-the-mouth lamb shank really well. But definitely the gnocchi! Yum! Read the rest of this entry »