It’s all about the food – we’ve had spectacular meals there.
But it’s also very much about IndiKitch’s boss lady, Vanitha Naidu.
We just love the dedication, love and curiosity she brings to her work.
So much so that for the first time in quite a few years we are rolling out a Consider The Sauce Feast.
For a month of Wednesdays in March, Vanitha will be offering a superb, um, feast based around the curries of Goa and Kerala, mopped up with a selection of roti.
You may, of course, partake of this offering on any Wednesday in March.
But join us on March 27 and you’ll get it a significantly discounted price – $30 as opposed to $39 – and enjoy rubbing shoulders with likeminded western suburbs food enthusiasts.
Here are the details:
CTS Feast No.14: IndiKitch 2/451 Melbourne Road, Newport. Wednesday, March 27, from 7.30pm.
Cost: $30.
Menu:
Fish molee (gf, medium) Beetroot, ginger and yoghurt curry (gf, mild) Carfreal – Goan green chicken curry (gf, medium) Dry Kerala lamb and sweet potato curry (gf, hot) Plain roti Potato stuffed paratha Selection of roti
Note 1: Additional snacks will be available for additional payment – baked chicken curry puff (3 for $14), spinach and onion pakora with kasundhi (3 for $14). Desserts will include: Payasam (sago, dried fruit, nuts in coconut sugar and milk, $14) and Indian trifle ($14).
Note 2: IndiKitch is licensed these days, but your choice of beverages will incur additional payments.Drink specials will be offered on the night.
Note 3: As I’m officially out of the regular workforce, and have no interest in having any discourse with the taxman, all ticket monies – minus TryBooking fees – will go to IndiKitch.
Note 4: Initial allocation is for 20 places. That may be revised if sales go off.
Unbeknownst to either of us, Nat and I had pretty much been scoping out Suzy’s Kitchen online at the same time with intense interest.
So setting up a visit was an imperative cinch.
As well, we had a hunch that this new place was already a substantial hit, so arriving bang on opening time would be most advisable.
My understanding is that Suzy’s offers its banana leaf meal deals at lunchtime only, with other fare sufficing during dinner hours.
My own hunch was that Suzy’s immediate hot vibe was no doubt down to being in a location and area where such food is scarce and also no doubt because of eating excellence.
So it proved to be – with one other wrinkle: The place is tiny, so fills up very fast!
Suzy’s Kitchen is located in a small, sleepy and rather nondescript shopping centre on Point Cook Road, about midway between the freeway and Sanctuary Lakes Shopping Centre.
Bennie and I arrive a few minutes after noon, but thankfully Nat and Jackie have already secured seating for us!
So what do you get?
And how good is it?
You get a pretty much standard banana leaf offering for a very good price of $17.
But in terms of greatness, this meal is significantly above being mere standard issue.
Dried chillies.
Globs of yoghurt and Indian pickle.
A fine dal with veg.
A tangy, tasty rasam.
Two papadams.
And – best of all – three most excellent veg concotions.
One is a turmeric-scented bean sprout-and-tofu number.
Another is a wonderfully verdant and still al dente green offering. I’m told it’s made from an “Asian green, a bit like bok choy”!
Finally, there is a creamy cabbage mix that is also top eating.
Aside from considerations of the outright ravenous appetite variety, the $17 plain banana leaf deal is a substantial meal all on its own.
But this being our first visit here, we do indulge in extras, with both Nat and I choosing the chicken curry.
It’s good, quite fiery and – as expected – bony.
Nat later murmurs that he found the price of $9 a bit on the steep side.
I know where he’s coming from. I mean, I’d like to pay less, too! But also: I wouldn’t want a bigger serve for the same price. Banana leaf add-ons are, well, just added on.
Bennie, being no big fan of banana leaf fare, opts for the standard nasi lemak chicken ($14.50).
He likes it a lot.
It has all the usual bits and pieces and he is especially in thumbs-up mode for the chicken chunk, which he pronounces as excellent.
The menu also offer variations on mee goreng and char keow teow.
Sinq has been going just a couple of weeks when we visit, but it appears to be travelling really well.
Part of that is the location.
It’s on Maribyrnong Road, just around the corner from Union Road – the nearest Ethiopian eatery from here is in Flemington.
And the nearest massed congregation of Ethiopian eating houses is, of course, in Footscray.
So Sinq is a boon for Ascot Vale locals.
Though front-of-house man Ephrem tells me about 90 per cent of Sinq’s customers thus far have come from the Ethiopian community itself.
But an even more important factor in Sinq’s early popularity is the food – it is fantastic.
In some ways, eating Sinq’s offerings seems more like sitting down to a great meal in a nice Ethiopian home than in a restaurant – it’s got a real cool home-cooked vibe about it.
Ephrem tells me that they are taking great care in their choice and use of oils. The food here is notably less oily/buttery than most Ethiopian food we enjoy elsewhere.
There are couple of other keenly interesting indicators that exemplify the Sinq approach.
One is the injera.
Quite a few years back, there was a Footscray joint that made its own injera. It’s gone now and I’m unaware of any others that do so.
Sinq DOES make its own injera – and it makes it with the traditional grain, teff.
The result is a darker flatbread than the regular injera, with something of a nutty flavour and even crispy edges – a bit like those on a Sri Lankan hopper.
Another good example of Sinq’s fine cooking is the chicken stew, doro wot.
We’ve enjoyed pretty much every version of this dish we’ve ever consumed across the west.
But the Sinq rendition is different – instead of a runny/oily gravy, here it is a cooked-down and thick sauce that is almost like onion jam. It’s delicious!
Sisters and super cooks Eleni, Helen and Aster
All this is orchestrated from the kitchen by some serious cooking talent – Ephrem’s wife, Aster, and her sisters, Eleni and Helen.
There are separate menus at Sinq for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Soon after our visit, the restaurant switched to a phone ordering system so I am unable to post them here.
Suffice to say, anyone who has eaten at an Ethiopian eatery will find much – or a lot – that is familiar. With a couple of twists along the way.
We are assured that what is offered on any given day will nonetheless change according to what’s available.
Thus you will pay $35 per person for the combo deal we enjoy – but it is very unlikely to be the same.
The day before my return visit for photos and more questions, for instance, Sinq had two fish dishes on the go – one of barramundi, the other of basa.
Finally, before discussing our meal in more detail, it’s very worth noting that Sinq is now offering a Wednesday vegan lunch-or-dinner deal.
Six dishes for $20 per person or 12 dishes for $25 per person.
How good does that sound, eh?
So this is our $35 combo lunch repast.
Spectacular! A huge amount of food that we most certainly do not consume in total.And very much a bargain.
At centre is the previously mentioned doro wot – complete with two hardboiled eggs and two drumsticks.
Beside the stew is a soft white cheese called ayib – a bit like ricotta or a very mild feta.
Scattered around are the familiar lentil offerings, veg such as beetroot and salad things.
There are two ground meat dishes – dulet at 1 o’clock and 11.45; and afagn at 9 o’clock – the latter being our most spicy dish.
At 3 o’clock are the familiar tibs. And at 7 o’clock are crispy tibs. Some may say the latter is simply wildly overcooked lamb, but it’s good eating by us anyway!
Finally, at 6 o’clock and 11.55 is gomen besiga, a greens-and-meat stew that is supremely yum. Also: A bit like an old-school southern American offering.
And … today’s lesson is: You really should get that Sinq-ing feeling!
The shops enclave opposite Tottenham station – “shopping centre” or even “precinct” are way too grand – is an odd one, eh?
The long-time staples are a bottle shop and a post office.
The secondhand/antiques kind of place up the road apiece – it also ran a handy line in mobility scooters – has closed.
A genuine cafe gave it a good shake for a couple of years.
But it, too, has gone.
There’s the obligatory massage emporium.
As well, vintage readers/westies will recall, as I do every time we pass, the ute/van that once sold socks – lots and lots of socks. Though, if IIRC, that was pretty much only at weekends.
And there’s a restaurant premises that has hosted a revolving cast of enterprises through the years.
These days, it houses Palms Restaurants.
At my insistence, and displaying a what-the-hell impromptu spirit much less prevalent at CTS post-everything, we pull over for lunch while headed elsewhere for spicy food.
Bennie robustly objects by pointing out that the place also sells pizzas.
I counter by pointing out that that sort of, um, “fusion” is not uncommon in current times.
My intuition is handsomely rewarded with a fine pair of lunch spreads.
And that’s despite the low-key mid-week vibes – I suspect the great bulk of this place’s business is at night, and much of that takeaways and deliveries – and ultra-cheap eats surrounds and very, very low prices.
While there appears to be little going on – not the bain marie we expected, nor any other customers – we are granted the freedom of the menu.
For Bennie, that means the $15 combo with three parotta, twoveg curry and one of meat.
The three breads are super and, we think, freshly made.
The dal is good, too, but he only dabbles at the other veg offering – it’s a coconutty squash curry, I think, but too closely resembling the dreaded zucchini for him to fully embrace.
The chicken curry is spicier, but not by a whole lot. As expected, and welcomed, the meat is on the bone.
For me it’s the $16 chicken biryani.
The rice, lovely, is fully in the Sri Lankan biryani mode – studded with onion slivers and whole spices.
The gravy on the side comes from the same chicken curry and there’s a few meaty pieces in there.
Raita is fine and I get a whole hardboiled egg!
The chook maryland looks like it may have some tandoori flavour about it.
But no – it’s plain-tasting and a bit on the tough side.
Cyprus Time, 74 Glengala Road, Sunshine West. Phone: 8589 1968
The shopping strip on Glengala Road in Sunshine West is one that falls squarely in our food roaming territory, but it’s not one we’ve visited often.
So it’s neat to be here – and thanks to Juz for the tip!
Cyprus Time falls into a category we fully adore – somehow places with something of a takeaway vibe serve some of the best restaurant-quality food we enjoy.
So it is here.
We expect the food to be closely akin to that of Greece.
It is – with a couple of cool twists.
Small chips are a good-size serve for $5.
We figure we’ve received the last of the previous batch, rather than first of a new one.
But it doesn’t matter and these serve to re-affirm our belief that the best chips are generally to be had from places that serve Middle Eastern/Mediterranean food.
Greek salad ($10) is another handsome serve, with the flavours nicely blended.
Mixed dips + pita ($12) are just OK and seem to be lacking a bit of the zing factor.
And while we really do appreciate that the tarama is made in house, it’s a bit too much on the sweet side for our tastes.
But the real action here, for us, is in the meatiness.
My lamb gyros is superb, the lamb meat that perfect mix of crunch and tender.
Bennie’s pork souvlaki is every bit as good, the cubed meat pieces just-right tender and seasoned lovely.
We love that the Greek-style pita has been stuffed, pocket style, rather than used as a wrap.
These two-handful jobs stay self-contained and undripping to the last!
The price for his is $16, the price for mine is $18.
We know there are folks who may think souvlaki/gyros prices heading towards $20 are a step too far.
But we have no problem with this when the food is good.
And going by recent experiences at both the Brotherhood in Seddon and Olive Oil & Butter in Yarraville, this is very much the going rate for such.
Cyprus Time carries a range of groceries – and they make their own sausages.
This pack of five costs us a good-deal $13.
We are expecting snags along the same lines as the Italian-style pork numbers we love so much.
But these are quite different thanks to the red wine and whole spices such as peppercorns and coriander seeds.
Good Good Burgers, 128 Mitchell Street, Maidstone. Phone: 9318 2566
We have attended 128 Mutchell Street, Maidstone, quite a few times.
Several when it was inhabited by Los Latinos.
Sadly just once when it was On The Bone – but it was fabulous.
Sadly, too, we missed out on its giros carnation – by all accounts it wasreal fine.
Now it’s back as a nfity burger joint.
And run, we are led to understand, by pretty much the same teams responsible for the bone/giros operations.
TBH, we’d not have known of this last development had not a friend whose food pronouncements I trust posted on FB, including a good-looking pic and giving a hearty endorsement.
I opined that the burger in question looked very nice indeed – and had the look of a project that was a mix of American and Aussie burgers styles.
“Very much so,” she enthused.
So, when we try for ourselves, is that how it shapes up?
Well, yes – to some extent.
More importantly, the burgers we are served are tip-top in every way.
Myself, Veronica and Bennie all go for the beef deluxe – regular ($14) for her, double ($17) for dad and son.
The menu description reads thusly: “Milk bun, beef, bacon, lettuce, tomato, pickles, cheese, garlic aioli, ketchip.”
Not much to say really – these are just plain good and tasty and we will happily inhale them again.
Chips and sauce cost an extra $4. The chips are fine and the sauce provided a lovely mustardy mayo concoction.
We also order a serve of fried chicken wings ($6 for three, $11 for eight).
These are sensational – crispy crisp, ungreasy, super yum.
Good Good Burgers is already a popular destination, so it’s worth giving some consideration to the day and time of your visit to avoid rush hours!
In the earlier years of Consider The Sauce, a sign in the doorway of a Yarraville shop heralding the imminent arrival of a new food emporium would’ve got my foot-in-door journo blood pumping.
Consequently, very little effort would have been spared in getting the lowdown.
These days – post-work, post-lockdowns and (perhaps) post-pandemic – we’re taking things quite a lot easier around here.
So we waited just like everyone else.
And didn’t it take a while?
But that’s hardly unusual in such crazy times.
But now we do have answers.
Answer: Jimmy’s Deli is a sibling for the Eleni’s, the fine Greek establishment right next door, with the new venture tapping into Yarraville’s greek heritage treasury.
And much of its goodness is being sourced from Andrew’s Choice, a further door away and another Yarraville gem.
Answer: Jimmy’s Deli? Well, the “deli” bit could be seen to be a bit misleading. Sure, there are some deli grocery items arrayed around – but they seem more like decor than the heart of the place.
That heart is … very much about house-baked desserts and sweet treats, of which we have sampled but just a small portion and which may warrant another story further down the line.
And that heart is also … sandwiches.
Answer: Jimmy’s Deli is very, very good.
We can become a bit ho-hum about our own background village, but we really love what’s happening here, specially as it’s such a family thing.
Over a few visits now, we have tried two of the three in-house featured sandwiches.
Why just two?
Well, we have no interest – at all – in the other, which features multiple different cheeses.
Just not out thing!
The Original Jimmy’s Roll is a stunner – and an outright bargain at $12.
A whole heap of that excellence comes down to the quality of the bread – these in-house rolls are just right; of firm substance but with enough softness and freshness going around to keep the eating easy on teeth and gums.
The rest of the goodies are every bit as wonderful – ham, mortadella, salami, provlone, antipasti, red pepper pesto.
Wow – so good!
The reuben sanger is quite a different proposition – yet it, too, is superbly yummy.
That’s a lot of pastrami in there – fully warranting the price tag of $16.
The beef is joined by sauerkraut, gruyere and “Jimmy’s sauce”.
This crispy-toasted marvel is abetted by potato chips and a crunchy pickled cucumber.
The service at Jimmy’s is of the smiling and efficient variety and the wait times are minimal.
There are a few interior small tables and stools and more of the same outside on the footpath.
CCWok, 464 Victoria Street, North Melbourne. Phone: 0468 783 168
We remember it well – our first visit to CCWok in North Melbourne.
The personnel involved were Kenny, Bennie and Nat – a formidable and regular trio.
The meal included, IIRC, chicken curry mee, nasi lemak and one involving roast pork.
But despite us having a swell time, I cannot – despite several searches – find any record of a subsequent blog post or even photos on my desktop.
Nope; it just didn’t happen.
Possibly it got lost in the rather giddy times between lockdowns or some such.
Or, more likely, the photos and reaction to that meal were “saved up” to be added to those of a subsequent visit.
Ah well, too late now.
But here we are again – just father and some this time, our Saturday lunch venue the latter’s winning suggestion.
Because during and after another splendid meal, we happily conclude that CCWok is right up there among our very favourite Malaysian places.
We enjoy our meals very much and ogle with envy many of those we see around us.
The corner restaurant is roomy and always bustling – or so it appears to me; this is, in fact, my third visit.
And here’s a real neat thing – each time the place has been very busy, but there’s always been a table for us.
The mains prices mostly fall in the $15 to $20 range; the serves are big, the service happy and the delivery prompt.
Bennie delights in his kon lou mee hoon ($17.80) and its multiple flavours and textures.
The soy carbiness of the skinny noodles is offset by bean sprouts and wonton pastry chips, with a soy hard-boiled egg, lard croutons and pickled chillies also arrayed around.
The roast pork – the main drawcard for him – is very nice and quite unlike that usually found in Chinese eateries.
For me it’s one of the weekend specials – the CCWok variation on the banana leaf theme ($23.90).
With one caveat, it’s a fantastic meal – and again it’s the contrasting textures and flavours responsible for a high pleasure rating.
The crispy wafer appears to be house-made. A Malaysian version of a papadum?
The green beans and a couple of luscious eggplant cubes are fine, the okra even better. The latter achieves the neat trick of being al dente outside and having inside just the right quotient of characteristic slime. Yum!
The deep-fried mackerel flakes away nicely; the apparent pervasive bones factor proves no barrier to ease of eating.
The curry gravy with the four plumps prawns is also very tasty.
The shellfish themselves peel with ease – but, sad to say, are pretty much completely tasteless.
Still, it’s a fine thing in the ongoing story of our banana leaf explorations.
CCWok offers also a range of snacky things and dumplings.
We try just one as we await our mains – one of Bennie’s very favourite things.
The BBQ pork bun ($4.50) is state-of-the-art good – fluffy and fresh, the stuffing sweet and sticky.
It’s been grand – and it’s highly likely we’ll be back quite a bit sooner than later.
Since first writing about Chai N Dosa more than a year ago, it has become a mainstay for us.
We found it especially useful during those long lockdown months, wherein we joined the many fans of the place for takeaway goodies that were always enjoyed, picnic style, in nearby Cranwell Park.
Mostly we’ve been OK with the wait times.
But there have been times when shuffling around the used car lot with other customers has been a bit of a drag.
And there have been, too, times when we’re read the signs of bulk customers and an eating service barely coping so we’ve split for elsewhere.
So we are delighted, upon fronting up for a Saturday lunch, that Chai N Dosa has become a restaurant proper.
The long-observed building activity has produced a real neat dining house.
Heavy on wood, it has a lovely airy and rather rustic feel about it.
It has, mind you, a perfectly fine fast-food vibe going on.
And there seems no doubt that takeaways and deliveries will continue to be the outfit’s mainstay.
But we are VERY happy to be seated and sheltered.
The kitchen is WAY bigger than that in the pokey caravan/truck that preceded this bricks and water (joke for a former colleague) version of the business. This is no doubt a boon for the hard-working staff.
And while polystyrene containers continue to be headed out the door, eat-in service is done utilising cardboard.
Chai N Dosa, it seems, will remain a lunch destination for us.
So that means we miss out on the specials we see on Facebook such as fry piece chicken with pulao.
So I am delighted to opt for a special posted on the menu board – poori with aloo curry ($11.99).
Pooris? Could well be my favourite kind of deep-fried dough!
I devour my three with glee.
The aloo curry is not what I’m expecting at all – but it is very good.
The fine spuddy sludge is dotted with corn and cashews!
Bennie opts, as on so many other occasions, for the standard masala dosa ($10.99).
It maintains the high standard we have come to expect from Chai N Dosa.
Flat bread, made from corn and originating from the Americas, various parts?
We’ve enjoyed heaps.
But nothing quite as fine as the arepas at Mr Gonzo.
The thick arepas are toasted is such a way as to be both crunchy and chewy; simply marvellous.
They’re formed into something that resembles a pita pocket.
Father and son both choose the beef brisket filling.
It is fabulous, shredded and very, very tasty and easy to eat.
The meat is abetted by some avocado and a “traditional Colombia sauce”. The latter no doubt contributes to the overall effect, but imbues no specific flavour to proceedings.
Whatever the yumminess, the admission fee of $17 seems a bit steep, eh?
Not a bit of it!
The above photo lies.
These are a deluxe lunch, much more fulsome than they look and worth every penny.
(Plain beef, no avocado, costs $14.)
Our mid-week arepa lunch was preceded by quite a different visit – on a busy Fathers’ Day.
We roam elsewhere on the menu (see below) to good ends; if our selections don’t quite have the same sensational zing as the arepas, the combined effect is more than enough to ensure we will become regulars at this cosy eatery.
Bennie loves is “tamal” ($16).
Round and tubby, it rather resembles a lamprey.
Encased in the banana leaves are rice, pork, chicken, egg, carrot and green beans.
A hearty thumbs up for this!
My combination patacone ($22) has the same beef as the arepas, equally fine chicken, potato sticks, mayo, avocado and, yep, tomato sauce.
It’s all very nice – sort of like a South American nachos.
The array of toppings is sullied, just a little bit, by the plantain base being really tough and hard to cut.
Our Fathers’ Day treat started with two chicken empanadas.
Oh boy – like the arepas, these two soar to the very top of our collective empanada reckoning.
The very corny casings are superbly deep-fried and the innards are impeccably flavoursome.
They may seem a little pricey at $4.50 each; the three-parcel combo for $12 seems like the go.
Well done, Bennie my son, for finding this tucked-away gem on a lunchtime foray from your nearby workplace, introducing us in the process to a lovely corner of North Melbourne we’ve never previously explored.
Indi Kitch, 2/451 Melbounre Road, Newport. Phone: 8383 4296
Vanitha Naidu is quite something of a numinous, unheralded hero of western suburbs food.
Unheralded thus far, that is.
CTS digs her, her food and her restaurant so much we’re very happy to give things a nudge in the right direction.
It’s rare for CTS and its pals to meet someone so firmly and deeply into their food and cooking, nor so happy to discuss them.
Just about everything at Indi Kitch is created from the ground up.
There’s a lot of spice roasting and grinding going on here.
And show me someone else who takes the time to hand stuff okra!!!
She’s lived in Australia for 40 years, yet describes herself as second-generation Indian via Malaysia – with a nifty side serve of Goan god aunts!
Vanitha has been running Indi Kitch since the beginning of the year and is having to be patient.
That means she has continued to foster the tradie/commuter morning and lunch coffee trade that comes as a legacy of the previous tenants in this cozy Newport space.
And it means, too, that inevitably it is taking time to get the word out to the thousands of nearby residentsabout the fine food available here.
This is not an area that conjures up mental images of spicy, delicious Indian and/or Malaysian food, but Vanitha tells me those local residents who have found the place are very happy indeed.
Finally, Indi Kitch is – no surprise – beset by the staffing problems that are near universal in the restaurant/cafe game at the moment.
So, in the short term at least, Vanitha is unable to open the couple of nights a week for dinner that are a cherished ambition.
Take-home meals are available, but if you’re regular working/schooling person unable to mid-week lunch it and want to eat in, you can have your pick of a Saturday or Sunday lunch!
It’s a Sunday for us – Nat, Bennie and myself – and we’re very happy to be here.
We can choose from the regular lunch menu of laksas, rotis or nasi lemak (see below).
But given the chance to go banana leaf style, we do so.
Of course!
The basic vego banana leaf set-up here costs $18.90.
That’s a few bucks more than we’re accustomed to elsewhere, so we all decide to keep it simple and go without any of the meaty side curries available.
That’s not just a matter of penny pinching, I suspect, but also largely about we three wanting something relatively light for our Sunday lunches.
We have no regrets about these tactics.
Our banana leaf spreads are excellent, delicious and unlike any we have previously tried.
For starters, these are real-deal healthy – there’s a noticeable lack of the oiliness and saltiness that we might normally expect.
And that in turn means that the food must deliver it’s flavour bombs through deft cooking and seasoning.
And deliver it does.
Silverbeet cooked with both red lentils and toor dal.
A tangy chutney made of coconut, yoghurt and mustard seeds.
Okra stuffed with coconut, chilli and other spices.
A powerfully fragrant lime pickle.
Mildly spiced potatoes, semi-mashed in a way that recalls the textures of American southern-style potato salad.
And, naturally, dal and rice. And a papadum!
All good, all delicious.
Earlier, our keen interest in the food and its preparation had been rewarded by a freebie serve of tuna samosas (normally $3 each).
They are superb!
Tuna and chilli encased in brilliant, crunchy flaky pastry cocoons, all with a whiff of empanada about them.
We depart feeling extremely well fed and very happy.
But foolishly, I forget to take pics of the restaurant’s exterior, giving me the perfect excuse to return the next day for a solo lunch.
Oh, yummy, yummy – Goan-style green curry with rice and more of that coconut/yoghurt chutney ($14).
Under that tangy sauce is a chubby, meaty, bone-in thigh of wonderful chook.
What makes it so green?
All the green stuff – spring onions, mint, coriander, curry leaves.
Life has been a rollercoaster for Ollie’s Deli in the past few years.
But they’re keeping on keeping on.
And, after watching their story unfold from afar, I’m very happy to be stepping inside the sanger shop – located in the what was once the Royal Hotel – for my first taste.
The mostly white-and-bright and tile-heavy interior is a surprise, conjouring up images of fast food and blandness.
But those impressions are swiftly, handily swept aside by the cheerful staff and the quality of the food.
I’m in for a mid-week lunch, so am unable to secure one of the weekend specials.
Normally, in this sort of setting, I’d hone in on anything pastrami/reuben on the menu (see below).
Today though I go for the Italian Deli Bagel ($15), even though it’s the kind of thing I’d create out of the fridge.
And maybe I go for it because it kinda seems like a New Orleans-style muffaletta.
It is, too – though a lot less pungent and garlicky.
It is very, very good.
And generous!
Piled high are mortadella, salami, ham, roast capsicum, spinach, provolone and mayo.
The bagel itself is equally excellent – both fresh and chewy.
And because I’m in the mood for a meal rather than a snack, I get extras – potato crisps and pickles for $3 each.
This, of course, nudges the bill upwards quite a bit.
But happily the serves of both are also generous and crunchy, making for a fine repast.
I like Ollie’s Deli a lot – they’re offering a yummy point of difference in Footscray Central.
And judging by the number of orders going out the door, it’s working.
Spring Rolling, 608A Melbourne Road, Spotswood. Phone: 9017 5913
Through more than 15 years with one agent across three properties, we are well used to property inspections.
This time, though, there’s something of a wrinkle – the property manager doing the biz, for the first time that I can recall, is a bloke.
He’s bemused to be chatting with Kenny Consider, whose food rantings he once enjoyed in a certain suburban newspaper chain.
Back when that was a thing.
For my part, I am bemused to be handed an intriguing tip – one of this South Kingsville resident’s fave places is a Vietnamese joint.
In Spotswood!
Duly noted and set down for almost immediate exploration.
So off we head for a Saturday lunch.
Well, no wonder we’ve never noticed Spring Rolling.
It’s been open since March, but we could drive past for years without it registering, such is the anonymous nature of the piece of Williamstown/Melbourne Road on which it resides, that vague impression fanned by the fact that the traffic here is something of bottleneck requiring stern driver attention.
Spring Rolling is, as we’d guessed, geared very much towards takeaway/delivery business.
But the interior is pleasant and cheerful, with a couple of tables and window bench seating.
We make ourselves at home.
We are not expecting anything by way of exotica or regional dishes.
So no surprises for us that the menu (see below) is a mainstream collection of greatest hits.
And that, too, is fine by us.
The food we enjoy is excellent – fresh, zingy and delicious.
Our food is presented in the same cardboard containers that are heading out the door.
Fine – we customise by ripping off the flaps for eating ease.
Bennie goes the bun/vermicelli route – with fresh sliced beef ($15).
He pretty much inhales the lot.
In quick time.
A winner!
For me it’s com/rice with grilled chicken ($15).
The chicken is not high on smoky grill flavours, but is fabulously tender, chooky and yummy.
As with Bennie’s meal, all the bits, pieces and accessories are in fine order.
What a wonderful boon Spring Rolling must be for locals on both sides of Williamstown Road.
Hudsons Road and Vernon Street are not without their charms and assets, but Vietnamese food – or, really, anything like it – is not what they’re about.
We see a bunch of Saturday lunch delivery drivers come and go as we dine – testament, surely, to the place’s popularity.
And despite being situated right on a very busy road, parking is plentiful on the side streets.
Gozleme Pide and Sweet House is a Turkish restaurant, true.
Yet somehow that description seems inadequate to describe a wonderful place where so much is going on.
Here you’ll find the dips/bread/salad/meat combos expected of a “Turkish restaurant”, though it is a long way from being a “kebab shop”.
Here there be also – as the name indicates – gozleme and pides.
And the desserts?
Oh my – there’s a startling array of sweetness to be had, one we are only starting to get our heads, and taste buds, around.
Topping off all this excellence are Hakim and Sevgi (she’s the baker).
From 2011 to 2020, they ran Flemington Kebab House, just a few doors up the road.
With their new joint, open since March, they are running full blast with the idea of home-style food with a profound emphasis of fresh and yum.
Their genuine customer care and delight in sharing their food raises them to lofty status.
Hakim intuitively understands our desire to try a wide range of the available without over-ordering, so he delivers us a couple of plates/bowls that are “off menu”, as well as mixing up the dips that are part of our mains choices.
Lentil kofte ($10 for six) are beaut, lemony cigars made mostly of bulgur.
We have eaten – and eat – a whole lot of chilli sauces/dips/gravies derived from cooking traditions the world over.
But I don’t think it’s any kind of stretch to state that Turkish chilli dip is our all-time fave – and the version served here is right up there with the very best.
We just love the chilli bite matched with tang and crunch.
The yoghurt/cuke and red capsicum dips are just as good.
Lentil soups are another world-wide staple with which we have wide experience, including at home.
The Gozleme Pide and Sweet House rendition is of the smooth, mild, blended variety.
It’s nice, but doesn’t really grab us.Perhaps the other soup (white bean) for us next time.
For me, it’s the grilled chicken meal for $20.
The many chicken pieces are superbly tender and tasty.
They’re abetted by spot-on accompaniments – more chilii dip joined by great hummus, tabuly, grilled tomato and capsicum, and cabbage salad.
Bennie and Veronica choose the lamb kovurma meal ($20).
The lamb kovurma is plain and tender, simply all chopped up and finished in the oven.
Both plates are topped with a couple of lamb kofta patties and yet more of those fabulous salads ‘n’ dips.
Our main have been presented with what at first I take to be a regular Mid-East serving of rice laced with broken vermicelli.
Wrong!
Turns out this actually bulgur with the aforementioned noodle bits – and it’s a pre-prepared product.
We will getting some of this for our pantry; such a great thing to have with dips, koftas and the like.
We three are rather joyful to be eating so well and, mostly, so healthily.
Sweets – including baklava – go home with us, while the gozleme and pides will wait for another day.
Noon, 31B Sun Crescent, Sunshine. Phone: 9078 9089
Things are certainly proceeding in a more measured manner these days at Consider The Sauce.
Quite a lot of that is due to events that have affected everybody and everything; and quite a lot, too, is down to me leaving the regular workforce.
So a couple of posts a month seems fine.
Urging these tendencies on is also about myself losing the hell-for-leather outlook that years back saw me hoisting four or five posts a week.
Losing, too, a hard-edged competitiveness I am happy to relinquish.
I no longer endlessly peruse news and reviews in other media outlets or keep myself up to date with what other bloggers are doing.
Yet while the stats tell me visitation and reader numbers are well down on a half a dozen years ago, it’s clear there remains a hardcore of readers, fans, supporters and friends who continue the journey with me and us.
These fine folks are by now, I’m sure, well aware of and comfortable with our modus operandi.
Stated simply, I think it’s largely about embracing uncertainty.
Seizing with glee upon the random and whacky!
So that means we often have only a vague idea of where we’ll be dining when we head out to eat.
And that means, too, being completely unfazed when our destination eatery turns out to be closed – regardless of whether Google or Facebook has informed us otherwise.
Opening hours have, as you all know, become even more random because of staff shortages, so it’s only sensible to be relaxed about the situation.
No menu?
No problem!
This kind of approach finds little sympathy with readers such as the gentleman who wrote me a pithy letter of complaint several years ago.
He’d responded to a review – I fully forget of which joint – by booking a table and driving all the way from a distant eastern suburb.
Upon arrival he found … the restaurant closed.
Not a happy camper.
For those happy to embrace the CTS ethos, we recommend Noon Restaurant, a newish place in Sunshine serving Sudanese food.
We’ve been frequent Sun Crescent visitors over the years to eat at such places as Panjali and Spicy King, but the premises occupied by Noon had escaped my notice because they’re tucked away some distance from the main grouping of shops.
Bennie tells me it used to be a tradies-style cafe.
It’s a huge place, but is doing quite good business on the mid-week night we visit.
No menu?
That is correct.
But between the items that are listed on the eatery’s DoorDash page and much arm-waving and consultation with our friendly server we get there.
She, by the way, is from Nepal – which strikes us as another splendid piece of random.
She intuits, correctly, that we – myself, Bennie and Veronica, joined by Justin later on – are pretty much open to anything and everything.
So that’s what we are presented with.
And what we are presented with is some very tasty tucker bearing a resemblance to other North African (and Middle eastern) food we have enjoyed, with a few engaging twists thrown in.
We dine without any pricing being made known to us, trusting in the process.
Lamb shank soup is tasty and packed with a robust sheepy flavour of the kind we are so familiar with from similar concoctions served in Flemington’s Somalian restaurants.
Though this one is quite a bit more fatty!
Then it’s on to some serious pot food – served in the manner of dips.
Two have meaty lamb bones residing within and at least one is made with okra.
They’re all good!
These are Bennie’s favourite part of the meal!
Served with these stews is a Sudanese-style flatbread.
A bit like a thinner, drier version of injera, it’s just right for the job at hand.
We’re also provided with some chubby Turkish-stlyle rolls. They’re fresh and warm and fit right in.
My favourite?
These super dooper barbecued lamb pieces, some on the bone.
They’re well cooked and some would consider the meat tough.
I’ll settle on “nicely chewy”!
They remind us of the cumin-laced lamb skewers we enjoy in regional-style Chinese places.
A word on the salad side trimmings served with our various dishes: They are all excellent, fresh and crunchy – something we invariably find to be the case in African eating places of various persuasions.
Justin and I make quick work of the fish – two tilapia, deep fried.
I’m usually quite snooty about these farmed fish, but these are fine.
Plenty of bones, but also plenty of mildly flavoured flesh.
Bennie and Veronica, not being the fishy kind, sit out the tilapia.
But they’re not done yet!
They spy a passing lamb shank, very much like the look of it, so order one for us all.
It’s the biggest shank I’ve ever laid eyes on – more like a smallish leg, really.
The meat is, it seems to me, very plain and almost unseasoned – but still yummy.
It’s been quite a feast – one for which we pay a few cents above $100, an amount that seems entirely reasonable for feeding four of us darn well.
Coverage of Braybrook at Consider The Sauce, through the years, has been scant.
Well, apart from those eateries we have enjoyed on the Ballarat Road aspect of the suburb.
Nevertheless, every time we are scooting up South Road, bound for Sunshine or elsewhere, we inevitably grab a fleeting glimpse as we pass of the gorgeous old shopping strip on Beachley Street, always hoping for some kind of food stuff to be going on there.
Now there is in the form of Haiki & Co.
Actually, there has long been foodiness here, though not with neon lights blazing.
Haiki & Co itself resides in the premises formerly occupied by Romu, which afaik was a rather ritzy and much-loved take-home/catering sort of affair.
And, as we discover during a guided tour of the precinct by one of the Haiki owners, other Beachley Street shops are active in the fields of baking and chocolate.
The early morning aromas can be, I’m told, rather intoxicating.
Haiki & Co is a cafe – of sorts.
Internally, it is – as it now stands – all kitchen, with eat-there options down to a couple of outdoor tables.
This means the joint is very reliant on take-away and delivery services – it is on Uber Eats and DoorDash.
And while regular dinner hours are being observed, impromptu openings for the odd lunch service are being posted on the eatery’s Facebook page.
So it behooves food fans to follow them there for updates.
We have – and that’s how we end up enjoying a sunshiney lunch on a public holiday.
And what a fine time we have.
The food we enjoy is very good, remarkably priced – and the whole deal is pretty wonderful.
From the entree list (all priced at $8, see full menu below) we start with cauliflower falafel with babaganoush.
They are excellent in every way, containing combining traditional chick peas with cauliflower in superbly deep-fried packages.
Such skilled frying so early in the day – we are the day’s first customers – augurs well, we reckon, for the chips to be served with Bennie’s soon-come burger.
We are happily compensated for being served three falafels (instead of the listed four) by being presented with the missing patty accompanied by a serve of samosas.
These, too, are terrific.
Yes!
The chips that come with Bennie’s chicken burger are just as good as we expected.
The burger itself ($16, bacon $2 extra) is a no-fuss, straight-up tidy piece of work.
Nothing too flash – just good ingredients well done.
My Asian-style linguini ($18) is a treat of a quite different sort – but just as lovely.
The noodles aside, the main ingredients are chicken and mushrooms.
It looks a bit like pad thai or char kway teow and tastes like neither – which as it should be.
It’s only mildly spiced, despite the many chilli flecks mixed through.
Haiki & Co is a massively cool and friendly place to dine – or get takeaway!
We are three, we are headed for Footscray – and we are aiming to chow down on some ace Ethiopian tucker.
Ahhh, as it turns out, the restaurant we have in mind is unavailable to us.
So we do what we always do in such situations – we walk about half a block up the street and eat somewhere else.
It’s that easy – and ongoing testament to the sublime luxury of living so close to Footscray and a number of other westie suburbs with high food concentrations.
Yum.
Actually, in this case, way more than mere yum and into realms of giddy delight.
It’s fair to say the Ethiopian we enjoy at Abol is as good as any we’ve consumed.
Abol African has been open about a month when we visit.
Boss man Abel tells me that prior to this he ran Jambo, just up the road apiece, for about seven years.
The menu at Abol African has a section devoted to fish dishes.
That aside, though, it is basically an out-and-out vegan place (see full menu below).
That’s fine by me – even if we’d paid more attention to the veg-inclined signage outside, I still would’ve insisted we eat here just out of curiosity.
And besides, it’s strongly embedded within me that on the occasion of countless previous Ethiopian meals, the meat dishes have been enjoyable but it’s been non-meat side things that has really been the heart and soul of the food.
The fare we enjoy at Abol Africa is emphatically in line with such ruminations.
It is spectacular.
We order one of four combo selections – the Hudade Special for two to three people at a cost $40 all up.
Wow!
That turns out to be an extraordinary bargain!
One of the menu-listed dishes is missing from our platter, but we barely notice.
The rest are superbly cooked dishes, some familiar, some less so.
The lentil salad (azila), seen at centre, is zingy and brilliant.
The shiro wot (chick pea stew, far right) is a smooth delight.
The duba wot (pumpkin stew, far left) is fine, too, but me ‘n’ Bennie – being not pumpkin fans – mostly leave that to Veronica.
But it is all wonderful, all extremely delicious, with a highlight being the profoundly spuddy dinich wot (potato stew, top right).
And we get extra injera at no extra cost.
Before tucking into our main feast, we devour three sambusa ($3 each).
Again, these are state-of-the-art and as good as any we’ve experienced.
Crisp, ungreasy, beaut.
And, yes, despite the filling being an unmeaty mix of lentils, onion and spices.
Abel tells me he uses a mix of avocado, olive and mixed vegetable oils in his cooking.
It shows.
Look, we love/enjoy a good old doro wot swimming in oil/butter as much as anybody.
But the Abol Africa cookinge leaves us with an equally profound sense of having eaten well and healthily.
Abol Africa is a pleasant, bright space to spend some time – and there is a fine-looking and tabled garden/outdoor section out back.
consider the sauce 