Snow Pony

Greetings, y'all! Yes, we are back on the blogging block, and I certainly hope we are here to stay for a while longer. Lots has been happening since we last updated, but as MM had said, we never stopped eating (obviously) and am still always on the lookout for good food!

Brunchy times has become sort of a staple for girly get-togethers and catch-ups for us (as we have graduated from student girls to working girls (mostly), brunches are especially awesome for weekends), and lately I find our food adventures centering around the eggs, hams, bacons and COFFEE (as any self-respecting Melbournian, I am a complete addict).

Brunchy Pony Times!

MM has ventured to Snow Pony a couple of times with her uni-mates, and when we found out that it was one of the very few cafes opened on Easter Monday, we decided to swing by and hang out there. Snow Pony is a popular brunch spot that doesn't take reservations (because they clearly don't need to - hopping busy all the time), we had to wait about 20 minutes before snagging a table out in their little covered courtyard. It was a GORGEOUS day so the spot we had was really awesomesauce.

Snow Pony classic: Giddy Up, with scrambled eggs on the top and fried eggs on the bottom

MM and San opted for one of the menu favourites: Giddy Up (isn't the name just nauseatingly cute) with bacon, slow-roasted tomatoes, smashed avocado and thyme-buttered mushrooms. Sis opted for scrambled eggs and San opted for fried eggs. Sis loves the food (hence we are back there on her recommendation) and was overall very happy with her brunch plate. She especially heart the thyme mushrooms, which is a special for Snow Pony and its sister cafe in Hawthorn.

San's comments, specifically, were "full and happy" - so I guess we can make a deduction that she is one satisfied diner! :P But if I remember her comments as we were eating, she thought the roasted tomato was yums to the max. She also liked the avocado - in which I stole some off Sis' plate since she wasn't a fan of the veg in general. I like their avocado as it was salted and peppered quite perfectly with a hint of fresh herbs smashed (pardon the pun) in them!

Le Mouse choice: Fabulous herb + cheesy toast with bacon

Looking at the menu, my choice was the obvious choice for me, obviously (see nickname). But oh wow, the Snow Pony people didn't name this dish wrongly. It was FABULOUSSSSS. The MELTED CHEESE! It was hot, stringy, gooey and OH SO CHEESILY YUMMY - with a satisfying cheesy kick! I realised I'm sounding like some cheese-obsessed retard (trust me, I'm not...I think) but this is honestly one of the best cheesy toasts I've ever had. Added the fresh herbs melted into the cheese, and crusty seeded bread AND crispy bacon...nom nom nom. Very very happy. Very very satisfied. I should add that the bacon was made just the I like it - crisped and done just right without being fatty/burnt. Thumbs up!

Another house special: Lemonade scones

We knew these scones are massively popular, so we very cleverly asked to reserve some scones upon arrival - and snagged the last two they have left (yippee). They were served with blackberry (yay Blackberry!) and chantilly cream. The scones were crumbly and very tasty in the melt-in-your-mouth way, especially with a dollop of cream and a smear of jam. We were all especially taken with the cream, all of us found it to be very good and a fantastic accompaniment for the scones!

Price wise: all of our food, plus the usual coffees that goes with every single brunch came to just slightly below AUD$80. I'm pretty happy with the service as well - the staff is cheerful and friendly.

Overall, definitely a breakfast/brunch spot that goes into the recs/for keeps list. It probably is a good idea to go a little earlier especially during weekends, and be prepared to wait.

Snow Pony
95 Whitehorse Road
Balwyn VIC 3103
(03)9816 8911

- Mouse

P.S. a little trivia - do you peeps know why it's called Snow Pony? It's a clever word play on its location - Whitehorse Road. :P

Cutler & Co.

Previous attempts to dine at Cutler & Co. were foiled by too huge a party (the restaurant requires a party of 8 people and more to go for the degustation menu and with various dietary requirements, we were not keen to do so). This time round, with a smaller party, we finally managed to reserve a table for four on thursday night (after forgoing friday night as it was fully booked). The occasion - celebration of mouse's special day.

I had been waiting for this! Being a fan of Cumulus Inc. - its more casual sister restaurant on flinders lane :)

The restaurant is bigger than I anticipated...spacious, which is not all that common for a fine dining restaurant (or any restaurants in melbourne for that matter). It was quite quiet when myself, mouse, sister & mum walked in at 7pm, but gradually filled up.

This is embarrassing...despite lugging along a SLR, the photos did not turn out so well. I better start learning to use that thing properly :(

Anyway...the food!!

very pretty lamps, and 2 types of bread - sourdough (L), rye (R)

I always look forward to the bread + accompaniments. A couple I sometimes day dream about - maze's (crown metropol) branch like bread with seaweed butter, yummy sweet potato dip at Number8 (crown).

Back to this post...the sourdough was yummy (crunchy on the outside, soft of the inside - the way I like it), but I unfortunately chose the latter which was too sour-y for my taste. I like their unusual butter knife :)

entrees : cured kingfish (top), poached chicken (L), oysters (R)

Fresh oysters, one of my weaknesses. 5 varieties were on offer hence we ordered one each to share among 3 of us. Can't go wrong :)

The cured kingfish  with octopus, avocado & pickled cucumber(a favourite for many) was a hit with mum and sisters. For me, it was certainly a very pretty dish which tasted nice...but somehow reminded me of sushi with the fish and avocado...hence not too exciting. The octopus was the best bit. I would like the cucumber more pickled. Maybe it's just me :P

The poached chicken (with foie gras parfait, quinoa & prune) was my favourite dish of the night even though it did not look as pretty with a huge pile of green covering most of the plate. The chicken was tasty, foie gras is always good, and there were crunchy bits which added a nice texture (sister thought they could be fried onion). Prune is not one of my favourite things but the combination worked.

mains : duck (top), wild barramundi (mid), john dory (bottom)

Mine was the slow roasted duck breast with confit of duck leg - duck breast was a little bit on the rare side for me, but the confit of leg was definitely yummy (sister ate a chunk of it).

Sister had the john dory which was cooked just right (from the small piece I tasted). 

Mouse and mum both had the wild barramundi with mushrooms, potato, fat hen & salsify. They both loved it, especially the super crunchy skin.

desserts : black sesame & apricot sorbet (top), chocolate ice cream sandwich (L), & petit fours (R)

Our desserts to share were plated separately for us, which was really nice of them. 

Mum and mouse shared the black sesame, apricot sorbet, yoghurt, thyme butter cream. I of course sneaked a taste and it was definitely my kind of dessert - the sorbet was refreshing (what I look for in a dessert after a huge meal), black sesame crisp was so fragrant, & I really like the thyme butter cream too! 

I opted to share the chocolate ice cream sandwich, vanilla parfait, salted caramel with sister because I've read some really good things about it. It did fall below expectations for me. Don't get me wrong, it's a great dessert but I guess it was not 'wow!!'...and as I said, chocolate is not what I would usually pick. 

Over coffee, we were served very dense chocolate (I want to say...truffle?) topped with black salt. I did like it, but we were all too stuffed and left with one of them still on the table. 

My verdict - lived up to all the hype for sure :) Great ambience, attentive staff, yummy food. Would I go back? In a heartbeat (but I do need to earn some moolah first *sob*).

Cutler & Co.
55-57 Gertrude Street
Fitzroy VIC 3065
(03) 9419 4888

-MM-

M.O.O. (Money Order Office)

I celebrated my mum's birthday at M.O.O. (Money Order Office) this year and really enjoyed myself, and I've always been looking for a chance to go back with foodie greedy San and my sister. This morning we decided on a whim to go for dinner tonight, and hence we did just that.

All hidden and cool like an exclusive club.

AND when we reached there, I found out that I forgot to charge my camera like the idiot Mouse I am, and thank goodness San's Sony Ericsson mobile phone camera was rather reliable, unlike my crappy Samsung one (I don't hate my phone, I love it but no denying that the camera sucks almost as much as taugeh (dumb beansprouts/beanshoots)).

M.O.O. used to be a money order post office back in as early as the early 1800's and it's in a rather hidden part of the city. The restaurant had a very nice interior, with a mixture of archaic and modern styled decorum that maintained some sense of the original structure. There's a bar where a lot of people were standing and drinking tonight, and a dining area with the usual wooden tables and private little booth-styled tables. We got the little booths as they seat three people nicely.

The interior!

Interior again!

And obviously not outside!

We sat down and was promptly served. After much debating over the specials and the menu, we all decided to share an entrée, have a main each and share a dessert. Bread came first, served with olive oil as usual. Ordinary crusty bread, that's all I have to say.

That's all the bread we have...each.

For the entrée, I was adamant, ADAMANT on the Snails on Puff Pastry (1/2 dozen; $14). I had them the last time I went and I love them.

Not what you see in the garden eating your plants, these snails.

As gorgeous as I remembered them to be. The garlic parsley butter was superbly fragrant and buttery, soaking into the puff pastry and went very well with the chewy snails. The herb salad was really yummy as well, in fact San decided to swipe the pastry bite with a little of the herb salad and its dressing, and it tasted yummy as well. A complete satisfaction; I could actually order that as my main and be happy with it, BWAHAHA. I love snails when they're cooked and shell-less.

San had the Pheasant ($35) as her main upon the chef's recommendation.

I am a pheasant not a chicken.

It was grilled and served with parsley potatoes. San was not a big fan of meats the Western style, she had the dish because it was recommended. She reckoned it was only okay, even if she did really like the complimenting sauce. She thought the pheasant itself was a little dry and coarse to the bite...maybe a little overdone? I had a bite of it and I think I do like it, even though I agree with San's sentiment that it was a little dry. But I'm a bigger fan of breast meats than San - she's a "fat person" to quote her directly. And no, she (and I) doesn't mean her size - that woman is anything BUT fat.

Sis (also known as MM in San's posts) went for the Cassoulet with Jumbo Quail ($36).

Served in a red pot.

And lids off to reveal the treasure!

A success to Sis, she really really liked it. A Cassoulet is a type of French baked dish with beans, usually with duck but M.O.O. had their variation with quail. Sis loved it and I tried some of it, gotta say the (haricot) bean mixture went really well with the meats. The bean mixture was spiced nicely with peppers and spices. There's also pork along with the quail and a strange looking sausage that was Sis's only complaint in the entire dish. San really slurped on the pork - and I don't blame her, very tender and juicy.

I had the Fish of the Day (price unknown) because Mouse should be eating lotssss of fish.

The Mouse Fish.

Served with olives, tomatoes and black olive mash, my fish was beautifully pan fried to perfection. The texture was succulent and yummy and the black olive mash complimented my fish nicely. The fish was seasoned just to the right taste as well. The tomatoes were grilled and very juicy and sweet to the bite. My only complaint was that the drizzle of olive oil was a little bit more than what I would've liked. Although I would rate my satisfaction to be quite high - higher than San with her dish. :D

Because Mouse should be eating veggies, we decided to order a side of veggies to share. I intended to order the Vine Tomato Salad or Sautéed Spinach but there was some miscommunication with the waitress, as it was noisy and she didn't hear us properly. She didn't reconfirmed with us and somehow put in an order for Bitterleaf ($7).

These leaves are BITTER indeed...like eating some Chinese medicine mixture, blaah.

For non-fans of bitterness ANYWHERE, this side was NOT a success to any of us. We were cringing and trying our best to finish it and I had to take gulps of water along with it because I really cannot stand bitter things. Uragh. What a complete waste! The tomato salad sounded nice, too. :(

For dessert, we ordered the Vanilla Bavarois ($14), served with fresh strawberries and candied mint.

It's pretty delicious, cos it's pretty AND delicious.

WOW. Really fantastic! All three of us loved it. It was basically a custard style dessert with fresh strawberry sauce, strawberries and sorbet. It was cold and nice and very fruity. The custard wasn't sweet and had a hint of vanilla in its taste, leaving the sweetness for the fruit sauce and sorbet, hence everything was matched very well. A success with this dessert!

I think it's a satisfactory and rather lovely dining experience. Granted it was a little noisier than expected, but the ambiance was lovely, food was on the whole rather good and the staff was friendly enough. One of the hidden fine-dining places that should be given attention.

FYI, The Age Good Food Guide 2007 did review M.O.O., and gave it 14/20 - one point short of a chef hat.

As for why the price for my fish was unknown, it was because I had the Entertainment Card and got a free main for one main ordered. :D The Entertainment Booklet was a GREAT buy and proceeds go towards a range of charities, including the one I support full-heartedly, the Cancer Council of Victoria. It has great many discounts for many many food outlets, from fine dining to ordinary pizza places etc. Find out more HERE.

- Mouse

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M.O.O.
Driver Lane
318 Little Bourke Street
Phone: (03) 9639 3020

Waterfront at Station Pier

MM has been mentioning this restaurant a few times and strongly recommends (she herself has been there several times!) us there as she REALLY like the ambience of it. Hence, since HW is here for holidays, I got the chance to tag along and to try out this restaurant =) This restaurant, Waterfront, is opened by the restaurateur Nick Zampelis, who also owned Cafe Greco(Crown), Waterfront (Crown) and Campari (Port Melbourne).

Waterfront (click here for their website), Port Melbourne

After approximately 45 mins of drive (it takes us that long because of traffic jams in the city), we arrived at Port Melbourne. The picture above is the outside of Waterfront, if you can c the words.

Waterfront's menu consists of mainly seafood although they do offer a few choices of steaks. If you wanna indulge yourself, there is luxury seafood platters. The menu also has sushi and sashimi. Yup, the menu is a fusion of western and eastern cuisines, therefore, you can expect to c words like "curry" on it =D

Inside of Waterfront:

I really like the interior design of it where they used alot of timber and glasses. It makes me feel very comfortable, plus the just right amount of light in the restaurant just make it really relaxing and romantic =) For the seatings, you can choose to sit inside o outside. We were seated inside and although this resulted us could not enjoy the view of the sea but we were happy as we needed the warmth! If you wanna have a day look of the restaurant and some scenic views, you can click here.

bread and capsicum dipping sauce

The sauce is very nice! Its just make you wanna eat the bread non-stop =D Luckily, I could control myself and stop at 2 slices of breads.

Entree:

Moreton Bay Bugs, $45

MM loves to eat the bay bugs and hence we ordered this to share. There were 3 bay bugs on the bowl and all of them were being cut into half. You have 2 sauces to dip into ~ lemon sauce and homemade mayo. Btw, they didnt season anything on the bay bugs so I feel its nicer to either squeeze some lemon on it or eat with the lemon sauce. The mayo is nice but it come across to me as too strong, hence, covers up the natural delicate flavours of the bay bugs.

Haha.. just for fun =D

Waterfront’s classic seafood chowder, $19.90

Another entree is the chowder. Its quite lovely with a few pipies and bit and pieces of salmon in the soup.

Our mains:

Seared Salmon fillet with fennel and scallop risotto and lemon butter sauce, $32.00

MM's choice for the main. She feels that the salmon is not seasoned properly, and the risotto as well. Thus, it makes u feel as if the dish misses some essential flavours in it. However, as a whole, not too bad and she enjoys the crispy salmon skin.

Lobster Risotto with green pea, chorizo, chilli, finished with mascapone and Thai basil, $39.90

When we were ordering, HW's eyes have been captured by the word "lobster" next to the risotto and hence he ordered this dish. The red thing on the right is the lobster shell, just in case you are wondering. Although he is quite happy eating the lobster, the risotto itself was too mashy =(

Whole salt and pepper Baby Barramundi, green papaya and pomelo salad, $32.00

My main

This dish came with a bowl of rice. The rice was cooked with coconut milk and hence very aromatic. The name of the dish sounds exciting, isn't it. However, I was quite dissapointed with it as first the sauce was way too little. Although the sauce was quite nice and tasted very oriental and also has a sublte hint of spicyness in it, it wasn't even enuff for 1 piece of the fish on my plate (I got a few pieces of barramundi). 2nd, I did not have any pomelo in my salad. The salad, as u can c, are just bean sprouts, cucumbers and 2 small cubes of tasteless green papaya (the green papaya was cooked b4 adding to the salad, either steam or cook in the water). To be honest, I could not really taste any dressings in the salad! =( The fish itself is crunchy, however, without any proper seasonings and sauce, this dish is too plain!! I can just pan fried a whole barramundi at home myself. San is really dissapointed!

Btw, I oso ordered a glass of wine. I forgot the name though... The restaurant only have 2 types of wines by glass, if im not mistaken. One is muscato and another one is white wine ~ the one i orederd. I did enjoy the wine as it was quite fragrant.

Desserts:

Although we were very full after finishing our mains, somehow we still manage to find some space in our stomaches to savour the desserts =D We only ordered one to share:

Dark and white chocolate terrine with Marquise chocolate and mocha, $16.50

OOO... this dessert is delectable! It tasted like frozen mousse and ice cream at the same time. Very yummy indeed.


Overall, the food, esp our mains, was dissapointing as the rissoto was too mashy and Me & MM's dishes weren't properly seasoned and (mine) did not have enuff sauce at all. However, lucky Waterfront got such a beautiful location as the ambience was very appealing that I might go back to try out other dishes there (mayb lunch to enjoy the views) and also thumbs up for the lady that served us. She was very friendly.

Or, I would go back to Port Melbourne and try out other restaurants there because of the nice views...


San


Waterfront
1 Station Pier
Port Melbourne
Victoria, 3207
Phone: (03) 9676 9180
Fax: (03) 9676 9186

SOS, Melbourne

SOS is a Vege-Aquatic (I don't really know what that means, but I'm guessing along the lines of "hip", "cool" and "exotic") restaurant located on Melbourne Central, one of the hottest and most prominent spots, in fact. It looks really impressive from the outside; secret sliding door and the works. It's also under the same management as Taxi (one of my favourite restaurants that I WILL review someday) and when Mum was here a while ago, I jumped at the chance to go (dining fancy and not out of my pocket money, bwahahha).

By the way, I should mention when I went to SOS, it was a month ago and I didn't have the intention of ever blogging about food back then, so the photos...kinda sucked. :D Sorry peeps, but food is much better than it looked.

Once you enter the great secret mystery sliding doors of the future to the interior of SOS...(I wish I had taken a photo, but yeah)

SOS Melbourne has a really beautiful (not to mention huge-ass) seating lounge, where you are served drinks while you wait for a table, if you're one of those dumb people like me who didn't make a booking on a Friday night. We were immediately given very good service by the maitre'd upon arrival, and we waited approximately 10-15 minutes before being given a table outside the terrace, overlooking the State Library of Victoria. The seating in SOS is kind of weird though - there were lots of long tables a la a canteen setting, and fewer individual tables in comparison. However, much to my relief, we got an individual table.

After ordering, we sat back and relaxed and waited ages, AGES, for our food. I was very hungry and I remembered thinking that the food had better be good (for both time and money) or I'll kick some SOS-chef butt.

Also, a side note: I think the menu has changed since I last went there (cos I can't remember the exact names of what we ate, so I hit up the menu online again), so I can't really remember some of the dishes.

First up we ordered an entree to share: Octopus Carpaccio with perilla, ginger crisp, enoki mushrooms and daikon radish ($18). And yes, I don't know what is a perilla, so don't ask.

Oooo...octopus buried under stuff!

It was very very yummy, very tangy and the texture of the octopus is just right. The enoki mushrooms were fabulous and I love the fish roe (might it be perilla?), and the radish added the thing needed to lighten the flavours. I even love the ginger crisps!!

Next up, the mains. I had the Seafood Pot au Feu, with calamari, farmed paradise prawns, clams, white bait and fregola ($30). It's actually an entree but I ordered it in the size for main because I'm just clamoring for prawns.

Seafood surprisingly on a plate not a pot

Looks pretty, right? :D It tasted just okay. I mean, it was good and all, but I had a feeling that I could probably recreate it. Maybe not as good, but something similar. My sister had the same thought. All the same, it's a good dish, but not really worth the 30 bucks I paid for. Everything is cooked nicely, but I would've preferred more prawns (I only had three), and it's also just a little heavy on the spices. Something lighter might be good.

My sister had the Baked Murray Cod, with baby spinach, braised fennel, radicchio romesco dressing, oak leaf salad ($33).

It's...a fish called Cod.

I only had a little bite of that one, but it's rather juicy fish and it's cooked just nicely. A very nice dish especially with the combination of the vegetables. By the way, you should know by now that I don't know what all those fancy non-English things are, so yeah. Can't help it.

Mum had the best dish, in my opinion, the Grilled Trevally, with green beans, red onion, marsh samphire, toasted almond and parsley ($32).

Ooooooo wish fish dish!!

It was soooo good!! The fish was just, wow. It's soft and tender meat with a crispy skin that's just so so yummy. The sauce they served the fish with is perfect for it, and the almonds added a wonderful flavor to the dish. It's an almost perfect fish-dish that anyone could wish.

And now, for the dessert!!

The first one was a Chocolate Mousse Ensemble ($14) which is no longer on the current menu; I can't seem to find it anyway.

Mousse, good. Berries, blah.

Now I didn't eat much of this as well, but it's rather good, the mousse. I would think the berry compote at the side is a slight mistake - it's too heavy and came off tasting like cough medicine. We basically finished the mousse and sort of left the berries. Not a very good complement to the mousse.

Mum chose the White Chocolate Marquise with honeycomb, strawberry and lavender ice-cream ($14).

Mum always chooses the good stuff.

It was swoooon as well. It's really a great dessert! I love the tastes of how everything combined together to create a perfect, light and yummy dessert. You can taste the chocolate, the honeycomb...every taste you're supposed to taste without it being overbearing. Thumbs up!

And MY dessert...I've wanted to have this sort for a very very very VERY long time until my mouse whiskers all fell out and grew new ones and fell out again and I never tried it until that night at SOS.

A CHEESE PLATTER. ($10)

(bad photo but) OMG I HAVE DIED AND GONE TO MOUSE HEAVEN

It was HEAVEN. Oh my God, I love every single bit of that cheese platter. I ordered some ten-year-old French Cheese, by the way, which I have forgotten the name of but not the taste! Such such excellent cheese, cheesily wonderful and the crackers, grapes, figs and quince paste they served along with the cheese just complements everything perfectly. I could sit there and eat cheese for the next 5 mouse-whisker-dropping-regrowing cycles, no joke.

And then we had coffee (me; cappuccino and Mum; latte and big sis; wimp) ($4) to round off our beautiful dinner night out!

Cappuccino love and we are coffee freaks!

Overall, a very pleasant dining experience, despite it being sort of cold, cos we were seated outside. We went there around 730PM and finished dinner at 11PM. :D You could sort of tell that the food DID take quite a while to arrive, which would be my only grouse. Service wasn't excellent to the point of exceptional excellence, but they were polite and helpful, which is good.

I would think the price is just a little too much - if it's maybe 5 dollars less for each course then it'll be reasonable, but I supposed you're also paying for ambience and stuff like that.

I would go back there - just not in near future. Gotta start counting my pennies, and I'm probably going to eat like 10 cheese platters instead of ordering mains and stuff. :D

- Mouse

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SOS Melbourne
Level 3
Melbourne Central
211 La Trobe Street
Melbourne Victoria 3000
Phone: (03) 9645 0808

EDIT: I was told by tummyrumbles that SOS is now closed. Sad. :( But if it ever reopens...well, here you go.