Category Archives: Places we like to eat at

Footscray Best Kebab House

8 Comments

93 Nicholson St, Footscray. Phone: 9689 0777

Such a humble exterior, such a humdrum name … but behind both lies what is indisputably one of the landmark hot spots of the Melbourne eating firmament.

In fact, such unabashed fans are we of this establishment that we firmly believe it should be permanently lodged on the same list of Melbourne Sacred Sites that pays homage to the likes of the MCG, Hound Dog’s Bop Shop, Pelligrini’s, Brunetti’s, the Vic Market and so on.

No kidding!

The term kebab, of course, means different things to different people.

For many Australian, kebab is meat (usually lamb, and usually carved from a vertical spit), salad goodies and a garlciky yogurt sauce served in bread – pita or pide.

Indeed, some of the FBKH customers do just that.

(Kebab also means meat on skewers – which make satay sticks technically, if not nominally, kebabs.)

The FBKH has skewers, too – namely sublimely juicy and marinated shish kebabs of the lamb and chicken variety, and the minced, spiced lamb of the adana kebab.

Finally, it’s my understanding that kebab simply means meat – and that’s where the FBKH is at.

As already noted, some customers go for the pide sandwich with the fillings of their choice.

But the savvy, loyal and greatly numbered regulars – and we certainly count ourselves in that happy band – know better, and go for the preposterously fantastic plated meals.

Those regulars are a glorious and fair representation of rainbow Footscray.

There’s Mediterranean types, of course, but the FBKH is also a major hit with the local African community, while it’s fully part of the everyday routine here to see members of the various Asian demographics likewise chowing down.

The regulars place their orders at the front then grab one of the several and prized tables.

Prices have inched up over the years, and these days run from $10 for the small vegetarian to $22 for one-size-only mixed grill.

However, the large plates – except maybe for the ravenously hungered or plain old gluttonous – are fine for sharing, as many folks do. And that puts the FBKH firmly in the cheap eats bracket.

The meats are all superb.

The dips are good, too, but we have two outright favourites.

The beetroot is normally a lurid pink and comes with just the right blend of sweetness and earthiness.

The chilli dip, I find, is a little too spicy to slather on bread like the others – rather, used sparingly it is a crunchy, tangy taste sensation when used as a meat enhancer.

In terms of non-meat fare, the stuffed vine leaves are exceptional, with a firmly packed and tomatoey filling that is best inhaled cold. Combined with the falafels, dips and salads, we often go that route for the vegetarian plate.

The large meal of the day ($14, and featuring the quick and easy option of meat from the spit) was our review meal (4/9/10), with the beetroot dip on this day being an unusually restrained pink.

The lamb and chicken carved off the spit is of the layered variety – not the reconstituted, sausage-like meat also sometimes found in such places.

They’re both good, but the lamb is our favourite – crunchy, salty, crusty. Oh my!

Each plate comes with a cheerful, lemony salad jumble of red cabbage, carrot, lettuce, green onion, while we routinely also request the addition of a portion of the potato salad – oily, but divine!

Along with two dips of your choice is served a basket of  warm, fresh Turkish bread, while the large plates usually are also usually accompanied by a grilled green chilli, grilled large slice of tomato and marvellous rice with slivers of almond threaded through it..

Crockery and cutlery is real.

Service is friendly, but can be on the brisk side – this is only natural, as things can get a little insane in here during the lunch rush.

The FBKH is not open on Sundays, and not for dinner on the remaining days – which is probably just as well, given that the mall in which it is situated can be a mite scary after dark.

The Footscray Best Kebab House – it’s a treasure, and one of those rare places where genius is matched at every step by consistency.

Footscray Best Kebab House on Urbanspoon

Yemeni Restaurant

12 Comments

124 Union Rd, Ascot Vale. Phone: 9372 0854

It seems unlikely there is another Melbourne noshery in which the food is derived from a country as unknown as this one.

If you hear about Yemen on the telly it’ll be on one of those highbrow current affairs programs; and when you read about Yemen in the newspapers (broadsheets only, of course), the news will never be good.

None of which even hints at the country’s history and culture, of course.

No matter – such geopolitical concerns lie outside the realms of our focus here – how simply wonderful and wonderfully Melbourne that we have a slice of Yemeni food culture right here.

It’s a Yemeni restaurant called … Yemeni Restaurant.

It’s been open for 14 months, we discovered it soon after and we’ve been semi-regular visitors since.

As befits a country that sits at the southern tip of the Arabian Peninsula, and adjacent the northern African nations of Eritrea, Somalia and Ethiopia, the food here will be oddly familiar to anyone who has trawled through any of the African joints gaily spreading through Melbourne’s west or who has partaken of the various longer-established Middle Eastern tucker options.

As well, as the cyber age follows the jet age, even regional food such as this boasts a touch of the cosmopolitan.

Thus the menu features fish and chips and pasta, while for breakfast there’s eggs various ways and the familiar foul.

Mind you, the opening hours are officially never earlier than 11am, so breakfast will be late if that’s the way you want to go.

Our usual order has been what I suspect is the standard Yemeni meal – mundi (meat and rice).

The lamb is on the bone, and has always been flavoursome and tender, although minus sauce or gravy. I love what places such as this do with the, ahem, more affordable meat cuts!

However, on my most recent visit (28/8/10), I was talked into trying the kebsa (chicken and rice, $12).

It was yummy!

A smallish but adequate leg and thigh were coated by and resting in a dark brown sauce/gravy. The multicoloured rice was studded with strands of fried onions and sultanas, while a jumble of salad bits completed the plate. Sitting to the side in little white bowls were creamy yogurt and a piquant salsa-like mash of green chilies.

The food is quite mild and not overly rich, but the chili concoction and yogurt do a fine job of providing zing.

We’ve also had a dish called mugelge – a sort of rich stew served with a flat bread called mullawah.

Others – such as the cous cous, falafel and Yemeni soup – await future visits.

The cutlery is metal and the crockery is real.

The owners tell me business is going well, and that they’re crowded and busy on some nights. For us – dropping in for a weekend lunch or an early mid-week dinner – we’ve mostly had the joint to ourselves.

The service is very friendly and the decor bog standard ethnic noshery – which is pretty much the place in the world where I feel most comfortable, outside my own living room, these days.

There’s a carpeted and cushioned area out back for a more stylish and traditional mode of dining.

Before stumbling upon this place, Union Rd was a thoroughfare we occasionally traversed in the course of going somewhere else.

These days it’s become much more of a destination itself.

There’s a somewhat similar and very good African place and an organic bakery that specialises in sweeties just up the road, along with a greengrocer, deli and butcher. A natty old-school Chinese place awaits exploration. More to come …

Yemeni Restaurant on Urbanspoon

Ripples Fish And Chips

6 Comments

14 Margaret St, Moonee Ponds. Phone 9370 0800

I’ve grown quite fussy about my fish and chips. I can imagine a scenario or two wherein I might eat them takeaway-style. Maybe tossed from the fryer into one of those cardboard trays, thrown is a paper bag and then scarfed at an adjacent beach no more than a few minutes walk away.

But as for eating ’em after they’ve been wrapped in paper and toted home – well, no, we don’t do that no more. The result might have appeal for some, but for me by the time you get around to it, them fish an chips is steamed, rather than fried. Just like home-delivered Cantonese food – in fact, home-delivered food of most kinds, including pizza.

I’m also quite a fan of the new-school fish and chip joints (and burger enterprises) that are now scattered across Melbourne.

Let’s face it – this isn’t the kind of food that any of us wants to live on, or even eat regularly.

So when I indulge, I want it good and I don’t mind going the extra yards – and paying the odd extra dollar.

In all regards, Ripples – in a strip of eateries right across from the Moonee Ponds train station – hits the spot.

Inside, it’s all spotlessly clean and gleaming formica and chrome.

They do such things as grilled this and cajun that, but I’m not interested.

The coleslaw is your typical Aussie routine – that is, swimming in mayo – but less so than in your average chicken shop. It’s pretty good, actually, and the cabbage/carrot/onion combo is crunchy and pleasingly on the fresh side.

The chips are always hot and likewise crunchy.

A recent visit (21/8/10) for fish, chips, coleslaw, tartare sauce, can of coke clocked in at $14.10.

On his single visit, Bennie had his usual burger-with-the-lot-minus-egg, pronouncing it just fine.

And here’s the clincher – Ripples staff not only bring your meals to your table, they bring REAL cuttlery and REAL crockery with them.

In the new world of fish and chips, one in which the oil is presumably changed a lot more often than on a yearly basis, that’ll get my vote and my money every time.

Ripples Fish & Chips on Urbanspoon