Tag Archives: Altona North

Great cafe find

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Vamoska Cafe, 22 Hunter Road, Altona North. Phone: 9193 3374

Let’s face it – the broader western suburbs are not without their share of unlovely shopping centres.

But even in that context, Millers Junction Village is a doozy.

Spectacularly ugly, it is.

Actually, it is more like a shopping enclave than centre; there are roads and stuff.

And while Bennie and I may make fun of the place and its predominantly grey-on-grey colour scheme, it serves the local community very well. And that includes us.

So much so that even about noon on a public holiday Monday, the place is a-bustle with people and cars.

Happily for us, Vamoska Cafe is tucked away in a far corner of the village/centre/enclave, mostly surrounded by gyms and fitness places.

Parking is no problem.

Even better, the full menu is available. It ranges from the full gamut of breakfast dishes through to burgers.

But son and dad are more up for lighter lunch/brunch fares.

Bennie chooses the Bao Wonder.

The basic dish clocks in at $17 and includes three bao, Asian slaw, mint, coriander, sriracha mayo. And a side of fries. With tomato sauce!

Fried chicken or fried tofu are added at $3.

The fries are real fine, but seem a bit incongruous with the bao.

We can’t help feeling the fries should’ve been omitted and the $17 bao trio provided already loaded with chicklen/tofu.

But these are minor quibbles – the bao are excellent, the chicken crunchy, the flavours zingy and the meal surprisingly substantial.

I go with the Miso Steamed Salmon Salad ($19).

The salmon has no doubt undergone steaming, but it’s also experienced some kind of grilling as the skin is admirably crisp.

The fish is well cooked and cooked through, but far from dry.

It goes just right with the tangy sauce.

Both fish and sauce sit atop beaut cauliflower rice.

The garnishes all go down well. They include a jumble of the sort of flowers/micro-herbs that would normally have me snorting with derision.

But here, in the context of this sort of dish, I gleefully gobble the lot.

That includes “cider-soaked figs” and “pickled target beetroot” that contribute to the whole but whose cider/pickle components are not discernible.

But again, these are quibbles – my lunch is a very fine, light yet pleasantly filling.

Vamoska Cafe presents as a treasure; we’ll be back to road test the burgers, which we suspect may be awesome.

Mighty bonus: Our takeaway coffees – latte for me, decaf flat white for him – are as good as coffee gets.

Vamoska Cafe is currently open for brunch/lunch seven days a week.

Snag mission

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A&L Gugliotta and Sons Butchers, 314 Blackshaws Road, Altona North. Phone: 9391 1606

After noting the front-of-house upgrade at Gugliotta and Sons in the most recent edition of Westie eats goss, I have been invited back to observe the making of sausages.

The old joke goes that after watching sausages being made, you’ll never want to eat one again.

In this instance, that is definitely not the case.

I am impressed by the simplicity of the process and the freshness of the ingredients.

The odours are likewise fresh and clean – if odours can be clean!

I love watching Nick and his offsider, Anthony, at work as their colleagues hussle about us taking care of other meaty chores.

 

 

The business makes quite a big range of sausages, but the main task today is a big batch of your basic Italian-style pork snags.

They start with two tubs of cut-up pork, one leaner and …

 

 

… one that includes a good deal more back fat.

As Nick says, a sausage without fat is a tasteless sausage.

 

 

The two tubs of meat are put through the mincer.

This is one of three machines used in the sausage-making process.

The machines are all simple affairs and, really, provide quite close facsimiles for what would take place if the whole process was done by hand.

 

 

To blend and bind, the meat is then put in the mixer.

At this stage, salt, pepper, some wine and a little water are added.

That’s it – that’s your basic pork sausage!

 

 

Given the homespun approach taken here, you’ll be unsurprised to learn Gugliotta and Sons use natural casings.

 

 

They are delivered to the Blackshaws Road shop packed in salt.

So while the meat is being prepared, the casings are being rinsed in lemon-infused water to remove the saltiness.

 

 

The minced-and-mixed meat is placed in an air pump and the meat forced into the casings.

The comes the most magic part – and the most manual!

With flashing dexterity, Nick ties off the long tube of sausage into near-equal lengths.

Here it is the thinner pork sausages that are being created.

Nick looks for all the world like a grandad making balloon animals for the grandkids.

 

 

Also being made today is a smaller batch of Sicilian sausages.

 

 

The provlone, chopped fresh and canned tomatoes and endive are mixed into the same meat base.

 

 

Anthony tells me it took a while for him to fully get the knack of the tying off process, but that these days he could pretty much do it in his sleep.

 

 

Here’s Nick with a water pump/sausage filler of the kind used in an earlier era.

Thanks for inviting me, guys!