Sake Restaurant & Bar

Disclosure: I was invited to dine as a guest of the restaurant

Sake isn’t your typical Japanese restaurant. Located underneath the Arts Centre along the Yarra river, the modern Japanese restaurant is a perfect spot for post work drinks, a pre-theatre meal, or a more romantic date night. The huge space is split up into a myriad of cosy spots, making for still a rather cosy and intimate experience.

We started off mingling with cocktails in the bar area, I loved the Mr Brightside, actually concocted up by the mixologist while at another bar. It’s like a Godfather alternative, using Yamasaki single malt whiskey, Disaronna Amaretto and Ardberg Islay whiskey…when you’ve got a cold like I had that night, it’s exactly the thing you need. Strong but smooth. Definitely having a whiskey moment. 

We got to eat in the upstairs area which is really lovely and cosy, with a beautiful lit up tree which just mystified me, and reminded me of Avatar quite a bit. 

As I was saying, Sake isn’t your typical Japanese restaurant, as although there are definitely Japanese dishes on there, Wayne Brown, the executive chef, who speaks very gently but with great fondness, brings an innovative approach to some of the dishes. We were here in particular, to try some new dishes being introduced for autumn (my favourite season in the year personally!)

Our evening started with Aburi Hokkaido scallops with salted capers, tofu and lime, which included scallop jerky and scallop carpaccio served at room temperature. Wow. What a village of textures that lived here! A bit of crunch and chew from the jerky, silky and light tofu and creamy and full scallop in the mouth, that’s just been lightly torched. The citrus really came through as well, adding a nice pop of contrast. An overall great way to start the meal, especially when paired with Amabuki Junmai Daiginjo sake. Beautifully light and floral, yet relatively full bodied as well. 

The wagyu tataki with soy egg, charred onion and Korean miso had me swooning. Although it sounds rich on paper, it’s actually not overly, perhaps because the Korean miso was so strong and dominant, which I loved (but I could see it not being everyone’s kind of thing). It seemed to balance out well with the tender wagyu, and I just loved smearing the soy egg on top all over the beef like a delicious sweet paste. 

The second sake that was served, I only have Kozaemon in my notes, I’m not sure exactly which one was served, but this sake was massively different to the first, a lot dryer, and earthier with a sharper texture on the tongue, but much more length down the palate. I actually ended up liking this one more compared to the other one. 

The fragrant duck breast with red den miso, snow pea tendrils and mikan marmalade was a surprisingly generous serve. The meat was served beautifully, blushing pink, with a lovely texture. It was like a Japanese take on a French duck a l’Orange. 

The shiso granita palate cleanser was firstly adorable, in it’s gorgeous shade of pink, but secondly, surprising in flavour. It’s was very aromatic, and sweet, but yet herbaceous as well, and refreshing on the palate like mint. Very different (and I would totally be open to having a bigger serve next time, or stealing someone else’s serve…)

Last but not last, dessert was spectacular. Goma (black sesame) with salted 70% South American chocolate mousse, caramelised white chocolate and sesame ice cream. Oh my. Happy sighs. This dessert was absolutely everything. Crunchy, sweet and rich, sesame and chocolate works surprisingly well together, which was proven here! I’m honestly sitting here wishing I had better words to describe this dessert, but it’s really the kind of thing I feel like you must try on your own. This was my favourite dish of the night (I know normally dessert is, but this was really a spectacular dessert). 

And of course, since we got a serve of Kokuto umeshu as well with dessert, I couldn’t have been a happier camper. 

I’ve always been a fan of Japanese food, but particularly with Japanese food, it’s always interesting to see other people interpret it and find modern applications and new ways of doing things, which I think Sake has done in a very elegant fashion. 

I’m certainly interested in coming back and seeing more of the menu (which is huge! Have you looked at it online?). I have a feeling it might be the kind of place I need to save more for an occasion; but it would therefore be a very enjoyed meal. 

Sake Restaurant & Bar

Hamer Hall, Arts Centre

100 St Kilda Road

Southbank 3004

 

Le Bon Ton

Walk into Le Bon Ton trailing a piece of string behind you. This place is huge, and a total maze!

The unsuspecting eatery, located in a quiet spot of Collingwood, is easy to walk by, even if you are looking for it, as several of my friends found when trying to meet up for dinner! But once in, the room is warm, atmosphere buzzing, noise levels high and staff busy as bees. 

Oh, and it smells amazing. 

On this particular Friday night, I had booked a table for 10 to have a little pre-birthday dinner, as several of us had wanted to check out Le Bon Ton…and well, birthday’s are just perfect catch up’s aren’t they? 

I was definitely impressed with how big Le Bon Ton was, but was quite pleased that our table was in a slightly isolated area, so that we could still hear each other comfortably and feel like we had a private area for us!

As we were a table of 10, we had to go with the set menu, The Southern Pride menu, for $59 per person which consisted of three courses, with numerous dishes in a couple of the courses.

On a Friday night, you gotta be on time, we were given due notice when booking the table, that we had to give it back in 2 hours, and gently reminded throughout the night. So when I gave the go to start the menu at quarter to seven, I wasn’t overly surprised with how fast our first round of dishes came out!

Chilli cheese fries, with traditional Texas style style beef and bean chilli with a cheddar sauce totally hit the spot and put everyone in a southern kinda mood. Yum. Meaty, and hearty, chips weren’t as crunchy as advertised, but considering they’re sitting under a fair bit of chilli there, they are forgiven. Serious comfort food here. 

The black bean hummus with pico de gallo, ancho creme and BBQ spiced tortilla chips was an interesting take on the usual hummus as well, a bit richer in flavour I found personally. 

The fried chicken was definitely a winner; Southern style buttermilk tenders with cracked pepper and white gravy were juicy and tender, with a decadently crispy batter that wasn’t very oily on the fingers. Sarah did comment that they’re usually a bit expensive if you get them ala carte, but they are definitely worth it. 

Once we had polished off the first lot of dishes, the waiters descended with hefty wooden boards topped with meaty deliciousness. The Smoker’s Lot included a serve of the grain-fed Riverina Angus beef brisket, Otway Ranges pork shoulder, Jalapeño and cheddar hot-link sausage and chicken basted in apple BBQ sauce. Talk about a smorgasbord! 

I simply loved the pork shoulder, and generally found everything to be tender, and although all smoked meats, each with a slightly different flavour profile. The brisket smoky, the chicken surprisingly sweet and the sausage with a  bit of heat, all around, a good feed. 

The meats come with a range of salads to accompany; a potato salad with spring onion, fresh dill, pickles and mayo, iceberg salad with dill, cucumber and lemon dressing and a tangy coleslaw with cabbage, carrot and onion. All cooling and refreshing, a nice contrast to the meats. I have a serious soft spot for good slaw.

Did I forget to mention the cocktails at Le Bon Ton? It’s a cracker of a list, and the sazerac, in my opinion, is best had with a blend of whiskey and Martel VS Cognac in a ‘New York’ style mix. It’ll hit you hard, but it’s smooth. 

Although mains were a sharing affair, dessert was an individual serve of chocolate brownie…which was a little bit lack lustre. A bit dry, a bit too dense, sure it was chocolatey, but it didn’t quite hit that the satisfyingly indulgent mark for me. This was begging for a scoop of ice-cream to go with it. 

Le Bon Ton had all the atmosphere, it was a fun environment to bring a group of friends and laugh and make merry in. And although the food was generally good, I did find it to be on the expensive side, although I guess American barbecue tends to be. Although I enjoyed myself immensely, with great company of course, Le Bon Ton doesn’t rank so high on my re-visit list. 

Le Bon Ton

51 Gipps Street

Collingwood 3066

 

Bond Melbourne

Disclosure: I was invited as a guest to Bond Melbourne

My girl Caryn and I? We’ve got history. Although she was the bigger partier animal than I (I am an out and proud nerd), we have shared many boozy nights on Asian clubbing nights, in cocktail bars, in pubs, at karaoke, at the races…and anywhere else two girls in university, who also work hospitality together might go create trouble in.

So when I got the invite to visit Bond Melbourne and check out some cocktails…well, I gotta call up my girl now don’t I?

And as you descend down into Bond from street level, with it’s soft reflective curves, Tron style lighting and flashes of brass and gold…Bond Street was certainly an upgrade from uni drinking days…we were now drinking as adults. 

We settled into our plush booth, as sensory overload took over; Bond recently had a $5 million renovation, and is certainly looking luxurious and slick for it with bottles of Belvedere backlit in neon pink, and the DJ was pumping some classic RnB that Caryn and I could not stop getting over all night. 

Since it was a Friday night, our hosts essentially decided that we needed to go hard or go home. So we started with a Protectionist cocktail, designed by the head mixologist Jack Coombes, with Hennessy Paradis, Starward Australian Whiskey, Aztec chocolate bitters, white chocolate, garnished with a large orange twist and served in custom made imported crystal glasses from Bohemia. 

Wow. Caryn and I could not get over how delicious this cocktail was. Despite the strength of the spirits, the Protectionist was silky smooth over the tongue, with a touch of spice, with the white chocolate flavour making a surprising, but delightful appearance at the back of the palate, giving a lovely lingering sweetness to finish the initial strong mouthful. The complexity was fascinating, and the richness addictive; although it’s certainly designed to sip, it is very easy to sip on and guaranteed to get you tipsy pretty quickly!

It also retails at $150 a glass, which is pretty rich, but I honestly have not come across many cocktails that have impressed me this much…and if 15 friends wanted to all pitch in $10 to treat me, I’d totally be in for that! 

A new liquid nitrogen cocktail menu is being introduced to Bond, and the rest of the cocktails we sampled were all made with this magic, awe-inducing stuff. 

The espresso martini was again simply so smooth, without a hint of bitterness…in fact you could hardly taste the alcohol and might be inclined to drink it as you would an iced coffee…which would be dangerous!

The ‘strawberry based’ cocktail (it was a bit loud, I couldn’t hear the full description!) was also very refreshing, although perhaps a little bit on the sweet side for me. 

We were next treated to Jack Coombes bringing a little setup to our booth and making an amaretto sour…but of course with a liquid nitrogen twist! Although we’ve seen it hundreds of times, it’s always magical seeing the waterfall of clouds just spilling out of the bucket, over the table and giving a little cold tingle as it meets the skin. Always loving the theatre! 

After putting the ingredients into the bucket, followed by the liquid nitrogen, there was quite a bit of stirring to ensure all the liquid nitrogen had melted (it’s deadly to digest otherwise!), but before long, we had amaretto sour sorbets. What fun! They did melt quite quickly, which meant we just had to drink/eat them faster…bottoms up! 

Hammer and Tong will also be catering for the venue, however on the night we were there, Banoi was serving up some delicious Vietnamese inspired eats, including udon noodles, Vietnamese stuffed bread ‘tacos’ and sugarcane prawns. If Hammer and Tong serves up anything similar to these flavoursome bites, they’re gonna do pretty darned well here!

Honestly, Caryn and I could have stayed all night (but her stubborn friends refused to move from the bar they were at...missing out!), switching to gin and tonic’s for me, and rum and dry’s for her, grooving along to some of our favourite nostalgic beats. Considering my office is just around the corner, and happy hour is insanely reasonable with $10 cocktails, I’ll definitely be back for after work drinks…!

Bond Melbourne

24 Bond Street

Melbourne 3000

 

Touche Hombre

Disclosure: I was invited to dine as a guest of the restaurant

Although the wave of Mexican in Melbourne seems to have passed through, with less new Mexican restaurants popping up, there are those who rode the wave successfully who are still standing, and serving up the goods. 

Walking in Touche Hombre, on Lonsdale street in the city, I couldn’t help but immediately smile at the Ghostbusters neon, flashing away next to a graffitied wall. Although some of the other Mexican players are clean and crisp, Touche Hombre is their antithesis, with a bit of grunge, colour, and texture with the music blaring (but fortunately not so loud that you’re yelling at your dinner partner!) 

Brad and I were in to try out some of the items from the new menu, but when doing Mexican, you’ve got to start with the margarita’s first! Served up in enamel mugs, we get the margarita del Tommy, with Espolon blanco, Pierre Ferrand dry Curacao, citrus and agave nectar, as well as the La Margarita de October 1941, with Espolon Reposado, damiana, Pierre Ferrand Curacao and citrus. You’ll have to forgive for not remembering which is which, as they were both delightfully potent, strong, but not overwhelming, balanced out well with a nice amount of acidity and sweetness. One was more citrus and summer, whilst the other had a herbaceous note…guess someone’s going to have to visit and let me know! 

We started our night with the spicy lamb ribs, with merquin, coriander and honey. I was amazed at how positively meaty these were, as I know my mum’s had some relatively lean lamb ribs when making them at home. Simply succulent and tender, don’t be shy of the fat, and brace yourself for the heat of the chilli, which is hot, but not unbearable at all. So much yum.

The Touche fried chicken with habanero cream with lime was also totally delicious, with a lovely spice dusting, and an insanely crunchy exterior (gluten free too)! The habanero cream had a lovely gentle kick as well, again, not so much that it would overwhelm either though! 

Our tostaditos are cute as buttons, and we were given one of each to sample. I had the blue crab with pickled chilli, lime and basil aioli, which was so refreshing, sweet and surprisingly juicy, and the tuna with candied peanuts, soy and black sesame which was also quite refreshing, but a little meatier, I felt like it could use a little more acidity though. Brad tried the chicken tinga, with mango jam, coriander and chipotle mayo and the pumpkin with cashews pepitas and jalapeño. 

Usually I don’t expect to really fill up on Mexican food, it’s tasty, filling, but typically not super huge servings. 

Well that’s until Touche Hombre brought out their tacos. These guys aren’t cheap usually (average price of $7 a taco) but they are meaty and filling.

In both the Mejilla taco, with slow cooked pork cheek, habanero cream and barbecue corn salsa and the chimichurri chicken taco with egmont cheese, taste peptise and coriander aioli, I found the proteins to be surprisingly generous and incredibly tender and delicious, especially the chimichurri chicken. Both combinations had a great mix of flavours, the Mejilla a little brighter and sweeter, and the chimmichurri rich and herbaceous. Both delicious. I had kind of forgotten how much I enjoy tacos!

To wrap up, the chocolate ice-cream sandwich with chilli and peanut butter parfait. Talk about my ideal ice-cream to biscuit ratio! Although I enjoyed this, it was a bit hard to eat, the biscuit could have been a bit shorter, so I could actually get a spoonful with the ice-cream, or have the biscuit crumble a bit more into the ice-cream, and there definitely was no chilli kick as promised (not that it was an issue, but I was looking for it). However, with other ice-cream sandwiches on the menu, I’d certainly be more than happy to see which one I like best!

Like I was saying, although I don’t normally leave Mexican restaurants feeling totally stuffed….well this was an exception. I definitely rolled out the door with Brad that evening! I think one critique my mother’s had for some of the other Mexican restaurants we’ve been to is that all the dishes tend to taste the same, as they use similar garnishes on everything, but I think what I liked a Touche Hombre, was that each dish really had it’s own flavour profile and textures, and that it was all very tasty. Would I be back? For sure. 

Touche Hombre

233 Lonsdale Street

Melbourne 3000