Magic Mountain Saloon

Disclosure: I dined as a guest of the restaurant 

I’m usually a morning person. The type of person who’s alarm on the phone is the ‘Harp’ sound, because it takes that little to wake me up in the morning. Even at 6am in the morning.

However, I haven’t had that much experience with whiskey, and even after just a couple of nips, was definitely finding the following morning much harder to navigate. Crusty eyes, fuzzy brain, yawns the whole way into the city for my morning breakfast date.

Caryn later tagged us in with the caption: Why did we agree on such an early morning breakfast?

Because it was Magic Mountain Saloon…and it was exactly the type of food I needed that morning.

On a cold morning, the red glowing neon is an unusual beckoning symbol, you feel like you could be going to a bar instead. 

But pop yourself by the window once you’re in to soak in the day light as it gentle creeps in and face the rainbow mountain mural, which is awfully soothing…especially when you’re feeling a bit blurry in the head.

Magic Mountain Saloon encourages you to extend your night with cocktails prominently displayed on the breakfast menu, along with a variety of rather interesting cocktails as well. Being it was so cold though, and I was feeling a bit rough, it was a mint and ginger tea for me, for sure.

Breakfast at Magic Mountain Saloon is also not your usual eggs Benedict affair. During lunch and dinner, the restaurant-slash-bar-slash-dance all night spot serves up Thai influenced food (like it’s bigger siblings Cookie and Toff in Town), so why should that be different in the mornings?

Thank god it isn’t. 

Because when you’re hung over, the chicken and kaffir lime scotched egg, stacked high with pork ribs and drizzled in a sweet and tangy tamarind sauce is actually everything you need. The scotch egg itself is completely bursting with flavour, the kaffir lime a delightfully bright and aromatic start to the day, jumping into your nostrils and waking up the brain, whilst the abundance of chilli is also another delicious alarm. True to it’s influence, the flavours are not diluted in the slightest, and I love it. The pork ribs are lovely meaty morsels, not too fatty, perfect for just tearing off the bone. 

I absolutely adored this mother of a protein hit to start my day.

We also got the sticky lamb and shrimp rice, with green apple, omelette, coriander, ginger and chilli. Total Asian style breakfast, and it’s so okay. The lamb was sweet and jammy, tender too. The rice was delicious, well seasoned, kind of nutty, and with just enough oil through it to make it totally moreish, and the green apple added a beautiful freshness. Although I was full, was definitely tempting to get more mouthfuls of this going on.

We also could not resist the black sticky rice with strawberries, banana, coconut cream and dried mango granola. Pretty, and again, very tasty. I was surprised that the black rice was actually served warm, I loved it wasn’t goopy, the texture and the flavours reminded me of the traditional Thai mango sticky rice…but with bananas and strawberries instead. It all worked very well and definitely something I want to have again. 

Caryn and I had a great morning hanging out, complaining about how early it was and stuffing our gobs with good food. It’s a great spot to catch up in the morning as it’s not too busy (yet), so you can hear each other and just chill out in the space a bit. I also reckon the food is amazing value, even though I did not pay for this meal, I couldn’t believe our scotch egg with all it’s pork ribs, was only around $18…it was really, really big. All the meals were! Good spot to feed the menfolk for sure. 

Although I don’t often do breakfast in the city, Magic Mountain Saloon is definitely somewhere I would see myself coming back to, for something a little different, that’s also insanely satisfying. I’m pretty sure I did not eat until about 3 or 4pm that afternoon afterwards….

Magic Mountain Saloon

62 Little Collins Street

Melbourne 3000 

 

Mörk Chocolate Brew House

It’s wonderful to see little businesses blossom in Melbourne. From humble beginnings, to essentially, taking over the foodie world. 

Mörk Chocolate has been doing just that, gradually building up a name for themselves, wholesaling to cafes and popping up in many a boutique gift shop in Melbourne. Cafes no longer just served you hot chocolate…they served you Mörk hot chocolate. 

I’ll be honest, when I have had Mörk at other cafes, I’ve not always been completely wowed by it. It’s got a lovely cocoa flavour, it’s not too sweet, but I think it’s often the lack of texture that gets me. I can’t help it, I’m a rich creamy kinda girl. 

So though, now that Mörk Chocolate have their own ‘brew’ house, surely they would be the absolute best people to prepare their own hot chocolate!

Brad and I could not have picked a better day to make our way over too, completely pissing down with rain, cold and windy…it was definitely hot chocolate weather. So we hustled over from our brunch spot, careful not to slip on the angled step in front of the door (a touch dangerous in the wet weather) and stepped into the warm and minimalist haven of Mörk.

The space is clean, and just so beautiful. It’s the details here that really catch your eye. Gold taps, beautifully crafted wooden handles, matte white jugs and mugs lined up like soldiers on the slate counter. It’s a dream. Maybe not very kid friendly though (surprised there aren’t chocolate handprints everywhere!)

The menu is short and sweet. Try the house hot chocolate at different variations of darkness, or something a bit different, like a chocolate soda or more importantly…one of the signature chocolate’s. 

And just because it had been making the rounds on Instagram, I had to give the Campfire Chocolate a go. Hot chocolate, with smoke and marshmallow. 

The smoke is captured in your glass, which just fills the air with the warm, crackly, richly smokey aromas of a campfire, as suggested. I had a family with little girls next to me who wrinkled their noses and exclaimed loudly that they didn’t really like the smell. Maybe not one for the kids, but definitely one for the adults who just want to be curled up in front of the fire place. 

As for the chocolate itself? Far better here than some of the cafes I’ve had Mörk at. Lovely cocoa, and a nice texture to the chocolate as well, not super thick, like the mainstream Koko Black’s and Max Brenner’s, but restrained and elegant. 

And then the torched marshmallow. Yum.

I also asked the staff to recommend me a tart, and I can safely say, the lemon meringue tart is a zesty little treat indeed. The lemon curd almost not quite set, and so molten and soft in the mouth, with a lovely short pastry…and plenty, plenty of zest. Don’t miss out on these little goodies when you make your way up to this very, almost, Willy Wonka place of whimsy. 

Mörk Chocolate Brew House

150 Errol Street

North Melbourne

 

RSPCA Cupcake Day

My family and I have long been advocates of adopting from animal shelters. When I lived in Hong Kong we adopted a cat from the SPCA there, and before Chai, my previous two dogs were both adopted from the RSPCA.

Chai was also adopted, from a different adoption centre, but I think what I’ve learnt, and loved, from having mutts in the house, is that you really never know what you’re going to get…but as long as you put the effort in, it pretty much always works out. 

Which is a similar experience I had with experimenting with some cupcake flavours, in support of the RSPCA Cupcake Day, one of the only days where you can fight animal cruelty with cupcakes. Not a bad deal hey?

RSPCA Cupcake Day is on the 17th of August, which falls on a Monday, so perfect for getting the office, school or family involved…who needs an excuse to bake cupcakes anyway? If you don’t really want to get your bake on though, you can just donate on the website. 

Over the weekend, mum and I thought we would try to make cupcakes, but give them a Malaysian twist, using pandan and kaya (coconut jam). 

It had obviously been a while since I had baked as I made the joyous errors of:

1. Using plain flour instead of self-raising

2. Attempting to make icing with caster sugar instead of icing sugar. 

Doh. 

Fortunately at the end of it all, we still ended up with something that was actually pretty tasty and perfectly edible, especially when you lobbed kaya on it like nobody’s business. 

I won’t share the ‘recipe’ we used, as I’d like to tweak them a bit more and change a few things to perfect it. We took a basic vanilla cupcake recipe, swapped out the butter for coconut cream and the milk for pandan (we blitzed a couple of leaves with a mix of water and coconut water and strained out the liquid to use). 

Really though, I think I would leave some butter in it, as the cupcakes came out nice and light, but need a little bit of fat to make it really moreish. 

Using just the pandan liquid is also not enough for colour, so we just added in a couple of drops of pandan extra to really get that lovely gentle green through. 

We attempted a couple of things with the kaya, baking it in the cupcake versus just drizzling it on and munching. If you put the kaya up near the top of the mix, it tends to bubble through, but turns into this delicious thick custard-y goodness. If you put it towards the bottom of the mix, and cover it thoroughly, it weirdly sinks to the bottom and kind of just caramelises…so it’s really better just to smear it on after the cupcakes are baked. 

If you want to make kaya at home, pop 12 eggs in a bowl. Use that same bowl to measure out the same amount of sugar and coconut cream. Get a few pandan leaves, then put all the ingredients over very, very, very low heat and stir all of the components. It's usually about 3 hours of constant and gentle stirring. Put a movie or three on.

Or just buy Luxbite's...

We also learnt that although swapping out butter for coconut cream in the icing doesn’t really work, you can instead use the resulting product for a lovely glaze, and make it pretty with some sprinkled coconut over the top. 

But really, just a bit of kaya, or whipped kaya and cream even, all smushed together in a delicious mouthful certainly does make for a happy place as well. 

As said earlier, although we didn’t really know what was going to stick and what wasn’t…we made it all work, and will certainly be eating everything regardless. The cupcakes without any icing even got Dad’s tick of approval (and that never, ever, ever happens). 

So save the date, the 17th of August, and have a cupcake party at the office.

The money you raise will support the RSPCA’s work to fight animal cruelty, and just this much can help:

• $24 can pay for an enrichment toy for a kitten
• $50 can cover boarding costs for animals of domestic violence victims
• $100 can desex a cat or dog so that it can be adopted into a loving home
• $240 can subsidise emergency surgery for an animal in pain
• $350 can keep an inspector on the road fighting animal cruelty

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Saigon Sally

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

The day after this dinner, I knocked on my boss’s door at 11am and asked if she wanted anything from Laneway Greens, since I was going to grab a green juice as I was feeling a bit run down. 

She looked at me.

“No Ashley. You’re hungover.”

Urk. Got me there. 

But good food, good wine…good company. Being hungover on a Wednesday was only natural thing. Surely.

Saigon Sally is a sensual little lady, hiding off on a side street perpendicular to Chapel Street. Keep an eye out for the red light, lively beats and great smells wafting out the doorway to find her. 

She’s dark and a little bit of a mish mash; dim lights, gorgeous wall mural, sanded down tables, white brick walls. 

We settle down on to our table and are swiftly greeted with a ‘You got Girlfriend Vietnam?’ cocktail, a dangerously delicious mix of Tanqueray gin, junmai sake, lime, cucumber, mint and jasmine tea. Sweet, but not overly so, and so refreshing. I want these all the time, especially through all of summer!

But before we get too drunk on cocktails, fried chicken ribs make their way to our table, with gocuchang, sesame, garlic and siracha mayo. Crispy batter, succulent chicken, seasoned well. What more do you want to stuff your face with? 

In contrast, the kingfish ceviche served with pomelo, green papaya, shallots and chilli on betel leaf is a lovely refreshing mouthful, with a nice array of texture thrown in for good mix.

The seared scallops with green curry, apple and salmon roe smell amazing, and have me tipping the shell so I could slurp the rich coconut broth from the bottom. I loved the crunch of the green apple as well, slightly tart, slightly sweet, just lovely with the perfectly cooked scallop. 

The wagyu beef tartare with young coconut, Vietnamese mint, perilla and puffed rice paper was simply, simply stunning. Beautifully presented, gorgeously tender, and such an experience on top of the crunchy, crunchy puffed up rice paper, which in my opinion just accentuated the tartare’s texture. Although it was a little messy to eat!

The DIY Banh Xeo Taco was quite cute, with a serving of prawn, pork, coconut, turmeric, bean shoots and spring onions; however DIY always means it’s a bit of a mess to eat (especially after a couple of glasses of wine)! 

The crispy barramundi sat in a spicy pho broth with lettuce, clams and lemongrass, beautifully aromatic and cooked well. I particularly enjoyed picking out the clams, sweet but also spicy from the broth. 

Sticky lamb ribs with mandarin, oyster sauce, fennel and star anise hide under an enormous flowery salad. The meat just pulls clean off the bone, and just melts in the mouth, a beautiful emulsion of fattiness, sweet and just a touch tangy. 

Bia Can Chicken is a whole roasted chicken cooked with Bia Hanoi in a Hainanese style. Don’t make the mistake of trying to drink that can of beer, it’s actually a broth to be poured over your roasted chicken! Herbaceous, salty enough, the chicken was tender, but I don’t recall it being super succulent and didn’t leave as much as an impression flavour-wise as I might have thought it would. Although having said that we were fed a lot of wine…

The pumpkin and tofu with coconut roasted pumpkin, crisp tofu, lemongrass, taro and watercress is simply an art piece when it arrives on the table. On top of that, delicious. I think this came out at the same time as the chicken…and although it was supposed to be for the vegetarian on the table…I certainly got enthusiastic about it too. Beautiful crunchy textures from the tofu and taro, with the creamy and beautifully savoury sweet pumpkin…yum!

Honestly, by the time we finished the mains, I’m surprised head chef Adrian Li hadn’t kicked us all out (or at least our end of the table). Seriously, put I-Hua and I next to each other, provide us both with ample amounts of wine and you’ll hear us from a block or two away. (Sorry other people at Saigon Sally!) 

But Adrian was good natured, laughing with us (or maybe at us) as he told us about his dishes. 

Looks like a sandwich, but this is actually the Tira-mi-Sally, and she’s sweet; macaron, Vietnamese coffee parfait, condensed milk and peanut brittle all in just a couple of mouthfuls. The Vietnamese coffee parfait was lovely and rich, and I loved the texture of the macaron, it wasn’t the usual macaron type of texture, there was a little more density to it, but it was still light when paired with everything else.  

But now really, the show stopper for dessert was the Dame blanche, bounty chocolate meringue shell, coconut ice cream, coconut cremeux and molten chocolate was another sculptural masterpiece. Although we were definitely feeling a bit of tummy stretch going on, I could not resist continuing to reach back for the meringue shell coated in chocolate, light, but sweet with that delightful texture that meringues have when it crumbles in your mouth. 

Obviously, a roaring good night. Literally. Saigon Sally is described as the ‘older, more sophisticated sister’ out of Hanoi Hannah and Tokyo Tina, and she really is. Creatively and beautifully plated food with big and interesting flavours. Great for dinner with the beau, or a long and boozy cocktail session with the girls. Make your pick! 

Saigon Sally

2 Duke Street

Prahran 3181

Harvest Food Store

As a blogger, it’s definitely easy to get caught up in the hospitality hype of Melbourne. But the longer you do it, the more you want to find the unexplored little treasures, that aren’t given as much love as they should and, more importantly, where you don’t have to wait for half an hour in line to get a seat for breakfast. 

As we had plans to check out the Truffle Festival that passed last month, I searched for breakfast options in Fairfield and stumbled upon the Harvest Food Store which looked cute and had a menu that read deliciously. 

Easy done.

Parking was pretty easy, and best of all? No wait for seat and a quiet environment to chit chat. 

I’ve actually been to the store before, it used to be called Organic Gertrude, but in 2014 they gave the place a facelift and rebranded as Harvest Organic Food Store…and I like what they’ve done to the place! The cafe seating had been moved from the back of the store to the front, and the space generally brightened and lightened with a minimal and simple use of timber…and the cutest and biggest pumpkin as a centre piece that I ever did see!

Chai was warming and delicious, especially with generous amounts of honey swirled in. 

The breakfast menu is small, but has plenty of enticing options. Brad opted for the okonomiyaki Japanese pancaked topped with a pickled vegetable salad, crispy nori, aioli and umami sauce. He also added an egg for a bit of protein. 

I simply adored how bright and colourful the dish was, stacked high with pickled vegetables and just oh so delicious. I love okonomiyaki, and really why shouldn’t we have it for breakfast? It’s just a lettuce pancake! It also smelt amazing, the umami sauce wafting over the table to me…yum!

I’ve been trying to wean myself off sweeter breakfasts, pancakes, waffles, muesli and granola and getting back on the protein train. 

However when I saw the gluten free symbol next to the pumpkin waffles with maple syrup, coconut yoghurt, toasted pepitas and ginger spiced pear…well how could I resist? 

This was delicious. The waffles were incredibly fluffy, with a touch of savouriness from the pumpkin. The coconut yoghurt was so light as well, delicately bringing the sweet coconut flavour to the plate. It’s a bit of a light breakfast, but if you’re just looking for something sweet to nibble on, this is just the thing you’d need. Definitely happy to return for this! 

A great little chilled out spot for breakfast, with a small but pretty banging little menu and a one stop shop to buy all your organic needs as well. It’s definitely tempting to drop some dollars on tea, peanut butter and snacks…Brad had to keep giving me the eye to keep me under control!  

Harvest Food Store 

108 Station Street

Fairfield