Cindy and I had a Friday evening free and decided we should chase down some dinner outside of our usual inner-northern enclave. Cindy remembered Sticky Fingers raving about My Restaurant, noting cheap and delicious food and more than 30 vego options, so we decided to brave the terrifying lands across the Yarra to check it out.My Restaurant is a pretty unassuming looking place, tucked away in a fairly unassuming part of Windsor. The generic name, functional furniture and big bain marie didn't generate a lot of excitement but a quick glance at the menu and we were sold. My Restaurant do Indian and Malay food: rotis, dosai, murtabaks, mee and nasi goreng and a range of Indian curries. And it's cheap! We're talking $6-$8 for most meals - a maximum of $10 for combo plates.
I went for one of the combo plates - a roti meal, with three curries, 4 pieces of roti and some raita ($10). The curry choices for the roti meal come from the bain marie but there are plenty of options: I went with a chickpea masala, mixed vegie Madras and sambhar daal.
The first thing to note about this meal is the roti: cooked fresh and to perfection, these were some of the best rotis I've sampled. The curries were a mixed bunch - the chickpea masala was the clear stand-out, with a tomatoey sauce that was rich was chilli and spices; the daal was good company for the roti, but could have used some pickle or chutney to spark it up a bit and the mixed vegies were soft and saucy, but a bit lacking in flavour. Still, the roti was so wonderful that you only needed vaguely decent curries to make this an excellent dinner.Cindy is a huge fan of dosai, and couldn't resist the masala dosai, stuffed with a mild potato curry and served with chutneys and sambar. The dosai was wonderfully crispy, and the accompaniments were all excellent - I particularly enjoyed the spicy chutney.
Despite its fearsome size, Cindy made her way through almost all of her dosai, a testament to its tastiness. She was careful to leave a little bit of room spare to sample something from the sweets menu. She wandered up to order a roti bom, but was convinced by the lady behind the counter that the tisu roti ($5.50) was the better choice.
The tisu roti is a crispy cone of roti bread slathered with condensed milk - it's like a delicious volcano. I'm sure it's terrible for you but it's very, very good - my 'taste' turned into a half-share just because I couldn't stop going back for more.My Restaurant is a great little place - the staff are friendly and helpful, the meals amazing value for money and the menu interesting and veg-friendly. If we lived on the southside there's no doubt we'd be regulars - with Bismi and Nila nearby though I'm not sure that we'll make the trek across town to visit too often.
My Restaurant has received particularly positive reviews from bloggers looking for authentic Malaysian-style food in Melbourne - see Citrus and Candy, Jeroxie and Deep Dish Dreams. It also got a nice write-up from The Age, back when Matt Preston was still chasing down interesting and cheap places for Epicure.
Address: 186 High Street, Windsor
Ph: 9521 4100
Price: $3.50 - $10.00
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mmmm roti and condensed milk - so indulgent but sounds so good
ReplyDeleteIt's a great place and been around for a while now... I love their stuffed roties, they do one with chickpeas from memory. It's great to watch them pound out the roti on the bench.
ReplyDeleteJohanna, it was awesome - something you must try at least once!
ReplyDeleteNudbot, they do have stuffed roties! I only noticed them properly after I'd committed to a dosa. I loved watching one of the staff stretching the dough for my bom roti. :-)
I miss Matt Preston chasing down interesting cheap places for Epicure. I think we're all going to have to start a proper hunting down cheap interesting places in Melbourne club!
ReplyDeleteYes, we agree, Kat! There are plenty of great unassuming places that have been doing their thing for years and deserve reviewers' attention. :-)
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