The quest for pub-club venues took us further afield than ever in December - up into the wilds of Coburg to sample the wares of The Post Office Hotel. Owned by a motley crew of Melbourne music identities, including Tex Perkins and members of Dallas Crane, The Post Office feels like a pub transported straight from the back streets of Fitzroy to Sydney Road.
It's a pretty massive space - an airy front bar (complete with jukebox - no doubt loaded up with all the Ladyboyz hits), a stylish dining area and a spacious, covered beer garden. We set up out the back, enjoying a rare day of Melbourne sunshine. On Monday nights, the food options are restricted to the bar menu - five mains ($20 a pop) and a similar number of sides and starters ($10). The vego options are quite limited, but there were enough for Cindy and I to find two meals worth of goodness.
I went for the main, a green bean tagine, with seeded cous-cous and soft herbs.
This was surprisingly successful - a spicy stew of crispy beans, soft cous-cous and loads of herby flavours. I thought it might get boring as my entire meal, but the richness of the sauce had me scraping out the bottom of the tagine.Cindy decided to combine some smaller dishes - battered potato moons and tamarind roasted mushrooms with sesame yoghurt labna ($10 each). The mushrooms came out swimming in an oily and delicious liquid, which had infused them with a sweetness and slight tang (presumably the tamarind). The yoghurt cheese on the side didn't seem to add a lot to the dish but the tender and tasty mushrooms were surprisingly great.
And then there were the chips. Thickly battered little chunks of glorious spud - Cindy was pretty thrilled with these, and guarded them jealously.
The rest of the pub gang were fairly happy with their meals. The vego options lack the variety of most of the other pubs we've pub-clubbed at (the full dining menu doesn't provide many more options either) and it's not the cheapest pub food around, but it's well prepared and served up in a lovely venue. Certainly worth a visit if you're in the area. Who knows, maybe you'll find Tex working the bar.The Post Office Hotel
231 Sydney Rd, Coburg
9386 5300
fully licensed
sides and entrees: $10, mains: $20
http://www.thepostofficehotel.com.au/
My local!! From bikie hangout to total ghost town to hipster pub, who woulda thunk it. I think Coburg has officially arrived'.
ReplyDeletesounds like a good local hangout for me - a friend of a friend recently recommended it to me (I think he is veg too). It is now on my to visit list
ReplyDeleteYes, I suspect Coburg's the next big thing! Hope you locals find this a worthy hangout. :-)
ReplyDelete