It's fantastic to see Ethiopean restaurants spreading more broadly across metropolitan Melbourne! Michael noticed that one such spot, Northcote's Mesob, is located along our bike commute. It's a comfortable, low-key place with a naturally inclusive and intentionally well-labeled menu: mains are centred around their wonderfully sour and spongey gluten-free injera, and almost half their main dishes are vegan.
Naturally, we went all-in with the Herbivore Combination Platter ($23 per person). We didn't take a whole lot of interest in the central salad when we could be scooping up shiro (thick, berbere-spiced chickpea flour), miser wot (red lentils), gomen (collard greens), yatakilt alicha (tender sauteed cabbage, carrot and potato), duba wot (caramelised pumpkin stew), and kik alicha (turmeric-spiced yellow lentils). And scoop scoop scoop we did, until it was almost done - those injera are filling!
Injera platters make for terrific winter comfort food, and they're so much fun to share. I've got a hunch that we'll be parking our bikes out front of Mesob on a regular basis.
____________
Mesob has already received positive review on veg blogs Green Gourmet Giraffe and Enlightened Decadence.
____________
Mesob
213 High St, Northcote
9489 6952
menu
https://www.mesob.com.au/
Accessibility: There's a small ramp on entry and moderately spaced tables and chairs throughout the restaurant. We ordered at our table and paid at a low counter. We didn't visit the toilets.
I am a bad vegan, and have never been to an Ethiopian restaurant before! I love the idea of it, but some of the menus I have seen look spicy, and I am not spicy.
ReplyDeleteHey Susan! Yeah, some of the dishes can be spicy but I have always found that there are a couple very mild ones on the veg-friendly menus. Hope you have the chance to try 'em one day, injera is so fun!
Delete