Lebanese Talk of the Town

September 14, 2015

We met up with a couple of friends at Talk of the Town for a south-side dinner on a Monday night. Despite the name, I'd never heard of this place before, but our dining companions assured us it was worth a visit. It's a pretty basic-looking Lebanese place - there's a big cabinet loaded up with food, about ten tables and a no-frills kind of atmosphere.

Still, you don't eat atmosphere, and the menu had a lot to get excited about: falafel, veggie kibbeh, vine leaves, stuffed capsicum, cabbage rolls and tons and tons of salads to choose from. Nearly all of the veggie dishes are vegan, and the staff are happy to talk you through your options. Options are kind of the problem - there were far too many dishes to choose from, so we sent Craig up to figure out an order for the table.

He came through with the goods, ordering up a falafel and dips entree ($8.50), a stuffed capsicum ($9), a couple of veggie kibbeh ($6 each) and a selection of five salads ($5 each, although I think there might have been some bulk discounting going on).

The falafel were excellent, and well served by the hummus, babaganoush and pickles that accompanied them, and the kibbeh (pumpkin crust around a leek and silverbeet filling) were superb, but the real stars of the show were the salads. We ordered the green beans with tomato paste, onions and spices (above, bottom-right), the eggplant and potato with tomato paste, garlic and cumin seeds (below, top-right), the chickpeas with silverbeet and mint (above, top-right), the fried eggplant with walnuts, garlic and za'atar (below, bottom-left) and the mejadara (rice and lentils, below, bottom-right).

There were split opinions as to the best dish of the night, with the fried eggplant and the potato eggplant both getting rave reviews and the spicy beans hitting the mark surprisingly well. It was all fresh and interesting enough for us to polish off everything without any trouble - a pretty impressive feat given how much food there was on the table.

The proprietor generously served us up a selection of fudge to cap the meal off - this wasn't vegan, so Cindy and I scoffed it all and he even more generously dished up some Turkish delights for the other two to take away with them.

We had a great time at Talk of the Town - the food is cheap, varied and delicious, the service is efficient and friendly and the corkage of $1 per beer is pretty damn reasonable. We don't get to Elsternwick that often, and when we do we usually wind up at Ren Dao. It's great to have another option along Glen Huntly Road - we'll be back to work our way through the rest of the salad menu.

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Only little white truths and Spatula, Spoon and Saturday have reviewed LTOTT - both were generally enthusiastic. 

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Lebanese Talk of the Town
446 Glen Huntly Road, Elsternwick
9528 6591
menus: one, two

Accessibility: There's a step on entry and a fairly narrow dining area. You order and pay at a high counter. We didn't visit the toilets.

Ren Dao II

August 22, 2014

We've been making a good go of the Melbourne Writers Festival, starting out with a Book Club taping over in Elsternwick. It was a lot of fun, and a great excuse to revisit Ren Dao for a late dinner. They agreed to serve us after 9pm on a weeknight without a hint of annoyance, and a few more Book Clubbers trickled in after us to make it worth their while.

We did our best to be decisive, in spite of the seventy (!) items on offer, and our food was served in good time. The Assam Pedas ($23.90) was a little sour and a little spicy, with plenty of zucchini, carrot, capsicum and celery adding variety to some slightly homogeneous mock fish strips... and a canned pineapple ring on top. While we gladly polished off the lot, it didn't have quite the panache of their Kung Po Chicken.

Roti ($4) arrived too hot to handle and thicker around the edges than we prefer, but it was great for mopping up the Assam Pedas sauce.

The night's victor was the Hainanese Roasted Chicken Rice ($12.80). Michael was utterly enamoured of the thin and crispy bean curd skin 'chicken' strips, and the back-of-the-tongue heat of the chilli sauce took us both by surprise. The rice mound had a nice whiff of galangal about it, too.

While we finished up and paid the bill, our waiter shyly recommended a few of her favourites for next time (watch out, roast duck and coconut butter chicken!). It was a nice gesture that reflects the understated, welcoming atmosphere of Ren Dao and it had us looking forward to a future visit before we'd even finished this one.

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Our first visit to Ren Dao is blogged here. It turned up on Veganise This! soon after but doesn't seem to have scored any recent blog attention.

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Ren Dao
275 Glenhuntly Rd, Elsternwick
9523 0150
menu: one, two

Accessibility: The restaurant's entry is quite flat and wide, tables inside are moderately spaced. We received full table service. The toilets are unisex but located up a narrow, bending staircase.

Ren Dao

November 17, 2012

Last weekend we drew inspiration from Brianna's Southside staples article in the 2012 VeGMeL zine, trekking across town to Elsternwick for a movie at the Classic and a meal at Ren Dao Vegetarian Restaurant. Brianna observed that Ren Dao has been around for "a year or two now" and reckons "it has a fresher feel than Enlightened Cuisine".

It set a promising tone with smiling, attentive staff, padded seating and - happy sigh - gentle, non-fluorescent lighting. The length and diversity of the menu also equals (and probably betters) the Enlightened Cuisine benchmark: there are a dozen entrees and half as many soups, mock meats in myriad preparations, tofu and vegetables, noodles, roti and rice. Vegan, gluten-free and spicy-hot dishes are well-marked and abundant (and include some g-f mock meat!). The mains hover around $20 each and we wondered whether they'd earn those extra couple of bucks on their rivals.

The 5 Spice Loh-Bak Rolls ($7.50) finally showed me how bean curd wrapping is supposed to work out - light, flaky and a little sweet. Instead of pork these were stuff with dense, starchy taro.

The Kung Po Chicken ($19.50) was a mighty bowl (not done justice in this photo) of mock meat, vegetables and roasted cashews coated in a thick, hot and sweet sauce. The capsicum, zucchini and celery did have a pleasing crispness to them and the 'chicken' was actually a medley of tofu strips, more textured tofu squares and chewy fried tofu puffs.

The Nasi Lemak ($12.80) made use of the glutenous mock chicken chunks we're used to in its yellow curry, along with more tofu and some melt-in-the-mouth potatoes. The surprise imitator in this dish is the mushroom-based, specially imported mound of mock anchovies!

Ren Dao's dishes certainly lived up to their asking price in both portioning and quality. If only we'd been heading straight home, they would have boxed up the last of our Kung Po to take with us. Actually, I wish we could box up Ren Dao and take them home with us! They rate highly across all my criteria: the variety of their menu, their fresh vegetables and restrained deep-frying, extensive options for special diets, comfortable surrounds and lovely, unhurried service. On these counts they probably have more in common with Veggie Kitchen than Enlightened Cuisine or White Lotus.

Actually, I think Ren Dao is carving a niche all its own in Elsternwick. We were heartened to see it bustling and boasting a demographic different to the inner north's veg*n hang-outs.

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So far Ren Dao seems only to have received a mention on Bait For Bookworms.

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Ren Dao Vegetarian Restaurant
275 Glenhuntly Rd, Elsternwick
9523 0150
veg entrees $6.50-9.80, veg mains $12.50-23.90

Accessibility: The restaurant's entry is quite flat and wide, tables inside are moderately spaced. We received full table service. The toilets are unisex but located up a narrow, bending staircase.