Movida Next Door

September 6, 2012

Thursday marked 12 years since Cindy and I went on our first date (to this shockingly romantic documentary about the Munich Olympic killings) and we decided to go somewhere fancy to celebrate. Given we made this decision on Monday we weren't confident of getting a booking anywhere flash, so settled instead on one of the pioneers of the no-bookings scene, MoVida Next Door. We visited the original MoVida a few years back and found it pretty enjoyable, so we had high hopes for its popular little offshoot.

Turning up at 7:30 we were, of course, unable to waltz into a table. Still, it only took ten minutes or so loitering at the bar with some delicious gin & tonics for things to open up for us on the other side of the bar.  The amount of gin and tonic left in Cindy's glass below is some indication of how brief the wait was (although it must be said, the glass just out of shot to the left is substantially emptier).

Things got started with some hefty chunks of bread and a little pot of very impressive olive oil for dunking. While we chewed our way through the crusts, we sussed out our options. The menu doesn't have quite the vego range of MoVida proper (no poor man's potatoes! Woe!) but there were still more than enough for us to cobble together a pretty excellent meal. Very few (if any) of them were vegan, but Carla seems to have had some luck in the past, so it probably wouldn't hurt to ask.

We started with the one vego option on the massively long specials board: the tortilla ($3.50), a Spanish omelette stuffed with potato and onion. It was lovely and creamy, and Cindy's initial decision to give it a miss was soon overturned.

Next up were my favourite dish of the night: the fried croquetta of wild mushrooms ($4 each). The only downside to them was the temperature they came out at - eating them was a balance between just wanting to stuff these crispy-fried balls of earthy mushroomy goodness in your mouth and avoiding the inevitable tongue burns from too much enthusiasm. I ordered an extra one while we were pondering the dessert menu later in the meal, but still didn't quite let it cool down enough.

Hot on the heels of the croquetta came the berenjenas (eggplant chips with salmorejo, $12.50).

These were like lightly tempura-ed slivers of eggplant, with a chewy skin and meltingly soft innards, all coated in oily crispy goodness. The sauce was a creamy tomato-based mix, which provided a bit of a different flavour to dip the chips in but wasn't otherwise particularly memorable.

The next two dishes came out together - firstly, the big plate of ensalada (apples, iceberg lettuce, Spanish onion, hazelnut with salmojero dressing, $11.50). Huh, I only just realised that the salad dressing was based on the same flavours as the eggplant sauce (it turns out salmorejo is a tomato and bread based soup!).

I really liked this - apples and red onions are a winning flavour combination (which reminds me, it must be time to make this again soon) and the dressing was salty and creamy in all the right proportions. Added health bonus: nothing on this plate was deep-fried!

Alongside the salad were these two little piquilo peppers, stuffed with pisto manchego and topped with aioli ($4.50 each).

After making the inevitable mess trying to manoeuvre one of them onto my plate, I happily chomped my 'deconstructed' version down. The salty cheese and sweet pepper were beautifully offset by the strong roasted garlic flavour coming through in the aoili. They packed a lot of flavour, and two would have been too many, but one was more or less perfect.

We'd been eyeing off the dessert menu all night, and were in complete agreement about the two dishes we wanted to split: the chocolate marquise and the tarta de queso. Sadly, there was some misunderstanding, and we ended up with churros ($12) instead of the marquise - neither of us cared enough to rectify things, and we consoled ourselves with perfectly crunchy doughnut sticks and a rich chocolate sauce (both of us ended up scooping the chocolate out in spoonfuls once the churros themselves had disappeared).

The tarta de queso came out as expected (goat's milk cheesecake with rhubarb sorbet, $13.50) and was just as good as I'd imagined. 

The cheesecake was an intriguing disc of mushy goodness, with a nice, tart cheesiness to it. The texture came from the strip of breadcrumbs laid down the middle of the dish, while the rhubarb sorbet was tangy and smooth. I happily picked away at the cheesecake piece at my end of the dish - it went well with the other components, but was a highlight even on its own.

Movida Next Door is a tight little space - after sizing it up, Cindy and I reckon that the staff have as much room in their combined kitchen/bar area as the customers all cosied up around the bar and a mix of communal and small tables. Despite our mix-up on the dessert, we were very impressed by the service - they work the crowded room efficiently and effectively, never leaving you alone for too long but not stopping by so often as to be annoying. Everything came out quickly, and you really had the feeling that this was a place where everyone knew what they were doing - it was a well-oiled machine. It's also pretty good value - we walked out of there well satisfied by how much we'd eaten, and only about $120 down (including four drinks). Definitely one to add to your lists.

____________ 

Only Carla seems to have blogged Movida Next Door from a veg*n perspective. Otherwise it gets rave after rave after rave - see: Mademoiselle Mange a Sydney, The Hungry Excavator, Sir and M'lady Dine Out, spicy icecream, Sweet and Sour Fork, Food Food K, JENIUS, Mel: Hot or Not, Kish and Co, eatshowandtell, Seasons of Life, A Food Story, Brave Bird Fly, Hold the Peas, Tasting Melbourne, Miss Adriennely, multicultural melbourne, Fork, Knife and Chopsticks, Off the spork, A Daily Obsession, Ooh, Look, The Food Blog, juganaut's foodie thoughts, Apple in a Bun, Eating Melbourne, Melbourne Dining Experiences, Wayfaring Chocolate, food, glorious food, CW's Food & Travel, EATspeak, The Very Very Hungry Caterpillar, melbourne gastronome, consuming design, Are you Hungary?, choieevon, Food Sailor, The Empty Fridge, Demitasse Demi-sel, here comes the food, My Food Odyssey, GreenTeaSpoon, I Ate it All, doublecooked, I just ate it, Barley Blog, The Learner Chef, Life in a Bottle and tubbymasu.

There are just a couple of more negative opinions out there - Food Fable didn't think MND was great value for money while Eat (almost) Anything at Least Once found the service disappointing.

____________ 

Movida Next Door

1 Hosier Lane, Melbourne
9663 3038

veg dishes $4-12.50
http://www.movida.com.au/movida-next-door/

Accessibility: Terrible. I'll leave it to Chekoala to summarise all the ways that Movida Next Door falls short here.

Gasometer IX

11/11/2013: We're sad to report the closure of our beloved Gasometer.

September 4, 2012

Brother Burger made a nice change from our usual Gasometer dinner on Cherchez la Femme night, but I'm not sure we would have strayed if I had remembered that Gaso are celebrating their second birthday with a best-of menu! The chicken burger, Rueben and chicken-waffles - some of our favourites - all made the cut.

I did find room for dessert, at least - I took my table number into the salon and was courteously delivered a strawberry cheesecake pop ($10) while the panel got sexy. One bite sent biscuit crumbs spraying everywhere and I was thankful for the napkin and spoon that came with it. The strawberry chunks were a highlight, supple and sweet without any iciness.

____________

It might be time to create a dedicated Gasometer label, since we've already visited one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight times. Since our last post it's had more veg*n visitors: Mel of Veganise This! loved the pastrami burger and then took Theresa the tropical vegan there for a meet-up. Johanna of Green Gourmet Giraffe spent a pleasant Saturday afternoon there, and wander cookie also counts it amongst their favourites.

____________

The Gasometer
484 Smith Street, Collingwood
9417 5539
veg eats $8 - $20
facebook page

Accessibility: The Gasometer has a small step on entry. The tables are crowded in some areas but the booths and tables closest to the entry are relatively spacious. Ordering and payment occurs at a high counter. Male and female toilets are on the same level as everything else but are not particularly spacious.

Brother Burger & the Marvellous Brew

Update 15/06/2023: Brother Burger has been replaced by Gogyo.

September 4, 2012

Cindy and I broke with our usual pre-Cherchez la Femme routine by having dinner somewhere other than The Gasometer. Our blog has been all recipes lately and it seemed like it was time for us to try somewhere new. We eventually settled on Brother Burger and the Marvellous Brew, the new fancy burger joint in the back of the old Retro Cafe/Eat Drink Man Woman space. From the outside, it's decorated with street-art and a minimalist neon burger sign, while the inside starts with the exposed-brick ex-warehouse style that's widespread in Melbourne and fits it out with some nostalgic milk bar features.

The menu is relatively kind to vegetarians (although vegans are probably out of luck). There's a couple of burgers, two starters and an array of chip-like sides (onion rings, fat chips, french fries). We started things off with the cheesy corn croquettes ($6).

These are pretty basic cylinders of fried goodness with a simple corn and cheese filling, served up with a crispy golden shell and some tomato sauce. They were gone in a matter of minutes.

Onto the burgers! Cindy couldn't go past the chip butty (despite her disappointing experience in their spiritual home), which was $9 worth of chips, bun, sauce and pickle. The fries were super crispy and heavily salted, which is exactly how I like them, and the addition of a few slices of pickle provided enough contrast to the sauce and chips to make this surprisingly successful.

I went for the more substantial veggie option, the magic mushroom (crumbed field mushroom, peppers, spinach, goats cheese, onion, mayo and sauce, $14 - I'm pretty sure they snuck a pickle slice or two in here as well, although it's not on the menu description).

It's a heavily stuffed bun roll (the rolls, by the way, are delicious - and baked on site apparently), and there's no way to eat it with any real dignity. I had mayo, mushroom juice and tomato sauce dripping everywhere pretty quickly. What it is, though, is very very tasty. The slightly garlicky mayo was particularly excellent with the crisply crumbed mushie. This is one of the best mushroom-based burgers I've had - definitely a real challenger to the $10 Beatbox version.

Observant readers will notice the beer in the background above - Brother Burger has an excellent booze selection, including this rather impressive Belgian-style witbier from Kooinda. They also offer a range of glorious-sounding boozy milkshakes, but the blue heaven and silver rum shake will have to wait for our next visit. Service was friendly, relaxed and efficient (which is probably pretty easy at 5:30 when there are 3 occupied tables, but still) and the whole vibe was laidback and pleasant. Slightly upmarket junk-food is being done to death in Melbourne right now but Brother Burger do it pretty well - we'll be back.

____________

There are only a couple of reviews of Brother Burger out there, both positive: see Double Dutch Oven and Burger Hop.

 ____________

Brother Burger & the Marvellous Brew
413 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy
9419 0088

veg burgers $9 - $14
http://www.brotherburger.com.au/

Accessibility: There's a small step as you come into the venue, which is a little bit cramped on the inside. There are a mix of high and regular tables. Ordering happens at the table - we paid at a low-ish bar. We didn't check out the toilets.

Tomato coconut soup

September 3, 2012

Berlin proved to be stuffed full of veg*n restaurants, and Kopps might have been my favourite of the ones we visited. Once back home I was so wistful for its rich dinners and varied breakfasts that I paid an inordinate amount of postage to have Kopps chef Björn Moschinski's cookbook delivered to me. A cookbook that is written entirely in German.

Thankfully Vegan Kochen Für Alle (Vegan Cooking For All) has lots of glossy colour photos to steer me towards the recipes I want. Google translate guided us well through our holiday and does a nice first draft of a recipe (although I thank Sarah and Sandra for tweeting extra expertise my way). I'm not sure I'll bother transcribing and translating Moschinski's 8-page foreword, though.

I started from the beginning; this tomato soup is the first recipe in the book! I know that tomatoes and basil are summer foods but we've had a weird waft of spring this week and I really couldn't wait. My soup was not quite as red and smooth as the one photographed in the book. Nevertheless, I really like the subtle sweet creaminess that the coconut milk provides; I also like that the German word for stick blender is Stabmixer!

Tomato coconut soup
(adapted slightly from Vegan Kochen Für Alle
by Björn Moschinski)

1kg tomatoes
2 onions
5 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon sugar
30g tomato paste
500 mL vegetable stock
400 mL can coconut milk
1 bunch basil
salt
pepper

Bring a large pot of water to the boil, and fill a large bowl with ice water. Remove the core from the top of each tomato, leaving the tomato whole, and cut a small cross in the base. Drop the tomatoes into the boiling water for about 30 seconds, then plunge them into the ice water.

Dice the onions finely. Drain all the water from the large pot and heat the oil in it; add the onions and saute them over medium heat until they begin to brown, about 10 minutes. While the onions are cooking, peel the skins from the tomatoes and dice the tomatoes finely. Add the tomato paste to the onions and fry the mixture for 2-3 minutes. Add the diced tomatoes and cook, stirring, for a further 5 minutes. Pour in the stock and coconut milk; simmer it all for 15 minutes on low heat.

While the soup is simmering, wash and roughly chop the basil. When the soup is finished simmering take it off the heat, add the basil and blend the soup (preferably with a stick blender) until smooth. Season to taste and serve.

Mustardy cabbage pasta bake

August 27, 2012

We no longer shy away from cabbage in the vege box, having a few tasty tricks up our sleeves, but they're bloody big vegetables and I'm glad to have acquired one trick more. This pasta bake comes from 101 Cookbooks and echoes the same cheesy-starchy approach that the author Heidi Swanson adopts in her white beans & cabbage recipe. While Swanson's photographs are always appealing, the featured shot of this casserole is additionally a little misleading - that's either a paella-for-twelve-sized skillet or a small fraction of the recipe described. By contrast you can see that my pasta bake was at risk of bursting out of my large baking dish.

Parmesan and waxy potatoes do suit cabbage well, and here mustard and a second rind-y cheese add some extra piquancy. The baking (instead of the previous recipe's sauteing) adds a whole lot of extra effort too, what with the pasta, the potatoes and the cabbage all requiring pre-cooking. It was worth the effort; a patient, plodding hour in the kitchen and nearly another hour waiting yielded lots of leftovers that I gladly microwaved at work throughout the week.

Michael bought a delicious fancy (and pricey) soft-rind cheese but it sadly got a bit lost in the mix. We might buy something a bit stronger - and dare I say it, cheaper - next time we're making a mustardy cabbage pasta bake.

Mustardy cabbage pasta bake
(slightly adapted from this recipe at 101 Cookbooks)

450g small waxy potatoes
sea salt
375g dried wholegrain fettuccine, broken into ~10cm segments
1 1/2 tablespoons butter
2 leeks, thinly sliced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cabbage, cored and shredded
1/2 cup vegetable stock
1 1/2 tablespoons whole grain mustard
1 1/2 cups grated parmesan cheese
16 fresh sage leaves, chopped
110g soft-rind creamy cheese, cut into tiny cubes

Clean and/or peel the potatoes, then place them in a medium-large saucepan and cover them with water and a pinch or two of salt. Bring the potatoes to the boil then simmer them until tender, about 40 minutes. Drain the potatoes and set them aside to cool.

While the potatoes are cooking, fill a large pot with water and a pinch of salt for the pasta. Bring the water to the boil and cook the fettuccine until tender, about 8 minutes. Drain the pasta and set it aside.

I used the drained pasta pot for the mustardy cabbage. Set the pot or a frypan over medium-high heat and melt the butter in it. Cook the leeks in the butter for a few minutes until they soften, add the garlic and stir it through for a minute. Stir in the cabbage and pour over the stock. Sprinkle over some salt and cover the pot for a few minutes to allow the cabbage to steam. Remove the lid, turn off the heat and stir in the mustard, 1/2 a cup of the parmesan and half of the sage leaves.

Preheat the oven to 200°C. By now the potatoes should be cool enough to handle. Slice them into 5mm-thick rounds.

Grease a large, high-walled baking dish. Spread half of the fettuccine across its base, then layer half of the cabbage mixture over that pasta. Next go half the potatoes, 1/2 cup of parmesan then dot over half the cheese cubes. Repeat the layers of fettuccine, cabbage, potatoes and cubed cheese to use up those ingredients, then finish up by sprinkling over the last of the parmesan and sage leaves.

Bake the casserole until golden on top, about 50 minutes.