Mr. Mason

                                                 Good evening nomsters,

Tomorrow is the boyfriends birthday and because of our clashing work schedules,  I decided to spoil him today. One of his spoils was being taken out to a fancy dinner.
After trying to book at Meat & Wine Co., which sadly was fully booked till Saturday, I decided to try Mr. Mason. Located on the bottom end of Collins St, we were expecting it to be just a little bit fancy and we were not disappointed.

It is located in an office building (I think) on Collins St but you can enter via Little Collins St. It looks very unassuming from the outside, but my mother taught me to never judge a book by its cover. Walking inside, I was very impressed by the stone and wooden walls, the comfy seating area near the bar and the fireplace by the dining area. I feel that it was very cleverly designed, the way that it partitioned the dining area away from the bar with just the stone wall, allowing there to still be a sense of openness about the area.

Mr.Mason

The service was excellent, with the waitress being very informative and honest about her opinions. Her humour also added to the enjoyment of the dining experience.
The menu is divided into small, medium, large, sides and dessert. The small is just an entree for a single person, a medium dish is an entree to be shared, large is your main meal and the rest is self explanatory.

After careful consideration and a rather beautiful pitch from the waitress, we chose our meals.
We decided to share an entree which was a salmon tartare with crème fraiche, nasturtium and warm sourdough. I had chosen to have a confit of duck leg with green beans, a polenta puree and roasted onions while Brad had a beef rib with parmesan polenta and spinach.

The salmon tartare was amazing, so fresh and light. The flavours just burst through my mouth and everything really went well together. I don't know how I'm going to eat salmon any other way after this.

The small - Salmon tartare $17

 My duck was so good, juicy and tender. I had to save it till last because I do this weird thing where I eat all my vegetables on my plate before I eat my meat, because I don't really like vegetables that much. So by the time I actually got to the duck, it was sort of cold but still delicious!

My large - Confit duck $26

Brad's main was also very soft and fell off the bone like butter. His polenta was packed with flavour and complemented the meat and other veggies on the dish.

Brad's large - Beef rib $26

 My favourite part of any meal is the dessert and chocolate anything is my number one choice on the menu. I did want to try the creme brulee but apparently Brad is not a fan, and after stuffing our faces we did not really want to have one dessert each. So, we settled (and I mean settled in the nicest way possible) on the chocolate souffle with homemade honeycomb and vanilla bean ice cream.

It. Was. Amazing.
The ice cream was so amazing, not so thick and I could really taste the vanilla bean. The honeycomb was nice and crunchy and I could really appreciate it being homemade. The best part, of course, was the souffle itself. Slightly gooey and warm on the inside and a slight crunch on the outer shell. The chocolate was rich but not over the top. All in all, it was amazeballs.

The dessert - Chocolate souffle $14

 We were two very happy customers and I will definitely go back to Mr. Mason for a special occasion, as I am a student with very limited funds. The money spent tonight was well worth it and I'm always happy to support restaurants that feed the hungry people with amazingly good food.

Mr. Mason

Shop 10, 530 Collins Street
Enter via Little Collins
(near corner of King Street)
http://www.mrmason.com.au

Taste: 9/10
Price: 8/10
Location/Ambience: 7/10 (The location is a bit funny but the ambience makes up for it)
Final Verdict: 9/10

Peace, love and nomnoms,
Jo

Huff Bagelry

Happy Monday fellow nomsters!

Today is the day where I talk about a place very close to my heart. I love this place oh-so-very-much. It has aided me in times of need, in times where hangovers are heavy and it brings joy to my life.

A little bit dramatic you say? All over bagels? This girl must be crazy.

I beg you, if you have not ventured down Koornang Rd in Carnegie, DO. 

Huff Bagelry is one amazing place that I love bringing my friends to. It is just a sin to not share something so good and amazing to your loved ones. 

The atmosphere is warm and the decor is full of neutral colours. The prep area is open so you can see where your bagel is being assembled. The coffee can take a bit of time to arrive but it is always so good. The people there (eating and working) are ALWAYS smiling, it's as if they have some kind of happy spray blowing around the shop.

I frequent Huff quite regularly and Brad and I have been going there for about two years now. In the last two years, I have to say that I have been rather unadventurous with my choices of bagels. I had two good ones that I really liked and I have not looked back since.

So, the lowdown for those who do not know of Huff.
When you walk in, you first have to spot yourself a seat. If you have to wait for a table, take this time to ponder over the menu. What will you have today? What bagel do you want that on? Did you want a dessert as well? 

Once a table is free, go and snag it! There is much to lose when you play this game of table snatching. You could go hungry for another 15 minutes and who wants to do that.

My personal favourites are these two wonderful masterpieces below.

Chicken shnitzel, cheese, tomato relish, mayo and roquet salad
on an onion and poppyseed bagel slightly toasted

 Tuna, roquet salad, gouda and chopped egg on a 
garlic, salt and rosemary bagel slightly toasted 

I hear the other bagels are pretty tasty too!
To our left, we have the roasted vegetable salad and to the right, we have the classic smoked salmon and cream cheese bagel.

                           

                                    Roasted veggies scare me

Salmon is not so scary

Huff Bagelry

112 Koornang Rd, Carnegie, 3163

http://www.huffbagelry.com/

Taste: 8/10 (everything is fresh and delicious)

Price: 9/10 (Under $10 for a bagel and a little bit more for coffee)

Location/Ambience: 6/10 (The location is good but a bit noisy if you sit outside and you have to know when to come so you can get a seat)

Final Verdict: 8/10 ( I Freaking Love this place!)

I hope that this inspires you to take a walk down your local shopping strip and discover what amazing foods that it has to offer. I for one am really thankful that one fateful day about two years ago, I was super hungry and hungover and decided to go for a walk down my local shopping strip and discovered Huff.

Peace, love and nomnoms,

Jo

Lava in Balaclava

Happy Cup Day, Melbournites!

Today was a lazy lie in day and the weather made it easy to do so. After slowly waking up and finally getting out of bed around 10, Brad and I decided to mosey on down to Balaclava for something to eat.
After a bit of research on the interwebs, we decided to try Lava in Balaclava on Carlisle Street.

Walking in to the restaurant, we were greeted with smiles and sat down at a cozy little table. It was pretty crowded for a Tuesday morning but I guess, it IS a public holiday after all.

They have WINE!... and a nice view of Carlisle St passing by.

Feeling a little bit ambitious (in hindsight, slightly OVER ambitious), I ordered the Lava Big Breakfast and Brad got the smoked salmon bagel.

Brad with his long black. Ignore him, look at all that WINE!

So, after waiting about 15 minutes or so for our food to come... it came! And I was very happy to see all the right ingredients on the plate in abundance.

Poached eggs on sourdough multigrain toast, avocado, mushrooms,
bacon, roasted tomatoes and a side of hollondaise sauce.

Close up of my favourite bit of the meal; bacon

Unfortunately, I found the meal to rather average. The mushrooms tasted like they were out of a can, the avocado was very hard and the hollondaise sauce tasted like runny butter.

The only good part about the meal was my bacon and eggs and for a much cheaper price, I could have just got... well, bacon and eggs.

Brad's bagel was apparently very nice so maybe it was just an off day for the big breakfast. I'm willing to give it another shot as there was a large crowd and by the amount of lengthy conversations happening between the staff and customers, there are a lot of regulars.
A place with that many fans must be good at something.


Lava in Balaclava
219, Carlisle St, Balaclava 3183
http://www.lavainbalaclava.com.au/index.html

Taste: 6/10
Price: 5/10 ($35 for both of us)
Location/Ambience: 8/10
Final verdict? 7/10


And that's it for my FIRST ever food blog post! Hope you enjoyed reading it and come back for seconds... and thirds... and dessert. :)

Peace, love and nomnoms,
Jo