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After reading some earlier posts and fearing i've become or have almost become one of those wanky food writers i decided to get back to basics and remind myself who exactly i am....for this i've decided to post a few words from a great chef and food writer Anthony Bourdain, this excerpt comes from his book The Nasty BIts, this man has a way with words and hits the nail on the head when talking chef....cheers tony..
"If you catch a chef in a quiet, reflective moment over a drink, and ask what the worst aspects of the job are, you'll probably get the following answer: "the heat, the pressure,the fast pace, the isolation from normal society, the long hours, the pain, the relentless, never ending demands of the profession."
If you wait a while, maybe two more drinks,and ask again, this time inquiring about he best parts of being a chef - more often than not, the chef will pause, take another sip of beer, smile...and give you exactly the same answer.
Cooking is, and always has been, a cult of pain. those of us who've spent any time in the business atually like it that way. Unless we've goe kurtz-like over the edge into madness, and started believing, for instance, tha we are no longer cooks but responsible for elevating the eating habits of a nation, then we know who we are: the same people we have always been. We are the backstairs help. We are in the service industry, meaning that when rich people come into our resturants we cook for them. When our customers play, we work. when our customers sleep, we play. We know that we are not like our customers, never will be like our customers, and don't want to be, even if we put down a nice score now and again. The people in our dining rooms are diferent from us. We are the other thing and we like it like that. We may be glorified servants, catering to the hims of those usually wealthier than us , but we are tougher meaner, stronger, more reliable and well aware of the fact that we can do something with our hands, our senses, the accumulated wisdom of thousands of meals served, that they can't. When your tired after a hard day in the kitchen and some manicured stockbroker is taking up too much room on the subway, you have no problem telling the stupid prick to shove over, You deserve it! He doesn't;.
Its not often you find one of those places that your gut tells you that should you step inside your going to find a little gem that
everyone around you has known about for ages but refused to let you know about for fear of losing their little peace of wonderland.
Having walked past a few times i found myself wondering about the obscurity of such a place in bland surroundings, it had character, it had atmosphere
it had the air of something that had stood the test of time and was now everybodys little secret but mine! Finally after weeks of 'having other things to do' i took
the time to step inside 'The Famous Blue Raincoat'. Immediately i felt like i had been shifted somewhere else, somewhere where my attentions would of been
drawn to on a lazy sunday afternoon in brunswick street. Books and magazines littered the small tables and chairs, an amplifier sits in the corner akin a small spotlight, photos
and random newspaper clippings adorn the worn walls and a lady without what it seems a care in the world greets me at the door. Relaxation sets through my whole body
and my mind settles on an already preconcieved idea of ' that cool little place'. I hadn't thought much about the food really, i didn't think there would be much on offer and i didn't really
expect to eat anything that would sit me back and have me full belly content, how wrong i was...it was lunchtime but as she walked past with two steaming hot plates
of sausages, egss, thick buttery toast, crispy bacon, tomato and mushrooms (something we might know as breakfast) my lunchtime cravings dissapeared and i knew my
stomach was calling out for a repeat of that very plate, who doesn't love a place that serves breakfast whenever you want it!...gold...breakfast was no trouble and before i could
lose myself in the raincoat's surroundings again that very plate sat right in front of me...a good breadfast is hard to find, ala, crispy bacon not half cooked and almost boiled, thick
toast that melts the butter, not a piece of 2 week old ciabatta...you get the drift...few words were spoken and breakfeast became the meal that would bring me back for more
tomorrow or the next day...as for the rest well its short and sweet, not too many options but as the old adage goes its quality not quantity that counts. The raincoat is a
music venue too boot, a bit of jazz and blues from what i can tell, an open mic night gives those creative enough a chance to let it all out and of course i'm sure i remember
reading somewhere about a sunday session and you can't go past a sunday sess can you...the raincoat was everything i wanted it to be, a rare find and a welcome relief
from the hyped up pubs and cafes that lie next door in williamstown...check it out, i'm sure you'll love it...
Thai Angels, Barkly Street, West Footscray, VIC, 3012
It's pretty hard to find good Thai in Melbourne, well thats what i've found anyway. After visits to some pretty mediochre establishments both within the city and the inner suburbs i decided to stop relying on the 'this looks like a good place' theory and ask around my inner circle. Amongst the head chefs, the ex head chefs, tafe teachers and usual suspects came the predictive 'go to Longrain' response. My penchant for the big food, big money, big chef restaurants has waned over the last year or so though...what i wanted was the little restaurant that could, the family owned business, the place that could do it and go quietely about it's way safe in the knowledge that their customers would come back tomorrow or next week (think supper inn, celestial avenue, chinatown). The search continued and my eyes settled on the quite little man in the corner pushing away on the woks, a wealth of knowledge, only if you ask though, a trait of many asian chefs in my experience. I put it to him and in 2 mins i had the name of a quaint little place in footscray that acoording to ming dealt in the 'real deal', not the sweetened curries and pea overloaded fried rice us Australians have become accustomed to. Thai Angels on Barkley St in Footscray had me at hello...small tables sat close together, a waft of chilli, lemongrass and ginger danced with my senses and my stomach grumbled. Slowly but surely i've come to grips with share dishes, it's not that i didn't get it before it's just that it's not us really is it, small plates of food each offering their own little delight...no we are used to having the plate in front of us, there's no option, just eat it...anyway where was i....so just to be boring i have a few staples when i dine thai, tom yum being the certainty, it always cleanses the inside and sets me up for whats to come and this one didn't dissapoint, a mild selection from the menu hit me with just enough heat to warm my mouth and scatter of thai basil freshened up the palate. Tom Yum bowl empty and back to the kitchen was quickly followed by a panang curry with some fried rice while the better half layed her eyes on a very full plate of pad thai. No complaints with the curry, it went down just as sweet as i thought it would, the pad thai lacked a little substance i thought, maybe just maybe the chef grabbed a little too much sugar but still quite nice all the same. Service could use a little work we thought as our waitress swooped up a quarter full glass of wine and headed to the bar when we asked for another??? friendly and nice enough though, a little understanding here and there goes a long way to enjoying your meal. I'm not looking for another thai restaurant anytime soon, i'll be back, maybe someday i'll check out the bright lights of Longrain but for now i'm sticking with the quaint little place in the suburbs, a winner in my books that had me full belly content!
It's easy to dismiss those restaurants/cafes that you keep going back to time after time, after all there's no need to think about them, you just end up there because simply
everything else wasn't good enough for you. It's easy to just look at everybody and just say "do you want to go here again?", the food was good enough last time, actually come to think of it the food was pretty damn good, the service friendly and prompt and a nice relaxed atmosphere, yeah lets go here again. You tend not to think of these sort of places as some of melbourne's best restaurants, you havn't read about them in the paper, they don't have that funny little chef's hat plastered anywhere and they don't have that 'celebrity chef' factor. Think about it though, what makes a good restaurant/cafe? The answer really isn't that complex, it's a: a place where you can go time and time again and the food is consistently good, b: the service comes to your table with a smile and c: you can spend a good couple of hours there with people and time will slip under the rug because you've found yourself in a place that makes you feel comfortable, happy and well just like home with a few extra guests, actually quite a lot of extra guests if you were to step inside Rococo's in St.Kilda.
Acland street can be a little overwhelming at times, especially on a warm night when the masses have come out to enjoy an evening of entertainment without having to put on 3 layers of clothing. Bars and Cafes seem to all merge into one and at times it can be hard to gauge a place as a restaurant, cafe, or a place where the kitchen has closed, drinks have taken priority and the clientele feel the need to all raise their voice simultaneously in a desperate attempt to hear one another over the tunes belting from either side of the street. So it's refreshing to be able to find a reasonbly quite place to sit eat and enjoy one anothers company. Rococos from the look of it could easily seat 100 people at any given time, it's long wooden tables fit in a good group but leave enough room to spread your legs and relax a little after eating some pretty damn good italian. On meny, rococos offers a good variety of pizza pasta, salads, meat and fish, no one dish really seems like the other which tends to happen when your glancing over an italian menu and they definatley wouldn't be getting complaints about not enough food on the plate...Rococo's serving sizes will probably have you reaching down to undo the top bottun or loosen the belt on your pants because it's not like you can help but want to put every little piece of food that's on the plate into your mouth no matter how full you are. I've started with the pumpkin soup before, it comes to your table steaming hot, in hot bowl with some warm ciabatta that is suprisingly fresh...one spoon and your bowl will be empty very shortly. A nice lite pasta or salmon salad to follow will fill the gaps and won't dissapoint...to wash it all down this place offers a pretty good variety of local and imported beers (if your looking for something new to drink in the warmer temps try an amsterdam beer called amstel, very refreshing) and a snappy wine list that won't have you running to the cash machine when the bill arrives...sit inside or out either way it's nice, staff are reasonbly attentive but more importantly happy and actually seem to care. Sit, eat, drink, be merry and watch the parade of acland street on a summers night in st.kilda, think about the food your eating and note that no matter how busy this place seems to get, it will come out just as good as the last time.Your text goes here
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It's one thing to really enjoy something, someone, someplace it's another to be able to put that enjoyment into words and tell everyone whats so good about it. When you love something i guess your mind finds no real reason to justify it, it just is, it's great, it's exactly the way you want it to be, a bit like that girl/guy you saw the other day, you couldn't really put it down to one thing, it was everything about them and when your friends ask why were they so hot, you just go 'well they just were, you should of seen them!!!' Thats right, you couldn't explain it and had they of just been there you know they would of shared your enthusiasim . Eating at a great restaurant i can't help but feel the same way...you just want people to experience it, it's as if you almost don't want to write anything about it for fear of ruining the surprise, the allure...there's not many places that hold that allure anymore around melbourne, the restaurants of the year and chefs of the decade are shoved so far down your throat that before you even get the chance to pick up the phone to make a reservation you already feel like you've eaten a 8 course degustation.
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Comment by leill
on FOOD -Buy Local/Grow your own