Monday, October 15, 2012

hanoi hannah

"Sex, drugs and rice paper rolls" announces the awning above the hippest Vietnamese restaurant in this neck of the woods.

The lights are dim and pink, the music is right now and the food is fusion but tasty.

I met a friend J here for dinner on a weeknight when our working lives point blank looked like scenes from the director's cut of Horrible Bosses. After a lively exchange of ways to make the problem "permanently go away" J and I drank from big white fleshy coconuts and ordered away with reckless abandon.

Due to the fact that J is very cool and I didn't want to embarrass her with my intrusive food photo-taking, the photos below are terrible. But I filched a good one from Food with Frank.

Chilli prawn with papaya salad. Photo from Food with Frank - http://www.foodwithfrank.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/IMG_1599.jpg
Papaya was thinly shredded and the sour/spicy sauce had soaked all the way through the crunchy slivers. The prawn were a little limp but boiled prawns (as these were) are kind of hard to glamourise.

Soft shell crab with wasabi mayonnaise and lime, basking in all  its pink neon glory. Even from this angle the crab looks damn sexy.

J and I have a devotion to soft shell crab. It combines love of seafood with complete laziness - Hey! Just eat the whole damn thing - and this one was definitely the best order of the night. The crab was like the size of my palm! Complete with scrummy lime and an exotic take on mayo (wasabi).

Mixed mushroom pho and Vermicelli with lemongrass beef
I have never ever had a vegetarian pho before, so seeing "mixed mushroom" on the menu was delightful to my 70% vegetarian sensibilities. However, quickly after the pho arrived I realised why. The reason I love pho is 70% attributable to MSG and high-blood-pressure inducing levels of sodium and there was neither in this very very healthy but unfortunately bland bowl. The soup was bountiful with mushrooms though and mushrooms are always welcome.

Vermicelli with lemongrass beef or bun (pronounced "boon") was yum. Fish sauce, well cooked beef, ricey vermicelli noodles, what is there to complain about? Heaps of condiments to add spicy to your life and the prices here aren't too bad either.

Hanoi Hannah
180 High Street
Prahran
9939 5181

Hanoi Hannah on Urbanspoon

Tuesday, October 9, 2012

we're getting married...

.... in 59 days!

1405 proposed in December last year for reasons I still can't fathom, nonetheless we are incredibly nervous and happy in a giddy way about the whole thing.

Source of image: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1350903/My-Big-Fat-Gypsy-Wedding-makes-Katie-Price-look-classy.html
We want nothing less.
This is the reason that many of the posts you'll see from us for the next few months are going to be a bit dated, they're from our huge archive (so very huge) of previous accidental feasts. Right now we are saving like good Chinese kids so we can pay for our wedding with duh cash. What good are four and a half university degrees for, if not paying for your own damn wedding?




Friday, October 5, 2012

the black toro

2012 has been the year of being engaged and a little obsessed with being engaged.

Also the year of Mexican food! Which has reached Kingway by way of owner chef Garen Maskal, just now. Already ubiquitous in the CBD and becoming common, anything other than Chinese food is still a novelty in Glen Waverley.

I read that the Mr Maskal heralds from Ezard and while I have not yet been there (upcoming birthday, Mr 1405?) I know a bunch of foodie friends who luff it.

With such grand backing and confidence, I took my family here for a 60-days-until-wedding dinner.

Roasted barramundi, marinaded tomatoes, olives and watercress.

Sher wagyu fillet with chimmichurri, parsley and shallot.
This was a special tamale with corn, zucchini, tomato and very green pesto.
Everything was yum and well done, I saw many happy Chinese families here. Everything on Kingsway is do or die and it will be interesting to see how this restaurant fares in the years to come.


The Black Toro
79 Kingsway
Glen Waverley
9561 9696


The Black Toro on Urbanspoon