The Butler's Pantry

The Butler's Pantry

There is not a great deal of good Cafe's in the Mulgrave / Rowville area but we had been told that this place is as good as it gets. Its a large cafe' that has not been open for very long but they have plenty of parking which is great.

 We arrived at about 10:30am and it was already busy, we waited about 5 minutes and got a table. They serve Toby Estate Coffee which is not normally good. I don't know what they do but it was not bitter so that was a bonus. The service was spectacular which we did not expect.

They had waffles on the menu and it sounded scrumptious and i also saw they had a crispy egg so i ordered that as well. The waiter said no one had done it before but i love my eggs and bacon.

The waffles where crispy but a little bit dry but the maple syrup fixed that and the bacon was not too crispy so i enjoyed it. The egg exploded as you cut into it and was beautiful, i will go back for it. The meal was great overall.

Kim had the Salmon breaky Salad, which had the crispy egg, Salmon, Pea, Avo. She really enjoyed her meal.

The Sad part is i am getting more allergic to Avo's which sucks as i love them so i had a little bit. We will go back again in the future.


Kind E-gards
Dale

Nishikian

Nishikian

After coming back from Japan we really wanted Okonomiyaki so after some googling and research we decided to go here. It is a New Zealand franchise which was surprising to us and has only been open for about a year and it was busy. It was a petrol station once but since then converted to a restaurant. 

It is a large brightly lit restaurant and they made you feel welcomed when you entered. They had a wide variety of food to choose from.

We ordered a range of food and the first thing we ordered was skewers, we had beef tongue the other was Pork belly with onion and garlic salt. The tongue was a good texture and not tough. It had a different seasoning so I enjoyed it as i don't normally like tongue. The pork belly was juicy and soft and mixed well with onion and garlic.

We ordered the large sashimi platter which had Salmon, Snapper, Tuna and Kingfish and a few other fish. The fish was all really fresh and melted as you ate it. The wasabi tasted like it was home made and not the tube ones. I almost felt like i was back in Japan.

The Okonomiyaki was really good but not sensational like Japan, it was just missing something and i don't know what.

The Takoyaki was sweet and the octopus was tender, it tasted fresh not like some places that give you frozen ones that become very tough to eat.

The tempura vegetables included beans, eggplants and massive mushrooms. The batter was light and crispy, and the mushrooms are juicy. I was happy with how they tasted.

The Eel on rice was yum , it had no bones and the sauce was not much but enough for the Eel. We decided to order some dessert as we were still hungry.

There was Green Tea, Strawberry and Custard Daifuku with Ice cream. Mochi is a rice paste cake that is the outside, when you fill it with something like ice cream or red bean then it is Daifuku. It is very sweet and its hard to find good Daifuku as if it has been frozen thawed out then refrozen you get ice crystals in the middle and it looses its flavour and texture.

Nishikian is a lovely little place but servings are a bit small for my liking but the food is great and we will go back.

Kind E-gards
Dale Stewart

Poppy's Thai

Poppy's Thai

You know when you want to go to a restaurant and it is empty but fully booked and then you have to find some place else. This was one of those times and i forgot to check the reviews. As you enter they have a door in the middle which was a bit odd but the decor' was cute and they tried to give you that feel you are in Thailand.

 

The staff are polite and they gave us some prawn crackers to start with. The prawn crackers tasted like they had been freshly deep fried whereas some places give you old stale ones.

For mains i ordered a Beef Gang Dang which had Beef, red chilli curry, coconut milk, bamboo, zucchini and pumpkin. The beef was not the best cuts but still tasted alright, the pumpkin fell apart  so i could not complain about that but the curry was a bit bland. It was not a thick curry but a bit watery but i did enjoy the bamboo as i don't think i have had it before. If it had better meat i could have ignored the curry consistency. Was it the worst curry i have ever had...No it was not but not the best by far. Melbourne has such an amazing selection of Thai restaurants that if it is not up to scratch it will get left behind.

My wife ordered a whole fish with hot and sour sauce. We still are not sure what fish it was and i don't think she knew as well but we did not get sick or die so it could not have been that bad.  The fish was cooked well and fell apart but it was not De-boned. I don't knoq what i could tell you about the flavour because it was nothing mind blowing but as i said the fish was cooked well.

Thank goodness the staff are friendly and the place is clean.
Kind E-gards
Dale Stewart