Donovan's

Donovan's in St Kilda is a restaurant that has excellent recommendations (Awarded 2 Chefs Hats by The Age Good Food Guide 2008), with the food generally getting good reviews. but unfortunately tempered by some complaints of bad service.

 

Ambience-wise, Donovan's is truly excellent.

You get a view of the beach and the sea, and I loved the quirkily designed interior which gives it a very cozy and comfortable feel.

As you can see, they use different chairs, the walls have plenty of things on them, everything looking very nice and comfy.

They started us off with some bread with butter and a fava bean dip, something I haven't tried before. I have a tendency to overdose on bread before a meal, and that's because I'm usually hungry while waiting for the food to arrive. The bread was excellent, and the dip was good as well.

I don't quite know how to describe this starter. It was called a 'parfait' on the menu, but as far as I know, a parfait is some form of dessert. If anything, it resembled pate more than anything. Maybe foie gras, but I haven't had that before, so I cannot say. Loved the quail, enjoyed the two chunks of pate-like meat, don't really know what the cherries were doing on the plate.

Oh yes, it came with some toast as well. More bread.

And then, we had some scallops. Seared. The only scallops I've ever before had were the preserved ones used in chinese cooking, and since I've heard a lot about 'seared scallops' from Top Chef, I thought it'd be good to try it. And the verdict? Not too bad, but nothing spectacular. Nice to look at though.

To the mains!

Unfortunately, this is where it fell short.

This fish, tasted a lot like chinese style steamed fish with soy sauce. And because we're used to that, this tasted weird, with the creamy mashed potatoes and the oxtail stew around it. There was also too much sauce.

And the pork chop. Its supposed to be one of their top recommendations, but, tsk tsk. I don't know why it is so, but western cooking seems to favour certain meats with the fat on them. Like duck. And this pork chop. I'm usually one who loves the fat on the pork, but this was too much for me. And you add to that the two chunks of garlic butter on top.

Just look at the butter dripping off the thing. And the cotechino (that's the sausage slice), I took a bite onto that, and it was SO oily. Oil, oil, and more oil. I had to remove a chunk of the garlic butter, and then remove the fat from the pork, and the cotechino was just inedible. The only saving grace was the lettuce in a bowl that came together with the dish.

Because of the disappointing mains, we did not proceed to dessert, and left soon thereafter.

Butter and Cheese

This morning, I was making my breakfast, which consisted of 2 slices of Helga's bread,each with some butter and ham on it. Now, because the butter just came out from the fridge, it was still hard and not spreadable, so, I had to scrape it multiple times and force it onto the bread. What resulted was little knobs of butter on the bread.

My friends who were sitting down nearby noticed it and asked, "Is that ham and cheese?"

And I replied "Nope, its butter."

"WHAT?! BUTTER!?", they exclaimed.

Confused, I said "What's wrong with butter?"

"Jian Wey, your heart must be dying inside you."

My question now is, is butter any much less healthy than cheese?

Taman Midah Curry Mee

In Cheras there is a place called Taman Midah, and in one of the lanes in Taman Midah, is a stall selling curry noodles (and also Lum Mee and other things).

Nowadays, to really get any drink to be less sweet, you'll have to actually hammer it into them. I want 'Extra Kurang Kurang Kurang Manis', or better yet, just say 'Teh Tarik Kosong'.

Due to miscommunication problems, I ended up with Curry Wantan Mee instead of Curry Beehoon Mee, but which actually tasted way better than what I expected.

Like I said, they have other things like Prawn Mee, Lum Mee, and any combination of noodles in any of the soup they have.

An excellent place for breakfast.

Marsala Lamb Shank at Delicious, Bangsar ViIIage

Lamb Shank at Delicious. Expensive, but very filling and quite good.