Nhi Huong (2 Sisters)

You may have seen on Twitter the hashtag #firstworldproblems.  You know, like, "so annoying that I have to clean up before my cleaner comes".  There's another level which is #firstworldbloggerproblems.  "Oh, I am so behind in my posts - just can't keep up with all the meals I have out!"  "Darn, I forgot my camera.  *Roll eyes*  Have to use my iPhone then!"  "Gah, why do my kids always order the same dish?  So annoying!"

Another is, "Sigh, I can't go back to that great restaurant because I "need" to try somewhere different."  Well, when the restaurant has a makeover - voila, instant solution to #firstworldbloggerproblem!  Nhi Huong (2 Sisters) are the new residents at the site of Pho Phi Truong.  I'm unsure if it's just a name change - they still use the old Pho Phi Truong menus, but have a new takeaway menu.

Bryan, Billy and I love eating family-style, which of course means I have to bring my often irritating children.  It's not family style without kids rocking the table, spilling their water and stabbing each other with toothpicks!  I know I complain about them but big screen TVs magically transform my children from sped-up ferrets to slack-jawed lumps.

Pipis with XO sauce

A special of the house, pipis with XO sauce.  They were fresh and quite delicious but there was a confoundingly enormous amount of cornflour-bound dark sauce.  They're better just licked with sauce so the dried seafood and ham of the XO sauce can really shine.  Still, I loved soaking up all the sauce with the accompanying Chinese donuts.

Muc rang muoi

Yummy salt-and-pepper squid, presented on fried noodles.  The batter was thicker than usual which was tasty but pretty naughty.  Loads of lovely zingy salt.

Bo tai chanh (rare beef with lemon coleslaw)

The beef here is wafer-thin, as for pho, marinated in lemon so that it is just barely cooked, cured in the acid as in ceviche.  This was pretty good - points for the inclusion of rice paddy herb - but the dressing was very much on the sweet side.  I love piling coleslaw on the prawn crackers to make Vietnamese tostadas. 

Lau De (goat hot pot)

The main event - goat hot pot!  Atop a portable stove bubbled a pot of chunks of goat, taro, tofu and beancurd skin.  Plenty of green vegetables came alongside including chrysanthemum leaves and mustard greens.  We were advised to order egg noodles and they came in a lightly oiled tasty tangle.  Also accompanying were tiny dishes of intense garlic and preserved tofu dipping sauce.

Here's Bryan doing uncle hot pot duties.  The broth was thick with taro yet mild and tasty.  We build little bowl after little bowl with noodles, cooked vegies, goat/taro/tofu and a tiny bit of the OTT garlic sauce.  I don't get my money's worth with goat, though - the point is partly the interplay of texture between meat, fat and skin, but I only eat the (deliciously tender) actual meat.

I love steamboat/hot pot, it's such a fun, dynamic and communal way to eat.  My fellow food bloggers are also such lovely people to eat out with; as well as being tolerant of my kids, they're always pushing the envelope.  What should we order - we want everything!!!  Now that's a #firstworldbloggerproblem I don't mind having.

Nhi Huong (2 Sisters)
255 Hampshire Road, Sunshine
Phone:  9311 6522



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Noodle Kingdom

Street theatre - statue people, pan pipers, pavement chalk artists and now, noodle makers!

Noodle Kingdom, originally of Preston, is probably best known for its handmade noodles.  In late 2010, their Russell Street store was slammed with an enormous fine for multiple food safety breaches.  Undaunted (and hopefully with some better food handling practices and/or more monitoring), they have remodelled Swanston Street's Chinatown Dumpling Restaurant into a reportedly six-storey pagoda paying homage to floury delights.

The dining room is far removed from other function-over-fancy establishments.  A banquette lines one wall, making for comfy reclining.  High above the room at the bank, a dumpling maker in pressed white hat watches benevolently over the room full of marble tables, lit by lantern-like lights.

Chicken, prawn and pork dumplings, $6

These look the business but golly, what thick skins.  They were thick to the point that the dumplings almost seemed like buns - we're talking half a centimetre thick here.  The filling was tasty but not all that juicy.

Dry-fried french bean, $14.80

These were all right, not the best I've had.  The mince was quite coarse and there was little flavour other than soy sauce.  Vegetarians, always beware this dish as the menu description rarely mentions the pork mince it is flavoured with and it's often filed under "Vegetables".

Stir-fried chicken with nuts and veg (hand-made broad noodle base), $16.80

My sister had gone here with a group of about 10 and everyone unanimously agreed her choice, above, was the best.  Say no more!  This was indeed pretty unreal.  The noodles were fantastic, wide and flat like fettuccine, with unparalleled al dente bite and seductive slipperiness.  I think the chicken chunks were deep fried.  Peanuts gave lots of fabulous crunch and we loved the mild heat of the fat red chillies.  Moistened with a little soy, it was a great dish.

So far, the noodles are the drawcard here for me.  There are many different shapes and styles to try, including in their beef noodle soup which is apparently a specialty.  The decor is quite lovely (although the toilets were filthy) and big points for Mountain Goat and Little Creatures beers on offer.  With Noodle Kingdom opposite the fantastic Dumplings Plus and the buzzing Taiwan Cafe, Asian food on Swanston Street is starting to get exciting!

P.S.  Sooper-dooper new comment system now installed where I can reply to your comment in a "thread" so no more of that cumbersome "Bob - yes!  Sarah - absolutely!" old Blogger style replying.  You can also sign in with Facebook and Twitter.  (If you log in via Facebook, click "Don't Allow" when it says Footscray Food Blog wants permission to post as you.  I don't want that at all but don't know how to disable it!!)


UPDATE:  Had to uninstall less than sooper-dooper comment system - it flicks back to Blogger comments occasionally it seems and if someone comments through that, it deletes all the new comments in the new system.  *sigh*  Hopefully I can find another program that's more consistent.




Noodle Kingdom
264 Swanston Street, Melbourne
Phone:  9650 1818
Hours:  Daily lunch and dinner



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Quan Viet, Braybrook

My friend wrote to me recently with a scandalous confession.  "I have never eaten Vietnamese food before," she confided.  "Will you teach me?"  Absolutely!!  Where else better to do it too than her new local Quan Viet which has opened on the site of an old chicken shop in South Road, Braybrook.

Sometimes when something is the only "one" in an area, you worry they have no bar to meet.  Not so here - the food is unreal and there are heaps of interesting regional specialties from the southern part of Vietnam's eastern coastline.  It's only small but the decor is lovely, contemporary yet colourful.  With six kids between us, we made so much mess and noise but no-one minded a jot.

Some rocket fuel to get the tummies rumbling.  J remarked that Vietnamese coffee tastes like Tootsie Rolls - I have to concur!  Don't suck it down too fast, let the ice melt a little to create a long, cold drink.

Nem cuon Nha Trang (Nha Trang grilled pork patties rice paper rolls), $9

These are a house special and a delicacy from Nha Trang in south-eastern Vietnam.  They are freshly rolled with chargrilled nem nuong pork patties (very springy from the baking powder and very finely ground pork used), a skinny, crunchy spring roll with a little spring onion inside, and plenty of fresh herbs and vegies.  The sauce is totally new to me.  It was orange, smooth, mild and lip-smackingly good!  We asked and were told it contained pork - maybe this is it.  These are fabulous in flavour and in texture, with juicy, smoky meat, the crunch of the roll and the sweet, cool vegies.  See here for a home-style banquet of these rolls.

Banh hoi dac biet (sugarcane prawn, grilled pork & spring rolls on angel vermicelli), $12

Poor J - I was torn between wanting to show her the classics and selfishly wanting to try unusual things!  Luckily Quan Viet offers this fantastic combo which means you can have your spring rolls but eat your sugarcane prawns too.  Take a cup of lettuce, fill with herbs and a "mat" of very fine vermicelli (they come in little squares), lay with your choice of spring roll, sugarcane prawn (prawn mince molded around sugarcane and fried/grilled) or excellent, smoky, juicy grilled pork.  Roll up tight and dip in fish sauce.  The classic Vietnamese flavour combo - superb.

Com bo luc lac (Shaken beef on rice), $9

This was J's favourite dish of the day and indeed it was excellent.  It's called shaken or shaking beef for the motion of the searing hot wok as you quickly toss cubes of beef back and forth.  The beef here was really tender and juicy. To be really authentic, it doesn't come with a thick cornflour-based sauce but the beef juices just speak for themselves, soaking into the classic tomato-red rice.  Here it was served with a dipping sauce made with just freshly-squeezed lime into a mix of salt and pepper.  Really great.

Com tam dac biet (broken rice with pork spare rib, shredded pork, eggloaf, fried egg), $9

The Vietnamese everyman's meal - the most classic everyday lunch.  It may or may not come with a bowl of chicken broth but will come with a bowl of seasoned fish sauce for dousing.  The egg here was gorgeous with a runny, sunny yolk, atop a generous serve of broken rice.  The pork chop was delicious, big and meaty with a tasty, sweet marinade.

Com chien cua (Crab meat fried rice), $11

I spotted a couple having a plate of this to themselves each.  It was fantastic - rich and tasty with soft shreds of egg and pieces of sweet, good quality crab meat.  This sort of fried rice isn't really for covering with another meat-based stir fry, but for enjoying on its own merits.

Banh khot vung tau (Vung Tau Crispy Mini Rice Cake), $9

I went back with another friend recently to investigate more regional specialties at Quan Viet.  These are teeny little patty pan-sized steamed cakes made from coconut milk and rice flour (see here for a recipe).  Each is dotted with a juicy niblet of prawn and (I think) sprinkled with prawn floss (essentially ground dried prawns).  They taste just like mini banh xeo (Vietnamese pancake).  Roll up in lettuce with mint and pickled carrot and dip in classic seasoned fish sauce - a flavour and texture sensation!  These are very rarely seen on Melbourne restaurant menus - Alan enjoyed some at Richmond's Thanh Ha 2.

Mi ga chien don (egg noodle with crispy chicken), $9

When we came here originally, we totally neglected the other side of the Vietnamese food coin - all its soups in their sweet, sour, herbaceous or chilli-slicked glory.  This is a naughty favourite of mine - a bowl of egg noodles in flavoursome chicken broth, with a crispy fried chicken Maryland on the side.  Oh my!  The chicken was awesome, the skin crackly and gorgeous and the meat succulent.  The noodles didn't rock my world though - I think they were dried rather than fresh, which is perfectly acceptable but I love that springiness fresh mi (egg noodles) have.

I loved my meals here and really dig the neighbourhood vibe.  There are still more unusual goodies to check out on their menu like tom hoa tien, conical spring rolls apparently known as "rocket shrimp rolls", filled with crab and with a prawn tail poking cheekily out one end.  Lucky Braybrook residents can wander here on a summer's evening, and even if it's not within walking distance, I reckon it is worth the trip.

Check out Kenny's recent visit here.

Quan Viet - Facebook - see menu below

103 South Road, Braybrook

Hours:  6 days, 10am-9pm - CLOSED TUESDAYS

Phone:  9312 1009

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Shanghai Street Dumplings

There was an interesting debate on the Melbourne food bloggers' Facebook group recently about queuing for food.  More restaurants are now doing a no-reservations policy where it's first in, best dressed.  This can create long waits which put people off, but personally I don't mind it.  More time to catch up and chat while the anticipation grows...  More drinks at the bar!  In some ways it's more democratic - everyone has to wait their turn.

I do love Hu Tong but have not been there for eons, although not for lack of trying.  Spontaneous dumpling cravings lead to me dragging people up there only to be constantly turned away for not booking.  Especially as these gorgeous daylight savings evenings just keep rolling in, I am just as happy to join the orderly line at Shanghai Street when the xiao long bao craving strikes.

Shanghai Street is a functional shop serving dumplings and "mini juicy buns" that has swooped in to capitalise on the collective swoon Melbourne has for xiao long bao in particular.  As Nina Rousseau writes, husband and wife team Min Shi and Wayna Zhu have much experience making dumplings back in Shanghai.  You may indeed have to queue but both times I have been, arriving at 6pm meant that we first waited five minutes and the second time walked straight in.

Homemade traditional steamed Shanghai xiao long bao (pork), $8.80

Xiao long bao are a type of steamed dumpling from eastern China.  The classic version is made with pork mince with gelatinous meat stock that upon heating melts to create the magical experience of a dumpling filled with hot soup.

To eat, place in spoon, pierce with tooth or chopstick and allow the soup to drain out before slurping.  OH SO GOOD - it's almost like the stock has been double-cooked, once on its own and secondly upon steaming and melting, it has picked up more intense porky flavour from the filling.  The minced filling itself is clean-tasting, gingery, soft and consistently textured.  These are really fabulous - hard for me to compare to Hu Tong as it's been so long, but really, really great.

Homemade steamed Shanghai xiao long bao (veg), $8.80

An interesting feature of the menu is xiao long baos of many sorts - crab and pork, chicken and pork, even panfried.  These vegetarian ones were interesting - a carefully-made filling of lovingly chopped greens with a little rice vermicelli and occasional umami pops of shiitake mushroom.  Normally I only get vegetarian dumplings fried as the nondescript filling needs to be offset by some oily crunch, but these were good steamed.  No classic xiao long bao soup but good nonetheless.  Sorry no mid-bite shot in which you would have seen the vibrant, emerald-green filling!

Pork & prawn wonton in chili oil with peanut & sesame butter sauce, $8.30

Fantastic pork and prawn wontons.  While the xiao long bao filling was pillow soft, here the filling was bouncy yet still juicy with chunks of prawn in slippery, seductive wrappers.  They came in a light broth just tinged with chilli oil but with the interesting addition of "sesame butter" (like tahini!) and chopped peanuts.  A taste sensation - the springy, juicy prawn with delicate, silky pastry, complemented by dobs of rich, thick sesame paste.  Hard to describe but I think an absolute classic.

Fried pork dumpling, $8.50

The classic jiao zi dumpling - these can come either boiled or fried.  These fried pork examples were pretty good.  The filling was honest and of good quality, minced pork with visible ginger and spring onions.  The skins were good with appreciably crusty bottoms, perfect dunked in a little black vinegar.  They weren't overly juicy though - I think I might prefer the super-crispy, rich and juicy ones at Dumplings Plus.

Homemade golden sesame seeded bacon & spring onion cakes, $4.50

Oh lordy, these were awesome.  Short, flaky, lardy pastry enclosing little smidgens of bacon and onion, the top rippling with sesame seeds.  Delicious!!

This place is pretty unreal.  You can really taste the freshness, helped by the massive turnover every day.  Each filling was unique, each skin texturally different and I was particularly impressed by the care evident in the vegetarian dumplings, which can often just be a cabbagey mush fest.  The only drawback to the queue outside is you feel somewhat pressured to eat and leave - I must say never by the staff, who are friendly and professional, but I had a sense of pity for all the hungry people waiting outside.  Nevertheless, my advice is to stagger your ordering as between chatting and eating, two plates of dumplings can cool fast and they are much better piping hot.  Sorry people in the queue for delaying you further - but as you will find out soon, when it is this good, it's worth waiting for.

Thanks Billy and Dan for the original tip (via this post).  Dan Kuseta is an all-round lovely, genuine person who has poured his heart and soul into Milk Bar Mag, "an independent guide to the best of Melbourne.  Updated daily and covering everything from food to freebies to art to architecture, the Milk Bar is your cultural and creative guide to the city".  Check it out!




Shanghai Street
342 Little Bourke Street, City
Hours:  Mon-Sat 11.30am-8.30pm
Licensed and BYO (no corkage, woohoo!)
Cash only



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Phong Dinh Footscray

Phong Dinh, specialising in hu tieu mi (rice/egg noodle) dishes, has opened on the seemingly ill-fated site that housed the short-lived Thai and Korean restaurants.  Let's hope they have a long and prosperous future there, as the food is really promising.

LOVE the outdoor area.  It's not a "true" outdoor area in the sense that you can't smoke out there and probably couldn't bring a dog, but you still get lots of lovely fresh air and feel somewhat more comfortable making huge amounts of noise and mess (...whether you have kids with you or not!)

Hu tieu mi tom thit (kho) - rice & egg noodles with prawn and pork (dry) $9

Hu tieu mi literally means "rice/egg noodle" and are a subset of dishes that can be made with either rice or egg noodles (or my favourite, a mixture) with some sort of topping/main ingredient, such as a piece of crispy fried chicken, wontons, prawn and pork, seafood etc.  Some hu tieu mi dishes will say "soup/dry".  "Soup" means that broth will be ladled on top to make a full bowl of soup whereas dry means the noodles will come as a sort of salad with a small bowl of broth on the side.

after mixing...

The prawn and pork hu tieu mi is perhaps the most classic in my opinion and while I love the soup version, a good "dry" (kho) is excellent - as is Phong Dinh's version.  Here, a tangle of fabulously textured, pleasantly bitey clear rice and curly egg noodles are tossed with just a little dark sauce (I think dark sweet soy?) and then topped with good prawns, tasty sliced pork, a quail's egg, bean sprouts and a cracker "lid".  This is dressed with just a little judiciously-applied sweet chilli sauce.  Add a spoonful or two of their absolutely excellent broth, filled with pork mince, chips of pork fat and spring onion, and mix (Thanks Hung for the tip a long time ago).  Slurp slurp, moan...  Delicious!

Com tam bi suon cha trung, $9

Great com tam - a very generous serve of broken rice (rice once "broken" in two as a by-product of milling but now produced for its own merit, beloved for its different texture to whole rice) with a well-marinated, tasty pork chop, snipped for ease of eating with fork and spoon.  The egg was divine with a runny yolk just begging to be popped.  Great bi (shredded pork and skin) which I normally do not love, but this was really fresh, very meaty and you could really taste the intriguing, nutty flavour of the roasted rice powder.  Lots of vegies, both pickled and fresh, lighten up what can be a meatfest.

Goi do bien (seafood coleslaw) $18.50

The only down point of the meal was the seafood coleslaw.  These vary wildly in price and had been originally what I wanted for dinner.  We couldn't get a spot at Hao Phong, where the coleslaws are all around $10 (looking at old pictures, I think they are smaller serves though).  This was $18.50 and didn't really seem like a coleslaw than a mixed pickle with seafood...  There was well-pickled carrot, daikon and onion, very sweet, with very little contrasting greenery and not enough crunchy shallots or peanuts.  Still, the seafood was fresh and we did eat the lot.

A very promising new offering to the Hopkins Street scene.  They are licensed which is handy and take cards albeit with some surcharges (none for EFTPOS).  The menu does include all the classics like rice paper rolls, beef in vine leaf etc.  Other menu gems I want to check out are mi siu cao (egg noodles with big prawn dumplings, usually only an off-cart secret of sorts at yum cha), Hanoi-style rice vermicelli soup and some good-looking barramundi in a clean tank, ready for eating with tamarind sauce or ginger and shallots.

I believe Phong Dinh either have or had an original restaurant in St Albans.  I also saw what I think is a second Phu Vinh opening in Sunshine recently.  Hu tieu mi shops rock!

Phong Dinh
152 Hopkins Street, Footscray


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Cong Tu Bac Lieu, Westville Central

UPDATE:  This restaurant is now closed and as of August 2012, most shops in Westville Central

The Westville Central apartment and shopping complex has recently opened up the top of Nicholson Street, giving us lots of new nooks and crannies to investigate.  Its flagship store seems to be the expansive (and expensive) Footscray Asian Buffet Restaurant, which in its short lifespan seems to have dramatically plummeting prices as the weeks have gone by.  I think it is dear because they have all-you-can-eat seafood but if you don't really want to do nothing but pig out on prawns, the price has made it kind of off limits.  They are down to $17.99 for an adult for a weekday lunch, though, so maybe it's worth trying.

Nha Hang Cong Tu Bac Lieu (or, "the long name place") is a dear little restaurant tucked away inside offering a Southern Vietnamese-influenced menu that punches above its weight.

I love the thoughtful decor and the menu is pretty cool too, with quite a few unusual dishes like Cha Ca Chien Com Chay or "fish paste on crispy rice", caramelised shrimp with pork and goat casserole.  Sadly a lot of these more unusual things were not available that day - hopefully it was just a recently-opened thing.

Pandan tea comes as standard which is a refreshing, floral South Vietnamese touch.

Banh mi xiu mai, $10

A DIY sandwich with meatballs and pickled carrot and daikon.  The meatballs were really good, pleasantly fatty and so juicy.  They were so soft and tender, it somehow defies physics that they stay together.  In hindsight this was probably a bit overpriced when the same thing, un-deconstructed at Nhu Lan is $3.80 but relatively overall it is still cheap.

Bun chao tom, $9.50

If you haven't gathered by now, I love bun salads.  Minus the nuts and depending on what meat you choose, they are virtually fat free.  Sugarcane prawns are a kind of prawn/fish paste formed around a sugarcane stalk and grilled/fried.  This was a good version - the prawns were not as plump as say, Sen's but still really good.  The salad was spanking fresh and I would wager the golden, thready shallots were fried on the premises.

Com Tam Suon Ci Cha Trung, $9

This was an excellent version of a classic.  The pork chop was really tender and tasty with a not overpoweringly sweet marinade.  The "cake" on the left is cha trung and it's a kind of steamed meatloaf made with pork mince, rice vermicelli noodles, black wood ear fungus and then topped with egg.  You can see a recipe here (thanks to Wandering Chopsticks).  Above is the bi or shredded pork skin with rice powder.  This is a great option for kids as there are just a few token vegetables but they get to try a lot of different textures.  It came with a delicious bowl of chicken broth.

Banh Tan Bi Soc Trang, $11

Billy had tweeted somewhat teasingly when he first had this that he had just eaten a Vietnamese dish he had never had before.  If you know Billy, that is saying something!  Indeed, these Soc Trang-style noodles are totally new to me too and they are fantastic.  Soc Trang is a province deep in the south of Vietnam.  Its original Khmer name was Srok Kh'leang meaning "silver depository" as it was the location of the Khmer (old Cambodia) king's silver treasury.  It comprised thick, white, spaghetti-like bun bo Hue noodles, meatballs as featured above, salad, bi and crazy crazy COCONUT CREAM!

The coconut coated everything giving it all luscious slipperiness while the tangy tomato of the meatballs shone through.  The coconut made it taste slightly Thai which might represent Soc Trang's location in the deep delta.  I shared Billy's delight in this unusual and unique regional dish.  See here for more info.  Interestingly, the Bac Lieu in Cong Tu Bac Lieu's name is a neighbouring province to Soc Trang while Tra Vinh just down Nicholson Street is yet another neighbouring province.

I really hope NHCTBL's gaps in the menu are only temporary as it is so refreshing to find regional specialties among the sizzling plates.  Meanwhile Westville Central's shops are slowly filling up.  Next to NHCTBL is a bubble tea place that as well as pearl drinks, sells balut (fertilised chicken eggs).  Cool!

See Billy's visits here.

Nha Hang Cong Tu Bac Lieu
Westville Central, 4/62 Nicholson Street, Footscray
Phone:  9004 2013
Hours:  7 days, 9am - 9pm



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