Tenth Muse is deeply disappointing, or: I don't finish

I often leave meals languishing in my iPhoto for months before blogging them. This one's really fresh; just hours old and driven by my deep and desperate disappointment. 

The Tenth Muse boasts wide range of omni, vegetarian, vegan and gluten free options.  I love ordering a vegan meal directly off the menu without going through all the 'no dairy' specifics. This morning I ordered the big vegan fry-up with beans and avocados. 

Coffee (watery) came and went. I read the paper cover to cover. We were the only customers. The music alternated between ear-bleeding and silent. 

Breakfast came. It was big. 

It was the worst cooked breakfast I can recall.

The Turkish bread was doused in what must have been at least two tablespoons of Nuttelex. The tomatoes were barely cooked. The scrambled tofu was soggy and bland. Every single thing on my plate was drowning in oil.

The avocado was black and brown all the way through.  The picture above doesn't do it credit. I cannot believe anyone had the cheek to plate it, let alone charge money for it. 

If I want baked beans from a tin I'll go home and open one of the little tins I keep which cost $5 for 8 at Coles. If I want a McDonald's hash brown I'll go there (I won't. But if I want a hash brown like the one here I'll go to the supermarket and buy a plastic bag full of frozen ones). 

Not a single thing tasted of anything but oil. If I had ordered this at Fat Eddy's Route 66 Side-of-the-Highway Cafe on Wheels at 3 in the morning, I would have been pleased. In a cafe situated in the heart of Melbourne's coffee'n'cafe streets, which has obviously taken great care to create a menu to suit all dietary preferences, this was incredibly disappointing. 

This disappointing: this is what I ate. 

I have rarely not finished a meal, and I've never chosen not to continue one after a couple of bites.  Especially when I'm paying for it. I just couldn't bear to eat this one at all. 

And when our harried waiter collected my virtually-intact plate, there was no checking if the meal was ok. Clearly it wasn't. 

We didn't get charged for our coffees because of the wait. It was the small positive (along with all the same-sex marriage rally pictures on the wall. I liked them).

I left deeply disappointed and feeling ripped off. There was nothing special, nothing even passable, about this breakfast. Much as I want to support any cafe that offers vegan options, I won't be back. I went home and ate toast.

End KeepCup Prejudice Now, Snobaristas! or, Keep On Keeping Up, KeepCup!

Lisa Dempster has written an excellent article on I eat I drink I work exploring the intricacies of the coffee surcharge, from decaf to mocha to - the main interest of this writer - soy milk. I have always hated but accepted with grumpy surliness the soy surcharge imposed by almost every coffee shop, but Lisa's interviews with various coffee vendors has shown that soy really does cost extra, and despite the call that the extra cost should be averaged out over all beverages, the imperative of the business owner to, you know, make a proft from their business makes an end to the soycharge (ha!) unlikely.

But what really grabbed me was a comment on Lisa's blog that some Melbourne coffee shops have taken to placing a surcharge on, or even refusing to use, KeepCups.

I love KeepCups. They're well designed, they're environmentally loving, they're cute, they'r easy to clean, and they have really caught on with consumers. And what's more, they save the vendor money in not using a disposable cup and not costing them washing up resources. Big shout out here to my regular coffee vendors, Espresso Depot at 1 Collins Street, who after noticing my KeepCup got really excited and started selling the cups themselves. 

I was outraged to hear that some businesses aren't behind the BYO cup surge sweeping the city. But I was even more shocked to experience not hours later my own instance of KeepCup Prejudice!

I went to a team meeting at - name and shame! - City Wine Bar on Spring Street. I asked for my coffee to be put in my KeepCup so I could take it away in case I didn't finish it. I can only surmise that the City Wine Bar's cultivated European atmosphere would be offended by the interloping plastic of my KeepCup, as I was told that store policy was to not allow KeepCups on the table - but they would do takeaways. Quelle bloody horreur!

I kept my KeepCup on the table throughout the meeting - empty, but who was to know? - for over an hour. No staff member asked me to put it away. No uber-too-cool-for-school trendoids fainted. No coiffeured besuited ladies sniffed. No one spat. And then I left, having bought nothing, to go and get my coffee on my way back to the office from the place I like best.

In Grade 4 my teacher banned the phrase "I don't get it" from his classroom. But I don't. There's nothing particularly nice about 100-washes old glass tumblers (and if you Snobaristas think that my coffee will just taste better in one, then leave that to me to decide). There's certainly nothing nice about single use cardboard cups. If you want to impose an aesthetic standard, then start with banning skinny jeans that reveal circumcision status and faux-Rihanna mohawks.

So get on board. Bringing your own cup is sensible, less costly to the vendor, promoting environmentally sustainable choices, and just doing your bit. 

*Disclaimer: I have two KeepCups (Small: white with chocolate trim, light mushroom lid and matt chocolate plug. Medium: white with light green trim, dark mushroom lid and chocolate plug). My sister has two (One medium like mine. One medium: white with fuschia trim, chocolate lid and aqua plug). Buzz has one (Medium: black with chocolate trim, black lid, chocolate plug). Toby has Darth Vader (Black. Just black). Lots of people have them. Speed up.

The Commune coffee - Oh Soy Drinkers, How We Suffer! The Commune, East Melbourne.

Ah, such is the lot of a soy drinker. Used to being slugged a surcharge for our soy drinking at every turn, this earns grizzles and grumbles but we usually succumb to our caffeine cravings and ask for an extra-large cup anyway.

It is my understanding that a coffee loyalty card entitles the bearer to one free coffee after a certain number are purchased. Some restrictions may apply, if published on said card, but in general the coffee purveyor accepts that in exchange for the repeat business of their customers, a small loss may be incurred when the unscrupulous suddenly upgrade their freebie.

Not so the owners of The Commune – Basement 2-6 Parliament Place East Melbourne, www.thecommune.com.au – which services the captive audience of bureaucrats around St Andrews Place, Macarthur Street and Treasury Place. Their freebie comes with (unpublished) caveats – soy drinkers must pay for their soy as an ‘add-on’ even when a free coffee is reached, and even when they have purchased the requisite number of soy-filled coffees. Apparently this is because some customers would ‘suddenly’ upgrade to soy on their freebie (at the wallet-busting cost of up to 80 whole cents a pop)!

As a soy drinker I find this highly suspect. Non-soy drinkers hate soy. You do, you tell us all the time. I find it a stretch to think that hordes of devious caffeine addicts would consider the opportunity to sneakily add soy to their free coffee an irresistible temptation to commit fraud. Some might do it for an extra shot, maybe; or some vanilla syrup, likely. But I can’t for the life of me imagine a dairy-drinker gleefully whispering “Today I will get soy! For free! Oh mwahahaha!”.

So what other reason could there be? Arrogance, perhaps. This writer has already been on the receiving end of unsolicited public soy-bashing from staff at The Commune (written about in a blog piece when she was too discreet to name and shame), or perhaps it is simply the opportunity to express disdain of ‘not real coffee’. In that case, please add a $10 charge to every small weak skinny decaff and refuse to serve anything but a short black after 10am.

A step too far, Commune. Sort yourselves out.

Feeding to Fitzroyalty, or: Miss T goes live

I know you can't get enough of me. I can't get enough of me.

Fitzroyalty has kindly offered to stream some of my posts to hyperlocal pages, so vegan musings, eatering, shoppering and other ings are now also syndicated here:

http://indolentdandy.net/fitzroy/
http://indolentdandy.net/carlton/
http://indolentdandy.net/brunswick/
http://indolentdandy.net/collingwood/
http://indolentdandy.net/innernorth/

Or - you could just go straight to www.indolentdandy.net. Whatevs.

Step 1 of my plan to achieve total world domination is go.

PS the wonderful Cindy and Michael of Where's The Beef are also over there so it is most certainly a place of quality.

Desecration Decoration, or: The Carlton Hotel is despicable.

In the hallowed, insular state-of-being of Australian Rules Football, there are immutable precepts and sacrosanct laws. One of them is that everyone hates the Collingwood Magpies. In return, Collingwood's mortal enemies are the Essendon Bombers and the Carlton Blues. As a one-eyed 'Pie, I am bound by blood, duty and honour to loathe mine enemies and smite them (this causes some real problems with Buzz, as we are in fact a mixed marriage. Whilst I am a mongrel magpie, he is a bloody blue and I can't repeat the epithets I delivered to him when Carlton beat Collingwood twice last season).

And I now have another Carlton to loathe and despise. Last night we went to the Carlton Hotel and the contempt I hold for their decorating preferences outstrips by a millionfold even my antipathy towards the Blues.

The Carlton Hotel is festooned with the stuffed bodies of animals - peacocks, parrots, butterflies, an ostrich and the neck and head of a giraffe. A rhino head is a copy in flocking, but in the midst of the other 'exhibits' provides little relief.

I just can't fathom the decision to pay for the corpses of deliberately killed animals to adorn your walls. They are positioned, observing, around the bar; dumbly witnessing the evening and the subject of both pointing fingers and bland stares from eyes that slide over them as they would any other object.

Perhaps I am an animal sizeist, but it was the head, neck and part of the chest of the giraffe that made me the saddest. So large, so quartered, so anomalous in her journey from wherever she was killed to an upstairs bar on scummy Bourke Street on a drunken Saturday night. She raised her head over the goings-on, like a spire, with the body of a tiny bird perched on her ear in a parody of life.

Somehow no matter where I tried to stand, I was always facing her.

As the night wore on I noticed more, and what became apparent after closer observation of the animals made me angry, contemptuous and despairing.

The ostrich had pearls wrapped around her neck like a choker; the giraffe had been prettied up with glittery eyelashes and golden eyeliner.

It was meant to be amusing, quirky, perhaps a reflection of the clientele; but it was the ultimate assault on the dignity of death. Such a fate - slaughtered to become a still and silent 3D mannequin, only to be gussied up for decoration and display. It's not enough that a living, breathing, sentient animal's dead body is presented for decoration, but it must be made a mockery of, dressed up and dolled up like a grand dame.

I can't think that the Carlton Hotel is bringing itself any good karma. I can only despise a decision to display what they have. You should bury those bodies with the dignity they deserve.

Graffiti Safari.

Has anyone seen these Vegan tags everywhere (I know Pip has! But I can't find the picture of her next to it ....)? They're all over the train line from Clifton Hill to the city, Victoria Parade/Street and surrounds.


I saw some more AR-ish work on a recent Graffiti Safari with Buzz and Cousin Zacman - whaddya think?

World Vegan Day, or: deletions deletions

Oh Grr Argh. I wrote a long post (read: masterpiece. Pulitzer worthy. Really. ) this afternoon on World Vegan Day, meaning that I am the last Melbourne blogger to do so, and even though I know I saved it, it has disappeared thus depriving all mankind of its greatest literary achievement. Yeah! (also the font button has disappeared, thus ruining my unbroken chain of Arial).

Anyway, what I'll do instead is:

a. tell you how fabulous my lost masterpiece was;

b. dot point the highlights:

• My badge - Kiss Me I'm Vegan - and book - Tempting Tempeh - from the aduki stall where Lisa and Emily puppysat Sam;
• The chocolate peanut balls and caramel slice from Tart'n'Round - sweet, think, bloody rich and a little pricey but bloody good;
• Our meals from Enlightened Cuisine - my first with them but now not last; and
• Buzz signing up to sponsor WSPA. I almost burst with pride.
  

c. post some yummy pictures:


Enlightened Cuisine sweet'n'sour 'pork' and satay 'lamb':

Enlightened Cuisine stirfried tofu and crispy duck (which Buzz assures me is very realistic, which I suppose is interesting in a human-flesh-tastes-like-chicken-I-ate-it-with-some-fava-beans-and-a-nice-glass-
of-chianti -tss-tss-tss kinda way):

Enlightened Cuisine satay 'chicken' skewers. I liked eating off the skewer. Me live in cave.


Sorbet from Fritz gelato - Bounty on the bottom, banana or mango on the top:


Sam thinks he might get some food. He did. I mean, c'mon.

A Study in Contrasts, or: I get some wicked service and some scatty service and think I need to forsake my weekend cooked breakfasts and take a stand.

Two recent eatering events have really highlighted the vast disparity in waiters' switched-on-edness to me. One experience left me ruminating on the value and warmth of a waiter who is engaged, knowledgeable and friendly, and the other left me just really pissy.

Item The First: On Friday night Buzz and I ate at Nudel Bar, on the recommendation of The Melbourne Veg Food Guide (and on the recommendation of my stomach, which demanded flat rice noodles and Asian-style vegies now, biatch). And as psychically predicted by stomach which led me directly and zombie-like to Nudel Bar, there were flat rice noodles with vegies on the menu, and I marvelled at the homing signal that my main digestory organ can emit when hungry.

When I ordered I asked the waiter if that dish contained any fish or oyster sauce. Clearly her psychic powers were on high alert too, because she asked if I was vegan, and said that she thought that there might be some non-veganness in there. She came back with a special menu that listed different dishes suitable for vegans, vegetarians, coeliacs and all other sorts of 'difficult' eaters (the menu didn't say that. I just made it up as an encapsulating term for us eatering freaks), and said that although my rice dish was on the vegan list, she had had a feeling that it did contain fish sauce, had asked the kitchen, lo and behold it did indeed and she recommended something else which she had also checked with the chefs. What a woman!

My vegan Mee Goreng was a huge serve, very tasty and all over just edging on to value for money at $19.80. What left me grinning and with a wish in my heart to return, however, was not the lovely crispy fried shallots or rich sauce, but the waiter's attention to detail, that she bothered to check with the kitchen for each dish, and that the restaurant even had a special list.already prepared. Nudel Bar, this is great service and the lovely waiter with red hair deserves a pay rise and a big hug.

Below: Vegan Mee Goreng at Nudel Bar.


Item The Second: Buzz and I often go to Gluttony on Smith Street for breakfast, partly because they have a separate vegan menu, partly because their cooked breakfasts are great, and partly because they are absolutely massive. In fact, when I was overseas I had particularly naughty thoughts about how many I could eat.

Below: big & tasty Gluttony breakfast for girls with hungry tummies


A few months ago we noticed a run of instances at Gluttony where, for example, my toast came with butter (and when sent back for rectification but never reappeared), or my plate came served with a little pot of mayonnaise which necessitated a whole re-litigation of how my breakfast was cooked, and removal of said breakfast once the kitchen had confirmed it was all very buttery. Mostly we were served by a very scatty waiter who appears to make a habit of not really listening and spacing out a bit. This made us abandon Gluttony for a time, but the lure of their chili beans and olive toast brought us back.

On the next few occasions we were served by a different and very capable waiter. Ms Capable Waiter informed us that vegan breakfasts were normally cooked in Nuttelex, whereas up until then we had been informed by Mr Scatty Waiter that it could only be cooked in oil. Ms Capable Waiter was very switched on and my meals came out squeaky-clean-vegan and yummy.

Today, however, marked a new low in Gluttony/MissT relations. We were served by Mr Scatty Waiter again. I very clearly said that I was vegan and wanted my meal cooked in Nuttelex. He said that they only did it in oil, which was confusing but I agreed - I'd already been pretty clear that no dairy was the go and said the 'v' word loud and clear.

Upon (late) arrival, a little pot of mayo nestled in my plate. It was served by Ms Capable Waiter again so I asked her what the sitch with the rest of my meal was. She went and checked with Scatty, who I clearly heard say "But she only said she wanted it cooked in oil!". This resulted in an outpouring of semi-whispered vitriol to our table from me. Scatty came over, said "my apologies!", took my plate away, and returned it less than a minute later without mayo, but with a piece of olive toast that had the lacy bit of fried egg white on it. Once I realised a few minutes later I tore it off, wrapped it in a napkin, handed it back to him and said why - he looked confused, smiled, walked off and did nothing more to work out why his customers were returning food into his hand.

A little later, he came over and asked if I wanted some mushrooms now - as it had been almost 15 minutes since my new meal came, and I already had mushrooms on my plate, this only served to raise the spectre of butter once again.

After a fair degree of intra-table sniping, I decided to ditch the passive-aggressivity and say something. On the way out I spoke to the owner, noting that we came here especially for the vegan menu and that this had happened on a number of occasions. He said he's speak to "him" about it, meaning either the chef or Scatty I suppose, but as he didn't spend that much time talking to me (or offering me a free meal or a discount or an apology or anything like that that I might do if I ran a restaurant that had a special vegan menu and I heard that a regular customer was frequently getting her meal un-veganized by my scatty staff).

If this was a restaurant that didn't especially advertise that it had a vegan menu, vegan cookies and was, quote, "vegan-friendly', I guess I would expect to have to fully explain how I needed my meal cooked each and every time, and I'd be prepared for some mistakes. But not here. Not more than half the time. Not any more.

It's a shame, because the chili beans really are fabulous.


Edit: It's a little later now, and although I intend to maintain the rage, there are a few things I'd like to clarify. Mr Scatty, I'm sure you're a lovely person although you'd probably agree that you do space out a little. Your service is always very smiley and friendly; it's just that I think you don't really pay much attention and that's why incidents like today's really get my goat (is that vegan or not?). I think you could be a lot better with a little application. Perhaps you should watch Ms Capable Waiter more and see how she is efficient, engaged and alert to her work. I would love to enthuse endlessly about Gluttony: it's got great food, coffee and juices; is not stingy on the cooked stuff; I really like the lino tables; there are always current newspapers lying around; and it's very puppy-friendly. But I don't want to have to be both alert and alarmed about my breakfast.

Thank you for your prompt attention,

Yours faithfully &tc,

Miss T


Nudel Bar: 76 Bourke Street, Melbourne. Ph 9662 9100
Gluttony It's A Sin: 278 Smith Street. Ph 9416 0336

The Napier's Tofu Burger with Chilli Jam, Watercress and Tofu Mayo, or: I am deflated

Seeing as this was my first foray into public food photography, I was hoping it would be accompanied by a post raving about not only how brave I was to whip out the camera at the table, but that it was well worth it to bring you sensational photos of wildly outstanding food that made me weep with spiritual revelation. It will now come as no surprise to you that I did not like this meal.

A pub meal was planned for Saturday night as a low-key general catch up-slash-dinner before Buzz and I go overseas next week. I was suggested either The Napier or the East Brunswick Club, being bold enough to say that I was sneakily suggesting them for my own benefit. Everyone else kindly agreed to the Napier, so I feel somewhat abashed about now writing this post.

I ordered the vegan option - a tofu burger with chilli jam, watercress and tofu mayo (I suspect they meant soy mayo, but never mind).



Although all up it was an average, ho-hum, not-particularly-bad meal, I feel the only way to properly describe it is to list my disappointments. And so:

Numero Uno: Turkish Bread. It took me a few bites to register what this was. I promptly discarded the top as I was pretty sure that they hadn't scoured Melbourne to source Turkish bread without an egg glaze, and if they had, I figured they'd be advertising it.

Zwei: The Tofu. It was a slab of wobbly, squashy, unflavoured, lightly fried tofu, and that's it. It was a couple of centimetres thick and had nothing to recommend it except the very thin layer of crispy fattiness. It's tofu served like this that gives tofu everywhere a bad name.

The Third: The Salad. I know it's a pub meal. I know it, I know it. But for the love of all that is holy, a packet of mixed salad (mostly rocket), with two quarters of crystally, thawed-out tomato, a couple of slices of hardcore red onion and two measly pieces of cucumber, drizzled with some generic balsamic, is really poxy.

IV: The Chips. Blah. So average I almost couldn't be bothered eating them. And that's really saying something.



Now here's the bit that's making me screw up my face and go "ernghhhhhh". I love that they bothered to make a vegan burger. I love that they remembered to veganise the mayo. And I know that just cos it's specially vegan doesn't make it good, and I know that my meal wasn't particularly better or worse than anyone else's, and I know that it's a lot to ask for anything more, especially considering that there weren't even many vegetarian options on the menu.

But "ernghhhhhh!"

There was nothing beyond the unforgettable side of average here, and that's disappointing not just as a vegan but as a customer.

Many thanks to Buzz who gamely held up the top of the burger to help me photograph it, despite his embarrassment. There'll be many more.