Attempt #43 - 'The Penny Black'

 

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When? - 16th of March, 2011

Where? - The Penny Black. 420 Sydney Rd. Brunswick

Price? - $19.90 regular menu, $12 Parma Monday

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.thepennyblack.com.au/

Reviewers - Bec, Brad, Lee, Luke, Nikki[/info]

 

I’ll start by saying I really like The Penny Black. As a pub I frequent quite often I was really hoping they served up a good parma, as I would feel ashamed turning up this weekend after giving them a bad review.

The Penny Black is an interesting pub, Situated inside a building that was once a post office - hence the name of the pub being taken from the name of a vintage stamp. Upon walking in the door it could easily be dismissed as ‘just another indie pub’ complete with a selection of board games or Kurt Vonnegut books available behind the bar, but through the doors by the bar there hides a massive beer garden, easily twice the size of the indoor section, complete with an outdoor bar, and heaps of tables.

I would say that The Penny Black is a well kept secret, but in recent months the word seems to have gotten out and its hard to get in the door on a Friday or Saturday night. Luckily Wednesday was pretty quiet and we got a table easily, we took our seats and placed our parma orders - $19.90 off the regular menu, but The Penny Black also offers a $12 parma Monday that would be good to keep in mind.

Wednesday night was $12 steak night (apparently a tradition on Sydney Rd) and the steaks coming out of the kitchen looked pretty damn appetising, as did the burgers (Thursday is $12 Burger night), hopes were high for this weeks chicken parmigiana.

After a short wait the parmas arrived…

Parmas always look worse in photos when I have to use the flash - It was dark at The Penny Black, so flash was necessary, but I assure you it looked tasty in reality

For those curious, the photo without flash looked something like this -

mmmm… delicious

The schnitzel, while a little small on circumference, was thick as buggery, over an inch thick of pure breast for the majority of the parma. The topping coverage was great with almost zero schnitzel nudity and a slice of ham that didn’t overpower everything else, the napoli was a little bit thick and tomato paste-ish for my liking but it held together well. The only complaint would be the parma was bordering on overcooked, not burnt, but getting there. This made the cornflake crumbs it was coated in very hard, almost rough on the tongue. I also want to issue an official checkyatemps.org warning on the Penny Black parma, this thing was bloody hot, so much so I had to let it cool for a minute before I could properly dig in, not that this is a negative, I’d rather a parma that is too hot than one that is too cold.

The chips were shoestring, McDonalds-esque fries. There was a big serving (both under the parma, out on their own, and even a little under the salad) and very well seasoned. I’m not normally big on shoestring fries with a parma, but if they all came out like this I could definitely be persuaded to convert.

The salad was also a big serving, but there wasn’t much of it. Consisting of rocket, onion, tomato, a single slice of cucumber and a splashing of dressing it was tasty but not really substantial, not bad but not wow’ing us either. Although in saying that Reviewer Bec made me promise to not that the tomatoes in the salad were particularly good, so yay for the tomatoes.

As I said at the start of the review I love The Penny Black, and I am so glad that I wasn’t disappointed by their parma - If they serve up the same quality parma on their Monday $12 special it would be one to put on your ‘must try’ list, but at $19.90 it is a little on the expensive side. The pub itself is a great live music venue with what is possibly Melbourne’s best beer garden out the back. Whether its for a sneaky pint after work or dinner on either Parma (Monday), Pizza (Tuesday), Steak (Wednesday), Burger (Thursday) or Roast (Sunday) night, its definitely a place you should check out.

Parma - 7.5
Chips - 7.7
Salad - 4.9
Value - 6
Total - 6.72

The search continues…

The Penny Black on Urbanspoon

Attempt #42 - 'The Carron'

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When? - 10th of March, 2011

Where? - The Carron, 398 Spencer St. Melbourne

Price? - $12 Parma Thursday, $18 regular menu

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.thecarron.com.au/

Reviewers - Cale, Emma, Janet, Lee, Nikki, Pat, Stefo[/info]

** NOTE - This pub has closed! Parma no longer available - Review will stay up for posterity. Enjoy!

The last time I was at the Carron was for pre-drinks the last time AC/DC were in town. The Carron, as a pub, is perfect for times like this - A stones throw from Colonial Stadium Telstra Dome Etihad Stadium, The Carron is a great little pub for pre footy/concert/Disney on ice drinks. I had heard they offer up a pretty decent parma, and as icing on the cake the Carron offer up a $12 Parma Thursdays. So we delayed our usual parma Wednesday 24 hours and headed to the Carron to see what they had on offer.

Other than some people sitting out in the sun on the little balcony thing they have going out the front, the Carron was pretty quiet when we arrived. We claimed our table then went to the bar to place our order - one thing I would suggest to the Carron management is to put more staff on. Every time I went to the bar to either order our meals or get a drink I found the bar unmanned and had to wait valuable minutes for someone to come out of the kitchen and serve. frustrating. However we ordered our parmas and in a fairly short time they were marched out of the kitchen.

I was pleasantly surprised when the plates hit the table, discount parma nights have a habit of being sub-par but the golden brown beauty that laid before me begged to differ. One or two out of the 7 parmas that were served suffered from slight slippery cheese, there was extremely minimal schnitzel nudity and it was a little on the small side but other than that the meal that laid before us was damn appetizing. The schnitzel was of decent thickness, nothing special but certainly nothing to complain about. There was a hearty coverage of napoli, ham and golden brown cheese. My only complaint would be that at times the crumbs tasted a little processed, but it was all in all a great tasting parma

The chips were standard chunky chips - middle of the road (a trait that has been common with chips lately) a little on the minimal serving scale but nothing to really complain about here, although they could have used a bit of seasoning

The salad was big and salubrious, taking up a large portion of the plate. It looked very promising as a mix of Lettuce, cucumber, capsicum, tomato, carrot and onion. Unfortunately there was no detectable dressing other than a splash of oil and it left what could have been a fantastic side dish wanting.

The Carron has a great atmosphere, a great location and on Thursday nights a fantastic parma! A glance at the website tells me that on their non-parma nights the meal goes for $18, a price I’d happily pay for what was served up, having it for $12 on Thursdays is just gravy, It only lost points for the run of the mill chips, a schnitzel that was a little on the small side and a beautiful looking salad that squandered its potential. Don’t let that put you off though, The Carron offers up a fantastic parma that I’d be happy to try again any day of the week.

Parma - 7.79
Chips - 5.21
Salad - 5.14
Value - 8.57
Total -6.90

The search continues…

Carron Tavern on Urbanspoon

Attempt #41 -'The Peacock Inn Hotel'

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When? - 2nd of March, 2011

Where? - The Peacock Inn Hotel, 210 High St. Northcote.

Price? - $17 Wednesday Trivia Players Special, $21 normally

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.peacockinnhotel.com.au/

Reviewers - Lee & Nikki[/info]

I will start this weeks review by reporting a tragedy.

A few blocks from the Peacock Inn, one of my favourite pieces of street art used to reside -

I only discovered this gem a couple of months ago, and on the drive past on the way to the Peacock Inn last night I saw that someone had torn off all the girls cards, legs and most of her torso. You will be missed, Random girl dropping playing cards… You will be missed.

We arrived at the peacock just on 7pm, it was a little hard to find a park on High St. itself so we wound up parking a little bit down Bastings street, the corner of which the Peacock resides on. On the walk from the car to the pub I got a glimpse of a very impressive looking beer garden before walking around the front of the pub and through the front doors, into the first room of the Peacock - the Cafe. I initially mistook the cafe for a gastro-pub dining room, much like the one at the Metropolitain, as it has the same classy look & feel to it, but a check of the website moments ago proved me wrong. We headed through the back of the cafe into the main bar. I was impressed, heaps of space, fireplace, pool table, couches and an abundance of table space, the Main bar at the Peacock has an old school pub charm but at the same time has been beautifully renovated to a great little space, and I haven’t even gotten to the amazing beer garden yet. We didn’t spend much time in the beer garden as it was getting rather chilly, however it was definitely impressive. Heaps of tables, an abundance of space, even speakers & TV’s out there to broadcast the Quiz Meisters trivia (that would soon be kicking off) right out to the back of the garden.

We took our seats and got a gander at the menu, $21 for a choice of chicken or veal parma. However we weren’t sitting for more than 3 minutes before one of the staff members approached and asked if we were partaking in the nights trivia, we said yes and he handed us a little sheet of paper with the following information on it…

“TRIVIA PLAYERS SPECIAL FOR 2011

Chicken or Veal Parma & Pint of Bulmers, Carlton, Cascade Light or Softie

$17.00”

Friggin score! A pint of Bulmers on its own can run around $7.50 these days, which means the Peacock parma’s price point (unintentional quadruple alliteration FTW) hit just under $10 including free trivia! it was settled, I loved the pub, I loved the special, I love trivia, It was on. We ordered our parmas, collected our pints of Bulmers and awaited their arrival.

In the time it took us to discover all this, the Peacock had filled up fast the place was packed so I would definitely recommend a booking if you were planning to give it a try.

We signed up for trivia. Trying to stay anonymous as we always do, we avoided calling ourselves ‘Team Parma Daze’ or anything like that, so Team ‘Fist pumping like champs’ was the obvious second choice. With 15 minutes before trivia kickoff our parmas were delivered.

The first thing that hit me about the Peacocks parma was the colour - it was very dark and looked as if all the crumbs had been burnt. I really wanted to like this parma so I gave them the benefit of the doubt and hoped they had just put a different spice in the crumbs to give them that dark colour, Unfortunately I think both outcomes were true.

The edges, where there was a little nudity, were burnt, I believe the crumbs were naturally dark in some places due to the types of crumbing used, but there were definitely some burnt edges, The chicken underneath the crumbs was fantasic, pure chicken breast - thick and juicy. There was plenty of cheese, ham and napoli on top of the breast, however I have a suspicion that our parmas had spent some time in the tanning salon (aka under the heat lamps) as the cheese had gone a little hard and rubbery. The parma had a good flavour, but the crumbs are definitely where it lost points, they didn’t have any hold on the chicken and just flaked off whenever they were touched, leaving a slowly growing pile of crumbs to the side of the plate.

The chunky chips were very well salted and in a pretty decent serving, and if that wasn’t enough there was a table at the front of the bar that held caddies of salt, pepper and the sauce trifecta (Tomato, Mustard & BBQ). Unfortunately they were served underneath the parma (a tactic that is unfortunately commonplace these days), I tried to save them by lifting the parma off as soon as it had arrived, but the damage had been done and a few had already gone soggy. Most of them had avoided the sogginess however and the ones that came out unscathed were pretty damn good.

The salad was one of the most imaginative we have seen in awhile, a welcome change from the standard garden salad we seem to have been stuck with, served to the side of the parma was a mixture of Lettuce, onion, cucumber, tomato, capsicum and olives, served in what I could only describe as a very sweet, almost honey soy-esque dressing.

As we finished our meals the Quiz Meisters kicked off their trivia night, The last time we encountered the Quiz Meisters was at Sentido Funf, and they never fail at putting on a good show, definitely worth sticking around for trivia if you are there on a Wednesday night. Unfortunately team ‘Fist Pumping Like Champs’ didn’t do to well, as there are clearly some people there who take their quiz meisters very seriously. Also, people who use their iPhones at pub trivia comps are total cheaters, I mean c’mon guys, I walked into the dunny to find 3 people on their phones looking up answers!

I really wanted to like the Peacocks parma, and if it weren’t for the overcooked crumbs and the heat lamps it would have been an amazing night! the Wednesday deal of $17 Parma, pint & Trivia is very tough to beat and it still wins points on value, the salad was different but by no means bad, and the chips had potential. I would definitely come back and give them another chance, hopefully they just had an off night. I definitely recommend ducking in, if only to check out the beer garden. Everyone loves a beer garden!

Parma - 6.00
Chips - 5.50
Salad - 5.00
Value - 7.50
Total - 6

The search continues…

Peacock Inn on Urbanspoon

It has definitely been a big week for the Parma Daze twitter, lets check in with the official ‘Parma Daze Twitter Situation’

It has been a great week for the Twitter Situation, since last weeks post we have jumped from only four followers to NINE! that is over 100% growth, but sadly the Situation is apparently a hard one to please. While being firmly out of a sad situation he is seems to still be very confused as to why more people aren’t following the Parma Daze Twitter, I mean I know we aren’t Charlie Sheen or anyone cool like that, but if you could find it in your heart to follow us you will make The Situation a very happy one!

Attempt #40 - 'The Sugar Gum Hotel'

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When? - 23rd of February, 2011

Where? - The Sugar Gum Hotel, Cnr. Melton Hwy & Gourlay Rd, Hillside

Price? - $19.50 in the Bistro

Barry? - No, but lots of other entertainment

Website? - None

Reviewers - Adam, Bec, Lee, Luke, Nikki, Tanya[/info]

I remember back when they built the Sugar Gum it was in the middle of freakin nowhere - Urban sprawl hadn’t quite reached it yet and I remember my parents saying ‘Why would you want to go to a pub all the way out here?’ Fast forward a few years and it is surrounded by suburbia. With Watergardens shopping center down the road and houses as far as the eye can see, The Sugar Gum is a pub in prime position for the locals of the area. Having seen it many times on drives up to the country, it stuck in my mind as a place to try where they might do a good parma, So we loaded up the parma bus and headed down the Melton Hwy. to the Sugar Gum Hotel (Or ‘tavern’ depending on who you ask)

The place is huge, with ample parking, large sports bar, TAB, pool tables, jukebox, pokies, spacious bistro and kids room full of arcade games, there are a plethora of options for entertainment (except for Barry, unfortunately). The staff are extremely friendly and helpful, however the drinks range is pretty standard, no Bulmers on tap unfortunately and the Jim Beam stubbies were bordering on criminally expensive ($10.50 each - I don’t like paying over $10 for a drink if it doesn’t have at least one piece of fruit & an umbrella in it)

We took our seats in the bistro and ordered our parma’s at the bar ($19.50 with a Thursday $15 parma night). I was freaking starving so the wait seemed a little long, but it could’ve just been my hunger distorting my perception of time - it happens.

When it first arrived, the parma looked pretty good, there was some minor nude schnitzel around the edges and the cheese was a little overcooked (bordering on burnt around the edges) but so far no unforgivable offenses, the schnitzel was big and thick, so we tucked in. Unfotunately the whole parma smacked of being processed, the chicken, the crumbs, the napoli, the ham and the cheese all tasted pre-packaged. All the ingredients of a parma were there on the plate, however it had no soul, no flavour and in the end it left us wanting. also, towards the end of the parma (after it had a few minutes to sit) the cheese turned into Mr. Fantastic from The Fantastic 4, extremely rubbery.

While we’re on the subject, how much of an ego must this guy have to name himself ‘Mr. Fantastic’ just because he can stretch. All the other members of the Fantastic 4 chose names that reflected their powers, I can imagine the meeting in which they chose their superhero names going something like this…

“Okay Sue, you can turn invisible so we will call you the ‘Invisible Woman’. easy. Johnny, you can burst into flame at will so ‘The Human Torch’ is pretty self explanatory, Ben, you got turned into an orange-rock-thing, lets go with ‘The Thing’ for you and me … well, I can stretch my body parts like an elastic band, hmmm, Elastic Man? no … Rubber Man? nahh, I know!, seeing as I am pretty fucking fantastic, I’ll just call myself ‘Mister Fantastic’. perfect. Any complaints? Ben, stop crying…”

Moving on.

The chips hidden underneath the parma were great, toeing the line somewhere between shoestring fries and regular chips. They were fresh, crispy, well seasoned and in abundant supply, the chips were definitely the star of this meal.

The garden salad (made up of lettuce, carrot, onion, cucumber & tomato) looked great when it landed in front of us, however it didn’t really hold up when it came to taste, much like the parma itself there wasn’t anything particularly wrong with it, but it just came across as bland and flavourless.

The Sugar Gum is a great little spot and some of the other meals I saw going past while waiting for ours looked pretty damn impressive. Unfortunately as I said earlier, the parma offered up by the Sugar Gum lacked any flair, It was a cookie cutter parma that didn’t quite carry any flavour and for $19.50 I expect something more. I would definitely consider going back for a $15 parma on their Thursday parma night, as from what I could gather they do some novelty parmas on occasion then, perhaps some extra toppings would give it the flair it needs to get over the line. you do want to express yourself don’t you Sugar Gum?

Parma - 5.75
Chips - 7.17
Salad - 3.33
Value - 5.50
Total - 5.50

The search continues…

Sugar Gum Hotel on Urbanspoon

The Parma Daze Twitter is still going strong! we have a few more followers now so it isn’t as much of a sad situation as it was last week, lets check it out on the newly created…

As you can see its almost out of the ‘Sad Situation’ category, however its still a pretty unhappy and somewhat confused situation, please follow our twitter and do your part to help the situation.

 

Attempt #39 - 'Cushion Lounge'

Photos of this place are frakking impossible to find online, so I snapped this while crossing the road, narrowly avoiding getting cleaned up by an oncoming tram

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When? - 15th of February, 2011

Where? - Cushion Lounge, 99 Fitzroy St. St. Kilda

Price? - $10 ‘Parma n’ Pot’ Tuesdays, $17 regular menu

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.cushionlounge.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Lee, Nikki, Tanya, Wade[/info]

My memories of Cushion are a drunken blur, an establishment that I have only been to as an after-bar after a long, long night on the town. I have vague memories of shots, cocktails and floors so sticky that I lost my shoes on multiple occasions.

However a couple of weekends ago I was attending my sisters wedding at the lovely Circa on Fitzroy St, and on the way to the reception the cab happened to pause at the large specials board outside Cushion, advertising their Tuesday night special - Pot n’ Parma for $10. The challenge was set, We moved our usual Wednesday parma night to a Tuesday one and last night we headed to St. Kilda to see what they had to offer.

We were told on the phone the night before that Cushion don’t take bookings, so we rocked up a little earlier than usual to ensure we got a table big enough for all the diners - carparking was an issue, but we managed to find a handy underground park at the nearby Metropol building and walked down - the five large outdoor tables were already packed with people getting their after work parma fix, so hopes were high that we would finally find the elusive combination of both cheap and good.

Inside the pub was relatively empty, apart from a few groups scattered around, who were also munching on chickeny goodness (chickeny is too a word!) we managed to score primo seating at the large wooden table to the left of the entrance, perfect.

I downed a pint of Bulmers while waiting for the team to arrive, and once they did we ordered our parmas at the bar, the ‘free pot’ extends to either carlton draught, soft drink or house wine, so beers were poured and we returned to our table to await our meal.

While waiting I had a chance to try and classify what exactly Cushion was… its not a pub, nor is it a restaurant or even a cafe, although it borrows aspects from all three. I think the best thing to call it is a nightclub on a quiet night - the concrete floors (not as sticky as I remember them), the boarded up DJ booth, the shiny disco ball hanging above the tables, the signs directing patrons to the smokers area and the cocktail list with entries such as ‘Love Potion 69’ are all hallmarks of the club-turned-restaurant to fill seats on an off night. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, The Prince of Wales had all of these features and yet we still rate it as the best parma we have ever eaten.

After a short wait, our parmas arrived

The schnitzel was kinda small and devoid of ham, I have been trying to avoid the whole ‘schnitzel nudity as people nudity’ joke lately as I think I’ve kinda been running it into the ground, but the lack of cheese on this parma pushed this thing to X rated, full frontal, with penetration, nudity, I would call it the Jesse Jane of chicken parmas, but the breasts weren’t that big, so lets call this one the Jenna Haze of schnitzel nudity

Okay that was the bad, the good however, is that the schnitzel, while kinda small was actually real chicken breast, the napoli sauce was delicious and the cheese that was there was pretty tasty, as a whole the parma worked well.

Before I get to the chips, I was thinking about this as I was writing the review - why is it there are so many porn stars who have names starting with the letter J - Jesse Jane, Jenna Jameson, Jenna Haze, Jill Kelly, Jordan Capri, Jenavive Jolie, Jayden James … I’m sure theres four or five out there with the sirname ‘Juggs’, the list goes on! I’m sure theres a scientific reason for it, maybe its just a mystery for the ages.

But I digress…

The chips were one of the few we have come across that were actually set beside the parma as opposed to underneath, This kept them hot, fresh and crispy the entire meal, a decent serving and seasoned with chicken salt, the chips were fresh, crisp, thick and tasty.

The garden salad seemed a bit of an afterthought, comprising of lettuce, onion, carrot and cucumber, we had to struggle to determine if there was dressing on it. The veggies were fresh but as a whole it was a bit dry without dressing, and although I’m not a fan of tomato myself, I was surprised to see it not included in the mix.

The Cushion parma, while a bit on the small side, was actually pretty damn good! the chips were great, and apart from some minor cheese related issues so was the parma. We had this parma on their Tuesday night special of $10 with a free pot, on their regular menu this parma clocks in at $17, which, to be honest, I would be less than stoked to pay for what we got. But as far as budget parma nights go, this is pretty damn good and I would definitely recommend stopping in for dinner if you are in the area on a Tuesday - for only $10 its great value and hard to go wrong.

Oh, one last thing - I’d normally put this after the scores, but the situation is getting kinda sad (not the guy from Jersey Shore, he is always happy)

The Parma Daze Twitter has been going for a week now and its only got three followers (one of whom is my personal account, the other is one of the reviewers and the third is some sort of german spam site) I see the google analytics stats guys, I know there are a lot of people reading this! go check it out and follow (please … this isn’t doing good things for my self esteem)

Its good! I swear!

Parma - 6.9
Chips - 6.4
Salad - 4.6
Value - 8.1
Total - 6.58

The search continues…

Cushion Lounge on Urbanspoon

Attempt #38 - 'The Blarney Stone'

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When? - 9th of February, 2011

Where? - The Blarney Stone, 35 Anderson St. Yarraville

Price? - We paid $17.50 but there are other options, check the review for more info

Barry? - Yes

Website? - None

Reviewers - Cale, Lee, Ness, Nikki[/info]

**UPDATE** The Blarney Stone has closed its doors, and been replaced with the newly redone Railway Hotel. Luckily, we've had that one too! Check out the full review of the Railway Here

At the start of the review I would normally give props to whomever it was that recommended us to a venue for a parma, but I can’t for the life of me remember how the Blarney Stone entered our radar. So whoever you are out there, mystery recommender, I thank you for recommending.

I was unsure how many reviewers would be attending this weeks review, so we went to the Blarney Stone without a booking (the last two times we have done this have been disasterous, so I was on edge). We entered via the side entrance straight into the relatively empty bistro (phew) and took a seat at the first available table, Checked the menu and the parma was there ($17.50), however when I went to the bar to order some drinks I noticed the bar menu was completely different to the bistro menu, and the bar menu offered both a $13 Chicken Parma and a Bolognaise sauce variety known as the ‘Blarney Parma’ (not quite sure of the price of this one, I want to say $14.50, but don’t hold me to that). The bar meals were not allowed to be eaten in the bistro, so we had a choice to make.

On further inspection of the menus we noticed that the bistro’s parma was called ‘Chicken breast chicken parma’, however the bar menu choices made no mention of chicken breast. Being a breast man myself (ba dum ching!) I was more than happy to pay the extra $4.50 for the chicken breast, as opposed to the mystery chicken served on the bar menu. Oh, and they also do a $10 parma night in the bar on Thursdays … confused yet? I know I am!

We ordered our parmas and grabbed our first pints. The Blarney is a huge pub, With a massive public bar area (with Barry & TAB at the front) and equally spacious bistro it would be hard to fill this place up. It is Irish-themed (as the name would suggest) but not as ‘in your face’ Irish as some other pubs we’ve visited. The staff were friendly & the place had a good vibe, I’d be happy to return for a pint or two some other time

Some of the reviewers ordered a pre-parma garlic bread (always a good decision), shortly after they had polished that off our main course arrived.

I have upgraded a little from iPhone cam…

The parma’s arrived and the first thing I noticed was a bad case of slippery cheese on mine (for the newbies, “slippery cheese” is when the cheese re-melts and slides off the ham if the parma is set at too much of an angle) The other reviewers weren’t as affected by this, so we tucked in.

The chicken breast was real chicken breast (as the menu suggested) while a little small, it was thick, juicy and, other than being slightly undercooked, hard to fault. unfortunately after that it starts to fall apart, the crumbs were extremely soggy, so much so that when I made the initial transition of my parma off the chips to level ground, many of the crumbs from the underside of the chicken stayed behind, having firmly fused themselves to the chips. The napoli was extremely minimal, when you have to resort to lifting up the ham to check if there is any napoli there at all you know you’ve wandered into bad territory. I can’t complain about the ham, it did its job perfectly, except (as I mentioned earlier) it failed to hold my cheese in place, and most of the cheese ended up in the south western quadrant of my parma - although this may have been an isolated incident as other reviewers didn’t seem to be as afflicted as I was by the slippery cheese menace.

There was a decent serving of well cooked (and somehow crumbed) chips hiding under the parma, they were crispy, tasty and pretty much served their life purpose of chips very adequately, nothing really to write home about with these boys! standard middle-of-the-road chips

The garden salad, consisting of rocket, lettuce, tomato, cucumber & onion was well portioned, however one thing put us off … the dressing. It is a little blurry, and hard to describe, but imagine a substance that tastes like balsamic vinegar, yet has the consistency & look of the peanut satay sauce you get at Thai restaurants as an accompaniment to chicken skewers. looking through the photos I snapped last night, this seems to be the clearest shot of it I got

We had never come across it before, and it tasted fine, but the look of it put some reviewers off.

After our parma we moved into the public bar for a couple of games of Barry … We were friggin close to winning $100 on a game of Cluedo before getting a freaking impossible question, something about the date of formation of the Canadian Orchestra if I remember correctly, then calling an end to our evening!

The Blarney Stone parma has so much potential, the chicken breast they are using is absolutely fantastic, all they need is a few minor, yet very important tweaks to their parma construction process and they would have a great meal on their hands, unfortunately they aren’t quite there yet. But a great pub that I’d definitely stop back into for a pint and some Barry.

Parma - 6.25
Chips - 5.25
Salad - 4.13
Value - 4.75
Total - 5.33

The search continues…

Blarney Stone Irish Pub on Urbanspoon

Attempt #37 - 'The Cornish Arms'

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When? - 2nd of February, 2011

Where? - The Cornish Arms, 163A Sydney Rd, Brunswick

Price? - $18 (With a $12 ‘parma night’ on Sundays)

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.cornisharms.com.au/

Reviewers - Carly, Giese, Kylie, Lee, Matt, Shanan, Tanya[/info]

I was thrown when I called to reserve a table at the Cornish Arms as I was asked if I wanted to be seated at the 6:30 or 8:30 sitting … seeing as our weekly review traditionally starts at 7 I went for the 6:30 session and asked the reviewers to attend a tad earlier. Why the restricted seating options you may ask? Well unbeknownst to me Wednesday night is the Cornish Arms’ ‘$12 steak night’, and I must say the people of Brunswick must love their steak, because this place was packed.

The Cornish is an impressively renovated pub, with leather bench seats across the walls, a beautiful beer garden out the back and a spacious, well stocked main bar manned by casual and friendly staff, really adding to the laid back atmosphere of the place.

The menu is impressive, Apart from nightly food specials (including a $12 ‘Parma Sunday’) the bar toes the line between a gastro pub and friendly local, I must say the steaks looked delicious and I have it on good authority that the pizza nights are equally impressive.

However we weren’t there for pizzas or steak, we were there for parmas. We placed our orders at the bar ($18), collected our drinks and took our seats - one oddity was that after we placed our order a staff member came to the table to also take our order, Reviewer Matt who arrived late placed his order with her, and he was given the option of veggies instead of salad - an option we were not offered when ordering at the bar. This prompted Reviewer Carly to change her order to veggies as opposed to salad, no dramas there.

After a fairly short wait, our meals arrived (I had heard rumors of slow service at the Cornish, so I was pleasantly surprised at how promptly our parmas arrived, especially since the place was quite busy).

I’m always amazed at how much a few green flakes makes a parma look so much more appetising. The Schnitzel was fairly wide and pounded flat, not too thin though however they were a little bit heavy on the corn-flake crumbs. When it first arrived I thought it looked rather standard in size however this is the first time in awhile that I’ve actually struggled to clean my plate, somehow this entry is amazingly filling without appearing so!

There was minor schnitzel nudity around the edges but the areas that had cheese had a lot of it. The napoli was good but there wasn’t enough of it, and it left the parma a little dry in areas. The star of this meal however, was the substitution of bacon instead of ham - an option we haven’t come across in our reviews as yet and I must say I was impressed! It is a well known fact that bacon makes everything better,( see bacon soap, bacon vodka and bacon lollipops ) parmas are no deviation from this rule and the inclusion of bacon on the parma is a stroke of genius. Although in saying that I know some people in the world don’t have the same love of bacon that I do (weirdos) and it might be nice to be given the option of bacon or no bacon.

There was a pretty big serving of chips hiding underneath the parma, however they were totally unseasoned and went a little soggy after living underneath the parma for awhile, salt shakers were provided on the table to remedy this and they were able to be partially brought back to life.

The salad was also supplied in a hefty serving, a garden salad served with Lettuce, sprouts, cabbage, tomato, onion, cumber & balsamic. Opinion was varied on the salad as it seems some people got more dressing than others, and the dressing really has the power to make or break a garden salad.

The Cornish serves up a damn tasty parma, I kind of regret that we didn’t hit it on their Sunday parma night, as if what we were served last night was the same as what would come out on a Sunday for only $12 it is definitely a winner. I highly recommend a reservation if you are going down on a Wednesday or you run the risk of not getting a seat, but it is worth it.

Parma - 7.79
Chips - 5.29
Salad - 5.21
Value - 6.43
Total - 6.5

The search continues…

Cornish Arms Hotel on Urbanspoon

A big thanks to the guys over at Melbournepubs.com for giving us yet another plug on their facebook page, you guys are the best and thanks for the support!

For all those who haven’t heard, Cyclone Yasi is currently wreaking havock to the north coast of Australia in the worst storm of this kind to hit the area in 100 years, our thoughts go out to all those affected by this disaster, stay safe guys!

Finally for the past few years (long before this little parma site was around) Myself and a couple of mates have been running Inner Coma, an online T-shirt store. I’ll be your bestest friend if you click over and take a look!

If you have read this far you are a true fan - here are some boobs for your effort  (oYo)

damn thats hot, I should mark this entry NSFW.

Attempt #35 - 'Sentido Funf'

[info]

When? - 19th of January, 2011

Where? - 243 Gertrude St. Fitzroy

Price? - $9 Parma Wednesday ($17.50 all other times)

EDIT 21/09/11 - Sources inform me that this parma Wednesday deal now sells for $10, still great value!

Barry? - No

Website? - http://sentidofunf.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Cale, Lee, Matt, Ness, Nikki, Tanya[/info]

When I told the group we were going to ‘Sentido Funf’ for a parma there were a lot of blank stares followed by ‘…where?’ but this little pub in Fitzroy has a big secret.

From the outside you wouldn’t look twice at Sentido Funf, as you can see from the photo above it doesn’t look like much, inside there is an unassuming little bar (with a great beer selection as well as a stellar cocktail list) and some tables scattered around. We took our reserved seat inside and sat for all of 60 seconds before deciding that we should move, where? to Sentido Funf’s best feature - The beer garden.

Following the door past the bar will lead you out the back to the beer garden, an indoor/outdoor expanse easily twice the size of the front bar itself, the beer garden is the place to be.

We ordered our parmas at the front bar and took our seats out the back amongst the trees, after a few minutes of waiting we realised that as well as being $9 Parma night, it was also Quiz Meisters Trivia night. Free to enter the Quiz Meisters put on a great trivia comp, the perfect accompaniment to a chicken parma (other than garlic bread … I love garlic bread).

It took a while to get all the teams sorted for trivia so by the time the competition started we had mostly all finished our parmas - so lets review!

The perspective of the photo may be confusing, but this parma is served on a skinny, oval shaped plate with salad to the side and a decent heaping of shoestring fries under a massive hunk of chicken.

The parma was wide but fairly thin with a minor case of slippery cheese and minor burning around the edges, not a hell-worthy tresspass. The schnitzel was pre-fab chicken that to be honest was a little disappointing, the breast was dry, stringy and at times was rather hard to cut through (although dull knives and being perched on the chips didn’t help with this issue). The toppings for the parma, however, were very good - with generous helpings of napoli, ham and cheese they were the saving grace for this meal.

The skinny plate made it hard to maneuver the chicken around to be eaten properly without losing chips to the table, but being rather experienced at this we managed to get it done. 

The chips that were hiding under the parma were surprisingly good, there was actually a decent serving of fries hiding underneath the chicken - well seasoned, fresh shoestring fries that are very similar to those served at McDonalds … not that there’s anything wrong with that.

The garden salad to the side was simple and fresh, with actual lettuce as opposed to just wilted leaves as well as cucumber strips, onions and shredded carrots. I couldn’t quite pick what dressing was used, but it had a very refreshing citrus tang.

After the food, team ‘Jimmy Rowes’ kicked off trivia, the Quiz Meisters do a great job of keeping things different and interesting with their variety of media questions, we managed to win a free jug of beer in the ‘Pick the Wags’ competition in which we had to identify Ten male celebrities based on photos of their wives/girlfriends, we got 9/10, I’m not sure whether to be proud or ashamed that we won that round.

Reviewer Tanya enjoys our winnings

In the end I think we came in about 4th or 5th, no prize but we had an awesome time playing, it was fun, exciting and (most importantly) kept us drinking!

For only $9 with free trivia its very hard to complain about Sentido Funf’s parma, and if it weren’t for the disappointing schnitzel quality they would be serving up a stellar meal in a very impressive gem of a pub!

Sentido Funf is one of those pubs that you wouldn’t know existed if you didn’t know it existed … if that makes any sense. It is a wonderful little spot and I definitely recommend going down before word gets out and it gets insanely popular - which will definitely happen. I saw some of other meals going past as we played trivia and they looked pretty amazing - the burger in particular looked legendary, definitely one I would try in the future.

In the end the meal was secondary to the fun we had playing, when you are in a good mood everything seems better and it made the poor quality chicken actually seem not as bad. 

I took this picture of the beer garden/trivia game in action and couldn’t find a way to work it into the article … so its going at the end!

Parma - 5.07
Chips - 5.86
Salad - 5.36
Value - 7.14
Total - 5.70

The search continues…

Sentido Funf on Urbanspoon

Attempt #34 - 'Coopers Inn'

[info]

When? - 22nd of December, 2010

Where? - 282 Exhibition St. Melbourne

Price? - $17.50 (Tuesday $12 special available

Barry? - Yes

Website? - http://www.coopersinn.com.au/

Reviewers - Cale, Janet, Lee, Ness, Nikki, Stefo[/info]

 

The old saying goes ‘better late than never’, I really hope that is true and you don’t all hate me for getting this review up so unbelievably late.

Cast your minds back to the Wednesday before Christmas. There was excitement in the air, as well as a lot of hangovers as the work Christmas party season was upon us, and it was no different for the Parma Daze team. We rocked up at the Coopers Inn for our last parma of 2010.

We arrived at the relatively empty pub and took our seats, a glance at the menu revealed a surprisingly great range of pub meals that almost lured a few reviewers off the path of the chicken parmigiana, but parmas are what we were there for, and parmas are what we ordered  (as well as a bowl of delicious wedges to nosh on beforehand - which came out piping hot and fresh).

price wise the parmas came to $17.50 each, we heard word of a $12 parma night on Tuesdays but unfortunately we were 24 hours late.

As it was our kind-of-Christmas-party we did what anyone would do … disrupt the whole pub by popping Christmas crackers!

The aftermath of the Christmas crackers

The ridiculously bad jokes kept us so entertained while we waited - comedy gold such as …

What do you get if you cross a bell with a skunk? Jingle Smells!

Why do ghosts live in the fridge? Because it’s cool!

And who could forget the classic…

Why did Santa’s helper see the doctor? Because he had a low “elf” esteem!

It’s a good thing our parmas arrived after that last one, otherwise we may not have been able to continue with our review due to a severe case of split sides!

My first impression was that it was a big schnitzel, thick and juicy with a good covering of cheese (apart for some minor nudity around the edges after the ham had curled under the grill) On closer inspection the chicken breast was actually two schnitzels fused together with cheese, I have absolutely nothing against this move - the more chicken the better in my book!

The parma tasted great with a lot of cheese, subtle hint of ham and a decent amount of napoli between the two - and the sprinkling of herbs atop the cheese added an extra level flavour that we don’t often get with a parma.

The chips that were hiding under the massive parma were of a minimal serving, unseasoned and pretty much standard un-exciting chips.

The garden salad to the side was there for looks only, A few lettuce leaves with some sliced onion, cucumber and tomato on top (and when I say sliced I mean sliced  - so thin they barely held any taste).

All in all it was a great piece of chicken but was let down by little effort put into the sides. I would definitely go back to the Coopers Inn however, They have a great range of beers on tap and behind the bar, a great looking menu and if I were there on a Tuesday a piece of chicken that big is hard to beat for only $12.

So from myself and everyone else and the Parma Daze team we wish you a (very belated) Merry Christmas, an amazing new year, and I want to thank you all for making 2010 an absolutely awesome year. Thanks heaps for reading and we should now be back to our regular update schedule in what promises to be a parma-packed 2011!

Parma - 7
Chips - 3.92
Salad - 3.00
Value - 5.92
Total - 5.37

The search continues…

Coopers Inn on Urbanspoon

 

Attempt #33 'The Customs House Hotel'

 

[info]

When? - 15th of December, 2010

Where? - 161 Nelson Place. Williamstown

Price? - $15 Parma Wednesday, $21 regularly

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.customshousehotel.com.au/

Reviewers - Lee, Matt, Nikki[/info]

I love Willy (that is SO what she said). Williamstown is a beautiful spot with some amazing pubs and a great vibe, it’s kind of a hybrid of a beach town and a country town - yet close enough to the City to consider it local. We have been meaning to try a pub in Willy for some time and last night we gave it a go - Originally we had planned to hit up the Steam Packet Hotel but they were unfortunately booked out when I called to make the reservation earlier in the day, we redirected the parma bus around the block to The Customs House Hotel.

First of all, parking is a bitch! situated on the beautiful Williamstown waterfront we did at least 3 laps up and down before settling on a spot a considerable walk away, we entered the Customs House and took our seats at the table - this place is freaking huge! With a front bistro, lounge/bar area with a stage that seems perfect for a two man band to rock out some acoustic cover songs, second dining area out the back and another two massive function areas you’d never be short of a spot to rest your pot glass. We were seated in the front bistro, against the window overlooking the park across the road and the waterfront beyond that. We ordered our Parmas at the counter, not realising table service was also available. The menu laminated to the front counter said the parma was going for $21 with the option of as ‘aussie parma’ for $22, it wasn’t until after we settled the bill that we realised it was Parma Night (seemingly unadvertised) at the Customs house, dropping the meals down to $15 a piece - very reasonable.

Its been awhile since we’ve visited a pub that has had my favourite drink on tap, so imagine my delight when I saw the Bulmers logo shining in the sunlight. Pint in hand, we didn’t have to wait long at all for our meals to arrive

On first glance this parma looked tiny with lots of empty plate staring back at us, there was good topping coverage except for a strange ‘arm’ of chicken breast that was protruding out the side of my schnitzel, but it seems as if that was tucked underneath for the cheesing and only protruded after the parma was plated, so they can be forgiven for that slight showing of nude schnitz. As I said the parma looked small, until I cut into it, this was by far the thickest chicken breast we have experienced, I’ve had chicken kievs that were thinner- it was as if it had barely been hammered down at all and as a result was the most succulent chicken breast I’ve had in a long while. If The Laurel Hotel got a ‘juicy breast’ score of ‘Scarlett Johannson’, The Customs House hotel definitely gets a rating of ‘Katy Perry’ or higher

The crumb/chicken ratio was perfect (with homemade crumbs bringing them home) was a good coverage of napoli, although it was a little bland for my liking, with a heaping of ham and cheese to finish it off. Amazing parma, and for only $15 on a Wednesday its a very wallet-friendly outing.

The Chips were a beer battered chip/wedge hybrid that were absolutely delicious, unfortunately I got shafted and didnt get very many compared to the other reviewers (I counted fourteen total, its not often you can count how many chips you get on the plate) however even though there were few of them, they were all big, and I honestly don’t think I could’ve had many more even if they were on my plate.

The garden salad accompaniment looked amazing and I couldn’t wait to dig in, unfortunately it was all flash and not much substance, fresh and full of variety however the balsamic dressing they used was very light and could hardly be detected on the dish, also, I’m pretty sure I got all of the onions.

In the end I was pretty happy that the Steam Packet was booked out this week as the Customs House Hotel produced an absolutely amazing example of a chicken Parma. If you can I’d recommend hitting it on a Wednesday to get the $15 parma special and if its a nice night be sure to get a seat on the outdoor tables out the front. It is a gorgeous spot, a beautiful pub and a delicious parma - I’d be happy to return any day of the week.

Parma - 8.0
Chips - 6.6
Salad - 6.0
Value - 7.5
Total - 7.23

The search continues …

The Customs House Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #32 -'The Junction Tabaret'

[info]

When? - 9th of December, 2010

Where? - 740 Mt. Alexander Rd. Moonee Ponds

Price? - $12 ‘Parma n Pot’ Thursdays

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.junctiontabaret.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Cale, Dale, Lee, Ness, Nikki, Pat, Sara, Shane, Stefo, Tanya[/info]

Oh no! another late update - castrate me and serve the remains to the dogs … I apologise, but had an absolutely massive weekend and didn’t have a chance to pump out the review. But I’m here now! so lets do this.

We had heard that the Junction did a great pot n’ parma special, and as it is literally just down the road from where the world’s best parma used to reside we figured it was well worth a shot.

We rocked up at the Junction and took our seats - the pub has been beautifully renovated (seemingly) very recently, with a spacious TAB up one end, large pokies room down the other and a thin bistro connecting the two - kind of imagine a ‘shake weight’ with the bistro on the grip, and without the obvious sexual innuendo

With the bistro being so long and thin it seemed a little cramped with not a lot of room for tables - but this may have been because our group of 11 reviewers took up a massive section of the room, but just to be safe if you plan to eat at the Junction I would advise making a booking.

Once the whole crew arrived we went to the bar to place our orders - once we got there we were presented with our ‘parma’s of the world’ menu and had to make a choice

Some interesting choices! I saw a Hawaiian go past and it looked pretty tasty - mayo would definitely be an interesting addition to a parma but unfortunately I’m not big on pineapple. Mexican is always a winner and the Asian parma just sounds weird, after a moment of consideration I decided to play it safe and go with the standard ‘Junction Parmy’ someone needs to tell the writers of this menu that we are in Victoria, not NSW or SA, down here its ParmA, not ParmY.

We ordered, gathered our included pots and headed into the pokies area, put on a ‘club keno’ ticket and used that to pass the time a little until the parmas arrived.

First of all, lets discuss a phenomenon that I haven’t mentioned before. We all know about nude schnitzel, the part of the chicken where no cheese, napoli or ham is sitting leaving exposed chicken schnitzel. The Junction’s parma wouldn’t have had any problems with nude schnitz if it weren’t for the unfortunate effect of what I have dubbed ‘slippery cheese’.

Slippery cheese occurs when a parma is made, stacked on an angle on top of the chips, then let sit under the heat lamps for a few minutes, the cheese gets the full force of the heat lamps and melts again, the napoli under the cheese acts as a lubricant and as the parma is on an angle gravity does the rest. The cheese slides away and what was once a decently dressed piece of schnitzel slowly reveals its shameful nudity, much like Tara Reid on a red carpet

Slippery cheese can easily be avoided in one of two ways - either don’t stack your parma on top of your chips or don’t let the parma sit under the heat lamps! If you are producing quality parmas neither of these would be an issue, but its definitely something to keep an eye out for.

Wow, massive digression.

Another clue that our parma had been victim of heat lamps was that the schnitzel itself wasn’t hot - I am unsure whether this was true of the other end of the table (who got their parmas last) but the first few that arrived came out lukewarm, not inedibly so, but a few more notches on the thermometer would have made a better parma. The schnitzel was small-ish in circumference but thick enough to be enjoyed. There was an abundance of napoli and cheese on the areas that weren’t victims of slippery cheese, but it seemed to harden rather quickly as it got out into the open air, leaving it a bit rubbery by the end of the meal. The ham was there, but not very noticeable, which can be either a good or bad thing depending on your opinion of ham.

The chips were fairly decent, a sprinking of chicken salt gave them a unique taste to what we have tried before - I would comment on the size if their serving but reviewer Pat seagull’ed a lot of them away before I got a chance to take note of the serving size (bastard).

The salad was poor, some wilted lettuce, a wedge of tomato and clumps of onion cut way too thick (and I’m normally pro-onion!) soaked in a very bitter white wine vinegar the salad was not a good accompaniment to the meal.

Opinion was varied on this parma, some rated it well and others rated it poorly - the opinion of the parma definitely seemed to change as we moved down the table so I can only attribute it to the parmas down our end coming out cold and the other end getting the piping hot fresh ones. If dining at the Junction’s ‘Parmas of the world’ night I would suggest getting one of the novelty parmas available to get full value out of your meal, as the plain parma was just that - plain. The price is perfect and for a $12 parma with a free pot I can’t complain too much, but when compared to last weeks attempt at The Albion Hotel ($13 with a pot and pretty darn amazing) it just didn’t quite cut it.

After our meal we headed into the pokies area to play the candy machine in there, pumped in $15 and took home a bag full of candy bars for desert, definite win there.

Parma - 5.5
Chips - 6.2
Salad - 4.3
Value - 7.3
Total - 5.75

The search continues…

Junction Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #30 - 'The Fox Hotel 1887'

[info]

When? - 24th of November, 2010

Where? - 351 Wellington St. Collingwood

Price? - $19

Barry? - No, but tabletop Space Invaders is an acceptable substitute

Website? - http://thefoxhotel.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Lee, Rachael, Sara, Stefo[/info]

Sitting on the corner of Wellington St. and Alexandra Pde. The Fox is one of those pubs that you would’ve driven past hundreds of times, but never really ‘noticed’ … if that makes any sense. A cosy, down to earth little pub that is overflowing with character, a staggering collection of tapped and bottled beers and a rooftop beer garden that is absolutely superb! Suggested to us by the guys over at http://thehappiesthour.com/ as one of their favourites, we loaded up the parma bus and headed over to give their parma a try.

On arriving at the Fox you are presented with a number of choices - should you sit in the well tabled front section by the bar?, pull up a pew by the pool table?, maybe take a seat in the dining area? … jeez that lounge area looks mighty cosy … is anyone sitting at the tabletop space invaders table? how about we go up to the rooftop beer garden? With little nooks all over the place, each with a different feel and atmosphere from the eclectic to the classy, its definitely a pub where you could go a number of times and have a different experience each visit. We took a seat on some very hard to get out of couches in the lounge area and ordered some chips to start the night off - got to say that the Fox not only has a stunning range of bottled beers available, but their tab system is amazing, just grab a lanyard when you buy your first drink and you wont have to worry about your wallet till the end of the night. perfect system!

We perused the menu and spotted our target for the night ‘The Fox Parma w’ Prosciutto - $19’ we placed our orders and sank down into the couches while we waited - if we could’ve gotten up there is plenty of stuff to keep you occupied while waiting for food - I have mentioned the space invaders table already, but theres also pinball, pool tables and according to a website I saw while researching this pub - a ‘table tennis room’ … not sure where this one was hiding but definitely a novel idea, and a room that would inevitably become the ‘beer pong room’ after a few hours of drinking.

Not long after our parmas arrived

 

The schnitzel was wide with a massive surface area, taking up a majority of the plate. This is sometimes a recipe for credit card thin chicken but the Fox schnitzel passed the test, not winning any awards on thickness but the crumb to chicken ratio was definitely in the acceptable range, although the crumbs were a little soggy for my liking. A combination of cheeses over the top left a little nude schnitzel on the edges but as the thing was pretty darn wide it can be forgiven for that, on top of the cheese there was a dusting of a spice that I couldn’t quite put my finger on - if I had to take a guess I would say paprika (which is what I will be referring to it as from now on). We made a few comments about how salty the parma tasted before remembering the prosciutto mentioned on the menu, A few loved the taste (myself included) but others weren’t big fans - those not big on spice should be weary that the paprika mixed with the prosciutto makes for a pretty spicy parma - I am all for spice but I also am aware other people aren’t, so make a note of that.

The Chips were chips. under the parma, slightly less than a handful and, in a complete turnaround from the parma, totally unseasoned. Not bad but nothing special.

The salad was a let down unfortunately, standard garden salad it was wilted and oily, more of an afterthought than an accompaniment to the parma.

I also promised to mention that they played Reviewer Stefo’s favourite song while he ate his parma. He enjoyed that.

After the parma we explored around the pub for a little and discovered the rooftop beer garden - a spot that sold me on this pub and ensured I’d be back. looking as if it had recently been remodeled, the rooftop garden was host to a stunning view of the greatest city on earth, as well as plenty of tables and heaters to stay warm on chilly nights. beautiful. We chatted upstairs for a little bit before the rain started to fall and we decided to call it a night.

The Fox’s parma is absolutely delicious, scoring up there with some of the best we have ever had - $19 is a little high on the price scale but I would have no problems paying it again, big, juicy chicken with a bit of flair and spice that sets it apart from the others, unfortunately the sides let down what could have been a truly outstanding meal. I would definitely be back.

Plus, any pub with its own Vespa has got to be good!

Before I give the final scores I have to say that we had a bit of a ‘family meeting’ and have come to the conclusion that our scoring system isn’t quite fair. We all agreed that the chips and salad shouldn’t have equal weight on the final score that the parma does, as the parma is truly the most important part of the meal.

Which means we will be going through some changes here at parmadaze! over the next week or so I will be working out a new equation to punch into my little score calculating spreadsheet which will change the way the scores have been tallied in the past, so watch the ladder over the next week or so as things might get a little reshuffled! I think this will keep things a lot fairer (and also stop a few of the angry emails I’ve been getting)

A prime example of this is this weeks score for The Fox - the parma is outstanding and should carry more weight over the chips and salad, which weren’t great. Under our current score system the score will get dragged down dramatically as the sides weren’t quite up to snuff - which I believe isn’t quite fair as the parma itself was the star of this meal and one I’d definitely go back for.

So for now, (still under the old system) the score for The Fox hotel is -

*EDIT 03/12/10 - Score updated under the new system, as expected brought the score up. the system works!

Parma - 7.4
Chips - 3.8
Salad - 3.0
Value - 6.0
Total - 5.52

The search continues …

The Fox Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #29 - 'The Duke of Kent Hotel'

Google street view saves my arse again! apologies for the sub-par photo guys, it looks a lot nicer than this in person I promise!

[info]

When? - 18th of November, 2010

Where? - 293 La Trobe St. Melbourne

Price? - $12 ‘Parmas of the world’ Wednesdays

Barry? - Yes

Website? - http://www.dofk.com.au/

Reviewers - Lee, Luke, Luke & Matt[/info]

When a friend recommended the Duke of Kent for review I was a little dubious, I have always been weary of inner city pubs and their pub meal offerings - being in the city center there is the immense pressure to cave in to all the wank that comes with being in the inner city, Their heads go up their arses and before you know it you’re paying $30 for a crap parma served with smoked buffalo instead of ham, gluten free soy goop instead of cheese and a bed of whipped chickpeas instead of chips…. apologies for the rant there, I think I have some suppressed childhood trauma regarding wanky parmas.

Which is why I was pleasantly surprised when I walked into the Duke of Kent - A spacious, down to earth pub in which you could completely forget you are sitting in the middle of La Trobe street. The Duke has multiple seating options, from cozy leather booths to the more restaurant style bistro area, and the high wooden tables situated next to massive open bay windows are perfect for warm summer nights. There were a plethora of beers available on tap, a decent looking wine list and a very creative pub trivia game going on the big screen - normally we would join in but it had started before we arrived. We had a smaller group than usual this week as a bunch of the review team were on holiday up in Queensland, so Bulmers in hand we took our seats and looked over our options for ‘Parmas of the world’.

Hmmm what to choose?

To be honest all of the options looked appealing, especially when I saw a Mexican come out of the kitchen that looked delicious (A Mexican parma that is, not an actual delicious looking human from Mexico). But even with all the options presented to us we opted for the standard parma, which strangely doesn’t appear on the menu pictured above.

There is plenty to do at the Duke while waiting for your meal, The pub trivia game I mentioned earlier was fun to watch, as well as pool tables, full TAB, a skill testing prize machine and of course Barry, to which we were seated beside - primo seating if I’ve ever seen it!

The above photo is a perfect indicator of how close we were to the Barry machine, as I took it from my chair as reviewer Nikki (who came for the Barry but no parma this week) played a game of Monopoly. If you look carefully you will notice that its a Superman themed question on the screen - we probably had three superman themed questions while playing, quite fitting I thought seeing as we were eating at the Duke of Kent.

He looks hungry, if I were you I’d give it to him

Moments after we ordered Reviewer Luke arrived and joined our table - having ordered for him minutes before he didn’t realise that there were different parmas available, he tried to change the order to a Texan BBQ parma but was too late -our parmas were (amazingly) almost ready. Very soon after that our meals arrived.

It looked good when it hit the table, apart from a slight burning around the edges on mine (lesser on the others) the chicken was well cooked with golden brown cheese. The schnitzel itself looked a bit small but the majority of it was thick chicken breast, although there were a few spots on it that shrunk down to thin territory. Good brown cheese and napoli coverage with a healthy dose of shredded ham hiding under the cheese, which while looking like a lot of ham complimented the chicken nicely and didn’t even come close to overpowering it.

The chips were standard, hiding under the parma soggied (it is too a word) them up a little, but they were perfectly acceptable, however not memorable.

The Garden salad consisted of lettuce, onion, cucumber and tomato, It had a balsamic dressing but was unfortunately killed by too much olive oil on the lettuce, nothing terrible but turned a decent salad into an ‘only okay’ one. One redeeming factor to the sides, however, was the massive bread roll which accompanied every parma - a fantastic addition that is often overlooked by pubs but makes all the difference when it comes to the presentation of the meal. points for bread.

Reviewer Luke was still hungry after his (and still a little shattered that he missed out on his Texan BBQ parma) so he ordered a second, Texan BBQ this time, which arrived in about 3 minutes flat - amazingly quick service

As he treated himself to a double parma, Reviewer Luke gave his score twice - however his score was the same for both meals

All in all it was a pretty darn good example of a parma, and at only $12 on a parma Wednesday its hard to go wrong.

From what I could gather The Duke of Kent is all about the food specials - It was hard to nail down the price of the parma as it fluctuates Daily, but from what Icould gather it goes a little like this: Monday - Thursday is a $15 Parma, However on Mondays it is still $15 but it comes with a free pot and on Wednesdays it is $12 with no pot, but you get a choice of the ‘Parmas of the World’ topping. All other times (so Friday - Sunday) its $19.90. Oh and on Tuesdays its burger n’ pot night for $15 - nothing to do with Parmas, but definitely worth mentioning. I hope you followed all that, It may require re-reading.

Parma - 7.1
Chips - 5.5
Salad - 4.3
Value - 7.4
Total - 6.28

The search continues …

Duke of Kent Hotel on Urbanspoon

Finally I want to say a big thanks to the guys over at Melbournepubs.com for their support over the last week, It’s greatly appreciated and anyone who reads this should head over to their site to find the biggest and best database of Melbourne nightlife on the Internet!

Attempt #27 -'Crooners'

 

[info]

When? - 20th of October, 2010

Where? - 43-49 Lygon St. East Brunswick

Price? - $19.50

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.crooners.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Lee, Matt, Pat, Stefo[/info]

** NOTE - This pub has closed! Parma no longer available - Review will stay up for posterity. Enjoy!

It’s not often I venture up this end of Lygon St. but I was pleasantly surprised by the great range of restaurants and watering holes in the area - Definitely a spot I want to revisit at some point

We arrived at Crooners and got our table, a considerably smaller review group than what we had in the past but good none the less.

Crooners is more of a lounge bar than a pub - I had been there many years before, when it was a ‘rat pack’ inspired and themed establishment (hence the name ‘Crooners’) unfortunately it seems to have lost that theme at some point since I last visited, as the only thing I could see that remains rat pack-esque is the name.

I had read online that Crooners offered a Wednesday cheap parma night - unfortunately that wasn’t the case and we were charged the full price of $19.50 for our chicken, I was absolutely starving by the time we ordered and luckily they wasted no time getting our Parmigianas out to us.

Its kind of hard to tell by the photo, but the Crooners parma is actually two chicken schnitzels, fuzed together by a more than generous helping of cheese. The schnitzels were a little on the thin side but as there were two of them they can definitely be forgiven, Slice of ham was absent but this was a totally G rated affair, with no nude schnitzel at all - Crooners is a very cheesy parma, whether that is a pro or a con to really comes down to personal preference - but all in all it was a tasty piece of chicken

The chips were eclipsed under the parma, which unfortunately left them in soggytown by the time I ate my way through to them, standard shoestring fries again - nothing to write home about.

The salad was a well proportioned garden salad of lettuce, onion, cucumber and a single slice of tomato with a very nice tasting cream dressing which complimented the salad and the parma well - points for that.

All in all Crooners parma was pretty good - It’s worth noting that they are open till 3am on weekends, perfect if you get a late night hankering for some parmage on the way home from a night on the town. They have a decent wine list and a great range of local, premium and imported beers. The schnitzel was very thin, which normally would be a dealbreaker but as they were kind enough to provide two schnitzels they redeemed themselves on that front. $19.50 is a little up there in terms of price but I certainly didn’t leave hungry.

After the Parma we headed up the road a few hundred meters to ‘The Quarry’ a pub that had Pinball, Pool Tables and Buck Hunter to finish off our night.

Parma - 7.2
Chips - 3.6
Salad - 4.6
Value - 5.6
Total - 5.64

The search continues…

Crooners on Urbanspoon

Attempt #26 - 'The Terminus Hotel'

 

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When? - 13th of October, 2010

Where? - 492 Queens Parade. Clifton Hill

Price? - $19.9, with a Tuesday $12 Parma n’ Trivia night

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.terminus.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Cale, Lee, Maz, Ness, Pat, Shanan, Stefo, Tanya[/info]

From the moment I pulled up out the front of the Terminus Hotel, I knew I was going to like it - the massive ‘Mountain Goat’ beer sign hanging over the door was proof enough it was a pub for me - The front bar was busy and bustling with people, some loyal regulars and others obviously just popped in for an after work pint. With an abundance of big wooden tables, sport on the big screen and a cosy lounge area to the side it’s definitely a pub I’d be proud to call my local, if they had a fireplace it would have been perfect.

When our group arrived we moved into the dining room around the back of the pub - A totally different, yet still very good experience that offered full table service and the lovely touch of chilled water bottles and complimentary bread with a bowl of oil & balsamic vinegar - something you dont often see in a pub setting.

We ordered our meals and a couple of jugs (The bartender recommended ’Moo Brew Pale Ale’ and we weren’t disappointed, a fantastic, flavourful beer that I’d definitely have again).

After a short wait, our parmas arrived - All but one, Reviewer Shanan missed out in the first round and we believe they had to quickly run out and rustle up another parma, but when his arrived it was fresh, hot and with a great coverage of golden brown cheese.

When it first landed on the table I was a tad disappointed, it looked small. There was a great heaping of salad on one side and the chips (although shoestring fries) were in abundance, which divided the plate almost perfectly into thirds, creating a veritable pie chart of parma, salad and fries - I took an aerial photo to further illustrate my point

Parma pie chart!

My fears of a small parma were soon allayed as soon as I cut into it, it was thick and juicy, pure chicken breast, not over-crumbed and perfectly cooked. There was a little bit of nude schnitzel around the edges of mine, but that didn’t appear on all of them. The most notable thing about the Terminus’ parma was the napoli sauce - it was fresh, tasty and obviously home made, it had a sweetness to it that I couldn’t quite put my finger on until reviewer Tanya picked it as capsicum, a welcome addition to the napoli sauce in my opinion. There was no ham, however I wouldn’t call that a negative in this case, the napoli sauce gave the chicken a great flavour that I don’t believe the addition of ham would have complimented. The cheese was golden brown, if only there was a bit more around the edges I would have trouble faulting this parma.

The fries were shoestring fries that looked as if they’d come straight off a large Big Mac meal - Now I’ve got nothing against shoestring fries and I actually found them well seasoned and rather enjoyable - but not every member of the review team felt the same, especially when we noticed that the steaks and other meals going past had hand cut chips that looked absolutely amazing - if they had’ve been beside the parma instead of the steak it would have been perfect, and we didn’t get why those chips weren’t in accompaniment.

The salad was cause for much debate, there was a lot of it, which is always a plus, it was a simple garden salad, yet some people felt it crossed the line into too simple. It was made up of rocket lettuce and very thinly sliced radish tossed through some olive oil. I thought it was simple and elegant but other reviewers found it bland and tasteless, even resorting to pouring the balsamic oil that was supplied with the bread over the salad to give it some flavour.

At $19.90 it was an outstanding parma - They advertise a $12 parma n trivia night in the front bar on Tuesday nights which would be fantastic (although word is they don’t take reservations, so you’d better get in early to secure a table). I honestly have trouble faulting the parma itself, The Terminus is a perfect example of how it should be done, however they let themselves down on the sides. If they spruce up the salad a little and give us the hand cut chips instead of shoestring fries and the Terminus would be in the running for the best chicken parmigiana in Melbourne.

We finished up at the Terminus and on the way home a few of us stopped in to Bridie’s for a pint of Bulmers and a game of Barry, we found a new game called ‘Monkey Business’ which kept us occupied for the better part of an hour.

Awesome game, I suggest you check it out! one of the few games on Barry that isn’t trivia based in which you actually have a chance to win some cash.

But I digress …

Parma - 8.4
Chips - 5.8
Salad - 5.8
Value -  6.9
Total - 7.08

The search continues …

Terminus Hotel on Urbanspoon

 

Attempt #25 - 'Westmeadows Tavern'

 

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When? - 7th of October, 2010

Where? - 10 Ardlie St. West Meadows

Price? - $22 (with a $12 Parma Night on Mondays & $12 Parma lunch special daily)

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.westmeadowstavern.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam Y, Glen, Lee, Nikki, Pat, Stefo, Tanya[/info]

This was not supposed to be a review about the Westmeadows Tavern. Our original plan was to do a review of the Irish pub known as P.J. O’Briens, located within the Melbourne Airport. We loaded up the parma bus and headed down, only to discover that the place was absolutely packed and there were no seats available, I normally call ahead and book our visits, but when I tried to call yesterday the number they had listed on their website was not the number for P.J’s, and thus no booking was made.

So standing in the middle of the airport, out front of a pub that wouldn’t take us, we decided to abandon P.J’s and go to the next closest pub we could think of, The Westmeadows Tavern (or ‘the Westy pub’ to locals).

Luckily for us, tables were in abundance at the Westy, we took our seats the bistro of a surprisingly large building (reminiscent of the Keilor Hotel) and ordered our Parmas.

Now this little snafoo with P.J’s had put us well and truly behind our usual schedule - We were all absolutely starving and our extreme hunger might have made it seem like the parma took longer to arrive than it actually did - but we were salivating by the time the chicken hit the table

With little hesitation, we dug in. The schnitzel was quality chicken kind of small and a little on the thin side of things (not terrible, but not great … I should start bringing a ruler to reviews so I give you an accurate measurement). If you like saucy parmas, then this one is for you, a ridiculous amount of napoli was dropped in the center, under a heap of cheese and on top of a tasty slice of ham - unfortunately even though there was a lot of it, they neglected to spread it all the way to the edge, leaving a fair bit of full frontally nude schnitzel, and caused some blackening of the edges.

The chips were minimal, but tasty - like the parma they were a little on the overcooked side. Completely unseasoned but with salt shakers on the table, I would’ve been happier with them if I had an extra handful - Reviewer Nikki had the extra handful I desired, however her parma was about an inch or so smaller than everyone else’s, not sure which of those trade off’s I would prefer.

I’ve never seen a salad with such an identity crisis, There was so many different ingredients packed into that little bowl I couldn’t decipher what it was trying to be! It contained -

  • Lettuce (two kinds)
  • Onion (lots of onion)
  • Cucumber
  • Tomato
  • Olives
  • Orange slices
  • Cream dressing

It was like the bastard lovechild of an Italian salad and a garden salad, That being said it was pretty tasty, although way too much onion, I was picking it out of the salad throughout the meal and eating it with the chicken just to tone down the overdose of onion in the salad itself … no kisses for me tonight!

The Westy parma was okay - I definitely left satisfied but nothing to write home about, unfortunately clocking in at $22.00 its very pricey for what you are getting, which brought its ‘value’ score down a fair whack. Apparently on Monday nights they offer a $12 parma night, with the option of Hawaiian, Mexican or Meatlovers varieties - Definitely something I would check out if I were in the area on a Monday night. I hope to one day try the P.J’s parma we intended to, but It will take awhile to get over the trauma of our first turn-away.

Parma - 6.3
Chips - 5.9
Salad - 4.3
Value - 4.3
Total - 5.41

The search continues…

Westmeadows Tavern on Urbanspoon

I just want to quickly point out that this attempt marks our 25th Official attempt to find the perfect parma. I know its only a small milestone but I just want to send out a big thanks to everyone who makes Parmadaze possible!

To the followers - Keep up the awesome work, I never thought we would ever get so many regular readers, I hope you enjoy my ramblings about a piece of chicken and be sure to keep reading!

To the Pubs - Thanks for putting up with us, keep up the awesome work and keep striving for that perfect Parma

And finally to the Parmadaze review team! I couldn’t do it without you guys, Thanks for giving up your Wednesday nights to come and eat some schnitzel and give your opinion. Here’s to another 25 parmas! (And many, many more!)