#403 - 'Royal Saxon'

Where - 545 Church St, Richmond

Price - $24.00 ($16 Parma Night Wednesday)

Website - https://www.royalsaxon.com/

The Royal Saxon is one of those pubs that I’m just amazed that we haven’t reviewed yet. It’s a nice looking pub in a popular area with a parma on the menu, and as far as I can tell they’ve been around since at least 2013 and yet they have managed to fly under our radar for all this time (although it does seem like they had less of a pub gribe vibe and more of an Italian fine dining thing going in the early days, so a parma may not have been on the menu).

It was a fine-ish Melbourne Sunday when I got the hankering for a parma, so I checked our recent suggestion list and the Royal Saxon was sitting on the top… Why the hell not. So we loaded up into the car and headed out to see what they had to offer.

I can’t tell you much about the inside of the Saxon as the outdoor area was so inviting we spent very little time indoors, almost immediately curling around to the left and grabbing a table in the leafy shade of the beer garden.

My heart sank when I saw the “Mr Yum” logo on the QR code at our table. Had I inadvertantly brought us to yet another Australian Venue Company Pub?? Thankfully not, as far as I can tell (nothing against the AVC, we’ve just been visiting their pubs a lot lately and wanted to try something new), the Royal Saxon just happens to also use Mr Yum like the AVC pubs do.

The QR code loaded up the menu and we took a gander at our target for the day…

Sounds good to me! We ordered via the app, along with a side of flatbread with edamame hummus to kick things off. We had arrived just after noon and the Royal Saxon opens at 12 on Sunday’s so we pretty much had the place to ourselves, not to mention the service was super quick, so faster than you could say “Dinki-Di” our flatbreads and parmas emerged from the kitchen.

But I’ll get to those in a sec, because this is the part of the review where I talk about the beers that they have on tap. The influx of online menus this past year has made this part of my job super easy, as rather than having to remember what beers are on tap I can just open up Mr Yum again and check the tap list. Lets see… We’ve got Peroni, Bentspoke, Burnley Brewing, Carlton, Jetty Road, Ballistec, Coopers, Balter, Pirate Life, Four Pines, 3 Ravens, Green Beacon, Mountain Goat and Asahi along with some ciders and seltzers, not a bad selection by any stretch! I decided to be a slave to current trends and ordered the Moon Dog seltzler to accompany my Sunday parma. Oh yeah the parma! Lets talk about that.

On first bite I have to say that The Royal Saxon put up one of the crunchiest chicken schnitzels I’ve tried in recent memory, perhaps ever. I don’t know what they did with those crumbs, but every bite carried a crispy snap like you would not believe.

The chicken itself was pure white chicken breast, well cooked and flavoursome. Not the biggest schnitzel I’ve seen, but thick enough and not trying to hide anything. I already mentioned the speed of the service, but in this case quick parma = hot parma, as this one was served piping hot and fresh as can be.

The toppings were pretty good, but didn’t floor me like the world’s crunchiest schnitzel did. A very cheddar-heavy and generous cheese blend on top was grilled to requisite gooeyness with a light golden brown finish.

The virginia ham was appreciated but didn’t add a whole lot to the flavour profile of the dish, however the napoli sauce is where I feel things fell apart a little - it was plain, smooth napoli sauce, not a single chunk of tomato to be seen and seemed as if it had possibly come straight from a tin. It was fine, but a bit of a disappointment considering the rest of the elements of the parma were so strong (especially when you check out the Royal Saxon’s Instagram, a photo of the parma from about 4 weeks ago showing some sort of greenery amongst the cheese that seemed very intruiging) .

The chippies were good. Piping hot like the parma and served with a side of faithful ol’ tomato sauce for dipping (not requested, it just came like that). Plenty of them and served beside, not under the parma. Could have used a little more seasoning, but a minor quibble on what was overall a damn fine serve of chips.

At first glance the salad looked pretty boring, but on tucking in I found it was topped with a unique dressing with flavours that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Possibly mint? I’m not too sure, but it was tasty, enjoyable and elevated what looked like a pretty ordinary salad to something quite flavoursome.

I’m pretty happy paying $24 for the parma we received, It was constructed with quality ingredients and was overall a damn tasty feed. If you’re on the hunt for a bargain the Saxon is currently offering a $16 parma night on Wednesdays, definitely worth checking out if you’re in the area.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention that the Royal Saxon also has a full menu dedicated to treats for your dog, ranging from jerky to beef patties to “doggy stew”, perfect for the goodest boy or girl in your life.

Overall the Royal Saxon offers up a pretty tasty, well constructed parma that I greatly enjoyed, it may sound like a minor thing to focus on but the crunch to the crumbs was fantastic and almost worth the price of admission right there. The toppings were fine, but I think are missing that certain je ne sais quoi that would have made it phenomenal. Perhaps those missing green things were the key.

Worth a crack though! Great beer garden too.

Parma - 7.50

Chips - 8.00

Salad - 8.25

Value - 8.00

Total -  7.85

The search continues...

#402 - 'Station Hotel'

Where - 59 Napier St. Footscray

Price - $26

Website - https://thestationhotel.com.au/

In the interest of full disclosure lets ge this out of the way early - I love The Station and have for many years considered it the spot to get one of the best steaks Melbourne has to offer - However over the years one thing always bugged me about them… They never had a parma on the menu. Over the last 10 years I would check the menu every few months in the vain hope that this was the week they serve up a parma, even accosted them on Twitter about it pretty regularly, but with no result.

So of course when I stop reviewing parmas they add one to the menu.

Now it has been a hot minute since I’ve been to The Station, the last time I visited the space that is now the beer garden was a carpark - But despite the lack of convenient parking it is a welcome improvement, being a decent day we grabbed a table where we once parked the car and enjoyed a bit of the great outdoors.

As far as beer gardens go The Station’s is solid. Outdoor bar, plenty of permanent shade to keep it viable in lots of weather conditions and an epic double storey cubby house to keep the kids entertained.

We took a seat and scanned the QR code on the table - This is when I realised that the Station is now owned by the Australian Venue Company, the pub group that owned the subject of our last review, The Imperial, along with an increasing chunk of Melbourne’s pub scene.

What tipped me off that this was an AVC pub? The thumbnail image of the parma that their mobile menu uses is the same photo that the Impy parma used. Not just a similar photo, the exact same photo.

We ordered the food via the app (The novelty still hasn’t worn off on this, it feels so futuristic, like how The Jetsons would order a parma and beers) along with a side of mashed potato for shits and giggles. As far as beer goes the tap list is the same as the Imperial’s, so let me save some time and bust out the old CTRL+C, CTRL V - Furphy, James Squire, Heineken, Balter XPA, Carlton Draught, Brooklyn, Kosciuszko, Little Creatures, Panhead, White Rabbit and Hawkers available on tap at the time of writing.

Interesting to note that along with using the same photo as the Impy parma it seems like the general “template” for this parma is the same as well, and I was interested to see how the two would stack up against each other. Would one be a direct facsimilie of the other? I guess we’ll see.

We didn’t need to wait long to find about because about 15 minutes the parmas fell before us, and I’m not gonna sugar coat it, the result was disappointing.

The schnitzel was decent size, nice and thick, but it was served lukewarm at best and the chicken itself was dense and very dry. You can see from the cross section photo just how dry this bird was. I did appreciate the lemon wedge as a garnish, something you don’t see with a lot of parmas, however starting with a schnitzel like the one we were served as a base this parma was off to a pretty bad start.

Toppings were pretty good all around and did their best to prop up the schnitzel. The ham had a good flavour and was rather thick cut, the cheese would have been nicer had it been hotter. The napoli was flavoursome however somehow even sweeter than the Imperial’s napoli, which we already registered as quite sweet.

As far as potato loaded side dishes go the chips were served hot & fresh. The parma was served stacked directly on top of them, but I managed to save them before too much damage was done. Well salted, crunchy and an all round great chip. While it doesn’t affect the score the side of mashed potato that we picked out was outstanding - I’m pretty sure it contained more butter than it did potato, but no complaints from me. Highly recommended.

The coleslaw to the side was a definite step down in quality from its Impy counterpart. It was very dry and needed much more dressing to try and salvage it. The menu called it a “raw slaw” but after some Googling I can’t quite work out what puts the “raw” in the “raw slaw” (I’m also having trouble determining who put the bop in the bop shoo bop shoo bop, but thats a story for another time).

As far as value goes $26 was a bit pricey for what it was, I could be convinced it was worth the money had we received a fresh one, but as it stands I felt a little short changed. I can’t see any discount parma nights on the menu and the “50% off your whole bill happy hour” deal that was rolled out to all of the AVC pubs expired at the end of January, so at the time of writing it seems like full price is the only option.

All told The Station was a bit of a let down, maybe because we had just come off the Impy parma which is pretty much exactly the same thing but … better. The Station parma felt like the Wish.com version of the Impy parma - Similar in style but lower quality once you look beneath the surface.

I’ll … what is the opposite of a preface… postface? I’ll postface this review by saying that The Station was very busy when we visited, and its possible that this sub-par parma was just a glitch in the kitchen - All the elements of a good parma are there, but just needed to stick the landing a little better. I’ll try and not leave it years before my next visit to the Station and I’ll post an update should I check it out again soon.

And thats it for this week! I’ll try my hardest not to go to another AVC pub for our next review. Unless they trick me again.

Parma - 6.50

Chips - 8.00

Salad - 7.00

Value - 6.50

Total -  6.90

The search continues...

#401 - 'The Imperial Hotel'

Where - 2-8 Bourke St. Melbourne

Price - $26.00

Website - https://bourkestreetimperial.com/

There aren’t many pubs in Melbourne that we have more history with than The Imperial Hotel. We’ve reviewed their standard parma three times (in 2012, 2013 and 2017), we sampled their Christmas parma made from turkey breast and served with cranberry sauce, and most recently we leapt from the page to the screen with a video review of their pizza parma, a schnitzel hammered out thin then sliced and topped as if it were a pizza (which, as far as I can tell, didn’t last long as it appears to have been ditched from the menu all together).

I’m pleased to report that two of the four consecutive golden chook awards for Parma of the Year that we presented to them between 2012 to 2015 are still sitting over the front bar, something I always check for whenever I drop in for a visit.

We didn’t discover the Impy until our 112th review, and yet in my mind it feels like as long as there has been ParmaDaze there has been the Impy parma, and to me their parma has always had a signature look that they didn’t often stray from - A massive schnitzel flanked by two bowls, one full of thick cut steak chips and a second with a shaved parmesan laden garden salad. I could pick it out of a lineup every time.

This is what I think of when I think “Impy Parma”

So last week, while browsing Instagram I spotted Instagrammer Chicken_parma_official’s visit to The Imperial and something definitely didn’t look right. The caption said “Imperial Hotel” but gosh darnit that was not an Impy Parma in the photo.

I had to ask in the comments and it was confirmed shortly after … this was the new world order.

Gone were the steak fries. Gone were the seperate bowls. Gone was the garden salad that was more parmesan cheese than vegetables. This was not my Impy parma. The weekend was quickly approaching so I figured what better way to return from our little “Hiatus” than to revisit one of the pubs that put ParmaDaze on the map and see just what the heck was going on over there.

While the Impy has undergone a bit of a facelift in recent years, The rooftop bar up top being the main attraction in the summer months, and I’ve got to admit it is a beautiful spot for a cocktail up there, however downstairs is still my favourite spot to hang out with a pint and catch one of the international sports games that are always running on the TV’s down there.

We grabbed a seat in the bistro, and in this brave new world scanned the QR code on the table to access the menu, which can also be used to order your food & drinks directly to the table from your phone.

Target sighted! Also nice to note the addition of an eggplant option for all the vego’s out there. We placed our orders and eagerly awaited the arrival of the new look Impy parma.

As far as beers on tap go the front bar has Furphy, James Squire, Heineken, Balter XPA, Carlton Draught, Brooklyn, Kosciuszko, Little Creatures, Panhead, White Rabbit and Hawkers available on tap at the time of writing, with a handful of extra options in the fridge including White Claw Seltzer, if you’re at all into the new seltzer trend that is taking over the world at the moment.

About 10 minutes after placing our order our parmas arrived at the table…

Well the rumours are true - The Impy parma has had a facelift. I was scared, had they ruined one of the best parmas in Melbourne? I picked up my knife and fork with trembling hands and tucked in to find … A damn good schnitzel.

It was thick, it was juicy, it was cooked to perfection. The Imperial parma may have had a bit of a rejig to more resemble something you would find at The Park or The Royston (both fantastic parmas in their own right), but I’ll be darned if it wasn’t still fantastic.

The crumbing wasn’t too thick and retained a solid crunch, and other than some slight flaking off the bottom of the chicken breast while I ate it’s honestly tough to find fault in the schnitzel the Imperial put up this time around.

Plenty of rich gooey cheese topped this parma off nicely, along with some shaved ham that didn’t pack a massive punch in terms of flavour, but I was appreciative of its inclusion.

As Chicken_parma_official noted in their Instagram post there was definitely a sweetness to the napoli sauce that some might find off putting. I didn’t hate it, I didn’t love it, but all things considered its a minor quibble amongst the otherwise stellar ingredients.

There was a sprinkle of spices across the top of the cheese which I tried to identify, as best as I could deduce it was a blend of cracked pepper, garlic salt & celery salt … although it could have just as easily been a pinch of Vegeta. Hard to say without invading the kitchen and breaking all sorts of social distancing rules.

This bit stings and probably the most controversial decision of the revamp of this parma - The chips have switched from thicc cut steak chips to a thinner, more McDonald’s style fry (not quite as thin as Maccas, but not a patch on what they used to be) This is one that firmly comes down to personal preference. I like steak fries, I know others prefer skinny fries. Gun to my head I would have preferred they stick with the original chip style - But these were fine too. Either way they were served hot & fresh, and we were still offered complimentary aioli and tomato sauce, an Impy staple.

If it were any other parma I would have said I preferred the coleslaw to the garden salad, It was flavoursome, rich and the little sprinkle of assorted seeds on top (while not doing much in terms of flavour) worked great for presentation. But the Imperial’s old garden salad was one of the few that I actively enjoyed. It was a fine slaw, great even. It worked great with the parma, was super tasty either eaten with a bit of parma on the fork or on its own. But do I prefer it over the old garden salad? … I don’t know. Apples and oranges.

I don’t mind paying a resonable price for good food. I greatly enjoyed this parma so to me $26 seems like solid value. If you are after a bargain The Imperial are running a promotion for the month of January 2021 - 50% off the total of your food & beverage bill if you order via mobile between 5-6pm every day of the week. As far as discounts go this one is a doozy and I’d definitely recommend grabbing a bargain this month if you can.

Part of me wants to kick up a fuss, flips some tables and chuck a world class tanty at the fact that the Impy parma I’ve known and loved for the past 8 years is gone - However what they’ve offered up in its place is a damn fine meal and (in my opinion) a worthy successor. Sure things are different, but a part of life is evolving with change. 2021 is different, ParmaDaze is different, the Impy parma is different - and I have high hopes for all three.

Parma - 9.00

Chips - 8.00

Salad - 8.25

Value - 8.00

Total -  8.45

The search continues...