Melbourne Food Review: Hofbrauhaus, Market La, CBD at Spatula, Spoon and Saturday
We interrupt the scheduled programming of the ‘What I Ate in Thailand‘ series to bring you something totally different. Were you shocked at the scary looking huge sausages? I was too.
Anyway, this was Wednesday the 30th of December 2009. It was one of those really hot Melbourne day. What could be better than a nice stein of cold beer. I looked around the dining room (it was 6-ish, very early in the evening we had plans to be somewhere else later) and it seemed like everyone was drinking out of them really huge jugs. I felt totally inadequate with my little stein of beer. However, it was beautifully cold and I can’t imagine ordering a bigger sized beer as I can imagine it warming up very quickly.
The restaurant seemed to have that whole kitschy stereotypical German decoration to it. It was very novel. It made me feel like drinking lots of beer and get up and do a Bavarian dance thing. Hey, I’m sure that’s the purpose of the joint!
The beer aside, the menu was dazzling with your also stereotypical German fare on offer. The meat, the wurst, the schnitzel, the spetzle, the knodel, the potatoes, the works. Fear not though, vegetarians, they do offer vegetarian platter and a couple of other meat-free choices.
(Roasted and pickled pork shank served with saurkraut and potato dumpling – $35.50)
But who am I to say no to something that is called ‘our specialty’ on the menu? The pickled pork shank or Münchner Schweinshaxe. I asked the waitress whether it would be a really large meal. She said yes. To be perfectly honest, I don’t know why I ask. I mean it’s not like I don’t have the capacity to eat a whole damn pig because I do.
Anyway, the meal arrived and let’s just say I didn’t think it was very big. Sure it was a lot of meat but really what kind of a pussy are you if you can’t finish this? Hehe. The pork shank was served with saurkraut – seriously the best saurkraut I have ever tasted. Although I have to say I can count the number of times I have had saurkraut with one hand (that is, we don’t include hot dog times). The knodel or potato dumpling was also declicious and creamy. Josh rather liked it so I gave him most of it.
Now let’s talk about the pork. It was incredibly fatty. See this was the main reason why the meal wasn’t really as epic as it looked. A fair percentage of this pork shank was fat and rind. And you just simply couldn’t eat them all. The meat was tasty and tender but there simply was too much fat to it. And for those of you who have witnessed me literally eating blocks of beef fat you would know that this is saying something. The rind itself was tough and fatty. It wasn’t puffy and crackling as I had hoped. Overall, it was one of those things you write home about due to its sheer novelty (Look ma! I ate a whole German pork shank!) Although I’m not too sure I would order this again.
(Krainer, smoked pork and veal German sausages served with mash and saurkraut – $27.90)
Josh’s dish looked much more impressive. Seriously. We saw them approaching us from across the room and I almost fainted at the look of the plate. No? You don’t get it? Try this. In fact, make it your wallpaper then you’ll realise how impressive this truly is. The wurst were, well, really good for lack of better description. I rather liked the accompanied mashed potatoes so I kept stealing it from Josh. All in all we were quite happy with our meal and since we had an Entertainment card, one of the meals was free. Even better.
On hind sight, I really should have brought more people, ordered more beer and go for the dessert afterwards. Hey, it was new year! Spatula, Spoon and Saturday would like to wish you all a belated happy new year and look forward to a good year of blogging in 2010. Hey, don’t say I didn’t warn you about being very behind!
Hofbräuhaus, 18 Market Lane, Melbourne 3000 VIC Ph: 03 9663 3361
