Asian Delights in Melbourne

After a few hours of shopping at Smith Str in Collingwood, Melbourne, we settled for lunch at Coconut Palm, a Vietnamese restaurant. We had Special Fried Rice(equivalent of Singapore's Yang Chow Fried rice) and Seafood Glass Noodle Soup which were simply delectable! They were extremely generous with ingredients such as chinese sausage and shrimps. The fried rice was topped with a fried egg. The Noodle Soup was a little spicy with lots of seafood in it! After lunch, we continued our walk down Smith Str for more shopping at the Factory Outlets!

Towards early evening, we returned to Melbourne city and headed for Little Bourke Str (Chinatown Precinct), which had excellent food as well as some shopping. At the cross-streets of Little Bourke St and Russell St, we found a quaint little chinese restaurant, called the Beijing Hot Pot, Noodle and Dumpling Cafe! It was a small eatery and nearly every table was filled with small groups of patrons. It was a little rowdy and obvious that the folks were enjoying the meal. At every table, they had Hot Pot, which is similar to steamboat. It looked good, however as there were only two of us, we decided that the quantity was too much for the two of us and decided on ala carte. We had Xiao Long Pao(which came in either 10 or 15 pieces), fried onion pan cake, spring rolls, Dim Sum and a Beijing Special Noodle. The Spring Rolls came first, a serving of 4 pieces. The skin was crispy and the fillings were mashed potatoes and some bits of vegetables. It was very good or were we very hungry? As for the XiaoLong Pao, the skin was pretty thick with a generous filling of meat. The pan cake was huge and thick, and quite succulent! Lastly, the Beijing Special Noodles came. It was called 'Ja Jiang Mian' where you have to "do it yourself" by adding the Black bean sauce and condiments of shredded carrots, cabbage and cucumber which were placed in little bowls. Then we tossed the noodles with the condiments before it was ready to serve.

It was all very filling and satisfying! Besides that, it was also a very affordable place to dine at. We promised ourselves that the next time we're there, we'll have more than two people and we'll go for the hot pot.

Read more!

Queen Victoria Market, Melbourne

One of the "must go" places of interest in Melbourne is the Queen Victoria Market (QVM). At 8:30am, my mum and I went to Elizabeth Str to catch tram #57 to Victoria Street, which was a short walk to the QVM.

Across from the tram station, we could immediately smell breakfast and coffee as we walked past several cosy cafes lining the street to the QVM. Then just around the corner is a building housing the gourmet market which sells a good variety of edibles such as candies, bread, sausages, cheese, etc! It was hilarious to hear the Aussie candy stallowner speak Singlish to get our attention.

Outside of the building was a market which had a colorful array of organic fruits and vegetables which prices were not cheap.


Then, a little further on was a huge covered space housing, I believe more than a hundred or more of stalls which reminded us of "Chat-tu-chat" (a weekend flea market) in Bangkok, Thailand except that it was much cooler (in temperature, that is) and had orderly rows of stalls rather than a maze. If you're looking for cheap buys - personalised dog/cat tags, crystal, footwear, bomber jackets and stuff - this is the place.

Read more!