perth – Page 10 – Abstract Gourmet

Velvet Espresso

The latest in the line of sexy new cafes run by people who know their stuff has hit the CBD. Velvet Espresso on King St is now open for business and pouring a fine brew indeed. I dropped by for lunch with Ben (W.A Barista Academy honcho and pin up boy for the Perth coffee scene) this week to check out the place and see how it all stacked up.

Justin Kenny, owner and barista of Velvet has a good track record in the Perth cafe scene. He owned Fix Espresso back in the days when it was actually making good coffee, and gained a reputation as a man who knows his stuff, quiety going about his work and impressing with the results.

Velvet Espresso is an excellent addition to the King St set. It’s relaxed but stylish, with lush dark wood tones on the tables and a Florence Broadhurst print on the walls. It looks the part, but what is more important… it tastes the part.
The King St area is currently dominated by cafes that earnt their reputations a long time ago (King St Cafe), and who now have fallen away into what I term espresso mediocrity (Cino to Go, Etro). They might look fancy, but the quality in the cup is a long way from ideal. Velvet changes all that.

Justin is using a great locally roasted ‘5 Senses’ blend. It’s full bodied and robust, with a bit of edge to it, and a slightly spicey aftertaste. It’s what I’d call a great drinking coffee, and it works well in a short cup as well as in milk. The shots are pulled quite short to get the best elements of the flavour, without the lingering bitterness that so often destroys a shot of espresso. What’s more important though, is that it’s all a work in progress for Justin. He’s still refining his blend to get the exact flavour and style of espresso that he wants. A concept that I’m sure is completely alien to the majority of cafe owners in this city, who are happy with whatever Vittoria or Segafredo or “Insert Generic Italian Sounding Crap Coffee Brand Here” gives them.

They’re also serving some very tasty sandwiches and rolls, and Justin’s mum’s friands (that she bakes fresh each morning) are bordering on levels of tastiness to rival some of *my* mum’s baking (well, close anyway :) ).

If you work in the CBD, go and check out Velvet Espresso. It won’t disappoint.

Velvet Espresso
5/172 St George’s Tce (Enter on King St)
Perth

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Latte Art Pro Style

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I dropped into Epic again yesterday and learnt an important lesson. If you hang around long enough talking to the barista’s you get handed all sorts of great coffee to try :)

I happened to come in while Megan (W.A Latte Art Champion this year) was going through the motions of making and perfecting every drink on the menu… just for practice (!) My latte art skills are quite obviously lacking compared to this… but perhaps one day I’ll be able to pull a few of them out. The coffee again was great.

Happiness is a sharp knife

I’ve just got my knives back from being professionally sharpened and I am a happy man. I mostly use my 10inch Wusthof classic for most of my chopping, julienning, chiffonading, and the odd COMPLETE AND TOTAL ANNIHILATION of meat, vegetables, and/or herbs. I also use my Wusthof paring knife on a daily basis for peeling, and tidying up the knobby bits on veges and the like. Then there is also an 8 inch Furi East-West (Santoku) knife that I’m trying to get Sharon to use so she doesn’t have to use my Wusthof… but it’s not really working.

Needless to say they get quite a workout at times, and although I keep them pretty sharp with my diamond pronged sharpener and honed with a steel… they still get dull after a while.

So driving along through the city yesterday I happened to be stopped at the lights behind a van that said “Professional Mobile Knife Sharpening !” (actually I added the “!”, because it seemed appropriate). I called the number on the van and talked to the very friendly Ken, who said he’d swing by my work the next day and sort me out.

Ken does all the sharpening for a number of the “King Of Knives” stores in Perth, so if you drop your knives off there, it’ll probably be him who does them, as well as numerous hotels and restaurants throughout the city. He is a busy man.

So in a very Proverbs 27:17 way (except it was man sharpening steel this time), Ken swung by in his van today and went through the process of sharpening my knives. The Furi had a couple of small dents that needed to be ground out on a stone, and then it was onto the grinder with three grit levels taking the edge back to razor sharpness before a finishing buff and polish. The whole setup runs off a small petrol motor in the back of his van. All up, it took about 10 minutes to do three knives and cost me $18… which I was more than happy with.

For a while I’m going to have to stop my normal routine of running my fingers over the edge of the blade to test how sharp it is, because even across ways I’d be scraping my finger prints off…they’re that sharp… or else I could take up burglary… hrmm.

Anyone wanting to get some knife repairs done, or to feel the love that only a razors edge can bring should give Ken a call. Now I just need to find something to cut.

Ken Powell – Professional Knife Sharpening
0418 916 947

Epic Espresso

Last Friday I headed down with great anticipation to see the latest addition to Perth’s burgeoning gourmet coffee scene, Epic Espresso. Epic is the vision of former “Core Espresso” owner, and all round coffee obsessive Corey Diamond.

The place looks nice. Sexy fit-out with wood tones and funky furniture throughout, and some crazy machinery sitting on the bar. To start with is the 2 x 3 group Synesso Cyncra’s… the top of the line in commercial espresso at the moment, and a small feat of engineering brilliance. I had the pleasure of playing around on one of them recently at the Perth Food & Wine Festival, and they are sweet. Next on the list is the sizable stack of Mazzer grinders. There are three Mazzer Roburs (two of them running off three-phase power, and another from regular power), and a Mazzer Mini (on the first day) for Decaf, that has since been replaced by a Mazzer Super Jolly. All that gear alone would cost more than I’d like to think… let alone the heavy duty ceramic cups, stylish new tea infusers, and an array of milk steaming jugs that could equip a small army (of milk steaming soldiers).

Needless to say, Corey is not one for doing things halfheartedly. Epic is his vision for raising the standard of coffee in Perth, and from what I’ve seen it’s done that already.

Stepping into the shop on opening day I was greeted by the lovely baristi, and asked what to order. I thought i’d better start with a flat white and work my way on from there. All of epics coffees come with a double shot as standard, they have a policy of sending all their flat whites out with latte art on top, so mine was presented with a lovely rosetta. Aside from looking great though… it tasted phenomenal. The espresso cut through the milk nicely and although I’m pretty bad at describing flavours it had a definitely chocolaty after taste… If you’re one of those 2 sugars in your coffee by default people… it may be a good place to start getting out of that habit.

Next I tried a double ristretto shot of the Capricorn Estate Singe Origin. Epic dedicated one of its grinders solely to single origin espresso (which is funnily enough, coffee beans that are sourced entirely from one place, and not blended). This week/month (?) It’s an Australian grown coffee, and a good one at that. A lot of single origins don’t stand up on their own as espressos, and there is much debate about whether they should be used for espresso at all… but I think it’s great to have the ability to try and taste different coffees, and to help educate people into not thinking of coffee as just a bitter black liquid you have to pour sugar into for your morning caffeine hit. It’s by tasting single origins that you get to see the vast array of flavours that are possible.

So next on to the hot chocolate. This is made with molten Belgian chocolate which is ladelled into a small steaming jug. Then milk is added and it’s steamed together to a nice thick consistency. Then poured out and extra molten chocolate poured over the top. No need for tacky marshmallows or the like…this is luxury in a cup… without the sickly sweet tasty that most hot chocolates suffer from… sure to be a hit.

Finally, when I thought i was finished, and had a nice little buzz going from all the coffee (4 shots so far), Corey suggests I try the piccolo latte… which he thinks works really nicely with the espresso blend they’re using (another 5 Senses blend).
He was right… deep rich espresso and steamed milk… A great way to get the flavour of the coffee and the sweetness of the milk in one package.

All in all, 6 shots of coffee, and the happy satisfaction of knowing there is somewhere I can count on to get great coffee when my Silvia (Rancilio) decides to give me hassles. Looking forward to heading back soon and keeping them honest… but I expect lots of good things to come.

Epic Espresso
Outtram St (turn left off Hay St, just down from Miss Mauds)
West Perth

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First & Last Night at Il Pasto

A week or two ago, late on a Sunday night in Perth (about 8pm), Sharon and I were doing our usual trick of finding restaurants to be turned away from due to the kitchen being closed. Having not been turned away from many restaurants in Mt Hawthorn recently, we thought we’d try there for a change.

So cruising down to the end of the ubiquitously named Oxford St, we happened across a little pizza bar called Il Pasto. Finding out that yes indeed it was still open, we headed inside for a pizza, and possibly the strangest experience I’ve had in a restaurant for a while.

Arriving at the counter, we were slightly suprised to see the chef sitting out in the restaurant eating a pizza, while people were packing boxes around him. He quickly explained that this was actually the last night that Il Pasto was going to be in operation. They had recently sold the business to another operator, who was going to be opening up a Japanese restaurant at the site. He also explained that we were welcome to stay as long as we didn’t mind people packing boxes around us, and that there was only one pizza left. I took that to mean that there was only one type of pizza left, because they’d packed all the ingredients away…but soon realised it meant that there was literally one piece of pizza dough left from which it they could make us a pizza. So we literally had the last pizza ever in that restaurant.

So straight away the atmosphere was strange. Instead of customers we felt like we were friends who had somehow been roped into helping someone move. In part because they were so friendly. Carlo (the chef) and Sandra (his girlfriend) chatted away to us like we were old mates. We ordered a quattro with cacciatore sausage, sun dried tomatoes, mushroom, and artichoke, and bought a bottle of Pizzini Sangiovese, which was a steal at $20 (which is very likely cheaper than retail).

That was the other thing… everything was for sale… and cheap. The chairs, the tables, the book case, the olive oil, the wine, all of it. Carlo’s Dad was chatting to Sharon about how we was a bit sad the restaurant was closing… “but ahh these Japanesey” he said… “they makea good offer”. He was pottering around the store, packing things into boxes, at one point showing me into the store room to ask me if i’d like to buy any of the white wine or champagne in there.

So our pizza came, in amongst chatting, and we wandered around the shop picking things up, asking prices of this and that, drinking amazingly good and extremely cheap wine, and basically acting like we weren’t customers who had just walked off the street.

So in the end, we ended up getting the pizza, a salad, the wine, some extra virgin olive oil, some chilli infused olive oil, some truffle extract flavoured oil, and another 3 bottles of excellent wine (including a Montepulciano d’Abrusso). It was like a closing down sale meets restaurant in a Red Dot “everything must go!” extravaganza.

As for the food, it was nice. The pizza was tasty, the garden salad was as tasty as a garden salad can be, and the wine was phenominal. It’s only a shame that the first time we managed to get to the place, it just happened to be the very night it was closing down for good.

Still, I gave Carlo my email and said to be sure to let me know if he starts another restaurant up in the future, because if they can make people feel so welcome when they are in the middle of closing for good, then I would love to see them at the height of service. That kind of genuine friendly attitude and love of food is something that you just can’t buy, and you can’t fake, so hopefully Perth hasn’t seen the last of these guys yet.

Il Pasto *was* located at:
401 Oxford St,
Mount Hawthorn
http://ilpasto.com.au

Cafe Banca

I make perhaps the worst restaurant reviewer in history. That is unless anyone wants to read a bunch of reviews about which restaurants are the best places to go to on a complete whim shortly before they close and still hope to get a decent meal.

It was a Thursday night, we’d been out shopping, leaving it too late as we always do, by the time the shopping was done (read: I got hungry and cranky), it was around 9pm. Now to most of you reading this post from the Eastern States or overseas, this might not be such a problem. If you’re in Perth however, you’ll know exactly what I mean when I say that the situation was dire. On a Thursday night, at 9pm, you’ve got a slim chance of finding anywhere to eat that isn’t a) Closed b) About to close c) McDonalds, or d) Primarily inhabited by drug addicts.

So it was a lovely surprise when we wandered into Cafe Banca at 9:15pm, and (after a quick consultation with the kitchen) were given a seat. Noted, we did have to order within 5 minutes, and asked to only order certain things because most of the stuff had been put away already… but we were so overjoyed at getting to eat at all it didn’t seem to matter.

Cafe Banca is a well appointed restaurant on Wanneroo Rd in Tuart Hill. It could be my local if I was one of those people who have locals, but I’m not, so it isn’t. It’s almost a little too funky for the spot that it’s in, which has lead me to question just how well they do there, but from the looks on the faces of the diners that were there (not being the kind of people who leave it too late to go out for dinner) it’s doing just fine.

We were initially seated next to the kitchen, but then moved to a comfy booth in the middle of the restaurant, one of the few booths i’ve been in that are actually comfortable and practical (I’m a big booth fan, but not when it means you’re sliding off the seat and have trouble reaching the plate because you’re slouched backwards in a highly trendy but utterly impractical way).

So, not wanting to overstep the mark of the already lovely service and hospitality we were shown, I promptly ordered the black and white prawn linguini, and Sharon picked the lamb shanks with mash potato, which I immediately wished I had ordered for myself. We also decided on a bottle of cheap wine to wash it all down, $15 for a bottle of Murphy’s Lore Shiraz Cabernet, crazy cheap, and a nice quaffing wine.

The meals arrived fast… a little too fast, but not surprisingly fast, if that makes any sense. By the time we got in and had ordered, the rest of the people in the place were ordering coffees or finishing off what was left in their glasses of wine before slinking back off into the night to their beds (like all good Perthites should). So there was nary an order coming into the kitchen except ours.

My meal was great, prawns were tasty and fresh, and the linguini had a chilli through it that gave it a nice kick. Sharon’s lamb shanks were so tender they fell of the bones before she could get to it herself (which I’m hoping was because they’d been slow cooked all day up until that point). The wine flowed freely and went down easily, to the point where we suitably rosey by the end.

At the end the owner was there to ask our how the meal was and generally made us feel like he was really happy we had decided to stop by, which was great. So you never know, it may just end up becoming my local after all.

Cafe Banca
75 Wanneroo Road, Tuart Hill
Phone: 9344 7007
http://www.bancacafe.com.au/

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Perth Norg

No it’s not Perth’s answer to the Page 3 girls, It’s actually the latest new style of news website produced locally, for Perth people.

PerthNorg (a contraction of News Organisation), is a community driven website featuring news, sport, lifestyle, and basically anything else you can think of that people want to read about. The idea is that anyone who registers with the site can submit stories, photos, links etc, and then vote on other stories, based on their level of interest/relevance. That means the most important and/or interesting stories will rise to the top, and the rest will float away into the never never of cyberspace.

It’s great for anyone who is now so entrenched in the world of blogs and online media that they cringe when reading a magazine, and look desperately for a comment box under each article in the newspaper (namely me). Collaborative journalism at it’s most raw and basic.

So please, especially if you’re a Perth resident, head over to the side, check it out, and if there’s some news affecting you that you think should be on there… add it ! It’s that simple. No longer should this town be shackled by the bonds of media conglomerates telling us what the news is.

Ok, that’s as “fight the power” as I’m going to get for a Friday afternoon… I should also note that I have a regular blog/column over at PerthNorg, so you’ll find some of my articles popping up there too, once I figure out what I’m going to write.