Place: Van Mai
Physical: 373 Victoria Street, Richmond
There is a lot of cheap Vietnamese food floating around the place. And--this is the Springvale local talking--a lot of it's mediocre. Sometimes even really quite terribly shit. That said, there are gems to be found. It's a process of trial and error. I don't think the annual cheap eats booklet is much help. A place that was lauded for years by those people was one of the filthiest restaurants I've ever been into and their food was just okay.
Van Mai is a better example of bargain basement Vietnamese food. The prices are standard: just below $15 for 90% of dishes (all of which are generously served). The menu is standard: a huge selection of popular Chinese and Vietnamese dishes with a smaller section where the real fun is located. The first, I don't know, page and a half of the menu is dedicated to dishes with Vietnamese names. These are dishes based around sound, inspired ideas like boning out chicken wings (one of my favourite things in the world) and stuffing them with minced pork, minced prawns and mushrooms (three of my favourite things in the world). Sadly, there aren't any dishes that include steaming pig guts or grilled chicken hearts on a stick. I was in the mood for that kind of thing after spying Hao's Oriental Grill, a Northern Chinese BBQ joint, next door. Hao's seems very popular and seems like the sort of place I'd take people I trust with my life. The menu has the standards--beef on a stick, grilled popular cut of popular animal--but has so many things that I must eat at some point in the near future.
Back to Van Mai. The restaurant plays it safe but gets away with it because the dishes are varying degrees of good, especially if you opt to enjoy them with beer (I liked the Saigon 333 recommended by the waiter). The entree--large balls of pork and prawn served with the obligatory lettuce leaves and chilli sauce--was a fine example of beer food. Salty. Crispy. Delicious. A product of two noble animals. Are these the best meatballs you'll have in your life? No. Are they among the best meatballs you'll have for, I don't know, six bucks? Surely.
The mains were a mixed bag. The calamari was, I think, just okay. It wasn't tough or anything horrible like that but for what was supposedly a heavily marinated dish it was lacking something. The braised eggplant was good. The sauce was sticky, spicy and, of course, salty. Too rich to eat by yourself, I'd argue, even if you really like eggplant, but worth a space on the table if you and your friends were sharing a lot of meaty dishes and wanted some plant matter.
My favourite was the pork ribs special. I expected either a great rack of ribs that had been broken down into sections, two or three ribs a piece, or perhaps the pork spare ribs of my childhood, but instead received the popcorn chicken of pork ribs. Boneless, bite-sized chunks of tender pork encased in a crispy, salty batter. Now these--these--were well thought out beer food. Mess free morsels of salinated meatasticness.
Service was, for this end of the market, damn good. Food arrived prompty. The waiter was keen to recommend a few dishes and was happy to point out the better of the two Vietnamese beers on offer. We weren't given the sense that we should, you know, just eat quickly and fuck off, which is so common in cheap restaurants (for sound business reasons).
Overall, Van Mai's offerings are well worth the travel and admission price.
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