[info]
When? - 19/01/12
Where? - Keilor East RSL. 12-22 Hoffmans Rd. Essendon
Price? - $20
Barry? - No
Website? - http://keiloreastrsl.com.au/
Reviewers - Adam, Bearder, Carly, Lee, Nikki, Pat, Stefo[/info]
EDIT 04/03/16 - We wen't back! After hearing that the kitchen at the Keilor East RSL had a revamp we went back for round two, and found a much better bird waiting for us! This review is no longer valid - check out our new thoughts by clicking HERE!
EDIT 2/12/15 - Just got word that the Keilor East RSL has seen the light from their processed-schnitzel ways and are now taking great pride in their home-made birds. Going to give them a re-redo in the new year, but until then perhaps you could give them a chance? If you do let me know how it goes on any of our social media accounts or shoot me an email. Cheers!
RSL is an initialism we have been avoiding for 81 parma reviews. Well, that isn’t quite true, we didn’t make any active effort to not visit an RSL, it kind of just … happened.
With the new year upon us we had to start somewhere and as we had all been on quite a long parma drought we decided to test the water with somewhere local, and as we have exhausted most of the local flavour in terms of pubs - RSL’s are the only venues that remain, and the closest one to most of the PD team is the Keilor East RSL. So for the first attempt of 2012, that is where we went.
First of all, RSL’s are great, I think you would struggle to find a place with nicer people.
I arrived at this attempt about an hour early, I was waiting at the bar for the rest of the group to arrive - looking like a bit of a fish out of water (being a lad in his late 20’s in a sea of blokes in their late 60’s) a guy stopped me wanting to get a better look at what was on my T-shirt. He read it aloud - “Dyslexics have more nuf”, had a bit of a chuckle, then invited me back to his table to have a beer and introduced me to his mates. It’s that sort of kindness and Aussie spirit that you don’t often find in pubs any more, and it was greatly appreciated.
The rest of the team started to arrive so I left my new found friends and took a seat in the bistro. I arrived at 6 o’clock and the place was absolutely packed, by the time we sat down to eat it was about 7:30 and a fair bit quieter, which was a great thing, easy access to the bar with its oh so cheap beer prices.
We ordered our meals and awaited their arrival, white waiting we finished off our complimentary bake-at-home bread rolls and a beer or two, I promise this year I am going to try and make a better effort to start timing between order and parma arrival. well actually, I can’t promise i’ll try, but ill try to try
Anyway - the parmas arrived
I had high hopes for the parma and it looked good when it fell in front of us, presented beautifully and on square plates (a microwaved turd would look good on a square plate) I couldn’t dig in quick enough, unfortunately though, it was downhill from there.
I have been trying my best to be positive about this parma, as it is served up at an RSL and the people there were just so damn nice it pains me to speak ill of them, how about if I get all the negatives out of the way in one go, as quick as I can, and we can move on from there… ready? *deep breath*
The schnitzel was processed chicken, it was over-cooked, dry and bordering on burnt in places, the ham was present, but didn’t do much for the overall flavour, the cheese and napoli were tasty well done but the overall dryness of the prefab chicken left a bit of a bad taste in our mouths that no quality of toppings could save, and $20 is a bit expensive for the quality of the chicken.
*braaarghh*..*pant…pant*
There, its done, the rest of this review should be mostly positive! As I said the cheese and napoli were great, and (once again) it amazes me how much a sprinkling of green things can help the presentation of a parma.
The mountain of chips was indeed impressive, albeit a little overcooked - caught in a limbo between french fries and chips, a little seasoning and they could have been much better, definitely quantity over quality in this case.
The salad was surprisingly good - Lettuce, onion, cucumber, beetroot, carrot & capsicum in a creamy dressing, heaps of it with a great flavour - if they shaved some fresh parmesan on that baby it’d be top shelf for sure.
The quotes were a bit of a shambles this week, The team was definitely out of practice, but take a gander at what they thought -
The end of Carly’s quote should read “than that parma”, I’d change it, but editing the quotes after the fact is a bit of a pain in the arse!
So our first RSL wasn’t the best, but that doesn’t mean we will stop trying - I have had some great (unofficial) parmas at RSL’s around this great country and I’m sure we will find one eventually. I complained in my burst of negativity about the price of the parma at the Keilor East RSL, but to be honest if the money I put over the counter goes to helping those who put their lives on the line in service of this country then I am more than happy to contribute - and the beer is friggin cheap, so it all evens out in the end anyway!
If you know any RSL’s we should try, shoot us an email or let us know on facebook or twitter!
Parma - 4.14
Chips - 4.36
Salad - 5.50
Value - 4.86
Total - 4.60
The search continues…
Taking a week off this week as parma day (Thursday) falls on Australia Day, and we will all be far to busy drinking beer and eating overcooked sausages to review a parma - I’m working on something so we wont be totally update-less, so stay tuned.