Where? - 70 Bridge Rd, Richmond.
Price? - $23.50
Website? http://www.mtviewhotel.com.au/
Reviewers – Erin, Fridge, Kim, Lee, Matt, Nikki, Pat & Stefo
Lets kick off this review by clarifying - I'm not sure if we reviewed the "Mt View Hotel" or the "Mountain View Hotel". The stone letters on the front of the pub say Mountain View, yet every mention of it on their website shortens it to Mt. View. I'm gonna stick with Mt. View.
Cool? Cool.
The Mt. View is a pub of levels. When you walk in the door you're in the dining area. Pass the hungry patrons and go down a flight of stairs to find the bar, along with a TAB and a fair few TV's showing a variety of sports games. Major sports bar vibe down this end.
If you backtrack a little and go up the stairs from the bistro you'll find a pseudo mezzanine level. Much quieter with more of a lounge vibe, complete with pool table.
There is yet another level above the mezzanine, but I'll get to that later.
We grabbed our table in the dining area and checked the menu for our target -
Sounds delightful! I'm not normally a fan of roquette salads, but if executed well they can be quite tasty... and bb chips? What are bb chips? Could it be we have found another location that serves up the fabled Bad Boy Chips of legend?
We placed our orders and got a few beers along the way. At the time of writing this review the current "Beer of the Month" at the Mt. View is none other than Mountain Goat Steam Ale, my current brew of choice and only $8 a pint. Fantastic news.
About 20-25 minutes after ordering our meals our parmas arrived from the kitchen...
At first glance this looked like a quality parma. I was excited. Knife and forks in hand we tucked into the dish.
The schnitzel was quality, pure chicken breast. Not quite as juicy as I would like, but passable. My major gripe with this parma from the get go was its temperature - The majority of my schnitzel was warm at best. It heated up a little toward the center, but on the whole it felt as if the Mt. View needs to invest in a bigger heat lamp, as half this parma was bordering on cold - Mine wasn't the only one, either, it was the same issue all around the table.
The crumbs were a little soggy but not criminally so. It was a passable schnitzel. Not bad, not great.
The toppings were a bit of a mixed bag, not unlike the schnitzel. There was a slice of ham, although its flavour was quite lost amongst the other toppings. As you can see from the above photo the cheese was in desperate need of a few more minutes under the grill. The napoli was okay, It was tasty however I highly suspect it came from a tin and was not freshly made.
On to the chips. Turns out I let my imagination run away with me as it would appear that the BB on the menu stands for Beer Battered, not Bad Boy. Cue crippling disappointment.
Yet as far as beer battered chips go these were pretty good. Unlike the parma they were served piping hot, crispy and not underneath the parma, with a pot of tomato sauce thrown in for good measure. If I had to nitpick I'd say I could have used a half-handful more, but thats probably just me being greedy.
The roquette salad was served in a seperate bowl, well dressed with a generous serving of freshly shaved parmesan cheese mixed through - An absolutely stellar salad with echoes of our long-time Parma of the Year champions The Imperial Hotel's salad. The Mt. View hit the nail on the head with this one. Fantastic side to the dish.
We finished up our meals but weren't ready to call it a night just yet. I had heard murmurings of a decent rooftop at the Mt. View so we decided to pop our heads up to level 3, known as "A bar above" and see what all the fuss is about.
I love a good rooftop bar, and A Bar Above was absolutely phenomenal. With plenty of room, a fully stocked and operational cocktail bar, decent looking food circulating and a spectacular sprawling view of the great city of Melbourne in all it's glory. It instantly earned a place on my mental list of the best rooftop bars in the city. Will definitely be back.
“My parma was unevenly cooked, or possibly had some time sitting unevenly under a heat lamp. Generally tasty otherwise, portion size was just right. Chips were a good standout here and the salad offering was fine”
“Salad was nice but could have been a little bigger, chips were crunchy - Just needed a little salt. Chicken in the parma was good, napoli not bad but the cheese killed it. Awesome venue with a great view from the rooptop”
“The salad was the nicest part of the meal”
“Great sides but the parma was average. Not sure what else to say but this could be a belter if some more love was given to the bird”
“Good sides let down by the lukewarm, bland parma that I was served”
$23.90 for this parma isn't too bad. The ingredients were great quality, just needed better execution. On Wednesdays the Mt. View offers up a $15 parma night with a few novelty options -
A pretty good deal, and I think the novelty toppings may help cover up some of the missteps this parma has taken.
The parma at the Mt View wasn't bad at all, with a few tweaks to its execution it could be great - I'm hoping we just hit them on an off night.
If you're in the area on a Wednesday I'd definitely recommend checking out the parma night at the Mt View, if only to have a squiz at the rooftop beer garden and its fantastic view of the city.
Parma - 5.42
Chips - 7.83
Salad - 7.92
Value - 5.50
Total - 6.42
The search continues...