Attempt #90 - 'The Anglers Tavern'

[info]

When? – 28/03/2012

Where? – The Anglers Tavern, 2 Raleigh Rd. Maribyrnong

Price? - $21.50

Website? - http://www.anglers-tavern.com.au/

Reviewers – Lee, Nikki[/info]

Growing up in the area The Anglers was always a summer favourite of mine. There was no better way to spend a Sunday than with a couple of pints relaxing by the river watching the world go by. Despite the great atmosphere the food at the Anglers was never something to be proud of, so when it came up on the rotation of pubs to visit in search for a Melbourne’s best parma I have to be honest and say I didn’t have high hopes.

We arrived to a very quiet bar on Thursday night, as usual the location was fantastic (it’s really rare for a pub to change its location, wreaks havoc with the foundations). Absolutely massive beer garden perched on the banks of the Maribyrnong River, we ordered our meals and took a seat outside in the sun.

As I mentioned the pub was quiet, and it was a small group this week, so the parmigianas were out of the kitchen in under ten minutes…

Would you look at this behemoth?!

Short of our special attempts at The Albion, this would have to be the biggest parma we have come across - absolutely massive, and on closer inspection revealed to be two chicken breasts that would stand alone on the plate as decent parmas. But how did it taste?

Not great.

Don’t get me wrong, the chicken was unprocessed and fresh, they weren’t too heavy on the crumbs and there was heaps of cheese, but the whole thing just carried no flavour.

We coined the term “Big Parma Syndrome” (Or BPS) during our review of The Central Lion, and this parma is a prime example. The slice of ham added some flavour, however the sheer size of the parma meant that a single slice of ham barely covered 30% of its surface area, leaving a majority of the parma ham-less. Like trying to cover Kim Kardashian’s arse with a hand towel.

The saving grace for this chicken came towards my last few bites, and it was then I put my finger on why this parma had no flavour - the Napoli. My last three bites of parma tasted fantastic, as the action of cutting the parma had pushed what little napoli there was to one side of the chicken and had left a little treasure trove of great tasting parmage - it was a shame that by the time I got to those final bits I was so full I felt as if I was going to explode like the guy in “Meaning of Life”.

fuck off I’m full.

[youtube id="MID1nT5_m_Q" width="580" height="337"]

The chips were … chips. Standard pub chips, unfortunately due to the parma taking up the whole god-damned plate they were rendered a soggy mess by the time I got to them

The salad was a disappointment, truly there as an afterthought. A stack of lettuce with a slice of furry tomato, some cucumber and a single sliver of onion.

Once when Winston Churchill was asked how dry he liked his martini, he responded “I would like to observe the vermouth from across the room while I drink my martini.” - I think the chef at the Anglers had the same approach with the salad dressing, perhaps he glanced at it across the room while he was preparing the salad, however it was nowhere on the plate we received.

If you’re in the mood for a big feed then The Anglers is the parma for you, unfortunately, as we have discovered in the past - bigger is not always better (At least thats what the wife tells me, although I get the feeling she is just being kind).

If they took the time to add a bit of flair to the meal, dish out an appropriate amount of napoli & ham for the size of the bird they are putting on the plate, then they would definitely be a contender - Until then I’ll be content with sitting in the beer garden and watching the water with a pint in hand, but I doubt I’ll be trying the parma again any time soon.

Parma - 6.25
Chips - 4.5
Salad - 2
Value - 6.25
Total - 5.05

Anglers Tavern on Urbanspoon

Attempt #87 - 'The Prince Albert Hotel'

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When? – 29/02/2012

Where? – Bettenay’s Prince Albert Hotel, 149 Douglas Parade,Williamstown  VIC 3016

Price? - $24 

Website? - http://www.bettenays.com.au

Reviewers – Stefo, Emma, Ella, Kim, Karly, Pat[/info]

So the last few days in Melbourne have been very true to the calendar, taking the last weekend of summer, a very hot 38 degrees that left us with a thirst that could only be quenched by the most beautiful beer of all, free beer (thanks to Leeroy & Knickers for having a few of us at their fantastic wedding), into a typically winter midweek, with rain, coats, umbrellas, the lot.

This sort of weather is hard to deal with at first, but upon walking up to the doors of Williamstown’s third reviewee, The Prince Albert, I remembered why I love winter in this city. The chill of walking the footpath outside just makes the atmosphere in the pub look so much more enticing. You know theres probably a nice glass of shiraz with your name on it that’s just begging to be paired with some form of medium-rare, juicy, mooing plate of meat and potato. A nice tall pint of stout is settling as you put your jacket on a coat hook, and your safe from the storm outside.

The Prince Albert certainly gave me the feeling they could shelter me for a few hours after work on a Friday night, and tonight was the perfect night to introduce myself to the pub and its take on Melbourne’s favorite, the Chicken Parma.

A Parma review just doesn’t seem the same without the normal chairman of the parma-board, Lee, but he and his gorgeous new wife Nicole are off to Hawaii & Las Vegas for their annual international parma review honeymoon, and so I was left with the honors of the Chief Executive Creative Director of the Parma Review Team, so lets see how it all went then..

We took our seats on the long picnic table-come-booth hugging the wall, and ordered our meals at the bar, and both boys and girls were welcoming to the drinks on offer, the girls opting for a refreshing Aspall Cider, the boys a pint of local White Rabbit. One of the things that I loved about this pub was the range of drinks available, including cocktails, which you can read further into here.

So we didn’t have to wait long for the dishes to come out of the kitchen, all of us licking our lips starving. The first thing one of the reviewers pointed out was home made crumbing, definitely a welcome change to some of the lower-rated parmas we have tried. The plate was full, the chicken was a very respectable size, there was a nice heaping of chips on all plates, and a garden salad to accompany the pair, so we dug in.

Apologies for the quality of the photos, the ParmaCam wasn’t on hand this week. (I’m pretty sure the tripod is planted firmly in the honeymoon suite somewhere in Hawaii)

The chicken on the plate was a fantastic bit of real, top quality, thick, free-range breast. Theres nothing the Parmadaze team love more then a good set of breasts planted in front of us, and this was exactly what we got. The crumbing, as previously mentioned, was home-made and definitely something we were all looking to try out. It was refreshing to the pre-processed crap that some microwaves kitchens put out.

 

The general feedback from the team was fairly consistent; It wasn’t a poor parma, that’s for sure. It just wasn’t fantastic. A heap of chips is exactly what the customer wants, but PLEASE don’t serve us McDonalds fries. Every second pub in Melbourne serves them, and its boring, repetitive but most of all lazy. Unfortunately we did have to cope with these and they were fine, but I think the scores reflect the attitude towards them, with nobody on the team giving anything more than 5/10 for them.

The salad on offer was again, what you find in most pubs, a simple garden salad that was not too basic but nothing special at the same time, the dressing was slightly sweeter then your regular which I personally didn’t mind but I think the girls grew tired of it after a while. I wish more pubs in Melbourne gave us some bang for your buck in the salad category, a bit of pasta salad and potato salad goes a long way.

The crumbing was ok, but again nothing special. I do appreciate the effort that goes into the home made crumbing but the taste just wore off about midway through. A topping of pancetta, mozzarella and napoli sauce rounded it off nicely but we weren’t singing its praises, as we have at other pubs.

The general consensus was basically as follows:

 The Prince Albert’s Website has the following at the top of its eating page:

 ”Eating

<Definition: Belly full, mouth singing.>”

We were about halfway there with the belly full part ( I am always complaining about the lack of size in portions of food these days, and no I am not obese!), but we were definitely not singing. Having said that the menu had an absolutely delicious range of steaks on offer and I would definitely go back to try these out, I just cant see myself ordering the parma anytime soon. The $24.00 price point seems a bit steep for the quality of what you get in return, when a lovely wagyu beef burger is available at the same price I think it would be the safer bet.

Having finished in a bit of negativity there I would just like to set the tone I aimed for at the start of this review.  The Prince Albert looks like a great pub to call your local, I would happily be caught in there on a regular occasion, so please make sure you sneak in if you get the chance, and tell them the Parmadaze team sent you. Hopefully they will know exactly who you are talking about and as a result recommend you try their new improved chicken parma. 

Parma - 5.92
Chips - 4.00
Salad - 3.67
Value - 2.33
Total - 4.37

The search continues…

A massive thanks to Pat for taking the helm this week! passing the torch to Stefo next week, so stay tuned!

Attempt #86 - 'The Old Hepburn Hotel'

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When? - 01/01/2012

Where? - The Old Hepburn Hotel, 236 Main Rd, Hepburn, Victoria

Price? - $22 for Traditional, $24 for Aussie and a $15 parma Monday

Website? - http://oldhepburnhotel.com.au/

Reviewers - Grace, Janet, Lee, Nikki, Pat, Shanan, Tony[/info]

I’ve been sitting on this review for a while now, waiting for a time when I needed a week off from the parma hunt, That week has arrived and I think I’ve got a damn good reason. “I’m getting married this weekend” is an excuse I hope to only give once in my life, and in the ranking of acceptable excuses I think it ranks pretty high up there, probably just below “I was kidnapped, buried alive and I’m using what battery life I have in my phone to let you know I can’t make it” and just above “A badger ate my foot”.

So cast your minds back to the first day of 2012, On the first of January after a night out at The Palais I awoke to a hangover only a parma could cure, and seeing as I was up at Daylesford with a pretty decent chunk of the Parma Daze review team we headed to the Old Hepburn Hotel try the first parma of the new year.

To give you an idea of the state we were in I have prepared a collage of photos, taken on my phone, on the 31st of December 2011.

Nerf machine guns, moths the size of my hand and a lot of inappropriate podium dancing while much alcohol was consumed, it was a big’un.

Early in the afternoon a very seedy group of people wandered into the Old Hepburn Hotel and took a seat in the bistro, the bold amongst us ordered an alcoholic beverage while the rest stuck to soft drink and water - A parma was set in my mind as my cure-all, then I noticed that, other than a regular parma, an Aussie novelty parma was available with bacon and egg in place of ham, now I am not normally one to indulge in novelty parmas, but my body needed bacon more than it ever had before, so I went with the novelty and the others opted for the original.

The wait for our meals was filled up with the usual ‘morning after’ conversation - lots of “I did shots?”, “What time did we get home?” and “where did you disappear to for 2 hours in the middle of the night”

Before too long, our precious hangover food arrived…

The Aussie -

The Original -

This whole parma just screamed home cooked meal, the schnitzel was thick and juicy, pretty sure they were crumbed in-house with home made crumbing, the napoli was perfect, chunky with big chunks of onion and herb throughout that gives the strong appearance of another home made creation, The cheese was tasty, well cooked and there was plenty of it.

My bacon and egg was cooked to perfection - I like my egg yolks runny in the middle and these were perfect. Despite getting looks of envy from those who went with the traditional parma, word came round that theirs was just as good.

This is normally where I would put the ParmaCam or cross section, however in my handicapped state it slipped my mind to get a photo (and I didn’t have the parmacam tripod when this was reviewed), so just use your imaginations!

Imaginaaaation! Imaginaatioon!

The chips were fantastic, beer battered perfection, the only complaint around the table was that there simply wasn’t enough of them, They were great, we just wanted more.

The salad was … enough. A garden salad of lettuce, onion, tomato and cucumber was definitely fresh, but a little lacking in the taste department, a splash of dressing would’ve really brought it to life.

Those around the table who could actually summon the will to speak managed to mumble out the following -

If you’re in Daylesford or Hepburn and looking for a good honest pub meal without a lot of the wank that is associated with restaurants in the area, then the Old Hepburn Hotel is definitely the way to go. The meals were top notch and definitely hit the spot for those of us dealing with post new years eve trauma, Looking at the pub’s Facebook page they seem to offer up a $15 parma night every Monday with a bunch of novelty options - definitely worth hitting if you’re in the area. Even if its not a monday night, stop in as its a great spot with a winner of a parma.

Should old acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind… Should old acquaintance be forgot, and Auld lang syne.

Parma - 8.29
Chips - 7.21
Salad - 5.14
Value - 6.43
Total - 7.07

The search continues…

Old Hepburn Hotel on Urbanspoon

As Reviewer Nikki and myself will be on our honeymoon from the start of March, the next two weeks are going to be a bit different! We have lined up some of the other, usually quiet, members of the PD team to take the reigns and I’ll be doing my best to track down some parmage in both Hawaii and Las Vegas to report back! Stay tuned to our Facebook or Twitter for more info

Attempt #84 - 'Rochester Castle Hotel'

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When? - 09/02/12

Where? - Rochester Castle Hotel. 202 Johnston St. Fitzroy

Price? - $8 for original, $10 for novelty

Barry? - No

Website? - http://rochestercastlehotel.com.au/

Reviewers -  Cale, Lee, Nikki, Stefo[/info]

** NOTE - This pub has closed! Parma no longer available - Review will stay up for posterity. Enjoy!

 

A couple of weeks ago I made a post on /r/Melbourne, the Melbourne sub-reddit of the website Reddit, Asking the good people for suggestions of pubs to hit to find a good parma - I was inundated with responses so last week I picked one at random from the massive list, loaded up the parma bus and headed down to the Rochester Castle Hotel.

The first thing that struck me about the Rochester was the sheer size of the place - I wasn’t expecting this corner pub to be so massive! heaps of tables in the front bar, booths through the back room to the pool tables and continuing into a quaint little beer garden out the back - we took a seat and perused the menu, we were in for more than just a standard parma as a rather sizable list of novelty parmas appeared before us…

Both the schnitzel & gravy and the traditional parma clocked in at $8, all the others $10. Reviewers Stefo, Nikki and myself kept it traditional, while reviewer Cale branched out and got the Nacho parma, with salsa, ham, mozzarella, corn chips, guacamole & sour cream.

While waiting for our food the two pints I had consumed got to me and I had to use the facilities, I don’t normally mention the men’s room in reviews but this one shocked me, as it was lit entirely by tea light candles - I don’t often pee by candlelight, and the whole experience felt … well I won’t say rapey but I was definitely clenching my cheeks.

When we ordered we got one of those plastic buzzers that light up and vibrate when the food is ready. I friggin love these things, I dont know why but if more pubs had them I would die a happy man!

The buzzer buzzed and we collected our meals, I have included photos of both the Traditional and the Nacho parma to give you a clearer idea.

Okay, it’s a cheap and nasty parma, but for $8 I can’t say I was surprised. It wasn’t terrible, not at all, for a cheap and nasty it was actually pretty good, but the whole thing was just bland. Unfortunately neither the chicken, ham or cheese carried any flavour, and the napoli was virtually nonexistent.

I’ll say it again in the conclusion but I’ll put it here as well for the record - This is a parma that needs the novelty toppings, the parma on its own just doesn’t carry enough flavour to stand on its own. The Nacho parma looked freakin delicious, and regretted not getting something from the novelty menu from the moment it hit the table.

The chips were standard, well seasoned but a little overcooked, nothing special - some tomato sauce on the table would have helped them out a lot.

The garden salad was basic, but for an $8 parma not a lot is ever expected of the salad. Simple garden salad of lettuce, carrot, onion, tomato and a splash of balsamic - was a little light on the balsamic for my liking but nothing terrible.

ParmaCam seemed to get a good reception last week, so it returns!

[youtube id="Z6sXdxuB9s8" width="580" height="337"]

I really need to work out a way to format these better so the quotes don’t come right after the ParmaCam, maybe next week I’ll put it after the parma section itself, I’d change it myself, but ehhh, I’m too hung over for that!

If you’re after a cheap n nasty parma then the one at the Rochester actually isn’t that bad, Tuesday night trivia coupled with cheap jugs and a $10 novelty parma sounds like a great night out to me, and definitely wouldn’t say no to another one, but avoid the traditional and go for something from the M selections range (a little bit fancy).

Parma - 4.86
Chips - 3.63
Salad - 3.63
Value - 7.88
Total - 4.97

The search continues…

Rochester Castle Hotel on Urbanspoon

Thanks to the Redditors for the suggestions! I have a lot to get through now and will not rest until we try them all. 

Attempt #83 - 'Bev & Mick's Turf Club'

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When? - 02/02/12

Where? - Bev & Mick’s Turf Club, 1 Flemington Rd, North Melbourne.

Price? - $15 ($12 Parma n’ Pot Tuesdays)

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.bevandmicks.com.au/

Reviewers -  Adam, Emma, Grace, Lee, Matt, Nikki, Tony[/info]

Much like last weeks attempt at the Keilor East RSL, The Turf Club is one of those pubs that I’ve seen hundreds of times, but never had an excuse to visit - until now.

Located at 1 Flemington Rd, under the giant Aussie flag at the Haymarket roundabout, This pub has recently joined the ‘Bev & Mick’s backpackers’ franchise and has thus had a bit of a paint job and spruce up since the above photo was taken.

Walking in half of the pub was blocked off as they seemed to be doing renovations in that area - no matter though, past the juke box and pool tables is a door that leads to a huge beer garden, much larger than I was expecting, with heaps of seating. It was a warm night so we pulled up a pew in the sun and placed our order.

The Turf’s standard parma clocks in at $15, and on Tuesday night there is a $12 parma n’ pot special. Unfortunately we were in on a Thursday, so it was full price for us.

After a longer-than-usual wait (about 45 minutes) our parmas arrived.

There was a lot of nude schnitz and the bottom of the parm was a bit overcooked, it was processed schnitzel (curse you processed schnitz!!) which caused the crumbs to often flake away upon cutting.

The cheese, while a little overcooked like the rest of the parma, was pretty favourful and it was clearly visible that both parmesan and mozzarella was used, adding a bit of depth to the flavour. The ham was passable, as was the napoli - if only it had covered the whole parma.

There was technically nothing wrong with the chips, but they were forgettable. A decent serving but not much else to say other than that.

The garden salad (lettuce, onion, carrot, cucumber & tomato) was also passable. It’s score dipped in the slightest as a very sweet dressing was used, and a garden salad usually doesn’t go down very well if it tastes like its been dressed in sugar syrup.

Now to introduce a brand new feature on Parma Daze - The Parma-Cam (patent pending). Click play below to watch…

[youtube id="0TYV5SbhD7k" width="580" height="337"]

Enough from little ol’ me, on to the comments!

The Turf’s parma is your standard el-cheapo processed parma, but saying that, on the scale of el-cheapo processed parmas, it tasted pretty good in the end - The chef has done what he can with the ingredients he had and has pulled off a decent meal.

Completely forgettable, and not one I would be seeking out again, but good for what it is - If I was there again and it was a Tuesday night $12 parma n’ pot deal I’d probably … wander down to The Metropolitain and get an awesome parma. Sorry, but at least I’m honest.

Parma - 4.92
Chips - 4.52
Salad - 4.33
Value - 5.42
Total - 4.82

The search continues…

Hit us up of Facebook or Twitter! Let me know what you thought of the new Parma-cam - a good addition? Worth continuing? 

Also, thanks to the folks over at /r/Melbourne on Reddit for all the awesome parma ideas - I know the Turf wasn’t one of the ones you suggested, but we will definitely be getting to some of those soon!

Catch ya next week!

Attempt #82 - 'Keilor East RSL'

[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.

Cooking with Parma Daze - 'Southern Style Parma'

Well this is something different! how exciting.

First things first a Happy New Year to everyone reading (if you aren’t reading you can fuck right off), I hope 2012 brings us all sorts of happiness and some truly tasty parmas - and not the end of the world, asshole Mayans.

Now we will be returning to our regularly scheduled programming next week, We will be hitting a pub next Thursday (the 19th) and a few of us even managed to sneak in a parma on New Years Day in Hepburn, more info on that little gem when I get around to it. In the meantime, you get to see photos of my kitchen … fun!

A few months ago a fellow blogger and twitterer known as @_BeerSnob_ Posted a recipe for a ‘Southern Style Chicken Parma’ on his website (check it out for the full recipe as i’ll only be posting snippets here) It intrigued me, and I have been meaning to whip it up since I read it - Well last night I had an opening in my dinner calendar, between Monday night’s Hamburger from the Airport West fish & chip shop and Wednesdays tasting of the meals that will be served at my wedding, Tuesday became an impromptu parma night. I headed to LaManna, loaded up the spices and started MKR - Parma edition.

Now I will warn you there are gonna be a lot of pictures from this point on, and I’m not sure if I’m gonna have much to say in between, but we’ll see how it goes - I have deviated a little from Beer Snob’s recipe in a couple of places, I’ll point em out as we go.

Lets start with the crumbing, in one bowl I beat an egg & added some milk, in the other a decent splash of cornflake crumbs, and in the third there was a plethora of spices - check the recipe for actual amounts but in the end I had something that looked a little like this…

The spices in that second bowl are salt, oregano, garlic powder, thyme, ground ginger, basil, Celery salt, black pepper, dry mustard and a shit load of paprika.

Now on to the star of the show, The original recipe calls for chicken thigh but, as the ladies know, I’m all about the breasts.

Personally I’m not huge on butterflied chicken breasts, so rather than play surgeon I played masochist - covered the chicken breast in a healthy layer of glad wrap and let loose with the rolling pin, after a vigorous spanking I had achieved optimal thickness

I gave the breast a good soaking in the milk (Think Carmen Electra in that scene from ‘The Raven’ - you know the one) Then into the spices - I wasn’t quite sure of the order put forth in the recipe so I went a little off book, giving it a covering in the spices, then back to the egg/milk mixture for adhesion, then into the crumbs for its final coating. chucked it on a greased up oven tray, posed it for a quick photo…

Covered the tray in foil and popped it into the preheated oven. The recipe calls for 30 mins of covered cooking then 20 mins uncovered, while I waited I prepared the side dish…

Good ol’ McCain oven fries - I find the original ones are the best from the bag, oiled up a tray, sprinkled with a liberal dose of chicken salt and slid it in alongside the parma.

Then it was time to wait…

After de-foiling at the 30 min mark and putting her back in for an extra 20 it was time for the toppings

I wasn’t quite sure what brand of everything to get, so I got the first ham that I saw, the cheese had a parma on the bag so that was a no-brainer and the leggos sauce also had Parmigiana on it. Easy done.

I went with the SHNC topping system, starting with the schnitz, then ham, then napoli and cheese on top - I was very liberal with the toppings and wound up with this delicious looking monstrosity…

Fired up the grill function of the oven (quite possibly the first time its ever been used) and chucked her back in.

I killed some time watching youtube videos for 5 minutes and re-approached the oven. Things were looking good except it seemed that the cheese and the napoli had a big fight, and the napoli told the cheese to get out - why can’t they all just get along?

I took a photo, the blast of heat from the oven fogged up the lens, but you get the idea

Not to worry, there was still plenty of cheese still left on the chicken

All that was left to do was to plate it up…

tadaa! No salad, CBF making salad.

The recipe calls for an accompanying IPA, but all I had was Bulmers or some Blueberry Cruisers left over from a NYE party. Bulmers won.

As for taste - Not too shabby if I do say so myself! the coating of spices definitely makes it different but well worth a try, Next time I make it (I will, as I bought a fuck-ton of spices) I don’t think i’ll keep it in the oven for quite as long, maybe 20 mins covered and 20 uncovered.

So if the wife is bugging you with “why don’t you cook dinner for once” chuck one of these babies in front of her and you’re sure to get laid. Guaranteed*.

Well I hope you have enjoyed this little deviation from the norm! Massive thanks to Beer Snob for his recipe!

If you give this parma a go, or have any ideas on how to improve it, send us a pic of your creation on either the Facebook or Twitter! I’d be excited to see other attempts

As I said at the beginning we will be back in force for 2012 starting next week. Catch you then!

The search continues…

*Not a guarantee, although its pretty likely, you’ll at least get a wristie out of it

Attempt #81 - 'Stolberg Beer Cafe"

[info]

When? - 15/12/11

Where? - Stolberg Beer Cafe. 197 Plenty Rd, Preston

Price? - $18

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.stolberg.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Lee, Nikki[/info]

Last weekend, on the way to Doncaster shopping center to battle the hordes of christmas shopping maniacs, we passed by Stolberg Beer Cafe - On the corner of Bell St. and Plenty Rd a sign out the front touted the pub as having “Melbourne’s Best Beer Garden”. A big call, and as regular readers will remember, I’m a sucker for a good beer garden. I set it up and last night we headed to Stolberg for our last ranked parma attempt for the year.

As a pub Stolberg is massive. A big front room with dining area, massive well stocked bar, heaps of TV’s running sports (last night was field hockey … interesting choice) and a pool table, turning the corner leads to an equally big area with fireplace, more TV’s and what I assume is the dance floor on busier nights. It was a small group this week so not having to wait around for other attendees to arrive meant we ordered our parmas on arrival, headed out the back to the beer garden and awaited the arrival of our birds.

The beer garden was rather decent (although I wouldn’t agree with the claim that it was “Melbourne’s Best”), as we sat down a two piece acoustic cover band known as “Bright Side” was starting up, they did a pretty good job, playing all the songs you’d expect an acoustic cover band in a beer garden to play - Although (and I’m going to sound like an old man here) at some points they got quite loud, and it was difficult to chat amongst ourselves while eating due to the noise.

With a pint of Goat by my side, our chicken parmas arrived -

The first impression of the schnitzel was it was a bit small and a bit processed. There was no nudity, well browned cheese and plenty of ham, however it was a little light on the napoli, it seemed most of the liquid had been absorbed into the crumbs by the time it arrived. There was also a sweetness through the whole parma that I couldn’t put my finger on, Reviewer Nikki likened it to cinnamon, but not quite.

I haven’t got too much to say about the Stolberg parma (amazing, on a parma review website) It wasn’t bad by any means, but it was just bland. I have mentioned Big Parma Syndrome in previous reviews, and the Stolberg parma seemed to carry the Big Parma lack of taste, in a rather small parma - quite the anomally.

The chips were the absolute star of this meal, crispy, fluffy, cooked to perfection with just the right amount of seasoning - my only complaint would be that there just wasn’t enough of them, I didn’t want it to end! They are quite possibly the closest thing we have had to the Prince of Wales chips in a very long time.

The salad was also a bit of a surprise - A kind of greek salad with lettuce, onion, carrot, fetta cheese and little orange cubes that we placed as either pumpkin or sweet potato, the balsamic dressing obscured the flavour and hindered our investigation into the identity of the ingredient. Overall the salad was quite nice - nothing amazing, but pretty good.

Overall the parma at the Stolberg was a bit of a let down, if it weren’t for those glorious chips the score would’ve been a fair bit lower - they absolutely saved the dish.

According to the website Stolberg offer up a $13 parma Monday - if I were in the area on a Monday I’d probably stop in for a parma, but otherwise I wouldn’t go out of my way for it. If you’re there on a Thursday like we were its probably better to opt for the $10 Pizza & Pot deal that they run, the pizzas looked quite good - and if you can get it with a side of chips you’ll definitely be on a winner.

So thats it! our last ranked parma for the year, and what a year it has been! Big thanks to all our readers, it’s because you read my insane rantings about crumbed chicken that we have the inspiration to head out week after week.

Although it is our last ranked parma for the year be sure to pop in next Friday, as Thursday night we are heading out and presenting a very special pub in Melbourne with the Dazey for Parma of the Year 2011. Exciting, huh!?

Parma - 3.3
Chips - 7.67
Salad - 6.50
Value - 6
Total - 5.43

The search continues…

stolberg Beer Cafe on Urbanspoon

Be sure to visit this time next week when we announce our winner of our 2011 Parma of the Year award, “The Dazey”! more info on the Twitter and Facebook!

Attempt #80 - 'The Union Hotel'

[info]

When? - 08/12/11

Where? - The Union Hotel, 109 Union St. Brunswick

Price? - $18

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.unionhotelbrunswick.com.au/

Reviewers - Alek, Emma, Lee, Nikki, Pat, Stefo, Tony[/info]

The Sunday before we visited the Union on official Parma Daze business was Reviewer Pat’s birthday - and to celebrate another successful rotation around the sun, Pat organised a Sunday sesh in the beer garden out the back of the Union Hotel, Brunswick.

The weather was gorgeous, the beer was tasty and the food around me looked good - if you follow the Twitter you would have seen me post a photo of the unofficial parma I snuck in that Sunday - After consumption of that bad boy we deemed it tasty enough to return for a full review, which we did last week.

Now just to be clear we are talking about The Union Hotel on Union Rd. Brunswick, there is a Union in Ascot Vale that we have already visited and I hear there is even a Union on Brunswick road, so this could get a bit confusing. This Union is a hidden little gem nestled in the middle of suburban brunswick, From the outside it looks like a standard pub, you’d never guess that inside is hiding a fantastic beer garden that I predict I will be re-visiting quite a few times as the weather warms up.

I made a call earlier in the day and reserved a table, I wasn’t expecting it to be busy but you can never be sure - it was a good thing we did when we arrived at seven things were fairly quiet but they quickly filled up, tables were disappearing left and right so we quickly took our seats to ensure our parma cravings would be fulfilled.

We ordered our meals at the bar and awaited their arrival, Upon returning to our table a basket of sourdough bread was delivered, a very nice touch, regular readers will know that we are suckers for free bread. The live music kicked in shortly after (if you check their website you’ll see an ever-rotating schedule of live acts on a Thursday night) I’ve resigned myself to the fact that I will never remember to set the timer and record the amount of time from ordering to arrival, but the Mountain Goat steam ale was delicious, the music was pumping and the conversation was good so the wait flew by, before I knew it the parmas were filing out of the kitchen

The lighting inside wasn’t too great, so to make up for it here is the photo of the parma I had the weekend prior - practically identical and a much better photo

The first and most noticeable thing about the Union parma is the excess of nude schnitzel I was a bit worried the first time I had this parma, but amazingly after starting I didn’t really care about the nudity - the home made schnitzel has an amazing herb encrusted crumbing that is rather tasty, so much so I didn’t quite mind the shortage of napoli and cheese (although full coverage would have been nice)

With the schnitzel and crumbing being so obviously home made it was a bit of a let down that the napoli was definitely from a packet, but there was plenty of it, as was the cheese, and they complimented the chicken nicely, Also the chopped basil on top was a very nice touch that actually added some flavour to the dish, unlike most of the other ‘green things on top’ we have discovered in the past. The chicken itself was a tad thin, but not terribly so, All in all despite being a little bit small the Union parma was full of flavour with a home cooked flair that you only find in small charming pubs like this.

The chips were well cooked, tasty, and there were a fuckload of them (pardon my french). The parma sat atop a mountain of chips that were quite nicely seasoned - A sauce pot to the side would’ve scored them top marks.

The salad, like the chips, was also rather sizable. A simple garden salad of lettuce, onion, carrot & tomato, however even though it was big it was rather dry - there was very little dressing, leaving the whole thing quite bland.

Now to celebrate our tenth consecutive week with reviewer quotes … here are some reviewer quotes!

Despite some minor complaints the Union serves up a respectable little parma, I love a good beer garden and this one is in the perfect stage of not being quite well known enough to get too busy - but that won’t last for long, and as summer is starting to kick in I recommend trying this place out ASAP - A pint of steam ale, a parma and a seat in the sun makes for the perfect Sunday session, give it a go.

Parma - 6.57
Chips -7.29
Salad - 4.43
Value -6.29
Total - 6.23

The Union Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #79 - 'The Steam Packet Hotel'

[info]

When? - 1/12/11

Where? - The Steam Packet Hotel. 13 Cole st. Williamstown

Price? - $21.50

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.thepacket.com.au

Reviewers - Lee, Nikki, Stefo[/info]

The first time we attempted to visit the Steam Packet it was booked out and we ended up finding the Customs House around the corner - A great parma in its own right, but I always wanted to head back to Williamstown to try the one that got away. I continued to hear many good things so we headed back to Willy and the Steam Packet Hotel.

In researching this pub before the attempt I came across an interesting tidbit - The Steam Packet is supposedly haunted - The story goes that an Opera singer who was there killed himself after losing his voice, If you want the full story there is a Ghost Tour that runs through Willy, which comes with a meal at the Packet - hopefully the parmas aren’t haunted! I think I’ve just stumbled on next summer’s blockbuster…

I’ve gotta say … I’m proud of this one

But I digress. Seeing as the last time we attempted to visit the Steam Packet we were turned away, we did the smart thing and arrived at the pub again without a booking. The bartender informed us that bookings are absolutely essential on Thursday night, as Thursday is cheap steak night that really brings in the crowds - After a bit of searching we managed to squeeze ourselves into a spot on the leather couches in the corner, not an ideal eating position, but thats what we get for not having a reservation. While looking over the menu we noticed that the steaks coming out of the kitchen looked amazing - If we weren’t there for parmas I would’ve been all over them like white on rice. However parma is what we were there for, and parma is what we ordered.

Now in my little life I follow two sports teams - The Western Bulldogs and the Detroit Red Wings, Unfortunately for me the only Red Wings friendly pub is 15,973 kilometers from where I’m sitting (thanks Google distance calculator!). On the other hand, Fortunately for me the Steam Packet Hotel is a ‘Bulldogs Friendly Business’ and a flash of a valid Bulldogs membership gets 10% off your total bill … a great deal.

Quicker than expected our parmas arrived.

This was a big parma, enveloping most of the chips and a portion of the salad.

The chicken breast was pure, unprocessed and cooked to perfection, the crumbs weren’t overly thick and the toppings were more than plentiful. One thing this parma had was a stack of flavour, especially for a big parma - lashings of shredded ham, not just one slice, but an impressing coating, heaps of cheese cooked to golden brown perfection, and the napoli, while a little absent in some areas, was fresh and home made.

I instantly understood why the Packet’s parma was recommended to me so many times, it was a great piece of bird that I’d be more than happy to try again.

The chips, while a hefty serving and well cooked, were a little boring - zero seasoning and, due to the fact that we were sitting at the couch as opposed to a table in the bistro, there was no salt shaker within reach - They were definitely passable, but did nothing to ‘wow’ us.

The salad split the group, but I believe that was due to uneven serves - My salad was a decent serving of lettuce, onion, cucumber, grated carrot, and tomato under a creamy pesto dressing that I really enjoyed - however Reviewer’s Stefo and Nikki had a different story, as the shredded carrot was all but absent from their salad, there was less dressing and less stuff overall - which can pretty much be put down to an unfortunate grab of the tongs in the kitchen, not a hellworthy sin but it did cause some contention among the group.

The Steam Packet parma is fantastic, let down only by some lackluster chips and according to some a so/so salad, however its definitely worth seeking out (but make sure you have a reservation!)

The pub has a great vibe and an impressive range of drinks on tap - My two favourite beers, McLaren Vale Pale Ale and Mountain Goat Steam Ale were both readily available. Although I didn’t see the ghost of any suicidal opera singers, this is a parma I will be recommending to people for awhile to come.

Parma - 8.33
Chips - 5.42
Salad - 6.33
Value - 7.83
Total - 7.25

The search continues…

Steam Packet Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #78 - 'Seared'

(once again I am stuck for a decent exterior shot … I try and remember to take one myself but am usually so caught up in the fervor that parmage is soon to take place that my mind blanks on the task!)

[info]

When? - 24/11/11

Where? - Seared Steak & Seafood. Shop 1140, Level 1, Highpoint shopping center, Maribyrnong

Price? - $22.90

Barry? - No

Website? - None

Reviewers - Adam, Cale, Carly G, Janet, Lee, Nikki, Stefo[/info]

Our reasons for visiting Seared were 100% selfish. As many of you may know The Inbetweeners Movie opened last Thursday night seeing as a majority of the review team are big fans of the TV series we planned a double event - Parma at the closest possible venue to the cinema, followed by the movie. It was a toss up between The Anglers Tavern and Seared, but seeing as Seared was literally 100 metres from the Hoyts box office, Seared won (and we will keep The Anglers in our back pocket for a future review).

Breaking a little from our unspoken convention Seared is definitely not a pub - more of a licensed cafe if anything. The majority of Seared’s dining area is outside, this is fine if the weather is nice and you can tolerate smokers all around.

None of us were too fussed, so we ordered our parma and awaited its arrival. (one thing I do want to go back for is the “giant chicken nugget” they advertise as a main on the menu… I have to know what that is)

A few opinions floating about the interwebs state that although the food at Seared is good, the service is terrible - I went in with an open mind but I’m afraid I’ll have to agree with the trolls. After we were seated and placed our order we were only approached one other time in the hour and a half we were seated to see if we needed any drinks. Not great.

But on to the important bit - The parma.

Based on looks alone the Seared parma is spectacular - stacked high on a mountain of chips, lashings of ham, cheese and you can never go wrong with the aesthetic choice of a sprinkling of green things. However looks have fooled us before, we tucked in to discover that for once the parma actually lived up to the initial impression.

The schnitzel was quality chicken breast, thick, well crumbed and cooked, the napoli was well herbed, definitely home made, the ham was in abundance and carried a fantastic flavour and the cheese (while leaving a little nudity) was melted to perfection and tasty while not overpowering the meal. The whole parma carried a home-made vibe that (to be honest) I was surprised to find in a venue inside a shopping center.

Compared to the parma, the chips were a let down - there were a lot of them, you can’t fault them for that - heaps of chips, however they were slightly over the line of overcooked and completely unseasoned. Everyone at the table reached for the salt shaker at one point or another to give them some semblance of flavour.

The salad, like the chips were a let down, it seemed as it was there mostly for show - presented well, with each salad consisting of a pile of lettuce, two slices of cucumber and two pieces of tomato strategically rested to sit atop the cucumber. The was the smallest hint of balsamic dressing, but it was so minute that it could’ve been added by accident as the chef dressed a nearby salad. All in all at first glance the salad looked pretty, but on closer inspection there was absolutely no substance to it… the Brynne Edelsten of garden salads

Quite possibly the strangest image I have photoshopped for this website … just go with it.

The quotes seem to agree with what I said, and I’ll carry that through to the wrap up - The Seared parma is great, top notch. however this is one of those times where it was horrendously let down by the sides, both the chips and salad were not up to par, and they let the dish down massively, dodgy sides are forgivable in times of a cheap parma, however this one clocked in at $22.90 - quite a price tag for a good parma and shit sides.

I’m coming off too harsh - it is an accepted fact that the parma itself is the most important part of the dish and the parma at Seared is worth getting if you find yourself at Highpoint, I said it before but I was genuinely surprised at the quality of the chicken - my expectations for a shopping center parma was quite low, and Seared definitely raised the bar.

Oh, and the Inbetweeners movie was freaking amazing - A must see if you’re a fan of the TV series. If you haven’t seen the TV series, See it, then see the movie.

Parma - 7.93
Chips - 4.21
Salad - 4.86
Value - 5.57
Total - 6.10

The search continues…

Seared Seafood & Steak on Urbanspoon

Attempt #77 - 'The Sherlock Holmes Inn'

[info]

When? - 17/11/11

Where? - The Sherlock Holmes Inn. 415 Collins St. Melbourne

Price? - $21 for regular, $23.50 for ‘Parma Deluxe’

Barry? - No

Website? - http://thesherlockholmes.com.au/

Reviewers - Adam, Emma, Lee, Nikki, Stefo, Tony Q[/info]

 

I love underground pubs, not underground in the hipster ‘this place is so totally underground’ way, but literal pubs under the ground where you have to take stairs down from street level to enter. Turf Bar, The Charles Dickens and even a bar called ‘The Bomb Shelter’ underneath a strip club in Fargo, North Dakota (Although when I went there it was called ‘The Basement’) stick out in my mind as some of my all time favourite spots to grab a beverage.

So when the option arose to visit the Sherlock Holmes on Collins St, it was a no brainer. This pub is the definition of cosy, once you descend those wooden stairs (past the 221B Baker St Lamp) you would have no way of knowing that you weren’t in 1880’s London, Well, Beside the flat screen TV’s and abundance of Aussies. One thing that does remain authentic to the time period is the lack of mobile phones - being an underground pub surrounded by brick and concrete mobile phone signal strength is slim to none, so make sure you get all your tweeting done before you venture down the stairs.

Drinks-wise there was a decent selection of wines & beers (18 beers on tap), My usual pint of Bulmers was off the menu so I went with a ‘Stowford Press’, their on tap cider, I wasn’t a huge fan at first but it grew on my as I drank. Much less carbonated than Bulmers but it did the job perfectly, would have again.

Bookings are essential for groups if you want to get a bite to eat at the Sherlock, as its a small pub with an even smaller dining area, if we didn’t have a booking I’m pretty sure we would’ve been in trouble. We took our seats at the table and had a look at the menu wherein we were presented with a choice - Do we go the regular Chicken Parma for $21, or take a walk on the wild side with the ‘Parma Deluxe’, which includes salami and feta cheese on top of everything else. The table was split, Reviewers Stefo, Adam & Tony went for the Deluxe, Nikki and myself opted for the regular, and Reviewer Emma toed the line by ordering the Deluxe, with no feta.

We ordered at the bar, grabbed some pints and awaited the foods arrival - Our table was situated with a perfect view through the serving window into the kitchen, so we could see our parmas being prepared. Before too long they jumped from the kitchen to our tables, and we began our meal.

The Regular

The Deluxe

The schnitzel was fantastic, no bones about it, thick, juicy chicken breast, crumbed to perfection, some minor nudity but the schnitzel was so tasty that I didn’t care. Take a look at the cross section below to get an idea of the thickness of this beast.

The cheese was plentiful, golden brown and delicious, the ham was fresh and carried a great flavour, the napoli was hard to spot - very light on the tomato unfortunately, it was there, but scarce. Overall it was a great tasting parma, and those that had the Deluxe had even better things to say, the salami added a much welcomed spice and the choice of not omitting the ham in place on the salami (as you’d expect many pubs to do) was bonus points for value.

The french-fried (McDonalds style) chips always split the table in terms of opinion - I don’t mind a properly prepared french fry, yet others much prefer the beer battered chunky option. Taste-wise the french fries were fine, however the small tuft of fries that we received left us wanting more.

Once again, the salad split the table. It was a garden salad of lettuce, onion, cherry tomatoes, shaved carrot & shallots with a creamy honey mustard dressing that almost came across as a hybrid between garden salad and coleslaw. I enjoyed it, there was plenty of it, however some reviewers throught it was a little too bland for their tastes. each to their own I suppose! (although I’m right … everyone else is wrong)

This is what they had to say…

Overall the Sherlock Holmes is a great little pub with a great parma! the chicken was quality, juicy and tasty - although at the end of the meal there was talk that it was a bit small (a few were still a bit hungry after the fact) I would take quality over quantity any day. It’s worth noting that they do a $17 Parma n’ Pint Wednesday special that is definitely worth stopping in to if you’re in the area - even if you’re not.

If you are wondering whether or not you should seek out the parma at the Sherlock Holmes, the answer is elementary, my dear reader. Definitely.

(And before you angry, angry Holmes-o-philes email me, yes, I am aware Sherlock Holmes never actually said “Elementary, my dear Watson” … but what a cool way to end the review. I suppose I’ve ruined it now with this excessive sidenote. Damn.)

Parma - 7.50
Chips - 5.83
Salad - 6.42
Value - 6.92
Total - 6.83

The search continues…

The Sherlock Holmes on Urbanspoon

Check out our latest venture, eParmony.com - Connecting the people of Australia with the parmas they love!

Attempt #75 - 'The Lincolnshire Arms Hotel'

[info]

When? - 3rd of November, 2011

Where? - The Lincolnshire Arms Hotel. 1 Keilor Rd, Essendon

Price? – $14.50 in Sports Bar, $21.90 in Bistro

Barry? - They have a ‘Black’ Barry clone, but it was out of order when we tried to use it

Website? - http://www.thelinc.com.au/

Reviewers – Cale, Carly, Lee, Pat, Stefo, Tony[/info]

 

**EDIT** We re-visited The Linc in March, 2014 and again in 2016! - Check it out here and here to see if it fared any better!

This is a review I did not want to write. We went into the Lincolnshire Arms knowing that it wasn’t going to be a great parma, but after 74 attempts we could avoid it no longer. It had to be done.

The Lincolnshire Arms Hotel (or “The Linc”) is the Local watering hole for the majority of the Parma Daze review team, to the point where 90% of our parma attempts finish up with a few pints there afterwards. Its a great little pub that I have been drinking at for at least ten years and after the loss of the Prince of Wales it has filled the void as our go-to pub to sneak off to for a cheeky pint, any time of the day or night.

It is because we frequent the establishment so much that we were already aware of the quality of their parma offering, many of us have had one before and it was for that exact reason that we avoided reviewing the Linc’s parma for so long. The problem is that it hurts us to see a pub we love as much as the Linc hurt itself with a mediocre parma, Its time to confront the Linc about its issues, and how they are affecting us all.

Lets begin.

We arrived just before seven to an already packed pub - The Oaks Day races having just finished meant that the place was full of guys in suits and girls in frocks, Our chances of getting a table for six in the bistro was shot so we headed through the beer garden (with waterproof outdoor TV’s and plenty of heaters) and into the sports bar, where it was quite easy to get a table amongst the punters in the TAB. We glanced at the menu, $14.50, placed our order and awaited our foods arrival.

Four minutes after we ordered, two parmas arrived.

Four minutes.

Thats a bad sign in any language, I find that the old saying “good food takes time” is damn applicable to the chicken parmigiana, and no parma that arrives in 4 minutes flat can be any good.

However I mentioned that the first two parmas arrived within four minutes, it took another ten minutes before another three came out of the kitchen, then another ten on top of that before reviewer Tony got his hands on his.

This isn’t going to be pretty, but remember, we are harsh because we care.

Where to begin. First of all, you will notice that the Linc opts for the SHCN (Schnitzel, Ham, Cheese, Napoli) system of topping layering that we discovered a couple of weeks ago at our review of The Cross Keys, However the slice of ham was missing from the Linc’s parma, leaving us with a SCN topping layering system.

Actually, I’ll correct myself there, as there was another topping present on the Linc’s parma, we will call it an SCNO topping order. Take a look at the above photo carefully, see how in some places it looks like the napoli has split and you can see the cheese underneath? That is due to the pools of pure oil that had gathered together amongst the topping, A lot of the reviewers resorted to dabbing the top of the parma with a napkin to remove the excess oil that drowned this parma. Unacceptable.

The schnitzel was as processed as can be, as thin as a credit card, the underside of the crumbs were burnt and the napoli tasted like dolmio spaghetti sauce tipped straight from the tin onto the parma. The only thing we could taste was oil with a hint of tomato, the chicken had no taste and it makes me feel terrible to say this, but it was simply an awful parma, I have nothing good to say about it whatsoever.

The chips were so tasteless it was almost as if they had negative flavour, they looked okay from the outset, but biting into them left an odd claggy texture in my mouth, as if I was back in kindergarten eating the non toxic glue, we all reached for the supplied salt shaker to load them up with something to make them edible.

As for the salad, its time to play a brand new game! its called…

Name that ingredient!!

The ‘salad’ on the plate was comprised of four ingredients (no dressing), I have separated them in the above photo and lets see if we can go through what they are.

The lettuce is the easy one to get us going, its leafy, its green, its gotta be lettuce.

the other three ingredients however had us a little more stumped. They all tasted exactly the same, so the only clue we had to discern what they actually were was their colour, from this we can assume that the second ingredient is carrot, the third is either beetroot or cabbage (although it had the texture of dried beef jerky) and the final ingredient remains a complete mystery. Our best guess was parsnip but without scientific tests I don’t think theres any way to be sure - if anyone else has an idea as to what the mystery ingredient may be, please send us a Tweet or Facebook message!

On to the letters from loved ones (otherwise known as the quotes)

As a few reviewers mentioned, the parma came with a bake-at-home roll on the side. Bake at home rolls are delicious and this was definitely the best part of the meal by a mile.

We finished up our meals and headed back into the main bar - A great part about having a parma at the Linc is that we didn’t have the hassle of getting to the Linc afterwards … we were already there!.

The parma at the Linc is bad, not worth your time, money (or health) trying, It may sound like we are being harsh but if any member of the Linc’s management is reading this, we do it because we love!

The Linc is one of our favourite pubs and we want to be proud of the parma at the pub we call home! I am putting it out there that this is only a temporary situation, and if you get your act together with your parma we will be more than happy to come back and sit down for a completely unbiased re-review, its up to you now!

‘Cause I know … somewhere deep down in my heart … I still love you!

Parma - 1.50
Chips - 1.58
Salad - 0.67
Value - 3.00
Total - 1.65

The search continues…

Lincolnshire Arms Hotel on Urbanspoon

Attempt #73 - 'The Cross Keys Hotel'

 

[info]

When? - 19th of October, 2011

Where? - The Cross Keys Hotel. 350 Pascoe Vale Rd. Essendon

Price? – $13 Parma n’ Pot Wednesdays in the Sports Bar

Barry? - No

Website? - http://www.crosskeyshotel.com.au/

Reviewers – Lee, Pat, Tony[/info]

 

A quiet attempt this week - A last minute change to Wednesday parma night left us with a smaller group than usual, but hey, A parma is a parma! so we saddled up the parma horses and headed to the cross keys (yeah, there are parma horses now, for the times when it wouldn’t be economically viable to take the parma bus - the fuel economy on that thing is a nightmare)

The Cross Keys is one of those pubs that I’ve always been aware of, but never actually been to, but seeing as we were looking for a local parma this week and have pretty much exhausted our parma options in the Essendon area, the Cross Keys it was!

Much like a TARDIS, the Cross Keys is bigger on the inside than it seems on the outside, a massively open space is home to a Sports Bar, a bistro, a TAB, a pokies room and a pretty great outdoor drinks area/outdoor TAB. If you are a fan of TV’s then this is the place for you, from where we sat I counted no less than forty TV’s surrounding us (including those in the TAB) playing everything you could imagine - lots of sport, this would be a great pub to come for a beer and to watch the footy, as there are so many TV’s so you could look almost anywhere and not miss a minute of the game.

On arrival we had the option of sitting in the bistro and getting their off-the-menu parma for $23.90, or pulling up a pew in the sports bar and trying their Wednesday Parma n’ Pot special for $13 - It was hard to justify heading in the bistro when the sportsbar counterpart was more than $10 cheaper, so we stuck to the sportsbar, ordered our chicken and awaited its arrival, before too long the chicken fell before us.

The first thing that struck me about this parma was the obvious mix up in topping layer order, your standard chicken parmigiana goes schnitzel-ham-napoli-cheese (or schnitzel-napoli-ham-cheese depending on where you go). The cross keys threw that notion out the window and opted for schnitzel-ham-cheese-napoli with the Napoli sitting on top, I know of a couple of pubs that do the SHCN system, but this is the first one we have reviewed. As far as I’m concerned all the ingredients are there, so we tucked in!

The schnitzel was small, there’s no sugar coating it, it was plain small, but it was real un-processed chicken and it was a decent thickness. The crumbs were thin and there was no attempt at hiding a thin schnitz under a thick layer of crumbing. There was minimal nudity, the cheese and ham were plentiful and the napoli had quite a unique flavour that, although tasty, was a little overpowering at times - whether this is a result of it having top billing I can’t say.

Overall it was a tasty bit of chicken, if only it were bigger it’d get much higher marks, but for $13 with you can’t really complain.

The chips were standard. Your usual pub chips cooked to golden brown perfection, however a lack of seasoning (and no salt on the table … Although there is more to say about that later) left them a little bland.

The salad was refreshing - served in a separate bowl was a garden salad of tomato, lettuce, carrot, onion, cucumber and a creamy caesar-ish dressing. It was fresh, crisp, and a fitting accompaniment to the parma

As reviewer Pat said in his quote, “I want another one”, and to be honest, so did I … So this happened -

Second parma! This one doesn’t count to the review, consider it an added extra, like a DVD commentary track or collection of scenes where the actors laugh while trying to say their lines.

The second time around was almost exactly like the first, the only difference I noted was a few extra chips and the bar girl gave us salt and pepper shakers this time - this helped the chips out a lot, and had we gotten the salt the first time around they probably would have fared better.

Overall the Cross Keys offers up a tasty parma, the SHCN system of topping layers didn’t bother me as much as I thought it would, and to be honest the major issue with this bird was the size - Although if you are here on a Wednesday and are still hungry after your first parma, do what we did and get a second one! at $13 with a free pot two parmas in the sports bar come out to pretty much the same price as one parma in the bistro, definitely worth considering.

Parma - 6.67
Chips - 4.00
Salad - 7.00
Value - 7.33
Total - 6.07

The search continues…

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