Huxtaburger

I have been wanting to come here for at least a whole month, before the day finally arrived. People have been telling me about it, the newpapers have been raving on about it. So it has been a long month to wait, before I found the time to head down to Collingwood.

I've heard about the waiting times before, so I thought going at 2.30 on a Sunday afternoon would mean no wait. Boy was I wrong, my boyfriend and I still waited for 45 min to an hour before we got our food.

The place is tiny, so I would definitely recommend you get take away considering the current freezing Melbourne weather. The place is run down but filled with people, so you really can't miss it when you go down Smith St.

The menu only consists of 5 burgers, 1 of them being a kids burger.

First one up was the original Huxtaburger. This has all the classic fillings: beef patty, mustard, mayo, pickles, lettuce, tomato, cheese and tomato sauce. What makes this the winning burger is the mayo and pickles. Unlike the usual burger joints, their pickles are freshly pickled and not the type you get from a jar. The patty was also juicy and full of flavour. Two thumbs up!

Second, there was the Bills burger. This had a slightly thicker beef patty with bacon, egg, pineapple and beetroot. This has a sweeter taste from the beetroot and pineapple, good combination and easy to down 1 or 2 or maybe even three in one seating.

Finally there was the Denise, which had the jalapenos, patty, tomatoes, cheese and sriracha mayo. Don't get me wrong, this is a good burger, but with the other options on the menu it just wasn't the winner. The sriracha mayo is beautiful but maybe just a bit too powering in this, especially with the kick in the jalapenos.

As a side, there was also the chipotle fries. This is an interesting concept, but my heart still lies with the truffle oil, parmasen chips at Charlie & Co, and Jamie's Italian. It was a good attempt to make fries interesting without an array of fancy sauces.

Overall. I think it does live up to the hype, maybe I am easy to please when it comes to burgers, but this is not what you will find easily. I think, when you visit this place you need to go with the mindset that you will be getting greasy burgers and not fancy burgers like Grill'd. 16/20

Mrs Parma's

This is one of those places that the boys like to head to on a night out. Lots of beer to choose from and a whole menu of Parma's

I am not someone who will shy away from a good parma either, so I was more than happy to go again.

We had the Mushroom Parma with veal. This was really as simple as Napoli sauce with oregano and mushroom topped with cheese. The meat was very juicy and it was crumbed nicely. Not a stand out but no complains from me either.

Next was the Roast Pumpkin Parma with chicken. This consisted of feta, roast pumpkin and basil, with the same Napoli sauce and cheese as the Mushroom parma. Again nicely crumbed but because the pumpkin was roasted, towards the end of the meal it started to get soggy from the water content in the pumpkin. Nice homey flavours. (Not quite sure why it was in a funny fish shape......)

Finally, there was the blistered pepper with veal. This was literally one big pepper on top, with bocconcini and basil accompanied with cheese and Napoli sauce. For me, this just didn't work. Having that whole pepper on top was not ideal, as it was hard to cut and put with each bite... Not a fan of this one. However, like the others it was also nicely crumbed.

Overall not a bad meal, not the best but then again this is not fine dining. However it is pretty neat for a parma. Don't expect your mind to be blown away with new and inventive combos, this is really a sample of all the classic flavours on top of a parma 14/20

El Loco

Another weekend in Sydney, so I could not pass the chance to swing by Surrey Hills and check out another one of Dan Hong's place. I've heard about El Loco and I normally like Mexican food, so I didn't need much more of a push.

When I got there, it was not as I expected. I knew the place was a drinking venue but I didn't expect a crowd to the door. There is no table service here, you pretty much just go in find yourself a seat and order (a bit like a canteen, but in a fun way). I had to admit when I walked in I was a overwhelmed but luckily one of the really cute chef noticed us and explained to my boyfriend how things worked. He even helped us look for a table

Anyway, on to the real reason for this blog, the food! Let's start with the tacos. All their tacos are $5 and they have 6 options, 1 being a secret taco that changes daily. So here it goes the tacos that I tried:

The pollo, a chicken taco with sweet corn salsa. This was my favourite taco out of all the ones I tried. The sweetness of the corn together with the tangy salsa, and crisp salad bed of cabbage was just something you would happily eat more than one of. Good combination of flavours

The tofu. This is as the name suggest, a taco filled with a marinated then fried tofu. For some reason this reminded me of spicy plume sauce tofu. It was nice but not something I will always order. But if you have any vegetarian friends, at least they won't miss out when you come here.

The pork. This was a bit funny, I don't quite know how to describe it. The pork was soft and juicy, but with the pineapple salsa it seemed to be overpowered by the salsa. I think because I had the other tacos beforehand, this felt disappointing. But if I had this at the start to lead up to the other tacos, I think I would've felt different. 

Secret taco. My secret taco was a pork belly taco. There is rarely a dish where pork belly fails, this time it was no different. Yummmmy

The beef. The beef was flavoured with lemongrass together with fresh salsa of lettuce and tomato.

Besides taco, I also tried the excelsior hot dog. It truly looks amazing. It was pork sausage in a soft bun, with loads of cheese and pickles inside and mayo on top. It looks better than it taste but that is not to say it doesn't taste good.

Finally, there was the nachos, fresh guacomole and spicy tangy salsa. So good I had it take away afterwards.

As a complement to the meal, I had the pink cuco, which was a pink grapefruit tequila slushy. This is a pretty girl drink, with a mild kick. Great for a good night out.

Overall, as crowded as it was, it was a good experience. It was really busy but the waitresses were still friendly and helpful. 17/20

Pricing $ dirt cheap. This is NOT fine dining, it is in a way bar food but it still kicks arse!

**more photos to follow**