Big Bone Pho, Box Hill

 Another restaurant running an opening special is Big Bone Pho. It is the third shop opened in Melbourne with the original in Springvale, the next in Glen Waverley and now in Box Hill. The signature dish but is a discretionary one dished out by the restaurant depending on availability is a piece of beef bone that had once been used to boil their pho stock. Many people requested for a piece of beef bone but was turned down because it had ran out. I guess it is for instagram purposes, but to me it is not that appealing to pick at a bone with barely any meat on it and whatever meat has been boiled the max out into the soup. In that sense, I have no bone to pick with the restaurant. But, I do have a gripe about how customer seating and ordering are handled. because the restaurant is small, it can only accommodate one queue to sit customers. This queue is constantly interrupted by other queues of people who want to order and who want to pay. At times there were conflicting instructions to get a table first then order, and order first without a seat ready. It became a source of frustration and I was surprised no food rage instances occurred that night.

We ordered prawn spring rolls ($16 for 8)as an entree. Lots of lettuce and fresh mint were provided but I had to resort to eating the lettuce on its own with their unique chilli garlic blend (in the blue bowl) because the lettuce leaf was inseparable. I think they had given us the cob. The spring rolls are crunchy and nice for an entree.

To break with the mold I ordered broken rice with pork chop ($17). This took longer to arrive and when it did the pork chop was hot, a sign of it being freshly prepared. The pork chop was a tad small and not so juicy but there was a lot of rice. The restaurant's recipe for the pork chop is without lemongrass so it is less flavourful but still well seasoned, and good when eaten with the fish sauce sugar mixture on the side.

The star of the dish really is the pho ($18). We ordered the beef slices pho which came with a generous dish of bean sprouts and Vietnamese mint, and lemon wedges. The broth was very flavourful and if it was a bit hotter it would have been perfect. I prefer it steaming hot to blanch the beansprouts in. There were generous slices of raw beef and a good portion of flat rice noodles. 

Big Bone Pho is offering 20% to 4th July across the menu. Another dish offered on the menu is their free range chicken which is quite popular with the older folks. One can order a whole free range chicken which comes with 4 bowls of noodles in broth for $76. 

The restaurant is quite small so be prepared to sit at the 'bar' overlooking the aquarium of people chopping up chicken and ladling out broth into bowls.

Hong Kong Station Cafe, Forest Hill

Hong Kong Station Cafe is the latest HK cafe in what seems like the growing popularity of Hongkie cha chaan teng trend. For the month of June 26, they are offering 12% off! The number 12 maybe holding a special significance to the Cafe but it is certainly helping to draw crowds to this place even though it is freezing outside in the Melbourne winter. 

The cafe is a sister restaurant of Ocean King Restaurant in Glen Waverley, though we did not know it at the time of our visit. Now it makes sense why they were also offering select yum cha dishes such as fried beancurd roll, radish cake, and duck meat vermicelli  soup. 

We ordered a set meal of pork strips, pickled vege with flat rice noodles in broth. It came with a choice of drink and Gaz picked HK milk tea. There was a whole container of sugar on each table which is a bad temptation for sweet tooths!
I ordered the dry fried flat rice noodles with beef. There were plenty of beef slices in the dish and they have not been tenderise with bicarbonate soda. I actually like it like that, because I think bicarbonate soda is an ingredient qe don't need to consume unnecessarily.

The fried noodles have a smoky smell but my only gripe is, it is a smaller portion than expected which makes it a bit pricey without discount. Likewise, the milk tea also came in a small, metal cup. 

The restaurant was fully packed on the weekend as I'm sure it would be this weekend. Put on an extra thick jacket and be prepared to wait outside in line to get a seat while the promo period lasts!

Chinese New Year 2026

 Autumn is here already. Yesterday was yuen xiu - 15th day of Chinese New Year and time to eat tang yuen. I made some black sesame tang yuen and enjoyed it with instant ginger drink (in lieu of ginger sugar water). Two weekends ago, we went to the city to watch the lion dance parade. The weather was fu fu ma ma (so so in Mandarin) so we decided to go early in the morning in case it rained later in the day. We made the right decision to go early in the morning because it did rain in the afternoon around 2pm when we left. Also, the city and the parade was less crowded in the morning. We caught the early lions at around 10am and had prime positions to see the lion dance and Dai Loong as it appeared from the Chinese Museum around to Lonsdale Street. 

There were about 10 lions all in different colours in the opening ceremony in the morning. There was also a newer dragon, doing the customary twirl trying to catch the ball of sun. The firecrackers went on forever, and was very smoky but it was much more enjoyable knowing it is once a year kind of event. I wish I brought some ear plugs along but without the cacophony of clanging cymbals, beating drums, and popping fireworks, it would not be Chinese New Year!

After the official lion dance opening ceremony, each troupe went their own ways to perform for the individual businesses that had paid them for lion dances. Two troupes with their dancers met in the middle of the street and the dancers stuck out their hand from the lion hand to shake hands. Such camaraderie!

There were also a centre stage on Russell Street where dances and performances were on but we did not stick around to watch because there were a lack of seats. There seem to be fewer stalls these year, but of higher quality and fewer food stalls. Tesla, Uniqlo, Hot Wheels were among the few I remembered. Gaz won a cooler bag from Uniqlo. We were there early, yet he had to queue up for about 20 mins for his turn to pick a gift. 

For lunch, I found a place that does not charge Sunday surcharge so we went there for lunch. More to come in the next post!

Anzero, Glen Waverley

When I think of Valentine's Day, several things come to mind. There was a year on Valentine's Day when we got accidentally locked out of our house. It was the only Valentine's Day where we had a threesome - ourselves and the locksmith. It was a very expensive date. 

There was another year where we spent 3 hours at a restaurant. The act of eating food took less than an hour, but the rest of time we were waiting for harried servers and kitchen staff churning out meals to all the customers. We had plenty of time to stare into each other's eyes which was the only advantage of the date. 

This Valentine's, we celebrated ahead of time. We went to a neighbourhood Japanese restaurant Anzero. Gaz had heard good reviews of the place and wanted to try it out. It is a small, neat and tidy place. We were ushered to a 'display table' - a table at the front of the restaurant beside the glass windows so passers-by can see us as though we were on display. 

There is a small selection of items on the menu and each item can be made into a set meal for an additional $5. The additional items in the set meal is a fried beef dumpling, an onsen egg, and some cucumber slices. Both single and set meals came with a salad and miso soup. We ordered the 150g scotch steak yakiniku ($27.50). The beef was cooked medium rare and was tender but there were some chewy parts that really tested my teeth strength. It was basically pan fried beef on rice, and while I really liked that I was eating a hearty portion of beef, the dish would benefit from some kind of sauce. The miso soup on the side helped, because it was much too salty on its own. 

The spicy beef karubi ($29.50) was good. The chilli oil sauce gave the whole dish a nice kick, but it is not spicy. The raw egg added some richness to the dish. A second egg came in the form of the onsen egg which was part of the set, so we set that aside to eat with the beef yakiniku. I think upgrading the meal to a set is not really needed because the three additional items are not substantial and are not must have's in term of flavour profile. They are good to have to add variety to the meal though. 

 The portions were on the small side, but we both agreed that we should not be eating too much anyway. The flavours are a bit inconsistent and a bit of a hit and miss - the miso soup was too salty, the beef karubi and dumpling was oily. The restaurant had only recently opened for dinner service so perhaps a refinement of the menu is in order.

Union Deli, Acland Street St Kilda

Gaz took us to a new cafe at St Kilda last weekend. He was in the mood for an American diner type food so he suggested Urban Deli on Acland Street. For lunches, there is a cart out the front of the restaurant that one can see the meats chopped up and the sangas assembled. It looks like it mainly does take aways but have several tables set up outdoors for those who prefer to eat in. I do recommend dining in because the meat plates are too good to enjoy on the go. 

We order the porchetta lunch box ($22) which came with a thick slice of roast pork, sauerkraut, pickles, stuffing, chips and sauce. The roast pork is tender and the crackling where it was crispy was delicious. Some parts of the pork was a bit dry but when I eat it with the stuffing and sauce, it was great. The stuffing is very tasty, I wished I had more of that stuffing. 

The smoked beef brisket ($18) burger had thick slices of tender and flavourful slices of beef brisket, pickles, coleslaw and chips on the side. The portions were generous and it did not leave any bit of hungry in our stomachs. That's a sign of a good lunch date.