Seven Seas Bar & Restaurant

With the timely arrival of the Mother of Booto from interstate and with it, the much anticipated arrival of a live in babysitter for Stinky, the Bloggers thought it an opportune time to circle back and tick off Da Bruno's from the 2008 Beaufort Street Challenge. As you can imagine, Booto immediately commenced salivating at the mere thought of the vast array of wine that awaited her. Alas, it was not to be. Despite our burgeoning reputation amongst establishments on the Beaufort Street strip, we were unable to secure a Saturday night booking (the Brains showed great restraint in not screaming "Do you know who I am??" down the phone line) and the Deliberator was otherwise engaged on the alternative Friday night.

With Booto desperate not to waste the services of a baby-starved grandmother who was more than happy to see the back of her daughter and enjoy a night of one on one with Stinky, the Bloggers shelved Da Bruno's for another week and returned to the next establishment on the challenge - Seven Seas.

After a quick glass of bubbles at the home of the Brains and the Deliberator, we arrived in good time for our 8.00pm booking. As we waited to be seated, the Brains and Booto duly noted the warm chocolate tones of the venue which was pretty much full - a good sign - and Brains congratulated herself for having made a booking earlier in the week to ensure a good table for the night ahead. Meanwhile, the Deliberator and the Sponge contented themselves with watching the big screen TV showing the Olympics - a bizarre aberration on an otherwise tastefully decorated interior.

Unfortunately, Seven Seas appeared to have lost our booking. Although to their credit, they did attempt to pretend they had not. However, a table directly in a thoroughfare and feeling the full brunt of the draught from the front door is always a dead giveaway!

Nothing could dampen the spirits of Booto however, who promptly called for the cocktail list and ordered her first Cosmopolitan post Stinky. The Sponge and Deliberator followed suit, whilst the Brains contented herself with a bottle of her trademark bubbles.

It was at this point, that it came to the attention of the Bloggers that they were not the only ones out for a big night at Seven Seas. The music was positively booming from the upstairs function room, making it hard to hear and overall, rather distracting. Surely, if you're going to have as function room above your restaurant, one would hope you'd go to the trouble of soundproofing. It seemed not.

However, despite the physical agony the Sponge was in (he's a massive Tom Petty fan and abhors all that "wretched doof doof noise"), the Bloggers focused on the task ahead....

In time honoured tradition, a couple of tasting plates were ordered. The usual foods were represented – including the ubiquitous fried chorizo and kalamata olives, several portions of arancini and some marinated octopus. It was all reasonably tasty but not particularly memorable.

The Sponge, Brains and Deliberator all ordered seafood platters for the main course, before Booto caved into the pressure to conform and thus made it a simple "2 x seafood platters for 2" for the Bloggers.

The "2 x seafood platters for 2" were served in good time which was just as well as the Deliberator was shivering in the draught and the Sponge had refrained from taking his jacket off.

Each platter was generous in size and included a generous mix of:

oysters kilpatrick - so drowned in bacon and worcestershire sauce, they resembled a parmagiana;

crumbed fish - to quote the Sponge: "unnecessary";

chips - always going to get a vote from the Deliberator on this one;

calamari - not melt in your mouth, but not too chewy either; and

whitebait – so crispy they were almost hollow.

Whilst the Bloggers would not rave about the quality of the fare offered, it must be said that Seven Seas do not skimp on quantity. Unfortunately, whilst the Sponge and Deliberator did their best and the Brains and Booto gave it their all, there was more than a little left over for "Mr Manners".

Despite being looked after by both a rather young waiter and a bizarrely dressed waitress (whose attempt at jazzing up her black uniform with some silver appliqué can only be described as plain scary), the Bloggers were duly attended, although all in all, it was hardly service to remember or indeed give much mention to on this blog. There were several instances where the bloggers were left waiting for wine, which was particularly irksome on a Saturday night when the general plan was to get as drunk as possible before midnight.

Despite feeling like falling asleep in our chairs, so full were our stomachs, the Bloggers soldiered on and called for the dessert menu. Whilst the Deliberator and Sponge opted for coffee and a licquer, the Brains and Booto dove right into the chocolate crème brulee and a chocolate sponge pudding. Booto’s brulee was quite delicious but the Brains’ sponge had a strangely familiar texture and taste – one that reminded her of those that came straight from a Betty Crocker packet.

Finally, with the Deliberator announcing he could take the cold draught no longer and the Brains and Booto having to deal with a rather rude punter on the table behind, the Bloggers departed Seven Seas with a rather indifferent feeling. Was it hideous - no. Was it great - equally no.

In summary:

Service: Average, but all the more interesting with the added sparkle to the waitress' uniform.

Food: Okay, but for a specialist seafood restaurant, with a name like Seven Seas, we do expect a little better than a pub standard seafood platter.

Ambience: Lose the party and the music resonating from upstairs and you might have something.

Highlight: Booto's cosmopolitan, although after 9 months of abstinence, her judgement tends to lean to the generous side.

Lowlight: Toss up between the party upstairs and being seated at a draughty table.

Rating: 2.5 crumbed frozen fish out of 5

Will we be back: With the high standards set by other seafood restaurants in Perth, probably not.

Details: the bill was higher than expected, although this probably had something to do with the volume of alcohol that was ordered (cocktails were an outrageous $16.00 and a $28 bottle of Cloudy Bay Pelorus was $53). The food was priced as you would expect, about $82 for a seafood platter for 2. You can call them on 9370 3030, or visit their poorly designed website on www.thesevenseas.com.au.

Tombstone Mexican Restaurant

While the title of this blog would indicate that it is about all things Beaufort Street (and, well, it is), we thought we would comment quickly on a little gem the BSBers stumbled across last week.

Tombstone on Walcott Street (which incidentally intersects Beaufort, lending a skerrick of legitimacy to this post) had been regularly carpet-bombing the area with pamphlets announcing their arrival and various specials. Booto, Stinky and the Sponge found themselves at a loose end last Thursday (having been passed over by the balance of the BSBers in favour of bridesmaid duties and general tooling around respectively) and accordingly decided to see what these paper-wasters were all about.

Tombstone is an eclectic place – set up in the former grand foyer of the Menora Theatre, it shares premises with a squash court (though you would be none the wiser for it until needing to use the loo). While ostensibly billing itself as Mexican, the interior is a garish mix of a dozen competing themes and styles, from Clint Eastwood posters to a large screen showing early-80s dance clips to 50s diner-type booths along the walls, all overhung with the ornate drapery and trimmings left over from its cinematic days.

Like the surrounds, the service was excellent because of, rather than in spite of, its unpolished edge. Staff and owner were very attentive – noticing the Sponge’s predilection for all things hopped and frothy, the owner made a point of offering him a particular new beer from the owner’s personal stash. He also very politely, but firmly, steered Booto away from the super-hot burrito sauce, a fact she was most thankful for as the "medium" proceeded to melt her fillings…

Which leads us to the food: Despite a Mexican theme running through the menu (with the standard burritos, enchiladas, nachos etc on offer), there are plenty more traditional meat and other options for those not willing to venture south of the border. Shared chilli con carne dip was very tasty, Booto’s beef burrito was tender and spicy, and the Sponge’s meal had to be seen to be believed: the $28 surf’n’turf steak procured a delightfully large and tender steak, a mound of garlic mussels, prawns and scallops, a log cabin of wedges and a side salad.

Stinky, sated with milk, slept through proceedings and only roused now and then to flatulate his approval.

In all, Tombstone is the ideal place to come for a cheap and casual meal with a bunch of friends intending to eat and drink the evening away.

In summary:

Service: Went above and beyond.

Food: Fantastic quality and value Mexican/steakhouse fare.

Ambience: Dizzying. Despite sitting there for 2 hours, we still can’t tell you.

Highlight: The surf’n’turf (seriously, has anyone ever seen scallops on a steak before?)

Lowlight: Not entirely sure what it wanted to be (not convinced this is necessarily a lowlight though)

Rating: 4.2 distended bellies out of 5.

Will we be back? Hell yes, with an appetite, a thirst and a table full of like-minded punters.

Details: Tombstone is at 344 Walcott St, and can be contacted on 9443 8888 or email at michaelriseley@hotmail.com. 2 (enormous) courses and 2-3 drinks each cost around $80 total. (We defy our readers to produce tales of better value!) Tombstone is fully licensed, and offers an array of dazzlingly cheap margaritas and assorted treats.

Sunshine Lunch Bar Cafe

While the bloggers were unable to get out for their weekly dinner last week, The Deliberator and The Brains did have a Beaufort Street experience worth discussing. The Deliberator and The Brains had a meeting outside of the city / West Perth precinct they are usually confined to. This was fantastic news for them because sometimes they think that if they are forced to eat one more Croissant Express Frozwich (and the Brooklyn is usually the preferred choice) or one more large sushi roll mix they would simply collapse and die. An outside-of-the-CBD lunch (even though it would be had on the run) was just what they needed.

As both The Brains and the Deliberator are lawyers (we don’t think we’re giving too much away here), they were very familiar with the lunching options surrounding the section of Beaufort Street near Walcott Street. This is because in their first year of lawyering, all Perth lawyers need to attend an offsite course called ‘Articles Training Program’ which is located on Alvan Street in Mount Lawley, directly behind the set of shops around Diva Café. ATP is a godsend to most young lawyers – it starts at 9.00, finishes at 4.00 and has about 5 coffee/tea/smoko/lunch/rest breaks during the day. And it gives everyone a chance to eat an Antonio’s continental roll 4 or 5 times a week. However, it was not Antonio’s that The Deliberator and The Brains were after on this day, rather, it was the little-known (and not open on weekends), Sunshine Lunch Bar Café.

The Sunshine Lunch Bar Café is essentially a Vietnamese run sandwich bar. You can also get your usual lunch time staples there, like Mrs Macs pies and probably even Chicko Rolls. The sandwich section itself does not look like anything special, and really, the Sunshine Lunch Bar Café would not be out of place in Welshpool, Osborne Park or any other highly populated suburb that requires many corner lunch bars for workers. The difference between those lunch bars and the Sunshine Lunch Bar lies in Sunshine’s Vietnamese and Asian roll specialty.

The Hot Asian roll is one of the finest Perth sandwich experiences around – it consists of that type of a bread roll you would typically find at a Vietnamese bakery, 2 pork fillets, which are heated up in the sandwich maker (to give you a picture, the pork fillets are about the same size and shape as the chicken fillets you get from Subway), shaved carrot and cucumber, onion, chilli sauce, coriander and ‘special mayonnaise’. It sounds like a ridiculous combination but it is really quite wonderful. The Vietnamese Roll is similar, except it is not hot, the meat is less identifiable and it comes with what can only be described as Vietnamese pate.

If anyone has been to Vietnam they will have seen vendors make exactly these types of rolls on the street. They are called Banh Mi (or something), and look just like the one in the picture. On a trip to Saigon, The Brains and The Deliberator spent 4 days looking for every Banh Mi vendor in the city to try their wares. Sure, the pate was generally fly-blown, the meat had been sitting in the tropical sun for 8 or 9 hours, and the vegetables were old and wilted, but this combination somehow came together to produce a delight so fabulous that The Brains and The Deliberator continued to sample Banh Mi everywhere it was available in Perth. The Sunshine Café Lunch Bar, in our opinion, has the best one around, and for a ridiculously low low price. You can also get pretty good ones (which are a bit more authentically unhygenic looking) from Lucky Importer Exporter in Brisbane Street, Northbridge.

In summary:

Service: No fuss and super friendly.

Food: Can’t say enough good things about the Asian rolls, but we cannot vouch for anything else.

Ambience: Similar to a Leach Highway truck stop.

Highlight: The ‘special mayonnaise’.

Lowlight: We wouldn’t know. Although not opening on weekends is a shame.

Rating: 4 Banh Mi out of 5.

Will we be back? Yep, but only if we ever get out there again on a weekday.

Details: Call them on (08) 9370 1165. 3 rolls and a couple of cokes cost far less than $20. The café is located in the same set of shops as Bliss Noodle Bar, Hanami, Subway and the Cheesecake Shop.

Inglewood Pizza Bar

Firstly, we'd like to again thank Lazy Aussie of the Worst of Perth for allowing us to use this picture (posted here and tagged 'worst advertising', 'worst graphic design' and 'worst sign' - all of which sum it up better than we ever could). This worst can be seen on the front window of the Inglewood Pizza Bar.

So, as you may have gathered, the Beaufort Street Bloggers made the commitment to finally tick Inglewood Pizza off the list. We’re not sure why it took us so long, it may have been the terrible pizza experiences we encountered on our way down the Inglewood part of the strip, it may have been that we generally leave pizza for impromptu Friday night house parties, or it may have simply been a result of passing by this picture time after time. Anyway, we didn’t need to put it off for so long, because in the end the pizza was pretty damn good.

The Brains rang the order through. Once again, with no menu, she was left floundering – and she was not helped by the less-than-friendly guy at the other end of the phone. The Brains first asked whether Inglewood Pizza Bar did a special. This caused some confusion with the order taker, and he asked what she meant by ‘special’. ‘Umm, do you have, like, an “Inglewood Pizza Special” on your menu or something like that?’ queried the Brains. ‘We’ve got a pizza called the Inglewood Special if that’s what you mean?’. Bingo.

Having crossed that bridge, the Brains didn’t know where to go next – having never been to Inglewood Pizza Bar, she was unsure as to whether they had gourmet treats on offer, or whether the standard Hawaiian & meatlovers were the go (looking back, it is obvious really). So, getting herself into a bit of a panic because the fellow on the phone was getting fairly impatient, the Brains caved and asked for one with the lot, as that is as far as her imagination could take her under the stressed state she was in. When we picked up the pizzas and read the menu we found that the ‘Inglewood Special’ and ‘the Lot’ were largely identical, except that the Lot had pineapple and bacon on it too. This would have been something that would have been good to know at the time of order.

To the ambience. Interestingly, Inglewood Pizza calls itself a ‘Pizza Bar’. This conjured up images of a casual pizza joint, complete with high tables and bar stools on which punters could sit on and dine in, perhaps some cheerful Italian music and the availability of something to drink (being Perth, we certainly didn’t expect alcoholic drink, but perhaps a few softies would have been on hand).

In fact, the Inglewood Pizza Bar is an enormous barren space, with no decoration, no music, no life, no charm, no stools, no chairs - but with 2 leatherette couches (which looked like they were borrowed from a student who had found them on the side of the road) facing a fuzzy tv and an enormous magazine rack. Weird. We also counted 3 drinks fridges, but together they housed exactly 2 bottles of soft drink (and even those appeared to be the employees’ drinks). Not that it mattered, we didn’t plan to dine in.

The fellow who the Brians spoke to on the phone took about 5 minutes to come out to the shop front after we arrived. But, once he was there, he was reasonably friendly and the Brains realised he wasn’t a bad sort at all, perhaps just not great with people.

The pizzas themselves were super. The bases were thin and crispy. The toppings on both pizzas consisted of capsicum, fresh tomato, olives, salami, anchovies & mushrooms. As mentioned earlier, the Lot also came with bacon and pineapple. All the toppings were generously portioned, and seemed to be of reasonably good quality. The anchovies in particular were liberally applied – they were nice chunky bits of fish, as opposed to the tiny stringy things that often appear on takeaway pizza. If you don’t love anchovies, we’d suggest you specifically ask for a small amount.

We also liked the good sized pieces of fresh tomato, and of course, the fact that at Inglewood Pizza, they’re not afraid to be heavy handed with the salami. We all love processed meat, and lots of it. All in all, the pizzas were fresh, tasty and unlike those from Magic Pizza or the Civic Hotel, very edible.


We do note that the menu is fairly limited, and that customers should be aware that Inglewood Pizza does not sell gourmet pizza like Stones Pizza in North Perth, it is more along the lines of good solid Friday night takeaway pizza, perhaps more akin to Marco’s Pizza in Tuart Hill.

In summary:

Service: Pretty gruff over the phone, but we suspect there’s a softie underneath.

Food: Fresh toppings and crispy bases make good pizza.

Ambience: Urgh. Although there was an incredible selection of back issues of Who and OK! Magazines.

Highlight: The anchovies.

Lowlight: The failure to mention we had ordered 2 practically identical pizzas.

Rating: 3.5 shabby couches out of 5.

Will we be back? Possibly, but we’d be more likely to continue buying takeaway pizzas from venues with a more varied menu.

Details: Call them on (08) 9271 3196 – there’s no website which makes over the phone ordering a little difficult. It was a low low $36 for 2 massive family sized pizzas which (almost) satisfied the 4 of us. We don’t think they deliver, or at least, they have declined to deliver when we tried to order from them in the past.

Coming up: Well, we just discovered that Chicken Treat in Inglewood has a Beaufort Street address, as does Mt Lawley Fish and Chips – and we’re pretty keen to finalise everything north of Walcott Street before we cross the road. Even though we’re pretty much over takweay, we might knock one of those off next week. The week after that we may finally make it to Da Bruno’s as Stinky’s eastern-states based grandma may be available for babysitting. Thanks Mother of BOOTO!

Bliss Noodle Bar

When The Sponge called ahead to book a table at the Bliss Noodle Bar, the lady on the other end of the phone seemed surprised. She told him no booking would be required, but The Sponge, being the cautious man he is, asked for one anyway. She took down his name and hung up the phone – she had no way to know whether 20 people would be rocking up at 8.30, or whether a romantic dinner for 2 was planned at 6.30.

Before the Bloggers set off for Bliss, it was decided that it was far too wet and cold for young Stinks to accompany them, so Bliss Noodle Bar became another takeaway stop for the Bloggers. The food was ordered, sans menu, and we chose 2 starters (fried squid and curry puffs) and 5 mains (seafood kway teow, pad thai, red curry chicken noodles, Mongolian beef and garlic prawns). Yes, it was a crazy medley of Asian cultures and far eastern delights that perhaps should not have been eaten together, but mixing cuisines is just one benefit of being an ignorant Caucasian living in this multicultural land.

The Brains and The Deliberator braved the rain to pick up our lorry load of carbohydrates and chilli sauce from the restaurant while BITO and The Sponge stayed back let the $4.99 bottle of red breathe. It was when The Brains and The Deliberator arrived that it became clear that bookings were not required. Bliss Noodle Bar is by no means a huge restaurant, but nor is it a pokey little Asian place you might find on William Street where the toilets are located in the kitchen and the tables are so close together that you couldn’t be blamed for accidentally picking up your neighbour’s last king prawn thinking it was your own. However, Bliss Noodle Bar was empty, but for one group of 4 stuck in a corner, happily oblivious to the barren land surrounding them. The décor was fresh and modern, but were very glad to be going home to eat on the couch by the heater, because the combination of a sleek interior and no diners left the place rather soulless.

But to the positives. The girl behind the counter was friendly and helpful, both on the phone and in person. We were thrilled with the free and generously sized bag of prawn crackers, a touch which seems to have all but disappeared in most local Asian restaurants, and one we would love to see make a come back. When we got the food home, it was generously portioned, piping hot and smelled delicious.

It is difficult to write a review of the food though, as when it came time to discuss our thoughts on the food the conversation went something like this:

BITO: the curry puffs were excellent.

All: agreed.

The Sponge: the garlic prawns came with plenty of prawns.

The Deliberator: I didn’t see one prawn in the garlic prawns, it was all vegetables. I also saw nothing but noodles in the red curry chicken noodle dish.

The Brains: I had plenty of chicken in the red curry chicken noodle dish.

BITO: the beef in the Mongolian beef was in cubes, when it should be finely sliced.

The Brains: I liked the beef in cubes.

BITO: the pad Thai was too sweet.

All: agreed.

The Deliberator: would you all just stop your yapping and turn the fucking TV up?

In the end we concluded that the problem was that Bliss Noodle Bar was a jack of all trades but master of none. It needs to focus on one country, or even one region (say, South East Asia, rather than trying to cover India, Thailand, Malaysia, China and Vietnam) and really get a couple of dishes to an outstanding level. Instead, everything was fresh and tasty, and some even had just the right amount of schtang, but nothing seemed to be a signature dish or something we would be desperate to go back for. Also, there were way too many vegetables in the meat dishes – if we wanted veggies, we would have ordered them separately, instead we felt they were being used as a cheap filler at the sacrifice of more meat.

Service: Friendly on the phone, and friendly in person.

Food: Good food, but it didn’t knock our socks off.

Ambience: Too bare and cold for a wintery night.

Highlight: The curry puffs.

Lowlight: Too many vegetables in what should be meat-only or meat-majority dishes.

Rating: 3 bags of free prawn crackers out of 5.

Will we be back? If we couldn’t get a consensus on which type of Asian food we wanted that night, possibly. We’d be more likely to visit Northbridge for our Asian food fix though.

Details: Call them on (08) 9471 8988 - the restaurnt is located in the same set of shops as Hanami, right near the Cheesecake store. It was $90 for 2 entrees and 5 mains, including rice and prawn crackers. They are licensed if you want to eat in. We think they’re on the web but a Google search did not reveal the address.

Coming up: Inglewood Pizza is really hanging over our heads. Has anyone been there? Is it ok or should we continue to put it off until one day when we’ve all had enough cans to face it?

... and a big thanks to the Lazy Aussie from The Worst of Perth, who kindly mentioned us in his fabulous (and actually popular) blog. If you haven't already seen it, check it out, it's hysterical.

Ankara Kebabs and Bakery

So the Deliberator (after much, well, deliberation) has ordered 2 chicken kebabs, 1 doner and 1 shish kebab (all with extra meat, egg and cheese), 3 large tubs of chips and a sausage pizza at the counter of Ankara. During the 15 minute wait for our artery-busting feast, Deliberator and Sponge head over the road to the petrol station to purchase soft drink accompaniments, whereupon Deliberator shoots down Sponge’s suggestion to purchase Fanta on the basis that it is "fat and unhealthy". Sponge didn’t know whether to cry or kiss him. (He ended up kissing him.)

Ankara came with a fairly hefty reputation. Billed by some as "the best kebab store on Beaufort Street", it had its work cut out for it against the likes of Medya (see review of 27 February) and Charcoal Chicken (see 11 Feb).

Unfortunately, and while it didn’t necessarily disappoint, we’d have to say that Ankara failed to reach the lofty heights of the aforementioned. Sure, it has a leather couch and a fantastically kitsch garden scene mural on one wall, however the kebabs were standard fare. While the shish meat was a cut above, in all they were relatively bland (even with a variety of different sauces). The pide, listed on the separate "deluxe" menu, was also fairly tasteless. In fact, the sausage on the pide only looked like sausage, it tasted like nothing.

It is not all bad however - the saving grace (and a big one at that) were the chips. Crispy, golden and encrusted with salt, the people have ruled that Ankara has overtaken Charco’s as the "Best Chip on Beaufort Street". No small feat.

Also, Ankara does excellent fresh Turkish bread on most days which beats the rot you buy at Coles.

In all, ideal after a few pints at the Inglewood, not recommended sober.

Service: Brutally efficient without pleasantry or bullshit. Ideal for a kebabery.

Food: Have had better.

Ambience: It’s a kebab shop. With a mural.

Highlight: The chips.

Lowlight: The inflated reputation that preceded it.

Rating: 2.8 double-meats-with-the-lot out of 5.

Will we be back? If drunk at the Inglewood, sure.

Details: Call them on (08) 9473 1083 Coming up: Still to mop up Inglewood Pizza and Da Bruno’s, before heading on to Bliss Noodle Bar.

Peking Chinese Restaurant, continued

In our review of the Peking Chinese Restaurant we mentioned that there was an incredible dragon-head counter, and a pretty appalling bathroom situation.

Photographic evidence of these 2 delights has now been uploaded. Here's the pre-war men's shitter -

and here is the Counter-of-Dreams -