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Hi, it’s Harvard again. I’ll get to designing a proper newsletter template one of these days I promise, so far these stock shots of fake smiley people trapped in a pre-COVID reality crack me up. Anyway, since my last newsletter I’ve received a few questions, most of them are:
Where’s the best place for <dish name>?
I used to take these questions seriously.
Nowadays I realise people don’t really want an honest answer.
They just want me to confirm their bias.
For example, croissants.
When people ask me for the best croissants in Melbourne, I think, they just want me to say LUNE. The shiniest, most popular, well-branded, expensive joint in Melbourne. People used to queue up from 6 am in Elwood, so they must be good. The lady says ‘croissant’ with a French accent, it must be good. They have a futuristic, temperature-controlled chamber in the middle of a giant warehouse. $10 instagrammable almond croissants.
Best.
The antithesis of LUNE would be Agathè in South Melbourne. Those are made and sold by real French people, in a market. Authenticity, so hot right now. They have pandan in their croissant. They have matcha. So local, yet international. Big, yet small.
Best.
What do you think, Harvard?
:S
Bourdain said the best way to get advice for local food spot is to create a fake post in forums or social group and say ‘I just came back from Singapore and had the best chicken rice at Hawker Chan!’ Then sit back and wait for the comments to pour in. You’ll get abused and ridiculed, but within that toxic vomit, you’ll find nuggets of under-the-radar spots. He calls it ‘Nerd Fury’.
So since you’ve bought my book and put food on my daughter’s plate, allow me to unleash some NF on croissants in Melbourne.
My current top two places for croissants at the moment are Oven Street Bakery in Brunswick and Small Batch in North Melbourne. You’ve probably never heard of them since they’re not on any media site’s top 10 list. You’re dubious, I get it.
But if I’m being honest to myself, M&G Caiafa sells freshly baked croissants in the deli section of Victoria Market. No, they don’t make it there (it’s by Noisette, probably frozen), but they have an oven on-site and they bake them in 20-minute intervals. When Hana was a baby I’d walk her in the pram and grab one at in the wee early morning. It’s $3.50, no queue, best of all, fresh.
When was the last time you saw hot steam coming out from your croissant?
A baker friend once told me, a croissant is only best within 60 minutes out of the oven.
So I’d take a basic 3-layer croissant, warm in hand, over a branded thousand-layered one but cold like a dead fish.
Fresh is best.
But if I’m going to be really, REALLY honest, the best croissant is Roti Canai.
There’s a meme somewhere describing Roti Canai as ‘Asian Flat Croissant’. Google it. As the Asian internet goes into nerd rage, I kinda get it. In the same vein, croissants are just ‘Puffy Buttery French Roti’. If you’re Chinese ‘Inflated Spring Onion Pancake’. The Chinese literally translates croissant to ‘sheep horn bread‘.
Think about it, it’s flakey, multi-layered, crunchy on the outside, chewy in the middle. You get dipping curry on the side. It’s vegan-friendly. (Margarine, not butter!) Best of all, it’s made fresh, by the guy next to the window. And it’s like what, $1-2 extra compared to the top-shelf croissants in Melbourne? How much do you think LUNE will charge you for serving a croissant, to order?
If I have all the money in the world, I’d put two food trucks to an endurance race - Roti Canai vs Croissants. Sure, in the beginning, the croissant leads. But the reversal starts when the roti comes with egg the next day. On day three, the Roti Telur shapeshifts to a giant crispy cone and becomes Roti Tissue. On the fourth day, it comes in condensed milk and turned into dessert - Roti Bomb. On the fifth day, banana. Then kaya, then milo. Back to savoury into meat-filled Murtabak the week after. They go into overtime, the final vote rests on this blind man with a signature fork carved from the bone of the last Dodo bird of earth ….
This third newsletter is very much ado about nothing.
Especially if you’re not from Melbourne.
Just remember:
Fresh is best.
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