All posts filed under: Reviews

Booze and Eats at Fat Tuesday New Orleans Festival

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In New Orleans, a “Fat Tuesday”  celebration is a day where everyone in the state will come together to celebrate the last day of the Carnival season! Coming together with floats, masks and good food and drinks, it’s the perfect chance to celebrate before the fasting period of Lent begins. Last night, Po’ Boy Quarter and Ding Dong Lounge partnered together to give Melbourne a taste of a typical New Orleans Fat Tuesday celebration. Set up in Argyle Square, Carlton, (which in our opinion is a much underused outdoor space) the festivities kicked off early at 4pm. With the afternoon sun beating down, crowds flocked to the sidelines for a bit of shade and to save their dancing feet for later in the evening. Food trucks to choose from included BlueBonnet BBQ, Gumbo Kitchen, Po’ Boy Quarter and Girl with the Gris Gris, serving up delicious cuisine including Louisiana Gumbo, Po’ Boys, Texas BBQ, Tacos and more. We got to chatting the man behind the Gumbo at Gumbo Kitchen learning the ins and outs of making the …

Meat Fish Wine Tasting

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A couple of weeks ago the We Know Melbourne team were invited to taste the new menu at Meat Fish Wine. Located right in the heart of QV, next to their sister restaurant Red Spice QV, the restaurant and wine bar are known for their extensive wine collection (featuring over 500 wines) and top tasting dishes. The tasting was an intimate setting, sitting down on an outside table with a couple of other well known Melbourne foodies, including @topfoodmelbourne. Each dish that was brought out was given the rundown by Chef David Schofield, explaining the detail that went into cooking it to perfection.  Some of the dishes we got to try include: Cheese damper with bush tomato jam Wagyu Rump Cap, Roasted Shallot Puree Normally not a huge carnivore, we found the wagyu so tender and we couldn’t help go back for seconds. Snapper, Smoked Cauliflower, “Noir Cracker” & Sea Foam Char Grilled Brussel Sprouts, Lardo and Mustard Crumbs If you are still scarred from the way your Mum used to boil your brussel sprouts and make you …

Victorian Pride March – 2016

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Representing The Swanston Hotel, Grand Mercure and Mercure Welcome Melbourne under the Accor Hotels banner – we participated in the Victorian Pride March, 2016 last Sunday. The theme this year – Marriage Equality. A small, but dedicated group of cool individuals – it was actually our first time marching as a team, but armed with enough rainbow flags to kit out a small army and some jumbo bubble wands, we rocked out to the sounds beats of JOY FM, and were even lucky enough to be marching behind My Pet Warehouse who brought along some gorgeous puppies (including a super-cool, giant Great Dane). And let’s be honest, puppies trump EVERYTHING! Accor Hotels are committed to celebrating Diversity in all shapes and forms and have recently submitted an open letter to publicly pledge support for Marriage Equality. As a company, Accor supports diversity and recognises the rights of it’s LGBTU employees to live and work, free of prejudice and discrimination.

‘THRILL ME: The Leopold & Loeb Story’

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Intelligent, wealthy Chicago law students Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, no longer entertained by the rush of petty crimes done for fun, planned and executed in 1924 what they thought was ‘perfect crime,’ the murder of 14-year-old Bobby Franks. Later caught, and narrowly missing the hangman’s noose thanks to their hotshot lawyer Clarence Darrow – the story of the ‘thrill killers’ has shocked and fascinated people for decades and is told fabulously in Thrill Me: The Leopold and Loeb. Having a slight fascination with the dark and macabre, not only was I excited to be invited to see this show, but I also confess to researching the heck out of the true story before going along. I was surprised, unlike other movies or shows of a similar vein, how closely this show stuck mostly to the facts, whilst also at the same time keeping the audience entertained and completely drawn into the whole proceedings. The set was simple, but dark and reminiscent of a dark, 1920’s prohibition Chicago, and though there was only a cast …

Modern Vietnamese breakfast with a twist at TBC

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Looking for a decent breakfast in the city is like looking for a needle in a haystack. While there are so many cafes that do serve up a breakfast menu, there are few and far between that do anything that little bit different from your standard bacon and eggs/avocado on toast combo. The Brass Coq (TBC) are hoping to change that all with the recent launch of their breakfast menu. You may remember our review of our dinner menu last year when the We Know Melbourne team were invited along to try the dinner – remember that VFC (Vietnamese Fried Chicken)?! Located in the ‘legal precinct’  this little spot is now open from  7am in the morning until 11pm.  The breakfast menu is filled with popular Vietnamese breakfast dishes with Asian and French influences (yes there’s even rare beef pho on the breakfast menu!) and is one of the CBD’s first modern Vietnamese breakfast. We dined on 3 different dishes. First on the list was the TBC’s Scrambled eggs, where the scrambled eggs were given …

So Frenchy So Chic in the Park

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Last Sunday, the We Know Melbourne team escaped Melbourne for So Frenchy So Chic in the Park. Set in the beautiful gardens of Werribee Park, the day was filled with plenty of sunshine, cocktails, French music and plenty of joie de vivre. The park was filled with plenty of  umbrellas (for the much needed shade on the 31 degree day), food and drinks stalls, a Kerastase braid bar and gorgeous festival goers dressed so very chic. Of course, no French festival would be complete without plenty of parasols, champagne and cheese to purchase and proving most popular for the day the gelato and frozen yoghurt stall. The Lillet stall was by far our favourite and to cool off from the heat we couldn’t help but go back again and again for  the Rouge Obsession: Lillet Rouge, Capi Cranberry and a wedge of lime. The soundtrack to the festival included Moroccan singer, Hindi Zahra (our favourite), the twins from Brigitte, Lou Doillon (also a favourite) and Soviet Suprem to get the crowd dancing with their Balkan …

Slipping and Sliding at Slide the City

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What could be more Australian than on a 30 degree plus, sunny Melbourne day than to throw on a pair of bathers and jump on a massive slip and slide through the city. Armed with post-Christmas tans and various blow up devices ranging from the standard issue tube, giant inflatable thongs, right through to super fashionable flamingos – hordes of people did just that last Sunday. The lines were long and the the food and shade was scarce, but overall, like any good slip and slide concocted in a mates backyard at a barbecue with a tarp, hose and a bottle of Morning Fresh, no one cared about the teething problems, everyone was there to have a great time – and they did. I kicked a guy in the chest by accident, rammed a small child because I couldn’t steer or stop, and fell on my face multiple times – and I had a blast. Slide the City hits Sydney next for some more crazy wet fun. For more details see: http://www.slidethecity.com.au/ We Know Melbourne tip: …

Moonlight Cinemas Opening Night

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Moonlight Cinemas is a quintessential summer event on the Melbourne cultural calendar. Based in the stunning Royal Botanic Gardens, the cinemas three month program screens a whole bunch of films every evening over summer, except for Mondays. The We Know Melbourne team were invited along to the opening night last Thursday to watch an advance screening of Suffragette. Slightly worried about the cooler weather in the lead up, Thursday evening presented itself as a perfect balmy evening. Red carpet arrivals kicked off the evening where each person could get their own paparazzi snap as they entered, before being ushered to the VIP section where we had sparkling wine, popcorn and bean bags to enjoy during the film. The Moonlight Cinema Candy Bar offers up a range of hot food (including the delicious fried chicken sliders that we ate) and snacks, as well as of course, alcohol and other beverages. The perfect way to spend a summer’s evening. When: 3 December – 27 March Where: Moonlight Cinemas, Royal Botanic Gardens Visit the website here.  We Know Melbourne …

Miss Universal – Chunky Move

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The We Know Melbourne team are long term fans of contemporary dance company, Chunky Move and were excited to attend their latest show, Miss Universal last week. Upon entering the studios, we were told it was an open space and we were free to move between rooms, bars and couches. Unsure what to expect, we first entered the room where there were two tiny sculptures in the middle in amongst the rest of the audience. We had a brief introduction from one of the members of the Chunky Move board and also the artistic director, Anouk. We were told that the performance was going to a blend of theatre and gallery installations. Proceeding to the other room, we could see the chairs but they were up against the wall so once again, we weren’t sure whether we’d be standing up the whole performance or whether the show would span across the two rooms. Soon we spotted the dancers (the only way we could tell was that they were barefoot) as they moved through the standing …

Mind games at the Escape Room

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Escapism: super fun, definitely a challenge  Working across the road from Strike Bowling at QV Melbourne, we’re often in there for a beer and a bowl to celebrate the usual occasions like birthdays, a new employee starting, people leaving and so on, but we’ve always looked curiously at the red doors dotted throughout – and wondered was behind them as we sipped our drinks. This Christmas instead of killing off our brain cells with an afternoon of beers and bad-for-your-health junk food, we decided to put them to the test in one of Strike’s three, challenging ‘Escapism’ rooms. Strike describe these red-doored conundrums as ‘one room. one team. 50 minutes. a bit of thinking and a lot of fun.’ Having chosen their ‘difficulty nine’ level Casino Heist room we definitely did a lot more than just a ‘bit’ of thinking, that’s for sure. Being under the constant pressure to solve riddles to get through each door in a series of rooms does interesting things to a team and brings the ‘leader,’ ‘follower’ and ‘problem solver’ …