La Kuaizi

La Kuaizi is a popular cafe on Manchester lane in Melbourne and about a five-minute walk from my gym.

Here they do Asian cuisine as well as Australian. My friend Kristian liked it and when I saw his post on Instagram I wanted to give it a go. So much so I got a $9 voucher for a breakfast meal and juice.

Here I have heard that Brinner is a big thing in the states. Brinner is Breakfast at Dinner and this thing is really popular in the States. So much so I decided to give it a go.

As part of Healthyintstudents Meat free may I went without meat and got the tomato, chilli eggs, and poached egg combo. It took them a while to make but I did enjoy it. It didn't have a lot of chilli kick to it but it did have that Asian kick to it with the soy sauce.

As for my drink, I had orange juice. As an athlete training hard orange juice is a must. It is packed with vitamin C among other things like potassium. I could have got wine but with all that drinking the next day it wasn't such a good idea.

The ladies on the table next to me got some yummy looking dessert. Next time I'll have to come for the dessert, wine and roti.

Ilya Frozen yoghurt

There are two stores one in South Melbourne and the other in Elsternwick. RNIS bought a Groupon for $9 to spend $15 at this place for one visit and the other visit they paid for it themselves

Here not only do they do froyos, the South Melbourne store has salads and other raw and vegan desserts. Plus they use stevia which is a sweetener for those health addicts. They use real fruit and the less sweetened pearls unlike the bubble tea places in the city.

Front counter 

Froyo 

Mantra  

Both the times the service has been friendly. But the second time, the waitress did not smile. In fact she wasn't that friendly.

The Chia dessert was good, it was not too sweet and was light and refreshing. However I did add cacao in there. All the mango was down the bottom. It worked a treat with the kombucha. For those that don't know what it is, it is a less sweetened soft/fruit drink with all the fizz. This is the trend with all the health professionals.

Do read the other review on this place too.

Il Mio Pasta

Il Mio pasta is in a new food court in the city and like Charlie said was pretty average. I bought the Groupon before Charlie reviewed it, so had some high hopes.

The city is getting a few new places each week. Il Mio has been opened for two months and they were busy at 1:50pm but by 2pm they were dead quiet. One guy did not finish his pasta.

The chef frowned and looked like she didn't want to be there.

Their pasta is homemade and I loved the look of the green pasta.

They don't have their liquor license yet and someone said that they were open until 10pm in the evening. Hmm I wonder why the Groupon is only valid until 3pm? People come afterwards for snacks and coffee and maybe tea.

I had their Aglio E Olio with spaghetti and it was pretty bland. Vapiano's one is amazing and it has a lot of flavour to it. Even this was a small size for $12. I had to add vegetables and sundried tomatoes in there for an extra $2 and the Groupon does not cover this charge. RIPOFF!!!.

The pasta as al dente and there was no chilli in this :(. 

Rating: 10/20- nowhere near as close to Vapiano. Vapiano have better service better food and they can deal with crowds. They too have homemade pasta but theirs is a lot better

Burger Kitchen

This place just opened up right outside of Moonee Ponds station and here its popular on a Thursday lunchtime.

The bathrooms are out the back and down some steps (watch your step). A watch your step sign would be a good idea as I nearly tripped. Also another good idea is to have a bathroom sign on the back wall where the sign is so that people know. I nearly thought that there was not a bathroom in sight.

Here I had bought a Groupon for $9.50 which includes a soft drink or water, burger and chips. It does not include any extras.  But I did order egg and grilled onions to my vegetarian one except there was not much grilled onion and I would have liked a bit more.

The chips were the mere frozen sort. It was those frozen American potato chip types. But at least the homemade sauce was good.

The burger was massive and they did have the frozen sort of veggie burger. But I did like the egg as that was nicely fried as well as the fresh vegetables in there. I couldn't taste a lot of the haloumi as the BBQ sauce drowned it.

There was pumpkin and it was good. It added to the sweetness of the burger.

The bun was light and soft.

Rating: 13/20- let down by the chips. Next time though I'd like to try the onion rings and the milkshakes as they looked stellar.

La Romana

RNIS bought a Groupon for this and it was $10 for one wine, pizza slice and a entree. You can choose between a salad or aranchini. I chose the rice balls.

Like Lievita which Sweet and Sour fork went to (and I have not been) you can choose the pizza by the slice or by kilogram ($27-$29). If I chose by kilogram I would have to share the pizza with a group of four or more.

I had a red wine which was quite strong. It worked well with my pizza, but my cup was just a tad bit dirty.

They make the pizza every day and they keep on going in that huge kitchen of theirs. They have a pizza oven so every time someone comes and orders one they put the slice in there to warm it up. the arachini balls had a fice filling of cheese and rice and they change the selection every day. Same as the salds.

This place is run by the Italians and an actual Italian chef works there.

The pizza was good with a lot of cheese but it was a bit lukewarm. It was doughy but not too doughy. It was a cheese and tomato pizza with basil and not a lot of sauce.

Rating: 13/20- just ok. But at least the service is good. This place would be great for all the law professionals to unwind after a hard day in the courts as they are open until 8pm.

Salona

Salona is a Greek restaurant in Swan st right around the corner from Richmond station. Here they had a $16 Groupon for one with a souvlaki (of your choice), chips and beer. The beer is an original Greek lager beer.

At lunchtimes they are quiet but during the dinner time they are busy. Hence that is why the Groupon is only valid for lunch and not dinner. I made a booking a few weeks ago and somewhat had to cancel but they didn't mind me walking in on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

The Greek lager beer was really strong and worked well with the souvlaki. I have never tried Greek beer before so can't comment too much on its taste. It did smell appley and they pour it into a really tall glass.

Here I tried their vegan souvlaki and it did not disappoint. It had loads of vegetables and lots of hummus. The pita was lukewarm though. The pita was the soft homemade bread. They make their own chips from real potato which is great to see. But it must have taken a while as my food did take a while to come.

The other two people came in for just coffees and sweets. I still can't have sweets due to the Sugar free month (but that will end soon and I can but just in moderation).

Rating: 15/20- me likes and I'm sure some other vegetarian bloggers will like it too.

Melbourne Namu

Melbourne Namu is a Korean fusion cafe in the heart of the city and its right in Hardware st. Here it is a cosy little cafe where Sensory lab coffee is served.

RNIS purchased a Groupon for $9 for one meal and one drink. Here I chose water rather than soft drink as they are very sugary.

 We went because of the kimchi queasidilla which we enjoyed. The meal also offers burgers but we wanted something different. Here it came with chips at 1:30pm we weren't that hungry so we were happy with smaller sizes.

The Queasidilla was really spicy and gave us that kick. The salad was good and the chips balanced out the spiciness well.

The lady there was really friendly. She knew a lot of people and this one lady that came in after got her coffee and she really likes the food.

Do come by for lunch. Oh and I wished they were open for dinner.