A couple of weeks ago (as I forgot to post this at the time!) a friend from Sydney and I went to Maha for dinner. The style & cuisine of this restaurant is Mediterranean/Middle Eastern.
Now I had been there before, as I had booked there for our office Christmas Lunch 2010, and had been impressed with it then. So we both chose the 5 course Soufra with wines to match. As Anthony is vegetarian, I chose to have the vege option as well. Upon reflection I don't think I would have eaten as well with the meat dishes!
It was superb! We started with a pumpkin soup, but not just any old pumpkin soup! In the bottom of the rather large bowl/dish, were roasted pine nuts and something green (which I can't remember what it was), and a small swirl of feta cheese. There was also a small roll made with cinnamon filled with feta cheese on the side. The soup was them poured over the nuts & greenery. It was absolutely delish!!
The second course was an antipasto style, there were bowls of olives marinated in chilli and a Maltese cheese (Name of which I didn't catch), a bowl of white cannelli beans with olive oil & garlic, a bowl with thinly sliced zucchini, olive oil & spices and a beetroot & sour cream dip, all served with individual Turkish bread rolls.
While we were still eating that, out came course No.3. This was a spring roll filled with roasted red onion and garlic, and a tahini sauce (I think!), a bowl of lentil in olive oil with caramelised onion and feta crumbled over the top. They were beyond words yummy!
By this point we were onto the double glasses of wine with the food. I cannot even remember what I was drinking! I know they were white wines and were very good. The main course was accompanied by 2 reds, one of which happened to be a Shiraz. I cannot drink Shiraz or any blends with that grape variety, as it just doesn't like me. So not wishing to ruin my meal, I asked them to take it away. The somelier then gave me some VERY nice Pinot Noir which also suited what we were about to eat.
So main course was pumpkin & feta (me thinks) ravioli, with a nutty foam of some sort. I tell you it was a different taste sensation! Some fatoush, and a rice dish with apricots, pine nuts and something else. The final dish of the mains was turnip & mushrooms, cooked I think on the grill with some sea salt and olive oil. I'm not really sure what else was with it, because at this point I'm enjoying the food too much to pay attention to what our attendant is telling us about it!
After all that, we still had the dessert/sweets to come. We opted to wait for about 30 mins before even contemplating eating again! So we sat and chatted and finished our wine.
I tell you it was worth the wait! Out came a board with 3 small dishes/glasses. The first was a cone of very fine pastry, made by piping and swirling it around to create the cone shape. It was filled with a white chocolate mousse, that I think m ay have had some sort of nut in it. Drizzled over this was an orange syrup. OMG YUM!!! It was but a mere mouthful, but it was heaven. The second was a shot glass, and according the the attendant was their version of a 'Golden Gaytime' ice cream. The inside of the glass was smeared with salted chocolate and nuts and roasted cous cous, yes you did read that right. At the bottom of the glass was a layer of salted caramel, on top of that was a dark chocolate mousse, and on top of that was a foam of some sort. It was toe curlingly yummy. The last was the signature sweet for Maha, Greek style donuts filled with Turkish Delight, and drizzled with Turkish Delight syrup. We also had 2 dessert wines to go with them, but I only managed to finish one of them, the other wine was way too sweet for me.
After all that we waddled home! It was a great dinner! I cannot recommend Maha enough, so if you come down to visit Melbourne, see if you can go for lunch or dinner!
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