Babagello: Trattoria e Pizzeria

Babagello has a lot of promise. I love the place. Emphatically. I have one problem with it and it's not really a problem for me it's more of a problem for the place (Well it was a problem for me because I thought I had a job there and the owner decided that he couldn't afford me but "Ce la vie".)

It's not busy enough.

Seriously people. Walk two blocks from Swanston or two blocks from Swan and you're there. Its amazing.

Very italian.

But good Italian. Very good Italian. The vision the owner-operator, Peitro, has for his venue is close to perfect. Nice fittings. The food is tradionnal Italian with primi followed by pasta, pizza, and insalada, then secondi and the dolce.

And it's GOOD.

And the wine's good. Sure they don't pour at the table but if you really need to see the bottle when you buy a glass just ASK.

Nice young staff with professional full time hospitality as the backbone and young hipster women as the casuals.

A nice selection of grappa for after your meal.

It's a nice place to sit.

If I do have a problem with the place it's that some of the staff are a little too interested in their won comfort. Pietro could get rid of a couple of them and probably double his bottom line. (They're eating your stock and bitching about customers Pietro. Lose them! )

What is wrong with you people? Perfect, traditional italian and the place is empty. Come in, have a drink, have a pizza; or optionally take the pizza away. It's trattoria; that means they do that too.

Five shots of Grappa. Get in there before it disappears.

MCUC has been cooking: Coriander, Capsicum, Bean Casserole

Ingeredients:

   1 Tin of mixed beans
   2 Small Red Capsicum
   2 Medium Brown Onions
   Roots and stems of a good sized bunch of Coriander
   2 Tbs Roasted Papricka
   2 Tbs Hot Paricka
   4 Cloves of Garlic
   Juice from 1 lemon.
   Olive Oil
   Pepper and Salt

Finely dice the garlic, onions and coriander roots and stems. Heat the oil in a medium sized pot and add all plus papricka to the pot. Allow to stoften.

Roughly dice the Capsicum and add to the pot.

Wash the tinned beans until the water runs clear and add to the pot.

Season with pepper and salt and finish withthe lemon juice.

Serves: 2-4 people.

Possible Alterations: More beans equals more food
                               Green capsicum instead of red, increases vegetal notes.
                               Chilli powder for more heat.

Serving suggestion:
    Wrap in flat bread with; 'Tomato, Red-Onion, Coriander-Leaf and Lime Juice Salsa'
    Top with Sour Cream or Tzatziki.

Street Fighter II Cocktails #3: M. Bison's Psycho Skull Driving Blazer

Ingredients:

   30mL 'Stroh 80' Spiced Rum
   30mL Cognac
   1 Pinch white pepper
   1 Three-inch strip of de-pithed orange peel
   1 Spray of Absinthe

Glass: Brandy Balloon

Place Stroh 80, cognac, and white pepper in a metal jug and set alight.
Allow to burn for 1 minute
Pour into the brandy balloon. (Be fucking careful!) 
Flame orange peel into balloon and drop in.
Extinguish flame and spray with absinthe.

Serve.

This will stomp on your face with both feet.

Just what you need after a hard day of running the 'Shadaloo Crime Syndicate' and trying to achieve World Domination.

Art in Collingwood

This is the beginning of a series that I will call "Art in Collingwood". It will contain pictures of anything that I find to be art in in Collingwood and it's surrounds. I will list the locations and the artist names when I remember to note them down.

I am not going to critique the art. (I'm a food, wine, venue and hospitality-personality critic. I am not qualified to critique creative stuff.) Most of it will speak for itself

Marco Martinez

Marco!

Absolute dude. Bartender and one of the friendliest finest individuals I have met in hospitality.

Aside:
Which, bizarrely, is rare. You'd think that a job that essentially involved being nice to people would be friendlier wouldn't you? But it isn't. Many hospitality crew (There are exceptions to this; don’t get angry, I’m not talking about you…. Or am I?) are stuck up wankers, or snobby university students, or bent out of their mind on caffeine/booze or something worse. It's the way of the job I guess. It jacks you up on espresso and then brings you down with booze. And then when those don't work you try other things that are sometimes worse and sometimes better. (Yo hospo fools; try some Zen Meditation or some Tai Chi. Get off the coffee/ jameson/grappa/coke and pot train. Or try mainlining heroin.... I hear that can also calm you down....)  .

This doesn't improve personality much. Intra-staff relations in hospitality are fraught with druggy conflict. And it sometimes leaks out to the customer. I've been guilty of not being hospitable in hospitality. I got my attitude readjusted by good managers.... Unfortunately they then rammed espresso and booze down my gullet.

Back to the review.:
As I was saying Marco is a fine Gentleman. He's a bartender's bartender. A bartender to the masses, can hold his own in mixology, can flair if needs be, or even just for fun. The boy knows his craft.
I worked with him some time ago at Room680 and Love Machine. When I met him at Room he was instantly my friend (Which is something he does with everbody.) and he turned into my goto guy at the bar whenever I needed something on the floor. (Replacement drinks, etc).

Friendly, funny gregarious and never angry as far as one can tell. If he has a fault it’s that he's too nice a guy and thus has too many friends. But that's hardly a negative now is it?

5 shots of Whiskey. Wassup, Marco?! ¿Cómo estás amigo?

My First Bar Job: Room680

My first real bar job was at Room680 on Glenferrie Rd, Hawthorn.

I'd been to Room before as a punter and I sorta understood what I was getting into. Plus I had a girl that I was serious about (For the first time.) and I thought that I needed to do something to earn some pocket money so that I could show her a good time.

Room is and always has been a magnet for private school slackers. You know the ones I mean. Youths whose parents have the money or are stupid enough to be tricked into believing that they need to send their kids to private schools to give them the education that they need to become doctors or lawyers or whatever....

Aside:
No matter the amount of money parents throw at a child an idiot is still an idiot. I guess the parents get points for trying but they are aiming in the wrong direction I think. (We'll get onto what I think about the education system in Australia later.)

Back to the Review:
Anyhoo most of the rich kids in the immediate neighbourhood of Hawthorn kicked it somewhere near Glenfrerrie Rd. Room680 was the most intense. Open three or four days a week it would knockout uni-kids and "of-age" year 12 students on Tuesdays and Thursdays until 5am and then pretend it was mature on Fridays and Saturdays with the twenty somethings kicking until 7am. The music was always House and RnB of various flavours and the drinks were straight club.

Lots of flair bartending going on; mostly because when you're making drinks that boring you need something creative to do to distract yourself from going crazy. (It also makes daft 18-19yo women want to sleep with you, but anyway.)

Anyhoo, I turned up to clear tables and unblock toilets and suchlike. Not the most glamourous job but I didn't care. I just wanted some cash and I was an insomniac who liked electronic music anyway so why the 'f' not?

Fun though the place was it did have, down sides: Late starts. Late morning finishes. Filthy taskwork. Easy access to booze and easy access to drugs. (The second night I was ther I was invited into the toilets by the Saturday night promoters to smash some coke... I wasn't shy.)

The place has its problems. Apart from its propensity to get teenagers too drunk and the fact that the male toilets are the most disgusting and spartan that I have ever experienced (No seats? This blogger needs to bog badly.) it all felt kind of shallow and cheap. Nothing there seemed built to last, it smelt like an ashtray and there were too many drugs.

But it's still fun. It's like a bag of goon. You know that you shouldn't but then some idiot will suggest it just for the irony value. And then you end up having a good time. Fucked up. But a good time.

Unless you get kicked out and end up vomiting in the gutter.

Two and a half shots of whiskey. Because sometimes dirty cheapness is what you want... Or all you can afford.

Street Fighter II Cocktails #2: Blanka's Electric Green Jungle Mule.

Ingredients:

    60mL Cachaca
    15mL Midori
    60mL Ginger Beer
    30mL Lemon Juice
    Half a lime diced

Glass: Tall Glass

Muddle lime. Add booze and lemon juice and shake and tip. Top with Ginger Beer.

Garnish: Tiger Lily

This mule will kick you in the face and stun you with its killer electric buzz.