james test

April 18, 2017 We were saddened late last year when the news broke that Enlightened Cuisine was closing down. We'd been visiting there on and off for a decade , enjoying their mock-meaty Chinese food. Their closure, hot on the heels of White Lotus ' shut-down, left a big hole in Melbourne's veg restaurant scene. Luckily 2017 brought good news: Enlightened has reopened under a new name, Vegie Kitchen. We checked it out for a quick meal before heading off to see the amazing Patti Smith at the Arts Centre. Aside from the new name, almost nothing has changed. The menu appears to be exactly the same, with more than 100 mostly mock-meaty dishes to choose from. We started off with an old favourite, a serve of the delicious prawn toast ($5), which remains a deep, deep fried delight. We followed up with a couple of mock mains: kung po fish ($19.90) and ginger duck ($19.90). These were both great - the fish had a really great chilli kick and the ginger duck was tangy and delicious...

Edit 25/04/2017: Enlightened Cuisine is now rebranded as  Vegie Kitchen . Not strictly Friday, and not pre-theatre. Instead, we wandered across to Enlightenment Cuisine in South Melbourne early on a Saturday evening following a matinée showing of Holding the Man at The Malthouse. Cindy had one of her semi-regular faux-meat cravings, and our previous trip to the incongruously located (across the street from Crown) Enlightenment Cuisine had been relatively successful. It all added up to good excuse to make our theatre-related dinner a slightly more expensive experience (although it turns out they're now offering a series of $9 'food on the run' meal combos straight from the lunch menu, so it needn't have been quite so expensive). Cindy, bafflingly, is rarely able to expand her faux-meat enthusiasms from the sickly sweet Chinese treats she remembers from her childhood: usually honey chicken, sweet and sour pork or lemon chicken. This week it was lemon chicken - I alw...

Edit 25/04/2017: Enlightened Cuisine is now rebranded as Vegie Kitchen . We've been looking forward to seeing the Guggenheim Collection at the NGV and jumped at the chance to attend the preview screening on Friday night. As far as dinner goes, the surrounds seem to be dominated by overpriced bar food and the Crown . Rather than succumbing to the neon lights we discovered the more zen Enlightenment Cuisine Chinese Vegetarian Restaurant, tucked away a little further along Queensbridge St. Much like the White Lotus , this is a very mock meat experience (chicken, duck, beef, lamb and a variety of seafoods) although there are also tofu-based and vege-only dishes in the menu as well. Meals are free of garlic, onions and leek and the restaurant strives to be vegan-friendly. The meals are a dollar or two more here than at the restaurant's North Melbourne ally, but for those dollars you'll receive a more meditative atmosphere: tables are large, of lacquered dark wood, and we...