Restaurant Review - Montrachet

I was taken to Montrachet last night for my birthday. I hadn't been there before, but it's on my list of "must do" restaurants. I have only ever heard good things about the place, and people generally rave about how it is the best restaurant in Brisbane. My boss knows the owner, Thierry, and also raves about it. He only eats at the best places and is extraordinarily picky, so I expected the place to be fantastic. He recommended I have the crab and cheese souffle for entree.

To further add to the hype, it has regularly been listed very highly in Australian Gourmet Traveller's Restaurant Guide Awards each year since it has opened, and I haven't read a bad review of it yet.

This site had the following comments from diners:

"If this isn't Brisbane's best restaurant, I'll eat my own head."
"Easily the best restaurant in Brisbane, the owners [sic] delightful, the staff professional and warm, not enough good things to say about Montrachet."
"The best food I have ever had."
"Absolutely delicious food. Had the crab souffle which was amazing!"
"Our waiter was very attentive and constantly ready to serve professionally and with a smile."

I must say I was very disappointed. I ordered a prawn "spring roll" for amuse bouche. It was oily, and had very little flavour. I then had the recommended crab & cheese souffle, while William ordered a scallop and truffle linguine dish. My souffle had clearly been in the oven too long. It was overdone, and the bisque accompanying it was burnt towards the edge of the plate, and congealed. William's scallops were overcooked and rubbery.

For mains, I ordered the bouillabaisse, and William ordered the much hyped steak frites. My bouillabaisse was ok, but nothing special. It was slightly overseasoned, and there wasn't really that much seafood in it. The aioli accompanying it had far too much garlic in it, which overwhelmed my taste buds and burnt my tongue. William's steak had a line of gristle running through it, and his frites were limp and seemed like they had been cooked some time ago and just left to sit out.

Dessert was somewhat better. I had the profiteroles and William had the chocolate and cognac ganache. Both were supposed to be served with a scoop of ice cream, but that was missing. William's ganache had so much cognac in it, I took one bite and nearly choked. It burned on the way down my throat.

The service wasn't exceptional either. We started off with one waiter, but while William was mid sentence asking for a wine recommendation, he just walked off. He was replaced by a waitress who didn't really seem that knowledgeable about the food. Again, William was mid sentence when she was taking our order when she suddenly turned around to start talking to another waiter. She also hovered over us throughout the meal, and asked at least twice through each course whether our meals were ok. I wanted to tell her that, no, they were awful, and I wasn't impressed. However, I am old fashioned and let the men speak for me when out at a restaurant, and William is much more polite than I am, so he said everything was fine.

And it wasn't like Thierry was off for the night and the sous chefs couldn't keep up the standard. I saw Thierry come out of the kitchen twice, so he was definitely there.

I don't know whether we just got a bad night, but I certainly wouldn't be recommending the place. I've had far better meals at E'cco, Absynthe, Shuck, B, Joseph Alexander's, Gianni's, 2 Small Rooms, Il Centro, Vanitas, and even Dell'Ugo at Southbank, and it's not really meant to be a high end restaurant!

Overall, I was very unimpressed by Montrachet. I don't know why people rave about it so. Perhaps they think because they've been told it's the best, they convince themselves of it? I don't know. All I know is that it certainly wasn't the best meal I've ever had. I can cook better than what I was served last night, and I hate going out to a restaurant when I know I can cook better than what I've just ordered and have to pay for.

We didn't tip.

News stupidity

"Hundreds at funeral watch Tom Carr-Boyd's last joyful moments alive."

I didn't realise drowing/suffocating in snow was so much fun.

"The family and friends of Australian Ben Cannon, killed in a base jumping accident in a notorious section of the Swiss Alps, have expressed shock and grief over his loss."

They're shocked he died base jumping? In a "notorious" section of the Swiss Alps? Are they serious?

At least so far there haven't been any ridiculous "he died doing what he loved" statements. Because, you know, of course the first dude would have loved getting buried in an avalanche, and of course the second dude would have loved crashing through trees after free falling, and then hitting the ground. Such great fun. Just like Steve Irwin loved getting stabbed by a sting ray and being poisoned. Must have been the greatest moment of his life.

I really hate how deaths are reported these days. And it's usually the ones where people have died out of utter stupidity that are reported as if the person is some great hero. Ugh.

Travel site

The travel site is finally up and running, and the first blog post is up. If you emailed me telling me you were interested in reading it, I will be sending you an email tonight with the link.

In other news, I have now had over 20 people apply for my job. I think I might have 3 decent ones out of that. Hopefully they're not too bad during the interview/testing stage!

Going to Death Cab for Cutie on Friday night. I'm not a great lover of live music (loud, crowds, people smell, etc), but I thought I would give it one more go since I love them so much. Hopefully they are so fantastic I stop concentrating on having to stand up all night, being so short I can't see anything, having people crowded around me and randoms touching me, the loudness of it, etc. We shall see!

Recruitment funnies

I am currently recruiting for my job, and these are some of the great things I've read in resumes:

I have excellent attention to detail. I have attached my CV for your convience.

Good with Microsoft Words.

Proven skills in organisation: Im living by myself I have to organise everything by myself, including living and studying.

Due to my extensive work experience, I have acquired an extremely high level of accuracy and computer skills and as a result my work is of the highest standard (and then made the following mistakes: collegues; competitons, liasing, among other grammatical errors).

I left due to personal reasons, and in particular a constant heavy workload (umm... so you're a slacker??)

Unfortunately, I was left with no other choice but to leave this position as my employer was not prepared to allow me time off (and she's applying for a role where she won't be allowed any time off in the entire 9 months she's here? I think she would have an issue with that.)

I also found this one really amusing for some reason:

Personal attributes: “Killer Instinct” – I believe this is what has enabled me to become one of ##’s top female drivers, competing in Winch Challenges. I enjoy the challenge and the dedication involved in pursuing anything that I am passionate about.

Possibly because I can't imagine a woman who competes in winch challenges would present themselves suitably in this position!

And the winner of dressing up your responsibilities to sound important is: Being part of the mailroom team, I recognised the crucial role of communication between our firm and others.

And my personal favourite:

Achievements: Elected Facebook forum moderator of ## group.

Dude, if that's your only achievement, you have led a very boring and unsuccessful life!

I also don't get why people list "interests" on their resumes. I honestly don't care that you collect cacti and succulents, or that you're interested in prog rock (yes, they were both included in the resumes I've received so far). I couldn't care less if you like to read the works of Proust in your spare time (no, noone actually listed that), I don't want to know that much about you. All I care about is your last education (don't stretch it back to high school if you've already completed tertiary), your appropriate work experience (don't list kitchen hand positions when applying for an administrative role!), and your references. That's it. And write in complete sentences! There is nothing I hate more than getting a resume full of dot points. It makes me livid. How on earth am I supposed to get a grasp of your written English skills when you haven't written anything?! Morons.

But despite this, I think I have one or two people that would do very well in this position. Once I teach them how to format documents properly. There is a ruler bar for a reason people! You do not need to space all the way into the middle of a document, or even tab 5 times. Set a tab on the ruler and tab once. That's all you need to do. It's not difficult. And it stops my eyes bleeding when I work with the paragraph markers on (which I do all of the time). Some of the documents I've gotten have just been a complete mess. I don't want those people touching my nice, clean documents!

I'm so hungry I could eat a whole zebra

This is what I have eaten for the WHOLE WEEK (since Saturday):

-7 pieces of bread
-1 avocado
-7 pears
-3.5 cups rice
-4 brussels sprouts
-7 broccoli florets
-7 cauliflower florets
-2 carrots
-2 celery sticks
-700g meat
-14 lettuce leaves
-7 mushrooms
-14 snow peas
-1/2 tomato

And I am STARVING!!!!! I've had constant stomach growls for 3 days now. I can't sleep properly because I keep waking up hungry. If I haven't lost any weight when my trainer weighs me this afternoon, that is it. I'm giving up. And going to see a doctor to see if I have inherited my mother's thyroid problem.

And then I'm going to go and eat a great big bowl of creamy mushroom pasta with truffles! Mmm, food!

UPDATE: I lost 2kgs! Wahoo! Only 8 more to go! Somewhat unfortunately, that means I have to stick to this diet, though. I was almost hoping I had a medical problem so I could stop eating so little. Oh well. My trainer has said I am allowed one meal a week where I can eat whatever I like, so at least that will keep me sane. Sadly, it looks like I shall be hungry for the next 16 weeks until I leave. I'll almost think squished guinea pigs look appealing!