Wedding Sausage.
Okay, so this is part food review, part community service and part share-your-newfound-eccentrics-with-your-fellow-bloggers.
Yesterday I went and ate breakfast at a new-ish place on the Brunswick end of Lygon street (Melbourne coolsies point of reference - close to Comfortable Chair. Melbourne dangerkids place of reference - close to 24 hour bar Cafe Romantica). I had noticed it previously not only for its 'wahey!' name (is Wedding Sausage actually a metaphor for the cock? Discuss) but the fuckoff array of deli products and kranskys peppering the front window.
Nothing could have prepared me and my dining companions for the gastronomic explosion that was our Sunday morning meal.
Firstly, you need to know that there is no menu. The owner is dyslexic and doesn't want to waste time writing one, so basically just tells you she'll put a plate together and it'll cost $7.50 and you can deal with it when it arrives in front of you. I realise this is not for everyone, but it should be. So.
Secondly, you need to know about Debra.
Debra is the owner/chef, for whom the word 'eccentric' was coined. In our time at the Wedding Sausage, she:
- Sang to us
- Made up a variety of words, including 'orgasmeringue' and 'definize'
- Performed an alarming tribal-type dance to a beat only she could hear
- Refused to be tied down to archaic terms such as 'breakfast' and 'lunch', insisting that 'there is only food. You tell me savoury or sweet and I will take it from there. There is no breakfast here. There is no dinner. There is just the love.'
- Warned that occasionally in her experimentation she may 'reach for the wrong jar', but we would have to brave those moments in order to make the most of our gastronomic journey
- Stood at a window and shouted up for about ten minutes at her dogs. Their names are Chakra and Bello
- Hugged us
- Consumed a cigarette, a drinking yoghurt and a piece of toast with double cream simultaneously
- Talked. And talked and talked. And talked.
But you know what? It was worth it. The food was unbelievable. Incredible meats, cheeses, pesto. A 'dessert' on walnut bread featuring blackberry shiraz jam and french chocolate that made one of us cry.
And the place was quiet as a mouse. Debra thinks she puts people off with her devil-may-care attitude towards food and customer relations. But those people are missing out.
So this is my community service announcement. She's open every day and you need to just go and sit and be quiet with someone you like to sit and be quiet with. And open up your world and your senses and pretend, just for a couple of hours, to be magic.
86 Lygon St Brunswick East 3057
(03) 9380 6033
723 days til the next election.
Comments
Sounds like the sort of place you can have the best of times and the wurst of times. Yum!
Toast with double cream? Did I read that correctly?
AND it has the lovely Kenny!
What's a Kenny?
And people call ME an eccentric. We need more Debra's in this world.
Will spread the word of the Wedding Sausage.
this morn i discovered a dried morsel of said shiraz berry jam and french chocolate, caked onto my frock. somehow it had escaped my mouth during yesterday's breakfast (a heinous waste). so i sucked on it for a moment. is this wrong?
"And the place was quiet as a mouse".
Yay, sounds for me. And walks distance. And all else asides acourse.
*goes*
Cripes, looks like I'm not the only person around here who knows Kenny.
I've not gotten along to the Wedding Sausage yet, but now it looks like I'll have to. Gastrolicious! Ew, that sounds gross.
debra abducted me and my (by then ex) housemate outside gelobar the day before she opened, she gave us a tour, which was pretty much our farewell to brunswick.
she's mad as a cut snake, and her food is grouse.
WHO OR WHAT IS A KENNY?
have only had an in-out coffee on the run there, but she already tickled my 'hello tangential moment' zone. i live down the road and walk past it all the time; after waiting months for it to open to find ou what the hell the name meant, i was slightly underwhelmed to find out how haphazardly it seemed ot 'operate'.
after that exegesis, though, i think i may become a regular. nice evocation, fits.
i read about you and your blogging efforts in Vogue. Great blog - keep up the good work!
Oh and thanks for the tip about the restaurant!
Fits, you're in Vogue???
I am absolutely fascinated by this blog. Came across it by accident - ended up on page about your crushes -> extraordinary.
Kenny is one of the most divine gentleman shaped creatures in existence. He works at the Wedding Sausage.
There is AMAZING wedding sausage at the polish deli at the Vic Markets. I ate some last night.
A friend of mine is of Polish origin.
His partner just had a baby
During the pregnancy, the boys went surfing.
Me: "So, the Missus got any cravings?"
Father to be (smiling): "Just a bit of the ol' polish sausage"
Me: "I heard that happens"
Him: "Like, crazy full on"
Me: "nice work if you can get it"
Other Mate: "Polish sausage eh?"
That same night Other Mate turns up to dinner with the parents-to-be- with a bottle of wine and then announces "I have something special for the mother to be"
A real polish sausage.
Three things:
1) Great review, Fits. Another calling?
2) Must attend this place for a meal. Nowish.
3) Kenny has no genitals (or is that Ken?).
4) I nearly snorted the contents of my Ribena squeeze box out my nose when I saw that Ms Fits' blogging efforts are listed in Vogue!
5) Thomasr, that story is fantastic! I wish I'd been there because it's very, very funny! (This is not sarcasm; I mean it. I suspect that you think I'm a dick, and although you're 100% right, I'm also a nice guy, so let's be friends.)
6) I cannot count.
I used to work in heaps of different restaurants, and to me, "chef" is just another word for "psycho". They are all pretty crazy; something to do with the long hours and ever present danger of cutting off a finger or burning your nads off, I suppose.
One chef, who this story reminds me of, used to hold up an empty plate to customers, then point to the place on it where each different foodstuff would go, in an effort to explain a particular meal to them. He would proceed to get upset when people failed to understand his location based theory of meal presentation. Another dealt smack from the kitchen backdoor.
p.s I am loving that you give props to the 'Melbourne dangerkids'. I KNEW there was a reason I loved Cafe Romantica, and it wasn't just that it served pizza at 2 am and had the pinkest interior on Lygon St, or even that it was caled 'Cafe Romantica' and was so obviously non-romantic.
It's cause I am a 'Melbourne Dangerkid'*.
*Now in title case.
pps. Bevis you are so cute.
I thought polish wedding sausage was one of those huge spiral affairs you get at the polish smallgoods shop at the Vic market (to repeat what hamish was saying). But I'm sure they used the name for the fnarr fnarr factor.
Vogue? What's that then?
cafe romantica is also adjacent to
cafe l'amour.
feel the love, wedding sausage.
fits, you omitted the place of reference for melbourne oldbores, don't be discriminatory now, and bevis, one thing. ribena squeeze box??!!
wedding sausage? there's a place down the road from me called wedding sausage? MY GOD I"M HAPPY TO BE BACK.
thanks ms fits.
BEVIS,
I like you .
The only way I could be annoyed with you is if you told my woman all the stuff you did for yours on her birthday.
oi, this is ms Fits blog, lets try to respect that and not stare at her.
thomasr
I'm starting to think there should be a blogger drinks for all the Melbourne girls at Cafe Romantica. 2am start, hand-holding and star-struck eyes essential.
Anonymous - DOES THIS MEAN YOU ARE ONE OF MY CRUSHES. If so, please leave details at usual outlets.
p.s. If you are Robert Hill, I was being ironic. All I like about you are your nice lips.
ahh miss fits i thought you'd never ask...
as long as we dont have to drink ribena related cocktails,
and as long as celine dion is playing in the background like it always is...
and can we wake deb up for a late night sausage?
does anyone else get scared when they click on the little button at the top that says 'next blog'
uuumm....
'fat suit get zip'
i want my mum.
cafe romantica, hand holding and starry eyes....!!!
WHEN?
You're the Wedding Sausage.
The phrase "gastronomic explosion" makes me have to go to the bathroom.
Thanks. I actually just got work there and was looking everywhere for the phone number. Your blog has pointed out everything about the place and her, which, of course, I am looking forward to and freaking out from!
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