Student food review - Eastern Kitchen, Union House Melb Uni

Dr. I is back in Melbs from NYC. She'll happily tell you that Eastern Kitchen (or EK for short) is her favourite place to eat. Yes, for her, it's right up there with Vue de Monde. I'm not sure if it's my favourite place, in fact I know it's not, but in terms of price to quality, it's right up there!

(Photo of EK not taken due to my fear they'll never let me order again)

EK is has a Chinese-Malaysian based and consists of a bain-marie foods such as black-bean beef, sweet and sour pork etc, as well as a menu of things cooked to order. Ignore the bain-marie (unless you're starving or in a rush), and order off the menu. The order menu has things such as fried rice, won ton noodles, crispy fried noodles, and so forth. All of the items on the menu are under $10 - I think the most expensive things are $7, probably because they have seafood in them like the Seafood Laksa. The regulars I order are Tom Yum Chicken soup noodles, Chicken Laksa soup noodles, and Char Kway Teo.

Cha kway teo!

All of these dishes do contain actual meat and actual vegetables. As you can see in that pic, it does actually have beanshoots, spring onions and onion onions, and beef. Okay, it doesn't have chinese sausage and prawns but I think it's still acceptable! The laksa is perhaps not a true curry flavour and I often have to spice it up by putting in a spoon of chilli sauce but I'll accept that too! The dishes are of also of a respectable size. In the past I have previously eaten only half and stored the rest for a later meal (during my hardcore days), or have consumed the entire bowl/box to the astonishment of my workmates who wondered where the food went (into my hollow leg).

Now the real kicker about EK is that when Dr. I came back after 3 years away from Uni, she took one look at the menu and said, "Three years and still the same price!" It actually wasn't - it has increased in price...but all the dishes are still $7 or cheaper! The cha kway teo is in fact only $6.50 (up from $6 in 2009) but for that price, I'll accept that lack of prawns in the mix!