MoVida Bar de Tapas (finally!!)
Movida Bar de Tapas
So I finally made it to Movida after having lived in Melbourne for a year and was not disappointed. I can’t think of any other place that better captures the essence of what’s cool about this city. It’s an intimate space, perfect for relaxing and sharing food and drink with friends and family, and just look out the window and you can catch glimpses of the incredible street art covering the walls of Hosier Lane.
1 Hosier Lane
A view while you dine
Being fully aware that, in our excitement, we were in no state to order sensibly, we asked the waitress to select a few items from the Tapa (small plates, $3.50-$5.50 a piece) and Raciones (larger dishes for sharing, $7-$25) menus for us.
First up was the Anchoa, hand-filleted Cantabrian artisan anchovy on a crouton with smoked tomato sorbet. No idea what you have to do to an anchovy to be able to call it ‘artisan’ is but it was delicious; thin, crispy crouton, salty fish with cold, sweet sorbet to take some off some of the edge.
Anchoa - hand-filleted Cantabrian artisan anchovy, crouton, smoked tomato sorbet
Next item was the Pollo Escabache al Miguel, spiced chicken escabache tapa on a crouton. The creamy escabache was sweet, zingy, with just a bit of heat. Think gourmet chicken mayo sandwich (mmm….).
Pollo escabache al miguel - spiced chicken escabache on crouton
The next item was a daily special, gerello with freeze-dried chilli and almond milk jelly. This was the only thing I wasn’t particularly keen on. The gerello was served cold and was very tender. An interesting texture that I’m just not quite used to.
Gerello, freeze-dried chilli, almond milk jelly
Moving onto the larger dishes, we started with the Cecina, air-dried wagyuu with a poached egg and truffle foam. The idea is to break the egg, mix the yolk with the foam and then have that as a sauce to go with the beef. Definitely my favourite out of the dishes we tried that day.
Cecina - air-dried wagyuu, poached egg, truffle foam
Next was another daily special, roasted whitefish with clams and pea broth. The soup was divine and we were pretty full by this point but there’s always room for dessert.
Roasted whitfish, clams, pea broth
We ordered churros, of course, as well as a chocolate pudding. The churros were piping hot, crispy and sugary and delicious dipped into creamy chocolate. However, I have to say that the chocolate pudding was the winner; a warm gooey fondant served with vanilla bean ice cream, custard and squares of nougat.
Churros - Spanish donuts, chocolate
Ganache - chocolate pudding, vanilla ice cream, custard, nougat
So much food, but we didn’t make it very far into the menu so I’m looking forward to another lunch sometime soon. Duck liver parfait and slow braised beef cheek are definitely on the list to try.
