~ Curious Charlie ~

The Royal Croquet Club - Melbourne 2015 @ Wednesday, January 28, 2015

Saturday 17th January

The Royal Croquet Club (RCC) is one of Melbourne's newest pop-up food, entertainment, ~~sporting~~ lol no, one lawn of croquet with less action than golf doesn't count ~~& lifestyle~~ festival. It's a food, drinking and mini music festival really. Happening at Birrarung Marr (dusty, wear boots, not office shoes like me) and it's a completely outdoor event. Rain, Hail or Shine it's open.

In my own words the 'Royal Croquet Club' is a very small food festival, from Adelaide, this is their first year in Melbourne. There's live music (at night), drinks (this is how you get the adults to come :P) and food!

Oh how wonderful it is not to be mainstream :P There was no lines or entrance fee, which applies during the most busy times. They made 15k Friday Night just from entrance fees.

Look at all that space!

One option for dessert.

Coffee!

Food Vendors

We went around and got all the pictures and then decided what to order. As always it was a series of expensive snacks, and yet still filling. Unfortunately I could only find two-three menus ahead of the event, would be great if they were online. Because if it's crowded it'll be very hard to get up close to see all the menus before deciding. They could do menus you could download on your phone instead of giving out menus at the entrance.

At night with fairy lights this would look amazing. It's a bar by the way.

The Stage

There was a croquet lawn, upon I was disappointed to see there was no Red Queen or flamingos. Damn I should have come in costume. But we did play croquet, it's like mini golf but a lot harder!

Croquet Lawn

Random Leg Model

We chose three entrees to share, no meals here, just snacks.

A series of expensive snacks like the Taste of Melbourne.

Mr Claws - Buttermilk Lobster Roll $12

Mr Claw's Lobster Mini Buns score very low on urbanspoon mainly because they're so expensive for that size! But my beau has yet to try them so we got one to share. Delicious we just wished there was more to love. ;)

Miss Chu - Crispy Hanoi Veggie Net Spring Rolls $6

From Miss Chu we got Hanoi Spring Rolls, Vegetarian (4 pieces) $6 which were very tasty. I've never had these before because I've only seen them with pork, but will be on the lookout for these this year near school. I heard/read that Dong Que has something similar.

Meatmother - BBQ Lamb Cutlets with Mint Dressing, Capers & Cornichon Potato Salad $14

With lamb there was skewers from Meat Mother and lamb cutlets with potato "salad" (mash) $14 which is what we went with. The mash was very nice, we're going to make it at home. Lamb I like though it's a bit hard to eat, but I do like the drumstick like shape. Do people ever have these as a main like steak?

Gelato Messina $9

Finishing off with dessert we went to Gelato Messina’s International Soup Kitchen, for their fancy ice cream marketed as ice cream in a soup can, Campbell's though up close it was different. It ain't a soup can, it's a sample size tin of paint, which was iffy as paint isn't very natural or good for you. Though you should really avoid any food that comes in a can...

I had the 'American Chow Down' naturally though I like PB but don't love it like Hector or most Americans it seems. An 'peanut gelato, Oreo custard, cream-cheese mousse and pretzel crunch'. It was rich, and so I couldn't finish it, I'd prefer to reduce the serving size to about 2/3 of the tin. The saltiness of the pretzel crunch and PB together was amazing! Cream cheese was a bit iffy as the texture wasn't as plesant as expected and it was lumpy and not smooth.

Meanwhile le beau had the 'Zuppa Duppa – hazelnut gelato, wild-strawberry preserve, pistachio crunch, Amaretti biscotti' on which he agreed about the size of it. The flavours were good though he prefer the PB. I didn't actually try his as well, he didn't offer... He said the name was interesting in that there's no relationship btw that and the contents of the tin. Because a Zuppa Duppa is a brand of icy poles, artificially colours/flavoured/preserved.

Le beau was going to get a drink but we were distracted. :P Overall we had a good time though we're iffy about all these food festivals that happen every couple months, where it's just a series of expensive snacks/entrees with very long lines at peak hours. He's prefer to go to a restaurant and have a proper meal, while what lead me here was the Gelato.

Did you go to the 'Royal Croquet Club'?

The name doesn't really say what it is, does it?