Dining at Arintji – Melbourne Federation Square

On a cold Spring night in Melbourne, we decided to venture out to Federation Square in the heart of Melbourne. I’ve been to this place a few times before so I knew what to expect. Though it has been over a year since I’ve dined at Arintji, the menu had changed slightly. The last time I was there we had a lot more small sharing dishes to choose from then the ones that are on offer now at dinner time.

We arrived on a Saturday night, and I suggest you book in advance, it was booked out for the whole weekend. From the moment you step inside the restaurant you are greeted by the friendly waiters, everyone is so charming and it makes for a comfortable dining atmosphere. If you’ve read my previous post on Artintji, you’ll see some pictures of the beautiful interior layout. As with the other neighbouring Federation Square restaurants, it is very modern through out, from the dining tables, walls, layout, kitchen and decorations, I love this feel.

Dips and Turkish Bread

For starters we ordered some house made dips. Tonight they had avocado, tzatziki, and hommus. I’m not normally a fan of hommus so I finished off the avocado and tzatziki dips. They were served with hot turkish bread, a great starter.

Rainbow Trout

For mains we decided to try there sharing plate special of 3 dishes for $50.00. This dish is the rainbow trout, it was served with asparagus and preserved lemon dressing. Not a strong tasting fish, but had a very nice zesty flavour with the lemon. The asparagus was just slightly blanched, so it still held its crunch.

Twice cooked Duck Salad

I could not go past this duck dish, twice cooked duck salad with a soy and sesame dressing. This salad was neatly presented in a crispy edible basket, I got stuck straight into this one. Duck is a hard meat to cook with and takes a lot to master perfection and tenderness, the duck meat in this salad I found a bit too chewy, and some pieces were not edible. Apart from that, the salad itself did not let the dish down, flavours were blended so well with the dressing holding it all together.

Soft Shell Crab

The last main dish we ordered had to be my favourite overall, soft shell crab with herbs, chilli and lime. It was deep fried crab, which normally I don’t tend to go for, but we didn’t know this while we ordered. The batter was cooked perfectly giving this crab meat a delicate taste in your mouth, I say the chefs have mastered this dish to a tee. There was no effort needed to cut this crab, it just pulled away nicely. Seasoned with chilli and lime, we could have gone through a few more plates of crab!!

Doughnuts and Lavender Honey

For dessert we shared a plate of Doughnuts with lavender honey. I think I order these everytime I come to Arintji, they never let me down either, the waiter said these doughnuts were the most popular dish ordered, so I dont’ think they will be removing them anytime soon.

Trio of House Made Ice-creams

We also shared a plate of housemade ice creams. The flavours tonight were chocolate ice cream, nougat ice cream and a moscato gelato. Absolutely to die for, you can’t beat house made ice creams. The chocolate one definitely had the smoothest texture, but the best flavour would have been either the moscato or nougat.

The service at Arintji was great, could not fault them at all, they were also very knowledgable of the products too. Arintji offer inside dining or outside. Outside dining is very popular at Federation Square so they have ample tables and chairs to cater for. Arintji is also a great place to hold functions, big or small, as they customise menus to suit all types. Also another great place to check out is neighbouring restaurant Feddish.