Most photos below are by the beautiful, talented and magnificent Stina.
On more than one occasion, my friends and I have commented on the fact that our lives are like a sitcom.
We are always at each others houses.
We are always eating out.
(sorry for posting this guys – but this was the best representation of us eating out. Check out the chewing action! It’s all sorts of marvellous.)
We are always going on random adventures in the car.
We are always dancing.
We are always laughing at random in-jokes. Some of us have dated and broken up, some of us are housemates, some of us are married. Some of us have pets (some of us want to steal the others pets).
But most of all, we are always TOGETHER.
And one of our favourite places to be TOGETHER is our local pub, Sweetwater Inn.
A mild parody of the American/Mexican food fad going on in Melbourne at the moment. The place is undeniably hipster, but packed full of typical ‘Australiana’.
Ceiling fans, corrugated tin, animal heads – it is a pristine impression of an outback pub, staffed by uber-cool young Aussies sporting beards and leather tasselled vests. The idea was that we, as a city, are obsessed with overseas food – but we have such an amazing culture of our own, largely unexplored.
Using native ingredients, the menu rocks a mean wagyu rissole sandwich with gravy and melted cheese (AUD$15), a housemade Chiko roll (AUD$10), a very close approximation of the original tuckshop favourite, but this time made with actual food-based ingredients. My personal favourite is the tender lemon myrtle smoked pulled lamb, stuffed in a pillowy soft damper roll and smeared with housemade beetroot BBQ sauce (single burger: AUD$12 double burger: AUD$18). A close second is the Kangaroo steak sandwich, marinated in Bundaberg rum and coke, in a warm roll with Melbourne Bitter braised onions (AUD$16).
Fried chicken wings with spicy mayo (AUD$12), crispy thick cut beer battered chips with gravy and swiss cheese (AUD$12) – it is close to impossible to go wrong.
AND – they have an entire vegan menu. Ever tried chicken drumsticks that use sugarcane to imitate the bone, so you can rip the ‘meat’ off just like your non-vego friends? No? Well you can here.
This vegetarian is happy.
They offer some mean cocktails too, packed with Aussie native ingredients, such as the Emma Chiset with Beetroot infused 666 vodka, dill, apple and soda; the Billy Tea with local West Winds Gin, Green Tea, Ginger, Lemon and Honey; or the Bush Whacker, also with West Winds Gin, Lemon and Eucalyptus syrup. The house wine comes bottled with labels that fit perfectly with the atmosphere, and the wine is pretty darn good too.
