252 Swanston St
Melbourne CBD
Cookie is ridiculously popular right now and as a result its impossibly hard to get a booking there. We'd drifted from brunch to shopping and on to a very early dinner so we lucked out and scored a table. Soon afterwards the place was full.
Cookie is upstairs and takes up the entire first floor of the building it's in. There are a few outside tables on the narrow balcony overlooking Swanston Street but its mostly indoor seating. The extremely high ceilings give the whole place an open airy feeling.
The menu has small dishes, medium dishes and large dishes. We started with the prawn and glass noodle firecrackers with avocado and coriander sauce. This was from the small dishes section of the menu.
Three torpedo shaped rolls arrived nicely wrapped and accompanied by a lovely dipping sauce. The prawn meat was juicy and cooked perfectly and it went very well with the crisp pastry.
I had expected the avocado and coriander dipping sauce to be spiced up a bit but it was subtle with only a hint of coriander and no extra spices or chilli.
This starter cost $14.50.
We then moved on to the fat rice noodles with duck, cabbage, green peppercorns and basil. This dish was fantastic both in appearance and taste.
The duck was beautifully tender - and there was actually plenty of it as well - and the entire flavour combination worked perfectly. The textures were also great with the tender duck and noodles offset by the crunch of the cabbage.
The green peppercorns, still on their stem, were a nice touch as well. The dish cost $22.00.
The chilli beef stir fry with beans and Thai basil certainly had chilli in it. You could both taste it and see it!
If you like your dishes hot then this one's for you. If not, but you still love the sound of this, fear not - the chilli's are large and can be easily set aside. It will still have a kick but nowhere near as violently! This dish was only $19.50.
We also ordered a side serving of boiled rice and roti. The roti was absolutely lovely - light and flaky and packed with flavour and good value at $3.50.
Cookie has an interesting menu which is large and varied. It's got great atmosphere, excellent food, good service and reasonable prices - particularly for the quality you get here. They've gone for a kind of pre-school/kids theme here with plenty of storybooks on shelves and pictures of dolls on some walls. Our bill even arrived inside a Peter Pan and Wendy Little Golden Book. It's one of the most popular places in town at the moment and doesn't look like slowing down.
