Rumi, Brunswick East

Well I finally made it to Rumi in Brunswick East last Friday night & I have to tell you it was well worth the wait & having to book in about 3 weeks in advance. So with Chloe safely in the arms of my parents out we went. The restaurant itself is quite small & intimate, dimly lit & with plain & simple furniture, nothing fancy here. The tables were quite small but they still managed to fit all of our food on so no problems there. The menu & wine list were also kept quite small & simple with my only problem being that of all the white wines on offer all of the wines by the glass were either chardonnay or chardonnay blends of some sort, I would have hoped for a bit more variety. The wine I chose in the end was a blend from Lebanon – I figured I may as well try the wine from the area as well as the food, the blend was of sav blanc, semillon & chardonnay, not the most typical, but I enjoyed it & if dinner wasn’t quite so efficient would have loved more than the 2 glasses I managed to squeeze in. Michael had a beer, there were about 4 types on offer including Effes from Turkey in keeping with the theme.

To eat we started with some delicious Persian meatballs in a tomato & saffron sauce, the serve was 4 so not too overwhelming. We also had some calamari crumbed in burgul & served with an almondy type paste which was almost like a hommus, these were nice & tender & very good too, in fact I could do with a plate right now as I sit & type away hungrily just before dinner tonight. These came with some complimentary pita bread too. For the mains we shared the lamb casserole with caramelized onion on top, served with a pilaf which was studded with chickpeas & a baby beetroot & yoghurt salad. The lamb was divine, it really was so lovely & tender that it melted in your mouth. All of the serves were perfect too, they looked quite small but it was more than enough food & it was an effort to fit in dessert but of course I insisted we share one. We had the pastry special which was filo with honey, pistachios & caramelized bananas, it too was fantastic & tasted like a cross between baklava & a banana fritter which may sound weird but worked pretty well indeed. The service was very friendly & efficient, my only problem was that with all of the noise I found it difficult to hear the waitress’s explanations of various food items. Also we were over & out in about 2 hours which I’m sure if you were in a bigger group would be drawn out much longer. To sum it up, yum, yum, yes please, can’t wait for more!

Rumi
132 Lygon Street
Brunswick East
9388 8255
Dinner Tues – Sat
Breakfast & lunch - Sat