ANDHRA MESS — Restaurant in Melbourne

Here is our enlightenment story at this MESS.

Me and my partner wanted to have Andhra food for lunch on this divine day. It is such a lucky day that we found this place on Google. Now it was after the sublime experience we believe it is google who is lucky to have this place listed for just 4.7 stars.

So, we go to this Andhra mess and what do we mortals do? We order Veg Thali. We get told it is North Indian Thali with roti, rice, panner & dhaal. I thought... HANG ON A SEC, ISN'T THIS "ANDHRA MESS"??? Now I am certain I must have been fooled all this while, must have been in delusion and here, at this very place I am going to be enlightened by the authentic ANDHRA MESS of NORTH India. So, I proceed to order the North Indian Thali for my wife, as they say - Ladies first.

Now, for me, I wanted to try some fusion and what better than PANEER BIRYANI. But hang on, must be my delusion again. Paneer is also now part of Andhra food and it is something common in Andhra mess these days. With that, we WAIT.. WAIT... WAIT.. WAIT.. for about 20 mins.

After 20 mins, we finally get to..... see someone who politely asks us "IS THERE ANYTHING YOU WANT??". I must have been in delusion all along.... food must have been served and we must have had and also cleaned the desk too. But since we didn't feel the need to EAT more we said no thank you and then the person enlightened us by saying "food will be here in 5 mins". Ah, lord thank you for getting me out of my delusion again. So, what do we do, WAIT...

Then by grace of the almighty, here it comes, "The thali" priced just $18, just so we mortals can taste what its like to have the divine food. One must feel so blessed and thankful to have food from this kitchen cause their secret ingredient must be truffle or gold. Well, unlucky for us, sinners, we could find neither.

In this treasure hunt in Thali, we were so satisfied & engrossed that we forgot about the Panner Biryani but not them. They promptly served, sorry blessed, us with Panner Biryani in only 10 mins after that.

I had happy tears.... FINALLY it is HERE. "Biryani" at this ANDHRA "MESS". Oh the smell, the color, the flavors, took me all the way to Andhra in North India.. Now, time for me, the lesser mortal to devour this AMRIT straight from heaven's kitchen.

As I put this holy food on my plate, I notice the PANEER is FLESHY. Must be my sinner mind, just as always thinking about flesh. As I put more on the plate, I see more fleshy parts.... I tell myself, "This is straight from heaven and this is how panner must be in heaven, except we mortals call it CHICKEN". Oh! dear lord, please help me, I do not know your language for what we call PANEER here... The lord there spoke...... "I "thought" you ordered CHICKEN65 Biryani"... Oh dear lord, forgive me, this sinner... I do not deserve to EAT at this divine place. My simpleton mind never understood until now how good RASAM goes with Biryani as side dish in place of SALAN. I never understood how close NORTH India is to ANDHRA.

But I now understand why this place is called "ANDHRA MESS" though. Thank you for the awesome experience to us and the readers of this post.

Dear LORD of this restaurant, I think your MESS is worthless, I mean priceless. But this silly Google needs a Star. I mean you are above all STARS which I know now. I hope, you can forgive me as I could give only 5 stars. But I hope you can enlighten others too just as you did to us. May be even open more of your MESS all around Melbourne and...

Found this lovely eatery when we visited Monash University. A quick Google search on nearby restaurants landed us here.

A very quaint place near a milk bar. But do not be fooled by its simple outlook or small layout. The food served is amazing, flavourful, and absolute value for money.

This is a family owned place, and you are pleasantly greeted by the owners family. Menu is simple, but I assure you everything feels like homemade authentic.

Hubby and I ordered Mutton Biryani and Non-veg Thali.

Mutton biryani serving was nearly double the size of what you get at other restaurants and plenty of tender meat slices. We infact took leftovers worth one person back.

The non-veg thali (platter) comes with servings of - Mutton stew, chicken curry, egg curry, rasam, yoghurt, pickle, papadam, rice, chapati and podi with ghee. The authentic taste and size of serving blew me away, Oh you also get a serving of sweet - mine was yummy gulab jamun.

The food was so yummy that we took 1 set of non-veg platter as takeaway and ate it the next day.

Please give this place a visit. Its family run cosy place, you won't regret it. I plan to visit soon with whole family.

Do note - food is on the spicier side (not that disgusting watered down local version with sugar...

The most shockingly disappointing dining experience- We went in for dinner and chose a few dishes, ordered Kerala Fish curry, we were told it was not available. Ordered Sambar vada, they didn’t have vada. Finally we ordered 2 chicken dishes, a paratha meal, a cheese dosa & a masala dosa. 1/2hr later one chicken 65 appears, (very average) then we were told they ran out of cheese, (on a Tuesday night) so we ordered masala dosa instead. 45mins into ordering, the paratha meal with a curry with more bones than meat arrived with 2 tiny parathas, (they looked liked they were not made on the premises but pre bought) Another 45 mins of waiting and we were told the burners were not working so dosas were not possible! We wasted an hour and a half for nothing! The place was empty and not clean, in fact shabby decor, (wall paper peeling, puddles of water at the kitchen entrance and a baby change table used as a utility table) What an unprofessional restaurant! Worst dining experience ever- food, service etc. Will definitely not be going there again nor can it be recommended to anyone looking for a pleasant and quick...