Hunky Dory Fish & Chips Watergardens — Restaurant in Melbourne

My partner and I came here for some Saturday night fish and chips. Hunky Dory is a franchise of fish and chips looking “to shake up the Fish & Chip game & give it a healthy spin.” Interesting.

The venue was clean and tidy (woooo franchise regulations). That’s probably the only positive thing about this place. Everything else was… in a word: abysmal. We were given menus and a table. Standard. When we were ready to order… the sole waitress was chatting to some people at another table. Probably her friends. That’s fine, I’ll forgive innocent youth and wait a bit longer. I waited. And waited. AND SHE WAS STILL CHATTING TO HER FRIENDS. I feel like that crosses over to unprofessional now. Talking to your friends when you are at work and there are tables to serve? Poor form. I had to order my food at the counter. Strike one.

The food came promptly. It looked like a mess, honestly. I am not even going to dignify it with a photo. I ordered the HUNKY DORY PACK – a flake, some chips, a dimsim and a potato cake. A tub of aioli and lemon slice on the side. For some reason, there were some stray salad leaves. Must have been from some other guy’s plate in the kitchen. Can’t say I loved that. Strike two.

The chips were tasteless. Bland. Terrible. The sorry sprinkling of salt couldn’t save the poor potato quality. The potato cake? Tasted like wet cardboard mixed with dough. My face actually winced when I was chewing it. What was this ghastly junk that I had allowed myself to put into my mouth? My partner thought I was exaggerating until she bit into it too – and had the same reaction. NOPE. Thanks Hunky Dory, you’ve just ruined one of my favourite foods from my childhood. STRIKE THREE.

The dimsim was… acceptable. (Doubt they made it themselves) Pretty hard to go wrong with a deep-fried sack of meat.

The saving grace of the meal was the fish. Barely. Once again, pretty difficult to go wrong with deep-fried fish. It had a decent amount of flavour. Everything else was atrocious.

I saw some of the prices for the other dishes on the menu. Woah ho, it sure isn’t cheap. I really do think you should take your money elsewhere.

An Australian summary of my Hunky Dory...

Nothing burns me up more than to sit and wait for nearly 1/2 an hour and watch while people who have come in after me are served. I tell the waitress and a couple minutes later brings our meals. The fish was warm, but not hot and crispy the way fish and chips “SHOULD” be. I wanted to take both meals back for something more fresh, but my son was so hungry and he was no longer waiting. I was fuming every time I took a bite. This lovely lady comes around asking about our meals and I told her it was not good and if my son hadn’t been so hungry I would have asked for fresh meals. She apologised and told me she would bring me a meal voucher for next time. A few minutes later she brings out a voucher and asks if they could cook me up something extra. I said thank you and I decided to try a piece of flake and some prawns. She said the kitchen was no longer busy so they could cook it up. I waited. 10 minutes later she told me it was coming up....it never came. I left because what was the point? Again....other customers were priority over me. I paid X amount of dollars and got rubbish. My extras that were offered to me never came because no one made it a priority to get it to me quickly...they were still bringing others their food. Other orders should have stopped and mine should have been priority. I waited and waited, but ended up leaving. The lady was lovely, but I’m sorry, it wasn’t enough. If you were the manager the extras offered should have been made before anyone else’s meal as I had already been sitting there way before they got there. I’m not sure I will go back. This was a massive disappointment for me. It gets two stars only because the lady was so nice to me. Whoever is in charge of the kitchen gets a big FAT ZERO STARS. This is a brand new place....get it sorted or the place will close. No one should get average fish...

Usually the food is very good even though I only order takeaway, but its not consistent.The service is always slow with at least a 20 minute wait on a quiet night like tonight, and upto 20 minute wait on busy nights like Friday before you can even place your order. One Friday night I noticed they were only using one cash register to take orders when they could have clearly used two so when I got to the register after 25 minutes in the queue, which had a mixture of people ordering eat in and takeaways. I asked if they were short staffed. The response was that if they opened the other register the kitchen wouldn't be able to keep up. What nonsense! It doesn't matter when you go there, there is always only enough staff to cause long waiting times. Today they have lost a regular customer. Even though it was a quiet night the service was again very slow. But what has really put me off is when from the waiting area I watched the young man who was preparing my burger without gloves grab a large handful of lettuce and squeeze into a ball it in the cup of his hands several times - who knows if he even washed his hands - before placing it on the bun, then handled a slice of tomato and other ingredients again without gloves before placing them on the burger. Then when he saw me watching he put gloves on before positioning the beef pattie to the bun and wrapping it up. I really didn't like the way he was handling the lettuce with his hands. The flake which is usually fresh and well cooked was burned and tough and the chips & potato cakes were also overcooked and almost inedible. Consistency and quality control need attention here, but I'm not going back. Took a bite and threw everything away....