SAINT DREUX — Restaurant in Melbourne

Date/time of visit: 28 May 2022 @ 3:40pm

Wow! Beautiful sandos. The shokupan (i.e. the Japanese bread) was light, fluffy, soft. The wagyu beef was cooked perfectly - tender and juicy. The panko was fried amazingly well - very delicate to taste. The mustard mayo was excellent. Combine all the ingredients and you have an amazing wagyu katsu sando. We also puchased the chicken katsu sandwich - also amazing. However, we ate the chicken sando after the wagyu...not a good idea. :-) The wagyu sando was so good it outshone a good chicken katsu sando. Best to be eaten fresh while still warm. Another reviewer has stated this is something you can "easily whip up at home". That statement is NOT true, unless you have experience with the ingredients. I have made chicken and pork katsu sandwiches using high quality panko but not using shokupan. My chicken and pork katsu were good but no where as good as Japanese bakeries/cafes or Saint Dreux. Further, Shokupan is difficult to make at home (I've tried) and is a little difficult to find in Melbourne and it can also be expensive. Wagyu is expensive and cooking it with the juiciness exhibited by Saint Dreux takes practise. I've had plenty of katsu sandos in Japan and they were great. Saint Dreux katsu sandos are better than the average bakery/cafe in Japan. Saint Dreux's sandos are also better than the one high class cafe we visited in Ginza. They are better than your standard Australian bakery. But you need to understand what is you are buying. These sandos are not something you easily whip up at home or can get from your normal bakery. Consequently the cost of these sandos do reflect quality (in Japan, yes they would be cheaper because that's what they do day in day out). The only downside is, yes, the price means I can't have these on a regular basis like I did when visiting Japan. The poppy seed castella cake was also beautiful. You'll be paying similar for lesser quality Castilla cake at Asian grocery stores. I will go back for more sandos and castella. It would be nice for a lovely cafe environment to go with the food; as it is, it's located in a fancy food court (not your standard shopping center foodcourt). Well worth the price....

I read about Katsu Sando in broadsheet and I did have a degree of scepticism based on a quote in the article referring to all Katsu Sandos in Japan are amazing! They're not, the standard in Japan is very good but bad ones exist albeit quite cheaply (One can be had for AUD $4!) Upon arrival at the shop location you are greeted by a stylish and slick shop fit-out which sets up the customer for premium experience. The team who put this together have obviously been inspired Wagyumafia in Tokyo, but that is where the similarities end. I ordered the pork and Wagyu beef (Wagyu means "beef" in Japanese and outside of Japan the term often refers to premium beef, but more on that later) At the moment of order you are informed that there will be a 30 minute wait, so make sure you go with plenty of time on your side. After you spend the time pondering how much you are going to enjoy your 'Sandos' disappointed is the only word I can use to describe what was served up. The pork was oily and the breadcrumb was pasty in the mouth, though tender. The 'wagyu' was anything but the premium beef you may be expecting in a $28 sandwich, sorry Sando. It had more silver skin in it than cheap and nasty hamburger mince, at times I couldn't bite it properly and I was forced to pull it apart with my hands and place it back between the bread which by now was completely soggy by the bloody discharge coming from the deep fried beef. Alas there might be enough Melburnians who chew with their mouths open and take an endless number of selfies whilst they eat to keep this place going, my advice is save your pennies, take a cheeky 4 day trip to Tokyo and enjoy the real deal - even...

I really really want to like Saint Dreux. So much so that I decided to go all out and order the wagyu sando ($28), sesame castella and a soy mocha. The works.

First thing that annoyed me is the service. They gave me the cake but got me to get up twice to get my sando and then my coffee. Why can’t it all come together? Preferably in a nice tray?

The wagyu sando, which at $28 I would have thought was their pièce de résistance would be melt in your mouth. Nope. The beef was quite tough and chewy. With bits of tendon. Wagyu my butt. Every time I bit into it, the bread and the fried coating falls off, and I had to rip the chunk of beef out of my mouth with my bare hands. Disappointing. I give that one a 1 out of 5. 1 being the bread is soft and nice and the flavour is generally good.

The mocha was quite bitter and sour, and I almost choked on a clump of chocolate powder. ☹️. Of my years of drinking soy mocha that never happened before.

The only redeeming factor is the sesame castella. It had really nice sesame flavour and it’s quite moist. That is how I didn’t give Saint Dreux a 1 ⭐️ 🙄. For $40 it’s a waste of my money and my calories....