Catalano’s Cafe, 266 Albany Hwy, Victoria Park (08) 9362 1121
Open everyday for breakfast, lunch and dinner
We headed into Catalano’s in Vic Park for dinner on Friday night for a good feed and catch-up with a few good friends. I have been to Catalano’s with burger boy a few times before so I knew to come with an empty stomach.
Rather than my usual Friday wine, I had a craving for a strawberry milkshake (I had a really light lunch and it was 7pm). It was ok but could do with a bit more flavour and ice-cream. We ordered the tapas plate and the grilled sausage, cheese and olives starter to share between the 6 of us. The cheese was really good, looked solid but had a soft texture to it - sausages were nice and best of all there were plenty of it .
[imagebrowser id=36]For mains, I ordered the grilled calamari served with chips and salad, this was absolutely scrumptious. The calamari was grilled perfectly and was very tasty. The chips were great and as per the starters, there was plenty of it! Salad was average, tomato still had a part of the core in it, but I’m not a salad person so I wasn’t fazed. I really enjoyed this calamari dish so much that I ordered the calamari again at The Beaufort Street Merchant 3 nights later - comparing the two dishes, Catalano’s overall calamari dish was better as there was more of it.
burger boy and I were meant to share our dishes but I was so stuffed that I could only have a couple pieces of the scallop & prawn creamy ravioli he ordered. The ravioli tasted authentic, the sauce was flavoursome, creamy enough and scallops / prawns were yum. Our friends had the chilli calamari, risotto and chilli mussels. Chilli mussels were the entrée size but as you can see in the pic, the dish was massive. My friend described it as tasty, but she does prefer chilli mussels with more sauce. From all the raving foodie reviews, the chilli calamari Catalano’s was the dish I was meant to order.. but I ordered the grilled calamari by accident. A good accident though as I don’t handle chilli very well - the boys loved this dish and it sure was chilli! The risotto was also rated highly.
I was really keen for dessert as there were a nice range of cakes / ice-cream on display - but I just couldn’t fit it in after our massive meals (very rare as I often have a separate compartment for dessert). Catalano’s is great value for money - cost us $40 each with the entertainment book voucher (25% off) including wine and beers.
Overall I had a lovely foodie experience at Catalano’s. I would recommend going here for a good quality casual feed just make sure you book and go with no expectations on the service. Also may be worth considering if you want to have a good chat or not as it is a bit to hard to hear each other, especially with groups of 4 or more…if you’re just there for the food then the noise shouldn’t faze you 🙂
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