REVIEW: Commercial Club Hotel
Pub: Commercial Club Hotel
Where: 344 Nicholson St., Fitzroy
Phone: 9419 522
Date: 10 September 2010
Score: 13.8/20
Internet: www.commercialclub.com.au
One of the maxims of life, we are told, is Location, location.
Unlike Kimmy berating her poor husband Brett in Kath and Kim by reminding him that it is the ‘best house in the worst street!, it seems that if you are lucky to set yourself up in the right spot – currently Gertrude St., Fitzroy, then the other maxim of life – Build it and they will come – surely follows.
Yes Nicholson and Gertrude meet at right angles – and that’s as close as they get.
This part of Fitzroy, home to the wonderful Commercial Club Hotel on the East Brunswick tramline doesn’t have anywhere near the cache that other areas of postcode 3065 have.
Indeed, I keep looking at the old pub and wonder why it hasn’t been converted into a modern skyscraper. It hasn’t thankfully, and that is a good thing.
On entering the small front bar (no TAB/Pokies) welcomes. Background music (Johnny Cash) is playing at the right level. The bar top is a sealed and polished concrete slab. Someone’s attempt at the ALL Australian team is scrawled out on an old 4 n 20 blackboard. I think they got 13 of the 22.
Beer is a delicious 200 ml of gold. Yay. The simple menu is small, beautifully priced (nothing over $21 for a fully plated main) and covers all bases.
There is a larger stately dining room where a family, with child, is welcome. Further into the pub, ante rooms to the side, lead us to the beer garden/former stables, now reconverted. Not many look like this.
Simply it is old brick, high ceiling typical inner suburban, except that the owners have decided not to over clutter with couches, chairs and everything popular in 1960.
Kick off with a pizza is my recommendation.
All priced at $10 and all have micro thin bases. Good serve, 6 generous slices. Two were chosen – a mozzarella and mushroom, and a pork sausage, onion, potato and a tomato sauce that has met with our good mates from Tabasco.
Pizza is all the rage in pubs at the moment and few pull them off successfully. The CCH does on two levels – price and quality.
Spaghetti ($14) was a big, swirling mix of tomato/bolognaise, all done from scratch – beautiful and rich. Again my point is that these high end profit dishes – pizza/pasta - in pubs are starting to become way out of whack as far as price goes. Here the balance is achieved easily.
Steak Sanga - $12 – was the right price for the popular front bar pub dish and if $15 is your mark for Snags, fish and chips, then you will eat well here.
Top was lamb cutlets – $21 – comes fully plated and if anyone bought lamb in recent times, you will know it has become a big ticket item.
A small, point of difference wine list is written on the blackboard above the bar. Most are priced in the high 20 -low 30 region, but there was a recommendation for the Allies Viognier Saone from the Mornington Peninsula.
Although the highest priced at $45, this was a luscious drop from a grape which I think is more used in blends. Having got a bargain with the food, the extra on the fizz was worth it.
The CCH doesn’t go for bells and whistles and in spite of the grand white brick façade, in many respects it has become a wonderful senior citizen. In the not too distant past, it was a trailblazer with Rubira and D’Olivera doing their finest there.
I applaud the owner/operators keeping this one going. A true local.
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