Vapiano - Italian done the German way

http://vapiano.com.au/restaurants/brisbane/

When thinking of Italian dining, there are a heap of places around Brisbane that come to mind.  I have a couple of favourites that I've visited many times over the years, my current favourite being Beccofino at Newstead (see post here).  Beccofino is not the only Italian restaurant I've visited, there have been many, and in fact, Brisbane has a dearth of Italian restaurants (see my blog list here). There is one Italian restaurant though that I don't often think about, even though it is right under my nose (figuratively).

Vapiano has been in Brisbane for a quite a few years now and is a restaurant that I'd gone to a little bit when it first opened, mainly due to it's unique approach.  Vapiano Brisbane is part of a much larger chain of restaurants which spans the globe and has outlets in Sydney and Melbourne as well as cities like New York and London.  It stretches from Estonia to Brazil; Luxembourg to Mexico; South Korea to Kuwait - there are over 135 outlets around the world.  Forty five of those restaurants are located in Germany.  Germany you might ask?  Yep, the very Italian restaurant Vapiano was created by a couple of guys from Germany and the first Vapiano opened its doors in Hamburg in 2002.

I remember when Vapiano first opened in Brisbane, it was actually kind of hard to get into, there were queues and fairly long wait times.  Nowadays, the restaurant is busy but those halcyon days are long gone, swept up with the restaurant renaissance that has occurred in the last few years in our fair city.  It had been a more than a few years since my last visit and I'd been meaning to get back to Vapiano and check it out for some time.  We just needed the right opportunity and motivation, which we found when heading off to see Spamalot one Sunday evening - it seemed as if the stars had aligned and we found ourselves standing at the entrance in Albert Lane.

Bavarian Bier Cafe - so.much.food

http://www.bavarianbiercafe.com/

What an interesting turn of events. I'd been invited along to check out the Bavarian Bier Cafe a while ago and kept putting it off, there just always seemed to be something else on or somewhere else to eat.  I finally made a concerted effort to make a booking for lunch, but I needed to pick the right person to dine with, after all, the Bavarian Bier Cafe was as much about the beer as it was about the food.  I thought long and hard about which of my mates I'd bring along and decided that sometimes lunch buddy and former work buddy C would fit the bill.  After all, we would be doing a beer flight and it would be wasted on me.

Now I'm not saying C is a booze hound, I'd leave that up to him to say, but he does like a drop of the amber fluid and it had been a while since we'd enjoyed a break away from the office for a meal.  It was a freezing cold Friday afternoon in Brisbane, the type of day where the southerly breeze is blowing in and making the city and uncomfortable place to be.  The type of day that would be perfect being in a warm environment and eating some comfort food and sinking a few to boot.  As I made my way to Eagle Street and the Bier Cafe, I had my hands in my pockets and was just trying to keep warm as the cold breeze did its best to strip me of life.

I'd been to the Bavarian Bier Cafe once before with another mate, quite some years ago, and of course am a local, so I knew exactly where I needed to go.  Located just upstairs from Grill'd at the Eagle Street precinct, the Bier Cafe occupies a huge space and is right next to Sake (see post here). There was no way I was waiting outside for C to show up, so I made my way inside and was shown to my table, which had fabulous views of the Story Bridge.  While I was waiting, one of the waiters kept me entertained for a while and we chatted about many things, one of which was the loaded question 'had I been there before?'.  I was quite upfront in noting that I had been, a few years before, and had left pretty disappointed with the meal and the value.  Recovering quickly, he noted that both their food and approach had improved significantly over the years - phew (but I thought I'd know more in an hour or so).