Pepper Lunch

309-311 Elizabeth St, Melbourne
Date visited: 15th January 2013

Pepper Lunch is another new restaurant that's just popped up recently along Elizabeth Street.  MerlinFan and I spotted it the same day we saw G2 Korean BBQ and agreed that it looked like a really interesting and unique way to dine.  Why?

Pepper Lunch is a new style of fast food from Japan.  The secret is their original iron dish technology that generates heat of up to 260 degrees within one minute and then lasts for more than 15 minutes.  The idea is that you no longer need professional chefs and the diner gets to cook their meal to their liking.  Watch how they do it here (it is the promo demo for the Singaporean branch but you get the gist).

Pepper Lunch offers a pretty decent range of meals from Pepper Rice, Curry Rice, Steaks, Hamburgers and even Combos of two types of meat or hamburgers.  You can also make a set by adding on rice/chips and drink/ miso soup for just $3.95.

You make your orders at the counter and find your seats. 

After the office crew left and before a new wave of hungry diners came in 

You get your condiments on each table - salt and pepper plus sweet sauce and garlic sauce.  The waitresses will ask you to use the the sauces - trust me, try them - they do complement the meat very nicely.

Our food came within five minutes.  MerlinFan had the Cheese Hamburger and added Chips and a Drink.

Cheese Hamburger $9.00

Trying to take photos of the food while they were searing and cooking on the hot iron dish was a nightmare as you needed to turn the meat quickly.  MerlinFan thought initially the beef patty was just like any other patty, then she added the garlic sauce which made it much yummier.  The bean sprouts seemed out of place and were left untouched.  MerlinFan thought the dish would have been complete if it came with buns so you could make your own burger.  Just a thought :D

Drink & chips $3.95

I had the Pepper Beef Rice.

Pepper beef rice $8.90

The pieces of beef were sliced so thinly that they were quickly overcooked and continued cooking for the 15 minutes whilst the bowl was hot.  If only they gave diners a separate bowl so we could take the beef out when the meat was cooked to our liking (yes I know, diners always have smart-arsed suggestions for everything).  Anyway, the rice was perfectly done, with kernels of corn, pepper and sauce with a knob of butter hidden inside - that in itself was pretty yummy - amazing what wonders a bit of butter can do.  The garlic sauce was really the star here - drizzled over the top of my rice, it really elevated the flavours.  I think I doused my rice with enough garlic sauce to keep vampires at bay for a century.

Bowl cleaned!

Pepper Lunch is a pretty fun, new way to have fast food.  As long as you keep in mind that this is fast food and not expect anything gourmet, I think you'll leave pretty happy. 


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