YOUNG LOVE MESS HALL

Score: 9/20

The Young Love Mess Hall is not only the apogee of hipster branding, it represents the apogee of hipster cookery with its pretensions, tone-deaf palate and ingredients so alien to each other it’s like wearing Manolos with a tracksuit. In other words, what at first blush might appear daringly individual, clever, anti-establishment and avant-garde is actually just BS.

When it opened last year, a bloggy person wrote that “Young Love Mess Hall is one of the most arresting venues opened of late”. No question: someone at Young Love should be arrested for crimes against food.

Which is not what bloggy person meant. Bloggy person was impressed.

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But — and there’s always a but — the room is a bit special. One walks in off busy William Street and into a haven of soothing greens and charcoal greys, long communal tables, clean decor and a nice bar. There are hanging plants dangling from the high ceilings in profusion — they’re quite the statement.

The other “but” was a scandalously brilliant key lime pie. Every key lime pie we’ve eaten in Australia over many years has been afflicted with soggy pastry, anaemic and greasy filling and a lack of lime.

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The pie at Young Love was deconstructed but not in a bad way. The pastry was truly amazing: crunchy, short, buttery and perfectly baked.

The filling, delivered in a random dump of blobs via a piping bag and quenelles, sat you back in your chair with a gasp. Sooo good.

The meringue garnish came in two forms: piped and torched Italian style (soft and silky) and the thinnest shards of crisp, baked meringue. The lime filling was lurid green — good fun — and piquant with zesty lime and sugar.

Time for a drink. Whoever made the Americano was probably still living with Mum and Dad and drinking Cottee’s cordial with dinner.

There is no other explanation for the drowning of this simplest — Campari, vermouth, splash of soda — of cocktails. The glass was filled to the brim with water, which made it awkward to drink, and so dilute a teetotaller would have enjoyed it. Not a great start. Note to bartender: the soda component in an aperitif- style drink is not measured by the bucket. It is splashed on top of the other ingredients.

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“Mac n Pork” with barbecue sauce and “puffed skin” was hideous.

The $17 pasta was dressed with a thin gruel that vaguely reminded us of a cheese sauce ... without cheese ... or flavour.

The sheets of puffed pork skin bits were like thin slices of foam mattress. Novel.

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Thufferin’ thukotash! The Japanese succotash, $17, was an improvement. It was a charred mix-up of eggplant with blobs of a stiff pea puree setting off the charry oil flavours. Nicely seasoned and nicely smoky.

Clams with sausage, seaweed and garlic chives, $13, was just blah. Think of all the tasty, appealing ways you could cook clams, then unthink everything and cook them anyway. Voila! You have the clams at Young Love.

The clams (vongole) were nicely cooked, though — just opened and moist.

Baby carrots, $13, with fresh cheese and “candied fennel” was one of the best own goals we’ve seen in a restaurant in recent times. It was cooked indifferently and came to the table as an awful-looking sludgy mass of carrots — some of which were overcooked and others cold and almost raw. And no, it wasn’t an intended textural gimmick, it was just bad cookery. The candied fennel went straight to the top of the list of Things I Never, Ever Want To Put In My Mouth Again. It tasted like a cough drop. One redeeming feature: it was a massive pile of food for a meagre $13.

And then along came chicken to the rescue. Adobo chicken is the national dish of the Philippines. It has nothing to do with the adobo sauce with which dried jalapenos are tinned for sale, the act of which changes the chilli’s name from jalapenos to chipotle. Got it? There are many ways to the nirvana that is adobo chicken, but three ingredients never change: vinegar, soy sauce and black peppercorns. Most recipes have garlic as well. Chillies are a common option. It’s a slow- braised dish.

While not particularly authentic, we loved the Young Love version. The sauce was disappointingly mild and bland, but the chicken was cooked to perfection. It was good chicken, too. It was a big dish of food for $29. The slightly charred “scallops” of onion added a nice touch. Not too shabby.

One hopes this little restaurant will improve. It’s got a nice vibe, great decor, an amazing key lime pie and good tunes on the speakers. The service is OK, but lacking confidence and the food is the mess in Mess Hall.

Young Love Mess Hall: 175 William Street, Perth.