I have a good friend, and recently, we’ve taken to meeting up every so often for a good old parma. My mate R also likes to bring his housemate N, and I like to drag along my Bit O’ Meat (my cheeky nickname for the partner). It’s been a fun habit – funny shit-talking, teasing, good pub food and hearty quantities of beer imbibed. What life is all about, really!

Time came for all of us to do it again, and I suggested we go to Mrs Parma’s, in the city centre. It’s in the very top end of Little Bourke St, which is ridiculously quiet, to my surprise. The staff are very friendly and there is quite the impressive array of exclusively Victorian microbrews available for drinking, both on tap and by the bottle. That night I had the Jamieson’s raspberry ale, the Holgate Temptress chocolate porter and a pint of a pale ale on tap I’d not had before. The wine list too is exclusively Victorian.

It was considered contentious by choice but I ordered an eggplant parma. I’ve actually had one before and was sold: no mean feat given that I actually quite dislike eggplant, quite odd for a vegie-lover. My eggplant parma came with the standard topping of ham, tomato and cheese, at my request (I feel like I cheated because there’s still meat on what is essentially a vegetarian dish. Oops!). My companions were a good deal more adventurous: R had the salami chicken parma, N a Mexican chicken one, and Bit O’ Meat bravely ordered a chicken ‘Parmageddon’, named thus because I believe it’s supposed to defeat you with its heat. I think it safe to say he survived!

I rather like that the parma is (coincidentally!) shaped like Australia, giggle.

The parmas are very generous in size, and were cooked very well, but we all agreed that the price tag seemed a tad steep for what is essentially a Melbourne pub staple. I probably wouldn’t go back specifically for a parma, but definitely for drinks if I wanted to impress upon someone that there is such a thing as good beer (and that, even better, a fair bit of it is made in this state). Again, cannot fault the service. If you’d like to look at the beer menu and the other parmas not shown, I direct you to my Flickr stream.

It demonstrated perfectly that I am indeed a creature who likes to eat, drink, and stagger, if nothing else! So yes, beer nerds, it is worthy of your patronage (and I think I’m allowed to say that, being a beer nerd in training).