The Carpenter’s Ruin is a new mini-pub from the team behind The Walrus, and they’re taking what’s on the plate in front of you seriously – in a fun way. Pub classics look a little different here: the star of the starters is the ika mata, a Cook Islands-style raw fish dish hopping with coconut and chilli, while the locals’ favourite once exclusively available at The Walrus, the oyster pâté, joins the line-up too. A healthy handful of macadamia feta amps up the eggplant cotoletta, meanwhile, and your steak is supercharged with a side of roasted bone marrow.
Here’s co-owner Amy McGouldrick now with what you might like to order at St Kilda’s delicious new local.
Which dish best captures The Carpenter’s Ruin vibe?
The moules-frites has to be the one. Steaming, buttery mussels with perfectly crisp fries, best eaten between sips of a cold pint. It’s nostalgic and a little continental, but with the relaxed confidence that defines the whole venue. Mussel night on Wednesdays has already become a local ritual.
I’m here for a good time not a long time.
A double cheeseburger or filet-of-fish. It’s going for $18 every Tuesday for Burger Day, but it’s good any day of the week. Double patties, double cheese, our own secret burger sauce, brioche buns and skinny fries with chicken salt. The filet-of-fish will be familiar to some Walrus regulars and it’s now a staple on the menu – it’s crumbed fish with seaweed aioli and a healthy amount of pickles.
Got anything light and fresh?
Ika mata, a raw fish dish in a Cook Islands-style. Chef Ciara Woodside hails from New Zealand and spent some time in the Cook Islands on her travels. The fish changes daily and is dressed with coconut, chilli and lime, served with cos lettuce cups and fresh tostadas.
How do you look after vegetarians, vegans and people who can’t or won’t eat gluten?
We make sure vegetarians and vegans are included in as many of the daily specials as possible, and looked after all week long. We’ve perfected the vegan or vegetarian double cheeseburger with some help from our amazing suppliers, the 100 per cent plant-based patty is a winner. Other options include the eggplant cotoletta with Persian macadamia feta and a rotating vegetarian Sunday roast. We always aim to keep our kitchen as dietary friendly as possible, so lots of our dishes are already gluten-free or can be made so, including gluten-free buns, breads and crackers.
You’re running some seriously pubby midweek specials each and every night of the week. Tell us about them.
We have daily food specials running Monday to Friday all day, happy hours every weekday afternoon and a rotating Sunday roast menu. We love being a regular fixture on people’s dinner roster and want the daily specials to be affordable enough that people can come every week (and sometimes more).
Monday we have our $26 Steak Day, and a big reason for this was to have something good to look forward to on a Monday night, especially for those of us that might not have Saturdays and Sundays off work. Tuesday is burgers, and Wednesday is mussel day. Thursday is fast becoming one of our favourite nights with chicken, veal and eggplant schnitzels for $20 from open until close.
There are $10 pints and wines every Monday to Friday for happy hour, too, and a meat raffle every Friday evening.
We hear there’s a few other crowd favourites from The Walrus making an appearance on the menu at The Carpenter’s Ruin, too?
We couldn’t miss having The Walrus’s oyster pâté on the menu at The Carpenter’s Ruin too. We roast freshly shucked oysters in butter and treat them to the same cooking process that chicken livers, for example, would go through to create pâté. The dish is salty, creamy and spreadable, served with grilled focaccia at The Carpenter’s Ruin and with freshly baked Woodfrog baguette at The Walrus.
What if we really want to go big and go crazy. What have you got for us?
First of all, start with some oysters and a peek at The Walrus’s wine list (which is available to order bottles from) while you try not to finish your Salt and Vinegar Martini too quickly.
Once you’ve decided on an appropriate bottle of wine and settled in, we recommend you secretly upgrade your steak with a side of roasted bone marrow. Usually we serve the bone marrow with bread, but the locals know the best way to amp it up is to slide the roasted bone marrow directly on top of your steak.
And to close?
Sticky toffee pudding with house-made vanilla ice-cream. Enough said.
The Carpenter’s Ruin, ground floor, 15 Inkerman St, St Kilda, open 3pm–11pm Mon–Thurs, 12 noon–11pm Fri–Sat, 12 noon–10pm Sun, thecarpentersruin.com.au, @thecarpentersruin