About Orient East - Seasons Botanic Hotel Melbourne
Orient East brings the heart of Malaysian food along with a contemporary twist to Australia. Keep a look out for retro posters of Penang pin-up girls inside the Seasons Botanic Hotel in Melbourne: when you see them, you’ve located Orient East. Find breakfast, lunch and dinner daily from Mondays to Friday in this Malaysian-themed eating house where you’ll find a combination of traditional and creative takes on Malaysian delights. A trip to St Kilda’s Orient East is an experience not to be missed, so make a reservation now.
Opening Hours
- Monday 06:30 - 22:00
- Tuesday 06:30 - 22:00
- Wednesday 06:30 - 22:00
- Thursday 06:30 - 22:00
- Friday 06:30 - 22:00
- Saturday 07:00 - 11:00, 17:00 - 21:00
- Sunday 07:00 - 11:00, 17:00 - 21:00
Further Information
Influenced by his childhood in Malaysia back in the 1950s, Mr Li has built the Orient East to reflect his animated personality. Orient East brings both classic and contemporary Malaysian food to Australia, and can be found in St Kilda’s Seasons Botanic Hotel. Popular breakfast food includes congee with foo yee tofu, black olive mustard, shredded ham and crispy you tiao (fried Chinese dough sticks).
Other favored dishes for lunch includes the beef cheek rendang, wok charred char kuey teow noodles, and Flinders Island lamb ribs braised in a secret stock and then glazed with rich gula melaka. Mr Li takes no shortcuts when recreating the Malaysian experience, and he goes the extra mile with vintage posters of Penang pin-up girls as well as plenty of Malaysian collectables and his family photos can be found on the menus and walls. A less-than-typical eating house in Melbourne is definitely an opportunity not to be missed, and online reservations at this St Kilda hotspot are highly recommended.
6 Reviews
Really good local lunch spot. Excellent service with a variety of menu options. Good specials as well and excellent value. The baby lamb ribs are particularly good!
Great service, prompt and delicious food. The beef cheek rendang is a smart reinvention of a classic that is simply delightful. We'll be trying the breakfast offerings again soon.
Lovely food and too expensive. Service not the best but we weren't in a rush.
Very popular hotel on Anzac Day eve. Perfect if you are going to the Dawn Service but I wouldn't stay there if you want to sleep in on the morning of April 25th !
The sad part about the Orient East is that the food there is incredible, it's just everything else that lets it down. The front entry of automatic doors feels like your entering a shopping mall and on the night we attended the floor required a serious vacuum and we needed to ask the waiter to wipe our tables which were terribly sticky. There was only one staff member who appeared to be serving and he was trying to take orders, bring out food and run the bar. His audible sigh and role of the eyes when we ordered cocktails to start was certainly a first. At this point we almost just got up and walked out. When we finally received our food it was beautiful and we ordered extra dishes it was so good. If this food was served in an enviroment of good decor, housekeeping, attentive staff and more of them i'm sure it would be full every night.
My waiter James was extremely delightful, explaining the dishes in detail to me and was sufficiently attentive. The chicken satays were extremely delicious and an excellent entree. The prawn/pork hot-pot was disappointing though. It was mostly glass noodles, 4 nice prawns on top, but the pork actually the fat/crackling and not meat, which was definitely not what I wanted. I would suggest the chef re-works that dish as it wasn't so nice. I could be tempted to go back and explore the rest of the menu though. Terima kasih.