Emilia reviews a beachside dumpling and noodle bar on the Mornington Peninsula!

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Owens Dumpling & Noodle Bar

1a Jetty Road

Rosebud

Here’s something you don’t hear often: affordable food and beach views.

Owners Merla and Owen have a strong relationship with the locals of Rosebud, knowing how to create connections quickly from their 30+ years in food trucks catering to music festivals around the world. 

Immediately, you feel like you’re one of the family at Owens. Owen himself is set up behind the bar, while Merla his wife is found behind the register and swanning around serving and there’s a staff of young people who inevitably are filling their summer making some cash.

To cater for the tourists over summer, they have to triple their workforce. 

Merla and Owen met in Monash, spending lots of time throughout Clayton eating the plethora of good Asian food, that’s where their love of Asian fusion began then travel, education, experimentation and years of flinging noodles and dumplings through food truck windows got them to where they are now. 

They spent years frequenting a vegan festival in Europe so there is a wide range of vegetarian, vegan and gluten free options and they rarely use oil in their food, making their dishes a healthy option.

Owens Dumpling & Noodles settled in Rosebud five years ago, just before Covid searching for a bit more stability.

It was a Rosebud local who told me I had to go to Owens, assuring me that the food was quick, delicious and the service was always above and beyond. It was, by the way.

I loved the details of this place; like you’ll also find a Japanese tetsubin or tea pot you can fill up with jasmine tea from their urn to take back to your table with as many teacups as you can bring over.

They have Japanese whisky and sake on the menu as well as local beers and wines. A bottle of wine can cost you just over $30, I rarely see a bottle on a menu go for less than $60.

I think you can tell the food they’re really strong in. Have your choice of dumplings; pork & chive, chicken, vegetarian, har gow prawn, scallop & tobiko or shanghai soup dumplings as well as options for anyone eating gluten free.

We tried the chicken and vegetarian and each came topped with fried shallots, sesame seeds and topped with a light sauce.

In the middle of the table are Owens branded sauce bottles that are full of homemade hoisin, chilli oil as well as vinegar and (gluten free) soy sauce, build your perfect dipping sauce with their in house flavours but be warned they don’t make their chilli oil mild.

Whilst the food isn’t the most authentic ever, I loved that they weren’t afraid to put bold choices on their menu like the massaman chicken betel leaf that we had or the lamb rendang bao buns which we all loved.

Or even the perfectly soul-warming Indonesian-style satay beef noodles.

The stand out for me was the make-your-own rice paper rolls and lamb rendang curry.

If you can make it to Rosebud and ever find yourself in Switzerland they still do one festival a year – the Paleo festival.

Images: Supplied