By cooking and reimagining the classics with care, this likeable Northbridge pub is both preserving and advancing pub culture in WA.
15/20
Contemporary$$
Monday nights in Perth tend to be kind of quiet. Unless, that is, you’re talking about this coming Monday: the feast day of Christian missionary Maewyn Succat, better known as Saint Patrick, patron saint of Ireland as well as those-that-wake-up-hungover-on-March 18.
And just as Good Friday might be Christmastime for fish and chippers, March 17 is go-time for Irish pubs everywhere as revellers donning oversized leprechaun hats and rugby jerseys paint the town green and consume heroic amounts of Guiness. Miraculously, some even remember to have something for dinner.
I don’t think it’s unkind to say that the menu at local Irish pubs tend to reference the same chapters of the ye olde Gaelic pub grub cookbook. There will likely be house-soda breads and things cooked in stout or cider, possibly baked into a pie. Forecasts predict a high chance of colcannon.
I also don’t think it’s unkind to say that this isn’t food that aspires to educate or challenge perceptions about Gaelic culture. These are menus designed to comfort homesick Irelanders and fuel travel fantasies to the Emerald Isle. (Supplemented, in the name of smart business decisions, by burgers, chicken wings, fish and chips and other things that aren’t exactly Irish, but people like eating.)
Also not quite Irish is Edward & Ida’s, a two-storey pub and beer garden that was opened in 2023 by Dimitri Rtshiladze – a bartender with Russian and Georgian ancestry – inside a historic Northbridge building that once housed a Hong Kong-style cafe. But consider the pub’s tightly packed beer mirrors, playful knickknacks and rock soundtrack, and it becomes obvious that Rtshiladze has visited many an Irish (and broadly British) pub.
The prevalence of Swan logos and other WA names, however, suggests that it values its home court advantage as much as British pub culture. This thinking also informs the menu: a thoughtful investigation of the past, present and potential future of counter meal culture.
Blaze Young’s opening menus turned heads for serving Aussie faves (schnitty! Steak and chips!) alongside ploughman’s platters, potted crab and other British standards, all cooked using local ingredients and a back-to-basics, DIY approach. Two years on and the approach remains unchanged, although Young – now in an executive chef role overseeing sister venues Foxtrot Unicorn and Nieuw Ruin – has handed over the kitchen’s day-to-day to Cassi Garret, her former sous. Young chose her successor wisely.
Like any pub, Edward’s has signatures. Those dapper handmade pies aren’t going anywhere: I’m all about the shepherd’s pie-style fish pie ($32) featuring rankin cod smoked with paperbark. The warm, fudgy-yolked curried scotch egg ($21), meanwhile, remains one of Perth’s finest egg dishes. East Perth’s City Farm still supplies the pert sheaths of red witlof, dainty fennel fronds, jagged young mizuna and other urban greens that cooks assemble into salads ($14).
I like these signatures. I also like the anticipation that comes with trying new things cooked by a kitchen enthralled with making things themselves. The smoked cabbage and cheddar doughnuts ($17) were new to me. I would have remembered the airy puff of these deep-fried zeppelins of dough enriched with proper cheddar that tasted like gutsy, working-class goujons to be washed down with middies of Swan.
Sausages are synonymous with pubs. They’re also integral to American barbecue, certainly to Big Don’s Smoked Meats, anyway. They’re now part of Edward’s identity after Foxtrot Unicorn head chef Cenna Loa attended a class run by Big Don’s general manager Dom Mault, where she got a crash course in sausage-making. Now, she makes a new batch of chubby, juicy sausages – currently a dazzling chorizo link shot through with pockets of molten mozzarella ($27) – every fortnight and sends them to Edward & Ida’s for Garret to hot-smoke and serve with pickles plus a bitey house-made Guiness seeded mustard. Still unable to strike gold at Big Don’s weekly ticket drop? These snags have much in common with the real McCoy. And they’re served seven nights a week. Consider yourself warned.
The kitchen’s commitment to made in-house is impressive. Crunchy, skin-on chips ($10) are cut from royal blues and triple-cooked till airy. The ketchup for the sausage rolls ($18) is also made here, as is the brioche for the whiting sandwich ($27) and heir apparent to the pub’s former Filet-o-Fish-inspired burger. (I’m hoping the crumbly dryness of the bread in the sandwich I got, however, was an anomaly.)
The menu features just one dessert: a dense wedge of cheesecake ($16) packing just enough bitterness to outrun (most of) that sweetness. While it was a pleasing and on-brand farewell, dessert was more Basquait than Basque as the menu promised, its richness calling to mind dense, New York-style cheesecakes rather than the jiggly, citrus-spiked wonders that Basque cooks gave the world.
Of course, some will forego dessert in favour of another round. Some might even ignore the kitchen completely and order nothing but whisky. I get it. Pubs are primarily places to drink and have fun: something that Edward’s knows plenty about. (When the place is heaving, general manager Adam Mitchell and his crew seem to be enjoying themselves as much as guests are.) In these uncertain times, fun feels more important than ever but so does looking to the future.
For anyone interested in scoring a sneak preview of what the smart-casual pub of tomorrow might look like, Edward & Ida’s needs to be on your radar. Don’t forget to eat something.
The low-down
Vibe: a heartfelt ode to the corner pub serving spirited, generous pub flavours prepared with care and specials throughout the week.
Go-to dish: the house sausage.
Drinks: a brilliant, idiosyncratic line-up of beer and whiskey supplemented by sharp cocktails and a handful of wines.
Cost: about $100 for two, excluding drinks.
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Max Veenhuyzen is a journalist and photographer who has been writing about food, drink and travel for national and international publications for more than 20 years. He reviews restaurants for the Good Food Guide.
