Regular readers would be well aware (and perhaps irritated) that my posts are often Northside or city-centric, mainly because I live in the North and work in the city. It seems I don’t really get out of my hood that much, so when Claire suggested a breakfast adventure that required going over the Westgate Bridge, I was immediately in.

Naturally, the Saturday morning we chose was wet and miserable (as basically every Saturday has been of late). To make matters worse, I was nursing a hangover. The fact that we were crossing several suburbs and many great breakfast joints did cross my mind. The Duchess of Spotswood had better be worth it.

The space was decked out in a sweet, simple, pared back style. The only nod to royalty was the superb chandelier shown above.

After a coffee (Small Batch) was downed, the homemade lemonade with fresh mint ($5 to share for two) seemed a perfect foil for my hangover:

Cold, refreshing and sweet, it certainly helped the brain to start functioning again.

In my state, the Duchess of Pork ($19.50) was a siren song (and a much better choice than Michael who was coincidentally there on the same day and nursing a hangover):

Pork belly at breakfast! With duck egg and a truffle sauce. It was rich, decadent and earthy.

Claire chose the enjoyably titled ‘loose morels’ ($16.50):

The last of the season’s morels with white asparagus, crispy smoked pork neck and smoked egg. The morels were sublime.

Clearly, the Duchess has it going on and their breakfast warrants crossing several suburbs and a bridge. I urge you to check it out!

Details:

Duchess of Spotswood
87 Hudsons Rd, Spotswood
Ph: (03) 9391 6016

I first read about the Bell Jar on Joyce’s blog (and it has since had some positive reviews from Cindy and Michael and Brian). It was a surprise to me that this little place even existed, particularly given its location on the very quiet end of Smith Street, between Alexandra Parade and Queens Parade (well past the factory outlets).

Mr M and I were up absurdly early on a Saturday morning and decided to visit. When we arrived at about 8.30am, there were no other customers in sight:

Although a cute, furry visitor came to have look at us:

The breakfast menu is divided into light items (including granola, bircher, fruit salad and porridge) and medium items (sourdough with avocado, lemon and Meredith feta, scrambled eggs with salmon, poached eggs with pancetta, mustard and rocket). There is also a list of daily specials – when we visited, there were some delicious sounding goodies, spicy corncakes with bacon, poached eggs, chipolte, passata and creme fraiche, ricotta hotcakes with stewed apricots, mascarpone, nuts and orange blossom syrup and poached eggs with white bean cassoulet.

The white bean cassoulet appealed to me, but I decided to go for the pesto scrambled eggs with smoked ham (or as I will always think of it, green eggs and ham):

Granted, this does not look particularly appealing, but it was actually really good. I love a good pesto.

Mr M went for the corn cakes with bacon, chipolte, poached eggs and creme fraiche:

The chipolte on these babies had a real kick and Mr M enjoyed the crispy bacon and creme fraiche. Mr M liked his breakfast (and it looked a lot more appetising than the version served to Gem when she visited).

All in all, a pleasant brekky. Staff were friendly, coffee was great (from 5 Senses) and we had a good experience. I will definitely return.  

Details

The Bell Jar
656 Smith Street, Clifton Hill
Ph: (03) 9482 7980

The backstreets of Armadale are not really the place that one expects to find a great cafe. But here it is. Nestled in a residential street, Coin Laundry is a bright, airy space serving great coffee from Allpress and some lovely breakfast dishes.

The locals have taken to this ex-laundromat like ducks to water. When I visited at 9.30am on a Sunday morning it was positively heaving with the ‘small children’ crowd. Lots of little people were tucking into breakfast, colouring in and wandering around.

The breakfast menu has a good mix of things on offer, from the simple (house toasted granola ($9) bircher muesli with coconut and passionfruit ($10.5) or poached fruit with sheeps’ milk yoghurt & burnt honey caramel ($11)) to the sweet (caramelised French toast with bacon & maple syrup ($14)) and the interesting (baked bean and feta cassoulet with green olive tapenade ($12.5), cured Ocean Trout with potato rosti, spinach and poached eggs ($16.5)).

A slight hangover on my part meant that the ‘Coin Laundry breakfast’ ($16.5) was hard to pass up:

Crispy bacon, perfectly poached eggs, smashed avocado with a great whack of lemon, spinach, tomatoes and beetroot relish saw me feeling human again.

J went for the ricotta and sweet corn fritters ($13):

J was pretty happy with her dish, tasty fritters (though perhaps a little dry), creamy aioli, fresh corn and cracking eggs and bacon.

All in all, a nice breakfast in a surprising location. I’ll pop by if I am out this way again.

61 A Armadale Street
Armadale, VIC
Ph: (03) 9500 1888

Day 5 at 2pm: De Clieu was pumping.

Seven Seeds‘ new baby had buzz from the beginning. Actually, it had buzz before the beginning, with rumours on Twitter well before the announcement of its impending opening. De Clieu opened on a Tuesday, had a series of reviews in the first 4 days (the first by My Aching Head) and by the Saturday was the madness shown above. A pretty impressive feat given the stiff competition on Gertrude Street.

But then again, Seven Seeds rightly has a name for itself. Clearly, the draw here is the coffee, although there is also a short menu that offers a mixture of dishes suitable for breakfast or lunch. On the more breakfasty side is toast ($5.5 or $6.5 for fruit), gluten-free muesli and the amusingly titled ‘let’s get going’ combination of coco pops, red cordial and coffee for $10. The balance of the dishes would work for either breakfast or lunch and include a ricotta wedge on toast with a range of toppings ($8.5 – $13.5), lentil and rice pancake ($12.5 or $16.5 with prawns), pickled calamari salad ($14.5) and a range of baguettes (poached veal $10.5, duck neck sausage $11.5) and toasted sandwiches (ham $9.5, asparagus and rocket $ 10.5 or banana and nutella $7.5).

I popped in for a coffee and quick lunch with my mate J. The obviously gluten-free options on the menu (muesli, salad or lentil and rice pancake) didn’t immediately appeal. While the menu does not state that gluten-free bread is available, I noticed that the bread supplier is Fatto a Mano, the maker of one of my favourite GF breads. The waitress confirmed that GF bread is served and I happily ordered the toasted sandwich with ham and raclette.

While we waited for my sandwich, we enjoyed some lovely coffees:

A good 30 minutes later my sandwich had not surfaced and we joked that the delay could be due to the staff having to make a mad dash across the road to buy more GF bread. I finally decided to ask after the sandwich and the explanation was far less interesting, the docket had mistakenly been marked as completed. The sandwich arrived shortly thereafter, along with an apology, and the sandwich was on the house:

This was good. Warm, smokey ham, with an interesting tomato mustard, spring onion and raclette.

All in all, it was a slightly mad visit (due to the crowds) but the coffee was great and the sandwich I had was nice. A slight misstep with service is understandable only 5 days in, and it was handled very well. I’ll definitely be back for a coffee and a nibble soon.

Details

De Clieu
187 Gertrude St, Fitzroy
Ph: (03) 9416 4661

Friends of Mine is the new baby from Jason Jones of Porgie and Mr Jones. The cafe is situated in the somewhat industrial Eastern end of Swan Street, Richmond and opened just over a week ago. I was quite surprised at the size of the space, with three rooms, an entry (with a seriously delicious looking sweets cabinet), a light filled middle room with polished concrete and accents of yellow, and the somewhat more formal main room, pictured above.

We arrived early (about 9am) on Saturday morning and comfortably found a table for our group of five. As we were leaving at about 10am, the place was completely full. If you want to avoid the crowds and the noise (I’ve been told that the place can get quite loud when it is full) the early morning start is worthwhile, although brekky is served until 3pm.

The menu at Friends of Mine traverses many of the favourites from Porgie and Mr Jones – familiar dishes include the herb and cheesy toast ($9.9), smashed avocado with thyme buttered mushrooms ($16.9, with poached egg $18.9), toasted banana bread with maple syrup ($14.9) and golden folded scrambles with fresh herbs ($12.9). Other breakfast options include bircher muesli with rhubarb and vanilla compote, croissants ($5.5 or $7.5 with ham and cheese) or a selection of piadini and baguettes ($10.9 or $12.5 with a side salad) from the ‘something bready’ part of the menu. Lunchtime offerings are divided into smaller plates (including a bread board, bruschetta and soup), salads (smoked eel, lentil and chicken) and bigger plates (including hapuka, risotto and pork belly).

Arriving first thing in the morning with friends N, L and S, our sights were firmly set on the breakfast side of the menu. S and I are both wheat-free and were very pleased to see that Friends of Mine offers homemade gluten-free bread ($1 extra).

I decided to try something a little different from my norm and went for the eggs benedict ($16.9):

That thick cut piece of toast was gluten-free and would be up there as contender for best ever (the other great GF bread is from Fatto a Mano). The hollandaise was rich but did not overpower the smokey chunks of ham hock and the poached eggs were perfectly wobbly. I’d come back for this alone.

Both S & N decided to go for the Porgie & Mr Jones (and now Friends of Mine) classic of smashed avocado, mushroom and feta:

The avocado had a nice acidity to it from the lemon juice, there was salty richness from the feta and those were some deliciously fragrant mushrooms. Another great dish.

L went the somewhat more healthy route of poached fruit with oat crumble and labne ($11.9):

The dish had a somewhat middle eastern twist thanks to the labne, pistachio and orange blossom. L enjoyed it, but enviously sized up our various egg-focussed breakfasts.

We decided to end with something sweet – a macaron from Babycakes:

These were my least favourite part of the meal – thick, crunchy shells (most with air pockets), too much filling and too little flavour.

Macarons aside, this was a lovely breakfast. Service was friendly and efficient, although I have heard of a few mis-steps from others (it is still early days). Coffee was very good. I am looking forward to returning very soon!

Details

Friends of Mine
506 Swan St, Richmond
(03) 9428 7516

As a change from our city breakfast catch-ups, B, Z and I decided to meet up for mid-week breakfast in Richmond. Demitri’s Feast won The Age’s Cheap Eats breakfast of the year 2010 and I have been told that as a result, the place is incredibly busy on the weekend. Unfortunately, I had also read a few reviews where there was comment that Demitri’s popularity seemed to be its undoing, with the food suffering from the frantic pace. We thought that a sneaky mid-week breakfast at Demitri’s would therefore be a stress free way of testing it out.

Demitri’s opens at 7.30am and we arrived shortly thereafter. It was very quiet, except for the deliveries that were arriving. While the lunch menu is more straightforward Greek cuisine, the breakfast menu has a Greek twist on the normal breakfast fare, think semolina pancakes with Greek yoghurt ($11), poached eggs with Ouzo ($15.5) and baclava french toast ($11).

B was very happy with her sage mushrooms with manouri cheese, toasted almonds and rocket on sourdough $12.5:

I went for the Greek omelette ($14.5), which looked a little sad, unadorned on its plate (the waitress apologised that they were out of rocket, which was fine, though a little strange given it was on B’s plate above):

While the omelette looked a little sad (and reminded me a little of another omelette fiasco) it was delicious, I loved the spicy, fennel scented pork sausage and richness from the cheese. It was also quite filling thanks to the potatoes.

Z went for the scrambled eggs with goat’s cheese feta and oregano roasted tomatoes on toast ($13.5):

Z reported that the scrambled eggs were pleasingly runny and from the forkful I tasted, I enjoyed the creaminess of the slightly sour feta.

All in all, a pretty positive breakfast experience. My only qualm was that service was quite slow, which was a little odd given that for the majority of the time we were the only customers. Nonetheless, I would definitely come back again mid-week, particularly for the cinnamon crumble or the Greek rice pudding.

Details
Demetri’s Feast
141 Swan St, Richmond
(03) 9428 8659

On my morning walk to work I have been watching with interest the development of a new cafe on Gertrude St. Thanks to Where’s the beef (those organised food-hounds), I found out that Sonido was finally open and organised breakfast there post-haste!

Sonido is a seriously cute little cafe, decked out with artfully mismatched furniture and shelves filled with all manner of quirkiness, including vinyl records, books, posters and shoes(!). The cafe is run by a Colombian couple and the food, music and decorations are all a homage to their homeland. It has been open for about 4 weeks now and I was told by them that mid-week is just starting to fall into a rhythm and that the weekends are ridiculously busy.

On the Wednesday morning we visited, Sonido was very slow and sleepy. Service was at a very relaxed pace, but this was fine and we had time to enjoy our lovely coffees (Supreme):

And look at the cute little wooden spoon:

The cafe doesn’t really have breakfast menu per se, everything is an all day option. You can try an empanada with beef and olive ($7.5), spinach and cheese ($7.5) or chorizo ($8). They also serve arepas (thin, crispy discs of corn) with a range of different toppings, such as cheese ($7.5), egg ($9.5), sweet corn ($6), ‘old clothes’ beef ($11.5) and black beans and feta ($11.5), and you can get a side salad with them too. All the arepas are gluten-free, except the sweet corn. For obvious reasons, I really really wanted to try the ‘old clothes’ beef, but decided it was probably a little much for breakfast. I’ll have to visit another time to try it out.

I went for the black beans and feta:

This was really delicious, thick, rich beans, slightly salty feta on the crisp arepa. The oniony salsa added a nice sharpness. Yum.

Breakfast companion P tried the arepa with eggs:

These were really creamy and P slathered them in chilli sauce, giving them a nice kick.

Sweets include muffins ($4.5), raspberry brownie ($4.5), shortbread hearts ($3.5), almond crescents ($3.5) and cocadas, which are a Brazilian coconut macaroon ($4). While sweets after breakfast are not my standard fare, all the cakes and sweets at Sonido are gluten-free, so I had to try them… right?

I admit that I have been quite taken by the sweets at Sonido (which are actually baked by Hartford Lane Organics) and I have made a few visits for sweets alone. Firstly, I picked up an apple crumble muffin on my way to work:

The top of the muffin was so crunchy and caramelly. Seriously awesome (and I really wish I had one now!)

I have also tried the brownie:

This was dense and fudgy, with a little surprise of raspberries at the bottom. The raspberries added a nice burst of flavour and it reminded me strongly of the chocolate raspberry layer cake I have previously made, I really need to make it again!

All in all, Sonido is a sweet little place with some great options, particularly for those who are gluten-free. I’m looking forward to going back and trying the ‘old clothes’ beef!!!

Note: lots of other bloggers have reviewed Sonido in its short life – have a look Vetti live in Northcote, Fat belly club, Crafty llama and Fitzroyalty.

Details

Sonido!
69 Gertrude St, Fitzroy
0404621946 / 0406850341

Boringly, work has been really crazy lately (hence the somewhat reduced frequency of new blog posts). In addition to feeling like I have neglected the blog a bit, it’s also been a bit a little hard to find time to hang with Mr M. The solution? Mid-week breakfast catch ups with the two of us, starting off first with breakfast at Birdman Eating.

I have eaten breakfast loads of times at Birdman Eating (and a couple of lunches thrown in as well), but to date had decided not to blog it. I decided to revisit this strategy because I just got my hands on a new fancy pants camera and I was overexcited to try it out (and before anyone asks, the camera wasn’t a freebie, I bought it with my own cashola).

Birdman Eating is a quirky little cafe, situated on Gertrude St. Apparently the name Birdman comes from the annual Moomba Birdman Rally as well as the myth of Icarus. I have always been somewhat bemused by the decor, which includes suspended vases and little winged action-figure types hanging from the ceiling. The figurines are actually quite delicate and beautiful and someone spent a lot of time forming those wings from feathers.

Birdman has loads of breakfast options that pleasingly differ from the standard breakfast fare. Tried and tested breakfasts include the black sticky rice with yoghurt and mango ($10 lovely texture, hints of sesame and freshness from the fruit) and quinoa porridge with coconut, banana and palm sugar ($11.5 caramelised chunks of banana, almost toffee flavour of palm sugar). Ricotta features, in hotcake form ($14.5) and baked with fruit ($12.5). Or you can try something more substantial like Welsh rarebit ($8.5), steak sandwich ($16), grilled kippers ($17), black pudding with potato hash and fried egg ($17.5) or kransky with bubble and squeak ($18).

I usually can’t get past the baked eggs ($12), which change regularly. The morning we went there were sweet potato, capsicum tomato and goats cheese, beef stroganoff and pancetta and tomato sugo on offer. Mr M went for the pancetta and tomato and was not disappointed:

These babies come out piping hot in their little skillets and pack a flavour punch. Here, there was a sweetness from the sugo with salty little bits of pancetta. Yum.

I mixed it up a little and tried the braised beans on toast ($13.5):

Joyfully, Birdman Eating has gluten-free bread on offer and this specimen above was damn good. When I first looked at the toast I didn’t think it was actually gluten-free (it looked too tasty and too normal), though a quick comparison of my bread and Mr M’s bread quickly put my mind at ease. I had an ‘incident’ a while back where I ordered a gluten-free pizza and it wasn’t gluten free. Tummy aches ensued and I am now a little paranoid about making sure what is supposed to be GF is actually GF.

This lovely bread is from Fatto a Mano, just up the road from Birdman Eating. As an aside, they also do a cracking spelt bread (for those who are just wheat-free not gluten-free). I will say that this is one of the best gluten-free breads I have had ever, and certainly the best in recent memory. Unlike other GF bread it wasn’t cakey or falling apart, it had some actual flavour and wasn’t horribly dense (GF will always be dense, but this was acceptably so).

Back to the beans, these impressed me almost as much as the bread (and sorry for the overexcited spiel there!). These were rich and tasty, with a range of different beans, little chunks of carrot and capsicum and a hit of cumin.

All in all, a very satisfying breakfast (and a nice hit of quality time too!). It was lovely to go to Birdman mid-week and enjoy a relaxed breakfast, such a different experience to its crazy pace at the weekends. But, Birdman is worth braving the crowds, it’s been a stalwart for years for a reason. Personally, I’ll be visiting again on a quiet weekday… a perfect start to the day.

Details:
Birdman Eating
283 Gertrude St, Fitzroy
(03) 9416 4747

Pope Joan has been open for 8 days and is already pumping. But it was always going to be with Matt Wilkinson (who up until last Tuesday was Head Chef at Circa) and Ben Foster (general manager of Carlton’s The Kent) at the helm.

Pope Joan is hidden in Nicholson St, Brunswick East, amongst a couple of abandoned shops and near a metalworks:

Nonetheless, the crowds have come. An early Saturday breakfast and the place was buzzing already. The decor is quirky, with knick knacks lining the walls, some statement tiling and industrial lights.

The menu is pretty comprehensive, with breakfasty options available all day, as well as a list of daily specials that veer more to the lunchtime crowd. There is quite an impressive list of egg dishes (they are Green eggs), with a twist on the usual, think boiled eggs with soldiers, bacon bits and herb salt ($8), baked eggs with tomonian & swiss chard and smoked yoghurt ($12), fried eggs with bacon steak, pineapple and beans ($18), poached eggs with smoked fish rosti ($16), crumbled coddled egg with anchovy and black pudding salad ($16), egg and mushroom pie ($12), ‘nearly’ full English breakfast ($18) and a classic bacon & egg sanga ($8). For the non-egg inclined there is porridge ($7), rice pudding ($10), fresh fruit, banana bread with rhubarb and geranium ($9) and toasted fruit bread ($6).

We ordered some coffees (from Allpress) and considered the menu. With my sweet tooth, I couldn’t resist the rice pudding with poached fruit. However, as I was waiting for it to arrive I couldn’t help but notice the baked eggs coming out of the kitchen – they looked great and I had some serious food envy. Said envy evaporated as soon as I tasted a mouthful of my rice pudding:

This was incredibly light, but really creamy with a good kick of vanilla. The poached rhubarb and pear was served warm and had a lovely scent of cinnamon. I also enjoyed the fact that the pudding itself was not too cold, too often I’ve ordered rice pudding and ended up with a fridge-cold mass of rice.

Mr M ordered the ‘nearly full’ English breakfast:

This was damn good as well. Somewhat hidden under the creamy scrambled eggs was a slice of smokey, thick cut bacon. Flavoursome porky sausage and beans in a rich, almost sweet tomatoey sauce. Yum.

So the upshot is Pope Joan is already busy and given the quality of the food, is likely to be busy for a while. Nonetheless, I think I’ll brave the inevitable crowds for another shot at breakfast – I still have to try those baked eggs!

Details

Pope Joan
77-79 Nicholson Street
Brunswick East, Vic
(03) 9388 8858

A little while back, I wrote a post about new cafe EARL Canteen. Despite its locale at the other end of the city from my workplace, since then I have had several lunches there – including the much discussed pork belly sandwich that it seems everyone has been talking about (Jess dubbed it the ‘sex’ sandwich and it was raved about by Melbourne Gastronome and Cooking with Goths as well). All I will say of the sandwich is that it is damned good and very popular, so if you want to try it, best to get there early in the day (although it is not ready before 11am).

I visited EARL recently on a very crisp Winter’s morning with breakfasting buddies B & Z. For breakfast, EARL offers a breakfast baguette, mushroom wrap, toast as as well as muesli, porridge, crumpets and some baked beans.

Z and I both liked the sound of the porridge, but Z was swayed to try the housemade crumpet with lemon butter ($4.5):

Z enjoyed her crumpet and loved the lemon butter. The only qualm was that one crumpet was probably a bit too little for a workday breakfast and she found herself hungry at about 11am. Thankfully, Z had a macaron to satisfy those hunger cravings, see below.

B had a special – breakfast ciabatta with salmon, creme fraiche and cucumber:

I had the porridge with two types of slow cooked apple ($8):

This was absolutely delicious. Very creamy and flavoured with vanilla and cinnamon. Ordinarily I like milk with my porridge but this was so moist that it didn’t need any at all. The slow cooked apple and quince were meltingly tender. Win win win!

We all took some macarons to go. EARL’s macarons are now supplied by Josephine – I have previously raved about these macarons. I had a coffee macaron and a passionfruit macaron:

Of the two, the coffee was my favourite – it had an earthy coffee flavour and was really delicious. The passionfruit macaron was quite subtle, the passionfruit was overshadowed a bit by the dark chocolate ganache but I enjoyed the chocolatey-ness of the ganache nonetheless.

All in all, a great spot to pop in for a mid-week breakfast. Service was fast and friendly and that porridge was seriously great. I’ll be visiting again!

Details

EARL Canteen
Ground level, 500 Bourke,
Lt Bourke St courtyard, Melbourne
(Just past the steps up to Movida Aqui – look for the large EARL sign)
Ph: (03) 9600 1995