The Bean Cafe Balmain

Well readers it is a challenge to blog a cafe three weeks after the fact. Unfortunately, I've been a slack bum & a busy bum but hopefully the memories of this lovely little Rozelle cafe at the top of Darling St will come seamlessly flooding back to me.

Firstly, I remember I arrived 45 mins early to this cafe as I had just dropped my friend Fliss at the airport for her return to Tassie & over-estimated the Maroubra to Airport to Rozelle trip on a sat morn. It was good to experience that Sydney hasn't yet quite yet come to Bangkok proportions of traffic.

So for 30 mins by myself I admired the decor, especially the framed original movie posters on the wall for classics  such as 'To Kill a Mockingbird', 'A Streetcar named Desire' & 'Rebel without a cause' as well as classic 60s/70s concerts.


When my esteemed fellow brunchers arrived talk soon brimmed with the possibilities of the excellent new STC season (we will be

doing Belvoir & STC this year) ;http://www.sydneytheatre.com.au/what%27s-on/season-2013.aspx

Also, this morn was the day of the Sydney council elections & so talk was ripe on one of our favourite subjects (especially two of us anyway!!) Sadly for those two, Sydney decided for more of Moore.

One outrageous thing, we decided that we had finally had enough of David Marr's vicious/bitchy/ repetitively myopic writing, so I tore his article on Tony Abbott (who I incidentally don't like) from the cover of the Good Weekend magazine & used it to mimic the wiping of my bottom. Now some of you may well be a fan of his & I apologise if my wiping offends (& I fear to write this due to the very close mutual friend we have in common) but the three of us had just had enough!
The food was delicious (not that I can really remember) & we achieved a perfect quiz score in what was remaining of the Good weekend.
BRAD: 3.5 golden eggs. Relieved to be back in a classy cafe after last week's truama.
SAL: 3.5 golden eggs. Concurred, happy to be free of the organic imprisonment.
ANDREW: 4 golden eggs. Staff were very nice too helping me also to love cafes again.

Bread and Circus (Fountain St, Alexandria) 1st Sept

To all our loyal Brunch Club followers we only have one thing to say...

DON'T GO HERE!

This morning's brunch experience has to go down as one of the worst. MAybe becasue we had been led to expect so much, maybe because some of us were recovering from the Marly dancing the night before, maybe because we had a predispositon for baulking at the word 'organic' or... no, actually, it is simply because this place is no good.

Behind the initially interesting setting of an apparently bustling industrially-chic cafe decorated with eclectic ornaments (See the photo of the large teapot et straw) was a pretentiousness which shocked even well-seasoned brunchclubbers. Which is fine, provided you deliver. This, they did not. In short, this place was all 'circus' and no 'bread'.

Snap shot of a morning in brunch hell:

1. No coffee. Yep, that's right. If you want coffee you have to walk out of the cafe and go to the Campos coffee stall next door (but in the same building) and line up to order, pay then wait to collect before taking back to the cafe. By which time you have been separated form the rest of your firends and missed the first installment of the morning's gossip. Even more bizarrely, when asked by Campos if 'having in or takeaway' one replies 'having in at the cafe' you are snubbed and only given it in a paper cup.

2. No water. Ok so this is not the only cafe that doesn't serve you water but this time you have to find the organically purified liquid infuser contraption, read the attached instruction sheet, attempt to operate the on/off button and self-cleaning device, only to be told then that the machine was down and there was a leak so sorry, no water. 'That's ok, I'll just have any tap water' 'Sorry, we don't do that' was the reply. But wait it gets worse...

3. Menu indecipherable. (see attached photo) Oh, and as I predicted, the obligatory "quinoa" was there right next to coconut non-dairy infused "organic" (of course) yoghurt.

4. Food inedible. Ok, I might be exaggerating here. Some of us quite liked their "organic" "not quite scrambled" (they looked scrambled to us!) eggs but my bircher muesli was disgusting. It was non-dairy and, we discovered later, had cardamon added but was bitter and awful. I shared it with fellow brunchers and they agreed. But as if that wasn't enough...

5. Poor service. An unsettling mix of 'tude' and 'try-hard'. You were left to fend for yourself and work out the system by trial and error. Again, it seemed that this chaos is designed to separate the locals from the visitors. Well, the locals can have it. To top it off though toward the end a waitress (if that's the right word) came over to me to offer another breakfast because 'I have heard you didn't like the bircher'. Well, apart from indicating that one of her staff had been eves-dropping in on our private conversation, it smacked of desperation and a sense that they knew we had, in fact, discovered that the emperor, like that of the original 'Bread and Circus' fame, has no clothes! And, whiel we resisted the temptation to point and laugh at said emperor we left quickly only to let you, our loyal followers, know the bad news.

RATINGS:

SAL:  2 1/2, and one of those was for the cute waiter.

ANDREW: 1. The worst cafe ever inspires perhaps the best blog entry ever!!Don't you agree readers? GO BRAD!!!!!!!!!!

BRAD: -1. Congratulations 'Bread and Circus' you are the first to achieve a negative egg on the brunch club scale. And let me assure you that this egg aint 'organic'!!!

QUIZ: 17/20. respectable but we'll try harder next time to build back to the 20.

urbanspoon review

Joe Black, Surry Hills

This hidden little gem right up the hyde park end of Commonwealth is easy to miss from the street. But we are glad we found it.  Glad we met Joe Black.

Many charming little idiosyncratic touches mark this cosy cafe. Diverse memorabilia lining the walls, particularly loved the juxtaposition of the famous Mexico city Olympics black power salute, Mohammed Ali boxing in front of a mirror& JFK with a framed Newington college 2006 Year 12 photo. But particularly memorable is the amazing siphon coffee which is produced using equipment normally found in a scientific laboratory (see pic) & takes a carefully detailed 15 minutes to make. Our coffee maker charmed us greatly, hello to you if you are reading this blog.

Before I go on to our review, we have to mention the Korean's young man's metro club that joined us (sat next to us but may as well joined us by sheer size and volume). The fashionabilitiness (yes I'm an English teacher so I have a license to make up words) of their shoes alone seemed straight from a Korean soap teeny bopper drama. This of course lead on to a discussion about plastic surgery.

Food was delicious. I went for Ham, cheese and avocado on toast which was lovely & I heard similar pleasurable mumurs/squeals emanating from my esteemed fellow brunchers. Coffee was like a ground-breaking scientific invention!!!

Quiz result this somewhat warm August morn was 19/20....if only we knew that Tarzan actor Johnny Weissmuller won an Olympic bronze medal in water polo. Incidentally readers, have you noticed the synergetic(more linguistic license) numerical pattern of our scores recently. 2 weeks ago = 17, last week = 18 & this week 19. Obviously, next week we will get a perfect 20.

ANDREW: Loved this morning. 4.5/5 golden eggs. Loved the coffee too.
BRAD: 4/5 scientifically prepared eggs. Great staff, totally relaxed as brunch should be.
SAL:

Barzura, Coogee Bay. 11th Aug, 2012

When the wind is howling and the temperature plummets, where else would one want to go but... the beach!.

Yes brunchclubbers, after some pressure from our coastal friend, we headed off to "Barzura" cafe at Coogee to sample the coffee and eggs (if not the rays). The cafe has a solid reputation and Brad remembered being here in the past when he was a 'local' for a few weeks (He was leant a friend's water view apartment right next door for a few weeks several years ago.)

We were advised to be there early and a good thing too. It is clearly a popular place with the locals. This may have impacted somewhat on the 'touch of a pre-fab feel' that was beginning to appear

Discussion topics were diverse but the level of contribution varied. The highlight was the spooky news of two different Robert Hughes in the news this week. One for being a brilliant mind and art critic, the other a child molester. Most unfortunate.

The Quiz: Well, shocking questions. All about popular culture, mummy porn and interior design. Still, the Club came up trumps and exposed at least one of us as having just a little too much general knowledge about such topics. Anyway, we scored a very respectable 18/20 but still felt like we needed a shower at the end of it.

Ratings:

BRAD: Good coffee but a little dull on the scrambled eggs which were a little too firm. You know I like things a little softer. 3 1/2 golden eggs

ANDREW: Thanks to my Coogee local colleague Kalliope for recommending this place. 3 1/2 golden eggs. Nice place but you must get here early. Sorry to my fellow brunchers that I had my period this day. Had a tough last 2 weeks & was nervous about doing the City to Surf in a twister. But shouldn't have worried, went amazingly well considering.

SAL: The highlight was the walk on the beach afterwards!

Dues Cafe

 

 A cool spot for anyone interested in custom bikes and also some interesting art works on the walls. Great brekkie. Brunch club this morning is missing one of our members whose left us for the Melbourne Film Festival this week end.

I really enjoyed my cured salmon with dill and creamy scramble eggs they were very good and coffee was okay. It was fun looking at the bikes and the accessories in the shop were great. I'd definitely go back to this one.

Conversation flowed freely about two of our favourite topics art and politics, interesting to note the painting of the Leader of the Opposition.

QUIZ: We did okay with the quizz 17/20 I think we may have improved on that score had Andy been with us.

SAL: 4 golden eggs the cured salmon was fantastic.

BRAD: 4 Golden Eggs. Especially as it was within walking distance!

This Cafe, George Street, Launceston

 Located in the main street of Launceston Tassie, "This Cafe" offered us a very acceptable brekkie during a recent visit to the Apple Isle. Good coffee and scrambled eggs with leeks (slightly overdone) scrambled eggs are always best when they leave the pan slightly underdone. A very relaxed morning discussing our day ahead's adventure. A drive up the Tamar visiting the local vineyards.

Launceston is filled with beautiful public buildings, lots of stone and lovely architecture.

We missed our third party this morning and no quizz being out of NSW no Herald GW available. Even though Andrew did text us some questions .. on holidays and brains feeling the effects of the previous evenings Pinot Noir so no score this morning.







Mike's Kitchen, Roseberry

 14/07/12

Mike's Kitchen tries just a little bit hard to be the latest hipster cafe hidden behind the old paper barks in a wharehouse with no signage!! A fun morning despite a terrible quiz score (12/20), one brunch member's refusal to start at 9am and some crappy disorganised service (but incidentally excellent dunnies).

This warehouse in the middle of the warehoused suburb of Roseberry was a good find by Brad and regular Brunch guest (and now a regular himself) Shelley. The food was delicious and the smaller portion sizes were actually really filling. Great set decoration inside.

Conversation was brimmed full of the possibilities of our soon impending trip to Tasmania (Granny Bear included who also joined us this lovely July sunny morn).
Service was pretty woeful due to a one-man show at - the - counter service who insisted on chatting about every menu possibility to every customer and was having some problems processing the credit card payments.

Shelley waited in line for an eternity just to buy a small pot of jam. Not a good look when there are more people standing in line waiting to order/pay than sitting down. Also, when our super-confident Brad tried to offer some constructive advice on how to improve the service the head guy got very defensive.

BRAD & SHELLEY SAY: Small portion size were perfect and I liked the decor   But the internet warnings were true about the bad & stupid service system.  3.5 very slowly delivered eggs
SAL SAYS: Great location. Food portion size were good however you can't serve breakfast on a tin plate without it getting cold. Tragic processes for ordering and paying. Tragic!! Loved the shop however in this environment they will fail cause it's too expensive. If they're price point was keener they would be very successful. 3 Golden Eggs for ambience and fun
GRANNY BEAR SAYS: I didn't think the food was that good really but it is a very hip place. Just 2 Golden eggs
ANDREW SAYS: 4 out of 5 for coffee and food. 3 out of 5 for service