From Eating Out with Sally Hammond, Sunday Magazine, Sunday Telegraph June 1 2003.

Residential Rosebery is on a roll, and helping it gain momentum is this retro café with a display wall of LP album covers and art deco surrounds.

It doesn't say "vegetarian" on the menu, and you don't even notice because the Kerala coconut curry on basmati rice, Johnny's almost legendary tomato pasta (al dente of course) and the MMM mushroom mozzarella melt sound so good. The first Johnny's Café in Balmain in the 1980s was well known for its coffee, and today it's even better. Come for breakfast and tuck in to his mum's Hungarian sólet (very slow-cooked baked beans with barley) on rye toast. Or have fresh juice and partner toasted Turkish or light Polish rye bread with Gimme the Works an all inclusive combo of eggs, mushrooms, home-made relishes and more.