This Place Needs Brunch

Initial impressions: the food menu could be more expansive. A chic café needs decent coffee, first and foremost, and this place does seem to have that one down. Still, the next thing I want to see are some actual lunch options. The cakes look rather nice, the slices adequate, and I’ve spied a few menu items that could pass for brunch. I’m not saying every nice café needs to double as a restaurant, but as a food critic, I know quite a bit about what people want, and the flavour of the month is brunch. Brunch, everywhere! Eggs benedict, quiche Lorraine, light sandwiches and wraps! COUSCOUS!!

I can’t help being critical; it’s my job. And when I’m nitpicking this much, it’s a good sign. I just came all the way from Frankston, and…oh my days. Such things I have seen in some of those seaside cafes. I wish I’d had business cards for all the places that did pest control in Frankston, because I could’ve saved myself the trouble of actually tasting anything. No soggy sausage rolls or watery coffee; I could’ve just dropped the pest control card, given the manager a pointed look and walked out.

I’m no health and safety inspector, of course, but part of the food critic’s job is to assess the surroundings. You can be served the most beautiful vanilla slice in the world, but if the table is covered in crumbs and there’s slime leaking from the walls, it all means nothing. A couple of places genuinely needed pest control- not because of rats, fortunately- but there shouldn’t be the slightest hint of a creepy-crawly in the house, and I saw several. Ants, spiders…and that’s just the first wave. A crowd attracts a crowd, as they say. You have to get on those pest problems early.

Maybe that’s an option. I’m off to Rosebud next. Perhaps I need to scout out the Rosebud pest control services, procure some cards and…well, it’ll just save time on a clearly hopeless visit. Savage.

-Leon

A Better Place to Drink Tea

 

Mum only has three taste buds left, but she stills loves coming to the café. In fact, we’ve had some lovely times in here ever since it opened. We used to drive all the way to Ethel’s Teashop out on the fringes of town, mostly because Mum and Ethel are old friends, but I’m so glad we can come here now. Ethel is a cranky old bat and her tea just taste like she dropped a few gum leaves in some water.

There’s also the fact that Ethel’s place just never seemed safe. It was basically a shack in the middle of nowhere, and her husband is an arborist for fun, so you could always hear him chopping down trees on the property. I’m not sure if he ever used to do arborist work around Melbourne– as in, as an actual job- but now he’s slightly off his rocker and just chops down trees because he thinks its fun. Mum and I used to go there on Friday mornings and politely listen to Ethel complaining about something or other (mostly the government or her ungrateful children), sipping our leafy water and wondering if our lives would soon be ended by a random act of unlawful tree lopping.

Maybe one day he’ll get too old to pick up a chainsaw, and thus take up tree pruning instead. Until then, I’m quite happy here at Johnny’s. The place is done up like a proper, inner-city café, the coffee is nice, there’s always something soft and jazzy playing…and we don’t fear for our lives. That’s probably the best part. Mum has destroyed her sense of taste from the period of her young life where she ate curries for breakfast lunch and dinner, for a period of sixteen years, but she still just about likes the coffee.

That’s the key to a good café atmosphere in Melbourne. Tree lopping kept to minimum. Also, friendly service.

-Albert