Va Piano

126C Nicholson St, Brunswick East

I love Brunswick. I love its range of food stores, unpretensiously provisioning cravings for any number of cuisines from around the Mediterranean. I love its capacity to support cafe after cafe. Before long, the ratio of foodstores and cafes to houses in Brunswick will be 1:1. I love the way its locals will drive, ride or walk past any new outlet with faces of intrigue, their intention to come back and check it out writ large.

Va Piano is the latest to add its food and coffee mix to the milieu. Perched at the top end of Nicholson, across from the Lomond, they look like they've been there forever, and by their fourth day of operation locals came to sit in with papers and take away coffees like they'd been coming there for years.

While their kitout is far from flashy, the wood on display is bespoke, rather than reclaimed. The cafe's name, cut out from the wooden front of the requisite window bench table (where better to watch the ogling Brunswickers?), sits jauntily on a shelf at the rear of its compact space.

Thankfully they haven't gone fancy with the crockery; Melbourne's stock of cute and kitsch plastic and crockery has been further depleted. It's put back into use at Va Piano to serve sourdough toast with a handful of toppings (that's tomato and hommous, below), fruit toast or baked eggs.The range of filled sandwiches in the counter display look particularly appealing, and muffins and croissants are also on offer.