Cafeklatsch III: Fuel, Red Box III, Big Dish

Fuel: 4 Margaret St, Moonee Ponds; 03) 9375 4499
Red Box: 317 Sydney Road, Brunswick; 03 9387 8699
Big Dish: 70 Wales St; Ph TBC

Who would have thought that Moonee Ponds is only as far from Brunswick East as the city is? Probably anyone who'd taken the time to look further west on a map than Melville Rd! Puckle St, leading from Pascoe Vale Rd down to Moonee Ponds Station is dotted with cafes, bakeries and restaurants (lots of Thai and Indian), along with a mix of franchise and independent stores.

Tucked around the corner, immediately across from the station, is Fuel (and, just a few doors up, Holy Cannoli - review hopefully to come soon). This is a gentle cafe, which manages to squeeze enough tables and chairs into an angled space to accommodate families, couples and friends doing coffee, but still give the wait staff enough room to wend through with coffee after coffee.


The menu covers most brunch cravings. French toast with bananas in caramel sauce was hard to go by, but it was a savoury kind of morning, and with the corn fritters (above) - served with avocado, bacon, salsa and sour cream - already claimed by one of my brunch partners, baked eggs it was.

So the breakfast trend of 2008, I'd eschewed baked eggs for a while. Fuel's version comes with chorizo, mushrooms and white beans in tomato sugo. I thought at first that they'd been extraordinarily generous and plonked not two, but three, eggs atop the sugo. The middle mound is actually a dollop of sour cream (the online menu proffers mozzarella - a much better option). And let's be upfront: these aren't, in fact, baked eggs. They're two poached eggs atop baked accompaniments. And while we're there, it wasn't so much a tomato sugo as the kind of tomato sauce that comes with tinned spaghetti.

Nomenclature aside, this was an enjoyable breakfast. One thing I don't like about baked eggs is the way they keep cooking in the hot plate, offering a too-brief window to enjoy a runny yolk. At least this presentation eliminated that problem. In such a deep serving dish, however, there was all too much sauce for the yolk to mix with. Great chorizo, in any case.

Speaking of generous serves, Red Box is a cafe that believes in feeding customers for the day, not just a meal. A soup-of-the-day of sweet potato and ginger was an effective anecdote to the impending cold that likes to niggle around on these cold June weekends. Smooth, warming, piquant, and about a litre more than I could eat! Just the buttered bread would have carried me through most of the afternoon.

And as for their burger...it's almost self-defeating, it's so towering. It's worth the effort to push it down to mouth-size, but you could make stock with the amount of juice that dribbles out from the lamb and beef pattie.

Big Dish has entered the inner north cafe scene with a very small splash. Tucked away on a quiet Thornbury street, it feels more country foodstore than suburban cafe. Our visit there was unphotographed, which is a shame, as their very commendable food is elegantly presented.

They've mastered baked eggs, or rather claypot eggs, as they appear on the menu. The pot comes to the table with the capsicum-sweet sauce bubbling around two free-range eggs, expertly positioned in the middle, so they're not still cooking in contact with the sides. Le Madre sourdough completes the dish.

Fruit toast, dense enough to keep SG going until dinner, is presented on a wooden chopping board. Unmissable (especially for $7.50) are the crumpets with warmed honey ricotta, delicately spiced poached fruit tumbled on top, and the whole lot drizzled with pomegranate molasses. Absolutely delicious.

Pancakes, pikelets: Auction Rooms, Enni

Auction Rooms: 103-107 Errol St, North Melbourne; 03 9326 7749
Enni: 915 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 8288

The press was abuzz with news of Auction Rooms when it opened in mid-2008. Matt Preston was particularly glowing in Epicure about its interior. Despite its soaring ceilings and double-shopfront width, it is a cosy place to be, and it offers one of the broadest range of seating options Melbourne has to offer. Take a simple table for four by the bright red coffee roaster, or perch on a low stool in the sunken area immediately adjacent to the plate-glass front. There's a courtyard out the back and a darker area behind the bar where those needing a few well-made coffees to buck up from the night before can shield themselves from all that natural light.

It's a venue that promises an interesting menu, and they've certainly shied away from generic breakfast dishes. It's not a menu filled with unusual ingredients as such, but their arrangement speaks of innovation.

Rather than pancakes and maple syrup, Auction Rooms offer coconut pikelets with vanilla pineapple, creme fraiche and orange syrup. Like me, perhaps the second item on that description has given you pause - just what is vanilla pineapple? It's diced pineapple that's been steeped in a vanilla syrup until it's candied and has countered the pineapple's sweetness - which to my palate is always a bit sickly - to offer instead a smoother flavour, with a touch of vanilla, encased in the firm, candied fruit pieces.

Perhaps you've also double-checked the description after looking at the photo to confirm that it did, in fact, say 'pikelets'. It does, but I would concur, that in my world pikelets are flat and share the approximate diameter of a piece of salami! The good news is that these pikelets are quite fluffy, and while the coconut milk is no doubt in part responsible for that, it offers only a hint of flavour. I do have a similar criticism to the that of the buckwheat pancakes at Giorno, that while the dish offers an uplifting combination of flavours and textures, there isn't enough of the wet to go with the generous offering of dry.

Update: It's kind of funny reading that description a couple of years later. Auction Rooms is the darling of the hipster crowd, and while its layout is still one of my favourite aspects of the place, the word cosy is no longer what first comes to mind. It's positively buzzing at any time of the week, and on weekends you can be sure you'll be putting your name down and waiting for a table. The menu remains reliably variable, if that makes sense, running the gamut from pork belly to felafel to creamed peanut butter and everything in between. And, of course, Auction Rooms is also one of Melbourne's coffee temples, with various blends available as well as siphon and pourover.

At the northern end of High St, where Thornbury starts to morph into Preston, Enni is not the kind of cafe to be written up for a Six Degrees-inspired interior kitout. This is a more traditionally laid-out cafe, with tables and booths on one side, and a lengthy display counter on the other. There is much to commend in that counter - a huge range of pies, filled sandwiches, salads and cakes that are a strong distraction from the menu.

The menu shows some thought as well, including dukkah eggs, (much vaunted) homemade baked beans and corn pancakes in addition to the regular pancakes. The latter, though amply smothered in berry compote, were not an exciting dish visually nor gastronomically. The cafe, however, is better known for its savoury offerings, and the corn pancakes didn't disappoint. Served with bacon, fried tomato, a poached egg and a decent chutney, they offered a lot more of interest to look at and to assemble into flavour combinations.
With the sad demise of Devour across the road, Enni offers a well-priced breakfast option on the edge of the inner suburbs. They are also a great option to stop into if you're heading northwards out of town and want some homemade treats - whether savoury or sweet - to take along with you.

Salty and sweet; A Minor Place IIII and Giorno II

A Minor Place: 103 Albion St, Brunswick East; 03 9384 3131
Giorno: 608 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 2040
I love a dish that combines two elements of the taste spectrum. It probably won't do my rep any favours to admit that in my formative years one my favourite indulgences was to dunk the fries from a certain corporate-evil fast-food franchise into said franchise's chocolate sundae. Sickly sweet chocolate sauce with extraordinarily salty chips...it was an inglorious start to a food obsession, but it's the same principle on which many great dishes are based.

A Minor Place has the right idea with one of the options for their scrambled eggs: adding fetta and caramelised onions. It promised a little more than it delivered, in that the salty fetta and sweetened onions didn't present quite the bold contrast I'd had in mind. It was, regardless, a very satisfying dish, with the creamy eggs sitting perkily atop the promised multigrain bread (I like a cafe prepared to go the grain).

Over at Giorno, I'd learnt on previous visits that their menu can understate things. Dropping in for a post-groceries spot of lunch, I was keen to try out one of their piadinas (available from 11am), the Italian contribution to flatbreads. More robust than a crepe, and more closely resembling naan than a tortilla in looks, piadina is perfect to wrap around some Italian meat and cheese. My choice at Giorno featured proscuitto, artichokes, fontina and rocket. 'Sounds like a salty combo!' I hear you say. You're not wrong! Hopefully it was an unusual batch of bread, as the piadina itself could have sold more beer than a bowl of peanuts. The Giorno/Pizza Farro staff are always friendly and forthcoming, and I did mention that the bread seemed unreasonably salty. The waitress didn't think they normally added salt to the dough, so fingers crossed in most cases it's the quality of filling that is allowed to dominate and linger, rather than the need to slake a thirst!

Toast; North Island and Crunch

North Island: 111 Scotchmer St, North Fitzroy; 03 9486 8864
Crunch: 669 High St, Thornbury; 03 9495 1655

"It is impossible not to love someone who makes toast for you," opined British food writer Nigel Slater in his memoir, Toast. I haven't quite fallen in love with the cafe staff who have provided me with a golden serve of carb with toppings in the last couple of weeks, but as long as the bread is good and the grilling hand steady, it is a marvellous thing to sit down to.

In an attempt to reclaim January as a relaxed, vacationing month, I headed out on spontaneous mid-week jaunts to tick yet more local cafes off the list. I wasn't after Big Breakfasts - more to get a feel of the place, sample the coffee, and quiet my gurgling morning belly. It can seem odd to leave a kitchen amply stocked with a toaster, bakery bread and quality Australian honey to order and pay for a plate of toast; then again, like a cup of tea, the flavour and crunchy delight of toast is somehow enhanced when someone else makes it for you.

At North Island, they took care of the toasting and slicing, but the rest was up to the diner.The simply served plate of pide, avocado and lemon fits the cafe's atmosphere, a proponent of the Brunswick model of minimal kitout, eschewing fancy touches in favour of good coffee and basic menu items with a twist. I had to interrupt David Sedaris (not him in person, unfortunately; rather, his humour, in the form of Naked) to effect my own avocado and lemon distribution. But look at that avocado - that's why you order out. I've never had one at home that looked like that: mine are browny green and mushed before they even leave the skin (due to my flesh-extracting technique, rather than inferior produce!). Accompanying this indulgently simple start to the day was a fine coffee.

Thornbury's Crunch probably isn't a cafe that many people cross town for, but it's one that looks after local shopkeepers and families with adequately prepared cafe staples for breakfast and lunch.

Their sourdough toast comes with a side bowl of orange and tamarind marmalade. Tamarind is vital for giving that extra oomph to good satay sauce, and combined here with the orange it produced a tartness best enjoyed via a light smear, rather than a good dollop. A refreshingly intercultural way to start the day with toast.

Stand by your pan(cake); Giorno

608 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 2040; Weds to Sun 8am-4pm
We've known and loved Pizza Farro's spelt-based pizzas for some time now. The Thornbury restaurant has to be one of the best-decorated in Melbourne, with rolling pins hanging from the roof, stitched tea towels and quilts decorating the walls, and the space and natural light to make an always-welcoming venue. Happily, patrons can now enjoy that same hospitality during the day, Wednesday to Sunday, when the site opens as Giorno.

Giorno's breakfast menu is built around eggs and cereals (not the Kelloggs kind!). The egg options break cafe standards: try poached with turkey, rocket and hazelnut pesto and beetroot (served with spelt bread). If you're after breakfast in a bowl there's rolled oats porridge and a gluten-free muesli.

For the non-eggy, non-porridge loving amongst us, the menu starts to look a little limited. There is, however, a house-made spelt fruit toast filling the gap.It comes with ricotta and a rumour of pure maple syrup. The menu warns it's surprisingly filling, a comment at short odds in this year's Cafe Menu Understatement awards. I sampled but a bite and felt weighed down! It's delicious, and smells and looks incredibly appealing, but it was also astonishingly dense. To finish one slice was challenging; attempting the second was out of politeness and and aversion to waste.

Slightly lighter, but no less filling, were the buckwheat pancakes. A bit of research tells me that buckwheat is actually a pseudocereal - it's not a grass and hence unrelated to wheat. It is used in many cuisines: from the basis of Japan's soba noodles to its various pancake forms, such as the Russian blini and French galette. As a gluten-free product it's often regarded as a lighter alternative; however, just as the fruit toast was a digestive challenge, making headway through just one of the two pancakes proved as much as my stomach could comfortably handle.

But I digress, before giving you the full description of the dish. Who wouldn't order pancakes served with orange mascarpone, pears stuffed with prunes and poached in pomegranate and marsala syrup, and pure maple syrup?It's a divine combination, but it's made more filling and less fulfilling by the ratio of bulk to sweet. I would have far preferred one such huge pancake, or two much smaller ones, and more of the sweet cheese and maple syrup. It's understandable that they ration the maple syrup, given it's certainly not the glucose-laden, overly runny, cheap variety, but it left the dish a bit heavy and drying overall.

For those heading to Giorno a little later in the day, the cafe offers a range of piadinas - with fillings such as prosciutto, fontina, artichokes and rocket - made with gluten-free or spelt flours. A trip back to check those out has to be on the cards.

They've expanded their cute decorations to the daytime menu as well. This range of condiments sits on each table; the LSA that accompanied the fruit toast came loaded on a souvenir spoon; and the medicine bottle sugar reminds you that, whether you leave feeling sated or satiated, this restaurant is there to offer their customers happiness and health.

Tasos II

695 High St, Thornbury; 03 9480 6222

My waking thought had been of spreading something sweet onto toast. It was closely followed by the happy realisation that that waking dream could come true by popping into Tasos en route to the grocery shop at Psarakos.

$4.50 at this Thornbury cafe buys two pieces of white toast, a tub of marscarpone and a tub of jam. The jam is not of the chunky nor pithy type; it's a smoothly blended strawberry variety. Being currently overrun with the chunkier-style jam, thanks to our Tasmanian trip and an unmissable bargain from St Dalfour at the Good Food and Wine Show (four, I repeat four, jars for $10!) I would have considered this a less 'artisanal' jam variety. However, while wikiing the distinctions between jams, conserves and the like, I came across this (American) description of the jam-making process:

Jams are usually made from pulp and juice of one fruit, rather than a combination of several fruits. Berries and other small fruits are most frequently used, though larger fruits such as apricots, peaches, or plums cut into small pieces or crushed are also used for jams. Good jam has a soft even consistency without distinct pieces of fruit, a bright color, a good fruit flavor and a semi-jellied texture that is easy to spread but has no free liquid.

And that sounds exactly like what I was eating.

It's a low-tech breakfast, but a satisfying one. You can control the sweetness by loading up on jam, or moderate by favouring the more subtle marscarpone. You can keep it light with a smattering of each, or heap on the creamy cheese.

Devour Cafe

806 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 8496 now closed

Have you ever fancied a hot chocolate that could serve as a meal in itself? Devour offer just such a drinking option. There really should be a size warning on the menu! The $4.50 drink comes in a tumbler, not a mere cup; is exquisitely decorated; and contains a winning amount of chocolate syrup. At that size, it's something you'd want to take slowly, but on this occasion it was somewhat tepid, so it was a matter of get into it or be relegated to slurping a sorta-warm chocolate.

Luckily there was time to be taken. Any trip to Devour leads SG or me to the Devour Burger, a divine, decadent meal that sports a pattie so enormous it carries a minimum 30 minute preparation time. When the burger arrives, it's speared with a skewer in order to keep the tennisball pattie sandwiched between the kaiser bun along with cheese, avocado, sun-dried tomatoes, spinach leaves, caramelised onions and tomato chutney.They've left no filling preferences to chance! The dish comes with a choice of eggplant or potato chips. I'm yet to sample the former, but the latter are extraordinary. They're chips of the long, flat kind, crisp and doused in delectable seasoning.

Devour also does a fine line in specials, particularly on their breakfast menu (eg their famous baked eggs). One of today's options was Eggs Krumpin. Something to do with eggs and crumpets, perhaps? Indeed! Two crumpets done french toast-style: dipped in egg, cream and parsley, then fried and served with bacon, maple syrup and Devour's baked beans (home-made, served with herbs and chilli). All very intriguing, but unfortunately my curiousity remained as unsated as yours...they were out of beans (out of beans! It's a Thornbury tragedy).

Second choice was their Breakfast Burger: everything good about a fry-up, but this time wedged between two slices of bread rather than beside. The bread in question is a Kaiser bun: a huge, round roll with a little pointy bit at the top - looks like an old-school helmet or a crown. Inside said bun is sausage, bacon (happy the carnivore), a fried free-range egg, spinach, tomato chutney and a huge smear of melted cheese on the top half. As if that wasn't enough, nestled beside the burger was a hashbrown: deliciously crispy and salty crumbing around moist, fall-apart potato. Who needs chips?

Devour is a small cafe, always welcoming. The fitout is all warm colours, with teal walls and drapes. The front section is brightened by sun coming through the plate glass windows; the slightly elevated back section is a warm place to sit by the fire, admire the artwork and work your way through a hot drink. There's also a courtyard out the back if you want to take in some sun, maybe with a locally brewed 3 Ravens beer.

Pizza Farro III

608 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 2040

Pizza Farro is rightly renowned for its spelt-based pizzas and on our most recent visit I'd had every intention of furthering my acquaintance with their selection. While browsing the pasta specials, however, the combination of pumpkin, spinach, pine nuts and ricotta became too tempting to forego. Nor would I forego spelt by choosing this option, as it's also the grain of choice for their pastas.

Pizza Farro isn't the cheapest eatery around - in most sections of their menu dishes start from around $18, travelling up to $23 or so for those with finer ingredients - but their produce is high quality, their cooking well-considered and their serving sizes ample. Their pizzas only come in one size, but it's a large one. The pasta alla zucca is similarly generous:The generosity extends to flavour. The cubed pumpkin is at a stage of mushiness that leaves it at the whim of your fork: pierce to pick up whole, or squash to dissolve. The ricotta, by comparison, holds its firmness; the pinenuts as always bring the crunch and the spinach some coarseness. The spelt pasta, too, brings a subtle distinction to the dish: matched with the pinenuts its hint of nuttiness lifts the flavour.

SG also managed to wrest his tastebuds from the salsicce pizza of our last visit. He's not one to stray too far from the pork, however, and selects the calzone with napoli, bocconcini, spicy pork sausage, mushrooms and, wait for it, truffle oil. The combination of field mushrooms and truffle gives a wonderful earthiness to balance the spicy sausage. Some mouthfuls of the folded pizza are a little heavy on dough, but that's more about filling distribution than any fault of the dish.

Service, as always, was helpful and friendly. We'll need to call on their help during future visits, I would think, as the menu keeps getting harder to choose from.

Tasos

695 High St, Thornbury; 03 9480 6222

Something of a Thornbury institution, Tasos is a great place to head to for breakfast or morning tea after grocery shopping at Psarakos across the road. Their breakfast menu is straightforwad: there's toast with spreads (including marscapone and jam), pancakes with or without bacon, and eggs how you like with the extras you like.

More impressive is their array of cakes and delicacies: caramel tarts, mud cake, cheese cake, baclava, canoli...it's extensive. Their website features some very impressive photography work that only slightly exaggerates the effect of looking at their front window display! Customers coming in to collect enormous special occasion cakes is a regular event.

We go for the pancakes:At $6, they don't get in the way of the grocery budget! The best thing is they're deftly-made: light and fluffy. It was these I was thinking of when I was chewing through the stodgier fare at Twist in Newcastle. As long as you pay a little bit of attention you can control the maple syrup to pancake distribution. And starting the day with strawberries and ice cream is always a good option!

Antz in the Kitchen

901 High St, Thornbury; 0407 413 948

A food review without photos is like a coffee without sugar, or pasta without parmesan: the substance is there, but you're missing the extra kick that makes it memorable. It was my fault that I'd forgotten my camera, but after reluctantly employing the illogical cross-technology that is the phone camera, the accompanying software decided to 'cut' the photos off my phone, without then 'pasting' them onto my computer. Gone to the ether. Oh, the joys of technology.

Had it been a terrible cafe experience I perhaps would have cared less. But the relatively new Antz (at the Preston end of High St), while not taking any new culinary directions, is handling itself well in its chosen niche: breakfast and lunch staples, fresh juice and commendable coffee. The cafe fitout is strong on natural sunlight and primary colours. The deep blue pressed metal ceiling and red velvet bar stools give it the feel of a miniature ballroom.

The menu dances a steady waltz. Eggs - bendedict, florentine, scrambled or poached - take the floor first. Muesli and pancakes are quick to follow and shortly afterwards everyone has the chance to sit down to a range of sandwiches. The range of Antz burgers up the pace a little bit: there's the straight 'Antz' (beef pattie, lettuce and sauce), 'chickant' and 'vegant'. The ants go marching down the 'Refreshmants' board as well.

The food keeps its respectability and doesn't go off jiving to tunes it can't quite pull off. A BLT is served on a white bun with strips of iceberg, loads of bacon, a sweet mayonnaise and some unfortunately soggy tomato. The Antz burger is a thick pattie with a relish-style sauce. Most promisingly, the coffee served is of high quality, with a little-finger-thick crema and smooth taste that shows well-controlled roasting.

This is a small-scale, suburban cafe playing familiar tunes but showing good skill with its instruments.

Pizza Farro II

608 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 2040

What to do when a multi-page menu has no dull bits, no sections to skip over before you get to the good stuff? Pizza Farro's current menu is temptation from the off, with the front page pasta specials - such as spicy pork sausage in a carbonara sauce - almost luring me away from my dining intention: their excellent, spelt-flour pizzas.

As described in a previous post, the menu is divided into pastas, antipasti and meat, non-meat and fish pizzas. We managed to delve into three of these subsections between us. First out was garlic bread, which was moister than on our first visit and glowing with garlic flavour. Four arancini balls came with a pert, minty yoghurt sauce (handy I guess after all that garlic!) The rice balls were suitably crispy on the outside and held their filling well.

The pizzas were, again, delicious. The spelt dough base is very giving and perhaps a little nuttier than a standard flour one. And it's just not as heavy, so even after bread and a starter you can really hoe into the laden pizzas. First up was the ricotta, with olive tapenade, spinach, pine nuts, garlic and artichokes. What a list! It's a superb flavour and texture combination, as the salty tapenade layering the pizza base is perfectly countered by the sweet, fluffy ricotta. The pine nuts add a tiny bit of crunch and the artichokes give some roughage, in a good way, against the downy cheese.

The salsicce - spicy pork sausage, roast capsicum, spring onion, bocconcini and parmesan - flies the Italian tri-colour flag and looks as tempting and fulfilling as a pizza can. It delivers on the flavour promise, though all that meat, dough, greenery and cheese shaved on post-oven had my mind tricked into thinking focaccia rather than pizza.

Pizza Farro has made a name out of its rustic charm. BYO wine is served in the same type of tumblers as the water. The waitstaff are keen to help you with the menu, make recommendations and ensure you're aware of any updates since your last visit. A word on corkage though - we were last there in May and the corkage was $3.50 and in our case was actually $0, as they waived it since we hadn't finished the bottle. Last night corkage was $7 a bottle, about the same price as their cheapest by-the-glass. It seems out of keeping with the rustic atmosphere.

Pizza Farro

608 High St, Thornbury

Pizza Farro first came to my attention via their stand at the FLOUR festival during the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival. They were selling spelt flour, which they use in all their pizza bases. I was very interested, as since I started baking a lot I’m keen to source something, anything, to use other than that bleached, almost indigestible stuff known as white flour.

The restaurant is wonderfully decorated inside – rows of rolling pins hang from the ceiling, the curtains are stitched together from old tea towels, and the furniture is a mismatch of old, well-restored wooden tables and chairs. The larger room at the back has high cathedral ceilings, and the lighting and care taken in the décor give the venue a friendly, relaxing vibe. The wait staff are incredibly attentive and helpful – I think they’re feeling the vibe as well and can’t help but be in a good mood.

Complementing all of this is a varied menu and great food. Pizzas form the bulk, not surprisingly, and they’re broken down into meat, non-meat and fish. The combinations of ingredients are imaginative and even for carnivores the veggie mixes look just as appealing, such as olive tapenade, baby spinach, ricotta, roast artichoke, toasted pine nuts, garlic and sea salt. Since I’m with SG, however, I know that on this occasion going sans meat is not an option, but the artichokes have caught my eye so we go for the Carciofi – napoli, bocconcini, Virginian ham, roast artichoke and fresh parsley. A garlic focaccia to start is presented simply, a bit like a pide, and could have done with some extra oil to pour over. The pizza was excellent – even as you’re eating you can tell the spelt base is being kinder to your stomach, and without worrying about filling up too early on white flour you can readily indulge in the topping tastes. The ham is thinly sliced and goes a treat with the artichoke, the moistness of which is off set by the more textural bocconcini.

Just a word on our BYO as well – the meal was wonderfully washed down by a 2003 Bleasdale Malbec, with was smooth, slightly sweet, and full in the mouth with the soft Malbec grape.

Note the restaurant also sells their spelt flour – a 500g bag is $3.50

Devour Cafe

806 High St, Thornbury; 03 9484 8496

I came to Devour for a dish so loved by those in the know that a chalk-written sign in the window was enough to have me salivating for breakfast the next day - 'Baked Eggs are Back!' Devour is a small High Street cafe, with a menu that is definitely different from your average cafe, but not off-puttingly or unnecessarily fancy. Their breakfasts are legendary and memorable, for example the corn flake encrusted French Toast with berries. Patrons can observe busy High Street from the front of the cafe or retreat with their paper to the slightly raised back area, both of which feature colourful wooden furniture and interesting artworks.

But back to the Baked Eggs. The menu advises of a 25 minute wait, reconfirmed by the waiter. There's no need for apology - the extraordinary Devour Beef Burger that SG ordered comes with similar advice, and it points only to the quality of method and produce being used. In the case of the burger, the wait is necessary to cook the hugely thick pattie adequately. The Baked Eggs are so much more than just eggs - homemade baked beans line a ramekin, top by two eggs with spinach leaves in between. Around the sides, clam style, are chunks of chorizo with just the right amount of spice. The dish comes with plenty of toasted sourdough 'soldiers' for dunking (be warned, if you like to dunk runny eggs, do it straight away as the yolks continue to cook and harden in the steaming hot ramekin). The homemade beans are vastly superior to anything out of a tin, and scooping the mix onto great bread brings breakfast possibilities to a whole new level.