Breakfast
February 1998
Breakfasts have always been the last, not the first, meal I'd dream about. Twenty one years of finishing work in the restaurant well after 1am, meant my scramble for the day was to get ready in time for lunch.
But with the Herald Sun Breakfast around the Tan coming up I decided to get into training and am beginning to like the habit. On weekdays there's a lot on offer around town but at weekends, its seriously suburban.
Breakfast goes till at least 3pm along Brunswick Street, till 6pm at Retro and all day at Marios where it all began. The Marios (Mario Dipasquale and Mario Maccarone) were the first in 1986 to offer breakfast as an all day meal and they've spawned lots of imitators up and down the street and all over town.
Their other establishment, The Continental, is Prahran's popular meeting place and gets particularly hectic on Saturdays. Their standard B & E (bacon, eggs and toast) is $7.50 and consistently good espresso at $2.50.
On Smith Street, Toast, has its own style. As the cheery yellow sign with its pop-up toaster indicates, this is toasted bread territory. All breads are made here and served in thick slices. Their Eggs Florentine, poached egg, spinach, hollondaise sauce (rather than the traditional mornay) served on a thick slice of dark rye, is really delicious. A range of tea (leaves not bags) is made in ample aqua ceramic pots each with a short and long spout (one for pouring and one for handling) and served with tea strainer and extra water. The B & E is also excellent but at $9.50 is amongst the most expensive around. At South Yarra's super fashionable Harvey's, the same dish including grilled tomato is a dollar less.
The surroundings and the customers could not be more different. A Porsche is almost compulsory as an accessory in Murphy Street, south of the Yarra. But Harvey's really knows its breakfast business. The service is fast and pleasant and over 4 hours on Sundays they'll serve up to 500 breakfasts, so bookings are advisable!
Not so speedy but trendy in its own boxed wooden seat way is La Barbera in Richmond. Here the Turkish Breakfast (boiled egg, carefully pitted black olives, mild fetta, cucumbers, tomatoes, pide bread and honey) is $8.90. The La Barbera breakfast (eggs, mushrooms, tomato, bacon and toast) is nicely cooked and prettily plated though insufficient draining of the eggs made the good sour dough toast a bit wet. Tea consisted of a bag in one little stainless steel pot with no extra water.
In Bridge Rd Richmond there are a plethora of cafes serving breakfasts between Church and Lennox Streets before you get to the much grander and infinitely more stylish Richmond Hill Cafe and Larder at no. 50. But right down the other end at 266 is the humble little Blue Heaven, a sort of cross between Fitzroy and St Kilda in its style. Another distinctive neighbourhood place is the George St Cafe in East Melbourne. There is a real community feel in this corner cafe with its tables and chairs outside and cute little slip cover chairs in the window inside, loads of papers and magazines to read, freshly baked goodies and very dedicated owners. Breakfast (B & E at $6.50) is served till at least 2pm all week.
Victory Cafe on Fitzroy St. is a favourite spot for families at weekends. The wide old railway verandas provide shelter and safety for kids and dogs at this busy intersection. Further along The Street Cafe loses custom by stopping their breakfast menu sharp at noon even on Sundays.
Southbank is busy for all meals at weekends but during the week the place for breakfast is Blue Train. The menu is more varied than most, as well as B & E for $5.90 (available daily from 7am-4pm) there are exotic combinations such as fig, apricot and orange compote over couscous. The fresh fruits is a generous combination at $5.70.
But it's the city itself, during the week, where the real bargains are and its hard to go past Hardware Street. As well as trade from surrounding offices there's lots more residents making this a really interesting cafe precinct and it was the scene of a Jazz street party in January during the Melbourne International Jazz Festival. The streetscape work done here won the City of Melbourne a Proud Capital City award.
At Cafe all'Angolo (corner of Hardware Lane and Little Bourke St) a B & E will be served to you within minutes for $2.50 and a good short machiato, a mere $1.50. There are other B & E breakfast bargains nearby, just across Little Bourke St the HardBourke Cafe charges $3.00, in nearby William St is Nick's at $3.80 or Donato's 472 Bourke Street at $3.00.
More discreet business breakfasts are held in the club like atmosphere of Syracuse in Bank Place. B & E here is $7.50, coffee $2.50 and tea $3.
Now up the other end of town we have the Georges Cafe which could become a major breakfast business meeting place with its tables ready to be joined for spreading out papers, its grand scale lending a sense of importance to the meeting and, the wonderful Collins street address. The breakfast menu (B & E at $9.50,coffee and tea$2.50) is available 7-10.30am weekdays and on Saturdays and Sundays from 10am till noon. It's great for the city having Georges open weekends bringing life back to Collins Street and not far away in the beautiful and historic Block Arcade (on the site of the original George & Georges Emporium) Cafe Segovia is a hip and happening breakfast place at weekends.
But on Sunday March 15 you can do six breakfasts in one leisurely healthy stroll with the Herald Sun Breakfast around the tan. The 3.8 km walk will give you enough exercise and appetite to get through juice, fruit & yoghurt, cereals, eggs, pastries & coffee and finish with a glass of sparkling wine. This breakfast is part of the fun of the Melbourne Food and Wine Festival which has also programmed a special country breakfast on the following Sunday at the opulently restored Chateau Yering Historic Hotel at Yering near Yarra Glen. On March 22 Chef Gary Cooper will prepare a menu starting with a glass of sparkling wine, a selection of French pastries and fruits then a choice of scrambled eggs with Spring smoked salmon or an omelette - fines herbes, tomato or cheese - all with bacon. Bookings: Sonia 9237 3333.
As I said earlier, breakfast could definitely become a serious habit.
Mietta O'Donnell
This first appeared in the Herald Sun on 7th February, 1998.
©Mietta's 1998.