Breakfast
July 31, 2011 | 
Author Proud Mary
172 Oxford St, Collingwood
(03) 9417 5930
Proud Mary, oh why have I not been here earlier? I am officially declaring my undying love for you, all because of one, orgasmic ricotta hotcake that made me weak at my knees every time I think about it. I am in love… or in lust… or both.
God… I think I just drooled at the screen for 5 mins staring at the pic I put up. OK I gotta snap outta it but this ricotta pancake is seriously good. It might not be as fluffy as other pancakes, this was easily overlooked by other quality, like how it was served with a beautiful tangy orange blossom sauce, crunchy walnut, and a slice of chocolate fudge that melts everywhere to create this yummylicious Jaffa like experience… drools… double drools…. I think I seriously moaned the whole way through my brekkie, causing my brekkie companion Esky and Hubby to look at my strangely- until they try it themselves. I reckon if I wasn’t so overprotective of my food they will eat all my brekkie! The best thing about it is that it is served hot, scaldingly hot actually but hey I am not complaining there. There are many places that by the time the pancakes comes to the table it’s either hot but dry or cold, but these ricotta pancakes remained hot throughout. So glad I ordered this instead of my usual savoury brekkie.
Here is another food porn that you all can drool on and be envious about:-
Phew I just gotta fan myself a litte here and also talk about the other brekkie that Hubby and Esky had.
Hubby had a potato hash with poached eggs, bacon and bagna cauda, which is like an anchovies and garlic sauce. Hubby doesn’t like anchovies and I wondered how he coped with it, but he said that it was good and ate the whole thing. The eggs were perfectly poached and the bacon was not too fatty. I got one tiny mouthful and thought that the potato hash was a tad bit oily. But hey, hubby seemed to like it, and he ain’t gonna let me have another mouthful so it must be good!
Esky had the baked beans with poached egg which he said it was a perfect winter dish. He was a bit sick and baked beans make you fart so I didn’t try any 
But he seemed pretty impressed by it and ate everything.
On the side note, Dr. B has also recommended the cured salmon brekkie item that I really wanted to try, IF I ever get past the ricotta hotcakes. Perhaps I need to convince Hubby and Esky next time to share the ricotta hotcakes as a dessert… Mmmmm
I had a hot mocha here and normally I don’t rate coffees but I thought my hot mocha was fantastic. Perhaps not as good as St Ali which is one of my favourites, but this is still seriously good mocha!
The service in Proud Mary was very efficient, and it can be ever so slightly borderline brisk but we did really enjoyed our food and would definitely return very very soon. 9/10
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Tom Phat
184 Sydney Rd, Brunswick
(03) 9381 2374
Man, I’ve been eating out lots lately, especially going out for breakfast every weekend seemed to be a tradition now. This weekend we went to Tom Phat, a place that many people have raved about.
Tom Phat had a really nice big space which doesn’t make you feel cramped at all. The service is friendly and laid back- the guy simply pulled up a chair to take our orders, enthusiastically explaining everything and patiently waited for us when we couldn’t decide. I love this laid back vibe instantly.
Asian inspired brekkie is hard to find in Melbourne, and with an array of tempting Asian brekkie like black rice pudding w/ mango and yoghurt, scrambled eggs with roti, Uncle Ho’s grilled pork chop with fried egg and rice, coconut bread with grilled banana & coconut lime jam I was dizzy with choices. What to do?
In the end I gave into temptation and ordered 2 things (all for myself!): black sticky rice w mango & jaggery yoghurt $9 and wok kingfish w rice eggs curry leaves, cherry tomatoes & lime $15.9.
The black rice pudding looks awesome but it was a bit too sweet for my liking. Thanks goodness the mango and yoghurt are actually quite sour so it kind of balanced the flavour a bit better. Dr. Hot Guns said that Birdman Eating’s Black rice pudding is way better. Mmmmm I guess I will need to check them out soon.
To be honest I reckon Black Rice Pudding is quite hard to stuff up (I mean how hard can it be if even I can make it?) so maybe I should have ordered something a little bit different, like the coconut bread w/ grilled banana and coconut lime jam $9 that Dr. B ordered. While the texture of the coconut bread is quite crumbly I still really love the combination of flavours. The dish doesn’t seemed to be too sweet and the fragrant of the coconut made my mouth water. It was a serious case of food envy there!
My wok kingfish w rice eggs curry leaves cherry tomatoes & lime came. This dish is basically fried rice with fish, atopped with cabbage and rocket. I wasn’t sure whether they did have cherry tomatoes in the fried rice cos I couldn’t see any, but the flavour of the fried rice itself was good, with just the right amount of saltiness of fish sauce and lovely curry leaves to make the flavours pop. The cabbage and rocket mixture had some of the palm sugar dressing, and while I like their idea of using the palm sugar to balance out the saltiness of the fried rice and the bitterness of the rocket, the chef was a little bit heavy handed on the sugar and it overpowered the whole dish a little bit. But the biggest issue with this dish is actually the kingfish itself, which was overcooked and a bit tough. Overall I would say this dish was better than average but it does have some room for improvement.
Hubby is an unadventurous soul so he ordered the Tom Phat brekkie with fried (instead of the normal poached) eggs, bacon, mushies, tomatoes, avocado… you get the idea $16.9.
I looked on with disdain as he tucked into a normal big breakkie which you can get anywhere but that’s kinda the good thing about Tom Phat- it caters for people like Hubby. That said however I think hubby is a bit sad it didn’t come with hash brown, like, you know, the normal big brekkie. *rolls eyes*
I asked him how it was and he shrugged and said it was alright, nothing extra special about it (I mean, how special can a boring big brekkie be?) but did say that the toast is a bit hard.
Overall, I would say this is an above average experience but since I am still intrigued by their menu I wouldn’t mind coming back to try some more. I shall report back afterwards! 6.5/10
Symposium Cafe
2/26 Commercial Rd, Fortitude Valley
07 3852 3836
Monkylicious brought me to this awesome cafe the last time I visited Brisvegas called Symposium. What’s the attraction? Degustation Breakfast. Oh yeah. Enough said. I am totally there.
For $45 you can have a 4 course degustation brekkie with coffee and tea. First course arrived at lightening speed. Fresh seasonal fruit shot w organic yoghurt & homemade honey nut granola & mango puree. The yoghurt puree and granola is totally awesome, the granola crunchy and nuts are fresh, the mango puree compliments greatly with the yoghurt. Not too sure about the seasonal fruit shot, I didnt mind it but it’s really huge. A small shot glass would have been much better considering we have so much other stuff to eat.
Next up is the Regal hot smoked salmon w hash cake, scrambled eggs & cottage cheese. Daintily stacked in beautiful colours, the salmon is smokey, more smokey than most of the other smoked salmon I’ve tasted, but the dill in that dish really refreshes the flavours. The scrambled eggs are creamy and the potatoes have the most wonderful crunchiness to it. YUM.
Our second savoury course is the Petit fry up w quail eggs & all the trimmings. It is so totally cute that we just stared at it and took pictures for ages. We didn’t actually wanna eat it cos it’s way to cute. The quail eggs has such intense flavours and it is cooked to perfection. It was just the right size for a degustation course.
Our very last course is another sweet course- Sweet brioche w poached strawberries & bourbon cream. There are 4 strawberries on the brioche, 2 poached and 2 fresh. It was funny cos Monky liked the fresh ones but I actually quite like the poached ones. Not too sure whether there’s bourbon in that cream cos I couldn’t taste it but the brioche with the cream absolutely hits the spot. It is my favourite part of the meal.
Other brekkie are also highly recommended, especially the Filo parcel lined w prosciutto & filled w creamy scrambled eggs, topped with hollandaise sauce is freakin awesome. You’ve got to visit this place if you’re in New Farm 8/10
Earl Canteen
500 Bourke St (entry via Lt Bourke St), Melbourne
03 9600 1995
Earl Canteen has, in a short period of time, made a name for themselves for being THE lunch spot in the West end of the city for the last couple of months. For those who haven’t heard of the LEGENDARY Earl Canteen PORK BELLY Sandwiches- you really need to get there- PRONTO!
In the past few days they have also got a new brekkie menu, and of course I gotta have it!
With PMummy and PDiddy in tow, we tried out three brekkie choices: Mushroom ($10), Baked Beans ($8.5) and a salmon bagel (forgot how much it is).
I would have to say my favourite is the Baked Beans. This is no ordinary baked beans, mind you, this is baked beans served with chorizo, fresh basil leaves and chunky fetta. For a mere $8.5, it a delicious, healthy and VERY filling brekkie. The mixture of flavours are so beautiful that my belly is rumbling at the though of it. Which reminds me I’ll be at that end of town next week so you will definitely see me there! OH YEAH!
The mushroom gluten free wrap though, I must say, it’s slightly less attractive. I love the taste and the variety of mushroom, especially the wood ear- love love love it! Sadly the wrap is a bit dry (maybe cos it’s gluten free?). Kudos for having gluten free option though! This would probably be great with a bit more sauce.
The cooked salmon bagel is a bit disappointing though 
The bagel is really dry and it took PDiddy ages to finish it. He wasn’t very impressed.
Overall, the service, the freshness of the food and the baked beans are the redeeming factors- just don’t order the salmon bagel! 7/10
Hardware Societe
120 Hardware St, Melbourne
03 9078 5992
First of all I would like to thank Tummyrumbles for introducing me to this cheery little place between Lonsdale and Little Lonsdale St. Splashes of yellow brightens up the place, and rows of baguettes, puddings and tarts made me drool.
My poor breakkie buddy Pannacotta have been dragged here one early, too early morning, and ordered 2 coffees at once. A big Illy fan, she was pleasantly surprised by the smoothness of the brand Hardware Societe used, which is called Supreme- must have certainly been supreme cos Panacotta soon ordered another one! Of course it doesn’t hurt that there was this morsel of mini bomboloni sitting prettily on the side plate. Pannacotta was nice enough to let me have one and it was soft, not very sweet and extremely yummie. I secretly wondered if I could grab the bowl full of these mini-bombolini which is just sitting on the benchtop and do a runner…
I would highly recommend their hot chocolate too-it’s a yummie big jug of melted good quality chocolate- YUMO!
For breakkie I ordered the boiled eggs with 3 soldiers $12- oh it’s just some old boiled eggs with measly soldiers- NOT! It was such a beautifully presented feast for breakfast for such a small price.
I am always a little wary of soft boiled eggs, at times they are way too runny, and other times it has this weird aftertaste to it. Well, not the ones in here- the eggs are fresh and it has just the right firmness to it.
The 3 soldiers are just exquisite- From right to left soldiers: salmon roe, jamon and frittata. The salmon roe was a fresh little burst of saltiness and sweetness; jamon is dressed with a fig syrup (I think) and it was beautiful. The frittata- what can I say? The egg and potato combo may be a bit chunky on a slice of baguette but it was so yummy that I don’t care.
On another occasion in their Saturday Brunch, I had yummie scrambled eggs with a smoked salmon noisette baguette. I still like the boiled eggs the best, but this is really awesome too!
Hubby had a Bircher Museli with Berries, stone fruit and nuts like pistachios- everything was so fresh, it tasted really good on the first bite, however, it tasted really sour the more you eat it! It would have been nicer if it was sweeter.
I would love to try Hardware Societe’s Lunch menu but sadly I work too far away for that. Fingers crossed that Saturday brunch would eventually have some of their awesome sounding lunch menu items for me to try!! 9/10!
Tags: Little Larder
76 Moray St, New Farm, QLD
07 3358 2024
To be honest, Little Larder was not our first choice. I’ve been to Little Larder before and while it was great, we were extremely keen to try Au Cirque. Disappointingly, Au Cirque had a power failure, which meant that not much was available and so we had to go to Little Larder.
Thank goodness Little Larder did not disappoint. Whilst the service was a bit abrupt at times, they generally deliver efficiently in a Saturday morning mad rush. We had two breakkies between the three of us, as the servings are quite big.
Pesto scrambled eggs $13.5- I love, love, love pesto so as you can clearly see- green colour of the eggs = lots of pesto! YUMMM! The scrambled eggs are creamy and salmon compliments the pesto and eggs well (actually, what DOESN’T compliment eggs?), kudos also to putting toast on top to the scrambled eggs, so it won’t get as soggy- the only glitch was that it needs a little teeny bit more salt- then it’s prefect.
We also had a polenta served w/ poached eggs, avocado, spinach and dill mayo $13. Ok, polenta may sound like a dull, healthy, tasteless snack but you’d be amazed what it can taste like with good seasoning. The polenta we had in Little Larder was crispy and I can safely say that it’s almost as yummie as a hash brown!! The dill mayo is just awesome with everything and the only complaint I have was that the avocado has these sad dotted brown spots all over it.
On such a hot day, I also had a watermelon, mint and apple juice- which not only cools you down but invigorates.
I still want to try Au Cirque just because I haven’t tried it before, but Little Larder is definitely a good choice if you’re hanging around New Farm. 7/10
My new hubby and I were wandering the streets of Byron Bay on our honeymoon looking for a good coffee and yummy breakfast to start the day. Not being very familiar with the area I picked a nice little cafe that looked busy and popular, hoping that was a sign of good things to come. This has been in my book for a while as a good way to pick a place to eat. If there is a busy restaurant and a deserted one, pick the busy one. It sits next to the rule that if there are two Chinese restaurants and one is filled with Chinese diners and in the other there isn’t one in sight, pick the one the Chinese are eating at. Following my own advice turned out to be a great decision.
The tables outside sit on a little raised deck. We found a cosy table in the corner, with the warm winter sun smiling upon our backs. We were presented with Mohka’s “Egg Book” listing all our choices for breakfast. I was happy to find at the bottom of one of the pages, the perfect breakfast for me. The ‘Breakfast Tapas’ with a little bit of everything I like.
The Breakfast Tapas
Free range poached egg, grilled haloumi, spinach, avocado, springs smoked salmon and organic sour dough toast.
Plus, I couldn’t resist adding a side of fried potatoes to my meal, and yes it is even more delicious than it looks.
This was my favourite breakfast during our week at Byron. I wish I had made time to go back again. The potatoes had lovely crispy bits, a nice naughty treat with my breakfast (I was on holidays after all, and no more having to make sure I can fit into the wedding dress). The sour dough was nicely toasted and a good thickness. As I sat there making different combinations of food for each mouthful I enjoyed telling myself that the avocado and spinach was balancing out the fact that I was eating haloumi for breakfast. Such a happy start to the morning.
My newly wedded husband chose a Spanish omelette for his breakfast. There were lots of delicious bits of chorizo, potato and onion and topped with more of that tasty sour dough bread and a bit of tomato relish. Even after eating my own breakfast I still couldn’t resist stealing some of his.
It was a lovely little place to have breakfast and breakfast service was at a good pace, though if you are down in Byron hopefully it means you are taking a nice laid back break and are enjoying a relaxing pace. The beach is only a few minutes walk away too, very convenient for taking a lovely stroll to walk off breakfast. I can’t wait to go back.
Smolt
2 Salamanca Square, Hobart
03 6224 2554
I really really wanted to eat lunch at Smolt, which offer small Spanish/Italian influenced share plates but it was breakkie time and only breakkie was offered and I am really really starving.
![IMG_2305 [640x480]](https://www.bellygood.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/IMG_2305-640x480-300x225.jpg "IMG_2305 [640x480]")
I have this weird thing with brekkie, I always wanted both sweet and savoury food and I get really confused about what to order.
Thank god there’s hubby there and he has been extra accomodating on that day, so we shared a baked eggs and french toast, so we have a bit of savoury, a bit of sweet. YAY!
![IMG_2308 [640x480]](https://www.bellygood.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/IMG_2308-640x480-300x225.jpg "IMG_2308 [640x480]")
The food took a while, perhaps it’s because I am just STARVED, but when it finally came, it looks really really good.
Eggs are baked with white beans, sausage and tomato. It was really really yummie. You won’t find canned baked beans and rubbery sausage here- these are freshly cooked white beans, mouth-watering home made sausage bits- mmm this is sooo good with baked eggs. You can also choose mushrooms with baked eggs, which is what I would have chosen if I didn’t have to share with Hubby. Not that I am complaining
![IMG_2310 [640x480]](https://www.bellygood.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/IMG_2310-640x480-300x225.jpg "IMG_2310 [640x480]")
French toast is served with caramelised banana, candied fruit, cinnamon vanilla butter. Yes, it sounded awesome, but sadly it wasn’t as tasty as it looks. I think they must have used ciabatta or some other bread that’s really hard- I’ve never had such hard french toast before!
It’s really sad cos all the banana, candied fruit and especially the cinnamon vanilla butter is fantastic. What made it worse is that the day before I had french toast in Cafe Vue, and whilst Cafe Vue doesn’t have fancy butters and fruits, it has a truly awesome, soft spongy thick toast. You just can’t beat that. Smolt needs to get their basics right on the french toast.
Still, I must say I really really wanted to come back here for lunch or dinner. I’ve got fantastic reviews from Sharon just today, and I want to go back right now! 5/10
Trotters
400 Lygon St, Carlton
This is fast turning into a breakkie blog. We braved the constant threat of Swine Flu to try this piggy cafe- Trotters. There’s no real pigs inside, thank goodness, except me! Trotters is a warm cosy space packed with tables and chairs, you will have to squeeze past people everytime you walk through, but that’s what makes it really cosy.
I had breakkie here twice now, and this time I had Risotto Cakes with smoked salmon, poached eggs and wilted spinach $14.50. The risotto cake is not much of a cake than a pile, mixed with dill, which is extremely tasty. The poached eggs were great, although it could have been poached slightly longer by my standards, I like my poached eggs slightly runny only. The salmon was OK but the wilted spinach is a bit too oily for my liking.
The previous time I had baked egg hot pot with mushroom, tomato and spinach $13, which is extremely satisfying in a cold day. It’s not as good as the one I had in the European though!
I couldn’t resist the choc banana muffin $3.5 that sits so invitingly near the cashier so I took one home for hubby, unfortunately it’s not really that great, a bit too clumpy for my liking.
Service-wise, it can be a bit inconsistent. The first time I went the waitress was very friendly and prompt, the next time I’ve been, they forgot our jam, told us they don’t have marmarlade but they actually had cumquat marmarlade, and they tried to take our plates before we finish eating!
Still, I quite enjoy my breakkie there, the serving is so large that you could probably share. I would dearly love to try lunch there too and I’ve already picked out a few dishes I would like to eat there! 6.5/10
Beetroot
123 Hardware St, Melbourne
(03) 9600 0695
Dark chocolate w/Persian fairy floss
Beetroot used to be my favourite spot for breakkie, however the last two times I went for breakkie and lunch, I was slightly disappointed. The service is the friendly usual- the boisterous owner greeted me heartily with a bottle of water. There are lemon ricotta muffin that tempted me- unfortunately unforgivable erro
r made me wonder whether go back again… but then again, the food is just so tempting and the atmosphere so cosy, it’s hard to stay away.
Well, let’s go to breakkie first. In my point of view, breakfast takes the medal here- it changes seasonally, and it always have something interesting, museli with fresh fruit which comes with a teeny tiny jar of milk, porridge with poached pear and cinnamon and of course, the usual favourites.
Dark chocolate w/Persian fairy floss is the irresistable choice, especially
when you can choose between dark, milk and white chocolate. As usual I chose the soy dark chocolate- a dash of hot soy milk melts the dark chocolate bits, but it doesn’t melt entirely, so you need to stir it a bit 
The hot chocolate is not too sweet, but the fairy floss makes up for the sweetness.
Timing-wise, it took them a long long time for the food to come out, at both lunch and beakkie. We had the blueberry pancake with berry compote $12, it looks pretty enough, but the pancake seemed to be premade and then microwaved (Tigerlily and I BOTH heard the microwave beeping), and it wasn’t even hot, which was quite disappointing- and why would it take so long (20mins) if it’s a microwaved pancake?!
The poached eggs with salmon and avocado ($13.5) was much much better, the eggs were perfectly poached, hollandaise sauce is creamy and just the right portion, avoca
do and salmon dances a perfect harmony with each other.
LUNCH. WELL. This is interesting. I felt like something warm and hearty, so I chose the celery and bacon soup $7.5. It was just what I needed,
as MC would probably say, “a nice, simple cafe style food”. While I am taking another bite, I thought the bacon felt really, REALLY chewy. I chewed a bit more and had to discreetly spit it out- it was a half chopped up rubberband. BIG MISTAKE. Aaaarrrggggghhhh…!
Pannacotta had a vegetarian lasagne and THAT was really good too! Pity about the soup! Everyone else had nice meals!
Other lunch selection includes vegetarian quiche, a giant sausage roll and salad selection. Most mains comes with garden salad also, which is very fresh.
It just frustrates me in the two seperate occasions I managed to find something wrong with Beetroot, especially when I’ve been a couple of times and it had been fine! Maybe I’ve gotta go there again to check them out again….I really want that lemon ricotta muffin… 4/10