Cafe Breakfasts

Birdman Eating, Fitzroy

~ culinaldi ~ 2 Comments

The pressure is on. Where do I head to on Saturday morning for breakfast? I’ve been a bit complacent over the last few weeks as there have been so many new and wonderful cafes to visit in my local neighbourhood but now I need to get serious about getting out and about and visiting those cafes on my “must do” list. Flicking through the Melbourne Magazine, I see an article on the Birdman Rally held in 1989 and then I mentally recall to mind a cafe in Fitzroy called “Birdman Eating” that had been mentioned to me several months ago.

With a destination in mind, I negotiated a train and a tram to get to Gertrude Street and looked for the cafe. I’m always fearful that there won’t be a table or space for me when I arrive, but I was in luck and found a table inside. A beautiful, old building with stained glass windows, art deco lighting and dark wood panelling and mirrors along the walls, it was exactly where I wanted to be on a warm summer morning.

Eagerly anticipating the breakfast menu, my finely honed radar sense zeroed in on French toast offering on the menu, but then my eyes skipped to the ricotta hotcakes, which is a dish close to my heart and is not always readily available on most cafe menus. The description of the dish was so unique – I’ve seen meat cooked using the confit method but the idea of possibly applying the same process to fruit was mind boggling.

Ricotta hotcakes with confit caramelised banana, peanut butter & maple syrup - Birdman Eating, Fitzroy
Ricotta hotcakes with confit caramelised banana, peanut butter & maple syrup – Birdman Eating, Fitzroy

The first mouthful was of the peanut butter ice-cream mixture on top of the hotcakes and it blew my mind away. Soft and creamy with a distinct but not over-powering peanut butter flavour. The hard part was trying to eat it before it rapidly melted away.

The confit banana still maintained its form, slightly mushy on the outside but firm enough to cut with a knife. The ricotta hotcakes were nice and hot, but not exactly memorable. I couldn’t detect any ricotta in the mixture and felt like I was eating a very crispy pancake but it adequately soaked up the maple syrup, melted ice-cream and banana.

I always save the hard bit to last! The pecan praline was a complete surprise and was a fairly thick shard of toffee but not too hard to break apart into edible bite-size pieces.

The best thing about this dish, and which isn’t really identifiable in the photo because I’ve zoomed in, is that it is not a substantially large dish that prevents you from eating again at lunch time. Bon appetite!

Hideout Cafe and Rubix Cafe, Wodonga

~ culinaldi ~ 3 Comments

Wodonga! Can anything good come from there? Well, it’s my home town. Sometimes I love it and at other times, I’m glad to leave it behind in the rear view mirror. Nevertheless, I have spent a great deal of my time and money indulging in Saturday breakfasts in Albury-Wodonga cafes over the past decade or so. My favourite places for breakfast used to be the Wodonga Plant Farm and Cafe Grove, but these cafes change ownership regularly so I’ve been a bit reticent to go back on recent visits.

Being keen to try somewhere new, one of my Facebook friends recently posted a beautiful photo of a pancake stack and I mentally noted that I needed to go and try it out when I was next in Wodonga. Hideout Cafe is located in Waratah Way and used to be a milk bar and takeaway store when I was in high school.

It felt really odd to return to the store after some twenty years or more. The facade has changed from mission brown to white, and the store has had a modern makeover to transform it into a cafe. However it still has that cloying smell of vegetable oil in the air and the usual corner store items are still for sale to the neighbouring residents.

At the counter, I quickly looked at the breakfast menu, which was divided into two pancake offerings, a French toast section, artisan bread for toast with condiments, corn fritters and then an array of individual items to create your own individual cooked, savoury breakfast. Enjoying the sunshine outside, the windows were emblazoned with self-printed signs proclaiming the “Border’s best breakfast”. Can’t wait!

My breakfast dish was personally delivered by a chef in whites. Extremely posh for West Wodonga but appreciated. The chef noted that I didn’t have water on my table and arranged for a bottle to be brought out to me. Two thumbs up.

French toast with poached pear, Turkish dried fig and lime yoghurt - Hideout Cafe, Wodonga
French toast with poached pear, Turkish dried fig and lime yoghurt – Hideout Cafe, Wodonga

The presentation was impeccable, however the yoghurt looked a little on the lumpy side and the obligatory sprinkling of icing sugar was about to declare war on my lovely orange pants. The bread was soft and light and perfect with the moist poached pears, which suprisingly still had skin on. I love toasted flaked almonds and they were a great accompaniment. The sliced dried Turkish figs were a bit tough to chew but added a sweet flavour.

When I tasted the yoghurt, I hate to admit it but it had a distinct taste of garlic. After another taste, I came to the conclusion that it didn’t need to be on my plate or near my toast for that matter. With all the dry elements on the toast, the dish needed some moisture and the syrup was not too sweet and was delicious with the figs, pears and almonds.

So in conclusion, a delicious and filling breakfast but I wasn’t overwhelmingly convinced that it was the best breakfast I’ve had in Albury-Wodonga.

A planned power outage on early Sunday morning made it necessary to leave home and go in search of breakfast and coffee. Last weekend, my wonderful Dad (who enthusiastically supports my food and wine adventures) cut out a comment from the letters to the editor in the local newspaper about a new cafe in Wodonga’s Cube complex and asking whether people knew about it. Well I do now.

The cafe space at The Cube is clean, spacious, modern with an outdoor dining area and much appreciated air-conditioning to escape the summer heat.

Rubix Cafe at The Cube, Wodonga
Rubix Cafe at The Cube, Wodonga

From the sweet to the savoury, the sound of the Potato Boxtie (sic), which is a traditional Irish potato pancake, with house smoked salmon and sour cream piqued my interest.

Potato Boxtie - potato pancake with house smoked salmon, sour cream and fresh lemon - Rubix Cafe, Wodonga
Potato Boxty – potato pancake with house smoked salmon, sour cream and fresh lemon – Rubix Cafe, Wodonga

My breakfast exceeded all expectations. Four fluffy thin savoury pancakes with a delicious creamy sauce of dill, finely diced red onion and sour cream, topped with thick, warm pieces of salmon fillet. Totally divine, delicious, yummy and filling. Perfect sustenance for getting me through another long train trip back to Melbourne.

http://www.thecubewodonga.com.au/cafe_bar/

As for the Border’s best breakfast, that honour will always go to my Mum and Dad!

Baby Cafe & Pizzeria, Richmond

~ culinaldi ~ 2 Comments

I know it’s unusual to go to a pizzeria for breakfast but when the restaurant is the latest offering by the same owner of the recently defunct Pearl Cafe it almost seems like a logical choice after all.

While the hordes are queueing up to get a table at Top Paddock, directly across the road, there are no crowds and table and chairs a plenty. It seems somewhat selfish, but I was secretly glad that the masses were elsewhere and I could stroll into the courtyard at Baby and immediately sit down and enjoy the beautiful sunshine.

Tables in the sunshine at Baby Cafe and Pizzeria, Richmond
Tables in the sunshine at Baby Cafe and Pizzeria, Richmond

I will admit to trying to find out what dishes were on offer for breakfast at Baby, but the online menu available only showcased the lunch and dinner options. I even asked a friend at work who had breakfast there recently what was available but the only information that I could glean was that Baby had the usual breakfast offerings. So with much anticipation, I waited for the menu.

With so many delectable things to try, my eyes stopped agog at the sight of the word “panettone”. Panettone and I have a very special relationship with each other. This past Christmas, my niece and I had toasted panettone, strawberries and Jalna vanilla yogurt for breakfast (sometimes with a healthy dollop of Nutella). I even made a panettone and strawberry bread and butter pudding for dessert over the holidays (which I think the muchkins and I had for breakfast one day as well!). Occasionally a good friend of mine will give me a little box of panettone as a Christmas gift, which is always received with a happy heart.

Panettone (French toast), mascarpone and macerated strawberries - Baby Cafe & Pizzeria, Richmond
Panettone (French toast), mascarpone and macerated strawberries – Baby Cafe & Pizzeria, Richmond

When breakfast arrived, the panettone was cooked in a French toast style and looked delicious with the strawberries, dollops of mascarpone and syrup drizzled over the top. As I took my first bite, I could only think of one word – Christmas. The sweet flavour of the fruit filled panettone and the cooked strawberries was incredible, mingled with the additional sweetness of the mascarpone and the strawberry-flavoured syrup, it resembled and tasted like Christmas on a plate. As I devoured my breakfast and with the summer sun still shining, I could almost believe it really was December again.