If Chin Chin is trying to captivate me and seduce me into a long term relationship, it’s going about it the right way.

(Disclaimer – my friend Jess Ho works at Chin Chin – but not even she can get you priority seating!)

The large (cavernous?) space on Flinders lane uses the best of what it’s got; high ceilings, a corner location; a serious gap in the market; fills it full of comfortable furniture (not too full!), eclectic music and “beautiful” people; and serves up tasty, interesting food of SE Asia for me to share.

We had a fun night, 5 of us, an easy wine choice (in carafes from Yabby Lake  winemaker Tom Carson… Pinot Grigio or Pinot Noir) a moderate beer list with many from  SE Asia, a few cocktails to start with and intelligent, smooth service (“I’ll let you have some more time with the menu, then come back and talk about wine “, says our “wine guy”)

The service snaps along, pacey but not pushy. I doubt you’d want a long, languorous meal here (although a bar session could be quite tempting), but we didn’t feel rushed.

We ordered

• Chin Chin Pork “Roll Ups”  - red braised suckling pig, with pancakes, slaw and sour herbs $16 Spicy corn and coriander fritters with iceberg lettuce and chilli jam  $8
• Crispy Barramundi & green apple salad with caramelised pork, chilli and lemongrass $24
• Steamed spanner crab salad & chicken salad with ruby grapefruit, coconut and fragrant salad $23
• Salad of organic silken tofu, banana blossom and thai basil $16
• Massama curry of coconut braised beef brisket $18
• Son in Law Eggs with Chilli jam $8

And 1.5 litres of Pinot Gris.

I guess the “hardcore” will say it’s “panasian” in a derogatory sense, but I’m more than happy to explore different spice mixes and flavours in the one meal.

It’s all geared to be comfortable, approachable and somewhere you can’t wait to return to. If they were open for lunch I think I’d be back tomorrow, but until that happens, I’ll drop in for dinner / snacks in the next week I reckon. I want those corn fritters again, and some more massaman curry, I didn’t get to try the eggnets, or the oysters, or the tripe salad, or the house made noodles, or so many of the dishes others have been raving about … Next week!

(There are no photos because it was too dark and I was having too much fun to really bother with manually adjusting settings – can there be any higher praise?)

Billy from Half Eaten really likes Chin Chin.

Ed for Tomato seemed to enjoy it – and was sitting next to us on his what third? or fourth visit.

I’ve got a cheeky day off work.  Shall I stay home and do housework? Snuggle up and read books or go to a film?  or shall I adventure out on the Number 8 tram to South Yarra, visit a cheekily named noodle bar and get me some noodles…

You know it.

So a year ago I discovered St Ali at Night.  Chef Benjamin Cooper cooked for all us hungry, hunnnnggggrreee bloggers at the end of the inaugural food bloggers conference Eat Drink Blog.

A room of 50 food obsessed people, drunk on the power of connecting in person and talking, talking, talking about food, wine, food, cocktails, food and blogging.  That’s a tough audience to cut through no matter how hungry we were.  But I remember the taste of the broth that came around the ox cheek ravioli. Oh how I remember it …salty, citrusy, sweet, sour …balanced. It was a revelation and it stopped conversation at our table more than the fishheads.

This was my first experience with Benjamin’s food. I’ve eaten at St Ali both in the day time and at night time several times since then.

I was keen to try out the new outpost (hah!) of the St Ali empire, just across the lane from Outpost in South Yarra, a short walk from the tram stop or the South Yarra train station. I’m not often in South Yarra, and was a bit surprised that the “laneway” was bright and shiny new and faced with an igloo full of shoes the day I visited.  I guess that’s a South Yarra version of a laneway then?

We're not in Fitzroy Anymore Dorothy

Anyway – food … as I walking down Yarra Street I could smell the chilli and fishsauce, and I started salivating.

I slid the heavy door open and entered into an concrete and mesh design den.  It’s dark, with polished concrete and honey coloured timber.  Outside looks like it’s been cladded in old pallet timber  -  lovingly and very neatly cut packing timber, but you know what I mean.  Inside there are cupbaords with cutout doors. There’s a large communal table and a fewer than I expected small round tables for two or three.  It’s slick, but warm and welcoming.

Honey ....

I sit at the concrete bar that separates the kitchen from the dining room and I can smell chilli and woks and all manner of good thing.  The menu is split into wok noodles, soup noodles and salad noodles.

Hokkien Nooddle with Pork

The Hokkien Noodle with slow roast BBQ pork is usually served with oyster mushrooms as well as the broccoli stems, chilli and garlic ($17), but it wasn’t any bother for the kitchen to whip me up a version without the mushrooms.  The noodles were nice and springy, the broccoli crisp and there was just enough chilli there to be taken seriously, but not too scarily.  If you really like chilli, I’d ask them to amp it up for you.

Pork Wonton Noodle soup

For the Spicy Pork Wonton Soup ($16.50), Benjamin  made the wontons to order, and they were poached in a good flavoured broth (the stocks are made inhouse, and you sure can taste the difference) and served with egg noodles and shaved cabbage.  Delicious and moreish.

I was lucky enough to dine the same day as their liquor licence arrived, so I enjoyed an asian beer with my cheeky lunchtime treat.  From this week they will be open nights and will serve the cold and hungry masses that live in the many apartments nearby.

Sure you can get cheaper noodle dishes in cardboard cartons around the corner somewhere – but they won’t taste a patch on this food, and you won’t get anywhere near as much cheap filler at MoPho.  The flavour is good and the ingredients top notch.  It’s not making me want to move to South Yarra, but it’s definitely worth a visit.

Next time I want to try the Yellow Curry of Coconut Braised Chicken with Son-In-Law Egg and Mint ($19.50)   or the Rendang of Brisket, Pumpkin and Ginger ($20.00) or the Pho, or a noodle salad … maybe some roti?

Oh yeh – and the panda with the green mohawk – that’s pretty cute Ben!

Links:

Read about the interior design on Habitus Living

And Broadsheet have been there as has The Age.

Blogs:

Michael from My Aching Head likes it (and was visiting again the same day I was)

and the Very Very Hungry Caterpillar rates the Pad Thai.

Subscribe to my posts to be advised of when this post is updated.

Am I a fan of the “grunge” styling?   I’m not sure I am.  All that has changed is the letters that spelled out the previous tenants name – Tugra Restaurant – midnight haunt of hungry cabbies, have been removed. The colour is quite hideous in my opinion.  But being next to the bike path I guess the local taggers will just cover whatever they did do, so perhaps it’ a wise choice?

I think my favourite time was the day I dropped in by myself on the way home for a Negroni, some salumi and a few bits and pieces with a glass of wine.  It was quite early, so the staff weren’t running around all over the place, and I sat at the bar which meant I could always get attention when I needed another glass of wine.

Negroni and Lupini

My tasting plate (olives $11)

Salumi selection $15

Bread and EVOO

The view across the bar

Pan-fried caciocavallo with tomato salad $12

Another of our visits has been blogged already by my friends over at Eat Our Way Up High Street Project

Unfortunately, each of the fours times I’ve been there the bill has been incorrect.  Sometimes in their favour, sometimes in ours.  I hope they settle in the front of house systems soon.

They continue to be very busy, and I’m not sure if it’s going to be a place I visit regularly.  The noise level is too high for me to have a decent catch up conversation with friends.  The kids will get restless waiting for food and it can be hard to get someone’s attention to order that second bottle of wine.

On the other hand, it is on the tram line home, and a quick visit for a glass of wine and main will be tempting, especially if I am there by myself.  And I am quite possibly addicted to the friend cauliflower.

I think the local families will continue to flock to it.  The food is good quality and tasty and the wine list is interesting. For me though – it will remain a “sometimes” restaurant.

Other recent visitors:

MelbourneGastronome

The Age

So, have you been? and what did you think?

Guest reviewer (JB maybe?) made a flying visit to watch Cadel, Lance, Robbie, Stuie etc. (that would be the Tour DownUnder – ed) After a day chasing the peleton refuelling was a priority.

PARWANA – Afghan Restaurant – 124b Henley Beach Road Torrensville 08 8443 9001

Wikipedia advises that Parwana is an Urdu/Hindi word that refers to an obsessed lover – literally it is a term for a moth attracted to a flame. This moth was attracted twice –first for a quiet dinner on a Wednesday night with Adelaide-based Sis and second for food after Sunday afternoon drinks at the Union Hotel (City) and the Wheatsheaf Hotel (Thebarton) with Sis, Bro and SisiL.

Located between a funeral parlour, a hairdresser and an African Internet café, Parwana is a short taxi ride from the centre of Adelaide on the Western side of town (towards the airport). (gee – sounds promising – ed)

Interior of Parwana

In two visits we sampled:

One Appetiser ($6 ea)

Mantu – steamed dumplings filled with onion delicately spiced and topped with yoghurt and ground lamb sauce;

Mantu - delicious lamby dumplings!

One Main ($15 ea)

Chopan Kebab – Marinated lamb pieces fried with onion and green chilli, served with naan, salad and chatni

4 Sides ($6-8 ea)

Chicken Qorma – Mild Chicken curry simmered with onion, tomato and traditional spices

Banjan Boranee – Eggplant simmered in tomato sauce, topped with yoghurt and mint garnish

Dahl – Red lentils flavoured with coconut, onion, curry leaves and spices

Sabzi – Spinach sautéed with paneer, onion and spices

2 Desserts ($5 ea)

Sheeryakh – creamy rose flavoured ice-cream with nuts

Falooda – Ice cream layered with saffron jelly, rose syrup and basil seeds

2 Drinks ($3 ea)

Cardamom tea

Dogh  – yoghurt, dried mint, cucumber and salt tastes

Everything was tasty and more-ish. The spices were handled well so that there was an immediate flavour effect without repetition hours or days later. My favourites were the Mantu, Sabzi and Banjan. Sheeryakh is a good simple dessert and saves a trip to North Adelaide for gelati. The mains include pasta (main course sizes of appetisers Ashak (leek in lamb sauce topped with yoghurt /mint) and Mantu (see above) and 3 rice options.  Servings are generous (shared appetiser and main plus a dessert each was more than enough for two on Wednesday) and alcohol is BYO (bottled wine only).  We had a riesling (Pewsey Vale) and shiraz (Pike’s?) on Sunday which went well after Sunday arvo beers.

Parwana is a very good family-run suburban restaurant offering well-prepared food in a relaxed atmosphere. It is great value for money and I would frequent it if it were in North Melbourne (would even go south of the river). Fortunately it is within a walk of Sis’s place so I will be getting back next time I am in Adelaide.

The Wheatsheaf (Wheatie to the locals) is a funky neighbourhood pub a couple of blocks back from Henley Beach Road (39 George St Thebarton) which would fit easily into Fitzroy, Brunswick or Northcote. It has an extensive selection of Australian and imported craft beers (on tap and by the bottle) and whisk(e)y. It provides hanging space for local artists – current exhibition is photographs of roller derby “Derby Stacks 09” by Matt Walker and features live music from time to time. Wheatsheaf only does cheese, pate and crisps but it is within walking distance of some ethnic food options on Henley Beach Road – Parwana (Afghan) and Terranova (Italian) are recommended but there is also Thai, Abyssinian, Indian, Thai, Greek, Chinese  and Oz pub grub available.

URBAN BISTRO – 160 Fullarton Road Rose Park 08 8331 2400

This is a reasonably up-market restaurant doing food that the Gourmet Traveller classifies as “Modern Australian”. It is located on the ground floor of an apartment block opposite Victoria Park race course which probably offers verdant views in winter but seemed dominated by pits, stands etc for forthcoming Brrm Brrms. It has been around since 2002 and seems to be well-regarded for food if not for its service. The room is pleasant if a bit soulless.

We visited on a Saturday for lunch when most of Adelaide was on Willunga Hill shouting “Go Cadel” and we had a large space more or less to ourselves.

We ordered a bottle of San Pellegrino Sparkling ($8) and couple of Trumer Pils ($9) while we perused the lunch/dinner menu, which is divided into: entree ($18-24); main course ($29-39);pasta and risotto ($26.50-35.50); and sides ($4.50 -$12.50).

The menu looked promising (see website) and after some toing and froing we opted to share a side of roast artichoke and parmesan dip and an entrée of maigret duck prosciutto with Persian feta, dry figs and fig vincotto .

Duck with Figs

For mains we ordered roast ocean trout wrapped in potato on nicoise salad, sauce gribiche and abalone ravioli with seared scallops, sweet potato and lime butter sauce.

Trout wrapped in potato

The food came promptly and was well-presented. The produce was of high quality and the combinations worked well. The roast artichoke dip was warm and unctuous, requiring extra bread to finish. The duck fig combination was very pleasant (the figs were fresh rather than dried which seems preferable).  The ravioli was very tender and tasty, the scallops perhaps slightly underdone but the lime butter and the sweet potato crisp were excellent. Ocean trout was well-prepared and presented but the gribiche combination not as successful .

abalone ravioli with seared scallops, sweet potato and lime butter sauce

We drank the 2008 Nigl Gruner Veltliner, Kremstal, Austria ($9) which was dry and round but not sweet or acidic. It was a good match with the food.

Lunch cost $150 with tip. The food quality and presentation would make Urban Bistro worth another visit.

I’ll even admit that over the past week, as we have welcomed Spring (goddammit!) with 6 or so days at or over 30 degrees C, I have been craving an Espresso Frappacino from Starbucks. But not enough to walk to one of the two surviving stores on Swanston Street to indulge. Moccona have released a new range of little or no milk cold coffees in a bottle, but I haven’t seen them close to work as yet. What do you do for a caffeine hit in the hot weather? I can’t deal with the usual iced coffee we Aussies get – too milky, not enough caffeine. I’ll have a lovely Liaison coffee in the morning, but what to do for my mid-morning hit? at 30+ degrees?

So … that’s the long story, I was looking for a decent coffee this morning to make up for it. I detoured to Seven Seeds to buy one, and thought I would have some breakfast as well.

I grab a spot on the communal table and check out the menu:-

• Bircher Muesli? nope. C’mon it’s Sunday!
• French Toast with banana, butterscotch sauce and peanut brittle? Sounds lovely but .. it’s breakfast! Even I can’t stomach anything that sweet for breakfast
• Pastries? ho hum
• Fruit Toast (ho-er hum .. ho-ho hum? Greater Hum)
• Sour Dough bread served with bits…salmon? don’t eat it; hummous tomato, olive oil and dukkah? sounds like lunch; African nutella and molasses, sounds like a diabetic coma
• Toasties – already written about them; not my idea of nice, way too much bread

No-one has come to take my order yet – I’m still not even sure after 5 or 6 visits if they do – no one has ever approached me before I’ve walked up to the counter to order. Can someone tell me if they do table service?

I approach the counter and order two lattes to take away – both for me as they only have a regular size.

*sigh*

The coffee is really lovely, deep and rich and satisfying, but the food? I just don’t get it. What am i missing out on? Dench bread is OK – but it is my local so it’s not “exotic” for me. But the slices are way too thick in my opinion and I just don’t want anything that carbo loaded ever really.

So tell me what I’m missing….

It was my birthday and it had been a pretty tough week. I really wasn’t looking forward to dining out, and probably would have been happy to cancel and stay in.

But I’d been wanting to go to Attica for a long time, and well, it was my birthday. Can we put the crap week behind us and enjoy ourselves? OK – it was a tough ask for the guys ‘n gals at Attica (if they had known what they were up against!) but I’m happy to say that from the moment we walked through the unassuming door in a slightly saggy strip of shops in Ripponlea, our minds were nowhere else but on the food experience.

I’ve had to think a lot about what I would say about Attica, I took no photos in deference to (a) my birthday and (b) the superb photos on the website. Go look > Gallery > Food images. I’ll wait.

We were seen to our table and coats taken promptly. I sat toward the kitchen so I could glimpse what was going on back there. Part way through the evening I was able to watch the cold larder move into full swing. Teeny space. It was a dance of desserts! (hah!)

We started with a glass of Jacquesson Avize Grand Cru Blanc De Blancs 2000, which true to the description was a “wine-y” variety of bubbles, rather than a yeasty one. Now I like yeasty, but this was no slouch.

We decided to go with the tasting menu (not difficult really) but we’ve had a few disappointments with matched wines (Jacques Raymond and Vue De Monde) so opted for a bottle. A quick consult with the sommelier and we were steered toward an 07 baudry les granges chinon cabernet franc.

But we were topped up with blanc de blancs to go with our first course, the snow crab. It was the matched wine and it was a nice generous touch.

So now .. the food. Seriously, I really, really enjoyed the food we ate. The dishes all push the boat out to varying degrees on presentation, flavours or both, but if you go with it – you’ll be in for a magnificent treat! I doubt I can do the food justice with my writing or vocabulary, so what follows is basically descriptive. The menu descriptions don’t do the experience justice either, so I will try to expand. If you want to know more – go! Seriously.

Starters: bread, with nibbles of Happy Fruit almonds, Mount Zero Olives, some house churned butter and carrot paste. Save some bread for later – you’ll want it to grab the last of some wonderful sauces.

Amuse Bouche: Crispy chicken thigh on parsnip puree with freeze dried balsamic. Can I have a bucket load to take away please?

1. Snow crab (or in my case cauliflower): a salad of crab, Yarra Valley trout roe, coconut, puffed rice and frozen verjuice, covered with a layer of “snow” made from horseradish mixed with egg white, and I think desiccated and shaved.

Wow – the rest of the menu has a lot to live up to. The “snow” was light, flavourful and a great textural accompaniment to the rest of the salad.

2. Smoked trout broth, crackling, basil seeds, fresh smoke. The signature dish at the moment and a bit of theatrics. JB isn’t usually taken in with these things, but he admitted that his mouth started watering at the smell of the smoke when it was released. The basil seeds looked like little frogs eggs with their mucilaginous coating (never let a scientist near an interesting food item), sitting in the gentle savoury broth which was poured over some small batons of cold smoked trout and pork crackling. The crackling “crackles” as the broth surrounds it. Smell, sight, sound and taste. Maybe we should eat it with our fingers? I’m not a real fish fan – and am allergic to crustaceans, and I found the trout a bit too much, but I loved the broth and the crackling.

3. Potato. Q: how do you make a potato taste more…potatoey? Cook it hangi style for 18 hours. I’m not sure how much difference using the “dirt it was grown in” made to the taste, but two of my favourite elements of the night were part of this dish. Smoked Goats Curd and fried saltbush leaves. Now I know why saltbush lamb tastes so lovely. There were other bits, including jerusalem artichoke dust which stained the curd black, and was it air dried tuna flakes?

4. Kingfish, chorizo, almond, squid. Right, bet you think you know what this looks like right? wrong! (unless you did as I suggested earlier and looked at the gallery of food pictures on the web site). The kingfish is smeared with a chorizo paste and topped with couscous that has been soaked in squid ink, so it’s black. This sits on a small pile of rice cooked with small rice sized grains of squid, in crab stock (or vegie in my case). They didn’t make a fuss about this at all. The rice was delightfully strange, half rice textured, half squid textured. My poor confused brain. The highlight (and one of the reason’s you will want bread) was the smoked tomato broth that surrounded everything else. So scrummy!

5. Pork Loin, morcilla, fennel pollen. At the end of the night, we thought that perhaps a little less food would have made us happier campers (that or walking home, but really, it was a bit too far back to North Yarra, and a bit too late for a walk to the tram), but agreed strenuously that this dish would not be one we would swap, or reduce in size. A simple cylinder of the most delicious pork loin sat atop some celriac puree and shared a plate with a dark brooding walnut sized sphere of black pudding sitting on some apple, a blob of distilled apple juice (god! amazing!), a ring of nashi pear filled with pickled cucumbers and carrot leaves. The loin was garnished with a sprinkling of slightly aniseed-y fennel pollen.

6. Squab, celery, licorice, bitter onion So – a few pieces of ruby pigeon, served with “compressed” celery (basically celery juice forced into celery to make it more “celery-like”) smoked beetroot (yum!), onion rings and broccolini flowers. The meat was dusted with licorice powder (Darryl Lea or liquorice root? I suspect the former actually – was delicious). The bitter onion broth was poured around the dish at the table. I was feeling pretty full by now, but the licorice was very tasty. I made me want to eat more!

So, now to fill up the “dessert stomach”.

7. Terroir was a “bridging course” – not quite sweet, moving on from savoury. We changed to a dessert wine, an 02 pichot coteau de la biche moelleux vouvray.

The “dirt” was a small scoop of fromage frais gelato covered with beetroot cake crumbs (including cloves, cinnamon and black pepper) surrounded by cubes of golden kiwi jelly – layered with bright pink frozen strawberry and raspberry juice, shaved. This was topped with some bright green sorrel granita (my favourite herb at the moment) and garnished with clover leaves. I’m sure i used to suck on the stems of clover when I was a kid (what an idyllic childhood I must have had), the grassy green-ness was tart, a food shock, and nostalgic. I loved this dish.

8. violet crumble Think you know what this looks like? Think you know what it tastes like? Wrong. Oh I love violet flavoured desserts, much like I love lavender and orange flowers and rose water. But violet flavoured is exotic, and this was a lovely play on words. Fromage sorbet, flavoured with violets, in a stem-less wine glass with butterscotch stickiness, crumbles of honeycomb and freeze dried chocolate. Freeze dried chocolate is brilliant, a taste and aroma of chocolate, but without the cloying sweetness.

9. Petit Four…grapefruit jelly.

How much would you pay for all this? $410 for two not including tram tickets.

Worth it? Every cent. We are already planning a return to the Chef’s Table on Tuesday nights.

The service was easy but professional, with our questions readily answered. They are a good team. The restaurant runs smoothly, but not like clockwork. There is room within the service for a chat about the cold larder, the smoke, Happy Fruit Almonds (get them at Slow Food Farmer’s markets) and New Zealand cooking methods.

In a word…terrific.

Coffee was much better today – delicious in fact, and they has keen beavers chatting to folk as they came in the door, much improved.

But 10 mins for a take away is too long … lucky it tasted darn nice.

Griff’s wine pub has been quietly feeding the faithful for almost two years under it’s latest guise (let’s all try to forget about the Purple Turtle shall we?). On the corner of Johnston and Napier streets in Fitzroy, it’s a stylish and comfy kind of place, with a front bar it can be hard to more on from, even when you’re only moving as far as the stained glass accented dining room, or the conservatory.

I love the feel of Griff’s, the smart cosy feeling, and the real beer. But mostly I love the reasonable mark-up on the wine list. And there is always an interesting bottle or two to try.

We share a charcuterie plate ($29) and a half dozen Streaky Bay oysters to start. The charcuterie was very generous with two types of terrine, duck and pork, liver parfait, salami and proscuitto along with various accompaniments including a delicious pickled cucmber and fennel.

For mains there was

Lamb’s liver was the “Offal of the Day”

“Fish of the Day” was a fish stew with saffron and shellfish.

And baked goat loin.

Griff’s hand cut chips are just that (and are fab with a beer in the front bar)

The Dessert Tasting Plate was terrific, featuring a warm frangipane tart with pears, some custard apple ice cream, a lavender creme brulee and a quince and pear crumble.

We went home very full, and very happy after a second bottle of Cab – well wouldn’t you?

Griffs Wine Pub
Cnr Johnston st and Napier St
Fitzroy
03 9416 5055
www.griffswinepub.com.au

I found the space a bit difficult I guess, the large communal table was pushed up against the stools along the window, and the least messy unoccupied table (where we sat), making me feel quite claustrophobic. Quite a feat in what is a large room, with massive, industrial height, ceilings that was quite cold. Too cold. It was like the tables were chosen for their look, not for how they would work in the space. It felt quite awkward for the humans, but grand for showing off some intriguing craft/art.

We cleared our own tiny table, searched about for some kind of menu, and I set about to find some coffee and sustenance.

I found the layout quite strange, it didn’t really provide a focal point, or any clues on where to go or what to do to get served, there was a throng of people hanging around the coffee machine, but I think they were waiting for takeaways. I meandered over in that direction anyway and eventually caught the eye of a waitress (waitperson? waitron? server?). She took our order efficiently.

JB ordered a danish, which was quite delish actually, and made by “some guy in Prahran”.

The sandwich was ridiculously huge and thick, and just not what I wanted at all really. The bread was sliced so thickly that the cheese couldn’t melt without the bread burning. I had to insist that JB eat half. What was going to be a bit of brunch turned into something much more substantial. Half of that sandwich did me for breakfast and lunch.

It came with some shredded cabbage, sprinkled with a few sesame seeds. We had no cutlery. Cabbage stayed on the plate. I went back over to the coffee machine to order another coffee…it really was a bit strange, where another waiter pretty much ignored me for 3-4 mins, then barked at me to move while he took a single coffee out to someone. I eventually got him to organise another coffee for me.

The coffee was a bit weird. My first seemed quite tasty if a bit bland, but my second was bitter. I thought this was quite strange as the same person made them, only about 10 minutes apart. These were made with the house blend, which they say they are always tweaking. Perhaps they “twoke” it.

The crowd was a strange mix of mature age students, mums & bubs, construction workers and economics professors (just a guess there! the others were easier to classify). They were fairly busy when we first arrived, but most moved on within 10 mins of us arriving there. Our plates were never cleared so I didn’t feel much like hanging around and finishing the paper.

I like the idea of the tasting, roasting, growing process being highlighted, but I have to admit that I’m not convinced that the taste of single origin coffee is the best. The idea is nice, but like a single vineyard wine, unless it’s absolutely top notch, it’s probably better off with some other beans mixed in. I think they lack complexity and are nice for a change, but not for my daily grind thanks.

I just wanted to be warm, temperature-wise and hospitality-wise. I guess, you’d be happy enough it if was your local, but I’m not sure I would regularly go out of my way to visit, unless I was mad keen about single-origin beans. If so, go, try coffee, roast…enjoy!

I will go again though, to be fair, maybe it was just a “cold grumpy day” for me. Maybe their heaters were broken. Maybe the staff were new. *shrug*

Seven Seeds
114 Berkeley St, Carlton 3053
9347 8664