Sourced Grocer @ Teneriffe

I had heard many things about Sourced Grocer and wanted to check it out myself!

I've been here on two separate occasions now and have both loved it!

Sourced Grocer reminds me of cafes in Melbourne with its interior design!

The great thing about Sourced Grocer is that they sell the ingredients that they use to make the food as well! So, if you fancy something from the menu, just enquire at the cash register and they'll be able to help you out!

I ordered their Bircher Muesli which is currently No. 2 on my favourite cafes for Bircher Muesli (1st place is still Lake Cafe on the Gold Coast)



Their breakfast muesli options are all very yummy as well because they use Farmer Jo Muesli.



My friend ordered the brioche, which unfortunately, I didn't get to try - but, she said it was very nice!


On a separate occasion, I tried their falafel salad and Sourced Sandwich, which were even better than what I had the first time!






Coffee here is very good - I love their cappucinnos because it's only a hint of chocolate that balances out perfectly with the coffee! Plus, mint green coffee cups always make my day!



The reason why Sourced Grocer is good is because they use top quality produce to make the food and really focus on making good quality meals, even if they are simple to make.

Sourced Grocer is definitely on my list of cafes with both good coffee AND food!!

Vue Lounge 2 @ New Farm

So I decided to bring my family here to try something new and we all really enjoyed the food! The service was a let down though. We were left unattended for quite a while, the tables we got still had leftover over scraps of food not wiped down and the staff took their time to provide us with their menus.

Although it was a rocky start to our brekkie, we discovered some more yummy treats this morning!

Bircher muesli with berry compote, greek yoghurt, honey and pistachios

I love Bircher muesli and I loved this one.

Chipolatas, cherry truss tomatoes, poached eggs on sourdough with beetroot relish and aioli.

I’m usually not a chipolata or a beetroot person, but I actually quite liked this one! The chipolatas tasted really good with the beetroot relish and aioli combo! The tomatoes were sweet and juicy too.

Creamy mushrooms, date and early grey puree on sourdough with cherry truss tomatoes.

I think the special thing about Vue is the sauces they make. They make good sauces that are unique to Vue and that’s why their food has that sprinkle of surprise to it. However, I also think you have to “know” what to get – some dishes are good, some are really just average.

The most average dish today was the smoked salmon, poached eggs, grilled lemon, zucchini fritters drizzled with tomato bernaise sauce. This was surprising because I really thought this would be the best one and was really looking forward to it!

The zucchini fritters were too bland for my liking. Those who love fritters, I’d really recommend Au Cirque’s corn fritters! A-m-a-z-i-n-g!

Overall, Vue generally serves good food but their service definitely needs improvement. 

Vue Lounge @ New Farm

We came here on a Saturday morning for brunch and Vue was packed with people. Vue is situated in the “café zone” of New Farm, just outside of Merthyr Central shopping complex. The café looks small from the outside until you realized that there are actually two adjoining rooms with the kitchen area in the middle.

We waited approximately 10 minutes for a table. As we were starving by then, we couldn’t help but drool at each dish that came out of the kitchen.

This didn’t help us to order at all. The dishes on the menu all seemed to have a special twist to the normal generic breakfast dishes.

Drinks wise, latte hands down for me! The texture was very creamy and smooth.

 

We ended up ordering the brioche French toast with maple syrup, strawberries, passionfruit and mascarpone.

After giving French toast so many chances, I have come to the conclusion that French toast is just not my thing. However, to a French toast lover, I think they would’ve been pretty impressed by it!

 

The roasted pumpkin and poached eggs pistachio dukkah and pumpkin sourdough seemed light and refreshing to eat.

 

I got one of their daily specials which had grilled mushrooms, haloumi, caramelised onions, poached eggs drizzled with Hollandaise sauce on sourdough.

 

The serving size was huge! I was very content after my brunch! The amout Hollandaise sauce was just right for me, as it didn’t overpower the whole dish and it blended well with the mushrooms, haloumi and onions.  Surprinsingly it wasn’t the mushrooms that stood out for me, it was actually the caramelised onions! It complemented the mushrooms and the eggs really nicely!

I also brought some macarons home - chocolate, vanilla, pistachio and caramel ones! They were pretty good, but if anything, maybe just a taddddd too much ganache? 

Overall, brunch at Vue was a good experience – good food and bustling atmosphere! Will be back to try other things, but hope that their service will improve as well.

Campos Coffee 2 @ Fortitude Valley

Campos Coffee May Menu 2012

Each month Campos Coffee changes their menu this was the first time we visited Campos to try their monthly menu specials!

Because we had quite a large group, they offered us a private dining room! This room was called The Roasting Room and as the name suggests, it was decorated with a bags of coffee beans, a roasting machine and posters of different aromas of coffee. The private room also had a service bell to make sure you weren’t left out in an isolated environment.

Coffee at Campos was fantastic as usual!

Today, we ordered exclusively from their May 2012 Menu:

Croissant French Toast with caramel apples, vanilla mascarpone, sweet nut dukkah

This was probably the best French toast-related dish I’ve ever had! Usually, other French toasts I’ve had are either too oily or too soggy bcause of the sauce. However, today, it was perfecto! The caramel apples weren’t too sweet and you could taste the freshness of the apples.

Smoke Salmon Fish Cakes with house made tartar sauce, house salad

This dish was presented the best out of everything simply because it was served on a wooden chopping board. They were very generous with the amount of salmon in the fish cakes but I thought it didn’t taste as nice as it looked; Probably because I don’t think it was the best way to cook the salmon.

Three Grain Risotto with wild mushroom, asparagus, green beans, and Persian feta.

This was one of my favourite! Not only did they use the three types of grains for the risotto rice, they also used three different types of mushrooms! Being a mushroom lover, this was a bonus! The risotto was cooked just right – right amount of creaminess and right amount of flavor! Definitely should be a permanent item on their menu!

Fettucine Pasta with mixed mushrooms, roasted French shallots, herbs, croutons, chilli lemon ricotta

A-m-a-z-i-n-g! The fettucine pasta was full of flavor! With so many types of seasonings and herbs, the taste blended really well with each other! Not sure if i could eat a whole plate of that for breakfast though…

Pumpkin Pancakes with candied pecans, vanilla ricotta and maple syrup

This was the other one of my favourite! The pumpkin pancakes had the perfect balance between the fluffiness of pancakes and the smooth and aromatic taste of pumpkin! The pumpkin taste was subtle and did not overpower the pecans, maple syrup not the ricotta. In fact, those all had to be eaten in one bite to get the best combination of taste! This needs to be a permanent item on the menu as well!

Overall, the May Menu did not disappoint me at all. Campos is well known for their expertise in coffee and their food is just as scrumptious too! 

New Farm Cafe and Deli @ Merthyr Village, New Farm

New Farm Cafe and Deli is a convenient location for brekkie. Situated in Merthryr Village near Coles, the deli sells a wide range of foods and produce as well as food to eat in at.

The coffee here wasn’t very good – quite bitter and the ratio of milk and coffee wasn’t quite right.

The food is good only if you’re a quantity-over-quality person. The banana and walnut bread was dense and you could taste the walnuts but there was nothing special about it.

The vego brekkie with avocado, smoked salmon, poached eggs and potato rosti was the nicest. The potato rosti was quite nice but avocado, smoked salmon, poached eggs didn’t require that much skill to make it anyway.

The homemade beans with poached egg and sourdough wasn’t anything special either.

That being said, the things they sell at the deli section are fresh and if you shop carefully, you can find quite interesting things!

Pablo @ New Farm

Yesterday, I caught up with a friend for lunch and we decided on a small café that’s tucked away on Brunswick St, in New Farm.

Half of the café’s seating area is located outdoors - some on verandas and some just outside the shop front, with huge outdoor umbrellas and cushioned mats on wooden seats. Even though the café is small, the cozy atmosphere is perfect for brekkie in winter, if you want to absorb a bit of sunshine as well! I really liked the design of this café, though it was simple.

At Pablo, they serve breakfast until 2:30pm, which is another bonus! Breakfast options at cafes are my favourite and I think all cafes should have all-day breakfast! The breakfast options lured me in before I could even decode what half the lunch menu ingredients were.

We ended up ordering:

Seasoned avocado on sourdough toast, grilled scamorza, tomato and basil salsa, pink lake salt, fresh lemon, maleny avocado oil

 

Even though the ingredients all sound quite simple, the fresh and high quality  ingredients really made it stand out.

Tasmanian smoked salmon, herbed crème-fraiche, dill scrambled eggs, smoked tomato compote, seeded peasant toast.

 

The herbed crème-fraiche complemented the smoke salmon well and this couldn’t be any better with fluffy scrambled eggs.

For drinks, I tried T2’s gunpowder green. It wasn’t as strong as sencha but still very refreshing.

 

My friend got their chai masala and I managed to get a sip of it – yum! It was a nice blend of honey, milk, cinnamon, and chai tea. However, I don’t think I could’ve had all of it because it was a little too sweet.

We struggled, but managed to clean off everything on our plates because it was truly, very delicious! They were very genuine with the amount of food and still maintained the high quality of ingredients used!

 ‘Twas a lovely catch up with my friend in such a cozy café in New Farm with delicious food as well!

The Little Larder @ New Farm

The Little Larder is a small but upbeat café that is hidden in the surburban streets of New Farm.  We got here at about 8am on a Saturday morning with half of the seats taken and by the time we were done, people were already starting to line up for seats. Little Larder serves all day breakfast and their menu consists of generic breakfast dishes. Lots of people also came in for takeaway coffee.

 

For me, their coffee was not hot enough when they served it this morning. It was also a little too bitter.

We ended up ordering:

Larder-made Baked Beans served on toast

 

I thought the baked beans didn’t really give off the Larder “signature” that supposed to lure you in to have some more.

Pesto Scrambled Eggs with smoked salmon and spinach

 

I could taste a little bit of the pesto, but I think the smoked salmon overpowered it. I would’ve liked the dish if it brought out more of the pesto taste. However, the texture of the eggs was fluffy.

French Toast with grilled banana and maple syrup

 

I’m not a big fan of French toast but perhaps, pancakes with banana and maple syrup would have been nice.

The atmosphere was vibrant however, I found the food and coffee to be quite average.