Showing 1-25 of 25 results
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Batch
Rubbing shoulders with St Kilda's stalwart kosher bagelry, Batch brings a Kiwi flavour to Carlisle St, with Supreme New Zealand coffee and juices. Nothing is overcomplicated, just straight-up fresh and self-assured meals.
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Brother Baba Budan
Melburnians get anxious when there isn't a Gaggia hissing away every 20m, so you'll never be short of options. This is a favourite: a cute city outpost of fine roasters St Ali.
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Cafe Fidama
With so many world flavours available, Fidama has thrown open the food-group classification to include influences from the Mediterranean, Middle East and Asia. Dexterous dishes are served up in sleek surrounds - all dark wood, banquettes and bentwood chairs. Locals love it here, so if you find yourself in the 'hood, it's best to book ahead.
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Café Latte
The Eastern Pearson-clad mums make time for the Puglian specialities for lunch at Café Latte.
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Cafe Segovia
The menu changes like Melbourne weather at this long-running, lively laneway café. Segovia is so familiar to its army of regulars who stop in for coffee or to grab a pasta or focaccia that they've hardly noticed the standard is slipping. Token service and slap-dash dishes are this old-faithful's foibles. It still pulls the punters though, and there are worse places to watch the city go by.
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Degraves
Longtime latte champs keep it calm during the rush; chase a short black with a Bloody Mary if it's one of those mornings/early afternoons.
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Degraves Espresso Bar
The rickety cinema seating and fashionable gloom make Degraves a quintessential Melbourne laneway experience. If you've overindulged in that other Melbourne laneway experience, the hip little bar with no signage, beat your hangover with poached eggs or French toast with maple syrup from the all-day breakfast menu. Or just pull up a pew for an always-good coffee.
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Federal Coffee Palace
Melburnians get anxious when there isn't a Gaggia hissing away every 20m, so you'll never be short of options. This is a city favourite with atmosphere in spades and tables beneath the colonnades of the GPO.
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Gravy Train
You wouldn't chug across town to get here, but you'd certainly pull in for a bite or coffee if in the area. Gravy Train is the coalface of Yarravillagers: students, workers and pram-pushers all converge on the bright dining room or roofless courtyard. Some artful savoury dishes accompany staple café fare, and there's a good selection of sweet things too.
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Hopetoun Tea Rooms
For five generations, ladies and 'nice' families have been nibbling pinwheel sandwiches here, taking tea (pinkies raised) and delicately polishing off a lamington. Hopetoun's venerable status, arcade location and pursed-lip air make afternoon or morning tea here refreshing indeed - the antithesis of Melbourne's constant coffee-taken-in-hip-laneways shtick.
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Ici
This small bluestone café is a cosy oasis situated behind the fast pace of Brunswick St and well worth finding for superb coffee and the unique breakfast menu. Try Moroccan spiced couscous with yoghurt and almonds, or French toast with mixed berries and caramel mascarpone, or just relax with the paper as the morning travels through the roundabout outside.
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Journal
The giant shared tables here - a rarity in a city that takes pride in its sprawling spaciousness - give Journal a touch of New York style and a welcoming openness. The friendly service, fantastic coffee and eclectic collection of reading material put you at risk of giving yourself a day-long caffeine buzz. A list of simple but delicious breakfasts (the muesli is divine) and lunches (soup, salads, bruschetta) are also on offer.
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Kamel
Sugar-and-spice breakfasts reflect the North African and Middle Eastern accents in Kamel's menu. Outside tables are often anchored with lapdogs, fresh from a walk on the nearby beach. Inside, the perky front room gives way to a moody lounge area, where a range of meze dishes are shared over lunch or dinner. Shared, unless you ordered the zucchini-and-mint fritters - too good to give away.
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Lever & Kowalyk
Nothing beats a languid breakfast after a brisk bayside walk. Settle in with a mound of porridge or stack of hotcakes. Latecomers can lunch on wraps and salads, while shoppers zip in to buy take-home goods.
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Lounge
Student types hang around pool tables and on the leafy 1st-floor balcony day and night, picking at giant plates of nachos, hoeing into burgers with chips or slurping up a slab of lasagne. Later at night the lights go down and the music is turned up when the Lounge segues into a lively, always-buzzy club .
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Marios
Breakfast, accepted as one of the best, can be ordered all day. Waiting for a table is part of the ritual, so grab a superb coffee and a spot at the bar window for a moment to check out the Fitzroy scene. Marios' waiters run a tight ship with terrific service and speedy customer turnover; the wait is never long.
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Montague Foodstore
This sunlit café is the friendly, corner store gone gourmet. The Montague serves a range of breakfasts and lunches, incorporating its own breads, jams and relishes. The croque-monsieur (French-style toasted ham and cheese sandwich) will keep you going for days, or, if you insist on a healthier option, the wattle-seed granola is really good. Filled baguettes, salads, cakes and daily specials round out the selection.
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New York Tomato
This place is so laid-back you'd think you were in someone's backyard. Oh, you are. At the rear of a modern townhouse, the owners transformed the garage space and downstairs, added a communal table and invited in the neighbourhood. Try the berry porridge in brown sugar, and, for lunch, the pumpkin and chickpea fritters or tandoori chicken pide .
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Newtown Sc
Regulars jostle to make eye contact with the person driving the coffee machine - all it takes to order an always-exquisite brew done just they way they like it. At Newtown Social Club, knowing nods are exchanged between locals: as a greeting, and in an aren't-we-lucky-to-have-this kind of way. Food is simple and consciously suburban: think Coco Pops and homemade lamingtons, plus focaccia and soup (in winter).
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Orange
Orange straddles the café/bar label with ease, its well-worn vinyl banquettes cushioning fashionable bums for early breakfasts and late-night beverages. Serving good coffee during the day, Orange slows its grinders at night, replaces teaspoons with bar coasters, and chooses Screamin' Jay Hawkins over Nina Simone LPs.
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Ray
Ray takes the flavours from the area's heritage and presents them in raw-cool surrounds to epitomise what Brunswick stands for. Labna (yoghurt cheese) and rose jam on toasted pide (Turkish bread), tomato and bocconcini (bite-size balls of fresh mozzarella) bread and really good coffee reflect the migrant influences of the area. Distressed walls and a big communal table accommodate the young café-conscious crowd.
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Retro Cafe
Customers here have been known to throw themselves to the ground protesting the end of lunch. Oh, to be four again. Babycinos are the beverage of choice at this kid-friendly café, with a toy box and separate kids' menu. And parents are kept quiet looking through the many pages of options on the main menu.
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Rosamond
It's amazing what you can do with a kitchen composed of just a jaffle-maker, a hotplate and a coffee machine. This no-fuss hidey-hole finds pleasure in the simple things. The blackboard menu proffers jaffles galore, with some considered combinations among them. Sandwiches, soups and salads, plus good coffee, sustain an arty crew. Enter from Charles St.
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Small Block
In this village-like strip of shops, Small Block acts as the community centre; its neighbourly drop-in and stay-awhile vibe is a hub for local activity. Big, beautiful breakfasts (eggs and otherwise) are worth writing home about. Salvaged service-station signage and concrete floors, plus warm and efficient service combine to make a super environment in which to write postcards home too.
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Wall Two 80
This makeshift café has long been on the lips of those on that unending search for the perfect coffee. Wall Two 80's coffee is good, yes. So too are the toasted pide and pastries. Prop with other loners at the communal table, nestle in a nook with a mate or line up outside along the eponymous wall.
Showing 1-25 of 25 results
