From Luxembourg, with love

. . .
[Dead man espresso, 35 Market Street South Melbourne VIC]

Phone: (03) 9686 2255
Open: Weekdays 7am-4pm; Weekends 8am-4pm

Broadsheet review: click here

With my special orange parcel all the way from Luxembourg in hand, I went to meet Ash (or ashie, if you’re my mother)

This little Mr had been waiting patiently for a very special gift from a very orange shop… you may know? Hermes?? 🙂 They had run out of stock of a particularly gorgeous scarf (or tie if you’re from Lucky coq), and as a result ordered it from Luxembourg to be preciously hand delivered via Germany and Qatar- a well travelled little tie. Scarf. 😉

We ventured down to his local- ‘Dead man espresso’ and enjoyed the sun, company and some quality melbourne service and food.

What I should’ve done is ordered a coffee to taste this special dead man blend from seven seeds, but instead I very unsurprisingly ordered a Chai latte (soy ofcourse)…. I just can’t help myself. Its either that or an ICED chai latte…no icecream, just plently of ice and chilled – seriously amazing sh*t.

Ash’s Latte: 

We both decided on toasties – and I must say, dunno if Ash agrees or not, I chose very quickly! 🙂 I normally take so long, the waiters will try to order for me….awkward.

Ash ordered an eggy bacony lovely number.
Before:

After:

And I was craving some smoked salmon, so I went with that:

The bread was fresh and smelt amaaaazing, lightly crusty exterior and soft and bouncy interior, fresh smoked salmon, spanish onion, mint and cream cheese.

Life is pretty sweet when you’re sitting in the semi sun, enjoying a gold ol’ catch up and taking it down the slow lane.

Dead Man espresso, is off busy Clarendon street, on a very quiet corner. This foodie’s sanctuary is exactly what the doctor ordered for a lazy sunday brunch or even a quick coffee on the go. Its buzzing with energy, happy satisfied tummies and the aroma of fresh beans linger softly against the humming of conversation.

enjoy!

. . .

Tastefully yours,

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Melting white chocolate dumplings??? oh YES PLEASE!!

. . .
[Oriental Tea house, 455 Chapel street South Yarra]

[From their website]:
Welcome one, welcome all! Feast your sense on the Oriental Teahouse – Melbourne’s premier tea and yum cha destination. A magical, culinary myriad of taste, aroma and atmosphere, here to welcome you with open minds, open arms and open menus.

Stace and I had a reunion over brunch the other day, and as I hadn’t seen her beautiful face since 2010, it was certainly an afternoon filled with laughter and tears of joy.

She took me to this beautiful YUM CHA style restaurant, Oriental Teahouse. Now this isn’t everyones ideal place for breakfast, and to be quite frank I did have ‘my first meal of the day’ already…. however thats what breakfast is all about isnt it? Indulging in it all day…. DROOL!

We drove to Chapel street (in Melbourne) to feast on yummies, as stace divulged in her stories of ‘yummies’ over the summer. 😉

We both decided, as the sun was high and scorching, an iced tea would be suitable.

I ordered iced toothpaste and licorice tea …(peppermint/aniseed… what a mistake!!!)

And Stace ordered a dreamy berrilicious tea

For food, we decided on a banquet for 2:

“Big dumpling lover” ($21.00 pp)
* Seafood basket dumplings
* Chive & baby pea leaves dumplings
* Variety Basket dumplings
*Pork shu mai & Buck wheat vegetable dumplings
*Satay Pork dumplings

and let me tell you, they tasted as good as they looked!!! YUM!!!

Prices:

after all that, we decided, YES we are still hungry. how?? I hear you ask? I will tell you how!

check out this: Steamed white chocolate dumplings ($5.90 for 3 pcs)

OH YUM!!!!!!!!!!!!!

we’re definately going back for the CHOCOLATE steamed dumplings. WHOAH!!

. . .

Tastefully yours,

Joanna

High street, not low street

. . .
[ Grapeseed cafe, 1084 High street Armadale]

I have a friend called Angela, and all throughout highschool we called her Ang – and spelt it without an ‘e’ at the end…all of a sudden she decided to add the ‘e’… it has totally thrown my meaning of life… I guess its another reminder that nothing is permanent and I will have to get used to the change…

Change can be a wonderful thing, but often isn’t the easiest thing… so in the spirit of change, Ang(e), I have decided NOT to write about a certain amazing visit to Carlton, but in fact to complete the back log of yummies to get all up to date.

This gorgeous little place – actually not so little inside, is situated on High street near the corner of Kooyong and is a hub for the ‘yummy mummy’ type mixed in with the ‘pre-child young couple’ type and 20 somethings that wonder down for a quick bite or ‘lartay’ – clearly thats Ozzy for cafe Latte for those playing along at home. 🙂

I was here to meet my ‘little sister’ of Dining Room Diaries for a great big ol catch up since it had been a while.

We joked and ate and shopped all morning and just enjoyed the relaxing energy of High street.

She ordered 2 Free range poached eggs on Sour dough with a side of Avocado

And I ordered what I believe was from the lunch menu: Avo/Tomato/Crumbed fetta on toasted turkish bread. But in the spirit of ‘available all day’, who says you can’t eat ‘lunch’ for breaky?…. unless the waitress specifically says so, then i guess you’ve been told. *awkward*

I have to say, a little bit more on the presentation would have just done it… it was missing a gorgeous drizzle of olive oil for taste and aesthetic value. (Same goes for lil H) But it was still very delicious and very melbourne…and thats really what I was after.

And ofcourse, to wash this all down I ordered a fabulous soy chai latte which was pretty damn creamy and tasty 🙂

Prices are very average and anyone on any budget can find something delicious and quick to munch here, the service is quick and very friendly, and if you’re there on a sunny yummy day like ours – you’re mostly likely to sit back and soak in the warmth of the sun and energy of high street.

Now Ang(e), I do promise you will be ‘famous’ :), but as they say patience is a virtue… but you’re right, basically I need to stop procrastinating and get my groove on with these blogs!!!…

Please take a moment to pray for/think about the victims of the Floods in QLD and now Victoria… its time like these you realise your problems aren’t as big as others.

Please donate to the Queensland government to show your support. Click here for website

[If you’d like to view a review: click here]
. . .
Tastefully yours,

Joanna

Available all day, year in review…

The stats helper monkeys at WordPress.com mulled over how this blog did in 2010, and here’s a high level summary of its overall blog health:

The Blog-Health-o-Meter™ reads Wow.

Crunchy numbers

A Boeing 747-400 passenger jet can hold 416 passengers. This blog was viewed about 2,700 times in 2010. That’s about 6 full 747s.

In 2010, there were 46 new posts, not bad for the first year! There were 480 pictures uploaded, taking up a total of 248mb. That’s about 1 pictures per day.

The busiest day of the year was September 29th with 173 views. The most popular post that day was R o y z e l : L e r o y [part 2].

Where did they come from?

The top referring sites in 2010 were facebook.com, mail.live.com, thediningroomdiaries.blogspot.com, blogger.com, and en.wordpress.com.

Some visitors came searching, mostly for weihnachtsmarkt gluhwein, available all day blog, violet darkling, christmas market trier, and availableallday.wordpress.com.

Attractions in 2010

These are the posts and pages that got the most views in 2010.

1

R o y z e l : L e r o y [part 2] September 2010
2 comments

2

D e l i c i o u s : & : b e a u t i f u l October 2010
2 comments

3

B e r n k a s t e l-K u e s : B e i l s t e i n October 2010
2 comments and 1 Like on WordPress.com,

4

D i a g o n a l l y : s h o p p i n g [part 1] October 2010

5

D i a g o n a l l y : s h o p p i n g [part 2] October 2010

Main street, main attraction!!

[Main street Cafe, 505 Main street,Mordialloc]



Soooo, after a very long flight from Germany to melbourne via (Doha) I pretty much wrote the next off the next day sleeping and vegetating which was well needed as I would be working as of the day after!!!

The first beautiful Saturday after arrived was the perfect opportunity to catch up with my beautiful “brazilliant” friend Shyam. (yes that is a wordbaby of “Brazilian & brilliant”… Shy isn’t REALLY from brazil, just looks it, but he is just so brilliant!!) I was absolutely dying to feast on perfect Melbourne poached eggs accompanied by a perfect soy chai latte…and as Shy lives near mordy, he suggested “main street cafe” right in the heart of Mordialloc, Melbourne.

I caught the train down, and was literally greeted with the buzz that is “main street cafe” as I exited onto main street. So a big gold star for ease and accessibility.

Shy opted for a very healthy poached egg on sour dough with spinach-without hollandaise (Benedict without the guilt). And I in true form, ordered the “veggie patch”

When my chai latte came out, I was dancing in my seat as I had been craving it all this time in Germany.

Then I tasted it… It looked like a chai latte, was spicy like a chai latte but it was missing SOY!! I absent mindedly had thought all chai lattes were a beautiful marriage of soy and honey….fail… But it was a pretty good full cream milk chai latte at least…

Next, (more seat dancing) our amazingly presented meals were brought out by this gorgeous french waiter.

The 2 free range poached eggs were beautiful and wobbly and as I poked my fork through, the most luscious oozing of warm egg yolk soaked my sour dough…. I was in heaven…. Gooey, yolky, delicious heaven!!

This breakfast destination is no secret, nor is it even that new anymore… But to me, being my first breaky since Qatar plane food, I felt I had uncovered something really special….

The space is airy and buzzing with energy, smiles and satisfied tummies, easy to get to and easy to find, and most importantly-filled with cute waiters/waitresses… Oh!!!! I mean served a mean breakfast ;).

I hope to be frequenting this place often over the summer, and who knows I might be fluent in French by the end of it!! 🙂

. . .
Tastefully yours,
Joanna