Seven Seeds Roastery & Cafe, Carlton {Melbourne Review}
First up, apologies in advance for the regression in photo quality. As you may remember that I refused to get an SLR, I have now actually altogether ditched my camera and have been taking photos exclusively with my phone camera for the past, well, two years. Anyway, I’m an amateur blogger. I try my best.
So, Seven Seeds. I could not believe it took me this long to get to get to this lovely coffee heaven (actually I could – I live in the Eastern suburbs and I don’t believe in crossing the river on the weekends – feels too much like going to work) but one fine day I did. It was close to Christmas and I had just picked up my mum who just arrived on a ridiculously early flight (I TOLD her not to fly this particular airline but does she listen? Oh no.)
The main purpose on the day was to look at a new road bike for me at a shop on Victoria St. so the criteria were a) somewhere near the bike shop; b) had to be opened by 8am due to our trip timing and c) goes without saying has to have good breakfast menu and good coffee.
Eggs Benedict with prosciutto & rocket – $15.00
Seven Seeds ticked all of those boxes and so we found ourselves running in through the rain – right after their opening time and were greeted in their lovely converted warehouse space by a smiling waiter and a mighty fine looking pastry case. We were shown to our table and while they had no high chair for Mini, the chairs were good enough. I’m glad she is finally big enough to sit on an adult chair or our lap without too much hassle. If you have a pram, the cafe is quite spacious and would be fairly pram friendly.
Best babycino ever
As usual, I order myself a flat white (house blend – generally not a big fan of single origin) and a babycino for Mini (yeah I raised one of those babycino kids – I’m allowed ONE.) Allow me to tell you right now, not all babycino are created equal and this one indeed made Mini squeal with delight. I suspect it was just the OTT foam and cocoa dusting. But a good babycino is a good babycino. My flat white was also excellent. I’m not a coffee connoisseur and only rate my coffee as ‘excellent’, ‘pretty good’, ‘decent’, ‘average’ and ‘awful’ and this one comes out as excellent. But don’t believe me about the coffee! Try, oh, any other Melbourne coffee blogs.
Toasted Reuben sandwich (pastrami, rye bread, cheese, sauerkraut) and a side of pickle – $13.00(?)
For our dishes Mum ordered the Eggs Benedict which she seemed to enjoy (forgot to ask her how she found it – I think she was too distracted playing with her only grandchild that she hadn’t seen in 6 months and really couldn’t care that much. Though she did mention how much Australian rocket leaves are better than the Thai ones.) Josh ordered the Reuben sandwich. He took a bite and sighed, ‘this is a good sandwich.’ He did find it small though but luckily…
Fried eggs with n’duja sausage on toasts – $16.00(?)
I ordered the fried eggs with n’duja sausage (the waiter approved of the choice – I always feel chuffed when I order something and the waiter thinks that my choice is awesome – surely this has gone into waiter’s training manual by now? ‘You should agree with the customer’s order choice even though it’s decaf soy latte’*) because, well, when was the last time you ordered fried eggs at a cafe? Although I wasn’t quite sure what n’duja sausage was (it sure wasn’t what I expected) – they had me at the word sausage. N’duja sausage, as it turned out, is a sort of spicy spreadable sausage with an intensely strong sour flavour (like salami but, you know, soft.) It was awesome. I was very impressed with my choice but only managed to put away half the food so Josh kindly finished the rest.
Vanilla rice pudding with toasted coconut, almond and mango – $13.00?
Part of the reason why I couldn’t finish my dish was this: the rice pudding. Dessert for breakfast. Love it. As there was no kid’s menu, we ordered what we thought she might like the most. This rice pudding was seriously good. The toasted coconut and almonds really added to the texture and made this dish a wonderful comforting summer food (it was served cold.) And mango? Who doesn’t love mango? Mini ate as much as she could (which wasn’t much – let’s face it – she was three and it wasn’t not chocolate) and I stole a few lots spoonfuls and we still couldn’t finish it. We got the rest to take away in a disposable coffee cup and I ate it for lunch. It was a dish that kept on giving.
All in all, it was one of the better breakfast experiences we have had in Melbourne. Coffee was superior and the food fantastic. We really enjoyed the lovely setting and the space. It isn’t the most kid-friendly cafe but it is definitely good enough for a 3-year-old. We would definitely be back here again given half a chance. I just wish this was in our neighbourhood.
Seven Seeds Roastery & Cafe
Address: 114 Berkeley Street Carlton VIC 3053
Phone: (03) 9347 8664
Hours: Monday – Saturday 7am – 5pm, Sunday 8am – 5pm
* I recently went to the cafe near work where I normally get my coffee from with a colleague who was having an extremely bad, jittery day and she ordered a decaf soy latte. Our barista said, ‘do you know what we call that? We call it ‘why bothered?’
