Reuben Hills, Surry Hills

It's cold and miserable in Sydney at the moment... the sort of weather the sniffles set in and all you want to do is crawl into your doonah cave and hibernate, only to emerge for necessities... or cosy breakfasts and nice coffee.

I've been a little under the weather of late and trying to get back to good health but it is taking time. Part of the problem is I don't really have time to stop and rest and recuperate, but I think any mother in the world doing things without much family support knows what that is like!

Anyway, between short sleeps, looking after my baby and working on my business, I recently headed to Surry Hills for breakfast with Mr Ladybird. This cafe has been the talk of Sydney recently as it was voted Best Cafe by The Sydney Morning Herald's Good Cafe Guide 2012. So, ignoring the imminent parking headache, we headed to Surry Hills to check it out for ourselves.

The cafe's look and feel is quite industrial, and the open kitchen is so small - I was amazed! Make's me think that I have no right to complain about my small apartment-sized kitchen!

The menu is South American inspired with lots of unusual breakfast options, such dishes with salted caramel ice cream, quinoa, dulce de leche, tortillas..! Check out the menu here and you'll see what I mean. And the only thing I need to tell you about the coffee is that it's good, very good...

And our breakfast for the morning... Soft baked eggs with goat's curd, wilted spinach, ranchero sauce and rye sourdough ($16).

For me, it was the Baleada - free range eggs, queso fresco and black beans ($11). The picture doesn't really do it justice, but the flavour really packed a punch - yummm!

Quick service and definitely a different menu to go with excellent coffee. Not my personal pick for best cafe, but good to check out!

Reuben Hills
61 Albion St
Surry Hills NSW
www.reubenhills.com.au

Breakfast at Pieno, Surry Hills

Hello, dear readers! I hope your Easter long weekend is off to a wonderful start. Yesterday in Sydney we enjoyed absolutely glorious weather, and it looks set to continue by the looks of things this morning! Beautiful blue skies and plenty of sunshine. To mark Easter I wanted to share something Easter themed with you all and so set about making Hot Cross Cookies - a Donna Hay recipe featured in last weekend's edition of the Daily Telegraph.. well, I'm sad to say they were an epic fail (sorry Donna, I've got to be honest here) and I saw little point sharing a recipe with you all that I myself will certainly not be repeating. Yes, hot cross cookies is a cute concept, but the aftertaste of the baking powder was very unpleasant. If I get time in the next few days I might attempt tweaking the recipe and will share with you all if I have any success.

Anyway, instead of Hot Cross Cookies here is a quick post on a place we went to breakfast yesterday. It's called Pieno, and is located on Crown Street in Surry Hills. If there's one thing this funky cafe has bucketloads of, it's atmosphere. It's cool, it's modern, and for a cafe in Surry Hills, there's certainly more than your average amount of seating. I love the splashes of red in the decor too with the chairs and the water bottles - a great vibrant touch.

We started off with coffees ($3.50 each) and they are delicioussss -seriously the best coffee I have had in a long time!

For breakfast, Mr L had the Vegie Breakfast ($16.50) with poached eggs, roast tomatoes, rosti, mushrooms and spinach with toast. The eggs were poached to perfection, but unfortunately the rosti were more or less deep-fried balls of mash.

And for me, I ordered the Breakfast bruschetta with mushrooms and garlic oil ($11). I can usually find something positive to say about a dish, even if I'm not that keen on it, but this was a very disappointing dish. The mushrooms were watery and rubbery.. so I end up eating the toast with a little rocket. In such situations, I am always a little embarrassed to complain about my dish... what do you do when faced with culinary disappointment while eating out..?

Such a shame Pieno, such a shame! I so very much wanted to rave about this place .. especially in light of all the positive reviews online on sites like Eatability. Perhaps I just got very unlucky (?) I love the atmosphere, the service is fantastic, and the coffee ***amazeballs***, but the food really fell short of the mark. A bit of a pity, but I would definitely return if I was looking for somewhere for a good coffee in the area.

Pieno
285A Crown St
Surry Hills, NSW
(02) 8354 1303

Café Zoe, Surry Hills

Now that baby Roman is nearing 6 months of age, he is able to stay awake for a few hours rather happily, making outings such as going out for brunch a lot easier. It's no secret that Mr Ladybird and I do love going out for breakfasts on the weekend, and we are absolutely loving being able to do this once again!

It might not be the leisurely sips on coffee and leafing through newspapers and magazines like it used to be.. nowadays it's sips of coffee and intermittent mouthfuls of food between Mr L bouncing Roman on his knee, and me keeping an eye on what he's trying to ram into his mouth next and managing the now constant flow of drool from his little mouth! He is a very good baby though, and having a little cutie like him in tow does have some unexpected benefits. For example, I have visited the same fruit and veg store for years, and never once received a smile from the cashier until I came shopping with Roman in the pram, smiling up at her like a little angel. Suddenly her face lit up - magic! Oh yes, he's very charming with the ladies... quite the lil' Casanova! In cafes, he always manages to charm the ladies at neighbouring tables. When visiting Café Zoe recently, in fact, he was so charming that the lady at the table next to us couldn't resist the force of Roman's cuteness and asked for a little cuddle. I was happy to oblige, and Roman proceeded to chat her up while Mr L and I enjoyed a few minutes to ourselves.

Café Zoe is one of my favourite spots for breakfast. There is ample seating and you don't have to book, service is friendly, and the food and coffee are good. It is open Saturday and Sundays, and there is a separate Sunday brunch menu.. so technically you could go there two days in a row and enjoy two different menus ;) Plus parking in the area isn't too bad (for Surry Hills I mean!) Mr L and I headed there recently for a nice weekend brekky where we started with coffees of course...

I enjoyed the corn fritters with toast, salsa, scrambled eggs and a side of wilted spinach. The eggs were delicious, as was the spinach. The corn fritters were nice, but a little more corn in them would have been good.

Mr L enjoyed eggs on toast with two sides - sautéed mushrooms, as well as some seriously tasty spicy beans - I'd give a limb for that recipe... sooo good!

Now, in all my juggling of baby, nappy bag, camera and goodness knows what else I lost the receipt for our meal at Café Zoe so I can't tell you the exact prices of our meals. However, I can say that you can expect to pay around $15 - $20 for breakfasts here. Sides are $3 each, so any extras can make it a little more expensive. But all in all, pretty good value as the quality of their food and coffee is consistently high.


Til next time! xxx


Café Zoe
688 Bourke St, Surry Hills
(02) 8399 0940