No, not the Muriwai version but the Jervois Road cafe version…
To be frank, I had misgivings about this place even going as far as to say to my companion ‘do we HAVE to try here?’. what she replied with doesn’t bear repeating here. Despite all this, I was pleasantly surprised; I think we both were. The decor is not to my liking – dated, in a trying-to-be-industrial way which doesn’t quite work. The red walls are off-putting also but the food is good. Cabinet food looks inviting, they even have those flash custard squares that are made in the South Island (Dunheath? those of you in the know, you know what I mean). We bypassed the cabinet to peruse the menu. It’s testament to the ordinary-ness of the menu offerings that we deliberated at the counter for almost an embarrassing amount of time – there was nothing that immediately grabbed either of us. In the end we both settled for pancakes – there is a choice of two – we both chose the fruit/yoghurt/maple syrup version sans maple.
Coffee is Karajoz and is hot, strong, slightly bitter and actually very good. The pancakes when they arrived had us both proclaiming – wow! there was an absolute orchard of tropical fruit underpinning two fluffy just-the-right-size pancakes, with yoghurt drizzled on top. The fruit servings were very generous. The pancakes were pretty much perfection and several people coming into the cafe commented on how good they looked.
I have had to revise my misgivings, at least in coffee and food terms. Would we go back? Despite the great food, I’m unsure, mainly because of the ambience (or lack thereof) however writing and even thinking that feels a little precious.
Bathroom facilities about average.
Coffee and food we rated about 8.5 – the highest on the strip so far. I imagine however that the people/’ladies’ who lunch/yummy mummies wouldn’t be drawn to this cafe because it is hardly the place to ‘see and be seen’. For everyone else (that’s most of us) we recommend the food and coffee. Oh, and the place is fairly consistently busy which is testament to something on this piece of road where choice is rampant.
Next week: Fusion.