Melbourne: Market Lane Coffee

If you happen to be strolling around Prahran in Melbourne, along Chapel St...

do drop by Market Lane Coffee for nice coffee and cakes. 

afternoon tea at Market Lane Coffee. Thanks E =)

Sam with her iPhone.

we had iced latte

image from Market Lane Coffee website

http://www.marketlane.com.au/

Prahran Market
Shop 13 Prahran Market
163 Commercial Road
Entrance on Elizabeth Street 
South Yarra 3141
Australia

Happy Friday

doodling on my mini whiteboard (a  piece of tile i got from Bunnings. hehe)

Verse of the Day: John 8:36

In Jesus there is freedom.

Love made of mini pom-poms? at Mt Lawley

sipping latte with bro at Exomod cafe, Mt Lawley.

a visit to Zakka Box & got a packet of MT tape stickers. Cute! 

Kind Yuka gave me a freebie! yay! 

been making some red buntings for Christmas...

bought some jelly powder for tomorrow! =)

Breakfast at Toast

This morning I had brunch at Toast with my friend. We both ordered corn fritters with avocados & poached eggs drizzled with hollandaise sauce. For drinks, I had a latte while my friend was having a chai latte.

I was looking forward to this brunch 'trip' at Toast as i've read about it via Urbanspoon. It is one of the popular spot/talk of the town so i had quite a high expectation of the experience. It has many good reviews by food bloggers so i thought it should be pretty impressive.

However, the food was slightly disappointing in my view. I ordered a latte because i was hoping to get a 'leaf' on my latte, but sadly no 'leaf' pattern for me. I could have just ordered a cappuccino (my usual preference) Anyway, the coffee tasted alright. passed.

As for the dish, i was hoping to cut into runny eggyolks for my poached eggs with my knife, but it didn't happen. And the hollandaise sauce somehow wasn't quite 'right' for me. The corn fritters were a bit bland lacking seasoning, some corn kernels were dry. The fritters could have been a bit more dense in texture.

When i saw corn fritters on the menu, i was reminded of the corn fritters at MART (a tram stop turned into cafe) at 130 Middle Park, Melbourne. I reckon they make the best corn fritters. So sadly that's why i had no choice but to compare the corn fritters of Toast with Mart.

Anyway, overall the service was good, staff was friendly. The ambience was lovely, have a beautiful view of the lake. And i like their collection of various kitsch homewares.

Food: 3 out of 5

Ambience: 4 out of 5

Service: 3.5 out of 5

Maybe i'll order something else, like a sweet dish, if i'm coming back again for breakfast/brunch.

Toast

$$

Shop 21 / 60 Royal St
East Perth, 6004

www.toasteastperth.com

ps: i am now getting a lot more better, recovering from a cold. Thanks everyone! =)

Free Coffee + New Camera

So, my poor faithful digital camera canon ixus 90 has come to its end of life on Monday while i was happily playing with sand & snapping pictures of my friend sandboarding. Sadly the superfine sand went inside the camera. Lens error, restart camera, stated on the screen. But no matter how many different ways i tried to rescue it,and still hoping that it would suddenly come alive, but it didn't.

Then it became clear that it could be the end of its life. sigh. My excitement did went downhill for a while. So i had to bear with my iphone camera to snap pictures for the remaining trip on Monday.

But somehow i kept my hopes up, thinking that it will miraculously come back alive!!

Anyway, that was few days ago. Yesterday i procrastinated, so didn't make a trip to the shops. I went online browsing at digital cameras because i had a feeling that they gonna say it's not worth repairing as you would be paying the same for a new camera anyway.

Always been a Canon faithful user, I had my heart set on Canon Ixus 220 HS, scribbled it on a sticky note, Then, went to the Camera House on Leederville this morning just to get it and go.

But we know it's always not the case.

After browsing and being distracted at the shop, I came out with a Nikon coolpix s5100 instead. I opted for a cheaper price with equally good features such as optical zoom x5. I knew it. I always end up buying a different product even thou I had planned to get a specific one.

Plus, yes, it was not worth repairing as they said. So...sadly i bid you adieu, Canon Ixus 90. It was a graduation gift to me 2 years ago. RIP, cammy. (sniff-sniff)

So, this time i am trying something different. Hopefully i'll have fun playing with my new camera!

The lady at Camera House was super friendly and patient. She even offered me a free coffee! Apparently they have a cafe upstairs where you can have a cuppa while waiting for your photos to be developed. What a brilliant idea!

And i got my free cappuccino. A generous large cup of cappuccino. Delicious!

It made my day! A yummy coffee & a new camera to experiment and play with! Happy Thursday!

Coffee at Cabin Fever

Cabin Fever at Bon Marche Arcade

iced lemon tea & cappuccino at Cabin Fever

Cabin Fever is also taking part in Coffee Appreciation Trail as part of Eat Drink Perth.

I've mentioned about voting for your favourtie coffee & get a chance to win a year's supply of your favourite coffee here.

You can read about how to vote for your favourite coffee here.

And my vote goes to Cabin Fever. Yay!

Simply because the coffee was yummy with creamy froth served on a lovely vintage saucer. It was not too expensive comparing to other cafés. Just $3.50 a cup while some are selling at $3.90 a regular cup.

Also, i like the ambience in the little quaint café, the vintage mix-match furniture, & the shelves full of vintage tea cups & the lady (i think her name is Ruth) really makes good coffee.



a collection of vintage cups & saucers



spend your quiet arvo here at Cabin Fever

 

Cabin Fever is Pigeonhole’s café & gallery space. Some events like music and theatre performances, craft nights and small-scale art exhibitions are happening there this month. Find out more about the events at Cabin Fever here!

Fab Five-day



Image: a collection a day by Lisa Congdon.



Here are my five highlights of events in Perth during March/April which i am pretty excited about.

http://www.showmeperth.com.au/

1. Yay! UpMarket is here again! This Sunday 20th March. 10-4pm.
at Winthrop Hall, Unversity of Western Australia
35 Stirling Hwy
Crawley

2. William St Culture & Arts Festival this Sunday 20th March. 10-4pm. Same day as UpMarket!
*The road will be closed between Brisbane and Newcastle Streets, creating the perfect venue to celebrate the artistic and multicultural vibrancy of the area.

3. Bicycle Swap Meet on Saturday 26th March. 8-1pm.
@ Russell Square, James St, Northbridge. Learn crochet from Granny Funk! Anything to do with bike is fun! unfortunately i don't think i could make it this time.

4. KickstART Youth Market

WHO: Everyone, especially young people aged 12 - 25 years!

WHEN: Saturday, 2nd April 2011

TIME: 10am - 4pm

COST: FREE

WHERE: Perth Cultural Centre

5. Coffee Appreciation Trail - 1-31st March 2011

part of

http://eatdrinkperth.showmeperth.com.au/

I love coffee. Anything with coffee. However, recently i have been drinking more earl grey tea at home & work rather than coffee. Yes, I am now a coffee+tea person. I love my earl grey with a dash of milk.

When i saw this event on Eat Drink Perth website, i thought i would like to try some of the cafés mentioned above in the Coffee Appreciation Trail. I've never been to any one of them so it would be really interesting to check out these venues.

so far i've tried cappuccino from Frisk & CNR cafés. Prices around $3.80-$3.90 for small cup.
I quite like Frisk's coffee for its creamy froth, the natural sweetness from the milk & the retro lounge area.
CNR is located at a very nice sorta hidden spot at James st corner Lake St. The coffee smell was great & i quite like the round sturdy metal cylinder as seats too.

The next cappuccino i want to try is from Ristretto Espresso Specialists which is currently top with a 268 votes. Also, i always wanted to have a cuppa at the Cabin Fever by the awesome people from Pigeonhole. Haven't get around to it. So, that's on my list too!

*You can vote for the best coffee served here and win a year's supply of free coffee from your favourite venue.

I will reserve my vote until after i've tried a few more. But somehow i really hope that Cabin Fever will have the highest vote cause i went past it a few times, it looks like a really comfy homely place to spend your afternoon at.

Doodles: What i saw

My overnight work ended at 7:15am on 21.10.10. I was walking to the bus station and strangely enough i took notice of a few things. Later i jotted down what i saw in my notebook before i easily forgot them as i was sleep deprived.

So, here's a little doodle on what i saw at around 7:15am.

i walked past the café and took in a deep breath of aromatic coffee smell.

i saw people holding take-away coffees in their hands.

people were walking in opposite direction.

i saw sunglasses in different styles and shapes.

a pigeon pacing around pocking its head looking frantic when i moved closer. Pigeons are funny to watch.

people are tuning into all sorts of music they like, perhaps morning radio show or news. Ipods, earphones.

i saw school kids with ipods and huge school bags. catching buses.

i saw a man dressed like a french baker with bright yellow striped top with huge stuffed fabric lightning bolts, skinny with a thick patch of moustache (could it be fake!?) pushing a bike with french sticks in the front basket down the mall. That instant i knew he looked familiar. He was promoting/advertising for Croissant Express. I thought it was hilarious.

image from google

If he could have smiled, i would be persuaded to get a croissant. lol.

coffee art

I love the aroma of coffee and anything coffee flavored. I used to drink 1-2 cups of coffee a day, usually making my own with instant nescafé with a dash of milk. These days i tend to drink less, maybe it's indicating that i am not so addicted to caffeine nowadays. I drink a bit of earl grey and Japanese green tea too lately and definitely a lot more milo than any other time of the year as the winter weather just makes you want to have a hot cup of tea/milo.

Recently i decided to make coffee using a different method using a coffee plunger. So i bought a packet of ground coffee and a small coffee plunger, sort of like a starter kit for brewing own coffee. Good thing was the coffee plunger was on discount so 'i wouldn't think i've spent so much' on this. heh. Since then i have been enjoying a different, slightly stronger, delicate coffee aroma on mornings like today, a rather wet and gloomy day and i needed to stay awake through a 3 hours talk on Drug and Alcohol at work office.

so i was fascinated with the coffee plunger and it inspired this - i drew a little coffee themed doddle on a page of an aged book found at a secondhand bookstore. These pages act as good canvas and fun to work on. :)