Rathdowne Street Food Store
617 Rathdowne St, Carlton North, VIC
Rom Caffe Coffee
It's usually hard to get a table but it was a breeze for us. Parking was just as easy, despite it being amongst the strip of cafes. The food store part of the homely café sells a great selection of homemade preserves and pantry staples. The interior was seriously mismatched - wooden chairs, butcher-papered table tops, red velvety cushions, opera music in the background… But I liked the casual atmosphere and friendly (though not very attentive) service. What I didn't like was the insect that resembled a baby cockroach crawling around on the sofa.
Coffee was good, the Italian chocolate was ok. Not bad but not what I expected. It looked more promising than it tasted. Maybe 'cos I'm used to thick, rich chocolate like Koko Black or Brunetti. .JPG)
We ordered the poached eggs with salmon & avocado on toasted muffins with hollandaise, & added hash browns. The quality of everything was good, but nothing to rant about. The cylindrical-shaped hash browns were tasty, but they could have used fresher oil to deep fry them in..JPG)
Portions weren't scarily oversized so we ordered the ricotta hotcakes with a poached pear and lavender ice cream. The pear was delightful but the hotcakes had a strong cinnamon taste which I dislike. I ended up picking at the sides 'cos they had less spice & were slightly crispy. Ice cream tasted like vanilla which was disappointing, but at least it wasn't the creamy vanilla I hate… it was more of the vanilla bean vanilla. 
