Back in September, the company which I work for had a brand new role opening, so I decided to apply for it. I was lucky enough to be offered the role (hooray!), and had to undergo 4 weeks of training. The training was held down in Collins Street, which meant I had the opportunity to visit some Collins Street Cafes!

Here are a selection of my favourite Collins Street Cafes that I visited during the four week period.

Filter by Small Batch

Address: 555 Collins St, Melbourne 3000
Phone: N/A
Website: http://www.filterbysmallbatch.com.au
Twitter: @filterbysb
Facebook: N/A
Instagram: @filterbysb

Back in August 2013, Broadsheet announced a competition ‘The Keys,’ for established cafe owners in Melbourne to open up a new venture where they will receive help from Broadsheet, and Bank of Melbourne.

Andrew Kelly of Auction Rooms was the winner of the competition, and after six months, his brand new venture on Collins st was opened.

I did visit Filter by Small Batch when it first opened, by I left my memory card at home and didn’t get a chance to revisit until a couple weeks ago.

When you step into the shop you will notice how clean and simple it looks – using shades of white & grey for their colour scheme and simple yet sophisticated shop fit outs.

The offerings at Filter are simple, with brewed coffee (batch, aeropress and pour over) as well as espresso and tea. Also at the counter you will see a selection of pastries as well as their smørrebrød that are on offer for that day.With so many cafes in Melbourne, it’s their focus on filter coffee (they serve espresso as well), and also the smørrebrød which is a popular open sandwich in Sweden and Denmark.

The staff at Filter are very knowledgable and will help you choose the coffee if you can’t decide. I decided to have their Batch Ethiopian blend with notes of peach and mars bar.
What I love about filter coffee is the lingering clean taste left on your mouth once you finish it. I was taught that filter coffee is best when it’s cold.

For the smørrebrød, I had the smoked salmon and cream cheese topped with devilled eggs & salmon roe served on a heavy slice of rye. All the ingredients married well together with the fresh thin slices of salmon that’s been cured perfectly and the creamy devilled eggs. I also love the use of rocket that gives it a slightly peppery taste.

If you’re after a Scandinavian experience, then this cafe is for you.

Long Shot

Address: 727 Collins St, Melbourne 3008
Phone: 03 9252 7979
Website: http://long-shot.com.au
Twitter: @Long____Shot
Facebook: here
Instagram: @long___shot

Long Shot is a cafe located in Docklands fitted with cute decor. They serve St. Ali filter and espresso coffee as well as baked goods by their award winning chef Maria Lantelme. Not only that they serve flavoured milks, house made sodas and even wine!

I was feeling really peckish that day and ended up having their soy chai latte and a quiche tart with candied walnuts.
Unfortunately I found the soy chai latte to be a bit weak for my liking – as I couldn’t taste the chai spices, and it wasn’t sweetened enough with honey. However I found the quiche mini tart to be amazing. The soft pastry shell filled with creamy egg filling and topped with beautiful candied walnuts.

If you work in the Docklands area or exploring – check out this quaint little space! I really love how they set up their cafe!

Pok Pok Junior

Address: Shop 9/555 Bourke St, Melbourne 3000
Phone: 03 9629 5881
Website: http://www.pokpok.com.au
Twitter: @pokpok_melb
Facebook: here
Instagram: @pokpok_melb

On my second last day of training, I was kicking myself for forgetting the cafes down on Collins St/Bourke St. Anyway, I was really glad to have visited Pok Pok Junior as the food was great.

Pok Pok Junior is the sister store of Pok Pok in Docklands and serves authentic Thai dishes.

Originally I was seated on the inside, but I found the high chairs to be ridiculously high, so I moved myself to the outside dining area.

I had a difficult time choosing my dish, but in the end I decided to go with the Bangkok Street Noodle which consists of – warm flat rice noodle with porchetta pork, pork crackling, dried shrimp, fried shallots, tofu and shitake mushrooms cooked in five spice and splices of sticky chilli soy sauce. (Yeah – just typing out this description made my mouth water!)

The rice noodles were cooked beautifully and none of the noodles were broken – making it easy to slurp up. The porchetta pork pieces were tender, lean and well marinated – with notes of five spice and soy sauce. The firm pieces of tofu and shitake mushrooms complimented the dish well. As for the pork crackling in this dish – well I had to really forget about my arteries getting clogged to eat it, but they were amazingly crunchy and really added an oomph to the dish.
Of course for any soup noodle dish – the broth is the most important. There isn’t a lot of broth in this dish, but I did find the broth to be very clean that has five spices flavour, chilli and soy – it truly packs a punch!

I wish I had the chance to try out the other dishes – it’s such a great little Thai cafe addition!

I did visit a number of other Collins St eateries, but these were the three cafes that really stood out for me!

The post Collins Street Cafes appeared first on Melbourne Food Blog.