I was extremely delighted when I stumbled upon this hidden cafe on a quiet side street as I was walking down the main strip in Glenelg. Tucked behind a quirky layout in an ambiguous location, it seemed full of promise. Places like this back home would have been the very representation of excellent coffee, crave-worthy signature treats, a tattooed waiter/waitress with at least 3 piercings (perceivable), and at least a 95% local population.
So it was with much anticipation that I returned to Zest Cafe Gallery the next morning, hoping for a much better breakfast experience than the likes of Biga.
I was not prepared for what happened next.
We ordered 'Hell's Eggs' ($12) - two eggs in a pot with a tomato, capsicum and rosemary salsa, topped with grilled cheese, Tobasco and Zest's BBQ sauce served with toasted baguette, and 'The Hottie' ($12) - a spinach, basil and pecorino risotto cake with chorizo sausages and a tomato, rosemary and red capsicum salsa, served with toast.
All sounds fantastic. Right? Wrong.
The baguette was toasted to an inch of it's crispy and rock-hard life, the grilled cheese was probably the only edible thing in the dish, the eggs were way overcooked, and only the tomato (and 5kgs of salt) were detectable in the salsa...the 'Hottie' was equally worse, if possible - the spinach looked like it had endured the boil for a few mins too long and was void of colour, or taste for that matter. The spinach, basil and pecorino risotto cake resembled nothing of its proclaimed yumminess. It was like eating stale rice with drabs of over-grown weed from the side strips. And the salsa. Ah, the salsa. What was that about differentiating between salsa and tomato soup again?
The coffee was typically Adelaide. Unimpressive, albeit in this instance, at least drinkable.
Food: We ended up feeding our deprived stomachs on toast and butter - 1/10
Service: The service was appreciative - albeit the waitre showed genuine signs of disbelief when we provided some feedback regarding the quality of their food - no one ever told them!? - 6/10
Value: Reasonably priced food, but I'm down-marking it due to quality 4/10Ambiance: Neat little cafe - 8/10
Overall: 23/50
Encore: Would not want to with a 10 foot barge-pole...
Your review is harsh and unfair. While we view any criticisms of food and coffee quite seriously, this reveals only personal preferences and personal biases masquerading as professionalism, and a heap of arrogance for anything outside your own melbo-centric world view. this reveals a cringe-worthy parochialism.
ReplyDeleteEncore: Yet another tosser who's taken it upon themselves to judge. 2/10