Auction Rooms

I spotted the Auction Rooms the first time a friend brought me to her favourite breakfast spot on Errol St in North Melbourne – Fandango. The place definitely looks stylish and very beckoning. I asked her if she had ever eaten there. She said, yes. And how was it? I continued to ask. She said it was okay, Fandango was better. We had breakfast at Fandango that morning, and I must agree with her, I do like the breakfast selection at Fandango. It’s definitely on my ‘to-visit-again’ list.

The following weekend, I thought I would pop by Errol St again and drop by Auction Rooms for breakfast. First impression (or second more likely), the interior is very stylishly decorated – high ceiling, plenty of natural lighting, artistic photography hung on the walls of the huge space. It was probably one of the biggest breakfast spots I’ve ever been to (size wise). I sat by a table not far from the counter, ordered and was leafing through the Saturday Age before I realised how slow they were with their order-to-table turnaround time. My coffee had gone cold by the time the food arrived. The menu is quite limited, with its egg selection mainly poached eggs. I ordered the Opening Bid and swapped the bacon for some baked beans. Even though the food is not bad, it was not great either. Put it this way, if I had to rave about one thing, I couldn’t think of one to do with the food – the decor, yes, but the food? Not really. With Atomica, I could rave about how good the coffee is and how yummy the hash browns are, how much I like the berry compote with their pancakes etc etc etc. With Fandango, I could rave about the pesto, and tomato relish that comes with their scrambled eggs. But with the Auctiom Rooms? Nothing immediately comes to mind.

Having said that, I haven’t completely discounted the place. Next time, I might pop by for lunch instead, or maybe for coffee and dessert. If anything, the feel and decor of the place is definitely its saving grace.

Mule

I went to Mule for breakfast not too long ago after having walked past it many times before. From the outside, the place looks promising – hippie-ish with funky retro furnishing. The eggs used are free-range. Coffee is free-trade. So it has a bit of a hippie feel to it, I thought to myself: why not? So on a fine Saturday morning, while I waited for the washing machine to finish doing the washing, I took a stroll up Sydney Road and dropped into Mule for breakfast. Big mistake.

The place is not particularly busy but I have to say, it was quite awkward having to stand by the door for what felt like a long time, unsure of whether I should wait to be seated or I should strut around like I own the place. Finally, a waitress spotted me and told me I could sit anywhere so I selected a table by the entrance. Even though service-wise Mule was off to a bad start, it quickly redeemed itself with its speedy order-to-table turnaround. I ordered scrambled eggs on toast with hash brown and baked beans on the side. Boy was it a disappointment. The hash brown looked like it was thawed out of a bag of commercially processed hash browns from the supermarket’s frozen food section. It still looked pale in its meticulous oval shape, like it had a too-quick dip in and out of the frying pan (or the oven, whichever the case may be). The baked beans were even worse – bland, dry, almost turned into mush, and–you guessed it–like it came out of a cheap can of baked beans from the supermarket. I almost gagged when I heard a customer said, “Thanks for the beautiful breakkie.” when she was paying, thinking to myself: which planet did you come from? The entire plate looks like it was assembled out of the supermarket aisle!

I hastily finished my breakfast (really, how else would you eat sub-standard quality food except hastily?), paid and left. Well at least I know that’s one place I won’t ever go to for breakfast again.