Stovetop

100 Leicester St, Carlton 3053

Date visited: 5th July 2014

Stovetop is a situated on Leicester Street, only a mere few minutes stroll from Melbourne University.  Walking over there brought back memories of old uni days, of Union House, lectures, exams... good times.  Shudder.

It was a miserable, grey day and we were glad to finally get shelter from the flurry of cold rain.  The interior of Stovetop was beautiful, airy and spacious.   

Our orders were taken in good time.  Service was efficient and the waitress friendly.  I had a Cappuccino and MerlinFan had a Latte. 

Cappuccino, Latte

My cappuccino had one of the most beautiful coffee art designs I've seen in a while.  The coffees had a lovely chocolatey fragrance and although not very strong, were velvety smooth with nutty tones.  Nice!

Cappuccino art

MerlinFan had the Latkes sweet potato and chia with poached eggs, baba ganoush and rocket.

Latkes $14

The latkes were crisp and sweet and her two eggs perfectly poached with flowing yolks. Although the baba ganoush was nice and smoky, MerlinFan said the scent of spice was almost too overpowering.  

Egg porn :D

I was tempted by a few dishes, however the House Salad of confit ocean trout fillet, crisp fennel and blood orange salad with apple balsamic glaze sounded too good to pass by.  I was feeling a bit bored of my usual default eggs and sweet dessert, so I decided to get something different.

House salad $21

The first thing that put me off slightly with this dish was the sight of the silvery pink, rubbery skin of the confit trout.  Crispy skin would have been nice.  The trout itself unfortunately was also too fishy for my liking.  Whilst it sounded good on paper, there was hardly any apple balsamic glaze so it was basically the rocket, blood orange and fennel and trout without anything really to tie the elements together.  For $21 I had to admit I was disappointed and left most of it behind.  

We both enjoyed our coffees, and the relaxed, comfortable atmosphere of Stovetop.  I think this was the case of ordering the wrong dish - I should have chosen one of either the porridge, baked duck eggs or cinnamon waffles - sure looked awesome on photos online.



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