Cafe Altenberg

We like most of the inland country towns near Canberra - like Bungendore, Cobargo, Milton, and, of course, Braidwood. They try that much harder than their coastal cousins and seem to attract a different type of resident than the seachangers of the South Coast. Instead of bland suburbia-upon-sea, punctuated by the gin palaces of successful mobile phone store owners and quantity surveyors, the stores and houses inland towns are generally older and evocative of the unknown country of the past. Similarly, more frequently among their residents are those who have sought to escape from Babylon rather than desiring to reproduce it.

Long a favourite stop for pies and ice creams for Canberrans on their ways to the coast, Braidwood seems to be going through a gentrification process, as various members of the monied classes follow one another in setting up homeware, antique, and 2nd-hand book shops and cafes along its main drag. Among this milleu, Cafe Altenberg can be found in a pleasantly shaded courtyard behind a gallery selling fairly generic contemporary art. When we visited on a somewhat busy on a Saturday afternoon, we were confronted with a friendly front of house waitress, and a clearly agitated cook mumbling to herself and purposefully slamming and rattling various kitchen implements. We thought we heard something about the flyscreen not being shut properly... Anyway, undeterred, we ordered and generally enjoyed a falafel salad and a Moroccan lamb pie. At $17, the latter was on the expensive side, and a little average, but the salad was OK at $12 and enormous. Both dishes were treated with a tasty, if slightly sickly sweet, dressing.

Overall, good if not great.

Sfoglia

One tyranny of life in Australasia these days is what might be called an ever-expanding 'manners of casualness'. Even when the most serious events are being undertaken, there is a widespread norm to maintain a lack of gravity, to keep "keep things relaxed" or, worse, "just chilled out".

While "laid-backness" has perhaps always been comparatively a feature of life in this part of the world, it does seem to be getting ever-more pervasive. Its intrusion has been particularly pronounced in the world of public affairs. For example, in a recent press conference a senior (male) executive of a major Australian firm announced the controversial laying off of 1500 employees, but did not feel the need to be seen wearing a tie. This would have been unimaginable 20 or even 10 years ago. We don't advocate formality and seriousness for its own sake, but simply that the gravity, complexities, and difficulties of life should be properly and honestly recognised, including in everyday activities such as preparation of food.

Accordingly, we like Sfoglia, a small Italian cafe in Dickson. While the food is excellent and well priced (try the $5 bruchetta), its main point of difference is that the staff seem to take their work seriously, in the proper non-pejorative sense of the word. There is little inessential banter and focused-looking faces. While the staff may not be continually smiling, they are certainly not unfriendly. Rather, they communicate a concern with serving delicious food quickly, as a third way between ingratiation or apathy towards customers. Refreshing.

Starbucks

Being for the most part tea people, we don't really drink much coffee, and even less espresso. So, the news of the closure of a bunch of Starbucks around Australia, including all of the outlets in the ACT, probably has less impact on us than on others (and in any case, chains and such are not really our thing).

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this event though is how it become widely framed as a triumph of Australian connoisseurship. We've seen stories in the SMH, the Canberra Times, the Murdoch press, and Crikey, all carrying the same basic narrative - Australian consumers have rejected Starbucks due to their superior tastes, predicated on the availability of superior espresso via mass Italian immigration. The evidence cited is that Australia is only the country, outside of the US, that has had stores shut en masse, coinciding with the firm running into financial difficulties.

Overall, this generally strikes us as a deeply spurious argument. As a corrective to Australian exceptionalism there is, as always, New Zealand as a mirror to the Australian experience. Trans-Tasman one-upmanship aside, coffee in NZ is generally comparable to that in Australia - the average espresso-based coffee in Wellington would match the average in Melbourne. However, Italian migration to NZ (and by implication the supposed "Italian immigration factor" on supply and demand) has historically been nothing like that to Australia, and can probably be safely ruled out as a variable. Yet, Starbucks will continue its current level of operations in Auckland, Wellington, etc.

Conversely, to examine the "Italian immigration factor" from another angle, Argentina, of course, was historically one of largest recipients of Italian emigration - probably to a greater extent than Australia - but according to Wikipedia, Starbucks will continue to operate there. Additionally, to undermine the "unique Australian coffee culture" argument further, it would appear that Starbucks will also continue doing business in other countries with indisputable "coffee cultures" (e.g. the Netherlands, or Austria).

All of this does not absolutely rule out the possibility of Australian exceptionalism - however, we need a bit more evidence to be convinced, including the more definitive ruling out of alternative explanations (e.g. exchange rate issues, comparative overstretch by the local subsidiary, the possibility of the sale of the Australian operations providing a relatively easy cashflow, and so on.)

As Nature Intended

Next to the Rydges by the lake, on the ground floor of one of the buildings that are part of the gentrification of Acton, is As Nature Intended, a cafe and grocery shop chasing the bourgeois-green dollar. While not perhaps actually typical of the clientele, one customer we saw on a recent visit seemed to personify the spirit of the place - a middle-aged woman, possibly having strolled from her (and accompanying husband's) new upmarket apartment across the road, wearing a polar-fleece and what appeared to be pyjama bottoms, but with the poise and confidence of possessing a certain amount of wealth.

As well as generally browsing through the (as you would expect) expensive organic grocery section, the other main purpose of our visit was lunch, which was a bit of a mixed bag of experiences. Foodwise, one meal (Beans and Sausage on Toast) was OK, if not outstanding. The other (Thai Scrambled Eggs with Tofu on Toast) was ordered knowing that this would be a gamble, and which turned out ultimately to not pay off. The eggs, though nonetheless excellent, were actually more of an omelet. The tofu was chunky and bland. Further, with both meals we were not impressed with the "toast" appearing to have come straight from a plastic bag, and not being toasted properly - for $15 meals we expect a bit more effort.

The effort of thought was also lacking in whoever chose the music that day - banal, vacuous cafe jazz/trip-hop - that sat uneasily with the underlying premise of the place on conscientiousness in consumerism. On the other hand, we did like the American organic farming journals from the 1960s scattered around. Views on the paintings of Australian pastoral scenes in bright oil paints on the walls will likely be a question of personal taste.

Overall, we would've liked to have liked As Nature Intended more, but it clearly needs to do some work on itself. However, wealthy baby-boomers, who genuinely believe they can eat their way to health, and are otherwise able to suspend doubt, may have a different opinion.

A Bite to Eat

For as long we we've lived in Canberra, Silo in Kingston has been viewed among most of our friends (and this being a view which we've shared), of being the best cafe in Canberra. After having visited A Bite to Eat in the Woden suburb of Chifley the other day though, we think it may have a peer. We'd heard good things about Bite, and it turns out those things were all true.

Despite their mutual food excellence (and reasonable pricing) the two cafes have a number of notable differences. Silo is minimalist and monotone in its decor, whereas Bite is bohemian bright and multicoloured - each table and chair set is different to the next. Silo is favoured by the elected representatives, bureaucrats, and lobbyists of the political elite, the main demographic at Bite on our visit on a midweek lunchtime were middle-class women dressed for comfort. Silo makes Canberra's best fresh bread and has a cheese room, Bite has Zierholz beer on tap - and so on.

We ate duck and potato pancakes, and felafels with chili-tomatoes on sourdough - both of which were delicious, and the latter costing less than $10. And importantly, whereas Silo is often too popular and crowded to be easily enjoyed, while Bite was busy, it was in no sense the upper middle class feeding frenzy that Silo can be on many mornings.

Overall, while Bite doesn't surpass its Kingston competitor, it does seem to suggest that the latter does have a rival - and that quality food in Canberra can be found beyond the fashionable suburbs.

Lynwood Cafe

Yesterday afternoon we paid a visit to the well-regarded Lynwood Cafe, just off the Federal Highway in the small hamlet of Collector, at the northern end of Lake George. On a sunny winter's day, with the blue sky, yellow tussock lands, neighbouring creek, aged leaf-less trees, and restored white colonial cottage, it's all bit of a contemporary Australian-Arcadia.

As an Arcadia, from this and previous visits, it is one populated primarily by upper-middle class baby boomers on their way between Canberra and Sydney. By way of example, a waitress asked the three couples in the small room we were sitting in, if we had seen the National Gallery of Australia's recent Monet-Turner exhibition. One of the couple said they had just come down to see it yesterday...

For the most part, the Lynwood Cafe does a good job reflecting this certain demographic - comfortable, visibly successful in worldly affairs, but not too flashy. Cream it most certainly is not. One absolute strength of the place is the service - which was friendly without a hint of ingratiation or world-weariness. Funnily enough, our only quibble was with the food. While the basil, tomato, and onion semolina gnocchi we ordered was delicious (with a tangy smokey flavour), the gorgonzola and mushroom risotto was a bit average (Chats at the ANU, does a much better and cheaper job). Like its upper-middle- class clientele though, such a flaw did not seem to much damage its general projections of overall authenticity and deserved esteem.

Gus's

Gus's is something of a celebrity among cafes in the Canberra hospitality cosmos. It's reputation as fashionable and superior is often quickly communicated to newcomers and visitors to the city. It even has its own Wikipedia page, repeating the locally well-known battles of the original Gus-from-Vienna in establishing outdoor eating at his venue (the page also suggests that the original Gus has long moved on (presumably) to al fresco dining in the sky). However, it is the contention of the Always Hungrys that like most celebrities, it is usually a disappointing experience when they are encountered in person.

Whatever the merits of Gus's in the past, it is clearly now no longer a leader among Canberra's cafes. This decline is both relative - i.e. in part due to the existance of many superior alternatives - as well when simply compared to the Gus's of a couple years ago.

An analogy with major fast food chains might be fruitfully made. The menu is predictable - in this case, stock-in-trade Australasian cafe food (mushrooms on toast, wedges with sour cream and sweet chili sauce, generic pasta dishes, and so on). Often, it would appear that they are prepared without a noticebly high level of care. Further, to stretch Haywood's observation below that the only acceptable substitute for good beer is very cheap beer, the food is not particuarly cheap - being priced at standard Canberra cafe levels (i.e. you could eat at the apex of local daytime eating, Silo, in Kingston, for around the same money). In sum, as with major fast food chains, one is probably going to be served food that only the young and callow are likely to be uncritically satisfied with.

To be clear, this is not to suggest the current Gus's is any worse than an all-too-large number of Canberra cafes, rather, that you can probably do better.