Timbuktu Cafe, Brighton

While visiting an exhibition at the nearby Brighton Town Hall, we went to Timbuktu Cafe for lunch. It's a nice cafe, very Parisian. There are tables set up outdoors in the sun, a play area for kids, indoor tables that still gets plenty of light from the large French windows and doors. 

We ordered the breakfast burrito $19 which had the usual - bacon, egg, spinach. I was on portion control diet, so it was an adequate size.

On the Specials board was the Beef Bourguignon (forgot how much it cost, around $24?). The beef was so tender and sauce was very flavourful. The mash was close to Paris mash, lots of buttery velvety butter. Served with carrots and beans. Meat and 3 veg the French way.

 The cafe is attached to a residence at the back which I found very quaint. There is only 1 other restaurant I have dined in that had a residence attached, in Victor Harbour South Australia. It was a Chinese restaurant and one of those places where we were just so glad to find after a few days' of travels in unfamiliar terrain. We tend to gravitate to what we are familiar with, don't we? That includes food. I always find that no matter how good the food is in the places we travel to, after a few days I would always crave for rice. 

On looking up their website, I found that the cafe also does Open Mic on Fridays. It sounds interesting and it would be good to go back for another delicious meal and an enjoyable experience.

Melbourne vs Brisbane, John Cain Arena

 I went to a basketball game at the John Cain Arena in Richmond for the first time recently, and enjoyed it so much! I'm not an avid sports fan but I do enjoy watching from time to time. We got to sit on the front row on the upper level, which is the best ever seat in my opinion! It is right above the entrance to the training rooms so we have a birds eye view of every player as they walked out onto the court. Some of the players also gave the little kids who crowd above the entrance high fives. 

There were cheerleading and flares before the game started and during break times. The energetic ladies and guys really brought some dynamic energy into the crowd with their tumbles, jumps and somersaults. There was a blimp with a camera going around the arena. I thought it was a kiss cam like the ones in the US, but it's very kid friendly here in Australia. No kiss cam, more like if a kid does something eye catching like dancing, they'll get projected in the big screen. 

Each player was introduced as they walked onto the court. I can only recognise a couple of names like Dellavedova and Yudai Baba from the Melbourne team, and none at all from the Brisbane team. The crowd were merciless towards the Brisbane team, so much so that I felt bad for them and started cheering them on. They did very well during the first half and led the game but Melbourne won in the end with 88 vs 79 points. 

During the game, if a player gets two penalty shots and misses both, the audience gets a Whopper Burger from Hungry Jacks. I was hoping this would happen for the fun of it, and it did! A Brisbane player got two penalty shots during the last quarter of the game and missed both. 

The game was fast and exciting, and the experience of being there contributed to it being a not to be missed experience, especially if your favourite team is playing. On the way out, Bulla distributed free vanilla and mint choc tops to the crowd. We had a terrific time at the game and it is so good to see Melbourne's sports scene roaring back to life. 

Marco's Cafe, Boronia

We were at Boronia Central, looking for a lunch spot after doing an errand. There were some options but they were struck out for some reason or other, until we saw Marco's Cafe. It is next to Woolworths so it gets lots of foot traffic. It is one of the few cafes on the strip that has a reasonable sized interior to accommodate dine in patrons. 

We ordered the Big Breakfast and Chicken Parma - I'd forgotten how much they cost, but I remember thinking for the price it was a reasonable portion. The prices on delivery apps are $19.50 and $19.90 respectively. (The Facebook page has been updated with the menu which shows the price as $14.90 each).

I was pleasantly surprised at the portion of the big breakfast. It was big! Three eggs, 1.5 slices of heavily buttered toasted bread, two sausages, three rashes of bacon, a hashbrown, some grilled tomatoes and mushrooms. I had difficulty finishing all of it. The eggs were perfectly cooked, the sausages and bacon are standard fare, hashbrown was crispy and the tomatoes were very sweet which makes the mushrooms an after thought. 

This is the Chicken Parma with chips and salad. Standard fare chicken parma, crispy chips and a garden salad. The portion is so large that we could only finish half of each plate and got a takeaway box for the rest. 

 The cafe is very much a mom and dad owned and run business, with both of them working in the kitchen and at the counter. Marco (I assume) is not very smiley, and there is confusion at the beginning with the menu and method of ordering (there is a menu in a plastic stand thing on each table, except ours, you order at the counter) but they were very obliging when we asked for a takeaway box and I can see they have good rapport with their regulars, even throwing in free cookies with coffee orders. 

The food is nothing to shout about, definitely not the jazzed up, insta type food. It's home brand white bread toast, home brand bulk buy bacon type food. It is honest, unpretentious food at very reasonably priced for the portion provided and I love that about this place. The recent reviews on Google on this cafe based on sub par experiences that are in part due to delivery services were not representative of our experience. Many restaurants have been impacted by Covid19 and we were glad to be able to support a local establishment.

Villa Alba, Kew

Villa Alba is a grand old mansion in Kew. It is not in the National Trust (which has properties like Rippon Lea, Como House and Labassa) but operates as a museum by a non profit organisation Villa Alba Museum Inc. Admission fees are $15 per adult when the museum is open to the public on the first Sunday of each month.

Compared to some of the other grand old mansions mentioned above, I think Villa Alba has undergone more restoration works and is better preserved. I love the wall paintings, rosettes, ornate fireplaces. Even the floors were decorated with fancy parquetry work. It is worth the admission fees to visit this mansion. You'll also be helping preserve the history and beauty of the mansion for future generations. 

The story of Villa Alba starts with Anna Maria McEvoy and William Greenlaw, or rather James McEvoy who was Anna Maria's father. A wealthy pastoralist, he gifted the land on which Villa Alba stands to his only daughter upon her marriage to William. The land was part of his own estate, called Studley House. And so, he became their neighbour, maybe to keep an eye over his new son in law, making sure he treats Anna Maria well? I think he was on to something... 

You see, William Greenlaw was an ambitious Scottish lad who migrated to Australia during the gold rush period, aged 22. He worked his way up to General Manager in Colonial Bank of Australia within 15 years (impressive!) but then he like many others, approved some bad loans in speculative land banks out in Fern Tree Gully (I could've told him it was too risky) which saw him lost everything and he died a few years after the banking crisis. He wasn't the only casualty, there were many financial institutions that went bust because it was an industry wide crisis. But because he spent a great deal of money already on the building and renovation of Alba Villa, he didn't have the funds to stump up his bank I suppose and he took it extra hard. 

Anna Maria became a single mom with 6 kids after his death. By then the kids would have all grown up, in their 20's but still... it wouldn't have been easy. The house was safe at least, because Anna Maria's dad had the foresight (or maybe he didn't really trust William?) to keep in trust for Anna Maria, so the liquidators couldn't touch it. It was sold 13 years after it was built to a hospital which whitewashed all the beautiful paintings on the wall and used it as a nurses' dorm. 

The house was built and decorated in 1882-1884. It was reportedly designed by William himself who wanted to build a nice place for his wife, and decorated by some of his mates the Paterson brothers from his homeland Scotland. In the sunroom, one can see a painting of Edinburgh landscape. The house is in comparatively good condition, probably because they didn't live in it for long. 

I really enjoyed our visit to Villa Alba. If you are unable to visit, there is a free virtual tour of the house on their website, and invaluable information about the story of the house on this website: https://recollections.nma.gov.au/issues/volume_8_number_2/papers/villa_alba#_edn57