It's extremely rare I venture to South Melbourne. The last time was when I bought a cheap Scoopon gym membership for a few weeks and the only places I visited in the area were Andrew's (defeats the purpose of going the gym perhaps) and the market.
On this occasion it was enroute and I had time to spare. A quick look found the ridiculously well rated Chez Dre - I can't remember why the name sounded familiar. Maybe it was so highly rated a cafe that I intended to go sometime. Perhaps it's the same name as somewhere I've been overseas. Not sure. In any case the entrance at the end of a little alley is slightly hidden and went into Bibelot first by accident. On a Thursday late morning the place was quite full inside and outside.
There's some great sounding menu options and I had trouble deciding between the grilled sardines and pork belly. My waitress said the choice was difficult but each was completely different - either breakfast or lunch. After a pressured 15 seconds of indecision I opted for lunch.
- Confit Pork Belly (with pickled pear & chive salad, crispy pig ears, apple & vanilla puree) $23 - a very nice slab of pork belly (natural flavour, not too fatty, quite tender meat) served with the crispiest skin I could imagine. The ear slivers add a little smoky touch and firm texture and the salad is the cold and light contrast;
- Prana chai with soy - real spices served in a pot. Mildly sweet and a good amount of cardamom. Not bad.
I liked the lunch but maybe being 1115am I intrinsically felt like I was missing out on carbohydrates. It could've been related to my seat next to the counter with all the breads on display and reading the information card about their sourdough. I satisfied that craving by taking home a 1.5kg round michette loaf for my next morning's breakfast - a soft, strongly wheaty brown colour bread.
Next time I would order grilled sardines or spiced lamb jaffle for breakfast, lamb goujons for lunch and a smoothie or iced coffee.