Pre-tennis brunch at Orange

Orange
126 Chapel St, Windsor (map)
9529 1644

CJ is back in town! After nearly a year overseas my partner-in-crime and fellow pho/chilli oil dumpling/dirty martini enthusiast has returned to Melbourne! To celebrate I invited her along with me to the tennis - I had been given two free corporate tickets for the Sunday day session - but we started off with brunch. For once I had use of a car so we drove past Replete, but there was a goodly queue (and anyway, I've already blogged about the brunch on offer there)... so after discussion we decided to go down to Orange instead.

Down the good end of Chapel Street, Orange is a nifty venue that works for breakfasts, for nightcaps, and for everything in between. In winter the little room out the back with a roaring fireplace is a great location for sipping brandy, but on a summer's morning the Parisian bistro-style front room is ideal.

The first decent coffee CJ had had in TEN MONTHS (accompanied by my hot chocolate).

CJ ordered the Grilled Italian Bread, which came with avocado, "sun blushed" tomatoes (!!), field mushrooms and chilli jam ($12). CJ broke off half a slice for me to try - it was bloody lovely. The homemade chilli jam was not too spicy - just right for brunch - and the chewy bread was lightly brushed with oil and had grill marks striping its sides.

Most unusually for me, I was in the mood for a sweet rather than a savoury brunch. I decided on the Crêpes with orange (appropriate given the restaurant name, eh?) and maple syrup ($9.50). I liked these even more than I liked CJ's dish - the combination of slightly-tart-given-the-season orange with maple syrup (mixed in with a small dollop of melting cream) was inspired, and the crêpes were soft and tasted like real crêpes, as opposed to tasting like wussy thin pancakes (as is so often the case here in Oz).

We felt that given the terrific quality of the food, the breakfast prices at Orange were very modest. We also enjoyed the tennis, especially when Frenchy meilleurs amis and doubles partners, Gasquet and Tsonga, were pitted against each other in a rather exciting singles match. The intermittent rain made the rows opposite us periodically erupt in a colourful sea of umbrellas... :)