REVIEW: Harveys Bar + Bistro



Lovely Harveys is a great place for people watching.

Can I just ask why, if they're going to serve breakfast at an establishment, why do they not serve it all day? Do they not know that I drank one and a half bottles of the second cheapest wine from a inner city pub last night and had to sleep til 9 then lay around in my pants for an hour watching reruns of The Love Boat? And therefore cannot possibly be expected to present for breakfast before 11 am? Do they not know!? Outrageous. And this is why we did not have breakfast at Gerards Bistro but instead made the perilous journey across the carpark driveway to Harveys Bar + Bistro. And you think I'm joking when I say it was perilous, but I'm not. Range Rover drivers think James Street is their personal Grand Theft Auto game and we're nothing but dispensable street walkers scurrying out of the way.

I'm not a fan of Dave Hughes, his voice annoys me but the women who sat down after he left were more annoying.

In any case, we made it across the driveway like frogs in a Frogger game, in the rain no less. We were seated with a slightly peevish attitude which was offset by the plum table in the corner of the outdoor patio area. We ordered drinks, two Bellini's to get the morning started in true New Farm style. While we supped our breakfast cocktails like two extras from Ab Fab, we did happen to spy a well known comedian (who I won't name, lets just call him Dave Hughes) seated at the table next to us.


I want all the liquids!

After we'd sated both our a.m. alcohol and celebrity spotting needs, we got down to the need of food. I was pleased to see a caramel milkshake on the menu and did my honourable duty of ordering one. And I was pleasantly surprised, I had not picked Harveys for the makers of a fine milkshake but they proved me wrong. The texture was silky and thickened with good quality ice cream. And though I could taste ice cream, I could taste milk. Which sounds strange, but with ice cream and caramel flavour, it's rare to actually taste the milk. The caramel flavour was a little weak but overall a very good milkshake. Check it's ranking on the Cassie Cakes Milk Bar.

I took all those chilli flakes and it was awesome.

Our breakfasts were delivered soon after. First was the Confit Potato, Ricotta and Spinach Omelette, with Tomato Chutney and Chilli Flakes with Serrano Jamon for $19.90. The omelette was packed with flavour, the egg was soft but also cooked through. The omelette is often a skill test for chefs, a simple dish but when done well, it's light, yet rich in flavour. And the omelette cooker at Harveys had it down. The jamon was perfect, salty and tasty. Had we not gone with the optional ham though, the dish might have been lacking a little.


Oh I wish I had this now. I'm jealous of past myself.

The second dish we ordered was the Potato and Feta Roesti, Creamed Sweet Corn, Poached Egg and Herb Salsa for $17.90, with bacon for $5.50 extra. The rost, or roesti as it was written, was really squat and fat, which usually means the insides would be stodgy and dense. But this roesti was really transcendent! The outside was crisp and the inside was light, fluffy potato, like it had been whipped by the wings of angels. The bacon was salty, thin and crispy and there was a dollop of sour cream that paired perfectly with everything. Also, creamed corn is amazing and I love it and I want to marry it. I was hugely impress with the poached egg, also perfectly cooked, no translucent white bits that can turn me off my breakfast. That's a lie, nothing turns me off food.


Yolk porn.

It is obvious to me why Harveys is a New Farm institution. Everything on the menu was simple but it was done so well. For this approach, I would really love to visit Harveys for dinner. And besides a slightly unhappy greeting, all the other staff were lovely and helpful. And hey, maybe that one member of staff was hungover too.

Food: 4/5
Service: 3.5/5
Price: 3.5/5
Atmosphere: 4/5