Eat. @ Capital Kitchen.

Chadstone Shopping Centre, 1341 Dandenong Rd, Chadstone ph :9563 4144

Thanks to the recommendation from my friend at Home Made Home Baked after my less than impressive visit to the Lindt Cafe, we tried out Capital Kitchen for a bite and a cuppa.  It has now become a fast favourite of mine for a good quality cafe pit-stop when we visit Chadstone.

Capital Kitchen is in the new bit of Chadstone, right across from Gap (lots of things to covet there for kids and for me, sigh....)  It's a mix of eclectic homewares for sale, big communal tables for groups, high counters for singletons, and smaller tables for groups of 3 & 4.  These are thrown amoungst counters topped with sweet bites and cabinets of rolls, wraps and salads, 2 large coffee makers staffed for a constant flow of drinks, and a counter for ordering made-to-order items from the kitchen.

The Chicken Baguette made for a very filling lunch.  Good amount of chicken with avocado, made more interesting by the crunchiness of the celery.

The Breakfast Burrito was saved by the tangy relish, which would have been quite dense and ordinary with just the scrambled eggs and bacon filling.  The relish gave it a refreshing tang, but I would probably recommend this more for brunch rather than for breakfast.

I love Eggs Benedict and usually order this when available whenver I get the opportunity.  Unfortunately I'm often disappointed by the lack of ability of many eateries to poach a decent egg.  The Eggs Benedict here was probably slightly above the normal standard of most cafes, but was let down by the slightly too heavy hollandaise sauce.

The little lemon meringue tart was very nice.  Many lemon meringue pies are too heavy due to the excessive pastry, especially when they are small versions, and as such the pastry to filling ratio becomes way too high.  This little gem was the perfect size with a cuppa, and had the lightest pastry just on the bottom, with a nice tangy curd and lovely meringue topping.

The citrus and passionfruit butter cake is essentially a lamington dipped in a fruity jelly sauce instead of chocolate, then rolled in coconut.  It made for a refreshing change and again went well with a cup of tea.

The kids could not go past one of the giant macaroons stacked high at the order counter.  These things were grapefruit-sized meringue and coconut confections stuck together with some chocolate cream.  It's probably too much even when shared by 2 kids, but relatively good value at $3.

The boards displayed behind the drinks counter showed a kids menu with kids soldiers, pasta, pizza and shakes.  We didn't get a chance to try those ourselves, but the kids on tables near us had some of those menu items. The serves looked to be decently sized and were certainly being devoured quickly!

The staff were very busy and looked much happier when chatting to each other than when taking your order.  Forgivable thanks to the relatively fast service.

All in all, I think Capital Kitchen serves inner-suburb-cafe standard food in an outer suburb shopping center, which is great to see.  The prices reflect their slightly-more-up-market cafe crowd (expect $11-13 for the rolls, about $3-5 for sweets), which is fortunately balanced out by decent sized servings that will fill you up for breakfast, brunch, lunch or morning/afternoon tea.

If eating is not enough you can also do some shopping here.

Eat.Play.Shop. Recommends : The Chicken Baguette, so far my favourite menu item.

Give it a Miss : I found it a bit hard ordering when there's just me, the kids and the pram.  You have to order at the counter and give them a table number, and during busy times it's hard (and a bit dangerous) to leave your kids and pram at a table half way across the large eatery and run over to the counter and order.

Toilets : they have their own toilets!

Highchairs : Yes