Goodness Gracious Cafe - Graceville, Brisbane. One of the newest kids on the block, this time situated in leafy Graceville, Goodness Gracious Cafe is already showing a roaring trade that is well deserved. Despite being on a main road, it is accessible with much of the parking being on the side street. With the plain white exterior and the large logo made out of hedge on the side, it is hard to miss this place. To add onto that, it is dog friendly, biker friendly and wheelchair friendly along with being accessibly by wheelchair. It also looks to be a good place for kids as well.
Inside is bright and vibrant all round, without anything needed to be hidden. It is the conglomerate of the many small touches that give this place a real feel, that it has been designed by a proper human. On each table is a small cacti plant, a tall water jug is already filled as you are sitting down (I almost thought it was going to be a vase), there is a specialty coconut sugar for the coffees and each chair is has a cushion for either the butt or the small of the back for for each customer's comfort. Looking around at the place, it has the skeleton of what would have once been a corner store in a prior life some time ago.
This was one busy place. Getting a seat was a stroke of luck, and it was right next to the kitchen. There were probably at least half a dozen waitstaff constantly on alert for orders for tables; this place was nearly packed and really popular. It was all for a good reason. Heck, as my dining buddy and I were walking out the door (which was not many steps away) the table was already being cleared. So with the prompt service when the meals arrive is prompt service for when the customer is done. That is some good ethic that is rarely seen at a place, much kudos to an efficient restaurant.
First things first, it is always the coffee for breakfast. There were three different blends available on the menu, with a Goodness blend that came from Algeria and a Gracious blend that came from Ethiopia both available for all the usual kinds of coffee. A third option is their brewed cold drip, which can be seen slow dripping into a jug on the counter. For me, it took some willpower to go for the Goodness blend for something slightly different. As usual, it was a double shot cappuccino. It was well done, with everything that a good cappuccino needs to have - good foam, well textured milk, solid body and it was a balanced flavour bordering on fruity notes.
Where Goodness Gracious really shines is with its breakfast menu. Instead of yet another trendy place spotting the usual suspects, the menu at Goodness Gracious consists of several inventive items. They strike the right balance between meals with breakfast items in them and meals that are a bit more complex, where people would suit them more for lunch time. As it has been said many times before, good luck trying to choose. If, like here, the tough choices need more than one hand to count then you know the selection ought to be good.
For the main part of breakfast, I ordered their eponymous dish. This was akin to a big breakfast in some ways, but was more their own creation than anything else. This was a big dish, which consisted of a cut of smoked pork belly, eggs how you want them (poached, yolk runny), apple remoulade, corned beef hash, a coleslaw, tomatoes, and sourdough toast. Additionally, I managed to nicked a bit of my dining buddy's bacon.
This meals is substantial and will certainly fill you up at least until lunch time. The way that it was presented suited the aesthetically pleasing aspect of a good meal, but it also was practical - it was served on a rectangular plate. None of the items were skimped on, at least certainly not the pork belly. This was a big hunk, at least twice the size of the bread. It was cooked to a tender, buttery perfection where the pork melted in your mouth. This was to the point that the thick layer of fat on top could be eaten by itself. For once, the eggs were soft and tore apart easily and the yolk ran like water; these were delicious as well in addition to the properly cooked tomatoes. The corned beef has was a block of crispy fried, grated potatoes which encompassed the meat and had the look of being house made. It was hot and tasty, generously and proportionally served with the rest of the meal. The remoulade was dabbed onto the sourdough toast and spread into a nice, even layer. Finishing it all off was a fresh lot of coleslaw which helped balance out the whole dish. Lastly, the bacon was cooked very well and to a good amount of crispiness.
Starting off on a very positive note, Goodness Gracious is certainly worth all the hype that is surrounding it. Quality is paramount at this cafe, and that does not stop at the food; it also applies to the service and the surrounding decor which are perfectly suited to suburbia. To make such a meticulously inviting place must take a lot of skill and dedication. I wish the best of luck to this place, and to see how the business grows.
An error has occurred! Please try again in a few minutes