While work is going on at home, we're staying at our friends' place, just off Brunswick Street. For those not familiar with Melbourne, Brunswick Street is now a renowned eating and shopping street, but when the beloved and I moved here (separately, on average) 20 years ago it was pretty grungy and alternative. Given the change, it's been interesting to be actually living here rather than just passing through.

And now, some food reviews. We've been out for breakfast three times so far, and been served four breakfasts.

The first was at idi bidi, which is the closest cafe to where we're staying. Yes, lazy. The beloved had scrambled eggs with mushrooms, and I had poached eggs on English muffins with hash browns, tomato and hollandaise. It was expensive, and pretty poor. The scrambled eggs were dry and overcooked, the hash browns were out of a packet. idi bidi has been around for a couple of years, but I don't think they've ever really thrived. They're in the same premises as the Sambuca Bar, which felt pretty similar.

Next we tried Retro, somewhere we've eaten a few times over the years. We've often felt it was overpriced for what you get but it's somewhere we've always ended up giving another chance. That's over now. The beloved decided to order a bagel with smoked salmon, cream cheese and capers. She hasn't been travelling for too long now (I still get a hard time for going to Iran alone), and was hankering for New York. Unfortunately, we were told there were no bagels, and were offered turkish bread instead. The beloved asked for sour dough, no big deal. I ordered potato roesti with grilled tomato, mushrooms, spinach roulade and rocket, which was delivered first. The roesti was precooked and reheated in a microwave. It was slightly burnt, not warm through and rubbery. The tomato was cold, the mushrooms gray and flabby. Instead of spinach roulade and rocket, there were a couple of baby spinach leaves. Frankly, it was revolting, completely inedible. The staff were friendly enough when we told them, but they seemed more surprised that someone said something than that the food wasn't good. The beloved's breakfast arrived on turkish bread and we gave up on Retro.

At a time like this, you go back to tried and true reliable friends, and therefore we headed to Atomica, where we had the green eggs and salmon (creamy scrambled eggs with some pesto stirred through), and the MTS (mushroom, tomato and spinach). It was so good we were moved to ask the waitress to pass our compliments to the kitchen. One of the great things about Atomica is that it always feels like the place is being run because the staff like hanging out there, rather than as somewhere to sucker in tourists.

This morning after a morning swim (it was under 10 degrees celsius, so we felt virtuous) we stopped in at Babka. Babka is a bakery and cafe with an Eastern European feel, and is another that's been around for a while. I don't recall having been there for breakfast before but we go there quite regularly for the superb lemon tart. I had an omelette, which was tasty but a little dry, with grilled tomatoes on the side, and the beloved risked the scrambled eggs, which were plain but good, with herbed mushrooms on the side. The mushrooms were magnificent. Really. The dry omelette was cured with some relish, which was more like kasundi. The bread was pretty plain for a bakery but we checked on the way out and they will give you whatever toast you want for no extra.

What does all this mean? What's it got to do with the changes in the last 20 years? Well, it was certainly possible to get a bad breakfast 20 years ago, but the stakes in general have been raised. If you're serving bad food on Brunswick Street now, it's a cynical money-making exercise that relies on the fact that there are always lots of people here. On the other hand, if you know where to look, there is some fantastic food available.