devour cafe patisserie.

Yay! The new Devour Cafe & Patisserie is finally open.  I've been waiting for this for months now and was not disappointed when a friend and I came to try out their new lunch menu.  It's all the way down in Richmond (near South Road), quite the distance between its sister dessert bar in Prospect, but luckily for me it's close to my church which means....weekly visits?  Hmmm, my wallet won't like that much.

In contrast to the rustically decorated dessert bar, the cafe is minimalist chic.  Clean and white, the interior is adorned with the odd floral decoration and a giant blackboard filled with beverage choices.  Food options are concise.  Eight for breakfast and five for lunch.

Slow roast pork belly, kimchi apple slaw & crackling: $25.00

It may not look like much but in real life it was pretty big.  A huge mound of kimchi slaw with crunchy, sour apples dominated the dish, but that's not to say that there wasn't a fair amount of pork belly and crackling mixed in.  The pork belly was marinated nicely and slightly fatty but not fatty enough for me.  This wasn't my order, hence I didn't try everything, but most of what I did try was kimchi-flavoured so if you're not a fan of the Korean miracle food, don't get it.

Gnocchi, radicchio, pork sausage, chilli & apple: $24.00

This was good.  Like, deliciously good.  The gnocchi was melt-in-your-mouth soft and generously coated with a chilli sauce which was kind of addictive.  The flavoursome pork sausage was cut up in to small pieces and was on the verge of being too salty, but not quite.   Cabbage and onion also make an appearance in this dish and serve excellently as a way to mop up the sauce.

Green Tea & White Chocolate Milkshakes: $6.50 each

Huge jars of creamy milkshakes to wash down the meal.  Green tea is always a favourite but my order was white chocolate - a subtle white chocolate flavour mixed with white chocolate chunks, milk and ice-cream.

It's not cheap for a lunch, but having said that, I almost couldn't finish my gnocchi because it was so filling (still finished it because I finish good food).  The breakfast options are normally priced, and by normal I mean $10 - $17 per item.  The portions are comfortably large though so I'm not too fussed.

Service, as always, was relaxed and friendly.  The waitress seemed genuinely interested in our after-eating activities and the food came out in a good time.   I quite like the neighbourhood cafe vibe it has going on.  It feels friendly and cheerful with mums coming in with their strollers and kids, couples, lone diners and small and large groups of friends.