When Nick Kolaitis, Ben Freeman, and Frank Gavralas decided to turn their Greek Street Food restaurant into a café, they took to the history books to find a name reflective of the area’s history, and their vision for its purpose. Having paid respect to their own heritage, by bringing authentic Greek Street Food to Melbourne, they decided their latest venture would pay respect to the native forbearers of land on which it’s located. Located within the Boroondara Council, which comes from an Aboriginal word meaning ‘place of shade’, the 3 men decided to name the venue Shade, and thus ensure the city’s Indigenous connections would not be lost.<br/ <br/ <br/ <br/ Step inside this Glenferrie Road...
Shade Cafe is located along Glenferrie Road, Hawthorn not far from the station. <br/ <br/ Stopping by lunch I couldn’t go past the zucchini and corn fritters with a side of smoked salmon and a coffee. Stacked high and generously topped with sriracha hollandaise and fried enoki, the fritters were very filling and full of flavour. As hungry as I was this day I struggled to finish my plate so this a great option if you’re quite hungry.<br/ <br/ Overall Shade is a great little cafe with tasty food and friendly staff and is worth checking out. I rate Shade out of 5.<br/
Had about 45minutes to grab some lunch and we popped into Shade Cafe at around 12pm on a Friday. Staff were very friendly and didn’t pressure us to pick their cafe, they passed on a menu and said let us know if you’d like to dine in. <br/ <br/ What we ordered: we both couldn’t go past the Vietnamese Pork Bao and we were glad with the choice we made. The meal itself was filling and contained a variety of flavor. The sauce was also a good touch. <br/ <br/ Would definitely come back!
My friend and I had lunch here, and we were very pleased with the variety on the menu. We shared the crab omelette and the pork bao, both were presented well and were full of flavour! The bao came in a set of three, and the mint mayo matched perfectly with the bbq pork. I also had a turmeric latte, which was delicious, but the only downfall was that there was a lot of sediment at the base that hadn’t been mixed in. Great new cafe in the heart of Glenferrie rd.
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Great burgers, tasty chili crab omelette (although it didn't actually taste like crab). Overall, food was fairly good for the price.<br/ <br/ The cafe was completely empty at 12:30, so it looked dank tired and old strange for a fairly new place. The dark lighting didn't help. It did fill up a little later which gave it a bit more life.<br/ <br/ Here's hoping things look up for this little place soon. Glenferrie Road needs a few decent places!
I've been coming here for almost a year now and loved it every single time. Fantastic coffee and the food is just the right size for me and always tastes fresh! The staff are lovely and I can't wait to come back again
Great cafe on busy Glenferrie Road. I ordered the cinnamon and honey toasted granola with blueberry panna cotta and a coffee. The portion size was great and it tasted delicious.
Cute little place on Glenferrie Road, the food was great and the portions are very reasonable, great value for money. Staff are lovely and friendly. Will definitely return.
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Very nice coffee with good environment and service. We ordered eggs Benedict and corn fritters, they are both very yummy. We will come back again for sure.
A very nice and cozy breakfast place, smashed avo was amazing and the portion size was good too. Orange juice.Highly recommend this place
