Code Black Coffee North Melbourne — Restaurant in Melbourne

I visited on a weekend and unfortunately had a very disappointing experience.

While the drink came out quickly, it was just average in taste, and the service left a lot to be desired. There’s a 1.5-hour time limit on weekends, which no one informed me of. I was suddenly told I had to leave in a few minutes, even though I was still waiting for friends to join me for brunch. When I moved from an outdoor table to inside, I was led to the farthest corner despite other tables being empty. I asked to sit elsewhere but was told it wasn’t possible. The table I was given was also dirty with breadcrumbs, and it was only cleaned after I asked. The indoor space was noisy with constant echoing, and it smelled strongly of food—worse the further inside you went. I wasn’t allowed to change seats just because I had only ordered a drink. At one point, a police officer entered and started taking pictures of the back door, with a flash going off right in front of me. Still, no one explained what was going on, which was quite unsettling. There’s a weekend surcharge. I paid $7.70 for a large mocha, which felt excessive given the poor service and overall experience. Most importantly, the Wi-Fi didn’t work at all, despite being advertised. There was no explanation or help from the staff. When I got up to pay, no one guided me on where or how to do so. I ended up waiting in the takeaway line. Even after giving my table location, the staff couldn’t find my order, so I had to repeat what I had ordered. This made the checkout process unnecessarily confusing and frustrating.

Overall, it was not a pleasant visit, and I won’t be returning. Even though I...

My friend and I arrived at 11.30am. We were seated at a dirty table. Nobody came to wipe it down. We ordered straight away but watched as 2 other tables, that were seated and ordered food AFTER us, were served their food BEFORE us. One table even finished eating and left before we were served.

When we finally received our food at 12.15pm, my friend tried to make a light joke about the wait and asked “Busy day in the kitchen?” The waiter shrugged and said “Nope not really” We then explained how long the wait had been and the waiter didn’t even offer an apology. He just said “Okay I’ll check” Check on what, we never found out, because he never came back to the table.

After many attempted waves we managed to get another waiter to take our order for a second coffee with our meal. One coffee was delivered, the other wasn’t. Ordered the second coffee again and which was plonked down on our table by a third waiter who didn’t say a word.

We finally finished up around 12.40pm. We were charged a 10% weekend surcharge, an extra 80c per oat milk coffee and an extra $1 per almond milk coffee. Excessive considering most Melbourne cafes don’t bother with weekend surcharges and only charge around 50c for alt milks.

At the checkout, the eftpos machine was slammed down in-front of us, we were not asked how our experience was, but my friend wanted to provide feedback since the whole thing had been kind of laughable. The waiter couldn’t care less, he was completely dismissive and every issue we brought up was shrugged off with a monotone “yup sorry guys” 😒

I guess this is just what you get and is to be expected at this place. Food was...

Cool looking cafe, concrete floors, warehouse feel and staff all in black. Nice at first glance. I went for breakfast. Coffee and Kale, mushrooms, rosti dish. I like coffee strong, deep and rich. Coffee here is a little mellower than I prefer. Also I prefer warm/hot coffee. Code Black follows more of the luke warm/warm stretched milk trend. While not the style for me, if you like it that way you will enjoy the coffee here.

The Kale, mushroom, rosti dish looks beautiful. Kale is tasty and not over cooked, oyster mushrooms are nicely seasoned (and great to get oyster mushrooms rather than just regular mushrooms). The cauliflower puree is tasty as is the burnt onion sauce. All very flavoursome. However... individually tasty but when combined as a whole dish it didn't quite work. Also the rosti was quite stodgy ( I prefer the grated potato style rather than the mashed style here)

Seating looks cool but not very comfortable. Smaller round tables are attached to the wall, so you can't sit in the middle but a weird angle that is not that comfortable when eating. Staff are relatively professional but would benefit from being more engaging

Update: return visit after about 18 months. New menu and this time had porridge (rhubarb with some dry oars nuts and coconut on top...very tasty) and eggs Benedict on a waffle (corned beef and cabbage added a nice salty and...