the Lilydale General — Restaurant in Melbourne

Edit: Here I am to edit this review after another couple of tries - great news folks, they have well and truly earned another star! Today I tried the eastern feast and oh. my. goodness! My mouth is exploding with flavour and texture and it is utterly delightful! Again, as always, the coffee is so beautiful. Smooth, perfectly brewed and actually flat (for a flat white). Well done guys, you have a beautiful cafe and you work hard to provide a 5-star service.

This cafe is great! I haven't had a chance to experience several options on the menu so have been disappointed with the food so far. However, the coffee and the very experienced barista makes up for it!

The food might not have hit the mark but the quaint hipster cafe vibe and superb coffee make it a highly recommendable place to go!

The location is somewhat unfortunate, as a more central location would be desirable (can you imagine The Lilydale General near the Lake Park!? Oh, bliss!) but don't let this fool you; this out-of-place cafe has Lilydale's best coffee. Quality beans, quality barista work, quality milk stretching all equates to a tasty flat white that certainly is flat!

It's hard to find somewhere that will give you a flat white when requested, so this obviously get an entire star rating on it's own. Why not five star? Unfortunately, the food leaves a great deal to be desired. However, because the coffee is so good, I will continue returning and trying new meals...

I have been here a few times in the past and have always left with an enjoyable experience however today seemed to have been quite the opposite sadly. When we originally got asked what we would like to order I did ask if I could substitute one of the items which was not aloud (I completely understand this and was quite fine with that being the case) so I stated that I will need some more time to decide. Well from there the waitress who I stated this to would not stop glaring at me from across the room. When she came near me she wouldn’t speak to me again and continued to keep glaring at me. This made me lose my appetite and feel extremely uncomfortable. She at one stage asked my friend if she was done with her drink and took away the cup however she didn’t ask me if I was done with my drink and just took mine which still had drink in it that I hadn’t finished. This has truly made me feel like I can’t come here again all because I stated I needed just some more time to figure out what I would like to eat. All good and well if she wanted to be upset with me I completely understand that we all do have our bad days and we don’t get along with everyone however extremely rude and unprofessional to be standing and glaring at your customers the entire time out in the middle of the cafe and making the entire experience dreadful. Keep it to in the kitchen and away from the customers if you need to blow off steam and be...

The food here was lovely with a variety of healthy, gf options. There is also a small AstroTurf area for the little kids to crawl around on. The sweet potato chips were a great snack and the gf macaroni and cheese was also pretty good. The zucchini patties were also yummy with a really good selection of sweet treats. If you aren’t into coconut, don’t eat the sweets as a lot of them were heavy handed with coconut oil and dedicated coconut based but still yum. The downfall unfortunately was the service, one waitress was incredibly rude and I’m ok with standard service but she went out of her way to make us feel incredibly uncomfortable as we asked if we could raise the umbrellas outside. I assume all the umbrellas are there for shade purposes but she was not only short with us but assured we received a fair amount of bad attitude. The other staff members were lovely however having to dine after you receive such a foul welcome really tainted the experience for me and my friends. Without the attitude, it would get a four but with that service, I’m taking it down to a two. Hopefully this can be rectified with...