Santi's cafe — Restaurant in Western Australia

The idea of Santi’s sounded enticing until I asked to purchase a pre made, vegan roll. Before me, a lady had purchased a ham and egg breakfast roll and without even stopping to think, the front of house staff used the same tongs to handle my roll. I told her this would not be okay for me to consume now as I’m vegan and this is contamination. She looked me up and down and said “then what do you want me to do?! It’s just the outside that the tongs touched?” I offered her a solution and said perhaps she could get me another roll and use different tongs which she angrily did. After this she attempted to toast my roll on a sandwich press that was DRIPPING with oil and fat from the non vegan rolls she’d just toasted on it when I promptly told her I would just buy it un-toasted. She rolled her eyes at me and told me I could have it untoasted and what kind of service did I expect if I was so different? I took my ice-cold roll and felt sick to my stomach whilst eating it and now have a persistent stomach-ache. If you’re offering vegan options, prepare to do the right thing and use clean, vegan-friendly facilities. There’s really no point having or offering a vegan roll to customers if it’s glazed with pork fat. Furthermore, my request was not unreasonable so it was unfair for the front of house staff to shame me and make me feel like an alien! I do not recommend this cafe at all. I felt queasy, uncomfortable and disgusted at the level of service I was offered. So much for the cafe Facebook page claiming that their front of house are accommodating. They couldn’t even deliver the...

3/2/2005: 2nd time in 5 days. We ordered the same meals. Both were perfect. I specifically asked for my eggs Benedict to have the bacon not overcooked. It came out spot-on and the 3 eggs were nice and soft. I had a medium latte, extra hot. My wife had a coffee frappe which she said was nice. Any more of this and we'll need to go on a diet. We saw other meals coming out and they were also huge in their servings. 30/1/2005: Two of us had medium lattes, mushroom bruschetta, and eggs Benedict with bacon, then another 2 lattes. The first 2 lattes were more like cappuccinos. For the next 2, after the meal, I asked for less froth and a bit hotter. These came out perfectly. Thank you, Sherri. The mushroom bruschetta was delicious, with HEAPS of mushrooms. My eggs Benedict came with 3 eggs (rather than the usual 2 from other places), and heaps of delicious sauce. One egg was perfectly soft, the other two bordering on hard. The bacon, while HEAPS of it (yum), was mostly overcooked. It was hard to slice, so I has to cut it on the plate rather than cut it on the bread. All in all we would come back, but I'd ask for the bacon to be slightly less cooked. The eggs I could live with as is. Staff were friendly and service speed was...

Located at the corner of Monash Avenue and Hampden Road it's easy to get to, but parking is a bit hit and miss, which also describes the experience of eating here.

The food, when it finally arrived, was great, I had the pancakes, but on a pretty quiet morning they took over 20 minutes to arrive. Coffee on the other hand was not quite ready by the time I walked from the counter to my table, but it was close.

After breakfast, I ordered some takeaway, plain toasted bread and butter as well as an avocado and Vegemite on toast with a small flat white. Again the coffee arrived promptly but the kitchen seemingly got lost in translation, with the barista needing to step in and confirm that the toast was actually toasted (it wasn't) and buttered and to ensure that my avocado didn't all of a sudden acquire a poached egg for no apparent reason.

As I said, the food was good, the barista on point, the rest of the experience, less so.

I wasn't prepared for a 40 minute experience, but that's what I got. I'll try again later when I've got some time to spare.

Give it a try, I will, but be prepared to exercise...