I have a love/hate relationship with Brewtown
Love:
The gorgeous vintage-style decor and post-industrial converted warehouse location.
The menu and its skilfully executed simple yet stylish fare.
Its authenticity as a quality Newtown cafe, neither bought out nor sold out.
Hate:
The service – slow and careless with a terse air of arrogance. The last two times I dined in, they forgot to bring one of our party’s meal, and were so unapologetic about it. On one of those occasions, it took so long for them to correct their mistake that the rest of the table had finished eating and were all still just waiting for that one person’s food. It was ridiculous. And whenever I pop in to order takeaway, the staff just seem like they’re too busy being cool to be friendly, leaving me feeling unwelcome. I definitely get the vibe that this place is so inundated with business, that individual customers don’t matter.
The takeaway. It’s like they strip the dine-in equivalent down to its essential components and then just throw it all in a box. Any care they take in the presentation of a meal on a plate is completely absent – do they think that everyone just shakes up their takeaway bag so much that it doesn’t matter? I don’t. When my takeaway meal is a big mess, I know I didn’t do that myself.
The crowds. It’s not their fault there’s a line out the door. But they do seem to be cramming more and more tables into the same amount of space, creating tiny corners for tiny tables where there were no corners before. The seating is uncomfortably cramped, which just doesn’t do the beautiful venue justice.
But here’s my dilemma… The reason I’m so critical of its shortcomings is because Brewtown is one of the good ones. Heck, it’s one of the great ones. Service aside, the coffee and the food have generally been excellent. If you were at my house and asked me “Where’s the best place to get coffee and food around here?” I would have to say Brewtown! And the coffee, the food, the undeniable Newtown flair is all so good on paper that I really want to like it, and yet my experience there is never a pleasant one. And this was reinforced yet again this morning, when I popped in for a simple takeaway FW and BB.
Maybe they’ve gotten sloppy, or maybe I’m just subconsciously holding a cafe with so much hype to a higher standard, but my coffee was average. It didn’t pop. It didn’t impress. It was just a flat white like any other. The BB, however, was just plain stale. With visible dryness along the cut surface, I couldn’t believe they were serving it. I was there early too – I don’t even know how it had time to get so stale unless it was left unwrapped overnight or something the night before. Disappointing, and even more so because this is Brewtown.
Coffee: 0
BB: -1