City eats at the Archway

Altius’s two young owners are both ex-Market Lane, and it shows: they precisely measure each coffee shot, they're developing a new ergonomic takeaway cup and they recruited Sarah Trotter (also responsible for two of Market Lane's fitouts) to design the space.

Fans of LuxBite in South Yarra will already be familiar with these Taiwanese pâtissiers, who have dedicated their second outpost to tarts. Expect flavour-combos as colourful as the tart toppings: the mango, yogurt, lime syrup-soaked white-chocolate sponge Emoji, for example.

Zev Forman and his crew get up a silly o’clock to twist, bake and boil their bagels; get here early enough and you might be able to watch them. Fillings are adventurous – bacon-maple cream cheese, for example, and toppings include pickled shallots, capers and radishes.

Delhi-born banker-turned-chef Charan Singh comes from a food family: his dad moved his family to Melbourne when Charan was five, and opened Melbourne’s first Indian sweet shop.  This colour-pop restaurant aims to deliver less ghee, more modernity: M&M-infused naan bread, for example.

Breakfasts don’t have to involve calories and caffeine. Just look at Hunters’ Roots menu, which includes coconut yoghurt parfait, a dragon-fruit smoothie bowl, muesli bars and even a raw Snickers bar. Husband-and-wife team Jeff and Kerry Chew make pretty much everything onsite, including almond milk and cacao-hazelnut ganache.