Middle Street Food & Coffee

One of the simple pleasures of autumn in Melbourne's suburbs is eating backyard figs. Wherever Mediterranean folk have put down roots in this city they've also planted fig trees, and walking the lanes and side streets you might come across a gnarly branch hanging over a wobbly fence with one surprising purple fig hiding under a leaf, almost but not quite out of reach …

So how nice is it to find backyard figs on the menu of a cafe in one of those Mediterranean-settled suburbs, in this case Hadfield in Melbourne's north?

The figs – just ripe and sliced in half – adorn a salad of fregola (a Sicilian pasta very similar in size and texture to pearl cous cous), draped with subtle slices of prosciutto and studded with pieces of salty whipped feta. (Chef Simon Polkinghorne popped out of the kitchen to explain that the goat's curd advertised on the menu was out: would we mind feta instead? Not at all, and nice of you to ask, chef.)

With some toasted almonds for crunch and a scatter of salad leaves, the big, pretty ceramic platter (enough for two to share) was a lovely taste of Mediterranean autumn in our own backyard. What's more, the figs were hyper-local, from the Hadfield tree of a chef friend: "He drops off a box every week in autumn," says Polkinghorne.

The space at this two-year-old cafe is compact – there are only 20 or so seats – with a simple but funky fitout: white tiles, roughly rendered brick, a cool mural, the actual green Laminex table that was in every share house you ever lived in.

"The food I like to eat is full of flavour," says Polkinghorne, who did his apprenticeship with Teage Ezard and worked with Jacques Reymond. "The menu is seasonal, based on ingredients that people in the area might not be exposed to in a cafe."

So you might get a crisp four-egg omelette of house-cured kingfish, fried shallot and cavolo nero with a chilli oil dressing; or a cheeky prawn and scallop toast of good fried white bread (from Dench) with a poached egg served with nori, truffle and leek.

The breakfast burger consists of smoked ham hock and two fried eggs on a brioche bun with tarragon mayo, while the heroic breakfast board is a more familiar selection of soft-boiled egg, avocado, smoked roma tomatoes, ham, pork rillettes and grilled sourdough bread.

Alongside the fig and fregola salad in the lunch department are some quite unusual dishes: cuttlefish a la plancha with piquillo peppers, chorizo and black garlic; a warm brioche bun stuffed with fried barramundi and a papaya and lime salad.

Five-spice confit duck leg featured nicely crisp skin and tender, delicious meat that came away from the bone sweetly. The duck sat amid a salad of fat, slippery rice noodles swimming in a light and just-warm broth studded with discs of lap cheong sausage and slices of Asian-style pickled cucumber.

It was a surprising mix of flavours and textures, in a good way, and good, though I won't say in a surprising way just because it was in Hadfield: that's no more surprising in suburban Melbourne than a ripe, purple fig hanging over a neighbour's wobbly fence.

Do … take milk with the Allpress coffee: it's delicious.

Don't … miss the Sunday roasts; BYO feasts from $25 a head.

Dish… Five-spiced confit duck and rice noodle salad.

Vibe … local cafe gem.