Plenty

In a city where cafes are practically cheek by jowl and corn cakes as common as corn flakes, it takes a lot to stand out but Michael Hoare does a bloody good breakfast.

Hoare first came to diners' attention when he set the breakfast bar high at Au Cirque at New Farm a few years ago before moving on to Chelsea Bistro at the Barracks. Now, he and his famous carrot jam have decamped to the West End's newest cafe, Plenty.

The cafe occupies a space that was once a graphics factory. It is huge, with soaring tin ceilings, exposed, unclad walls and timber floors. There's a touch of the rustic, married with a bit of industrial. The outcome, surprisingly, feels comforting and homely; a bit like a barn or an old farmhouse. Apt really because on the wall are posters entreating us to "know our farmer". Plenty's ethos is about locally sourced food and owner Karyn Hodges aims to source as much as she can directly from farmers.

Diners are a demographic pick 'n' mix, from mothers with babies to a booted and suited early breakfast business-meeting crowd.

Arranged around the perimeter of the warehouse are pallets on castors – some are used as tables for water jugs, others as produce shelves, laden with baskets of Levain bread, local honey and Hoare's own line of pickles and jams. A fridge holds Maleny milk, Blackall Country cheese, Bundaberg XO sauce and more.

A commercial kitchen is on the way, but at the moment, the chef is cooking with a sandwich press and a griller, which makes the breakfast impressive and lunch even more so. Written up on a huge blackboard, dishes change frequently.

Those looking for a sweet start to their day will appreciate the spongy hotcakes with white and yellow peaches in citrus syrup with mascarpone ($13.50). Simple and delicious. A breakfast "salad" ($14.50) sounds both odd and virtuous, but add a lacy fried egg, haloumi and generous chunks of avocado to the leaves and sprigs of parsley, sprinkle with a nutty dukkah and top with roasted chilli and it not only thumbs its nose at tradition, but at salad-as-diet-food.

Baked eggs, spinach and mushrooms are scattered with pine nuts, sexed up with creamy melting wedge of piquant blue cheese ($14.50); too strong for delicate palates perhaps, but very good with a side order of bacon.

There's a smaller, more private space upstairs and near the entry, clad on the outside with artistically rusted sheet iron, is a little coffee corner where baristas pull coffee using an organic, ethically sourced bean. Smoothies, frappes and coconut water are also available.

Once the kitchen is installed, they'll be offering demos by producers as well as encouraging locals with a surfeit of home-grown vegetables to bring them in to exchange for a meal or jar of preserves – a nice community touch. Hodges, herself the mother of a farmer, says in the future they hope to organise farm visits for school kids.

It's a solid concept and an interesting space, but unlike many hipster try-hard places spruiking the ethical/local line, it feels both genuine and welcoming – exactly the kind of place you want to fuel up for the day.

Menu ... Flavour packed, imaginative breakfasts and lunches.

Features ... Buy a "suspended coffee" – pay for two and donate one to a stranger.

Value ... Fairly typical West End breakfast prices.