I hit ‘The Grounds’ running, straight off the plane from Manila, and was astounded, in my jet-lagged stupour, to discover this rustic café located in semi-industrial Alexandria, only minutes from the airport, the site startlingly at odds with its surroundings.
The Grounds began life as a pie factory in Sydney’s inner west in the early 20th century. A hundred years on, it has been transformed into a smart café, a coffee research facility, a kitchen garden and an attractive courtyard dining area, maintaining a sense of its industrial heritage with black, steel frames, rustic woodwork and open brickwork. The attention to detail is mesmerizing.
‘The Grounds’ has been a family project, created by food industry entrepreneur Ramzey Stoker, his sister, interior designer Caroline Stoker and co-Director and coffee expert Jack Hanna. Executive Chef, Lilly Fasan, works hand-in-hand with horticulturalist Erin Martin to grow quality, seasonal produce, her menu emphasizing healthy home-style cooking and fresh ingredients. Heirloom vegetables, edible flowers, fragrant herbs and fresh fruit are grown in planter boxes made from recycled railway sleepers.
This miniature mid-city pastoral landscape is a little twee, but who can argue with an attempt to prettify a dreary old red brick factory with pergolas, vines and a painted pig sty? One review described ‘The Grounds’ as a theme park, and I see their point, but to me it recalls the glories of a walled kitchen garden in an old English Manor house. What would you call that? Rustic whimsy?
Parking isn’t easy, even on a Friday, but we walk up an appetite over three or four blocks. Apparently the weekend queues are horrendous, so I am grateful for a peaceful Friday morning. It’s still thrumming with life, but we waited only a few minutes to get an indoor table – luckily an earlier cloudburst had cleared and we sat beneath a chilly but clear blue sky. Ensconced at a table near the kitchen, we watched the hustle and bustle of the kitchen staff through a wide hatch. As I wandered past in search of “The Chooks,”(aka the Ladies) I paused to chat with a woman creating tamarillo tarts.
Mistaking them for a tomato variety, I was told it is actually a temperate South American fruit now cultivated in New Zealand – and apparently in the Philippines. How did I miss that? According to Wikipedia, it is actually known as the tree tomato to most, but the New Zealanders wanted a more exotic sales pitch and invented tamarillo by blending the word “tomato”, the Spanish word “amarillo”, meaning yellow, and a variation on the Maori word “tama”, for “leadership”. 
Whatever its name, it made a very pretty tart on a bed of soft cheese, and I was only sorry they weren’t prepared to let me test it. I did manage to snitch a small piece of discarded tamarillo, though, that was unexpectedly tart. Serve me right, I guess!
Breakfast arrived promptly: poached eggs and toast with feta cheese, heirloom tomatoes, ham, pesto and avocado served up on a wooden platter. Nervous of undercooked eggs, I ordered them well done. They took me at their word and presented me with two of the hard-boiled variety. Never mind, I mixed them up with the cheese, avocado and pesto, and created a delectable spread for the crispy sourdough toast. And oh! The joy of a flavoursome, creamy avocado instead of the rubbery, tasteless Filipino variety.
After our filling brekkie-on-a-chopping-board and a couple of good coffees, we wandered out to explore the grounds of ‘The Grounds,’ passing the coffee roasting room where classes are held to take you through the coffee making process.
An expensive, but irresistible grocery store lords it over another corner of this expansive site. Salt, Meats, Cheese houses all sorts of imported luxuries, including a delicatessen whose counter is crowded with large wheels of hard cheeses, the ceiling draped in cured sausages and salami like meaty chandeliers. There are fresh pastas and fresh peanut butter – we watched a young woman using a press like one I have seen in the Philippines for crushing coco beans into chocolate paste – while huge rocks of pinkish salt litter the counter space. Apparently they offer the highest quality products from the best international suppliers at wholesale prices. Mmmm… it still seemed pretty pricey to me.
Back near the café, beside the kitchen garden, we find a handful of shy chooks and a piglet called Kevin Bacon – memories of Wilbur that Radiant pig – who gets a good scratch and lounges in Roman splendour for a photo. Little does he know…
We meandered on, beneath a pergola dripping with vines and strung with lamps 
made from old jam jars, the courtyard scattered with an eclectic collection of outdoor furniture. For small kids, there is a ditsy playground complete with Wendy house secured by a painted picket fence. A row of blue pots on a shed roof sprout fresh herbs, and a French provincial-style fountain mutes the noise of passing traffic. It truly felt like a secret garden concealed withinan industrial landscape.
The Grounds is open seven days a week: weekdays 7am-4pm, weekends 7:30am-4pm. If you visit on the weekend, be prepared to queue.