Vans

Vans is an early morning café and every now and then I like to enjoy a cup of long in a quiet setting because at 6.30 am not too many people are out and about in town. The coffee is exceptional and its priced at the higher end compared to city prices. The breakfast menu is impressive with a good range of healthy, hearty and sweet. I tried the Acai bowl of chia pudding, granola and fruit. Not one for a cold breakfast during winter however I would definitely order this again!

Good service. Interesting menu. Enjoying smashed avocado on rye with tart dressing. Partner said his Wagu beef burger was very delish. Coffee fabulous. French manager Anton charming and excelent customer service.

When I go to a new restaurant I watch other people dinning there a little bit more than usual for some reason. Anyway, I got the feeling this is a place where you can go to meet up with friends, have a lovely quiet dinner and also celebrate a special occasion and still feel intimate, even though the restaurant is full! The staff tend to make a lovely but subtle fuss of you, which is nice sometimes, as going out to eat is special.
Ok, so, the food is Devine! I had chicken tacos which were an absolute delight! The barramundi was also spectacular. So much flavour in all the food and everything was cooked to perfection. The style is very unique, a healthy fusion of organic healthy raw styles beautifully fused with gourmet. I absolutely loved this place. It feels like a holiday dreamy restaurant memory only it was right here in my beautiful Perth! Well Cottesloe but anyway… So lovely!

Pulled pork sandwich
Delicious.
Good staff.
Not a cheap eat but remarkably consistent.
Happy. Highly recommended local.

A heaving restaurant is usually enough to keep me away, I am not a fan of crowds, noisy dining spaces, slow service and waiting a long time for meals to arrive. But Vans is an exception. Despite being heaving, the maitre d is always quick to welcome you and find you a table. Water is immediately put on your table as is an immediate invitation to order your coffees while you peruse the extensive menu. The acoustics are favourable so you don’t need to yell across to your dining partner to be heard. Our orders were taken as soon as we lifted our heads from the menu, a sure sign we were ready — yet a sign many wait staff ignore or miss. Meals come out fairly promptly and I always enjoy what’s on my plate.
They also have a little takeaway coffee window if you’re on the run which I find super convenient and has become a regular stop off point if I’m in the area.
I’m keen to return to try the breakfast martini!

I was looking forward to this meal, having dietary restrictions and looking ahead to see that there was many options I could choose from straight off the menu. All I needed was a friend and an excuse to try this place out. Its wasn’t close to home, 40 minute drive that I thought would be worthwhile given the good reviews on Unilocal.
It was busy (a good sign) and we arrived at 11.19am and found a table. The staff member dumped menus in front of us and disappeared until 11.34am. The lunch menu was strangely split into dishes available after 11.30am and dishes available after 12noon. We asked why there was a menu that had dishes not available for ½ hour and she said she didn’t understand what we were asking. I told her that i wanted to order the avocado toast dish (which i had just seen delivered to the table next to me.) She told me i would have to wait ½ hour to order this dish. I said I don’t understand how the table next to me could order the dish, but I could not until 12 noon. She rolled her eyes at me, took back the menus and said «I don’t understand what YOU don’t understand, its simple enough for everyone else». She made my guest and I feel that we were not good enough to eat in the establishment and that it was above her to serve us.
Now im not a stupid person, I have a well paid autonomous job that sees me travelling and interacting with professionals at many levels — but never have I felt so unwelcome in an establishment. I was not rude, did not raise my voice, but merely enquired as to why I could not have a dish that appeared on the table next to me and on my menu.
Not once in all my 38 years of dining out have I ever left a restaurant before I even got to order, but the service and rudeness of the staff was enough to make me get up, take my guest and leave in search of somewhere who wanted our money and custom. We will not be back to try again and that’s very disappointing as it looked like it could be a new favourite.

Great spot! I have mainly been here for coffee and cake, but lunch looks amazing!
Their selections of cake per day are limited and thank goodness for that because even the limited variety has me salivating for a taste of every single one!
I’ve had the carrot cake, salted caramel slice, coconut and lime cheesecake and also the rich salted caramel tart. Beautiful cakes that seriously are hard to share after just one taste!
Coffee is delicious here also, I’m a sucker for a good caramel latte– and this place offers the goodness with just the perfect amount of froth and sweetness I’d be back here everyday if I could!
Staff are super friendly and I just love love love table service!
Be wary of how popular this place gets though and parking may be a little tricky but mighty worth it!

The location of this place is what drew me to it. Every time I drive past its busy and that’s normally a good sign.
Looked at the menu online and saw they have a lot of veggie options. Alas, on my visit at least, they had none of those available.
So — chips, fritters and mee goreng — with a carafe of wine. The waiter was clueless about the wine, and lip reading the Barman when he was asked showed he didn’t know either. Great. It took an age for it to arrive too. This almost had me heading for the door.
I wish it had. The food was, at best, poor.
Chips and aioli — chips were good — the aioli was utterly bland and without taste.
Fritters were bland too the only saving grace was the red sauce.
The mee goreng was not great — even the egg was over cooked.
I will not be coming back. And I’d recommend you avoid.

Coffee is by far not the best I’ve had, wouldn’t come back for the coffee but the atmosphere is really pleasant & the cheesecake was super tasty.

Best scrambled eggs on toast in WA!!! Absolutely brilliant. Also the coffees and juice are very good. Service can be a bit slow but that’s Perth. I’ve been going here for years and have the same thing every time.

I don’t travel to Cottesloe too often to eat but Vans was a great choice — it’s just very busy to be prepared to wait for a table because they don’t take bookings. Luckily we only had to wait 15 mins for a table for 6 for brekky.
The coffee is yum and comes in a good size mug and the freshly squeezed juice is delicious but you pay more if you want more than 1 fruit so it was $ 13 for apple and orange!
I had the breakfast bruschetta which was nice but maybe lacking in feta and too much ham but the flavours were good. The highlight was the homemade hash browns, so good!
The service was nice but the food took a long time to come out. I would probably go back and maybe try out for lunch next time.

We went there on a sunday evening, waitress was argumentative when she brought my sister inlaw the wrong wine, finely bought wine that was ordered then tried to get us to pay for the wine that she delivered incorrectly!!!
Three of us ordered ‘fish & chips’ which was less than very average Chips were OK (how can you mess up chips) fish was a laugh and was over cooked, batter was dark brown and hard as a rock and the fish dry.
Tip: For the cook, (couldn’t have been a Chef,) stroll down to the local fish & Chip shop and ask them how to cook fish or even have a look at how they do it.
Whole experience was dissappointing and damn expensive, after the argument with the wine we couldn’t be bothered arguing about the fish… wouldn’t go back.

There are a number of morning options that you can still order throughout the day and so my choice was a hot potato cake with smoked salmon, wilted spinach and a poached egg. I was blessed with a sumptuous gooey egg but the remainder of my dish was less than impressive. The lemon butter was poured over my dish to the same exaggerated extent that the rain flooded the streets. The sheer amount of lemon butter would have been overwhelming had it not been that the potato cake was bland and poorly seasoned and was in dire need of a lift.
Our dessert choice was a caramelised ginger rice pudding with the deceptive appearance of being a crème brûlée. We tapped and cracked the thin shell on top to reveal a thick creamy bed of dulcet rice pudding. Subtle hints of fresh lemony ginger added a bit of zing with even more tangy ginger in the scoop of ice-​cream.
Encouraged by our winning dessert, we thought we would sit out the rain for a bit longer and have a round of coffee. Unfortunately my companions coffee was served burnt. I reached over to grab her coffee for a taste; it was piping hot with an after-​taste much like charcoal. What was to follow was something I’m sure can be defined as «how not to handle a disgruntled customer 101». After three rounds of burnt coffee and a number of condescending comments implying that we obviously had no idea what a long macchiato tasted like, we were both left bewildered and mildly offended.
Customer service unfortunately still remains sorely lacking in some venues around Perth. With the recent opening of so many exciting and switched on eateries it would be wise for these restaurants to start improving or risk ending up getting left behind in the slipstream of other’s successes.

I didn’t enjoy Van’s as much as I expected to. The décor/​environment was nice, but the dining room was extremely noisy. The waiters kept interrupting our conversation with their own chit chat as they served drinks, etc.
I had the lamb ragu, which looked excellent but was lukewarm and bland.
I think I will probably go again to see if this was a once-​off bad experience. Sadly, 2 stars.

Our first meal in Australia did not disappoint, although it was quite heavy on the wallet (we quickly learned eating out is very expensive down under). I wish I had a café exactly like this one at home: modern, energetic, great mix of people, diverse food options, good wines and other drinks.
Breakfast was awesome; my husband had the spicy fried Indonesian egg, and I had the more traditional breakfast of poached eggs, sausage, beans, and grilled tomato. Both were excellent. This was my first time ordering coffee in Australia, so I was a bit confused and didn’t order correctly (I just wanted a plain cup of coffee), but I did enjoy the espresso and cappuccino.
I also came in a couple of days later for lunch, had the open faced chicken sandwich with hummus, tzatziki and tabouleh, and with a limonata. Nice light lunch.

Vans for me personally falls into the same dining elite group that includes the likes of Il Lido, Bivouac and the newly establish Cottesloe Hotel Beach Club (stay tuned for a write up shortly on this place!). What each of these places have in common is that no matter what mood you’re in, or what type of dinning experience you’re after (whether that’s casual and relaxed, formal or romantic) these places seem to be able to cover all bases at all times.
The vibe at Vans for breakfast, lunch and dinner is always awesome! The places is always packed and has a killer atmosphere generated by a lot of satisfied customers enjoying good food, wine and company.
++ FOOD ++
The menu for breakfast is exception. My recommendation for the AM selections includes the potato cake smoked salmon with wilted spinach and a lemon butter sauce, as well as the just the scrambled eggs with aged cheddar and chives (There’s scrambled eggs, and then there’s Vans scrambled eggs! Get them in you’re pie hole!). And if you’re a fan of spice in the morning, GET THE INDONESIAN SPICY EGGS!!! Check my pics, they’re amazing.
For Lunch/​Dinner the options are just as good, including amazingly tasty and fresh salad options (and not your standard boring run of the mill salads), beautiful pastas (the blue manner crab linguine is one to keep an eye out for) along with a range of other options that to change depending on season and what fresh produce is available.
++ DRINKS ++
Breakfast = BLOODY MARYS! (Loaded, naturally)
Lunch/​Dinner = A really good selection of local WA wines as well as a few other international and national beauties. Prices also are fair, they don’t completely take the mickey on the booze like some other establishments which for me is always a winner and shows they’re confident on making their money on quality food instead of bleeding people’s pockets via the alcohol.
++ BOOKINGS ++
I suggest if you’re going with a group, call ahead, the place is always busy for a very good reason so to avoid disappointment give them the heads up.
VANS FOR THE WIN! EVERY TIME! And just to note, I’ve visited this place dozens of times so consistency is also something I can vouch for ;)

I think I could find myself wanting to try Vans again, but certainly no-​time soon. For brunch, they only offer Bloody Mary’s as an alcoholic choice. And, for $ 10 a pop it is essentially tomato juice and a celery stick. Geriatrics may rejoice! And, how about some other options… Mimosas? Bellinis? Micheladas? Not everyone craves a Bloody Mary and there are plenty of other options out there to offer patrons.
My poached eggs were way over done, eliminating my ability to «dip» the toast they provided. The eggs were sitting in a bed of kosher salt. I have no idea why, other than maybe for aesthetic reasons. I wasn’t prepared for a Sunday morning salt lick.
The waitress was overbearing and not in a good way. I told her we planned on talking for several hours and will be ordering, but no time soon. She returned 5 minutes later. This could be the reason why I ordered the first thing I saw on the menu and paid the price for it later (literally and metaphorically speaking).

A fun, always-​busy-​on-​a-​weekend restaurant that does a pretty mean breakfast in my opinion. Nothing too fancy for those who like their eggs on toast eggs on toast. The restaurant is kicked-​back and yet still sophisticated, I particularly like the alfresco for breakfast on a Sunday morning. Have yet to try lunch or dinner but the menu looks impressive — a fusion of Meditteranean and Asian flavours that doesn’t seem to try too hard.

VANS is ‘safe bet’ restaurant with a dish for every appetite. Their kitchen accommodates breakfast, lunch, dinner and also lighter tapas or share plates. Its not unusual for you to see poached eggs, ‘Fish of the day’ and a plate of olives at the one table.
The style is contemporary with a fusion of Mediterranean and Asian flavours. Prices range between $ 15-​$ 35 for a main. My favourite menu item; the egg white omelette is sadly no longer, but I can usually find something else which is almost as good. The breakfast bruschetta gets lots of points as does the Bircher muesli.
The VANS atmosphere is bustling, with large windows that let in the beach side breeze. It’s a great people watching café and VANS draws a rather attractive, well-​heeled crowd. Breakfast can almost certainly be enjoyed with a side of eye candy.

I haveto admit, I always thought that his was a shoe shop selling vans shoes and other products. It was only recently that on closer inspection, I noticed the beautiful interior, the take-​away window at the side and the throngs of people inside. Realising that this is definitely a popular haunt, I had to try it out. The service was super fast and attentive and obviously employed because of their quirky attitudes and freakish good looks. It’s menu is advertised as Mediterranean which is reflected in the outdoor seating. Breakfast does a roaring trade, largely due to their birch muesli and smooth coffees.
If you haven’t got the time to stay then hop to the take-​away window for your coffee or juice.