Bills 2, Surry Hills (Sydney)

I visited Bills a little while ago and was hesitant to write up this review because I respect the man. He started the first Bills when he was in Uni and has worked hard to be what he is today. He has three cafe's in Sydney, all of which are quite successful, he has his own international TV series, a number of highly successful cook books and is now the shiny face of Macleans Toothpaste. Not bad for a kid from Melbourne who moved to Sydney to study art.

Bill's whole franchise is based on simplicity, everything from the recipes to the design is simple. Which is what I'd heard about his food at his cafe's - simple food, done well. Well the rumours are right, it's simple food, but to put it bluntly, it was over priced and basically crap.

The Bills we visited was in Surry Hills, which is apparently similar to Melbourne's Fitzroy. To be honest, I live in Fitzroy and have never seen so many dodgy people wandering the streets as I did in Surry Hills. We sat outside, which was probably a bad idea considering.

Now to the food. I ordered Scrambled eggs with Bacon and Tomato. Just this plate totalled about $20! How was the food? Well, to begin with, cold. The eggs were literally a degree away from being too cold to eat. Admittedly, they did taste good, but they were cold all the same. The bacon, as you can see in the photo below was burnt and dry, as well as being cold too. You know how bacon gets when it's over cooked and it's all brittle and breaks apart in your mouth, it was just like that. The tomato was... well a tomato, nothing different here, apart from again... cold. I was beginning to think Bill was working on a Breakfast Salad, considering how cold everything was. To top it all off, the toast was so thick! I could barely get my mouth around it! No jokes, check out the photo! (...and cold)


Rach ordered the Ricotta hotcakes with banana and honeycomb butter. The hotcakes were floury and chewy and of course to go along with the theme of the morning, cold!!

The service at Bills wasn't much better than the food, very few smiles, very rushed and you could say, cold! One saving grace though, was the coffee. The coffee was outstanding, some of the best coffee we have ever tasted anywhere. Maybe the barrista should start cooking in the kitchen!

How can a chain of cafe's be so successful when they let food like this go out of the kitchen? Have they just become to complaisant with their own success that they don't care what their food tastes like anymore, or that it arrives at the table cold? I think Bill should start forgetting about getting his head on television and whitening his teeth and get back in the kitchen and start concentrating on making his simple food - good again!

3/10
Over-priced, Over-hyped and Cold