As it happens, I don’t think High Street, Ashburton is ordinary. Sure, it’s no High Street, Armadale, but the name is quite similar and you can walk through it without tripping over wedding couture every couple of feet. It’s an eclectic mix – an NQR next door to a high-end florist – but the people are friendly and well meaning and much, much more welcoming than they seem to be up the road in Camberwell.

We chose Two Seeds because names with ‘Seeds’ in them sound like they should be better at making breakfast than names with ‘Caffe’ in them. Verily we sat at a wrought iron table right on the edge of the gutter and waited until such a time as we realised we were to order at the counter. It did briefly occur to me that such a thing would never happen in High Street, Armadale, but I also know it’s important not to just go on and on making that comparison.

I ordered poached eggs, smoked salmon, avocado and hash browns, and my dining parter opted for an egg and bacon roll of some description. The egg dish was on the steep side at $20, but I am always happy to pay through the nose for a bit of runny egg yolk. We waited for a short while, talking to the nearby dogs about their mornings. I told them how I’d been to the Ashwood Farmer’s Market and bought some stuffed cow hooves for my own dogs, and was sorry that they couldn’t partake in such a delicacy. They seemed miffed, to be honest.

The food arrived in two stages, mine first. The fan of avocado was generous, and had brought along its friend the floret of smoked salmon. Just the one hash brown, taken from its home in the plastic bag inside the freezer, but that was fine. The eggs looked reasonably jiggly when poked.

Unfortunately the flavour did disappoint. Most baffling was the colour of the eggs – one of the yolks was such a pale yellow that I actually didn’t eat it. The toast was hard and the hash brown was oily. I moved the food around on the plate, hoping the better stuff might be underneath.

The colour in this photo is alarmingly true to life

Gaz’s turkish bread sanga had that kind of reheatedness that leaves a person with limp rocket, rubbery cheese and crunchy egg. To say he was unimpressed would be quite a kind understatement.