This sunny cafe is a tranquil oasis serving coffee custard and honeycomb espresso

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If you are negotiating the intersection of Euston and Sydney Park roads in Alexandria, a wide, rushing, multi-lane experience on the cusp of West Connex, a cafe like Ellen coexisting metres away seems bananas.

Serene and clean-lined, its linen lanterns swinging in a breeze brushed by the tree-edged lawn outside, this cafe’s tranquility feels like a miracle. Not a jot of traffic noise. Birds singing. Views of people walking dogs beside footpath gardens growing spinach and lemongrass and cherry tomatoes.

Walk around the other side of Ellen’s location, within the base of one of the 2019 Arkadia apartment complexes, built with half a million recycled bricks, and the roar of cars and concrete trucks is deafening.

At Ellen, a curved and high-windowed space with wooden tables, tiled floors and slate grey walls, it’s quiet enough to hear your teaspoon swish through chef Dingqi Xin’s silky custard and coffee syrup dessert.

There are other dishes to enjoy before this wonder, but its well-crafted simplicity encapsulates the excellent, fresh and carefully thought-through dishes here.

The food is just plain lovely. Depending on the week, or even the day, parts of Ellen’s menu, and specials, change frequently. One highly popular menu stalwart is the cracking fish burger. Paper-wrapped, and made with hoki, cucumber pickles, mustard seed, lettuce and American cheddar, its crumbed fish is delicate and crunchy next to its zingy, saucy accompaniments.

Another, a gently charred, blushingly pink and tender curve of sliced Bangalow pork loin, festooned with fennel frond greens and herby pink lady apple segments, is fantastic.

That’s a memory now. In its place this week are wagyu steak and fries, with red wine jus and herb mustard puree; and fried chicken Maryland, featuring Brussels sprouts, pomegranate and spiced cashews, which is making the lady at the next table very happy.

“This is divine,” she says in response to my gaze.

I’ve polished off another menu star – the halloumi and green peas salad. As emerald as the grass edging Ellen’s outdoor courtyard seating, its combination of green pea puree, slender slabs of the salty cheese tossed with chickpeas, herbs and a sherry vinaigrette, is rich, light and bonza.

Ellen, which opened in 2022 and offers breakfast until 11am and lunch after that, is owned and run by Xin, known as Chris, and his business partner, Jianxin Cheng, known as James.

Xin’s hospitality background includes time at Rockpool on George, Rockpool est 1989, Tetsuya’s and Cedric’s, which explains the sense of fine dining here.

“Ellen offers me a refreshing change, a space where I can explore new ideas and adapt to the unique environment of a cafe,” Xin says.

Everything is made in-house apart from collaborations with Staple Bakery for the viennoiserie and Moon & Back for speciality canele. Cherry Moon supply the sourdough for Ellen’s scrambled eggs with maple bacon and confit tomato, and a poached chicken breast sandwich doing a hot trade today.

One of the stand-out things about Ellen is the way it inspires people to sit down and enjoy eating. Takeaway is available but customers fill its sun-soaked tables inside and out.

There is an alcohol menu with a selection of five beers and seven wines, all Australian, available by the glass. Good strong coffee comes from beans roasted by Cheng and there is a range of teas and excellent cold drinks. Stand-outs include the grapefruit soda, the lemon passionfruit soda and Cheng’s invention, the honeycomb espresso. This is the one to drink into summer. Cold, caffeinated and jingling with ice cubes, it comes topped with a house-made wedge of golden honeycomb. Cheng, a warm host, also tweezers out sample pieces to any honeycomb-curious customer at the counter.

There are plans to open Ellen, named after Cheng’s fiancee, for dinner but, for now, Xin is focussed on continuing the cafe’s high food quality and local feel. “We are grateful to be a part of the community,” he says. “We love having that connection, seeing marriages, kids and lives flourish.”

And people sinking their teaspoons into velvety coffee syrup custard to the tune of a quiet spring breeze.