Two Boys One Beagle and a Coffee Shop owners Mikaela Keysers and Jamie Bowmen met 13 years ago. She was a waitress; he was an apprentice chef. They fell for each other and they’ve worked together ever since.

The couple’s second baby was born less than a month before they opened their first cafe on a quiet, residential Frankston street.

“We planned it terribly, but everything was pretty much built and we’d done a lot of work before he arrived,” says Keysers. “We had two days’ rest and then it was straight back into it.”

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That baby is now 19 weeks old. The shop is named after him, his older brother and the couple’s beagle, Penelope, who also has a dish named after her – fennel and lemon-infused waffles with wood-smoked bacon, maple butter, whiskey and banana jam, and vanilla ice-cream. Fried chicken is an optional addition. It arrives neatly piled up on a pink plate.

There’s also pork belly with a fried egg, kimchi, saganaki, charred onion and fennel cream as well as a grain salad with beetroot labneh.

Jalapeno and manchego croquettes are a good weekend option. They’re made with charred corn, avocado and finocchiona salami (a type of salami with fennel seeds that originated in Tuscany), served with homemade tomato jam. There are beautifully decorated cakes too, such as the flourless mandarin with vanilla mascarpone.

For kids, there’s Coco Pops, a simplified waffle dish with ice-cream and maple syrup, and fruit cups.

“We wanted to offer the kids a simpler version of what was on the full menu,” Keysers says. “We added little fruit cups because Otis, our two-year-old, always loves to eat his fruit – even if he won’t eat anything else. So it’s just a healthy little addition.”

Commonfolk coffee is made in the pink La Marzocco, and there’s Mörk hot chocolate with house-made marshmallows and cinnamon-spiced chai too. There’s also kombucha in ginger, lemongrass or peppermint flavour.

The pastel-meets-plywood eatery has plenty of space to bring the kids – a stack of child seats (also pink) sits by the counter.

Two Boys One Beagle and a Coffee Shop
59 Kareela Road, Frankston
(03) 9785 9239

Hours:
Mon to Sun 7am–4pm

twoboysonebeagle.com.au

This article was updated on November 8, 2018. It first appeared on Broadsheet on September 6, 2018. Menu items may have changed since publication.