Charming art and coffee at E for Ethel
Much like a good book tucked in your back pocket, North Adelaide's friendliest cafe and gift shop is tucked just off Melbourne Street. With bright smiles and homely atmosphere, E for Ethel makes a charming spot for a coffee (and scone) break.
Founded by couple Amanda Matulick and Daniel Harland in 2011, E for Ethel has grown to be one of Adelaide's favourite cafes — and their lengthy list of awards are proof of that. Passionate entrepreneurs and community members, Amanda and Daniel share their secret to running this happy, welcoming cafe.
What makes a really good cup of coffee?
Daniel: "A really good cup of coffee, we believe is using the best beans possible. We use a local roaster — they're based in Port Elliot, De Groot Coffee Co. They get to us the week they're roasted. So, fresh beans... and local milk if you like milk coffees. Again, we use Tweedvale Dairy — another local supplier. Just fresh and good quality product."
Why Adelaide? What made you choose Adelaide to start E for Ethel?
Daniel: "We're both from the country but we've both lived in Adelaide our whole adult life. It just felt like the right space — Melbourne Street in particular. We looked at quite a few areas around and we both kind of liked the feel of Melbourne Street.
We wanted quite a community-oriented space. We didn't necessarily pick Melbourne Street as the one and only space we wanted but we both fell in love with it. It's kind of gone 10 years on, and we're still here!"
Amanda: "Yeah, we love the community. The community here is beautiful."
Daniel: "Adelaide is great — it's a great place to be. The people are all lovely, there's the Park Lands everywhere, and the horses are really close. We have a young daughter and we just feel like it's a great place [for her] to grow up."
How is E for Ethel different from other cafes?
Amanda: "We focus on service — we're a really happy team, we're a bit silly sometimes! We have a really fun environment, and our customers can definitely feel that as soon as they walk in. We've been here for a really long time — almost 10 years, and we have some really beautiful customers in that time. So it feels a bit like family; like a fun gathering at a family house I think. Our staff are just as silly as us, so that's perfect."
Daniel: "Maybe sillier [laughs]!"
A wide range of gifts from Australian artists and authors are available for purchase.
Tell us about your customers - who comes in here?
Amanda: "I guess we've got customers from every demographic and we feel really lucky that we have that. We kind of have everything from the young school kids that come in after school and have a little treat together, right through to the neighborhood-watch eighty year old ladies who get together and talk about how to keep the community safe — they come in once a month. And everything in between that; we get lots of mums with prams, we get the office guys, and workout guys... so that's a really nice mix!
There's never one group of people in here... there's kind of this really beautiful mix going on all the time. I think we're really lucky that we have managed to draw lots of different people through our offerings. And we do think about that in the way that we build our business especially having the gift shop — we don't want to be too streamlined into only offering things for women so we want to make sure that our branding is black and white and our menus and have a really good offering for everyone."
Scones from local North Adelaide bakery, Perryman's Artisan Bakery.
What's a must have at E for Ethel, apart from the coffee of course!
Daniel: "We would say, our halloumi, egg and avocado. It's probably our most popular dish — a best seller."
Amanda: "And our scones — we get them from Perryman's Bakery. They supply a lot of our baked goods and breads, and their scones are amazing! They're a good seller and not a huge amount of cafes in Adelaide sell scones."
Any fun facts or memories to share?
Amanda: "We've been here for so long, there's so many! We didn't get on the mushroom latte trend, but we did once serve a latte in a giant filled mushroom to a staff member who doesn't like mushrooms and we thought that was hilarious...!"