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This great little place is on the main road in Hepburn, opposite the Post Office.

To quote their brochure: Chowder House is brought to you by the boys of GAS Natural Foods. We use a combination of organic and conventional produce and goods, and try to source ingredients locally and seasonally.

The day was cold, wet and windy and when we arrived we were asked if we would like something to drink. Gottie had a "hot toddy" made from warm apple juice and Stone's Green Ginger Wine. It truly warmed the cockles of her heart! I think we're going to have to get the ingredients in to make this...

Gottie and I had lunch there, Gotti had a prawn chowder and I had a clam chowder. Both were absolutely beautiful. The prawn chowder had about 8-10 large prawns which were tender, sweet and simply delicious. The chowder is very satisfying and is served with half a focaccia type roll. The clam chowder had many baby clams plus it had about two dozen clams in the shells. It was a stronger flavour than the prawn chowder and IMHO was simply stunning.

We shared a passionfruit fairy cake for dessert. The guys make these themselves and it was refreshing not to have something with passionfruit that is overly sweet. The flavour still had that tartness that real passionfruit has and it was gorgeous.

One of the guys comes from the Cape Cod region in the US and he has brought over his traditional chowder recipe which he uses as a base. He normally uses bacon in the base, but only uses it in the cafe if asked for, because so many people are doing the vege thing these days.

The staff in here all seem to enjoy their work, there was a continuous stream of laughter and banter which feels very welcoming.

I would recommend this cafe to anyone who wants a hearty feed and enjoys good tucker.

TIP: Make sure you're hungry, the serves are large, but you can ask for a smaller serve if you wish.

Is that the one with the Renaissance-style painting of the "rubenesque" women cavorting with vegetables on the front wall, as a frieze?

Did you get to The Farmers Arms?

I live in Hepburn Springs, next time try their breakfast and have a serve of the fried apples.
Another place that is great is the Red Star the locals breakfast is the best, 2 eggs poached or fried with a choice of 3 sides for $9 but only Monday to Friday. The Chowder House is good but alot more expensive.

Me and Hubby had breaky at Red Star a few Saturdays ago. Great atmosphere and the courtyard was lovely on this particular sunny morning, surrounded by their growing and ever changing edible garden. Lovely staff, delish breaky.

How lovely for you to live there!

I was Sea Change Dreaming for the 3 whole days we were there!