The last Greek café
The last Greek café: beginnings and endings
The Australian Greek café's link to America also assisted, in part, with its demise in the final decades of the twentieth century. American-led fast food corporations began to replace family-based food catering concerns; take-away rather than sit-down meals burgeoned. Most Greek cafés were forced to transform, principally into take-aways, or be relegated into memory or oblivion.
Photo: Effy Alexakis.
The Greek café may be rapidly fading from Australia's social culinary landscape, but its legacy and influence remain as an often, almost inescapable, part of the daily lives of many Australians — when drinking a Coke or a flavoured milkshake, frequenting a fast food outlet, munching on a milk chocolate treat or ice cream at the movies, or singing along to the latest popular music hit.