Strolling around Surrey Park in east Melbourne is a lovely way to spend an afternoon, but it’s better spending an entire day just a few blocks away on Box Hill’s Main Street. Platform 3 is a cafe and bar basically offering everything you need to get through the day – superb coffee to perk you up, generous lunch meals to fill you up, even an array of succulent sweet treats to help you push through the afternoon. The industrial chic interior design, with long polished wooden tables and low-hanging exposed bulbs, creates a nice ambience where sharing food and catching up with friends is easy, but equally ideal is perching in solo with a book or laptop. If you’re lining up their revered angus beef burgers or mind-bogglingly good gluten- and egg-free chicken parmas you had better reserve ahead, because Platform 3 fair hums around lunch time.