THE Starbucks logo can’t compete with the gleaming green and white Sporting Lisbon plate.

It has hung behind the counter at Brown’s Cafe in the Covered Market for years. The counter itself may have been spruced up, and the ashtrays packed away.

The ‘Nice Cold, Ice Cold Milk’ sign may have switched sides across the room. But little else has changed between these comforting walls.

On the frosty September morning when I make my return, the cafe is lit by eight ceiling lamps and six side lights and daylight floods in from the clerestory windows above Avenue Four.

The rotating fan which keeps the cafe cool in the summer is switched off. The polished floor glows like something arrived fresh from a television commercial.

The red and brown sauces sit in colourful plastic bottles. And the cakes are displayed in a vintage patisserie display cabinet.

There seven varieties already out when I step in at 8am. My order, number 87, is a pot of tea for one at £2.20.

I’m after a burst of nostalgia. What I want is proper tea served by a person who isn’t wearing a name tag, served in a cup that isn’t the size of a small bucket.

It’s such a delight to be able to take five minutes to sit and watch the world pass by, instead of rushing down the street trying to find a bin to put your teabag in, while a cardboard cup malevolently scolds your flesh.

And what’s with the tissues that modern coffee outlets hand out with these cardboard cups – are they only assuming that I will spill half the contents down my shirtfront the moment I take the lid off, or do they know from the splash marks on my umpteen loyalty cards?

People smirked when I’ve expressed my admiration for Brown’s Cafe. But to me there’s no better place in the centre of town.

At one time I admit, it may have seemed like any other, ordinary cafe. But in 2015 at the age of 91, its ordinariness takes on a tint of old world glamour, where food is served properly.

Here you can order pie and mash, without it being pan-fried, sizzled, tossed, drained or daubed in the ruins of a handpicked mango. Why spoil a good thing? And its glamour was confirmed to the world when Brown’s hit Hollywood in 1984 as a backdrop in the questionable Rob Lowe movie Oxford Blues.

Brown’s Cafe still sells milkshakes, “made with real ice cream” in strawberry, banana or chocolate. The bottles retain pride of place on the windowsill.

The ‘lime’ milkshake variety has sadly gone from today’s menu, for there are few things as romantic as a frothing glass of bright green milk between two young lovers, while an imaginary skiffle band plays The Rock Island Line in my head.