Archive for category Coffee
Coutume – cafe joy in Paris
Walking down Rue de Babylone a couple of weeks ago I noticed a cafe with startling resemblance to what one might find in Australia (apart from the ice cream cart at the front). It was closed that day and I took a mental note to return next time. As I entered Coutume a week later, I noticed torn paint work, light bulbs hanging naked from the ceiling, siphon apparatus with the unmistakable halogen heat source (Hario) and the tall, cold drip coffee maker. At the back of the shop was a roaster separated from the cafe with transparent plastic. I have no doubt I have found my favorite bench to sit on. Perfect to do some cooking school homework when they are not too busy.
A mini ice cream cart on the right
“Hello, how are you!?” one of the staff said to me as I waited to order. Sounded like someone who knew me. And it was. Antoine, who I met in Melbourne a few years ago, used to have a coffee roasting shop in the suburbs of Melbourne. I remember he said that he wanted to open a cafe in one of the French colonies in the tropics. He would have his own roaster and espresso bar by the beach. I didn’t remember he was going to Paris. But here we are few years down the track under the same roof. I call it coffee foot prints. He introduced me to Tom from Canberra who, together, opened this cafe. They serve single origin, blends, siphon, cold drip and milk based espresso drinks in all its glory. A piccolo latte (my favorite) was easily done. Milk well textured and served without being burnt. For purchase are beans and brewing equipment (pour over, siphon, espresso machines.
Paris as a whole is just beginning to realize coffee is far more than the swill they are used to. A ironic fact is how a city ( or nation) so obsessed with food, drinks and leisure is so late in coffee development. Their deep worship of tradition and the respect of how things are done as they used to be (thinks of chopping vegetables in triangular ‘paysanne’ shape at school) is proving to be a major contributor to their slow embrace of the coffee movement. The competition will heat up though and I really wish Coutume the best in leading this revolution.
Piccolo
75007, Paris
Tuesday – Friday 8am – 7 pm, Saturday – Sunday (10am – 7pm)
Egg&Co – Paris
Egg&Co. is the cure for one’s yearning for Australia’s cafe culture. In Paris, it is unbelievably hard to find a place to sit down for breakfast (without table cloth), be automatically given a bottle of water and a cup and coffee orders taken before getting the menu. Coffee came the way I am used to for a latte – balanced, not too hot and nicely textured. Yep, the guy at the coffee machine used to work in Sydney. But make no mistake, this cafe is run by the French – really friendly and enthusiastic French. The egg-focused menu delivers an omelette with fresh tarragon that is perfect. Slightly brown on the outside, soft and airy and juicy inside. I am told next time I should try their specialty, the cocotte – or what I know as ‘baked eggs’.
I haven't worked out the names on the chairs yet
The decor is cosy. Nearly all the seating is upstairs and partly loft style. The roof is low and supported by old and large wooden beams. There are 2 windows out the back which over looks some green climber plants. I don’t have a photo that does these windows justice. The owner pointed out that they had a fake chicken farm upstairs too. Such intimate space also proved popular with a couple kissing away while waiting for their coffees. This rare place is a reminder of just how lucky we are in Australia to have so many places to chose from for a place with decent coffee and breakfast. It is obvious that our habits are different to most Parisians.
I didn’t catch their names. But I figure I will be back soon.
Looks familiar?
Tarragon omelette
"Because if we had a real one, we would be shut down"
Sitting in a small lane way. I came across the place after wondering around without a map in hand. In retrospect, I have read about this place somewhere but I wasn't looking for it today.
Sydney July 16th, 2011 – Mecca Espresso Bar
Piccolo latte - Mecca Espresso Bar
A sigh of relief after handing in my stack of paper work to the French Consulate for visa application. One of the best piccolo lattes I have had recently. Sit and ponder what the rest of the year will bring.
67 King St, Sydney(02) 9299 8828
The League of Honest Coffee
Danny Bhoy is a super act. Chilled, calm, confident and in control all the time. Just like having an every day conversation except he can talk for 80 min without making me bored or think of something else. I was walking home in the mist and saw some serious hardware.
Melbourne’s coffee scene is bubbling mad. Many cafes are trying to ride ‘the third wave coffee’ and producing ‘specialty coffee’ these days that the terms are obsolete. Pointless because everyone who roast or buy roasted beans, as long as the beans come from one region, can sign up to the ‘single origin’ badge. A mention or a sign to indicate how much care and emphasis is made to the coffee, or the offering of a non-espresso based coffee allows one to claim the honour of ’specialty’. Tear off paint to show distress bricks, have a big wooden bench or communal table and you have ticked off the circles like the Heart Foundation ticks. That’s fine, the just-being-educated-by-The-Epicure mass will bite.
What is really needed at the bottom of the cup is honest passion and the relentless pursuit of the best. The barista should be the ‘pass’ at the cafe where every drink is looked at and the deficient ones are discarded, just like a good restaurant. I have visited Padre Coffee, (Specifically, Brunswick East Project on Lygon St), a few times and their passion is certainly not running low. These guys probably drink a bottle of passion everyday they wake up. This will be their new cafe – The League of Honest Coffee. Looking forward to it.
Plating
I have been very amazed at the quality of the food from a few Melbourne cafe’s lately. Produce driven, seasonal, innovative menus and beautiful presentations at a fraction of the price you might pay for in a restaurant with starched, white linen. These are from Dead Man Espresso. It seems not long ago when city cafe’s that planted their own herbs and some veggies was unheard of. I am still playing around with colour management between my monitor and softwares.
Dandelion & Driftwood
It’s in a suburb with quite a few doctors’s homes. You might be able to point around the street and say that’s a radiologist, that’s a ophthalmologist, that’s a anaesthetist and the dermatologist is next door (R-O-A-D to medicine). I was lucky enough that my friend who works in a couple of cafes in Brisbane told me about the opening of Peter Wolff’s new cafe. What a lovely place – bright, cosy and waitering staff in colourful and chirpy ties. I really like the “dandelion” lamp and incidentally on the same day I went to IKEA and saw the same (or very similar) design. The work bench is a bit small for the number of machines and equipment – the wall of grinders is like a fence between the bar and the customers.
On the espresso front, there are two blends: Dandelion (more females like it) and Driftwood (more males like it). As expected, just like in perfumes, the stereotypical scent/aroma profiles of feminine (more fruity, floral) versus masculine (earthy, bitter) are portrayed. There are other methods of brewing available, including cold drip, siphon and a fairly new machine called the Trifecta. It’s a more manual kind of the Clover in my opinion. The machine allows adjustment to parameters such as time, pre-infusion, pressures, agitation and aeration. The coffee looks and taste a bit like the Clover. Compared to a Siphon brew, it’s a little murky, more on the acidic/fruity side and less earth. I’ll pretty much leave you to decide on what you think about the results.
Speaking generally, there are more and more different methods of brewing coffee and cafes are trying to be a step ahead all the time with new machines and gadgets. Consistency will be a big issue when there are so many different brewing methods which potentially require different roasts.
Cold drip and siphon
It's bright and cosy
The bench table facing outside
tea set
The dandelion
Trifecta brewed coffee
De Clieu
Finally, a good place for coffee near St Vicent’s Hospital! Unfortunately I will be in Kew and Peter MacCallum till the end of the year. Gertrude St has been getting a food-lift in the past few years with a pizzeria , bakery, tapas bar and a fine dining restaurant added to the bookshop with only food related books. It’s about time coffee was added.
Created by the owners of 7 Seeds, good coffee will be expected from De Clieu. Day 2 of opening and people are already populating this place like it’s been there for a while. The food menu is short (good), interesting, and acknowledges individual suppliers for quality products. They are going to very busy on the weekends. I hope they allow people in scrubs to walk in too.
Interestingly, while I was browsing the web, I found out that 7 Seeds is also the title of a manga series about life long after a meteorite destroyed most of life in Earth. A side track anyway. The 7 seeds of cafe name refers to the story that a a pilgrim named Baba Budan smuggled 7 coffee beans from the Middle East to India and subsequently spread it from Africa/Middle East to the rest of the world. Gabriel de Clieu was known to transport 2 coffee plants from Europe to the South American Island of Martinique, from where coffee spread to the Americas (according to Wiki).
With coffee demand growing so rapidly sometimes I do think about the sustainability of coffee as a crop.
Monk Bodhi Dharma
Rear 202 Carlisle St, Balaclava VIC 3183 Australia. Enter from the lane on the left of Safeway.
I think this design has been done to death in Melbourne. Distressed brick walls, ex-warehouse, clipboard menus, Synesso and did I mention Synesso? Uniquely they use old sewing machines as coffee tables! I think these guys have done pretty well with their own roasted beans and carefully textured milk. The food is vegetarian only (no eggs) and they serve ‘specialty’ teas – hence the Buddist-ish references in the name. I had a French toast which was made with baguette slices with saffron caramel with a poached pear. Surprisingly very nice (surprisingly, as there are no eggs involved). The caramel was too hard when it cooled though.
But hang on, and 1 or 2 monthly vegan breakfast degustation? Sounds pretty original. One thing I don’t get is why chose such a small location only to want to solve the problem so soon after opening?
Obscure signs
Clipboard, check. ACF-like cups, check. Rosetta, check
This is pretty much the entire cafe, plus 3 tables to the right
Saffron French toast with poached pear
The cutest stack of cupcakes in Melbourne!
Sowing machine tables
Entrance and a make-shift table outside
Pacamara Peaberry
Morning coffee
I love the way the morning sun hits my coffee cups in the morning. The near horizontal rays hit my sleepy eyes and gives me cataracts. My last week’s coffee is from the Nicaragua Pacamara peaberry. It is a cross between the Maragoype varietal or the “elephant bean” due to the size and the Pacas type. The beans are huge, almost double the size of normal coffee bean. Normally a coffee cherry contains two coffee ‘beans’ in close opposition to form a ovoid shape. A peaberry occurs when one of the halves is not fertilized so only the fertilized half grows and takes up the entire whole ovoid shape.
Sweet, caramel and simply pleasant with a half-volume latte / flat white. Then I hopped on the plane to Sydney for a lovely weekend.
You think the Slayer is the new black?
You think the slayer was the new black?
A bit more on the cafe trends of Melbourne with the help of my friends.
The blindingly obvious – free pour latte art is the expected topping now days. I still remember in the good old Maltitude days where latte art was only found in very few cafes. And the dozen or so others trying to learn were serving wilted rosettas on their lattes.
Being a barista no longer means that you are either: still at uni and just wanting to make minimum wage OR you are old, probably from southern Europe and still believe (truthfully) 6 month old beans roated from Italy produce dark, full bodied and bitter stuff. There is more recognition (shit… I can see the word “celebrity baristas”) of the hard work some baristas put in.
It came as single origin coffee with the Synesso, different brewing methods like the Clover, siphon (which by the way, the Japanese and Taiwanese have using already). Roasting lighter and lighter to suite the non-espresso methods. Murmurs about paring food with coffee have remained just that for a long time. I think an all dessert menu would suit better. And moving on from coffee are single origin teas (The Age). And notably, Intelligensia are offering exotic mineral water.
We’ve talked about the $37 Aesop soap, th single origin raw sugar, the communal table with a large flower center piece and the industrial, bare brick look. A couple of cafes have coffee plants in pots too. The Age seems to have caught on the coffee craze a couple of years after it started and apart from being rather under-informed, it has mobilized masses of people on weekends to choke up the ‘best’ cafe’s in Melbourne. how many years ago was it easy to walk into your favorite cafe and not thinking about reserving a table or waiting half an hour while 4 groups get seated?
Where can I add a few cents? I think milk. Already there are a few brands of milk catered for the cafe industry. I can see good potential here as the majority of the coffees ordered are still milk based. When 80% or more of the drink is milk, the quality and taste would have a huge impact on the final drink. On my trip to Japan this year, they have a graph of the seasonal variation in the fat content of the milk. Milk could taste better, sweeter and creamier. Get the cows to eat acorns. Where is single estate milk?