Tag Archives: coffee

Coffee Adventures: Market Lane, Melbourne

Though our stay in Melbourne was only quick, one thing we had plenty of time for was coffee. From our hotel, it was only a short stroll through Prahran market to a place we discovered on our last visit – Market Lane.

Market lane really is a place for coffee lovers, as well as the standard espressos, cappuccinos and lattes, they specialise in single origins and filter coffee – perfect for people who want to try something a little different.

I personally stuck with my old favourite cap, whereas Kris alternated between a latte and double ristretto on his many visits.

Over the number of times we visited, the coffee was consistently good, with the non homogenised milk textured perfectly. I find the flavour of the coffee on the earthy side, but you can tell it is a desired quality of the roasters.

Kris says “Market Lane also served up the best double ristretto single-origin while I was in Melbourne. It had no bitterness and had some earthy-chocolate undertones.”

When we returned for one last hit before heading to the airport, they had a little food stall set up which, to our delight, was selling mushroom burgers. It is not often that you come across a stall selling a vegetarian item as the only option, and the BBQ’d mushies smelled so good that we just had to give them a try.

Wow, it really was a perfect burger with crisp bread rolls and spiced mayo, the only problem was that we decided to share!

Served on a rustic wooden board, we savoured our last moments in Melbourne eating burgers in the sunshine, taking it all in and relaxing before we had rush off to the airport.

Market Lane, Shop 13 Prahran Market,
163 Commercial Road (Note the entrance to Market Lane is on Elizabeth Street),
South Yarra, Melbourne

Photos from: my camera and Kris

Coffee adventures: Black Coffee Lyrics

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This week’s coffee adventure took us back to an old favourite , Black Coffee Lyrics.

Generally, we try to stay away from Surfers Paradise.

If you have ever been to the Gold Coast you will understand why: it is busy, full of tourists and extremely tacky; complete with backpackers touting pub crawls, underdressed metermaids and its fair share of riff-raff. To make a bad situation worse, you can never find a carpark nearby.

The cafe itself is located down a dingy alleyway smack bang in the middle of Surfers, yet once you arrive, Black Coffee Lyrics is well worth the mission.

Stepping inside is like being transported to another place, the vintage style furniture and quirky decor add to the homely feel, yet the awe inspiring art makes it like you are in a a makeshift gallery.

Sitting down at a table that has been made from an old door, we ordered coffee as we waited for our breakfast dates to arrive. We aren’t sure what kind of beans they use, but the coffee was excellent. It was made to the perfect temperature (around 63-degrees) with thick textured milk and a natural sweetness that you can only get when a coffee is made right. Black Coffee Lyrics haven’t yet jumped on the ‘earthy-coffee’ bandwagon yet – much to our delight.

Perusing the menu we were impressed by the wide range of vegetarian options, and the guys were more than happy to accommodate our requests for extra eggs when everyone at the table ordered a ‘Penny Lane’.

The atmosphere was great for some creative chat with chilled music that was loud enough to create a vibe but not so loud to stifle conversation.

Our food quickly arrived and again we were impressed, the egg was poached to perfection and perched atop crunchy Turkish bread, roast pumpkin and wilted spinach, and smothered in a basil hollandaise type sauce that added richness without being overwhelming.

After polishing off our food, the boys ordered a round of ‘dirty chai’, which is a delicious creation of the guys at Black Coffee Lyrics.

A ‘dirty chai’ is basically a chai latte topped off with a shot of espresso. I know it sounds like an odd combination but when the owner of a cafe recommends something, we give it a try – we tried one on our first visit many moons ago, and each time we return, one of us has to order one!

Best of all, Black Coffee Lyrics is open for dinner, and yes they do BYO wine, but also have a fully stocked bar if you are keen for just a drink.

Black Coffee Lyrics

4/3131 Surfers Blvd, Surfers Paradise
Gold Coast, Australia

(Down the alleyway opposite Waxy’s)

We are off to Melbourne today so next week’s Coffee Adventure will feature one of our favourite cafes that we discover over the weekend!

Photos: by Kris and from my camera

Coffee Adventures: Barefoot Barista

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For our second ‘Coffee Adventure’ we decided to venture to the opposite end of the coast to a place we have been meaning to visit for ages, Barefoot Barista.

On a side st in Palmy, Barefoot is a favourite of the locals. Having heard of the fantastic coffee and of course being impressed that they use Campos beans, we thought it would be a great place for a weekend breakfast date, so headed down early to try it out.

Barefoot really lives up to its reputation. We were blown away by how good the coffee was (which certainly isn’t an easy feat) and as we sat on the high tables surrounded by our magazines, our food wasn’t far behind.

Kris got a little overwhelmed standing at the counter perusing the single menu while a line of customers formed behind him, but despite the pressure he made excellent choices for our breakfast: Two different styles of open sourdough sandwiches, one with mushrooms and spinach, topped with gruyere, and the other with pumpkin, hummus and pesto, sprinkled with crunchy pepitas.

The bread was phenomenal and everything a sourdough should be, crunchy despite being soaked in mushroom juices. The only challenge being cutting through it without a steak knife. The mushrooms had such a ‘mushroomy’ flavour, there is really no other way to describe it. I’m not sure what the trick is to cooking mushrooms, but they did an excellent job of accentuating the flavour of the mushrooms without overwhelming them with too many other flavours.

The pumpkin was served cold, but its smooth texture contrasted with the crunch of the toast and the pepitas, while receiving a flavour hit from the pesto. We shared both and really ended up with the best of both worlds.

We stayed a while reading magazines and drinking extra coffees (and if that’s not a good sign I don’t know what is), without feeling any pressure to move on or give up the table, enjoying the discovery of a new favourite cafe.

It is just a shame that we live on the opposite end of the coast because Barefoot would be an excellent local haunt, but after our first visit we have decided that it is well worth the trip.

On the way out we stopped to grab some photos and had a chat to the owner of Barefoot, a lovely guy, who gave us some tips about how to make a good home-made naan when he saw we had purchased some spice packs that they stock by The Curry Traders.

We definitely recommend checking out Barefoot, especially if you are lucky enough to be more local to Palmy! Awesome coffee, excellent food and above all, an enjoyable experience!

Barefoot Barista - Shop 5, 10 Palm Beach Ave, Palm Beach

Find them on Facebook or Beanhunter

Photos by: Kris and from my camera