Coffee frenzy

Sensory Lab








I spotted this joint in David Jones as I strolled past this place on my way to get some groceries. My plan of having a quiet night was immediately dismissed as I stepped into this place. Out of the blue, a friend who was patronising the place called out my name , I joined him and his friend for coffee and we subsequently made our way to a long dinner.

To some coffee lovers, this place might seem a little pretentious and overly commercialised - with the staff wearing lab coats and the expensive interior. But there will always be a tension between keeping it "real" and commercialising it. On one hand, commercialing a place might make it lose its authenticity. On the contrary, commercialising it exposes the world of coffee to non-coffee geeks like me. My usual response to coffee is "mmm...this is good" or "this is not very good/the froth is burnt" - needless to say, very limited coffee vocab.

The girl behind the counter spent an entire 10 minutes kindly and enthusiastically dishing out her wealth of knowledge on coffee. In summary, she told me that real coffee is not the coffee as I know it. She tells me to think of coffee as a fruit and not as a bean. I responded, but isn't coffee grinded from its beans? Yes, but the beans are in the fruit, she replied. The coffee that I've been drinking all this while is brewed by one method - the espresso method. In fact, there are many more ways to brewing coffee. She introduced me to the siphoning method of brewing coffee.

Siphoning method:
Grind the coffee, add it to the top vessel. Add cold (or hot) water to the bottom. Put the bottom on a heat source. Add the top vessel with its attached siphon. Watch. Liquids defy gravity. The brew gurgles, but it's not boiling. Remove from heat source. Watch the coffee move back down, or "south". Watch the bottom vessel's brewed coffee gurgle as air is drawn through the spent grounds to release the built up vacuum. Remove top vessel. Smell. Ahhh. Pour. Taste. More ahhhh.
Source

My reaction to my first taste of siphoned coffee?

It taste nothing like the coffee I know but like bitter fruit juice.

For now, I'm still sticking to my usual coffee - espresso method but I will test new waters once in a blue moon.

Sensory Lab
David Jones
297, Little Collins Street
Melbourne

Dead man espresso












Saturday lunch saw me at Dead man's espresso. The timber shutters and concrete columns provide a very nice, classy ambience.

Again I can't comment much on the coffee, lest I embarass myself. In summary, coffee is good.

A word on the food. A fly on the wall told me that the food here is suppose to be excellent. Matt Preston (THE food critic) gave the food raving reviews - particularly the BLT pork belly sandwich. With high expectations, I ordered my meal enthusiastically. The BLT sandwich came with an absolutely delicious tomato soup. I'm not one for thick sour tomato juice but the tomato soup had an easy and good consistency for swallowing, it was not too sour and the broth they added into it was amazing. The pork belly was sandwiched between two slices of toasted bread that was laced up with some sort of herby-pesto filling. It was light and flavourful. A word on the pork belly. hm...i thought that was the most disappointing bit. I found the pork belly slightly dry and very thinly sliced. Maybe it was suppose to be like that - but the flavours from the pesto filling seemed to have overpowered the pork belly taste. Sigh, almost perfect but not quite.

Overall, I give the place 7/10. Most points for the ambience plus coffee. The food was good but a tad overpriced.

Dead Man Espresso
35 Market Street, South Melbourne


St Ali


















I'm loving this water truck.






St. Ali itself.

Saturday was a brilliant day not only because our happy stomachs were full from all the Dead Man Espresso goodness but because it was St. Ali's live street art and Laneway party. Graffiti artists were invited to paint the lane St Ali was situated on. Good crowd. Met quite a few people. Really kewl stuff. There was a dj playing. Booze. Mmm.. and of course, coffee from St. Ali.

St. Ali
12-18, Yarra Place
South Melbourne