Cafés in Sydney

_Serious coffee_ Cafés in Sydney

If you drink espresso, these are the cafes I suggest you go to.
These guys _all_ take their coffee _very_ seriously.

Mecca Espresso Bar, cnr York and King sts, Sydney
- Sam from Artisan Focacceria had been telling me about this place forever,
  but it's not all that friendly a place to get to during the week, being in the
  middle of the CBD, so I'd kinda let it slide... The other week though, Jack
  (neonphyte on coffeegeek.com) mentioned that from Easter they'd be open on
  Saturdays. So I finally made it down there last weekend, and _wow!_, Sam is
  right, this place does _amazing_ coffee. They've got a "hotrodded" Mistral,
  with PID controllers and a custom "pre boiler" which combined ensure that its
  group heads are temerature stable to better than 0.1 degrees no matter how many
  shots they're pulling. They've got Alex Kum, Paul Gershon, and Jack Hannah
  working the machine, all of whom are almost insanely passionate about the coffee.
  This is a place I _will_ be back...
Single Origin Roasters, 60-64 Reservoir St Surry Hills
- This place is _great!_ If you turn up at the right time, they'll be
  roasting coffee in their big roaster (named "Boris") that sits right
  by the door of the cafe. The staff are outrageously friendly (Gavin,
  the guy I see running the roaster most often, recognised me and came up
  to say "Hi" at the coffee festival at the Rocks after I'd only been
  to the cafe a handful of times.)
  The coffee here is consistently outstanding. This is the sort of place
  where people are likely to discover that they actually do like short blacks.
Tobys Estate, 32-36 City Rd Chippendale
- Another place where the coffee is _always_ great. They've also got cafes
  in Potts Point (which feels slightly too small and cramped to me) and in
  Woolloomooloo (which doesn't have much convenient parking).
Campos, 193 Missenden Rd Newtown
- Another place that roasts in the cafe, and makes great coffee all the time.

Artisan Focacceria (with excellent espresso coffee), cnr Palmer and Liverpool Sts, Darlinghurst

This is a post of mine to the alt.coffee newsgroup in early Aug '05:

So I dropped in there this morning to check it out. 

Its _good!_ The staff seemed nice and friendly and passionate about 
their coffee (a guy walked in and asked for "a skim flat white and two 
ordinary flat whites please", and got the response "sorry, we won't serve 
'ordinary' coffee, we only make 'great' coffee"). The atmosphere was 
cool, less hectic that Single Origin, but not as tranquil as Tobys 
Estate's City Rd store, a good balance I think. The food menu looked 
interesting (I just had toast though, and it was good - the jam was 
excellent!)

The Robur has a doser, but they're running it with the dosing chamber 
completely empty, and with only a few hundred grams of beans in the 
hopper. I should have taken more notice of who's roast they're using, 
but I didn't (they have "branded" espresso cups and saucers, but I've 
already forgotten the brand...)[1]. The Marzocco holds pride of place in 
the cafe - they're obviously pretty proud of it - it makes the place 
instantly feel like a "serious coffee place".

But what you _really_ want to know about is the coffee, right?

I had a latte and an espresso.

The espresso was _really_ good - nice thick crema, smooth creamy 
mouthfeel, great flavour with just the right amount of bitterness. It 
was served in an appropriately warmed cup. I really enjoyed it.

The latte was good, but not great - the actual shot was probably great, 
but the milk wasn't quite right, not quite as smooth as I'm used to from 
places like Single Origin or Tobys Estate. It was perfectly drinkable, 
but as I said, not "great". (It did have a nice rosetta on it though.)

All up I'd rate them based on todays visit as somewhere between good and 
excellent, with a suspicion that they're only being held back from 
approaching excellence by teething problems (I'm pretty sure they 
weren't open yet when I went past on the weekend, so they've only 
actually been open a few days).

I'll be back. If you're in the East Sydney/Darlinghurst/Oxford St area, 
take a detour down to the corner of Liverpool and Palmer - if you read 
this newsgroup, it'll definitely be worth you while.

(No affiliation, just a satisfied customer. Sydney needs more "serious 
coffee" cafes. I'm happy to support them when they turn up.)

Update: 2006 05 10 Its Di Lorenzo coffee they're using. I just got mail
from Scott at Di Lorenzo letting me know.
As I mentioned in the original article, I have been back, quite regularly
and it continues to impress. As I expected, the slightly short of "great"
latte was in fact just teething problems, Sam (the usual weekday Barista and
part owner) has really got that nailed, and Scott who works Saturdays came
2nd in the Australian Barista Championship a few weeks back (losing out to
David Makin from Victoria, but beating Hazel by half a point! No shame coming
second in that sort of company...). The food is consistently interesting and
good, having (in my opinion) a much higher priority than most other local "good
coffee" places - Campos don't really do food at all, Mecca and Single Origin do,
but they clearly focus on the coffee rather than the food, where Artisan manage to
hold their own in the coffee stakes against them, while at the same time managing
a modern seasonal menu (check it out on their website).

Other Recommended Cafés in Sydney

Darlinghurst Cafés

Le Petit Cremé, 116 Darlinghurst Rd [map]
- This is actually my favourite cafe. The coffee isn't the best
  you can find around Sydney, but the ambience and staff and menu and food
  really shine, in my opinion. Highly recommended!
Café Hernandez, 60 Kings Cross Rd [map]
Roys Famous,176 Victoria St (Kings Cross end)
Ed's Deluxe, Victoria St (Kings Cross end)
Dov cnr Burton and Forbes sts (seems to be closed as of late Sept '05 :-( )
Dov are now down on the north end of Victoria St, down past Roys and Eds...
Tropicana, Victoria St (they're now back in their old place on the city side of Victoria St)
Colluzi, Victoria St
Fellinis, Victoria St

Leichhardt Cafés [map]

Café Barzu, 121 Norton St,
- I'd commented here about the fact that this place reliably
  does great food, but I'd been let down before by the coffee. I've
  been contacted by them asking me to come back and try the coffee again
  because they're _sure_ they do it properly, and that they hope this
  information is wildly out of date... They could well be right, I haven't
  been there in almost a year, and the time that sticks in my mind when the
  coffee could have been better was probably closer to 3 years ago. I'll make
  a point of dropping back in soon and report back here ;-)
Galletta's Bar, 161 Norton St, often dodgy service, looks like its closed Tue nights these days...
Café Gioia & Pizzeria, 126 Norton St
- This place recently (May/June 05) a) lost the barrista with the
  dreadlocks, and b) switched to Illy coffee. I don't know which one made the
  difference, but their coffee has gone downhill fast. It used to be OK and
  occasionally good, its now uniformly lousy... (and its not just me, see the
  "Worst Coffee Ever" thread in the Australian section of the coffeegeek forums.

Glebe Cafés

Ottos, Glebe Point Rd
Badde Mannors, Glebe Point Rd (aka "Badde Service"...)

Newtown Cafés

Satelite, Wilson St
The Old Fish Cafe, King St
Citrus, King St
Feel, King St
Lou Jacks, South King St

Balmain Cafés

Next, Darling St (Rozelle end)
The Coffee Bean, Darling St (Rozelle end)

Others

Too Fatz, Shop 6/ 152 Campbell Pde, Bondi [map]
Museum of Sydney Cafe just up from Circular Quay
Mt White Cafe, but not for the coffee, thats for sure...
Warpidos Crows Nest

If you've got comments (or complaints) about this page, feel free to email me at bigiain@mightymedia.com.au.