Melbourne’s best coffee – the untold story, by a local

One of the things Melbourne is best known for – next to its incredible fashion scene, cool arcades and hidden laneways – is its café culture. Never, ever, get in between a Melburnian and their coffee. It’s close to obsession – for some it’s like a religion.

Another very Melbourne trait is that its best finds are, by their nature, hard to find, and this goes for coffee as well. While finding a good coffee made with passion and expertise isn’t difficult, stumbling across a perfect macchiato in an unassuming café is a real pleasure. And usually they’re not on the wider tourist radar. Here then are some top coffee spots worth seeking out to enjoy a true taste of Melbourne.

Melbourne CBD

There are decent cafes scattered across the CBD grid of Melbourne – from the original and arguably, the best; Pelligrini’s in Bourke Street, a Melbourne institution, to a whole cluster of cafes around Degraves Street, Flinders Lane and Centre Place, an area that has an ambience so smooth and cool, you could slip over in a hipster slick. It’s coffee heaven around here and the aromatic roast of the beans is a familiar scent. Honourable mentions must go to The Journal and Dukes Coffee Roasters both in Flinders Lane. The latter not only does espresso coffee from its local roaster in Collingwood in a range of roasts and blends, but cold filter coffee as well – the new, very on-trend way of enjoying coffee in Melbourne.

For a real Melbourne café experience, you can’t go past Switchboard Café. Actually, if you didn’t know it was there, you could! It is literally a hole in the wall at the bottom of the wonderfully Art Deco Manchester Unity Building on Swanston Street, and is so out-of-the-way that most locals are unaware of its existence. Eccentric Melbourne chic at its finest.

A few blocks away, look out for two of a new breed of cafes. The League of Honest Coffee in Exploration Lane just off Little Lonsdale Street takes its single bean roast very seriously, and expects its clientele to do the same. And you can tell it means business by the décor – minimalist, bright and spacious. Not far away in La Trobe Street, check out Flipboard. Taking its cue from Japanese architecture, it’s a labyrinth of small booths, some facing the street and some inside on multi levels. While it might be a maze inside, the coffee selection is delightfully simple – black or white. So don’t go expecting to find a hot decaf skinny cappuccino – they’ll laugh you out onto the street. And it’s very serious about recycling and minimal waste too.

Out of town

It’s not just the CBD that boasts great coffee. Just down St Kilda Road in South Yarra is Slater St. Bench. A simple and sophisticated interior, with a European-style bench for standing and drinking your coffee, and a central counter where you can watch the barista work their magic, means that the focus is definitely on the coffee, which you can have espresso-style or filtered. And it’s good, it’s very good.

On the other side of the city is the hip Auction Rooms, located in very cool Errol Street, North Melbourne, who also offer a number of different brewing methods, and a changing coffee blend daily.

And nearby suburbs also feature plenty of very Melbourne café experiences, from Brunswick Street Fitzroy staples, Marios and the Black Cat to newer cafes like Top Paddock and Three Bags Full in Richmond, Proud Mary and Allpress Espresso  in Collingwood, Seven Seeds and DOC Espresso in Carlton, Little Big Sugar Salt in Abbotsford, and even Finders Keepers, Axil Coffee Roasters and Sasa’s Café in Hawthorn, a little further east have exceptional coffee that regulars travel miles to for their caffeine injection.

There’s no escaping good coffee in Melbourne – and one reason why Melbourne is such a liveable city. Now, where’s that latte I ordered…

(Feature image: Alpha; Search flights to Melbourne image by Jorge Láscar)