A Long Black Coffee at Bar Moda

It is hard to find a good coffee in the city outside of normal work hours. After 4pm, almost all of the cafes close, leaving just a handful huddling around the mall, nothing like the number of options available during the workday.

Bar Moda is an office hours cafe. Sitting in the foyer at 307 Queen Street and surounded by other office blocks, it is not likely to get much foot traffic on the weekend. During the week is another matter entirely though.

Bar Moda has two counters, one facing out of the building and another inside. There is seating near both, but most importantly, the two counters keep the takeaway orders turning over fast. The coffee is strong and good, though the latest one I had was pretty hot for black coffee. I imagine it would have been fine as a milk coffee.

There is one more thing: they have free WiFi via CafeScreen. The service looked interesting and it ran an image insert/replace in some RSS feeds within Flipboard. Twitter and email were fine, but I did not stay long enough to try it out properly.

TL;DR

• Takeaway orders move fast
• Good coffee, better if you like it with milk
• Free WiFi

Bar Moda
307 Queen Street
Brisbane CBD, 4000
ph: 3221 0101

Work Desk Coffee

Industrial estates are not known for cafes. Currently I work in an office in Eagle Farm, and unlike when I worked in Spring Hill or Milton, getting a decent coffee is all but impossible. Barring work-supplied instant coffee, the only other options are to bring in your own takeaway coffee, bring what you need to make it yourself, or the coffee van, which turns up most mornings around 9:30.

The Coffee Van

In case you have never seen one, a coffee van is pretty much just that. A van, with an espresso machine and an amusingly spelled or phrased name, whose purpose is to drive around selling coffee and light snacks.

The coffee itself is usually acceptable and the prices are fairly reasonable, comparable to what you would expect to pay in a cafe. Which is good, considering the lack of alternatives closer than a ten minute drive away. The one that stops by my office is a Cafe2U franchise van, which fills the cafe gap as well as can be expected.

It never is just about the coffee though; cafes are more than just a well placed espresso machine. A coffee van is not something you can go to for lunch, or a destination for a coffee run and a chance to leave the office. A coffee van does not come close to replacing the ‘Cafe Closest To The Office’ experience.

For those who have been consigned to the office denizen nether hells of a suburb in the middle of nowhere, the coffee van is a rare glimpse of how things could be, if you worked somewhere else.

TL;DR

• If you work near a good cafe, treasure it.

Epresso for buying coffee online

For me Wednesday is the worst day for buying coffee on the way to work. It is the day I usually run out of change entirely, or struggle to find enough small change for a takeaway coffee.

This is why Epresso sounds like such an awesome idea. Epresso is a service where the users set up a prepaid account, and top it up online, which lets them order coffee online, from either a computer or smartphone.

With this service, the customers pay for coffee without cash, and without slowing down service at the cafe. By ordering before they arrive, their coffee will already be waiting once they get to the cafe. The business won’t miss sales because the customer has no cash.

The idea is very simple, and solves a small, but persistent and annoying problem, and that is why I can easily see myself using this, given half a chance.

TL;DR

• Pre-order and pay for coffee using the Internet
• Not having change is not a problem
• Saves time for cafes and customers

Coffee Hit, a Brisbane CBD cafe

In the Brisbane CBD, there is a cafe called Coffee Hit on King George Square. I was in the city early for an Interactive Minds event, and I needed to get some form of caffeine. Coffee Hit looked promising, in a generic CBD cafe way. And they met my expectations, in a generic CBD cafe way.

Coffee Hit's Dollar

Except for one thing. The change that they gave me for the coffee. The dollar coin was damaged. Well, defaced. Scoured is another good word for it. Ground down would also work, maybe even savaged, if I wanted to use something more emotive.

Both sides of the coin had been very comprehensively scratched, possibly obliterated, you might even say brutally torn into. All trace of the Queen, and the unique Australian wildlife that decorated its once unmolested form had been remorselessly eradicated, like kangaroo genocide. That is completely unfair. I gave them real money for the coffee; it seems a little mean to give me something that almost wasn’t change.  It’s nearly as bad as getting New Zealand money.

The coffee itself was OK. Like a lot of rather ordinary long blacks, it was a little too bitter. Since it was also boiling hot, that wasn’t a real surprise. Like their coffee, the prices were in line with most other CBD cafes as well. Nice location though.

Seriously, what am I going to do with that one dollar coin?

Long Black Coffee at Cafe Chez Laila

It was a Friday afternoon and the office relocated to Portside for an afternoon of beverages, team building and beer battered chips. The venue was Cafe Chez Laila at Portside and I opted for the coffee.

Portside is on the Brisbane river, just down from Racecourse road. It is a great location, with a number of different cafes, bars and restaurants, some of which are right on the river. Cafe Chez Laila was not. But you could still see the river from where we were sitting outside the cafe. The kitchen closed before we could get a second batch of beer battered chips, but they still served us drinks.

Why?

It was an OK cafe, and the coffee had a strong flavour. I can not comment on the, as I never really saw it. They chips were good, but mostly, Cafe Chez Laila is about the location. That afternoon there was a pleasant breeze coming off the river, and in the failing light of the afternoon, it was a great place to just relax.

Xpresso Delight Pod Machine

At work we have just gotten a new coffee machine from Delight Xpresso. Due to the relatively low demand for coffee, the office has swapped the old machine for a new one. The New Pod machine uses satchels of pre-ground coffee instead of fresh beans, and requires a little more effort.

More flexibility, fewer buttons

Gone is the one button cappuccino and flat white. Now the coffee you end up with is determined by the length of the shot (pre-set or otherwise), and how frothy you want the milk.

I have actually found that the coffee tastes better with this one. This could be due to more control over the quantity of coffee, higher pressure, sealed coffee rather then what ever had been in the hopper for a week, or just because the older one needed to be descaled. Whatever the reason, or reasons, I do prefer the coffee.

So whats the point in all this?

I would choose this machine first knowing what I know now, but there is a learning curve, more of a gentle slope, but there is always someone who won’t bother getting the hang of it.

Illy Cafe long black

As a part of my job, I was sent down to the Gold Coast for the day to take some video and photos for use online.   It was a long, hot day, and I really do not like sand.  However, I did find something that I liked. There is an Illy caffe on the Gold Coast.

I found it on Surfers Paradise Boulevard situated amongst the fashion shops.  It has been a while since I was able to visit the Illy caffe on Eagle Street in the CBD in Brisbane, so I was very eager to take a break and grab a long black.

And why this matters

Illy does a very nice coffee blend, and their branded cafes are very good at demonstrating this.  Their look and feel are also very polished, and while their menu is also very limited, there is a real emphasis on good quality ingredients.  So, an Illy cafe is usually a very safe choice if you are after a good coffee.

Xpresso Delight coffee machine

There is not a lot you can say about a $1 coffee. The price point serves to both set expectations and define user experience, at least if “Predictably Irrational” by Dan Ariely is spot on. I am sure that this was not the idea when Xpresso Delight were asked to bring the machine in. The price point was set to cover costs.

The coffee machine is very straight forward. It can produce a coffee without milk, and a coffee with milk. The milk will be hot when it comes out. I could not spot the difference between pushing the flat white button and the cappuccino button. To be fair I never actually tried them either.

The coffee is drawn long and drunk without sugar or milk. It does the job, and for a $1 coffee, it sure beats what I used to get out of a plunger.

What should you care?

If you work somewhere without a cafe in walking distance, there are options. If a coffee machine is too much of an expense, get one in like Xpresso Delight.

Cafine Long Black, with a giant cookie.

I have recently finished up on a contract with the Department of Education, Training and the Arts. I was employed  as a content producer, and trust me, it is not as fun as it sounds. However, some of the people in the office were great and the money was not too bad either. The coffee shop just around the corner was pretty good too.

The place is called Cafine, and their long blacks are pretty good. They can make a strong and drinkable long black, without it needing sugar.

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They did not make that cookie though, that was from one of the vending machines in the office.