Location: 2/118 Devonshire St, Surry Hills NSW
Taste-Type: Café
Price: Raspberry Dark Chocolate Loaf $2.50, Mocha $4.00 (~$2.80 take-away)
How to get there: Train or bus to Central station, then a short walk up Elizabeth St before a quick turn down Devonshire. Parking is, as in all parts of the CBD, abysmal.
Contact: 02-83990100
The crisp morning air has a spicy tinge to it, like a shuriken laced with wasabi. I feel oddly euphoric and this only makes me redouble my guard as I sidle into KoKo, one of many hole-in-the-wall cafés in the Surry Hills area. I am immediately taken by the minimalist sheen of the outside awning, and my impeccable artistic taste appreciates the way the interior blends post-industrialist chic with a rustic wooden tinge. KoKo boasts both sleek aluminium counters and homely cushion-benches, and as I take a cautious seat I eavesdrop on patrons talking about everything from software implementation to the previous night’s football. There is also a Korean Guy.
The Korean Guy (sometimes known as Phil) makes the coffee and is paid in a system which both intrigues and concerns me. Instead of paying up-front at the counter, one simply throws one’s money in a plastic tray atop Korean Guy’s coffee-machine before leaving. There is a cash-register hidden (ashamedly, it seems to me) behind the hodgepodge of barista arsenal, but payment is casual and indeed seems almost optional. I have broken into the Pentagon seventeen times (twice by crawling through the Internet connection) and the notion of trust disconcerts me. Have some of my colleagues (I immediately suspect Ninja 37) been assigned to protect this establishment’s coffers?
When I take a bite of my Raspberry Dark Chocolate Loaf, I begin to grasp what keeps patrons from stealing off, sans payment, into the somewhat grimy sunset. The loaf’s crispy shell conceals a juicily moist interior, one tinged with a surprising not of cocoa bitterness. The compelling chocolate taste hides all but the faintest hints of raspberry, at least until I come across a morsel of tenderly sour fruit. There are at least three such gems hidden in this rather nuanced loaf, which help me forget that it looks like a turd covered in icing sugar.
My mocha is covered in a cheerily bubbly layer of foam which, like the loaf, has a certain raw bitterness to it that brings to mind the Spartan-chic atmosphere of the café itself. The coffee has been delicately brewed and its tangy punch is only highlighted by the interplay of chocolate and foam. The porcelain cup is generous enough; the price for take-away (approximately $3) is even more so.
I slip out of KoKo with barely a sound, not wanting to disturb the near-Zen bubble which seems to wrap itself around the café. Perhaps it is because of the early hour or the backstreet location, but this coffee-spot has managed to blend a calming atmosphere into both its décor and its fare. To not reward the Korean Guy for his labours would surely draw upon one’s head a sea of bad karma, and quite possibly Ninja 37’s caffeine-edged katana.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
The orange and poppy-seed macaroon ($3) is my new weekly fix of delightful taste sensations, and hopefully it won’t evolve into an unmanageable addiction. Might have to fight off 37 for a table though.
Looks like Koko is a great little cafe.