It’s charming, cute, and could pass off as a feminine chemist’s laboratory.
A recovering coffee abuser’s worst nightmare.
Dandelion & Driftwood, each representing one of the owners (Peter and Penny Wolff), is a unique Brisbane cafe nestled in Hendra. What makes it unique is their focus on filtered coffee, notably via: Chemex, Syphon, Aeropress and Cold Brew (yes I had to look these up too).
When we arrived, Peter explained the concept of Dandelion & Driftwood (D&D for short… teehee) to us and you could see he was passionate about his coffee. One could imagine he could speak for great lengths about the many aspects of coffee making and the origins of each bean they stock. Thankfully it must’ve looked liked we needed some caffeine stat, so he proceeded to recommend a few brews to begin with. Begin. With.
For the vast majority of cafés, you don’t get to choose the type of bean your coffee is made from. In D&D’s case you can, and each type of cupped bean was accompanied with a card describing its origins. A nice touch that didn’t feel pretentious.
I opted for a more manly bean (apparently men in general prefer stronger beans to women) in both hot and cold form and it was a damn good coffee. The cold brew came in a ridiculously awesome amber bottle and it tasted as awesome – strong and flavoursome, and reminded me of the iced black coffee you can get in Malaysian hawker centers (in a good way). Sampling from coffees others were having around the table, each was remarkably different. The feminine Dandelion blend didn’t even taste like coffee.
Along with coffee, they also serve all manners of sweets and cakes. They looked great but we didn’t try any. We were already high on caffeine. We didn’t need to add sugar to the equation.
So we’ll definitely be coming back to D&D (…nope still funny). There are still many other beans and methods of preparation to sample. It’s a whole new world!
We left happy and wired, but then again, nothing like the group that left before us – rapidly mentioning something about 5 or 6 cups each before realising they should probably leave. I guess that’s the kind of place this is. Before you know it, you’re a full blown coffee addict (again). And you love it.
Dandelion & Driftwood
Shop 1, 45 Gerler Rd
Hendra, Queensland, Australia
