Duce And Co.

Best coffee on the city If you drink long black you have to try!!! no hiding in milk it’s really good coffee The team Charlie Jasmine and Co offer great service and the home made treats are worth the stop. Really cosy sitting area down the stairs. Give it a try😊

The coffee is always excellent with a great variety. Has a good selection of food that is also gluten free and always reasonably priced. The service is always friendly and quick!

Fantastic coffee! Awesome service and a relaxing and inviting atmosphere. I should know. I’m here every morning. Thanks so much for making our morning!

I came here on a warm Saturday, ordering an iced black. The coffee tasted smooth and floral though it was not cold enough so my coffee turned warm pretty quickly in Brissy heat :'x

This review is going to be a short and sweet one this time around. For a small place, a brief encounter, and not that much gotten from here, fair is fair is fair. Needless to say, there are still some things to talk about and they managed to get a decent cup of coffee in there - so there is always that.

Getting to the point, this is Duce & Co. Just a stone's throw away from Central Station, it is a little pocket that is taking inspiration from the laneways idea in Melbourne. So many times have I bypassed this after work, and have pondered about going in to get a coffee. One - it is a new place, two - it is coffee, and three - it is pretty conveniently located. It was only a matter of time before temptation got the better of me and I headed down the stairs.

And when going down those stairs, it is really cosy. The many times going past here, I just assumed it was the area at the bottom of the stairs and that was it. Nope, around the corner to the entrance left is a small seating area with a few small tables. It is as tucked away and secluded as one could get in the central area of Brisbane, and uses what I presume was the basement at one point - this building is heritage listed after all. Getting into the modernised times, a few artworks are strewn around the place to give it some life and it seems to work. Not that I have had many of them, but with a business meeting over coffee I think I know the perfect place for it in the future.

Service here, if fairly introverted, manages to be pretty quick and get a high turnover rate. It must have taken only a few minutes between ordering and paying before I was off on my way. The barista was a talented one, and wholly focused on getting the drinks out.

An aspect that I have seen from time to time at coffee places has been the suspended coffee. In short it is where customers can choose to pay for a coffee that they "don't get". Instead, it is reserved for someone less fortunate to have later on when available. Previously I have done it, and it can be seen as a tiny, yet significant gesture. More places ought to promote this, and it can get rid of pesky change.

Aside from a bunch of sweets that are sitting on the counter and in the cabinet, the menu is purely beverages for now. As of this review, breakfast food is said to be coming soon. With the beverages in mind, at the moment it is coffee, teas and milkshakes (and that latter one looks to be beyond the standard syrups).

Well, it was the afternoon and that slump for when coffee just sounds so good. And as per usual, I get the doppio. Bonus points already to this place, they knew exactly what I meant thus did not have to ask for reiteration; that is often a sign of optimism and that they know coffee. Bear Bones provides the beans for them. The blend that I got it in was the Badger blend, one that was described as being dark chocolate and caramel with the sweetness of raisin fruit. I could get the chocolate taste, more in a cocoa than chocolate bar way, but not quite the caramel - the raisin in part. As for how it was crafted - another spot on coffee, the extraction, temperature and crema.

Well, knowing myself it would not be worthy to review if it were just a coffee. Something on the side ought to have done the trick, and looking in the cabinet, the coconut tea cakes looked pretty good. It is something about the sweets which have less sweet flavours to them that I am now gravitating towards for some reason, probably because of how they get a more characteristic taste. This was the case here, even if the coconut flavour was not overtly dominate. It was soft, moreish and the coconut was spread throughout the cake and sprinkled on top. Subtle was not quite the adjective for its taste, but it definitely needed some attention to indicate. Nevertheless it was perfect with a coffee.

Well, not much else to say other than I see how this place could do well. It is quiet, it has a distinct character that is lacking in central city coffee shops and wears cute in an understated way. This feels just as much of a charity as it does an honest coffee shop without going too far out there. Good luck to it, since it deserves it - and that is for real this time.