Melbourne

Abbotsford's Vietnamese cafe has a stranglehold on the city's FYP right now — the salted cream coffee is what started the run and the queue on Lithgow St shows no sign of moving. Get the matcha basque cheesecake while it's still on; these things cycle out fast.

Order Salted cream coffee, Zen bloom, matcha basque cheesecake, garlic cheese bread

Juniper's Greek-inspired coffee frappe is holding the top Google search spike in Melbourne this week — not the loudest cafe in the city, but the most hunted. The chicken roll with crispy skin is the kind of thing that shouldn't share a menu with a frappe, but here we are.

Order Famous coffee frappe, chicken roll with crispy skin

Standing Room's Cherry Shrub Spider — fruit vinegar over ice with lemon cream — sounds like something a fermentation nerd cooked up on a dare. Carlton's drinking vinegar revival, concentrated into one drink that's genuinely hard to put down.

Order Cherry Shrub Spider (fruit vinegar over ice with lemon cream)

Behind a North Melbourne roller door, Assembly doubles as a cellar door for Tina — a non-alc wine label that treats its products like the real thing. The Dunkaccino (half filter, half hot chocolate) sounds like a gimmick until you're halfway through one.

Order Dunkaccino (half filter coffee, half hot chocolate), shan cha (mountain tea from Taiwan), Tina non-alc drinks

Every table at The Glass Den is lit like a film still — the stained-glass interior does most of the lifting before the food arrives. The Italian hot chocolate is genuinely worth the drive out to Coburg.

Order Viral Italian hot chocolate, new brunch dishes, strawberry matcha latte

Seoul's doughnut latte format landed quietly on Elizabeth Street and now the CBD has a genuine queue problem on weekday mornings. The chai cinnamon version has a caramel cream crown that's more structural feat than garnish.

Order Doughnut lattes (chai cinnamon, chocolate, matcha), Kkwabaegi (twisted Korean donuts), Jasmine Cloud

Nimbo is in the kind of Melbourne alleyway you walk past twenty times before you notice the door. The ube matcha is the reason the regulars aren't telling anyone about it.

Order Ube matcha, banana croissant pudding, hojicha hot chocolate, hot Earl Grey matcha

The warm orange lighting bleeds out into the laneway and does most of the work before you've sat down. Order the In Btwn Dirty — espresso with orange zest — and decide for yourself whether it's a cafe or a bar.

Order In Btwn Dirty with orange zest, Einspanner, Matcha Einspanner

The Injeolmi Pandoro — dressed in Korean rice powder — is what Katherine Place gets queued for on weekends, and fairly so. The tiramisu croissant sounds like a mashup that doesn't work; it works.

Order Injeolmi Pandoro (the icon), tiramisu croissant, tissue bread, Korean dumplings pie

Presgrave Place's street-art laneway has hosted cafes before, but Trbl's Korean salt bread — the sogum — has given regulars a concrete reason to walk it again. The sea salt chai latte has no business being this good inside a space this narrow.

Order Sea salt chai latte, Korean salt bread (sogum), vanilla bean latte