While it can’t lay claim to the prettiest surrounds, inside a white brick façade at the back of a car park, you’ll find A Spot for Joe, Geelong’s latest specialty café.

Enter at the front (or is it the back?) or from the little cobbled laneway at the side. Prop counter-side on a quaint cowhide stool, by the large pale wood communal with a centerpiece of white orchids or settle on the lengthy navy banquette-style seat extending along the back wall. Alternating apple green and white seats and small white round tables lie under modern bare bulb lights on polished concrete floors. Before the menu, eyes glance quickly to that fabulous ‘Poolside Gossip’ print by American Slim Aarons, which portrays Lita Baron, Nelda Linsk and Helen Dzo Dzo at a 1970 Palm Springs designer home.

If you’re in to coffee, get excited. It’s superb. Installing “The Slayer Espresso,” one of the world’s finest handmade machines ($30,000 worth), owners Jared Cooper (a former chef) and his wife Talya are the first outside Melbourne to use beans from renowned Chapel St roasters Dukes. On our visit, our coffee came with the perfect cheerful compliment – a classic mini chocolate freckle.  Word is the hot choc, made from Ecuadorian organic cocoa is just as good.

If it’s for breakfast, try house made bircher with chia seeds, passionfruit coulis, labna and fresh blueberries or test out their ‘avochoke smash’ with avocado, artichoke, barrel aged, Mt Vikos feta and vine ripe tomatoes on seeded sourdough.

If it’s for lunch, from behind the counter come paninis, baguettes with fillings like chicken, pickled chili, sesame cucumber and tahini and a salad – maybe quinoa with green beans, fresh herbs, chickpeas, Spanish onion, barrel aged feta and pomegranate dressing.

For something sweat, the treats don’t hide – resting on marble slate beneath a clear glass cabinet, smack bang on the counter. Lamingtons, baci’s, pain au chocolates… and some luscious Argentinian Alfajores. Unlike those notorious macs, these babies boast thick caramel wedged between two soft biscuits with a chocolate or coconut flake coating.

Geelong is a meagre 1hr drive away and while many wouldn’t think to stop there on route to the coast, A Spot for Joe is a reason.

Where: 33 Little Ryrie St | Geelong
When: Mon-Fri 7.30am-4pm | Sat 8am-2pm
Details: Facebook