“In Italy a cafe is open 24-7,” says Manuel Francesconi, owner of La Moka Café + Aperitivo Bar in Peel Street. “They are in a cycle to suit customers’ changing appetites, from coffee in the morning to cocktails at night.”
Francesconi is an electronic engineer who has “always worked in hospitality on the side”, so when he migrated to Adelaide in 2006 from Ravenna on Italy’s Adriatic Coast, he saw an opportunity to make hospitality a full-time occupation.
La Moka owner Manuel Francesconi. Photo: Jack Baldwin
“I married an Italian here – it took two years for my partner (Linda Mercorella) and I to find this location on Peel Street. We opened in June last year.”
Francesconi admits that it’s hard to be both a day and a night-time venue, so the fit-out had to be functional. It’s a tiny, narrow space, all coffee machine and shelves of Italian spirits and wines, but it does have extra seating upstairs and in the vibrant Peel Street laneway.
View of the interior at La Moka from upstairs. Photo: Jack Baldwin
Francesconi and Mercorella used designer Adam Johnson from Xtra Shiny to “capture the essence of Italy”. Johnson is also responsible for the fit-out at Clever Little Tailor (also in Peel Street) and the Grown in the Barossa film about Tanunda restaurant fermentAsian produced for the SA Tourism Commission. The result is an interesting use of space and texture, and a happy vibe with signature pops of bright yellow.
The food is unpretentious, simple, modern Italian café food. The one-page menu covers breakfast and lunch, offering Italian classics such as minestrone soup, pizza, caprese salad, lasagne, custard cornetti, zeppole, cannoli, and “an Italian spin on Australian classics” such as egg and prosciutto rolls and parmigiana ciabatta. A few daily specials are also offered.
Vegetarian lasagne. Photo: Jack Baldwin
There is no dinner at La Moka. At night it’s cocktails and platters of Italian cheese and salumi for grazing. The drinks menu, by comparison, is five pages and offers some enticing Italian cocktails and wines – even mulled wine.
La Moka is great for a quick buzzy breakfast or lunch and takeaway coffee. It’s all about the people who live and work nearby. “We see the same people for coffee in the morning that we do for cocktails at night.”
La Moka interior. Photo: Jack Baldwin
Favourite dish: Vegetarian lasagne ($12) was the lunch special the day InDaily visited. A modest but tasty and relatively light dish that didn’t impinge on the afternoon’s productivity.
Other dishes: Also on the specials menu were minestrone soup served with toasted bread ($10.50), chicken parmigiana ciabatta made with homemade crumbed chicken cutlets, Napoletana sauce, Grana Padano cheese and rocket ($12), and a rocket salad with pear, walnuts and parmesan cheese ($9).
Custard cornetti. Photo: Jack Baldwin
Something sweet/to drink: Unfortunately we weren’t quick enough to snaffle the last zeppole ($3.50) “made by Mauro from Andres Cucina”. The Segafredo coffee is also very popular here. It’s extracted with a reconditioned 1980s St Marco spring-pressure coffee machine – “there’s only one in Australia”. Francesconi says it produces a softer extraction. “People line up for the coffee – we do up to 700 shots per day.”
The vintage St Marco coffee machine. Photo: Jack Baldwin
La Moka
Open week days from 7.30am for breakfast, lunch and coffee, and Friday and Saturday evenings for drinks and small plates.
16a Peel Street, Adelaide, 0406 729 164.
Ernesto Di Benedetto is “second in charge” at La Moka. Photo: Jack Baldwin
