Images: @donvick.adelaide
Tucked inside Every Nation Church on Currie Street, a colourful new cafe is serving creative matcha and ube drinks while giving small local food businesses a place to showcase their goods.
Grace Ground opened on July 22, with community at the centre of everything it does.
“We want the community to stay here and talk with one another,” owner Alie Soria told Glam Adelaide.
“We love community, meeting people and making friends,” she said.
“I want people to come here and feel cosy and relaxed, and for everything they see to be creative.”
The creative touches can be seen in everything from the drinks themselves to the cafe design, to free stickers and motivational drink toppers made by Alie herself.
The stickers and drink toppers come with motivational words intended to give customers a small boost alongside their order.
“We don’t know what people are going through,” Alie said. “When they read it, I want them to feel like they’re okay and they’re doing a great job.”
That creativity carries through to the menu, where colourful drinks put ube, matcha and house-made flavours front and centre.
The Ube Cloud is inspired by Filipino ube desserts, with cooked ube mixed into a creamy purple drink.
For something lighter, the Coconut Kiss combines coconut water and strawberries, with the strawberries cooked in-house rather than coming from a syrup, and strawberry cream layered on top.
Matcha drinkers can also choose between the Matcha Cloud, topped with cold foam, or a regular matcha latte.
And specials are already proving popular, including a Banana Pudding Matcha combining banana, cream and matcha, as well as an Ube Matcha.
The pop-up deliberately keeps its food offering open to collaborations with other small businesses, rather than making its own pastries and snacks.
Crumbs and Comfort, which sells small-batch baked goods, supplies Grace Ground every Thursday and sometimes Wednesday, while Loaf Story House brings buns, garlic bread and other treats. Vegan cookie business Namit is also part of the mix.
The collaborations mean customers can grab one of Grace Ground’s colourful drinks alongside something made by another small Adelaide business.
“We’re open to more collaborations,” Alie said. “Businesses can reach out to us and we’ll schedule a time for them to collaborate with us.”
Grace Ground
When: 11am to 7pm on Wednesdays, and 11am to 5pm on Thursdays (or until sold out).
Where: 149 Currie Street, Adelaide, Every Nation Church.
To find out more, follow them on Instagram
