STORY BY LARISSA DUBECKI, PHOTOS BY CHRIS TURNER

Lauren Bieber and Tom Crowe aren’t the only Melbournians who’ve packed up to seek a simpler life steeped in the beauty of Central Victoria. They are unique, however, in being members of the city’s café intelligentsia who’ve brought their skills to the `hood. Part of a wave of smart operators who helped revitalise Melbourne’s café scene into a world leader more than a decade ago, these days you’ll find their skill-set transplanted to a vibrant café on Daylesford’s Vincent Street.

Melbourne’s loss is spa country’s gain. These days you’ll find the couple slinging excellent coffee, smart food and local wines at the small but perfectly formed cafe Pancho. Named after Lauren’s Chilean father, it was known as Awkward Jeffery before Bieber and Crowe took it over two years ago and before that was a butcher. “It’s an old terrace so it was once someone’s house,” says Bieber. “The dry store upstairs was once someone’s bedroom.”

Their Clifton Hill cafe Mixed Business, which opened in 2008 to instant acclaim and was sold ahead of their treechange, shows its proud legacy at Pancho. Crowe is in charge of the kitchen and remains a keen proponent of the DIY approach, making all the things that are often bought in such as relishes, yoghurt and cakes. The meat, poultry and eggs are free range but it’s not the kind of place to expect something as prosaic as straight-up scrambled eggs and bacon. Instead you might find slow-roasted pork belly with poached eggs and mushroom ketchup on a potato rosti, or a life-affirming bowl of Japanese-leaning breakfast greens with a poached egg and a lively sprinkle of the spice mix togarashi.

Lunches lean towards the hot rolls that were beloved by fans of Mixed Business, stuffed to the gunwales with the excellence of house-roasted beef or chicken with cheddar cheese and `slaw, seeded mustard aioli and bright with pickles and relish. Soup – maybe roasted parsnip with thyme and goat cheese – demands a seat by the open fire once business returns to a post-coronavirus normal. Lockdown switched them to a takeaway footing, with the offering extending to a selection of the menu along with an excellent takeaway coffee, made with beans by Brunswick heroes Wide Open Road, and a number of grocery items.

Bieber and Crowe exchanged the bustle of East Brunswick for the assured serenity of the tiny town of Campbells Creek, just outside Castlemaine, where they live with their two boys, Sidney aged five and Arthur, three. The drive to work is a far cry from the days they would battle inner-city traffic jams getting from home to neighbouring Clifton Hill, just a few kilometres away: “It takes about the same amount of time but instead we’re driving through the gorgeous countryside and beautiful towns like Guildford and Yandoit,” says Bieber. “It’s actually relaxing.”

Pancho Cafe                                                                                                                                                                                                   5373 4230                                                                                                                                                                          panchocafe.com.au                                                                                                                                                                                   117 Vincent St, Daylesford