Author Archives: Brian Williams

About Brian Williams

Author of Brian's Coffee Spot, you can read all about me in the "About Me" section of the blog (www.brian-coffee-spot)

Coffee Spot Awards 2016

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An espresso, made by my Rancilio Silvia espresso machine, in a classic white cup and saucer from Acme & Co., New Zealand, distributed in the UK by Caravan Roastery.Merry Christmas to all my readers old and new! I hope you’re having a great Christmas. As the year comes to an end, so it’s time for the Coffee Spot Awards, now into their FIFTH year! It seems only yesterday that my friend Andrew Rilstone suggested the first Coffee Spot Awards. If only I’d have known what I was unleashing back then…

2016’s been an amazing year, with more Coffee Spots visited and written about than ever. The annual Coffee Spot Awards provides a chance for me to reflect on all the great places I’ve visited and to give them all some more well-deserved time in the limelight. As usual, there are 20 Awards, the shortlists for each being publishing between now and New Year’s Eve, the winners being announced on New Year’s Day.

Thanks to everyone who’s visited the Coffee Spot, followed me on Twitter, liked my Facebook page, +1ed me on Google+ (a dwindling number!) and liked my pictures on Instagram. While I do this for the love of coffee, it means a lot to me that so many of you take the time to read and comment on my writing. Without you, it really would be pointless.

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Ultimo Coffee, Newbold

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The sign, painted on an old window, on the back wall at Ultimo Coffee's Newbold coffee shop.The first ever speciality coffee shop I visited in Philadelphia was Ultimo Coffee’s Graduate Hospital branch on Catherine Street. It is therefore a little ironic that it’s taken me two years to visit the original, Newbold, on South 15th Street, where Ultimo started back in 2009. As is usual in these cases, the loss is all mine.

Ultimo, rather unusually, shares the space with Brew, a speciality bottle beer company, with Ultimo and the coffee taking the front of the store and Brew taking the back, the two sharing the seating. Ultimo, also unusually, has a strong focus on pour-over coffee, something which is slowly catching on in the US, but which Ultimo has championed from the start, using BeeHouse drippers to serve an interesting selection of single-origin filters to go with two more on espresso.

During my visit in February, Counter Culture was the house-roaster, with occasional guests on espresso and filter. However, since then Ultimo has started roasting its own coffee (with the roastery based at Newbold), which is now available on-line and in both stores. If you’re in a hurry, there’s bulk-brew until 11am, while for those with a sweet tooth, there’s a selection of cake.

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Cartwheel Cafe & Roastery

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My pour-over, served in a handleless glass carafe with a handleless pottery cup, plus a slice of salted caramel and chocolate shortbread tart, at Nottingham's Cartwheel Cafe & Roastery.Cartwheel Cafe and Roastery is part of Nottingham’s speciality coffee explosion, which saw a cluster of openings over the summer of 2016. It joined the likes of The Speciality Coffee Shop and Outpost Coffee, along with more established players, such as 200 Degrees and Wired Café Bar. As the name suggests, Cartwheel is both café and roastery, the roasting taking place at the back of the store using an innovative 2.5 kg electric roaster. There’s an impressive food offering, with full breakfast and lunch menus, plus pre-prepared sandwiches and salads for those in a hurry. Of course, there’s plenty of cake, plus a choice of six Postcard Teas and multiple soft drinks.

However, the main draw is the coffee. When I visited in the summer, just six weeks after Cartwheel had opened, there was a Brazilian single-origin espresso, with a choice of three single-origins on pour-over (for one) or Syphon (for two). There are plans to change this slightly, keeping the Brazilian for milk-based espresso drinks, but offering espresso (including long blacks and Americanos) as a brew method alongside the pour-over filter and syphon, the idea being to have three or four single-origins available through any of the brew methods.

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Hot Numbers, Gwydir Street Update

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The new Hot Numbers logo from the sign outside the original branch on Gwydir Street, Cambridge.I first visited Hot Numbers in the summer of 2014. Back then it was the one place that pretty much everyone had recommended to me in Cambridge. Café, single-origin roaster, music venue and, by association, art gallery, it had something for everyone and was pretty much the only speciality coffee place in town. How things have changed!

Now Cambridge boasts the The Espresso Library, Urban Larder and Novi in the centre of town, with Stir on the outskirts. There’s also a second Hot Numbers, a coffee shop which doubles as the roastery on Trumpington Street, which the staff were talking excitedly about during my visit in 2014 and which opened towards the end of that year.

With all that change going on, it was too much to ask that the original Hot Numbers on Gwydir Street would be unaffected. However, I was unprepared on my return earlier this year for just how much had changed! The good news, though, is that the most important thing hasn’t changed: the coffee. Still all roasted in-house, Hot Numbers still only serves single-origins, each carefully matched to how you’re drinking it. This includes options on espresso and pour-over via syphon, Aeropress and Clever Dripper.

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Grindsmith Cross Street

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When visiting Manchester for the Manchester Coffee Festival, it’s traditional that I start one of my days at Grindsmith. Two years ago, it was the original, the Pod on Greengate Square, while last year I called in on the second branch on Deansgate. This year it’s the turn of the latest branch, on Cross Street. Bizarrely, this means that I’ve done all four Grindsmith branches in the order that they opened, having previously visited Media City, Grindsmith’s other opening this year.

Grindsmith’s always has interesting spaces. The Pod is just that, a pod/container with a coffee shop inside. Deansgate is at front of an amazing old warehouse, effectively the house-café for the Central Working/Rise co-working space. Meanwhile Media City is a bright, light-filled spot with a cosy mezzanine above the counter/kitchen.

The latest Grindsmith is a joint-venture with Chop’d, the London-based salad-bar chain, now rapidly expanding with this, its first branch outside London. The two share the space upstairs on Cross Street: if it’s food you want, the Chop’d counter is to the left, while if it’s coffee, the smaller Grindsmith counter is tucked away to the right, by the stairs down to the basement, where you’ll find additional seating.

November 2017: Grindsmith has ended its joint-venture with Chop’d. The coffee bar is still there, but the coffee is now from London’s Notes.

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The Roasting Party

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I first came across The Roasting Party, subject of today’s Meet the Roaster, in 2014 at Beany Green, Paddington, where, for a couple of years, a Roasting Party flat white was the start to my working day. Shortly afterwards, I met Kirby and Wes, the Aussie duo behind The Roasting Party, at that year’s London Coffee Festival. I’ve been following their progress ever since, both as Beany Green has expanded and as The Roasting Party has gained accounts at the likes of C.U.P. in Reading, Brighton’s The Marwood and Espresso by K2 & Farm Girl Café in West London. Most recently, The Roasting Party has started supplying Winchester’s very own Coffee Lab.

Kirby and Wes (perhaps unfairly) have a reputation as the party boys of speciality coffee, free-spirited Aussies who don’t take themselves too seriously. On the other hand, as the name suggests, they do like a party, which is abundantly clear to anyone who’s visited The Roasting Party stand at successive London Coffee Festivals, where there’s even a resident DJ…

This, however, does The Roasting Party a disservice, since while Kirby and Wes might not take themselves very seriously, they do take the business of coffee extremely seriously indeed…

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Wainwright’s Speciality Coffee

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The Wainwright's Speciality Coffee logo from the store in Clifton, Bristol.Bristol’s long been one of my favourite coffee cities, replete with any number of excellent establishments. Except, I’ve found, in Clifton. However, this has all changed in the last year with the emergence of Wainwright’s Speciality Coffee, a lovely spot on Regent Street, right in the heart of Clifton village.

That I found out about it at all was large due to a chance encounter in Full Court Press with Matt, of Leeds-based roasters, Maude Coffee. Matt told me all about Wainwright’s and, if that wasn’t enough, the next day, Alex of Bakesmiths was singing its praises, so off I went. And, in fairness, Mike Stanbridge also told me about it on twitter back in July.

Wainwright’s is a lovely spot, beautifully laid out, with some gorgeous lighting too. The new manager, Ben, has also upped the coffee game, with the house espresso from the local Clifton Coffee Roasters and a regularly-changing guest on the second grinder. There are also filter options through the V60 and Aeropress, each matched to a particular single-origin coffee. During my visit, Clifton was on the Aeropress, Maude on V60.

As if that wasn’t enough, there’s hot chocolate from Kokoa Collection, and a decent breakfast/lunch menu based mostly around things on toast and sandwiches, all made using bread from Bakesmiths.

December 2019: I’ve just learnt (through Mike Stanbridge) that Wainwright’s is now Foliage Cafe. I’m not sure what else (if anything) has changed.

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Ogawa Coffee Boston

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The Ogawa Coffee logo from the sign outside the Boston branch on Milk Street.Ogawa Coffee is a large (40+ stores) speciality coffee shop chain from Kyoto. However, the branch on Milk Street, right in the heart of downtown Boston, is its first overseas venture, having opened in 2015. An interesting blend of Japanese and American coffee culture, I loved it, particularly the attention to detail shown by the baristas.

The shop itself is long and thin, with perhaps the highest ceilings I’ve seen in a coffee shop this year. About as wide as it is tall, Ogawa has a great sense of space. There’s a good choice of seating too, with tables at the front and what is called stadium seating at the back, opposite the counter. Best of all, you can sit at the counter itself and watch the filter coffee being made.

Talking of coffee, it’s all roasted in Kyoto and air-freighted to the shop on a regular basis. There is a house-blend and three single-origins, which can be had by any method (espresso or hand-pour filter). These are joined on espresso by decaf and guest single-origins which change every week or two. Perhaps best of all, Ogawa serves a tasting flight, where you get to sample all three single-origins side-by-side.

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Kiosk: Project Space

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The modest front of Kiosk: Project Space, on York's Fossgate.Kiosk: Project Space is an interesting little spot on York’s Fossgate. A little way down from old hands Spring Espresso, it’s right next to the Merchant Adventurers’ Hall, so much so that when I first visited, I did a double-take, fearing that I had come to the wrong place before spotting it, tucked in to the right. Run by the wonderful Russ and Rebecca, who get bonus points for name alliteration, it is a hybrid: part gallery, part coffee shop and part kitchen, but 100% amazing.

The art/gallery comes in the shape of ceramics, textiles, fine art, jewellery and a whole lot more, all of which adorns the walls and shelves on both sides of Kiosk. While everything is for sale, it also acts as decoration, turning Kiosk into a wonderfully eclectic spot. The food appears from a tiny kitchen at the back, where impressive all-day breakfast and lunch options are turned out using a seasonal menu. The coffee, meanwhile, is from the wizards at Dark Woods, with a single-origin on espresso and another on filter through V60, Aeropress or Chemex (for two). The coffee is bought in 8 kg amounts and when it’s gone, another takes its place.

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The Coffee Spot Christmas Gift Guide 2016

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Some lovely latte art from Rag & Bone Coffee in my Therma Cup, one of this year's Christmas Gift suggestions.It’s that time of the year again, when everyone publishes their Christmas gift guides. Well, never one to be accused originality, here’s the Coffee Spot’s entry into the fray, an eclectic selection of gifts for your coffee-loving friends/relatives.

Let’s be honest, the coffee-loving community can be awkward to buy for, particularly if, like me, they’re towards the far end of the coffee-geek spectrum, when any choice runs the risk of being ill-informed. Do you get them coffee? Or coffee-related kit? Or a book about coffee perhaps?

Never fear, the Coffee Spot’s here to help you out, whether you’re a novice, looking for pointers for gifts for your coffee-obsessed friend, or if you’re that coffee-obsessed friend, looking for a handy guide to point your friends towards. There’s also a few suggestions for presents to help those of your coffee-loving friends who’re at the top of the slippery slope of coffee-geekdom and who just need a helping nudge to start them on the headlong descent into the rabbit-hole of speciality coffee.

Of course, while this is styled a Christmas gift guide, feel free to return to it throughout the year. It serves just as well as a birthday or anniversary gift guide…

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