Caffe Reggio

Posted on October 2, 2014 by Brian Williams

I’ve been visiting Caffe Reggio, a Greenwich Village institution, for years, almost as long as I’ve been coming to New York City. Like Boston’s Caffé Vittoria and Little Italy’s Caffé Roma, it’s the sort of old fashioned, American-Italian café that I can’t help but fall in love with (although I also have a soft spot for the Anglo-Italian variety). Established in 1927, Caffe Reggio been going strong ever since, trading partly on its heritage, although there’s a lot more behind its success than just nostalgia.

In terms of its coffee, it’s not going to win any third-wave aficionados over, but it serves a decent espresso, while there is an excellent range of cakes, which I’ve sampled before. Like many cafés of its ilk, there’s also a full food menu, which, due to illness, I didn’t get to try on this visit.

It’s a fairly small, busy space, with a sumptuously-appointed interior, which is half the attraction. You can also sit outside at a row of tables on the sidewalk. Full table service is an added bonus. It’s fair to say that while I enjoy the coffee, the main purpose of my (continued) visits is to soak up the atmosphere.

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Hot Numbers, Gwydir Street

Posted on September 22, 2014 by Brian Williams

I first visited Hot Numbers on Gwydir Street in the summer of 2014, when it was the one place that pretty much everyone recommended to me in Cambridge. These days, there’s much more competition, with the second Hot Numbers (the cafe/roastery on Trumpington Street), plus the likes of The Espresso Library, Urban Larder and Novi, but the original Hot Numbers still has plenty to offer.

Spread over two large rooms on the ground floor of the old Dake’s brewery, Hot Numbers is a café, single-origin roaster and music venue. The coffee is the main draw, Hot Numbers only serving single-origins, all roasted in-house at Trumpington Street. There’s a choice of two espresso beans (with milk and without), plus decaf and another single-origin on offer through Aeropress, Clever Dripper or Syphon. There’s also a decent range of loose-leaf tea.

If you’re not that obsessive about your coffee, it’s still a great place. To start with, the atmosphere is lovely and you can sit in either of the two rooms, which offer a variety of seating. The cakes, with offerings from local bakers such as Afternoon Tease and Fitzbillies, are amazing, and there are decent breakfast and lunch menus too.

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The Java Room

Posted on September 20, 2014 by Brian Williams

When I originally started the Coffee Spot, the intention was to write about places where I liked to have coffee. Although it’s evolved a lot since then, this original motivation is still very much at the heart of the Coffee Spot. On that basis, I present today’s Saturday Supplement, The Java Room. Located in a small plaza on Littleton Road in Chelmsford, you might be mistaken for thinking that this represents my first foray into Essex, but this happens to be Chelmsford, Massachusetts. Confusingly, the New England version of Chelmsford is in Middlesex County. Go figure, as my American friends would say.

The Java Room offers pretty standard coffee-shop fare. There are no flat whites and piccolos here, no single-origin beans or micro-lots, just large lattes, cappuccinos and espresso, along with bulk-brewed filter coffee and various iced and blended beverages. Where the Java Room really scores is in its atmosphere. It’s a lovely spot, the perfect, small town, neighbourhood coffee shop, friendly, relaxed and welcoming. I’m kicking myself for having been to Chelmsford many, many times and not discovering it before last year.

March 2015: Correction. I popped in one Monday in March (since I was literally passing by) and there are indeed flat whites to be had at The Java Room. Naturally, I had to have one and it was very fine.

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The Fleet Street Press

Posted on September 15, 2014 by Brian Williams

My visit to The Fleet Street Press was an exercise in going from the sublime to the ridiculous, since I had just come from the soaring, glorious space that is The Wren, to the small, intimate series of spaces that make up The Fleet Street Press. Really, the two of them are like chalk and cheese, representing the two extremes of coffee shop spaces, and yet I love them both.

The Fleet Street Press fills a fairly awkward, long, thin space at the start of Fleet Street, opposite the Royal Courts of Justice. Spread over two floors, the highlight is a cosy basement, stuffed with sofas and armchairs, although upstairs, with its bright, window seats, bar opposite the counter and intimate nook at the back, is pretty decent too.

Talking of decent, The Fleet Street Press serves a bespoke seasonal house-blend (The Press Blend) on the espresso machine, roasted by Caravan, plus regular guests and a daily-changing single-origin on filter. Add to that a wide range of loose-leaf tea from London Leaf and award-winning hot chocolate from Kokoa Collection and you’re onto a winner. And I’ve not even mentioned the wide range of cakes and the friendly staff…

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Spring Espresso

Posted on September 8, 2014 by Brian Williams

York is part of the not-very-well-known Yorkshire Coffee Triangle, along with Harrogate (home of the inestimable Bean & Bud) and Leeds (which featured in my latest article for Caffeine Magazine). This lack of recognition is a shame, since the area contains one of the greatest concentrations of high-quality coffee shops outside of London. Spring Espresso, on York’s Fossgate, is right up there with the best of them.

Like the other mainstays of York’s independent coffee scene, The Perky Peacock and Harlequin/The Attic, Spring Espresso is very much a home-grown talent. Opening in the autumn of 2011 (although with roots going back to 2006), Spring Espresso is the creation of the lovely Steve and Tracey, both of whom I was fortune enough to meet when I visited one Sunday morning.

There are two main reasons for visiting Spring Espresso: the excellent coffee from London’s Square Mile and the warm welcome you get from Tracey and Steve. The food’s not bad either (okay, so that’s three). And the cakes are excellent (four). And I’ve been told the tea’s very good too (five). I think I’ll stop now…

You get the picture…

December 2016: There are now two Spring Espressos, with the second opening on Lendal. Expect a write-up in 2017, just as soon as I get back to York!

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Dinner at Caravan King’s Cross

Posted on September 6, 2014 by Brian Williams

As the Coffee Spot approaches its second birthday, I thought I’d present another first. I’ve visited a few Coffee Spots that serve full dinner menus, but I rarely go for (or write about) the food. However, at the start of the summer, I was en-route to Leeds for my most recent Caffeine Magazine feature when I found I had a couple of hours to kill before my evening train. Instead of grabbing something at King’s Cross station, I took a short stroll to the north and today’s Saturday Supplement was born…

A roastery, coffee bar and restaurant, Caravan, in its cavernous space in an old grain warehouse next to Regent’s Canal, is many things to many people. For me, it’s always been a great place to sit inside at the counter at the back, drinking coffee and shooting the breeze with the baristas, or, on a summer’s evening, somewhere to sit outside with a carafe of one of Caravan’s many fine single-origins. It’s also one of my favourite roasters: as well as the single-origin pour-overs, I’ve always liked Caravan’s Market espresso-blend, keeping an eye out for its coffee wherever I go.

Now, however, I also think of it as a restaurant…

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Loustic

Posted on September 4, 2014 by Brian Williams

I first became aware of Loustic after a tip-off from Fancy a Cuppa?, who I’d sent ahead to scout out Paris for me. It’s a lovely spot, tucked away on rue Chapon and, while not far from the Pompidou Centre, it’s off the regular tourist track.

Unashamedly blending French café culture with speciality coffee, Loustic is the brain-child of Channa, an ex-pat Brit, who has lived in Paris for the last 13 years. He seems to have managed it as well, with a customer split of about 70% locals to 30% tourists/ex-pats, a much higher ratio than several other Parisian speciality coffee places I’ve visited.

Loustic itself is long and thin, but a masterpiece of internal design, with a clever use of mirrors giving it a much bigger feel. At the same time, it’s split into three distinct seating areas, giving it a cosy, sometimes intimate, nature. The coffee is from Caffènation in Antwerp, while the tea is also very good (as vouched for by no lesser an expert than Mr Fancy a Cuppa himself). To round things off, there’s an interesting array of cakes and a selection of savoury tarts for when you need that little bit more.

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Sugar BLUE Café

Posted on September 1, 2014 by Brian Williams

Good coffee can be a little hard to find in France, especially if you don’t like traditional, dark-roasted espresso (if, like me, you do, there are plenty of places that will serve you a very drinkable cup of coffee, but woe betide you if you want a pour-over or single-origin espresso). Therefore it’s always nice when you come across a place such as Nantes’ Sugar Blue Café.

Situated right in the centre of the new town, just north of the splendid Place Royale, it had been open all of two weeks when I called by. The brainchild of joint-owners, Marlyse and Emmanuelle, it’s an attempt to bring the coffee culture of London (and increasingly, Paris) to Nantes and I wish them every success.

With coffee roasted by Caffè Cataldi of Brittany, Sugar Blue offers two single-origin espressos and a third single-origin as a filter. Equally as impressive is the food offering (its slogan is “All you need is good coffee and fresh food”). Everything is homemade and there are good breakfast and lunch menus, with a great selection of cake. To round things off, it’s a lovely spot, the perfect place for a quick (or leisurely) coffee and some food.

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Coutume Update

Posted on August 30, 2014 by Brian Williams

The last time I visited Coutume, the (relatively) old, established player in Paris’ third-wave coffee scene, I arrived just before closing on a day when the espresso machine had just been repaired, having been broken all day. It was also my last stop before heading back home on the Eurostar.

This time, in a nice piece of symmetry, I decided to make it the first stop of my visit. So, having arrived from Nantes, I turned up just before closing on a day when the espresso machine had just been repaired, having been broken all day … Some things never change!

I was there at the invitation of Connor, one of Coutume’s baristas, who had been following my progress around France. He made me a lovely cup of an Ethiopian Nekisse through the V60, a rich, complex brew which matured as it cooled. While I drank it, I sat (out of the way) at the bar at the front and chatted with Connor about all the things that had changed since my last visit.

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Artisan Roast, Glasgow

Posted on August 28, 2014 by Brian Williams

Artisan Roast is a chain of three coffee shops, two in its home town of Edinburgh (Broughton Street and Bruntsfield Place) and this one, on Gibson Street in Glasgow’s West End. Compared to the other branches, it’s massive, although that’s not too much of an achievement, since both of Edinburgh’s Artisan Roasts are fairly compact. Nevertheless, the sense of space afforded by Gibson Street was refreshing.

Despite its size, it manages to have the same sense of intimacy, largely due to a clever partitioning of the store into multiple, smaller spaces, which includes a mezzanine. Generous windows, running from almost the floor to the (very high) ceiling, make the front of the store a very bright space, helped by a large mirror over the bench opposite the counter. This is in stark contrast to the back, where the lighting is (deliberately) subdued, adding to its sense of intimacy.

Until April 2013, Gibson Street roasted all its own coffee in a Toper called Fatima which sat at the far end of the counter. Then Artisan Roast centralised its roasting in Edinburgh, freeing up space for Gibson Street to do more food. It now has the best food offering of the three.

November 2015: Artisan Roast is now a chain of four, with a third Edinburgh shop opening in Stockbridge in March.

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Brian's Coffee Spot

Devoted to Coffee

Category Archives: Breakfast

Caffe Reggio

Hot Numbers, Gwydir Street

The Java Room

The Fleet Street Press

Spring Espresso

Dinner at Caravan King’s Cross

Loustic

Sugar BLUE Café

Coutume Update

Artisan Roast, Glasgow