Welcome to the next Coffee Spot Awards Shortlist for 2021, the “Most Passionate About Coffee” Award, which was won in 2020 by Whaletown Coffee Co.. For me, this is one of the most important awards, and also one of the hardest to judge, which is why I’ve left it to the last day.

It’s not just about the coffee, it’s also about people who love and care about coffee. Everyone who I’ve covered in the Coffee Spot is passionate about coffee and one of the great things is how much love there is out there, both for the coffee and for those who make it.

This year, more than most, I could have filled up the shortlist many times over. Indeed, anyone who opened their first coffee shop during the pandemic must be really passionate about coffee.However, those shortlisted for this award stand out even from that crowded field.

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We enter the final day of the 2021 Coffee Spot Awards shortlists with the “Best Breakfast” Award, which in 2020 went to Catalyst. Along with cake, breakfast has a special place in my heart. It used to be that I rarely got up and out of the house early enough to get to places before they stop serving breakfast.

However, I’ve been doing a lot better recently, so I’m now able to generate a healthy shortlist this year, helped by those wonderful places that serve all-day breakfasts! In fact, given how often I have things from the breakfast menu for lunch, I wonder if I should rename this award “Best Brunch”…

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The final shortlist of the day is for another of my favourite Coffee Spot Awards, that of “Coffee Spot with the Happiest Staff”, won last year by Party on Pavilion. In my opinion, staff are probably the most over-looked part of any Coffee Spot. Good staff can make a place and bad staff, no matter how great the coffee and wonderful the location, can kill a place.

Everywhere that features in the Coffee Spot has great staff, but these were exceptional, with some infectiously happy staff. However, this award isn’t just for happy staff; it’s for any staff who go that extra mile to make their coffee shop a special place.

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Next up today, the 2021 Coffee Spot Award shortlist for “Best Physical Space”, which was won last year by Obscure Coffee. One of the most important things for me is how a Coffee Spot looks and feels. This, to me, is just as important as the coffee.

This award celebrates those Coffee Spots in which there’s a pure joy in just sitting there, soaking it all in. It’s not just about physical beauty and elegance. Instead, it’s as much about atmosphere, layout and overall feel.

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The second of today’s 2021 Coffee Spot Awards shortlists is for the “Best Flat White” Award, which was won last year by The Flower Cup.

Although I love black coffee, espresso with milk is very much its own thing. This award recognises those who have produced the perfect blend of coffee and milk with the smoothest, silkiest flat white (although awesome cortados, cappuccinos, etc, also qualify). This year there’s been a particularly strong showing by various decaf flat whites, while an oat milk flat white has made the shortlist as well.

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First up today, the 2021 Coffee Spot Award shortlist for “Best Roaster/Retailer”, which was won last year by Quarter Horse Coffee Roasters. Initially, this award was only open to retailers, but in 2014, I expanded it to include roasters, who now dominate the award. Contenders have either appeared in the Meet the Roaster series or are cafe/roasters which I’ve visited during the year.

Although the Coffee Spot is mostly about places to have coffee, I still drink the majority of my coffee at home (actually, with the amount of travelling I now do, I’m not so sure this is true…), so those wonderful people who provide me with my coffee beans need a mention. The problem, as with all these awards, is knowing where to draw the line for the shortlist. I’ve visited lots of coffee shops/roasters this year, but I’ve made a decision, by-and-large, to stick to either roasters I’ve written about as roasters or coffee shops where the beans are roasted on site.

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Welcome to the final 2021 Coffee Spot Awards shortlist of the day, the “Best Cake” Award, won in 2020 by Bean & Cole. Despite what it says on the tag line, the Coffee Spot’s not all about the coffee. After all, what would a cup of coffee be without a decent slice of cake to go with it? So, cake plays a major part in the Coffee Spot and this Award celebrates the Coffee Spots which excel in the cake department.

This is another of my favourite Awards and I was treated to some absolutely fantastic cake this year, with a strong showing from various bakery/cafés this year alongside some excellent coffee shop cakes.

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Coffee Spots come in all shapes and sizes, but for some reason I have a real soft spot for small Coffee Spots. Last year the “Smallest Coffee Spot” Award was won by Over Under Coffee, West Brompton.

This year I have once again been blessed by some very small Coffee Spots, serving some very fine coffee. As in previous years, this Award is entirely subjective: no Coffee Spots were measured during the judging process! This is one of the few Awards where I could have filled the shortlist over again: the world seems full of lots of really lovely, small, Coffee Spots. Note that I have excluded places where there’s no physical coffee shop to go inside.

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We’re halfway through the 2021 Coffee Spot Awards, so it must be time for the shortlist for the “Best Espresso” Award, which was won in 2020 by Quarter Horse Coffee. When it comes down to it, I still tend to judge a Coffee Spot by the quality of its espresso. Of course, this is entirely subjective and down to taste. I would never knock a place that made a good espresso just because it wasn’t to my taste.

This award is for those Coffee Spots which served me the best and most memorable espressos of the year. I started the Coffee Spot as a confirmed Italian espresso drinker with my palette evolving and expanding over time. This year I had some very different espressos, leading to this being one of the most hotly contested of this year’s Awards.

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We kick off the third day of the 2021 Coffee Spot Awards with the shortlist for the “Coffee Spot with the Best Outdoor Seating” Award, celebrating all those wonderful Coffee Spots with excellent outdoor seating. This was won last year by Carbon Kopi.

To qualify for this award, it’s not just a case of sticking a couple of tables or chairs on the pavement outside your coffee shop. Too often, what could be a lovely spot is marred by traffic noise, or cramped conditions, or just being in the wrong place. The best outside seating is often away from the road and passing pedestrians and offers shelter from the wind, rain and/or sun (although rarely all three at once!).

Fortunately, there are plenty of Coffee Spots which do exactly that and this is another award that I could have filled many times over, particularly since the COVID-19 pandemic has led to many coffee shops improving their outdoor seating.

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