Category Archives: Saturday Supplement

A Saturday Supplement is any post that’s not a Coffee Spot

The Coffee Spot is Ten!

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The Coffee Spot cup, a classic white espresso cup, with a shot of espresso, pulled on my Rancilio Silvia espresso machime.It’s quite an auspicious day for the Coffee Spot: exactly 10 years ago, on Friday, 28th September 2012 (at 14.15 to be precise), I posted my first ever Coffee Spot. To mark the occasion, I’ve come to one of my favourite coffee cities, New York, although it’s also possible that I just happen to have a work-realted meeting here this week (I’ll leave it to you to decide which is true).

Ten years ago, I had no idea what I was unleashing on myself, hoping that the Coffee Spot might become a useful resource for coffee (shop) lovers and an entertaining way for me to spend (some of) my spare time. Instead, it has become an all-consuming passion which has spawned, amongst other things, a book (The Philosophy of Coffee) and gained me coffee friends all around the world.

This last two years have been very testing times for the hospitality industry and, consequently, very strange times for the Coffee Spot, although 2022 has seen things moving back to how they were, despite the on-going COVID-19 pandemic. In particular travel, and, for me, work-related travel, have opened up again, so I’m back to writing about Coffee Spots from around the world.

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Il Grifone at Prufrock

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Two espressos side-by-side at Prufrock Coffee, one made with the Red Brick blend and pulled on a modern Black Eagle espresso machine and the other made using the limited edition Il Grifone blend and pulled on a vintage Faema President lever espresso machine.Today’s Coffee Spot is part Saturday Supplement and part Coffee Spot Update. Earlier this year, James Hoffmann went to Milan where he met Enrico Maltoni, who restores vintage espresso machines. One thing led to another, with James buying a 1958 Faema President lever espresso machine, which Enrico restored. Fast forward a few months and the Faema was delivered, in full working order, to London, where James had decided to install it, on a temporary basis, in the legendary Prufrock Coffee, Square Mile’s coffee shop on Leather Lane in Shoreditch.

However, James being James, there was more to it than that. Rather than use a modern blend, like Square Mile’s ubiquitous Red Brick, James and the team at Square Mile developed a limited-edition blend, Il Grifone, specifically designed for the lever espresso machine, with the option of trying it side-by-side with a shot of Red Brick, pulled on the modern Black Eagle espresso machine. All of this was explained in a video that James posted on his YouTube channel two weeks ago. As luck would have it, I was passing through London the following week, so naturally I made my way to Prufrock, my first visit there in many a year.

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English Bridge Coffee (Nomad Coffee Co.)

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The distinctive HuskeeCup with its ribbed sides, but only 3oz in capacity, holding my espresso at Nomad Coffee Co.For many, the COVID-19 pandemic has been a time of retrenchment or consolidation. Not so in Shrewsbury, where its small but vibrant speciality coffee scene has flourished with the opening of both The Colonel’s Son Coffee Roasters and today’s Coffee Spot, Nomad Coffee Co. Both were on my list before I made my daytrip a week ago today, but in fairness to Nomad, everyone I asked said that I must pay Raúl (the co-owner and head barista) a visit.

Located at the start of Wyle Cop on the western end of the English Bridge, Nomad is small, but around twice the size of The Colonel’s Son (which isn’t saying much!). The counter is at the back, leaving space for a bench/table down the right-hand wall and a five-person window-bar along the front. Nomad is a multi-roaster, serving single-origins on espresso, with two different roasters featuring each fortnight. Although the coffee’s the star turn, I was also entertained by conversations between Raúl and a succession of regulars who’d come as much for a chat as coffee.

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The Colonel’s Son Coffee Roasters

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Details from the wooden A-board outside The Colonel’s Son Coffee Roasters in Shrewsbury, showing stylised line drawings of a rank of soldiers on parade.The Colonel’s Son Coffee Roasters opened just after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, temporarily closed in September last year, then re-opened following a makeover in May 2022, since when it’s been going from strength to strength. On Meadow Place, a very short walk from Shrewsbury Station, there’s not a lot to The Colonel’s Son, just a small shop with a window-bar at the front, the counter in the middle and the roaster at the back. Oh, and a bench outside, in case the four seats inside are taken.

The Colonel’s Son is run by Patch, who is indeed the son of a Colonel, his father having served with the Queen’s Royal Irish Hussars. It’s very much a what-you-see-is-what-you-get sort of place, with a standard espresso-based menu (served in proper cups, I’m pleased to say) and a choice of a medium or dark roast blend. There’s a wider selection of coffee for sale in retail bags, including some lighter roasted single-origins, roasted fresh each Monday, along with a small range of cakes.

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The Philosophy of Coffee Goes Green!

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The new cover of my book, "The Philosophy of Coffee", published by the British Library, showing the familiar line drawing of a moka pot, but now with a dark green background, while the writing and line drawing are in gold.Breaking news: my book, The Philosophy of Coffee, has gone green! No, it’s not some environmental  improvement (although if you are worried about the carbon footprint of printing and shipping physical books, it is available as a handy e-book). Rather, The Philosophy of Coffee has had a makeover. Rather than the original pale blue cover, the folks at the British Library (who publish The Philosophy of Coffee) have gone with a deeper green, which you can see in the thumbnail and in the gallery below.

I must confess that I was rather fond of the old blue cover. However, with all the new additions to the Philosophies series (which now runs to 10 titles), I was told that it wasn’t standing out on the bookshelves and I’m not going to argue with the experts. Of course, you know what that means, don’t you? Anyone who bought a copy with the blue cover is out of date and has to immediately buy a new one with the green cover. I mean, that’s how it works, doesn’t it?

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Spro – Mission Bay/SOMA

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Detail from the A-board outside the Spro Coffee Lab trailer in Spark Social SFI was tipped off about Spro Coffee Lab by the baristas at Devout Coffee, visiting Spro’s Mission Dolores/Castro coffee shop the following day. In typical Coffee Spot fashion, this was Spro’s second location, its first being a trailer in San Francisco’s Mission Bay/SOMA neighbourhood. Fortunately, this is close to Caltrain’s San Francisco terminus on 4th and King Street, my gateway for my various day trips to the city, so the very next day, I headed for the original Spro.

Spro is part of Spark Social SF, a large outdoor food truck park, beer & sangria garden and event space. Impressively, given that it’s literally a trailer, serving from a window at one end, the menu is identical to Spro’s Mission Dolores/Castro coffee shop. The coffee’s from Black & White Coffee Roasters, its Classic espresso and decaf on espresso, joined by a blend and two single-origins on pour-over through the V60, along with mocktails and other drinks. There’s also the full range of salads, open-face toasts, soup and sandwiches, plus the dedicated pastries and desserts menu.

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Canopy Coffee Update

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The Canopy logo (the word CANOPY with five leaf outlines above the C & A) in white chalk from the top of the menu board inside Canopy Coffee.It’s been just over five years since I first visited Canopy Coffee, at the time, Guildford’s newest speciality coffee shop. Very much the creation of its owner, Jonathon, Canopy was a wonderful multi-roaster coffee shop, one of Guildford’s coffee pioneers, as well as offering some fantastic food. Jonathon also did an amazing job of turning an awkward corner spot opposite Waitrose into a cosy coffee shop.

When the COVID-19 pandemic struck, Jonathon reinvented the space, turning Canopy into a take-away coffee shop, the first of Guildford’s speciality coffee shops to re-open. Although Canopy reopened some limited indoor seating, it retained the takeaway window, effectively becoming a sit-in/take-away hybrid.

Jonathon always said that he wouldn’t be at Canopy forever and, true to his word, this time last year, he sold Canopy to its current owner, Jackie, an Australian who has been running cafés in the UK for over 15 years. I’ve visited Canopy a few times since the change of ownership, so I thought it was high time I did an actual Coffee Shop update.

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Brian’s Travel Spot: San Jose in Club World

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A nose-on view of my British Airways Boeing 787-9 on the stand, Gate 15, at San Jose, having flown me in style from London Heathrow.After two years with no face-to-face meetings for work, things have suddenly taken off. Following my trip to Berlin at the start of May, I was off again in July, this time to the Bay Area, where I had a week-long meeting, followed by a week of exploring. I then flew to Atlanta to spend a couple of weeks with Amanda, before flying home exactly a month after I left.

Flying into the Bay Area presents a range of options, with San Francisco and San Jose being the most convenient. I did a similar trip in January 2020, and, just as I did then, I decided to fly to San Jose with British Airways. Although San Francisco is slightly more convenient, with several flights a day, on both occasions it was considerably more expensive. This made San Jose, with its one flight a day, the logical choice and, just as I did in 2020, I decided to fly in World Traveller Plus (premium economy to you and me).

Although I’ve just returned from that trip, it’s only now that I’ve had the time to start writing up the Travel Spots, starting with this one about my flight to San Jose.

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Meet the Roaster: Neighbourhood Coffee Update

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Detail from the label to Neighbourhood Coffee's Brazil Sitio Jacutinga: "(You Gotta) Fight For Your Right (To Latte)", witth tasting notes of black cherry, milk chocolate and praline. The coffee is naturally-processed (patio-dried) and consists of red and yellow catuai varietals grown at 1,200m altitude.I first met  Liverpool’s Neighbourhood Coffee at Cup North in 2015, not long after Ed and Chris had set up the business, roasting on a 15 kg Giesen in a railway arch just north of the city centre. Although new to roasting at that point, they already had plenty of coffee experience, having previously worked for green-bean importers and African coffee specialists, Schluter (now part of Olam).

Since then, I’ve enjoyed Neighbourhood’s coffee, with its striking pop-song themed names (Grind Control to Major Tom and It’s a Grind of Magic spring to mind), both in coffee shops around the UK and at home. Over the years, the business has expanded, resulting in a move in early 2020 to a new location a little further north along the Mersey shoreline. Clearly, when I made a long-overdue return to Liverpool in June, a visit to Neighbourhood’s “new” home was top of my list!

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Scullery

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A classic espresso, made with Saint Frank Coffee's Little Brother blend and served at Scullery in San Francisco in a classic, bright yelllow cup.No trip to the Bay Area would be complete without a visit to San Francisco, so, with a day to spare before my meeting started on Tuesday, I hopped on the Caltrain, heading north to the city, where my first stop was Scullery, recommended by my friend Karen. In British English, a scullery is a small kitchen, a fitting name given Scullery’s size, although the actual kitchen area, behind the counter, is probably twice as big as the space allowed for customers.

Lack of size is no limit to Scullery’s ambition though. A multi-roaster, drawing from a range of local roasteries (“friends of ours” according to the manager), the concise espresso-based menu is joined by batch brew filter, several signature drinks, tea (including PG Tips) and a selection of toast-based items. These include plain toast, classic avocado toast and, in a nod to the country of my birth, Welsh Rarebit.

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