Category Archives: Boston

Coffee Spots in the city of Boston, Massachusetts

Pavement Coffeehouse, Boylston

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The Pavement Coffeehouse logoPavement Coffeehouse is a chain of four shops (six as of May 2015), all in the Back Bay area of Boston. I was fortunate enough to visit the original, which is at the western end of Boylston Street, just beyond the junction with Massachusetts Avenue. I really liked it, finding it a curious mix of American coffee shop (front) and European coffee house (back). The coffee, from Counter Culture, is excellent, the food is good and the staff friendly. I was there twice, once for morning coffee and once for lunch; both times it was packed!

You can tell that Pavement is serious about its coffee: there are two espressos on offer, a single-origin (Buziraguhindwa from Burundi), served straight, and a blend (Rustico; a mix of 70% Guatemala and 30% Ethiopia) to be served with milk. There is also the choice of two more single-origins (a Rwandan and a Bolivian) on filter (generally called “hand-poured” in the US) in this case made using the Clever dripper, something I don’t see very often (the last time was at Bath’s Colonna & Small’s). The coffee options were rounded off with the obligatory drip-filter (bulk brew), another single-origin (Baroida from Papua New Guinea).

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South End Buttery

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My cup of coffee surveys the bar at the back of the South End ButteryBoston’s South End Buttery is an excellent bakery/café that, until this visit, I had tabbed exclusively as a breakfast spot. Its breakfast offerings aren’t as extensive as some other establishments; mostly egg sandwiches on biscuit (American, not British) or bagel, with hot oatmeal as an alternative. I usually opt for the egg sandwich on a biscuit which never fails to satisfy while leaving space for lunch and dinner later in the day!

If you come for lunch there’s the usual range of sandwiches prepared while you wait and some tasty pastries to tempt you throughout the day. The South End Buttery changes a little in the evenings and at the weekends. Brunch is served on Saturdays and Sundays from 10:00 to 15:00, while the bar (see below) turns into restaurant from 17:30 onwards, staying open until 22:00 (23:00 Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays).

Since I’ve only ever been there on weekday mornings I can’t really comment on the merits or otherwise of it as a dinner/brunch spot. One day I’ll visit on the weekend and let you know!

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Charlie’s Sandwich Shoppe

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Charlie's Sandwich Shoppe sign hangs proudly over the sidewalk on Columbus AvenueCharlie’s Sandwich Shoppe is my go-to breakfast place in Boston. Although my first visit was in 2003, I’ve only been a regular since 2011 (if visiting at least once during my annual trip to Boston makes me a regular that is!), which is when I started staying in Boston’s South End. Charlie’s is the quintessential family-run American diner, although it’s now in the hands of local chef, Evan Deluty. It’s so much a fixture of the neighbourhood that it’s even got its own Wikipedia page!

To the detriment of my waist-line, I’ve always been a fan of American breakfasts: fluffy, buttermilk griddle cakes, smothered in maple syrup; a plate full of eggs, fried potatoes with a couple of slices of toast; there are reasons why I put on half a stone whenever I go to America.

Charlie’s supplies these in abundance, along with bags of friendly atmosphere. It’s best experienced sitting on a bar-stool at the counter with a mug of coffee and enough food to last you for the day. There you can watch the regulars come and go, read the Boston Globe, or, increasingly these days, browse your smartphone or tablet. Not that Charlie’s has succumbed to the lure of wifi just yet…

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Berkeley Perk Café

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The Berkeley Perk Cafe logo on a flag hanging outside the shopThe Berkley Perk Café is a well-established and well-loved coffee shop in Boston’s South End, having been around for 15 years. It offers a typical American-style coffee shop menu, with the usual espresso-based drinks, the obligatory flasks of filter coffee and a sideline in iced coffee. It has a small but tasty range of cakes and cookies, a decent breakfast menu of omelettes, bagels and egg sandwiches and an extensive range of reasonably-priced sandwiches for lunch.

In conversation with the owner I learned that the inspiration had been a trip to London 15 years ago, which led to a desire to create something with a different look-and-feel than the run-of-the-mill American coffee shop. Whatever the inspiration, the end result is a wonderful place, the lovely atmosphere making it close to the perfect place to drink coffee. Quiet but busy, with friendly but not intrusive staff and a bright and warm interior to draw you in, the Perk is the sort of place you could spend an entire afternoon and leave wandering where the time had gone.

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True Grounds

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One of the many fine tables in True Grounds, with some of Maria Marx's paintings hanging on the wall above it.Some places I’m sold on when I walk in the door. Others take a little while to grow on me. Some never do and so don’t make it into the Coffee Spot. It’s fair to say that I was sold on True Grounds from the moment I saw it from across the street. I’m not sure why, but I’ve learnt over the years to trust my Coffee Spot radar: it rarely lets me down. So it was with True Grounds.

True Grounds is a neighbourhood coffee shop par excellence. It’s the sort of neighbourhood coffee shop that makes you want to move into the neighbourhood. It might be off the beaten track up in Somerville, north of Boston, but I’m glad that I went out of my way to pay it a visit. What makes it for me is the space, a bright, sunny, warm and welcoming place to drink my coffee, which was, by the way, excellent.

I might have been swayed by the bright, sunny day, but whatever it was, True Grounds made a lasting impression on me!

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Flour Bakery + Café, South End & Back Bay

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The Flour Bakery + Cafe at 1595 Washington Avenue on a sunny morning in late February 2013Normally I write about a single place, but this post is about two branches of the Flour Bakery + Café chain. In all, Flour has four outlets, all in Boston and, on recommendation, I visited the Back Bay branch on Clarendon Street and the South End branch on Washington Street.

If ever there was a lesson that the physical space plays as big a role as any in whether I like a Coffee Spot, Flour is it. In terms of what’s on offer, both are very similar, the main difference being the space. There’s nothing wrong with the Back Bay branch: it just didn’t do it for me. On the other hand, the South End branch is exactly what I’m looking for in a café. It’s a smaller, more intimate space and, on the sunny day I was there, filled with warmth and light from the windows that go almost the whole way around the place.

What you’ll get from both branches is good coffee, breakfast, soup, made-to-order sandwiches and an outstanding selection of cakes. I only had time to try the coffee and cake, but if everything else is up to the same standard, then you’re in for a treat…

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Wired Puppy, Boston

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Wired Puppy: Speciality Coffee and TeaWired Puppy managed to become my favourite Boston Coffee Spot in a matter of days when I visited in 2013. Even though I haven’t exhaustively tried the other options available in the city (I didn’t even manage to try all the options on Newbury Street, where Wired Puppy is located!) any challenger will have to go a long way to beat Wired Puppy.

The space might not be to everyone’s tastes (I loved it, by the way), but the real killer is the coffee, which is awesome. I had three espressos in Wired Puppy (out of four visits) and each one was perfect. They were easily the best espressos on the New England leg of my trip. However, if espresso’s not to your taste, Wired Puppy has about 10 different beans/blends on offer, with a variety of brewing methods available. And if coffee’s not your thing, there are plenty of other drinks to tempt you.

Finally, the staff are really lovely too. Passionate, engaging and knowledgeable about their coffee, they go a long way to making Wired Puppy what it is.

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Caffé Vittoria

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One of many such pieces in Caffe Vittoria on Hanover StreetCaffé Vittoria is something of Boston institution, or certainly a North End institution (the North End being the Italian part of town). It’s an old-fashioned Italian Café, with heritage dating back to 1929. Spread over three floors, with four seating areas, I’ve only ever visited during the day, when just the ground floor café is open. At night it becomes more of a bar than a café, although the menus stay the same throughout the day, serving coffee, drinks, pastries and ice-cream.

As a day-time café, it trades on my sense of nostalgia as much as anything else; waitress service, a menu that is delightfully concise and to the point, and all with certain air of opulence. A real touch of old Italian class. It helps that the coffee is reliably good and, being an old-fashioned Italian espresso man myself, it very much hits the spot. The pastries, by the way, are divine.

If you want something a little different from the typical American coffee shop, then Caffé Vittoria is the place to go. For me, no trip to Boston would be complete without popping in for an espresso.

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