Category Archives: USA & Canada

Coffee Spots in the United States of America and Canada

Sweetleaf Williamsburg

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A mug of black filter coffee in a classic black American diner mug, adorned with Sweatleaf's logo.I’m off to America again next month, so I thought it was about time I finished publishing all the places from my trip this time last year! I therefore present Sweetleaf in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, which I popped into in March, so at least the snow in the pictures is still topical!

The second of Sweetleaf’s three locations (the other two being in Long Island City, Queens, with the original on Jackson Avenue), the Williamsburg branch opened in 2012, sharing the building with the Modern Spaces estate agents (realtors for American readers). It’s a long, thin space, decked out in reclaimed wood and exposed brick, with a gorgeous, partly-tiled floor, quite a contrast to the modern, open office at the other end of the building. In look and feel, it has more in common with a British pub than with a coffee shop, right down to the table football! It is, by the way, amazing.

Like many American coffee shops, Sweetleaf roasts its own coffee, the Williamsburg branch offering the house-blend, decaf and a single-origin on espresso, plus three more, one on the obligatory bulk-brew filter, the second as an iced filter, with the third on pour-over (V60). There’s also a small range of cakes and pastries.

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Slipstream

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The A-board outside Slipstream in Washington DC, which poses the question: "How do we take our Coffee?". The answer, of course: "seriously, very seriously".I went to Washington DC with no great coffee expectations, but then found the amazing Peregrine Espresso, a lovely little coffee shop that would grace any city. That, honestly, would have sent me home happy, but just six blocks further along 14th Street is the amazing Slipstream.

It’s not just that the coffee here, from Michigan’s Madcap, is excellent (which it is). Slipstream is also, by speciality coffee shop standards, huge. With a good range of loose-leaf tea. And with decent breakfast, lunch and dinner menus, all the food being prepared on-site in the kitchen behind the counter. And, as befits a place that’s open well into the night, there are cocktails from a fully-stocked bar.

However, I’d been drawn by the coffee, which Slipstream amusingly (and accurately) splits into “Quick Coffee” (espresso and bulk brew) and “Worth the Wait”, hand-filtered single-origins using the Modbar. There’s a choice of four of these, plus decaf, and they change on a weekly basis. They’re also all available as espresso, where they’re joined by the house-blend, Madcap’s Third Coast. If that wasn’t enough, there’s another blend, Six-One-Six, on bulk-brew filter, plus a rotating seasonal coffee.

And the service was exceptional: coffee-heaven in an amazing setting.

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Peregrine Espresso, 14th Street

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A large, mirror-image, lower-case e in green over the word "(perergrine)", with the brackets and middle 'e' (which is also a mirror-image) in blue. Finally, the word "espresso" is in blue in the bottom-right corner.I visited Washington DC in March this year with no great expectations about the coffee. I’d heard of some good places, but I really wasn’t expecting them to be THIS good! Peregrine Espresso, on 14th Street in the northwest quarter, was my second stop of a day which started at Filter Coffeehouse & Espresso Bar and was to end at Slipstream. A tiny place from the outside, like any good TARDIS, Peregrine’s bigger on the inside, but still pretty small, with seating limited to a window bench and some small tables and bar stools along the left-hand wall.

The coffee, however, is awesome, Peregrine serving me perhaps the best espresso and filter I’d had on my entire trip. Since this had included New York and Philadelphia, as well as DC, there was some pretty serious competition! I also had a cinnamon bun with a hat on, which pretty much made my day. Does it get any better than this?

The coffee, by the way, is from Counter Culture, with Peregrine offering a number of single-origins on pour-over, one of which is also available as batch brew from 8 to 11 each morning. Another, along with the decaf, is also available as espresso.

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Blue Bottle Coffee, Chelsea

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The Blue Bottle Coffee logo from the A-board outside the Chelsea coffee shop: the outline of a bottle painted in solid blue above the words "Blue Bottle Coffee".Near the southern end of New York City’s wonderful High Line and opposite Chelsea Market, this was famed Californian roasters, Blue Bottle Coffee’s first Manhattan coffee shop. However, despite its proximity to the High Line, this shouldn’t be confused with Blue Bottle’s High Line Café, which is just a block away on the High Line itself (it also has seasonal opening hours; being a partly outdoor location, it’s currently closed, reopening in April 2016).

Back to the Chelsea branch, which isn’t far from fellow-roasters Intelligentsia and its coffee shop in the High Line Hotel. However, while that’s a very upmarket setting, Blue Bottle, situated in what was the loading dock of the Milk Building, is much more down-to-earth. Split over two levels with minimal seating, it still manages an impressive range of filter coffee to go with the usual espresso-based menu.

You can sit downstairs at one of two window bars, or outside on the pavement on one of two matching benches. You can also sit upstairs, where there’s a second counter, unless it’s being used for training courses (usually Saturday afternoons). This also used to host the famous Blue Bottle syphon bar from 11 until 2 on the weekends, but sadly this is no more.

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Intelligentsia, High Line Hotel

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The word "Intelligentsia" written over a pair of wings, bracketing the words "Fresh Roasted Coffee", all in white.Intelligentsia, the Chicago-based coffee roaster, with cafés in Chicago (5), Los Angeles (4), Boston (2), Austin (1) and New York (1), has a place close to my heart. I visited the downtown branch in the Monadnock building on my first trip to Chicago in 2003, long before the Coffee Spot came to be. I’ve been a regular visitor there ever since (if visiting each time I’ve been to Chicago counts as regular!) and I’ve enjoyed Intelligentsia’s coffee elsewhere (for example, Gasoline Alley). Naturally, I jumped at the chance to actual visit Intelligentsia proper in New York.

Located in the lobby of the High Line Hotel, just across 10th Avenue from the High Line itself (and across the road from Underline Coffee), it’s one of the most sumptuous coffee-shop locations I’ve seen, giving Stumptown on West 8th Street a run for its money. As well as the permanent zinc-topped coffee counter in the lobby, a refurbished 1963 Citroën coffee truck sits out front in the hotel grounds for those who don’t want to wander inside.

The Citroën serves a limited range of espresso and pour-over coffee. Inside, there’s a choice of the famous Black Cat seasonal espresso blend, plus a single-origin espresso, another single origin on pour-over (Chemex or V60) and decaf.

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Anthony’s Italian Coffee House

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A classic, Italian espresso in a classic white cup at Anthony's Italian Coffee House, PhiladelphiaAnthony’s Italian Coffee House, on 9th Street, is a slice of culture/history in Philadelphia’s Italian Market district. Recommended (once again) by my friend and guide, Greg Cohen (of Coffee Guru App fame), Greg comes to the Italian Market to do his shopping. After taking me around several old-fashioned grocers and delicatessens, themselves a delight to visit, particularly if you like Italian food, he abandoned me at Anthony’s (“left” would be a more accurate statement, but abandoned has a more dramatic quality to it, don’t you think?).

Anthony’s is an old-fashioned (in style; Wifi being just one of the concessions to the modern age) Italian-American espresso bar/café of the type that I love. Less grand than say Boston’s Caffé Vittoria or New York’s Caffe Reggio, it has more in common with Soho’s Bar Italia. This, I feel, is much more in keeping with Philadelphia’s working class, blue collar roots.

Don’t come here looking for the latest third wave coffee experience though. The espresso is good, but you won’t find any single-origins or fancy hand-crafted pour-overs (although there is the obligatory bulk-brew filter). Instead, come for a slice of character and history, plus to put your feet up after all that shopping!

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Gasoline Alley, Grand Street

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A shot of Intelligentsia's Black Cat seasonal espresso blend served by Gasoline Alley in a white cup with oversized handle, the beautifully-mottled crema clearly visible.I first discovered New York City‘s Gasoline Alley in 2013, when I visited the original branch on Lafayette Street. This, the second branch, which opened in 2014, is just around the corner from one of my regular breakfast spots, the Landmark Coffee Shop (a very typical American diner). The original Gasoline Alley could actually be an alley and, while the same is true of this one with doors at either end, it’s more corridor than alley. Considerably smaller than the original, there’s space for two bar chairs at its solitary window-bar, with a pair of benches outside, one for each window.

I much prefer the atmosphere in this Gasoline Alley. However, where it wins hands down, just like the original, is that it serves Intelligentsia coffee and serves it extremely well. In fact, it might have served me the best shot of Intelligentsia’s seasonal Black Cat espresso blend that I’ve ever had!

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Meet the Roaster: Tandem Coffee Roasters

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A light bulb in the shape of a tandem bicycle from the wall of the Tandem Coffee Roasters RoasteryI first came across Tandem Coffee Roasters in Boston, where I enjoyed a cappuccino at Render Coffee, made using Tandem’s seasonal Time and Temperature espresso blend. I also met with Larry, owner of Boston’s Pavement Coffeehouse chain, who sang the praises of Tandem’s co-founder, Will (an ex-Pavement employee). That pretty much sealed it for me, and when, a few days later, I popped up the New England coast to Portland to start my coast-to-coast, Portland-to-Portland train trip, I naturally sought out Tandem’s roastery.

What I found wasn’t just a thriving roastery, but an excellent, friendly coffee bar too. The coffee bar aside, which features in its own Coffee Spot, this Meet the Roaster post focuses on the roastery side of the business. When I first visited in 2015, the roastery was in one half of a single-storey, L-shaped building, also home to the coffee bar. These days, it’s become so busy, it’s had to relocate to a separate building just behind the first, where a 35 kg Loring roaster takes pride of place, roasting all of Tandem’s coffee, for use in-house in the coffee bar and Tandem’s bakery/coffee shop on Congress Street as well as for Tandem’s growing wholesale business.

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Brooklyn Roasting Company

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The Brooklyn Roasting Company's 25kg Loring coffee roaster in its current home on Brooklyn's Jay Street.The subject of today’s Meet the Roaster is the Brooklyn Roasting Company. Tucked away on Jay Street, under the Manhattan Bridge, it was a highlight of my visit to Brooklyn back in March. Occupying the ground floor of a sprawling five-storey building, it’s an amazing place, which, as well as being a wonderful coffee shop, is also the Brooklyn Roasting Company’s headquarters, with all the roasting taking place on-site.

So, as well as popping in for a great cup of coffee, you can also sit in the far corner watching the green beans being hoovered into the 35kg Loring roaster and enjoying the spectacle of freshly-roasted beans pouring out some 12 minutes later. Don’t worry about when to come if you want to catch the roaster in action; it’s pretty much a nonstop, all-day operation!

Although the Brooklyn Roasting Company is a very modern affair, the building on Jay Street is steeped in coffee history. It used to be the stables of the famous Arbuckles’ coffee roastery, which was situated across Jay Street, the horses being used in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to haul the sacks of green beans from the ships docked at the nearby waterfront.

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Street Bean Coffee

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The A-board outside Street Bean Coffee on Seattle's 3rd Avenue, pointing the way inside.Coffee with a conscience, community coffee, social coffee; the list goes on. The idea that a coffee shop can do more than just serve good coffee seems to be taking off, with several social enterprise coffee shops springing up, with some London’s leading society enterprises being featured in Issue 15 of Caffeine Magazine. However, while in Seattle, I was lucky enough to visit Street Bean Coffee, a pioneer in this area which first opened its doors in 2009.

Sitting in the shadow of Seattle’s futuristic Space Needle on 3rd Avenue, Street Bean doesn’t wear its heart on its sleeve. Rather than relying on pricking your conscience, Street Bean is happy to stand up on its own two feet as a coffee shop, something it does very well. Street Bean is a multi-roaster shop, quite a rare thing in the US, offering single-origins and blends on espresso, a wide range of single-origin pour-overs and the obligatory bulk-brew (yet another single-origin option).

By the time you read this, Street Bean will also have starting roasting in the space next door, with initially a 1.5 kg roaster, which will be used for training. Check its website for more on what Street Bean does.

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