Riverhill Coffee Bar

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The writing in the window of the Riverhill Coffee Bar (reversed)For those of you whose appetites have been whetted by my feature on Glasgow in Issue 9 of Caffeine Magazine, I present the first of two Coffee Spots from that fair city which, for space reasons, didn’t make it into the article. Today we’re at the Riverhill Coffee Bar in the city centre, while on Thursday, we’ll be out on the Great Western Road, the other hub of Glasgow’s coffee scene, at the Veldt Deli.

Located just a stone’s throw from Glasgow’s Central Station, the terminus of the West Coast Mainline, Riverhill’s the perfect stopping off point for new arrivals. It also makes a great alternative if you’re killing time while waiting for a train. Despite occupying a tiny spot on Gordon Street, Riverhill nevertheless manages to pack a huge amount in. There’s breakfast and lunch, espresso and filter coffee from nearby Dear Green Coffee (literally a ten minute walk away), hot chocolate from Kokoa Collection and a selection of tea and a wide range of cake.

All of this is packed into an incredibly handsome space with bare-brick walls and just enough room for the counter, a six-seat bar on the opposite wall and a three-seat window bar.

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Beany Green, Paddington

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One of Beany Green's A-boards, promising Aussie Coffee, Home-made Banana Bread and FREE hugs!If you’ve talked to me at any length about being the writer of the Coffee Spot, you’ll know that the only downside is that I don’t really have a regular coffee shop I can call my own. The problem is, while I’m out and about, the desire to visit new places for the Coffee Spot trumps visiting old favourites. The closest I had to a regular was Bar des Arts in my home town of Guildford, until, that is, Beany Green turned up in Paddington.

Those who follow me on social media will probably be aware that I spend one day a week in Paddington doing my “proper” job. For a long time, this was a desert when it came to decent coffee. Then, in quick succession, Burito 8 started serving Climpson and Sons, the Can Do Coffee barge turned up and Beany Green opened.

Now, on my weekly visit to the office, I take KeepCup or JOCO Cup to visit Beany Green at least once a day (and usually two or three times). You would think, given the frequency of my visits, that I’d have sampled the entire coffee menu by now, but I usually have a flat white…

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Look Mum No Hands! South Bank Pop-up Update

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"Look mum no hands!", written on the side of the south-bank pop-up.You know it’s summer when the Look Mum No Hands! pop-up appears under Hungerford Bridge on London’s South Bank. So, on the second sunny Sunday in June, I took the train up to Waterloo, headed north to the river and then, eschewing my normal route, popped down under the bridge where Look Mum No Hands! is in its second year of operation.

Last year’s set-up was fairly impressive, but this year it’s been expanded, with a larger, more permanent seating area and a bigger caravan. This houses the espresso machine (which was in a separate trailer last time) and an array of craft beers, as well as soft drinks. There’s also cake, crisps, bananas and, new this year, the option of a ploughman’s platter.

Although I’ve termed Look Mum No Hands! a pop-up, that does it something of an injustice. With the expanded seating area and the fact it’s under the bridge, it has a pretty permanent feel to it. On all but the coldest days, treating it as a sit-down café is a viable (and, on a sunny day, a lovely) option. One downside is that the coffee is only served in takeaway cups, but you can’t have everything!

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Milk Bar

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Milk Bar, with the name written in Polish in the window. Naturally.It’s taken me ages to discover Milk Bar on Bateman Street, perched towards the northern edge of Soho. On the other hand, given that it’s recently come under new management (along with its older sister, Flat White), resulting in a bit of a shake-up, perhaps I timed it perfectly.

However, discover it I did, retreating there on an impossibly busy and bustling (ie perfectly normal) Friday night in London, where Milk Bar provided me with an oasis of calm. It’s not a huge place, just an L-shaped row of tables around a large counter, but it’s exactly what I was looking for.

The coffee’s all from Square Mile (currently espresso-only, but with plans for single-origin filter in the near future). Part of the shake-up has led to a re-vamped menu, featuring all-day brunch and a multitude of cakes, some made by the staff, as well as the introduction of decent, loose-leaf tea from Edinburgh’s Eteaket. You can also buy single-origin beans to take home.

The other thing that made me really warm to Milk Bar was the friendly welcome from assistant manager Kathryn and Liam, the barista, which seemed equally genuine for both regulars and first-time visitors such as myself.

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Caffé Roma: Update

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A St Joseph's Cake, from Caffé Roma in Little Italy, New York City.Last week, I promised you something different for this week’s Saturday Supplement. After weeks of reports from The London Coffee Festival, with the odd interlude for the Coffee Stops Awards and Caffé Culture Show, today’s Saturday Supplement is one for those of you with a sweet tooth. It’s also something of a new venture for the Coffee Spot, to go with recent posts on Tea Houses & Chocolate Shops.

Last year, I wrote about Caffé Roma, an old favourite of mine in the heart of New York City’s Little Italy. An old-fashioned Italian café, Caffé Roma is renowned for its excellent cakes, one of which is the St Joseph’s Cake. These are only made at weekends during February and March. Using a deep-fried dough, they can be had plain or filled with either cannoli or vanilla patisserie cream.

After publishing my original piece on Caffé Roma, I entered into e-mail correspondence with Vincent Jnr, whose father owns Caffé Roma. Knowing that I was back in New York, Vincent invited me over to say hello and, when I arrived, offered me the chance to have a tour of the bakery where the St Joseph’s Cakes are made. How could I refuse?

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Box Kite

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An espresso in a white cup from Box Kite CoffeeBox Kite is a relatively new player on the New York coffee scene, occupying a small, cosy spot on St Marks Place in the East Village, two blocks east from old favourite I Am Coffee and just across Tompkins Square from Ninth Street Espresso. Opening on January 1st this year, Box Kite is, dare I say it, more European-style coffee shop than American, offering coffee and wine in the day, with food in the evening. This is all served with a touch of elegance that reminded me of the likes of London’s Notes and Fernandez & Wells.

Seating is very limited, both in the number of seats and in what’s available. While you can come to Box Kite for a romantic, candle-lit dinner, don’t expect to find yourself sitting at a table, gazing across at your loved one. Seating at Box Kite is strictly at the counter or on stools at one of two very small bars. That said, it’s the ideal place to sit and drink coffee!

I’m indebted to Lee Gaze for recommending Box Kite, which he said was so good he walked two miles in a blizzard to get to it. You can’t get better than that!

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L.A. Burdick, New York City

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The store-front of L.A. Burdick on W20th Street, New York CityFor today’s Wednesday-Saturday Supplement, we’re staying in New York City with L.A. Burdick. Like Monday’s Coffee Spot, Stumptown on West 8th Street, L.A. Burdick is another out-of-town incomer, although this time it hasn’t had to come as far as the West Coast. Originally from Walpole, New Hampshire, I first came across L.A. Burdick in Cambridge, Massachusetts, when a friend tipped me off about it a couple of years ago.

For those not in the know, L.A. Burdick is a chocolate shop, but not any old chocolate shop. L.A. Burdick has made its name selling high quality chocolate and, through its four in-house cafes, equally high-quality drinking chocolate. Although it does fairly good coffee (and tea, which I’m not qualified to comment on), in my personal opinion, you’d be mad to come here and have anything other than the hot chocolate.

It also sells cakes and pastries, which, it seems to me, is complete overkill. As regular readers will know, I am rather partial to a slice of cake or three. However, having once described L.A. Burdick hot chocolate as a “heart attack in a cup”, the last thing I want to accompany one is more calories!

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Stumptown West 8th Street

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The writing on the window of the Brew Bar part of Stumptown, W 8th St,, New York City. "STUMPTOWN" over "COFFEE ROASTERS" in capitals, with "Brew Bar" in cursive script in between.Stumptown is, in US coffee circles (and beyond), something of a legend, both as a roaster and as the owner of some iconic coffee shops. On this year’s US trip, I thought it was high time I paid a visit. With branches in its home town of Portland (Oregon, not Maine), Seattle and Los Angeles on the West Coast, but just New York City on the east, the logical choice was NYC.

I made a beeline for Stumptown’s second NYC location on West 8th Street, just north of Washington Square in Greenwich Village. Open since May 2013, it possesses quite possibly the most handsome interior of any coffee shop I’ve ever seen (although Intelligentsia in the lobby of the High Line Hotel gives it a run for its money). It consists of two connected spaces: a lavishly fitted-out espresso bar on the corner of West 8th and MacDougal Streets and a smaller, more intimate brew bar, with its own door onto MacDougal Street.

The coffee, as one might expect, is all from Stumptown, with a quite bewildering array of eleven single-origin beans available, along with three blends and two decaf options (one blend and one single-origin). As far as I could tell, all can be had through any of six filter methods, as espresso or cold brew.

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Caffé Culture Show 2014

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Doctor Espresso's fully restored and working Gaggia lever espresso machine at Caffe Culture 2014.What with all the fuss about the London Coffee Festival, it’s all too easy to forget about the Caffé Culture Show, a trade-only show all about cafés. It’s held in May every year in the soaring halls of the Kensington Olympia Exhibition Centre. It features suppliers to the café trade, from coffee machine manufacturers and roasters through bakers all the way to furniture suppliers.

I attended for the first time last year and liked it sufficiently to go back this year. It has a much more relaxed pace and feel than the London Coffee Festival, although for various reasons, I didn’t have very long at Caffé Culture this year, so ended up doing a lot of rushing around. The biggest difference I noticed this year is that there seemed to be more a lot more coffee roasters than I remember from my previous visit.

Due to my lack of time I was quite focused in my approach this year, catching up with some old friends (Doctor Espresso, Aeropress, Matthew Algie, Terrone) and making some new ones (Sanremo, Black Sheep). I also took KeepCup #1 along to make some new friends.

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Torre Coffee

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Torre Coffee, from the sign hanging outside the shop: the words "torre coffee" written in a cursive script, cream on brown.I’m rather annoyed that I didn’t discover Torre Coffee on my previous visit to Cardiff almost exactly a year ago. However, back then Torre had only been open a few weeks, so I could perhaps be excused. I almost missed it on this trip too, but am indebted to a tip-off on twitter a few days before my visit, which reminded me to add it to my list.

To have missed Torre a second time would have been a terrible shame. An Italian-Romanian collaboration in the heart of the Welsh capital, serving James Gourmet Coffee from Ross-on-Wye on the English side of the Welsh border, Torre is a lovely place, which gives you a warm, friendly welcome. Torre’s owned by Silvia (Romania) and her husband, Ruggero (Italy), who came to Cardiff specifically to set up Torre, having been inspired by the coffee shops of Edinburgh. Cunningly, I’d timed my visit to coincide with their day off, but I did meet Silvia’s sister, Roxana, who was holding the fort (castle?) with her boyfriend.

As well as the usual espresso-based coffee menu, there’s bulk-brew filter, loose-leaf tea, full breakfast and lunch menus, plus pastries and cakes, the latter baked on the premises.

March 2016: Sadly Torre has closed and will be sadly missed.

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