Taylor Street Baristas are one of the sharpest commercial operators in the London coffee scene. Everything from their property investment relationships to the partnership with Tescos speaks to a team that wants to build a serious business. They have also managed to remain serious about their coffee. The Taylor St Baristas pop-up in Shoreditch was my local when I worked for a web design agency back when I first arrived in London.
Mr Porter have offered to shout people a coffee at Taylor St Baristas
This week Taylor Street Baristas have partnered with online fashion retailer Mr Porter to offer free coffee between 8am and 10am at a few of their locations between 23 September and 27 September. The last one is at Taylor Street Baristas Liverpool Street on 27 September. It’s a fun little marketing stunt that I hope continues on as a long term relationship between the two brands.
For the last couple of months I’ve been working from the Innovation Warehouse co-working space in Farringdon. The Innovation Warehouse provides free filter coffee, 50 pence espresso pods and hot water for members to use in their Aeropress and plungers. Each member of the space has their own coffee routine. One of the startups has a tradition of grinding a whole bag of fresh Monmouth coffee in the morning if they have a particularly big day coming up. But sometimes there is no substitute for going outside for walk and a flat white or a real espresso.
Dose Espresso is the perfect place for a meeting in Farringdon/Clerkenwell/Barbican.
I asked some of the other Innovation Warehouse members where they go for coffee in Farringdon and compiled their suggestions into a list based on the things that entrepreneurs most need in a cafe. Continue reading Best places for coffee in Farringdon
Last year I was in New York for a startup investment tour organised by UKTI and VentureOutNY. I was interested to revisit New York and see how the coffee culture has changed. New York is obviously a big city but has it evolved its own coffee culture? And where is the best Flat White in New York?
The best flat white I had in New York was from Brooklyn Roasting Company in the creative DUMBO startup district.
The New York Times has been waking up to the growth in small independent cafes. I noticed lots of interesting things in the course of my week exploring the cafes of New York. New York coffee is as good as you can get anywhere else in the world, but they still have a lot to learn.
Cafes spread all over the place
In many cities in the world, the best cafes are clustered together around a certain neighbourhood. In New York the best cafes are spread across different neighbourhoods. The geographical spread makes it more fun to explore New York by hunting out the best cafes. Much like London, New York is great for coffee orienteering. I used the New York’s Best Coffee iPhone application to navigate the city.
New York’s Best Coffee Map on iPhone
One of the reasons that the cafes in New York are so spread out is that they are serving such different cultures and groups of people. In many cities in the world high-quality coffee is associated with hipsters and young or creative people. In New York, lots of different demographics including bankers, yummy mummies, hipsters, designers, students and tourists all enjoy high quality coffee.
The price of real estate is also extremely important to how the New York cafes have evolved. In some cities like London, property developers and owners are starting to appreciate the influence of an independent cafe on the local neighbourhood. Therefore, some developers are providing discounted rent to high quality cafes in London. My sense is that in New York this increased property value caused by good coffee not yet been a factor so the New York cafes are paying full market rents and therefore renting much smaller shops in more obscure locations.
Abraco didn’t technically have a “flat white” on the menu but the small latte made a passable substitute. (Photo by: Abraco)
Most of the New York cafes that I visited were takeaway only or provided only a very small area for seating. This feels normal for New York as, culturally, most New Yorkers are drinking the coffee on the way to or from work. The New Zealand style of sit down cafe for a lingering brunch still exists in New York, but New Yorkers would associate brunch with a full meal instead of with a coffee and a muffin.
Less Tribal
In many cities, hipster grade coffee is associated with particular groups of people and particular lifestyles. In New York everyone drinks coffee. I noticed many people ordering coffee from independent artisanal cafes that you would not expect to see in an independent cafe anywhere else in the world. For example, I waited behind a fire truck load of firemen in one small cafe on a Tuesday morning. Some of this is driven by the American attitude towards service, where anyone that walks in is a good customer. Overall, I found the New York independent cafe scene less cliquey than Berlin, Paris, London, Melbourne and Auckland.
Ninth Street Espresso only sells coffee by volume so I took a 3 ounce for the flat white. Although the 6 ounce looked good. (Photo: Brian’s Coffee Spot)
The broader customer demographic does not mean that there is a broader appreciation of high-quality coffee. On the contrary, I found that the clientele of the high-quality cafes did not necessarily appreciate the product they were being served and might have been just as happy with Starbucks.
Quality Culture
The average American coffee consumer has been exposed for years to Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts. It is only those who have travelled to Australia, New Zealand or the UK who have experienced modern, high quality coffee. The baristas in the independent cafes are doing their best to provide high quality coffee, but it is hard to keep the quality high when customers don’t appreciate the product. There are an increasing number of discerning customers and I still found some excellent coffee in New York.
Bluebird Cafe was casual and friendly. It was next to our AirBnB so it was my local in NYC.
Overall, the cafe scene in New York is vibrant and fast growing. The cafes are widely spread out so you have to travel to get to a good coffee, but then maybe that makes you appreciate it more. Once you find a good coffee, there is nowhere to sit and drink it because the cafes are all too small, but then maybe that makes you get out and explore New York. Even if you find an independent cafe there is no guarantee that the coffee will be high quality, but then maybe that’s part of the New York adventure.
The North of England seems like an odd place to be roasting coffee but York Coffee Emporium are doing a stunning job of finding interesting coffees from around the world and roasting them for delivery. Ben from The Distance hooked me up with a few bags to try and I’ve been experimenting with them in a pour-over, a french press and an aeropress.
Brewing at home makes a nice change from running in the rain to London cafes.
I tried three varieties and was surprised at just how much difference the beans made to the final taste. This blog is usually about reviewing cafes and espresso based drinks like the Flat White and Latte.
A flat white coffee isn’t just a small latte. They’re very different drinks. If you get caught in a cafe that doesn’t serve a flat white, then a small latte might be a passable substitute, but they’re still not the same drink. The flat white vs latte debate is common in the UK and USA where the flat white is still new.
Flat white and a Latte from Climpson & Sons in Shoreditch. The flat white may look like a small latte, but there’s more to it.
I drink flat whites and my partner drinks lattes so we’ve seen the differences between the two drinks across cafes in the UK, USA, New Zealand, Australia, France, Germany, Spain, Sweden and Denmark. I’ve had a lot of discussions with baristas and I thought it was time to shine some light on the common debate about exactly “what is a flat white?”
I’d love to hear from people about cafes in unexpected places around the world that serve a Flat White. Where is the weirdest and most of out of the way place that you’ve found a Flat White?
One of the challenges I took on this year was to visit every independent cafe in Zone One in London. So far I’ve been to about twenty cafes and filmed little YouTube clips of me talking about the cafes as I go. I’ve been shooting photos of the Flat Whites and taking notes on which cafes are the most chilled out and fun to hang out in.
Map of the Independent Cafes in London Zone 1
Because I’m only visiting cafes listed in the London Coffee Map application there haven’t been any bad cafes but I’ve seen a few stressed out customers, some over worked staff and some confusing etiquette around ordering. On the whole, the cafes have been excellent and I’ll be posting more reviews as I get to explore more.
On the way back from Yorkshire we stopped off in the city of York. We wandered the old town, climbed the city walls and got a little bit lost. But we couldn’t find any good coffee in York. We were about to cave in and go to Costa but I jumped on FourSquare and found The Attic cafe. The ground floor looks like a normal tea rooms (The Harlequin) so we’d ignored it while walking through town. But hidden upstairs is a local focussed cafe where the owner is pulling world-class coffee shots.
The Attic cafe is hidden on the top floor above a tearooms and serves a mean Flat White.
I would have been happy enough with a Flat White. But he made a double, ristretto based Flat White that I’m still thinking about days later. Gordon has won a number of barista competitions and we had a good gossip about the London coffee roasting scene. The cafe wasn’t officially open yet but he could tell from the Kiwi accent my pained expression that I was desperate for a real coffee.
Caravan is perpetually cool. I’m never sure whether it’s a cafe, restaurant, bar or pub. But somehow it all works.
Caravan is a kiwi owned cafe in Exmouth Market.
The coffee itself is roasted in house and they have some of the best tasting beans in london. The Flat White is pretty inconsistent depending on the barista.
Brill is a lovely local cafe in Exmouth Market. The Flat White is near perfect.
Brill is a combination music store and cafe in Exmouth Market.
Milk is a smooth texture. Temperature is lukewarm (not as hot as most, but perfect for drinking as soon as it arrives). Taste is smooth and mellow. Recommended.
