Being a great coffee shop isn't just about the quality of your espresso or the ratio of
baristas generally interested in your day compared to condescending coffee snobs.
It's about those special touches that weave a humble purveyor of warm
beverages into the fabric of a community's everyday life. Like free
Wi-Fi.
Since nearly every community has at least one caffeine hotspot that
serves as a "third place" for people who "can't get work done at home",
compiling a list of the 21 best was not an easy task. So to separate the
gold from grounds we polled our nationwide staff of city editors as
well as some of the biggest names in the coffee world.
In the process we had to cut some iconic local haunts, new-school
barista breeding grounds, and roasting titans, so your favorite might
not be on the list. If we missed your home away from home, let us know
in the comments, and the most popular suggestion will be added to the
list as the people's choice. But don't let your vote be swayed too much
by a
tip flirt.
Grand Rapids, MI
Clocking in at number three on our list of
best roasters in the country,
Madcap's put Grand Rapids on the coffee map and set themselves apart
from other shops by offering tasting flights, serving espresso in
snifters to emphasize the intense aromatics, and implementing a
zero-waste policy by trading trash cans for bus bins and sorting all of
their trash into compost and recyclables.
Kansas City, MO
Oddly Correct stands out in the surprisingly coffee-rich city of Kansas
City for their bags of beans letter-pressed with sketches from the
owner, excellent cups of pour-over made with Kalita Wave drippers, fun
one-off events like soul brunches, and enough humility to remember that,
despite all the artisanship, they're “just caramelizing cherry pits in a
glorified clothes dryer”.
Santa Barbara, CA
Equal parts coffee roaster, bakery, and a community center, the French
Press is such a large part of Santa Barbara that they actually hold a
farmer's market in the parking lot. And even though they've got one of
the top baristas in the world behind the bar, they still pride
themselves on customer service over coffee knowledge.
New Orleans, LA
You won't find any bespectacled hipsters debating the virtues of the
AeroPress at Cafe Du Monde. The New Orleans landmark is a snobbery-free
zone, and earned a spot on our list thanks to their status as one of the
oldest shops in America (est. 1862!), a unique embrace of Chicory
flavoring, and their legendary beignets. Pro-tip: Avoid the half-hour
wait by heading to the take-out line.
Portland, OR
The slick, Scandanavian-influenced design of Heart comes courtesy of
their Finnish owner, who used to be a pro snowboarder before going into
the bean biz. Heart's serious enough about their coffee that they don't
serve cold-brew because it doesn't meet their flavor standards, and
they're so transparent with their roasting practices that their cafe is
literally built around a black Probat roasting machine that allows
customers to get a first-hand look at their craft.
Seattle, WA
From the birthplace of second-wave coffee giants like Starbucks, Seattle
Coffee Works claims to be the only active roastery in the Emerald
City's downtown, and takes their service as seriously as their beans.
For regular Joes, they offer an express side loaded with cafe pressing
pots of international roasts. But the real magic happens in the Slow
Bar, where patrons can pick from a variety of beans and brewing methods
to compare the tastes of single-origin brews and test the cutting edge
of coffee technology.
Denver, CO
As close as you're going to get to an authentic Italian coffee bar in
the Mile High City, Little Owl serves locally roasted, small-batch beans
from Corvus Coffee. The espresso drips from a serious La Marzocco
Strada MP machine. The pastry selection is also top notch, with
offerings like ham and cheese quiche.
Miami, FL
Although many shops on our list roast their own beans, no other can
claim to have farmed them. Eternity Roasters in the heart of downtown
Miami is the last stop in the founder's family's "seed-to-cup" vision
that started on their Colombian coffee farm 60 years ago. When they're
not brewing their own Colombian fare single-cup pour-over style, it's
single-lot harvests from around the world that have gone through a
rigorous blind taste-testing process to ensure beans never waver from
the farmer's standard.
Portland, OR
The guy from Ristretto literally wrote the book on home brewing (
How to Make Coffee Before You've Had Coffee: Ristretto Roasters' Spectacularly Simple Guide to Brewing at Home),
but while he prescribes a wide range of at-home options, the star of
his three shops are their Steampunk brewing systems. The most
Portland-sounding machine ever, the Steampunk is a variation of syphon
brewing that results in a faster and more consistent product than most
any other single-cup system. Ristretto also roasts in-house, allowing
them to tune-in their flavors to specifically complement the
experimental brewing method.
San Francisco, CA
While many big-city coffee shops double as people-watching sites, Saint
Frank is all about a serene coffee experience enhanced by blonde oak
walls, skylights, and the fourth wall between barista and patron broken
down by sinking the stylish Mod Bar espresso machines into the
countertop. The founder entered the coffee world through local roasters
Ritual, and he's still sticking with them, using the espresso in
everything from lattes with housemade almond milk to a rarely seen
espresso and tonic.
Los Angeles, CA
The champion baristas and overall coffee gurus behind G&B (Kyle G.
and Charles B.) take the term "coffee bar" literally. Tucked into LA's
Grand Central Market, G&B is just one long bar at which they
encourage patrons to mingle while enjoying espresso drinks served in
reusable glass jars. Their second shop, Go Get Em Tiger, flips this
standing-bar idea for more diner-style bar service in which patrons are
circled around the barista area in order to encourage a more friendly
environment.
Nashville, TN
Rocking a wood-handled Slayer espresso machine, Barista Parlor's always
serving beans from at least three different roasters, from up-and-comers
like Minneapolis's Dogwood to nationally renowned caffeinators like
Intelligentsia and Stumptown. The vibe is all-artisan-everything -- from
the uniforms to the furniture -- and they've just entered a partnership
with one of the guys from the Black Keys to open a second location,
which will feature a roastery enclosed in glass and framed with wooden
beams reclaimed from the original George Dickel Distillery.
Chicago, IL
The only spot on the list where you can both get your bike fixed and
score a caffeine fix, Heritage is run by a fifth-generation Chicagoan
who cut his teeth building vintage-inspired bikes in the East Village
before moving back to the Chi to dedicate himself to custom-crafted
bikes and serious coffee, including a pour-over station and cold-brewed
Stumptown Hair Bender.
New York, NY
Pretentious-quality coffee without the pretentiousness, Everyman opened
in 2007 in the cramped corner of the lobby of a theater near Union
Square and expanded in 2012 to an equally-cramped storefront of their
own. The owner has coffee tattoos on his knuckles, single-origin roasts
on the brain, and no menu on the wall: instead of awkwardly gazing at a
chalkboard, customers are encouraged to awkwardly converse with the
baristas to settle on their order, forcing a bit more humanity into the
transaction and encouraging experimentation with AeroPress and Chemex.
San Francisco, CA
Part-coffee shop, part-fixie parking lot, Four Barrel is housed in a
former industrial warehouse in San Francisco's Mission neighborhood,
where your coffee is literally made bean-to-cup in the coffee version of
an open kitchen, right smack dab behind the register. Not only is the
coffee some of the best in the caffeine-rich 7x7 (credit partners that
include Stumptown and Ritual vets), but it's also just generally an
awesome spot to enjoy an affogato; large bay windows face
people-watching-rich Valencia Street, they only play vinyl, and they're
the home of the infamous Great Four Barrel Boar Burglary, which was
about as awesome as it sounds.
Dallas, TX
By day, Ascension’s using a $20k espresso machine to brew beans from the
largest privately owned plantation in Rwanda, because the owner just
happens to sit on the board. At night, they move all the tables -- which
are made from former bowling alley lanes -- to form an intimate wine
bar with a killer menu. Pro tip: Go for the Kyoto drip.
Boston, MA
If ever an indie coffee house captured the eclectic character of its
'hood -- from Harvard grad students and journaling hipsters, to Spanish
tourists and aging hippies who ask you to use your laptop in the
back
of the cafe because they need some "technology free" time (not even
kidding) -- 1369 is that place. With two locations a stone's throw away
from one another (one Inman,
one Central),
this bustling, always-hard-to-find-a-table-at Cambridge icon's been
pouring high-grade java for over 20 years, serving it alongside tasty
scones, tons of teas, and occasional live tunes. And that's to say
nothing of the chipotle-spiced Mexican hot cocoa. They even deliver
growlers of their popular cold-brewed iced coffee… by bike, of course.
New York, NY
Neither snow, nor rain, nor sleet, nor massive lines at the Supreme
store next door can keep SoHo loyalists from this sleek, high-ceilinged
caffeine Mecca. One of four NYC outposts of the premium roasters (who
got their start in Philly 20 years back), this one has a special place
in our hearts... because it’s right around the corner from Thrillist’s
headquarters. Well, that and the rich house blends. And the almond
croissants. Alright, so there’re a few things. Don’t be daunted by the
line, either: it moves quickly thanks to the professional-as-hell
barista corps.
Newtonville, MA
George spent 20 years building his brand of Coffee Connection shops to
24 locations, then sold out to Starbucks to focus on traveling the world
to help strengthen the international coffee-sustainability
infrastructure. After earning every coffee award ever, he threw his hat
back into the coffee shop ring in 2012 to reopen a cafe outside of
Boston serving his own roasts to dedicated coffee pilgrims.
Brad Chaffin
New York, NY
Making Greenpoint cool before it was New Williamsburg, Cafe Grumpy
opened their first shop on Meserole in 2005, back when the neighborhood
was mostly Polish immigrants with just a salt and peppering of hipsters.
The success of the shop has grown it from a quiet study spot with an
adorable book exchange to a six-location giant with its own roastery and
cameos as Lena Dunham's place of employment in the HBO show
Girls.
Houston, TX
In a space that formerly housed Houston's most iconic gay bar,
Blacksmith sets itself apart from the rest of the Houston coffee scene
thanks to its all-star cast of city veterans, including the roaster of
Greenway Coffee and the guys behind Beard-lauded establishments Anvil
and Underbelly. Expect meticulously sourced beans from African farmers'
collectives paired with special pop-up food offerings like smoked
bologna tacos.
Editor's Pick: the fine coffee shops of Austin, TX
Having lived in Austin for 15 years, and spent countless hours
coffee-shop camping, it's impossible to choose a singular best in the
city without losing my Wi-Fi privileges everywhere else. But the city is
also loaded with so many great shops! Despite the proliferation of
places pulling single-origin cups, it can still be nearly impossible to
find a seat, let alone a power outlet. My favorite changes like the
weather.
For pure espresso excellence, I've gotta tip my hat to
Caffe Medici and Houndstooth for their ability to give you 10 adjectives for every one of their beans;
Thunderbird for being a perfect neighborhood meeting ground;
Once Over for their lower-key, oasis-like vibe;
Brew & Brew for their love of the AeroPress and emphasis on craft brews; and
Cenote for attaining a well-tuned balance of all the above qualities.
Dan Gentile
is a staff writer on Thrillist's national food and drink team. In the
course of compiling this list, he drank at least 21 cups of coffee. Pray
for his sleep cycle and follow late-night tweets at @Dannosphere.
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