Espresso...NYC Style...!

As part of our trip to NYC in June we decided to have a coffee 'theme' and seek out some of the small espresso bars in the city.  The New York Times had run an article earlier in the year (March 2010) entitled 'New York is Finally Taking Its Coffee Seriously ( http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/10/dining/10coffee.html?_r=1&pagewanted=1&h - it may need you to register before you can open the link - it's free though).  It caught our eye and decided to select some of the places listed and went off in search of what New York feels espresso should be.

Some of the places we chose didn't meet up to our expectations - too small, no seating, and in some cases just too 'hip and trendy' for us middle aged Brits (places where the baristas were far more interested in having fun with their colleagues, chatting to each other, not really acknowledging customers, carrying on a conversation about something really interesting (to them) while they filled my order - I don't like to feel I'm more of a by-product of their fun place of work rather than a reason they're there...). 

This photo of Mike sums up what we were looking for on our search ... somewhere to relax, enjoy really good espresso and decompress - ok, decompress and caffeine may appear to be a contradiction but it works for us....! We went out each day, with reading books, as well as in my case my notebook ready for any jottings Jaxter felt like making, hoping to find somewhere to settle down and do our thing...

At Third Rail Coffee we found it - and that's where the photo was taken :) www.thirdrailcoffee.com

Located on W 3rd and Sullivan Street in SoHo, they offer a small, perfectly formed haven of tranquility, and despite the 110% concentration that goes into the creation of every cup of heaven,  (my cortado was complete with its beautifully feathered thick milk foam) you're left with an overall feeling of serenity.  We sat in the window, perfect for people watching both inside and out. The NY Times article says ' Third Rail Coffee punches above its weight. It’s one of the city’s smallest coffee bars, and its most focused. The owners, Humberto Ricardo and Rita McCaffrey, offer at least two different espresso blends (each needs its own grinder, a commitment of capital and counter space), single-origin coffee in a Chemex and a full range of espresso drinks. The cortado is memorable.' Yes, it certainly is!

Culture Espresso www.cultureespresso.com also fitted the bill nicely.  It turned out to be just a couple of streets away from our hotel (72 West 38th, just off 6th) and was a real find.  It hadn't been on our shortlist of ones to try, (the blurb in the article was very brief) but we are so pleased we did.  It may not be on one of the prettiest streets but it more than makes up for it on the inside! It was a very late find - the day before we came home - but we know where it is for our next trip!

And then there was Jittery Joes... www.jitteryjoes.com 

 

Now their NYC store turned out to be located in the ground floor lobby of a large office  building on East 54th between 2nd and 3rd.  If you decide to go there, don't be put off by it's location - it may not have its own ceiling, and it may feel a little like an impromptu film set ready to be taken down and packed away never to be seen again, but it does great coffee!  It was hot hot hot in the Big Apple during our visit, and with this in mind I had an iced Americano, ready to add lots of half and half to take away any unwelcome bitterness but much to my surpise I didn't need any!  It was thoroughly enjoyable and thoroughly refreshing!  Mike had his usual espresso, and whilst it was way too strong for me (I soon found out that this wasn't specific to them - it's the NYC way of making espresso - espresso strength = ristretto strength...or even stronger than that in some places!) he said it was great! It has a small seating area and we happily whiled away half an hour there, watching the baristas work and their customers coming and going.  

We loved this sign - and having witnessed this so much at home in the UK look forwards to seeing it appear in our coffee shops!

Having looked at their website, it's a shame they don't have a 'proper' store in the Big Apple - we could have gotten carried away with merchandise purchases (or should I say their merchandise would have been carried away by us LOL!).  The NY Times article says 'Based in Athens, Ga., it opened its first New York branch in the gloomy lobby of a fashion business school in Midtown East — it’s a makeshift setting and the beans are dark roast; the baristas are talented.' Yes, they most certainly are!!!  Whilst it wasn't what we expected, it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience and somewhere we'd visit again if we were in that part of town.

The last place we visited on our coffee tour (on our last full day actually) was Stumptown Coffee, which is situated at the Ace Hotel www.stumptowncoffee.com/locations/nyc-ace.  I decided to try an espresso con panna rather than my usual cortado... which in some ways was a mistake.  Their espresso hits you straight between the eyes - almost daring you to drink it, and when you do....wowzer!  The article says... 'With its travertine floors, walnut bar and natty staff, this is a striking setting for a cappuccino. The drink is up to the surroundings. Cold-brewed iced coffee tastes as bright and fruity as berries steeped in water, while a shot of espresso is so sweet and plush you’ll wish it lasted longer.'  I'm not sure whether I'd say sweet but hey!  I'm not THAT much of an espresso connossieur...but I doubt I'm brave enough to have it again without a certain amount of milk in it....!.  It is an exceptionally trendy place though - baristas wearing the ubiquitous flat caps or other such fashionable head coverings seen at pretty much all the places we visited, and full of beautiful, young, trendy people on both sides of the counter, with a dose of tourists for good measure.  There's no seating without going into the hotel lobby, however you can stand at the long narrow counter in front of the window and gaze at the world passing by, which of course we did!  I wanted to put this into my blog almost as a counterpoint to the others in here - there was no seating, the coffee was waaaay to strong for me, and to be honest, I wasn't entirely comfortable there (far too many beautiful people :) ), but out of the rest of the places we visited apart from Third Rail, Jittery Joes and Culture Espresso, it best fit what I think the NY Times article was trying to highlight - New York is definitely taking its coffee SERIOUSLY - almost TOO seriously for me.  Espresso for me is a pleasure, something to be savoured, appreciated and most of all enjoyed, not something that overwhelms my tastebuds.  The glass of water that accompanies my espresso is to cleanse my palate (as well as to counteract the inevitable dehydrating effect caffeine has on the body),  it's not meant to be a necessity aid in diluting the extremely strong aftertaste, nor should I be seeking out more several glasses of water after I've finished that one.  Having said that, and in an aim to give some perspective to what my taste buds were going through, at the time of our trip I'd just almost totally given up milk, which meant giving up my beloved lattes and moving to cortados and the occasional espresso - perhaps if I had still been drinking those, I might have appreciated the intensity in a more diluted environment.  Having said that, I had no problems with espressos at home... even those made by the most traditional and talented Italian baristas...

Who knows...maybe I'm just an uneducated Brit with an inability to appreciate art when I drink it ;)

Immersion Therapy...NYC Style!

Mike and I like good coffee.  We also like to immerse ourselves in cities we visit.  We like to find places to sit and experience the world going by - folks doing what they do, travelling from one place to another, living their lives - it's like having a little window from which to watch those little snippets of routines...get a kind of insight into their lives...

Anecdote time...  We visited Las Vegas in 2005 for my birthday, and had the pleasure of staying at Bellagio.  Now the mall in Bellagio has a great coffee shop and patisserie and you guessed it - we found it.  Well there we were enjoying our coffees - large extra strong latte for me, double espresso for Mike - and sharing a very good cinnamon bun.  A man and woman sat at a table next to us and the woman proceeded to get out their itinerary for their 2 night / 3 day trip - they'd just arrived.  The woman proceeded to walk the man through the itinerary and believe me it would have made a 5 star general proud (if a little exhausted...).  They basically had 6 minutes to have their coffee after which they had to be in the lobby meeting friends...they then had 7 minutes to get to the front of the hotel to see the next fountain show - they couldn't watch all of it as they had to be at Treasure Island for the next pirate show, then get their skates on for the volcano show at The Mirage... they could grab a sandwich at some point as they wouldn't have time for a full meal - they had to be goodness knows where for what by when.... We were pretty exhausted eavesdropping let me tell you!  She managed to have a scheduled phone conversation with their children that had been left with grandparents and then they were off! (They left most of their drinks....) Now we were only there for 3 nights ourselves, but apart from wanting to see the Star Trek Exhibition at the Hilton (it's no longer there which is quite sad...), see Ron Lucas's show at the Rio and have a nice meal in Prime for my birthday night, we were pretty much flying by the seat of our pants, agendaless and it was a great trip!  How can folks go on a trip which pretty much wipe them out, leaving them more exhausted than before they left?  Where's the 'holiday'?  Where's the 'relaxation'?  I'm sure some of you reading this will be shouting 'We do and we love it! It's a perfect holiday!' and I'm glad for you but it is SO not for us! :)

When we go to Barcelona, we spend a fair amount of time doing just the same kind of thing - sitting in nice cafes or coffee bars, or great market eateries and menu del dia places, enjoying great espresso and cafe con leche, good food, and completely surrendering ourselves to the ebb and flow of life, equally and perfectly happy to either chat to each other or just watch and listen to the interactions around us - the banter between bar staff and kitchen staff, the 'Hi, how're you doing Mary?' or 'Usual Fred?' or any of the thousands of brief interactions we get the chance to observe in our day to day journeys.  We actually got to see the Olympic Flame be run through the centre of Barcelona in 2008 simply by deciding totally at random whilst walking around Eixample one morning, to have nice little break in a coffee shop,  and have some 'do nothing for a bit' time,  which lead to reading the local paper and seeing an article about it happening - that day!!! 


This June we return to New York.  Mike and I first visited for Thanksgiving in November 2008 - my first visit.  I've been twice more in 2009 mainly as sanity for Mike during his long stays (he worked for a Madison Avenue based company) and just to actually sleep in the same bed as my husband - he'd been away from home ALOT that year.  The stay was quite hard though - he'd be in the office before 8am and if we were lucky he'd be back to the hotel around 8pm - each day hoping to leave the office 'at a reasonable time..' (6ish) but always getting dragged into something meaning it would be much later than that.  We did find a couple of bars where we could do our 'immersion therapy' though - Annie Moore's near Grand Central - it's an amazing place for that.  I had a really nice chat (under the watchful eye of Nicky I might add - one of the bar staff who had taken his role of guardian angel very seriously for the couple of nights I went there by myself to meet up with Mike - thanks Nicky :) ) about the baseball game on TV with a friendly old chap who was a self confessed barfly.

Another bar that was great for immersion therapy was up 92nd and 2nd - Blondies - it's changed hands now which is a shame.  (I arrived on St Paddy's Day in March - a totally mental time in NY - and we did our get-a-seat-at-the-bar-chill-and-watch-the-world-go-by thing.  We weren't quite prepared for the madness of one of the bar staff getting up on the bar in his hastily wrapped-around-his-waist stapled-on Ireland flag skirt, walking up and down with a bottle of Jack Daniels in his hand, pouring it into eager customer's mouths...but it was alot of fun to watchto'ing and fro'ing of lighthearted insults and anecdotes from the evening).

Back to June though...unfortunately the weather was not kind.  I was there for nearly a fortnight, and I had TERRIBLE weather - it absolutely teemed it down for about 7 days in a row - rain like you see on the movies and TV shows set in New York - it was like a monsoon!  So... no sitting in Central Park under a tree with my book, or on a park bench in Bryant Park in the shade with my lunch, or walking miles and miles exploring... Even the locals kept saying it was soooo not the norm for that time of year.... So, I basically frequented a lot of Starbucks that I already knew the locations of - usually to dry out my jeans - they'd be soaked from mid thigh down...  I loved it in some ways though in that I got to see the same folks interacting with the Barista's each day on their way to work, or at lunchtime, or when they popped in for their mid morning drug of choice, and I got to see the Baristas interacting with each other during their working day - the jokes they'd make, the general banter, and it was great.

So - to bring all of this stuff I've just waffled on about for ages together - we've got a bit of a plan for this visit, the idea for which came out of a New York Times article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/10/dining/10coffee.html?pagewanted=1&hp

Whilst 'The Man' (i.e. Starbucks) may still get the odd coffee sale from us, we're gonna try the independents - places where New Yorkers not only go to get great coffee, but that seem to have a great sense of community and friendship.  Potentially perfect locations for Immersion Therapy!  This one for example:

http://joetheartofcoffee.com

And another one that catches the eye....

http://jitteryjoes.com/ourcoffee/  Isn't that just a fantastic name for a coffee shop!

So - watch this space in June folks - I'll be blogging about the places we visit along with pictures, observations and insights :)