Your Guide for Craft Coffee
Most visitors to Cyprus come for the Mediterranean island’s sunny weather and immaculate beaches. Nicosia, the country’s landlocked capital, rarely even gets so much as a stopover. With the international airport in Larnaca, most tourists have no incentive to make the trek to Cyprus’s largest city. But those who travel inland will find a bustling coffee scene well worth skipping a beach day. These were four of our favorite place to have coffee in Nicosia. …
I recently bought a bag of coffee from one of my favorite European roasters. When I opened the bag I was surprised to discover the coffee was quite a bit darker than I expected. Brewing the coffee revealed a flavor profile to match the color: bitter chocolate, roasted nuts, and — dare I say — ash.
Even though many specialty coffee drinkers prefer a light to medium roast, there’s still a significant number of people who prefer something darker. For them, coffee should taste like, well, “coffee.” And though I will admit my personal preference is for a coffee dropped closer to first crack than second, a good dark roast can be enjoyable if prepared properly. But dark roasted coffee needs to be brewed differently than light or medium roast coffee to get the best results….
Amsterdam has been one of our favorite cities for visiting coffee shops– er — cafés since before we even started this website. But there’s a lot more to the Netherlands than just its capital. Perhaps nowhere is this more evident than in Den Haag. The coastal city might be best known as the home of the International Court of Justice, but it’s also boasts a growing number of specialty coffee shops, serving up the best roasters from the Netherlands and beyond. Although we weren’t able to visit every café on our list, there were three of our favorites. …
Earlier this year we were at a cupping at Istanbul’s Arabica Trading House when a colorful coffee bag caught our eye. It turned out to be the first production roast from KungPow Coffee, a collaboration between South African expat Warrick Masfen and Istanbul native Suzi Erit. After finding out we liked the contents just as much as the Aqua Teen Hunger Force-esque label, we reached out to learn a little bit more about the brand.
So, tell us about KungPow Coffee. What’s your origin story?
The idea has been around for some time now– basically since Warrick started working in the coffee industry, and then we got to the point where we asked ourselves would we rather be the head of a chicken or the tail of the bull. With the morale boost from the win at the 2019 SCA Turkey roasting championship, we set into motion our plan, to build a transparent coffee roasting company with competitive prices all while adopting a more fun and colorful vibe.
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Ernest Hemingway said, “If you were to visit just one city in Spain, it should Granada.” The picturesque Andalusian city is home to more than just the sprawling Alhambra palace or its towering Renaissance cathedral, it also boasts a growing independent coffee scene that demonstrates the depth and diversity of the Spanish specialty coffee scene….
“Soy hot chocolate?”
I’ve only been to Puzzle Café a handful of times, but owner Thomas Audebert has already learned my order well enough to joke with me.
Not missing a beat, I reply “Of course.”
And sure enough, a delicious double espresso turns up at my table, just like it had the several days previous….
Peanut butter and jelly. Cookies and milk. Thai food and riesling. There’s a lot of classic food pairings, but perhaps none more universal than coffee and chocolate. So it’s fitting that Wake Forest, North Carolina’s Black & White Coffee Roasters recently opened their second retail location inside of bean-to-bar chocolatiers Videri Chocolate Factory. We caught up with Black & White co-owner Kyle Ramage to learn more about what he and his business partner Lem Butler have been up to in Downtown Raleigh….
It’s been a long time since Vienna was the capital of Europe’s largest empire, but it remains a cultural center unlike any other. Majestic palaces and cathedrals pay testament to a bygone gilded age, but a new wave of contemporary coffee shops prove that Vienna is a city very much in the present. In addition to Jonas Reindl Coffee Roasters (read our full review here), we enjoyed these four Vienna coffee shops during our recent visit….
“Good coffees is worth the stairs.” That’s the motto that’s helped make Montag Coffee Roasters a fixture of the coffee scene in Istanbul’s Kadıköy district. The original location occupies some prime real estate overlooking the fish market, and despite being a floor removed from street level, is almost always crowded. As such a pillar of the city’s Asian side, perhaps it was inevitable that Montag would expand to the more densely populated European side. But rather than opening up in specialty coffee hot spots, like Nişantaşı or Cihangir, Montag chose the up-and-coming Bomonti neighborhood….
Vienna has a long history with coffee. Legend has it the first coffee house in Vienna was opened with coffee the Ottoman army left behind at the Battle of Vienna. Whether or not that’s true, the city is still famous for its grandiose coffee houses, many of which remain relatively unchanged since the 19th century….
