Boutique Coffee Companies Make Their Mark On NYC

NOVEMBER 9, 2010

A handful of boutique companies have been introducing coffee connoisseurs to the best of the West Coast, one locally-roasted cup at a time.

Though Starbucks may have introduced mainstream America to West Coast cafe culture, Stumptown Coffee Roasters, based in Portland, OR, has long been a cult favorite. The company has become the brew of choice at a number of hip food-and-conversation spots including the Ace Hotel and Cafe Pedlar. The company opened a stand-alone “brew bar” in Red Hook, Brooklyn, in perfect harmony with the recent wave of interest in local, seasonal food.

Those who favor the flavor of Intelligentsia coffee might claim that good taste beats the best of intentions. Recently voted Best Coffee by the Village Voice, the San Francisco-by-way-of-Chicago company supplies java junkies with their fixes at Ninth Street Espresso and Ost Cafe as well as peddling their beans at food emporium Gourmet Garage. Since good coffee leaves little to chance—you can geek out over their brewing process here (via BoingBoing)—Intelligentsia runs a “Cupping and Training Lab” in Midtown Manhattan, offering tastings, barista training, and “a space to explore and experiment with coffee.”

Blue Bottle Coffee, a third locally-roasted boutique newcomer is making East Coast inroads (via Grub Street) in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The company—which brews its coffee through a kind of Japanese flannel—has converts lined up out the door, hastening the demise of the oft-heard complaint that in the country’s most cosmopolitan city, it’s hard to find a good cup of coffee.

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Boutique Coffee Companies Make Their Mark On NYC

NOVEMBER 9, 2010

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