People from Amsterdam never want to travel outside the capitol of the lowlands. Everything you need is at a palm's reach. Although the Netherlands is a small, tiny country, everything outside of the ring is far far away land for the Amsterdammers. And so, most coffee places I know in the Netherlands are located in Amsterdam. Of course I can name others, but most I have never seen in real life with my own eyes. And so my friend 'B' and me decided to travel. Take the trains and discover all the lovely coffee spots outside of our hometown.
The third stop on our coffee crawl; Utrecht. A city full of coffeehouses. A city where some would argue specialty coffee took off the quickest in the Netherlands, with Brandmeesters and the Village Coffee & Music. Below you can read about our adventures.
 |
| See the Map |
30ml
address: Mariastraat 35
espresso machine: Synesso
coffee: own roastery
30ml is very near the Central Station. Quite small, filled with wood, metal tubes and a lot of coffee accessories you immediately see you are in a coffee house. On the bar are four different espresso grinders and in the back a small 2KG roaster. There is a lot to see and on the wall there are gorgeous coffee related prints, which you can buy.
We had a Nicaragua espresso and a cappuccino. It was the first coffee of the day and it was perfect. Tasty, balanced and flavourful. In a lovely atmosphere. What more could you want. I could have sat here all day.
Blackbird Coffee & Vintage
address: Oudegracht 222
espresso machine: Faema
coffee: Koffielab
Blackbird not only does coffee, but also sells vintage items, and during this season also vintage Christmas bobbles (amazeballs!), t-shirts and bikes. It is filled with vintage tables, couches, stools, decoration and more. A very comfortable place, where there is a lot to see.
Quelle surprise, they had some unwashed Ethiopian coffee, and as it had been a while, we had this! Both as a drip coffee and espresso. The espresso was a stretched shot, clean and balanced. The drip a huge enjoyment.
The Village Coffee & Music
address: Voorstraat 46
espresso machine: la Marzocco PB
coffee: Caffenation
The Village has been around a long time. And from day one and probably until forever in the future, this coffee house is up to date, on the latest trend and as expected very,very busy. Although very busy, the service is always amazing, friendly and quick. And if you do need to wait a long time, there is a lot to see in this store, with coffee accessories, well designed merchandise and music. Like their style of stuff? The owners also select quarterly gifts on Curated.
They use Caffenation roasted coffee, from Antwerp, until they find the perfect place to start their own roastery. The coffee, as always, made our day. This time a perfectly brewed Kenyan coffee.
Broei
address: Oosterkade 34
espresso machine: Mistral
coffee: the Golden Coffee Box
I was sooooo looking forward to Broei, which opened this year. Not only because everything I read on line sounded so good, but also because they use the Golden Coffee Box, which I really wanted to give an other try after Bart's Koffiekafeetje served it to me.
The space is colourful and filled with cool stuff to look at. The espresso machine used is a Mistral, which is the machine that taught me how to brew espresso, so immediately I felt at home. We ordered a cortado and a macchiato.
And there it was, a bit of an unexpected disappointment. The cortado was quite large and so milky, it only tasted of milk. Which for the second time in three coffee crawls means the cortados are not up to par! People, these are cortados! The macchiato was an espresso with a little cloud of broken up and big bubbled foamed milk. Which was so brittle, it was gone after two stirs. The espresso tasted the same as it did at Bart's Koffiekafeetje, bitter and unbalanced. Which creates an important question, is it the barista or the coffee?
We did also get some food, which made up for a lot. It was rich, tasty, delicious, generous and just what we needed after all that coffee.
Lef Koffiecoöp
address: Europaplein 702
coffee: own roastery
An other coffeehouse that only opened this year. Again with mouth watering social media. An other let down! Closed! Lef is only opened from Tuesday through Friday from 10am to 5pm. Not sure what a 9 to 5 girl's gonna do now...
Looking through the window, it does look like a really nice place to visit. If you manage to go, let me know what you thought would you?
Koffie & Ik
address: Vleutenseweg 169
espresso machine: la Marzocco PB
coffee: Single Estate
The last stop. We were cold and the coffee house was warm. After all that coffee, we enjoyed an Oolong tea and of course a cappuccino (we do need to try some coffee). And it is just what you expect. Nice, clean coffee. Good milk. Good espresso. Nothing abnormally amazing, but also nothing to criticise. It was nice.
The atmosphere is probably the most generic of all the places we visited. With a straightforward bar, tables and chairs. It was tidy clean and light in its atmosphere. Which can be a breath of fresh air amongst all the vintage, messy and filled to the brim coffeehouses that are out there.
Want to see more Coffee Crawl Utrecht edition? Check out the album on the Coffee Strides Facebook page.
Want to read about the Coffee Crawl Den Hague edition? Read it here. Or rather the Arnhem edition? Read that here.
No comments:
Post a Comment