Specialty Coffee Shops in Tokyo! vol.2

Bear Pond Espresso @ Shibuya

Located right in the heart of Shibuya,  Bear Pond Espresso, is also worth visiting. It’s not really a Specialty coffee bean place but is specialized in espresso.

The photo is not allowed inside the shop, so I show you the outside^^. We ordered their Espresso and Cappuccino for take away. It was really nice! The coffee was freshly roasted at their shop so we bought back a packet of beans as well!

I have been making lattes with their house blend in my home espresso machine and it taste very nice, well grounded, fruity and not too bitter:)

Sarutahiko Coffee @ Ebisu

Ebisu, 1 stop away from Shibuya on train, there is this another excellent coffee shop called Sarutahiko Coffee.

This shop is very small with a few tables and high chairs, and my family could barely fit in… (my husband had to carry our son on carrier while I squeezed in one person space with my daughter), but their service and coffee was excellent that everything was alright! We went on a rainy day and the shop lady helped us put the stroller outside and fold the umbrella. I know that Japanese hospitality is quite good, but this shop was beyond our expectations. I bet regulars come back because of this.

Like these two senior men.

Excuse me on this photo shot, but I couldn’t help taking them because it was such a heart warming scene of two men, one with a retro hat, chit-chatting over a cup of coffee before they start the day. Sometimes the customers add the scenes to the coffee shop and makes the whole experience nice and memorable.

We ordered their specialty Iced coffee in hand-dripping style. You can see the pour over tools in front of the man in the second photo. Their house roast is rather dark and is suited for iced coffee and it was really nice!

We visited a couple more coffee shops but these are the Specialty Coffee Shops we went. I enjoyed the beans we brought back from Japan, and some with my students! I hope to visit back some of the shop and other coffee shops in my next Japan trip!

Thank you for always visiting my blog & Have a great weekend!

 

 

Specialty Coffee Shops in Tokyo! vol.1

 

Speaking of Specialty coffee, I would like to introduce some of the coffee shops I visited in my last Japan trip!

 

The Roastery @ Omotesando (Harajuku)

 

 

First is The Roastery in Harajuku, Tokyo.

Harajuku, Omotesando and Shibuya areas are known to have nice cafes and coffee shops. Many popular pancake shops are also located here and recently, Magnolia Bakery, the famous NY cupcake shop, opened their first branch in Japan as well! It’s a trendy and hot spot for the cafe lovers!

The Roastery is located in one of the small stretch of road that leads from Omotesando Harajuku to Shibuya.

 

 

 

The shop reminds us of some cozy cafes in the west coast of the U.S., and being part of a large restaurant & cafe group, it’s quite spacious for a cafe in Tokyo.

 

 

They serve New York Ring here! It’s a donuts made from croissant dough and is popular as ‘cronuts’ in the U.S.!

Their coffee menu is quite simple and you choose from Americano, Espresso and Cappuccino from the two types of coffee beans. They change the beans on a weekly basis, more or less. The beans are roasted in the shop itself, as you can see from the first photo, and they share the same Specialty coffee beans with NOZY coffee, another famous coffee shop in Tokyo.

 

 

We tried their cappuccino and espresso, together with the N.Y. Ring! The espresso had a very powerful flavor, and even with cappuccino where normally milk makes the coffee tastes blend, I could feel the strong characteristics of the Specialty coffee beans. We liked the coffee beans so much that we bought back a few packets of COE and Specialty coffee beans that were available in the shop. Price range from JPY1,200/200g to JPY1,800/200g (RM40-RM70).

As for their Americano, they were using French Press and not hand-dripping (pour over) style.

 

Coutume @ Omotesando (Aoyama)

Just 10 minutes walk from The Roastery, in same Omotesando (Aoyama) area, we found another Specialty Coffee shop called Coutume. This shop, which is newly opened in April 2014, is a Paris found cafe. It has various kinds of coffee but especially specializes in French Press.

 

 

Look at this French Press machine! It is completely computerized and looks very stylish!

I honestly don’t appreciate French press as much as the hand dripping style, but some people say that French press can extract the nice coffee oil which the hand dripping will take away from using filter paper.

 

 

In contrast with the wooden feel of previous cafe, The Roastery, Coutume was a bright and white stylish cafe! Fashionable like Paris!

 

 

Even the way they serve was cute and stylish, with some details of the coffee bean explained in the transparent cube that came along with the coffee.

 

 

We ordered their specialty French press hot and ice coffee. My friend ordered their Pour over coffee and it was served in this cute glass pot.

 

Overall we had a good experience! My husband liked the modern and minimalist design and of course the automated French press machine was very impressive! Ok, I will talk about other cafes in my next post! Have a good day!

Thank you for visiting my blog!

 

 

BEAM @ Sri Damansara

The other day, I had a chance to visit a cafe called BEAM at Sri Damansara, thanks to my dear student who recommended me of this newly opened shop! It opened in end of July. I wouldn’t have known of this shop otherwise because the coffee and cafe business in Malaysia is expanding vast in the last couple of years. (My student has joined our coffee & macaron master course, by the way. I am glad to be sharing such information with students lately^^…)

As soon as I entered the cafe, I immediately liked this spacious yet cozy ambience. It seemed that this shop lot was a former warehouse, thus the table and chairs were displayed spaciously and had couple of areas in theme. This corner close to the door caught my eye as I entered, and before I even checked their menu I was impressed by how various coffee items and tools they carry for sale. They had the same kettle, coffee filter, syphon machine and others that I have, and they also had some unique coffee tools. I even found two sets of water-dripping machine on the high table (this was of course not for sale).

And then we came to the counter to order our coffee.

Specialty coffee and… Kopi O?

First, I was surprised that they handle Specialty coffee beans here, which is still quite new and difficult to find in Malaysia. Then I was surprised that they also serve the local coffee as well because normally those two do not exist together in the same cafe. But soon after we order our Macchiato and Hand-drip Specialty Coffee (Papua New Guinea bean), the man who made us a hand-drip coffee explained to us all.

It seems like this cafe was built by a coffee wholesale company who has been supplying local and Arabica coffee beans, and now Specialty coffee beans, to cafes and coffee shops in Malaysia since 70’s.

No wonder!

That explains why they have so much knowledge and sources of coffee beans, not only the local beans but also the other kinds. When he mentioned, “We made this cafe to educate people on Speciality coffee beans”, I was clapping hands in my mind(!) because I was just trying to teach my coffee & macaron course graduates what Specialty coffee beans are and how good the tastes are through my Specialty Coffee class.

He poured the coffee carefully and steadily… very similar to how I make mine, but slower and with more using his whole body.

He gave us a nice and informative talk. Thanks!

Specialty coffee beans are rather limited and hard to get, and in Japan it costs about RM70/200 gram. But now you can get here in Malaysia with around RM28/150gram!

They had various raw beans and a roaster which if we request they will roast for you (it takes about 20-30 minutes) at the shop. Their main roaster factory seem to be just around the corner from this cafe.

Specialty coffee beans are picked carefully so it normally indicates details such as farmer, altitude, the way they dry the beans and the aroma you can taste from each beans. After we carefully looked at the list of beans here, we bought back a packet of Tanzania Specialty coffee beans (Tembo Farm), which was roasted only 2 days ago in their factory.

After we went back home, we straight away made a coffee from this bean. It was really fresh and had a nice fruity flavor…

I really enjoyed the experience there, and although it’s a little bit far from my house, I cannot wait to go back there!

Thank you for always visiting my blog ^^!

Patisserie Cacahouete Paris ~Tokyo~

At one of my favorite patisseries in Tokyo ~Patisserie Cacahouete Paris~ ! 

It’s located in the city center of Tokyo called Nakameguro. I like this shop so much that every time I go back to Japan I visit this place at least a few times. Twice during this Spring trip. The shop is very small space with only four seats and a bench outside. Most people take away their cakes but you can also take a seat on high chairs facing the mirror that reflects the entire French style lovely shop.

Like we did.

We shared two kinds of cakes- a chocolate mousse in a glass and a chocolate tart, as glace dessert and chocolate cakes are this young French patissier’s specialite! He also uses 100% French Valrhona chocolate, the No.1 chocolate in the world.

This tart was called ‘Tonka’ which was named after the coffee bean called Tonka. This bean is getting a lot of attention in the French pastry world in the last few years and it was my first time to try them. The flavor of Tonka bean and chocolate went very well and it was delicious!

We also bought back many cakes (I think about 10 kinds…^^). Since we visited during Spring they had seasonal Sakura Choux Cube, a cherry blossom flavor cream puff in a trendy cubic form. It was delicious too!

I cannot wait to visit them again…

Darjeeling Tea (Second Flush)

I started enjoying drinking English tea about 2 years ago when I learned about tea in cafe business class.

The history of English tea and the kinds of tea leaves were interesting to know.

Since my family prefers coffee and my house had so many stocks of English tea that we got from someone or we bought somewhere, I started drinking them one by one comparing the taste. I was shocked to see some of the very rare and high quality leaves, which perhaps my dad got from someone, sitting there without opened until it was expired way long time ago. I still opened and tasted them but the scent was mostly gone…

Ideally, both coffee and tea should be consumed within a month after brewed(coffee) or opened(tea), however, I think it’s difficult to do so especially for tea.

Anyway, this is Darjeeling tea I got recently at my favorite tea shop in Japan.

This is the shop Tea salon G-clef. I’ll talk about this shop later.

Darjeeling tea has 3 seasons; First flush for spring (Mar.~Apr.), Second flush for summer (May~Jun.) and Autumnal for autumn (Sep.~Nov.). First flush picked up during spring is a young bud and tastes very light and fresh almost like greentea. The production is limited and is valuable. Second flush has the rich tea taste and is called “champaigne of tea” or “muscatel flavor”. At last, autumnal has darker and bitter tea taste.

Although I might still prefer coffee, I came to appreciate tea as much as coffee. English tea is more of a social drink than coffee and can take time to drink, so it’s more relaxing and is good to drink while chatting with your friends. You can choose which to drink depends on the situation!