Coffee Feature

I wrote an article reviewing a passel of coffee shops in Chicago and it recently went up on The Real Chicago website. I'm super excited about it and wanted to mention it on my blog. This is an excerpt. Read the whole piece here.

Coffee craze: Exploring the best, most unique independent coffee shops Chicago has to offer

Whether hip, quirky or comfy, these favorite coffee destinations are worth visiting on a Saturday morning

By Corey O’Day


I love the coffee house culture in Chicago, especially when the weather turns cold. Chicagoans are not content to hide in their homes and wish away the winter. We bundle up, hunker down and brave the elements to commune over a warm cup of something delicious and caffeinated.

It’s easy to get wrapped up in my routine and forget what new and exciting offerings this city has for a coffee enthusiast like myself. So, I accepted the challenge this winter of exploring about a dozen unique and independent coffee shops that came highly recommended to us by our readers.

Of course, we couldn’t include every great coffee shop in a city like Chicago, so if you’re particularly fond of a place that didn’t make our list, shoot us a line.

Asado Coffee Company
1432 W. Irving Park (Lakeview)
www.AsadoCoffee.com

The vibe: The rich blue interior of this cozy café greets you as warmly as the staff. Seating and décor is sparse because it’s all about the beans. The focal point of the facility is the roaster looming importantly in the back corner. Asado is not only a café, but also an artisan coffee roaster that has been turning out a quality, cared-for product since 2009. A second location at Chicago Ave. and Paulina was set to open mid-March.

What I ordered: Pour-over coffee in two varieties: meru bourbon and Tanzania peaberry. The meru bourbon was rich and full and seemed to me that it would be an excellent after-dinner coffee. The peaberry was a bit brighter and more energetic — the perfect morning brew.

What keeps ’em coming back: The friendly staff and Asado’s commitment to a quality product. On their website they describe themselves as “forever students of the fine art of coffee,” and this is clear in the care and craft they exhibit.

...

Read about these other cafes at The Real Chicago website:

Bourgeois Pig Cafe
Bridgeport Coffee Company
Cafe Mustache
Fabcakes
Filter Cafe
Jupiter Outpost
Sip Coffeehouse
Star Lounge Coffee Bar
The Wormhole

a little pick-me-up(beat)

It is cold. Bone-chilling cold. And right about now is when I feel there is no end in sight. Actually, that weight normally presses down on me in February, but it's a bit early this year. Our bills are high (screw you, People's Gas) and our spirits are low. We've turned down the furnace and piled on the blankets and will only watch comedies in attempt to brighten our mood. Or musicals. Because when we dance along it warms us up.

When I get like this I try to force myself to do a little bright-side thinking. Tonight the universe lent a helping hand in the form of a drunken, accordian-playing, broken English speaking, Polish man that staggered into the coffee shop where I work. He began telling us his name was John (I think?) and playing polka and asking if the one other customer in there was my husband or boyfriend. I was trying to communicate with Accordian John but all I could comprehend were a few stray syllables steeped heavily in alcohol.

The smell of coffee and vodka fumes swirled around him, but this was overshadowed by the deafening sound of that accordian. I had forgotten how loud they are! Well, I don't know if I had ever really known how loud they were since I have not had very many close encounters with accordian players... At any rate, the volume of the instrument surprised me and all I could do was laugh about the whole thing. I wanted to immediately call my mother who always seems to wind up in similar situations--maybe it comes with the territory of owning/ working at a small business?

While I was enjoying the story-worthy aspects of this event, I was also not going to survive much more of the super-sonic accordian. I wasn't sure if our one customer was up for it either (or all the potential customers that walked right past the door when they heard the ruckus). I finally said, "No polka, thank you" and poor Accordian John looked up at me with his sad, drunk accordian eyes and squeezed out a few last meloncholy notes. "Sorry," I said. And he sort of shrugged, mentioned again that he had been in Chicago twenty years and got up to leave.

I tried to get him to take his coffee to go (because it really smelled like he could use a cup) but he just said goodnight and staggered out onto the sidewalk. My night was made. I'm glad there was at least one customer to witness the whole thing. And that he seemed to be as excited about it as I was.

Thank you, Accordian John, for helping to keep my winter blahs at bay.