(no subject)

[gothwalk]

(A comment from an older post, but so long it's worth posting in itself.)



cheerfulcynic writes:

>I'm inclined to disagree with this. I've at
>least a decade of memories of hanging out on the
>sofas in Bewleys, which while not a good-coffee
>house, definitely has something of a coffee
>house culture about it. Not quite as long a
>memory of Cafe Moka, especially the Rathmines
>branch when they had the board games in the
>back. And new shops along a similar line are
>starting up, like Tri D on Nassau St.

>From the frothy-coffee point of view, look at
>the proliferation of Cafe Sol's coffee bars,
>homegrown but definitely modelled on the
>Starbucks idea. (Lovely hot chocolate too). I
>don't think we need Starbucks - they're coming
>too late to the market here.

You see, none of those live up to what we've found Starbucks to be, in Leeds and in Edniburgh (at least three branches in Edi). Bewleys is too big, too noisy - it used to be comfortable, but doesn't seem to be any more. Moka was indeed good, when the staff spoke English and their baked goods were less than a week old. Tri D I've only been in once, and it was far too plastic-and-chrome for my tastes (maybe I should go back and look again). And the Cafe Sols are tiny.

There's also Cafe Irie, but much as I like the place, the queue of people looking for tables - or, indeed, looking for a table myself - is not comfortable.

There are several things I liked about Starbucks; let me try to list them off here, and if there's a cafe that matches, I'll certainly try it.

One: tables distant from doors and counters, so that people aren't constantly passing back and forth beside me.

Two: comfortable seats, either chairs or armchairs. Too many Dublin cafes have chairs that feel as though they're going to fold under me, and in some cases sofas that you can't get yourself out of.

Three: some room between tables. I don't want to hear the conversations from the next table, at least not so clearly that I can hear meant-to-be-confidential whispers (and my hearing isn't the best).

Four: decent sized servings of coffee (not looking for American-sized buckets, just a decent mug). I realise this doesn't apply to espresso. :) Fancy coffees are also good.

Now, there are a few places that actually come close to this. The Cental Hotel's Library Bar is rather nice, and meets three out of four calls, but the coffee is served in cups, and is a little bit pricy. The JCR in Trinity would almost meet all of them, were it ever open when I could get there, and if they served decent coffee.

There are actually a number of pubs that almost meet these too, and they're good in their own way - but they're not what I'm looking for.

Actually, I'm going to make this a post as well...



(Now behind cut tags, cos as inannajones observed, it's a bit big.)

Comments

What Starbuck's have you been in?

[microgirl.livejournal.com]

Cos it sure ain't like (okl, admittedly only one or two) that I've seen. When I was in Portland, OR. in 1997 I ventured into a Starbuck's, cos I'd heard of them, and they were cool things that hadn't come to Dublin - and certainly not Galway - yet. And the biggest joy for me was that you could get any of their coffees in decaffeinated. Otherwise, the two I were in were basically, as you said earlier, the McDonald's of coffee-shops. Pretty much like West Coast Coffee Co. surprisingly enough, seeing as WCCCo is modeled on Starbuck's. I hope Starbuck's don't come here. I prefer individual bars, and seeing as any decent places now do decaf espresso (which means decaf everything else) they've even lost that edge.

All I want is for Kaffe Moka to return to what it used to be - decent service, reasonable prices and (the best yet) open til 4am.

On decaf

[cheerfulcynic.livejournal.com]

Lavazza Blue is damn good - I hardly miss the caffiene and it doesn't have that wierd aftertaste some decafs have.

Re: On decaf

[microgirl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I was determined to get a decent espresso/cappuchine machine when I came back from France, but then lost the grá for coffee, as I found it virtually impossible to buy good decaf here. Lavazza is good though. Nice and powdery too, which is what you want for espresso.

Re: On decaf

[cheerfulcynic.livejournal.com]

It might be worth asking the guys in La Corte in the epicurean, since they seem to import quite a lot, and its nearer to you than Ranelagh for Nortons.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

Been in one in Leeds (It's on Market Street or something prosaic like that), and three different ones in Edinburgh, one of which was within a Waterstones on Princes Street, one further down on Princes Street, and one on the Royal Mile - High Street, I think, just across from the top of Cockburn Street. The US ones we saw in Boston weren't as nice, though - smaller, for the most part.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[microgirl.livejournal.com]

Yeah, amybe it's just the British ones that are good. Maybe there was no cafe culture there really before Starbuck's and so they had to do it properly. But as Ann said, we have a pretty decent cafe culture now, so I don't think we need Starbucks, and they might follow the more US pattern hre rather than the British one.

Though OTOH, because there's more competition over here from "proper" cafe's maybe they'be more inclined to go the "open space, comfy couches" route here to compete effectively. Hmm.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

That's what I'm hoping - that British-pattern Starbucks here will teach the rest "how to do it". In the heel of the hunt, I'm going to go to the place that pleases me most - and at the minute, I'd choose a Starbucks over any cafe I've tried in Dublin.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[microgirl.livejournal.com]

Even the Boston ones? (See, this is the thing, the ones in Portland I remember as being typical steel-tables-and-a-few-hard-chairs ala McD's or Burger King. Maybe a little more sophis. and along the lines of the new McCafes - perfectly decent for a quick coffee, but certainly not somewhere I would preferentially go to spend long hours in comfort and relaxation.

Having said that though, I wasn't really looking and was there specifically for take-out, so it could just be I didn't notice it.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[ailbhe]

Hate to rain on the parade - but almost all of the Starbucks I've been in have been in the UK, and none of them were as good as K. Moka near St Stephen's Green was in the 18 months after it first opened. Most of the Starbucks I've been in here have been fairly small, almost completely geared towards takeaway coffee, and unable to produce anything drinkable. Fancy coffees are limited to espresso, cappucino etc, with or without flavoured syrups - sometimes you can choose between Own Blend and Kenyan, and in a very very few (though I could be thinking of Costa) you can buy a real variety of beans. Also, practically no coffee shops over here open anything that even vaguely resembles late; going from being able to sit in Bewleys until long after the last Nitelink to having to dash if I want to go for coffee after work was a bit of a shock.

Chains over here that aren't terrible - Costas can do luxury sometimes, and almost anything that has a deal with a bookshop will be ok in its bookshop branches, if overcrowded at weekends.

What I really want is for the Well Fed Cafe to come to Reading.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[gothwalk.livejournal.com]

Most of the Starbucks I've been in here have been fairly small

That's not my experience of Starbucks in the UK - mostly they've had a small front section, and much more room upstairs or in the back for sitting around. I do hope they continue that model if/when they open one in Dublin. I suspect that the building in question is what used to be the (vile awful) Manchester United shop on the corner of D'Olier St and Westmoreland Street - the only other good sites I can think of are what used to be the Virgin Megastore and Mary's of Dublin, both on Aston Quay. All of those are sizable places, the Megastore far too big. Actually, there's an old bank on Dame Street too, which even has planning permission signs out for a cafe/bar...

Fancy coffees are limited to espresso, cappucino etc, with or without flavoured syrups

This I find odd - I've never seen a Starbucks, even the smallest ones I've seen, that didn't do a wide range of fancy stuff - enough to put me in ferret shock.

Anyway, we shall see. I'll be pleased if it opens here, and won't have lost anything if it doesn't.

Re: What Starbuck's have you been in?

[cheerfulcynic.livejournal.com]

There's more than a few pokey little Starbucks in London. The one in that peculiar place down near HMS Belfast in particular struck me as filthy and uncomfortable.

By fancy stuff, what do you mean? Choice of coffee types or roasts or what? Gloria Jeans has a wider choice of roasts than most of the Starbucks I've been in. Best place though was the Karen Blixen Cafe in Copenhagen airport. They had Jamaican Blue Mountain:)

Having said that, if they manage to get a big enough place so they can do a nice Starbucks, and manage to overcome the staffing problems common to most coffee shops in Dublin except Cafe Sol, who have very regular hours and pay well, I won't not go in there if I have to meet someone.