best coffee house

Peet's Coffee: Focused on Making the Best Coffee

Filed under: Dining

Peet's Coffee is nominated for a Luxist Award for Best Coffee House

Starbucks may be America's best-known purveyor of coffee, but Peet's Coffee & Tea has been around even longer. Though it has grown considerably in its day, Peet's remains focused on its craft through 188 retail outlets in six states and distribution to grocery stores, restaurants, homes and offices around the country. No surprise, then, that Peet's is a nominee for a Luxist award in the best coffee house category.

Peet's was founded in 1966 by Alfred Peet, a Dutch immigrant outraged by America's coffee-drinking habits upon arriving in San Francisco. He opened his first shop in Berkeley, focusing on making smaller batches, using better beans, and roasting darker coffee than those to which his Californian compatriots were accustomed. Peet's gained a loyal following of "Peetniks," including the founders of Starbucks, who turned to Peet's as a supplier in their early years.

As the millennium turned and Peet's continued to grow, the company went public on the Nasdaq stock exchange in order to help finance further expansion. Wall Street drank it up – shares of Peet's have risen nearly 200% since the initial public offering nearly ten years ago, bolstered by the company's expanded retail locations and robust online presence.

Meanwhile, Peet's continues to follow a philosophy aimed at ensuring it will never lose its old world charm: all beans are never more than a few days old; coffee is brewed fresh every 30 minutes; milk is never re-steamed. Some things do stick around – the original Peet's location still sits on Vine Street in Berkeley.

Vote for the coffee house that you believe is the best of breed. The voting period runs through April 30 and winners will be announced on May 1.

Tags: awards-main, best coffee, best coffee house, coffee, luxist-awards, peets, peets coffee

Victrola Coffee: Cup with the Connoisseurs

by Annie Scott (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Victrola Coffee is a small Seattle chain of cafes with enormous heart, and a nominee for a Readers' Choice Award for Best Coffee House.

If you've ever wanted to know coffee the way oenologists know wine, Victrola Coffee's weekly Wednesday "public cuppings" should be your first destination. There, you'll get to "cup" (fancy coffee terminology for "taste") a number of different roasts and beans to orient your tastebuds -- they're confident that once you're an expert, you'll choose Victrola.

The Victrola Coffee cafes are comfortable and cultural, just as coffee houses should be. You can pop in to read the newspaper or a book, or to check out the local art on the walls, which changes regularly, or even see a favorite band perform (upcoming events are listed here).

Gallery: Victrola Coffee Roasters in Seattle

One thing Victrola provides is truly knowledgeable coffee connoisseurs behind the counter. The have a morningly staff cupping before opening to get their buzz going and, most importantly, to taste the previous day's roast. Varietals like the widely-loved Streamline Espresso, Fair Trade Deco Decaf, Guatemala Santa Rosa and El Salvador Finca Alaska are roasted in-house, ensuring that everything is prepared with the utmost care.

If you'd like to know how far coffee geekery can go, visit their website for descriptive gems like: "Its pillowy viscosity clings to the sides of the warm demitasse. In a swirl around the cup, it offers fleeting notes of fresh pine that plump into a full, soft caramel aroma. Streamline's fruit---juicy blueberry and blackberry--carries it accross the palate in no rush: toasted hazelnuts, bittersweet chocolate, and brown sugar each take their time on the tongue before melting into a butter frosting mouthfeel. The four coffees working together here are a linear, tight knit bunch. They have dinner together and laugh until their bellies hurt, kind of like us."

Obsessive? Maybe. But that's just the kind of people we want making our coffee. (And maybe they just wrote it really caffeinated.)

Vote for the coffee house that you believe is the best of breed. The voting period runs through April 30 and winners will be announced on May 1.

Tags: awards-main, best coffee house, coffee, coffee house, Luxist-Awards, seattle, victrola coffee

Starbucks: A Coffeehouse Community Around the World

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining

Starbucks is nominated for a Luxist Award for being one of the best coffee houses in the U.S.

Unless you've been living under a pile of Sumatra beans for the past few decades, you've probably visited one of Starbucks' 16,000-plus locations. If so, you're one of the millions of customers who pass through the company's doors every day. Those impressive sheer numbers have earned Starbucks a Luxist nomination in the best coffee house category.

It's taken Starbucks nearly half a century to achieve its current success. The company's origins date back to 1971, when its first store was established in Seattle's Pike Place Market to sell fresh-roasted whole bean coffees from around the world. Named after Captain Ahab's first mate in Melville's Moby Dick, the Starbucks moniker was dreamed up to conjure images of the first seafaring coffee traders.

In 1981, current chairman Howard Schultz tasted his first cup of Starbucks coffee and was hooked. He joined the company a year later, and soon he was traveling the world researching coffee. He grew so fascinated with Italy's coffee houses that he left Starbucks to start a chain called Il Giornale; in 1987, he returned to purchase Starbucks for $3.8 million. As CEO, Schultz guided the company to its peak before leaving in 2000, only to return to his position in 2008 amid concerns of over expansion.

Starbucks is perhaps best known for steering America's tastes beyond a simple cup of Joe. With offerings including espresso, cappuccino, latte, and a variety of specialty items including the trademarked Frappuccino, the company's lingo has worked its way into the American vernacular. Beverage sizes (tall, vente and grande, instead of small, medium and large) have given Starbucks aficionados a language of their own.

In an effort to broaden its scope, the company now offers a variety of products, including sandwiches, bottled water and even CDs, in addition to coffee and breakfast. As Starbucks enters its fifth decade, the company's growth prospects are cloudy – hundreds of under-performing stores around the world have been shuttered – but there's little doubt millions fans will keep streaming through Starbucks to satisfy their caffeine cravings.

Vote for the coffee house that you believe is the best of breed. The voting period runs through April 30 and winners will be announced on May 1.

Tags: awards-main, best coffee house, coffee, luxist-awards, starbucks, starbucks coffee

Readers' Choice Awards for Best in Entertainment

by Carrie Coolidge (RSS feed) —

Filed under: Dining, Spirits, Wine, Big Givers

Is there a coffee house that offers both ambiance and a great cup o' Joe? Do you have a favorite brew pub that makes great-tasting beer and serves good food? What wine bar offers an extensive selection of wines and a knowledgeable staff? What are the best cocktail lounges? Which hotel bars are the best in the world? If you can recommend the best places to enjoy a cup of coffee, a glass of wine or a cocktail, we want to hear from you!

The Luxist Awards Readers' Choice Awards for Best in Entertainment will be awarded based on your nominations and voting. We're currently seeking nominations for the best-of-breed in the following categories:

Best Brew Pub
Best Cocktail Lounge
Best Coffee House
Best Hotel Bar
Best Wine Bar

One nomination per category, please. Submissions can be filed until April15, 2010. Winners will be announced on May 1, 2010.

Tags: awards-main, best brew pub, best cocktail lounge, best coffee house, best hotel bar, best wine bar, luxist-awards