Costa

2 out of 5

Feedback from my legions of adoring fans (denoted in old English as 3000-6000 Cavalry… apparently Horses really dig snarky literature about Coffee) suggests that nobody likes reading about how much I like places. It is far more in keeping with the current economic climate and British-ness in general for everything to be awful and to moan about it so that others can node sagely and agree.

Also it’s a lot more fun to get good and worked up about a coffee being awful and it allows for much more colourful comparisons, like saying their drinks are about as enjoyable as eating a pine cone dipped in marmite. So I guess it’s time for me tackle the first of the ‘Big 3’ Coffee giants, that employ a workforce the size of a small country to make substandard Coffee and avoid corporation tax.

Costa then, fair warning it isn’t the worst or most evil of Big 3, more of a slow-witted lumbering giant who is tricked by the villain into carrying out their schemes but doesn’t really know any better. I actually do visit Costa (when nowhere else is available) but their drinks leave me feeling flat and disappointed rather than angry. They over-milk absolutely everything (apart from the Cortardo which is by far and away the best thing on the menu) and the quality of the coffee varies wildly by location and individual barista.

I know for a fact the machines they use are good, the coffee itself is good and I guess the milk frothers are up to scratch (it’s hot air how bad can they be?), but for a company with 1000 times the resource of any independent branch, why can’t they be as good? At the very least kidnap a wandering Kiwi or Australian (all the best independent places seem to be run by them) and get them to teach your staff, there must be a few of them leftover from the world cup who have yet to fly home?

The Reach Bar and Kitchen

4 out of 5

A few weeks back my friend Lewis asked if I wanted to meet him at a local Bar (where his housemate bar tends) for a pre workout coffee. Having just started this blog I saw this as a fortuitous coincidence so eagerly agreed.

The Reach Bar is located in Gallions Reach (ohhhh I see what they did there) right on the water front. I know this goes against my usual zone 1 coffee shop rule but 1. There are no sprung floor gyms in central and 2. I like to make any stalkers I may have accrued work for it by mixing up my movements now and then.

The bar has a good solid wood traditional feel and a decent range of ales and lagers on tap which is an instant point in my books (no naughty! Focus on the coffee), luckily the chef wasn’t in as it was a bank holiday so I didn’t have the temptation of the (well reviewed) food colouring my opinion of the coffee. I plumped for a macchiato while Lewis opted for a mocha. While Lewis has a great many good qualities his taste buds have been corrupted to the point where his drink of choice is a Starbucks white chocolate Mocha so any opinion of his regarding coffee should be taken with the entire dead sea’s worth of salt. Nether the less he enjoyed his mocha so I guess if you have any toddlers or mad people with you then The Reach will also accommodate their incorrect beverage choices.

Anyway, the coffee was good, nicely rounded with the foam adding a subtle contrast to the strength of the espresso. I am looking forward to returning and getting some food and the lack of a heavy milk component would suit ending a meal.

Noble

4.5 out of  5

Greetings readers, apologies for the delay in your regular reading (oh god, 1 month in and I’ve already become one of those people who posts about how they haven’t posted). I have been rather busy as of late, jet-setting to Spain with work and then being brought crashing back to earth last weekend, spending the day being dropped into mud, tear-gassed and electrocuted. That’s the last time I leave the comfort of Zone 1….

I was all set to write some kind of ‘Froth Sloth on Tour’ post about a charming coffee shop on the south coast of Spain, but I guess we can’t always get what we want - there were no coffee shops in Estepona, unless you count the Irish pub who offered me a shot of coffee liqueur, which tasted of moonshine and Nescafe gold blend.

Instead, I picked a more local establishment, Noble espresso, a literal pop up (their marquee is spring-loaded), which wheels out an all-in-one bar counter with espresso machine, from their van every morning, setting up just outside Kings Cross. And Noble is good, in fact it’s great, they manage what an entire soulless mega corporation fails to do: make a decent cup of coffee with a menu that could be written on a stamp (a big-ish stamp, one of those ones you get at Christmas, but the point stands). Also, their Barista has a truly ludicrous moustache, which he pairs with thick rim glasses for the full +7 Hipster Coffee Buff Armour Set (that was a videogame reference for anyone whose parents never let them have a PlayStation).

My Italian friend approves of their espresso but was less enthused by their pastries - they aren’t made on site, which is fair when your venture packs into a van every evening. So my advice is: coffee good, best get your all-butter croissant fix elsewhere. 

Saint Espresso

3.5 out of 5

Located just next to Angel Station on Pentonville road, this small coffee shop grabbed my eye as I walked to work a few weeks ago and has become a semi-regular place to dip into. Why not a regular place you ask? We will get to that later (nice, build some intrigue, draw in the reader, my old English teacher would be so proud).

Saint's Coffee is that very standard 'Good' coffee that has sprung up all across the capital like caffeinated mushrooms. just a few years ago it would have been a real gem to find to but there is feeling of slightly corporate cookie-cutter hipsterness... (yeah I don't see that phrase catching on) as if a group of executives in their mid to late 30's listened to the Spotify indie playlist for an hour and then said " yep, we're down with the alternative crowd, let's make a coffee shop'.

This isn't to say it's bad, the beans are well roasted, they use nice organic whole milk and get a good thick layer on my Flat White and they serve some nice looking pastries on slates, another 'kind of alternative but not really touches'. But the staff are all identically dressed, with nary a nose piercing or sleeve-tats between them, the decor is all perfectly matched and it all feels just a little sterile, as if you could peel the skin back from the baristas faces to reveal a terminator skull with glowing red eyes and processors powered by money.

As one Google review (yes I had to Google the street it was on) whined 'It doesn't have any Wi-Fi and won't be getting any', a massive faux pas in alternative coffee shops as no pretentious bloggers can be expected to stay for long if they can't get online (yeah glass houses but I'm making a point). Clearly a focus group realised that Wi-Fi isn't cost effective for getting more people in and out of the shop, thus reducing revenue and going against BAR15STA core programming.

All in all, a decent cup of coffee with no warmth or character to the shop, be a faceless giant or a hipster hangout Saint's because being trying to be both only increases the chance your staff will go haywire and attack commuters with milk frothers, (which incidentally sounds like the plot of a Simon Pegg film)

notes

4 out of 5

My first review choice was an easy one, notes (yes spelt lower-case) is located 20m from my office and is my most frequented shop of late, partly due to proximity, partly because the rest of my team all smoke and it gives me an excuse to get away from my desk with them and partly because notes does a pretty good coffee.

My poison of choice is Ricin  a Flat White, which I will always order in a new place as it combines the strength of the beans with the body of the velvety milk to give a deep smooth flavour. It is also a good choice for coffee on the go as unlike a cappuccino (or other foamy coffee) the 'sippy cup' hole doesn't get in the way. The notes Flat White very almost ticks both of those boxes; the milk is creamy and rich, with a pleasing body to it and the coffee is well roasted and tasty. Where the drink could improve is in the beans themselves, they are just a little too mild for my personal taste which robs notes of a perfect score.

But the appeal of notes isn't just the coffee, for the jittery mess who has already pounded their 9th espresso the options of beer and wine are also available. I initially thought this sounded like a great option but then realised that I had never sampled a notes beer and stumbled across the problem: people don't go for a coffee run and end up with a beer (not unless it has been a particularity awful mornings work) and people craving a beer after work never say "actually do you have a Latte instead". The former are drowning their sorrows while the latter deserve to be water boarded for upsetting the natural order of beer o'clock on a Friday.

What I do like about notes is the feel of the place, it's all varnished wood, rustic counter tops and soft music, it feels almost like a book shop instead of a coffee bar. A little quiet space in a bustling city. Also, there is not a single syrup bottle, whipped cream can or frappé blender in sight, marvellous. 

Enter the Froth Sloth

Oh hello reader, I didn't see you there, most likely due to the fact that I am writing this in the past and I haven't quite cracked how to spy on you via webcam, but enough about my other projects...

Welcome to the Froth Sloth, a review of some of London's greatest (and not so greatest) coffee establishments presented with all of the sarcasm and attempts at humour I can muster. As part of my day job, (at least until my revenues from this blog surpass all previous concepts of wealth and I can retire) I get to see an awful lot of London and by extension a fair amount of coffee shops. This means that when the team is craving a pick me up, I am usually the one to suggest somewhere as otherwise someone will say 'Starbucks?' and I will be forced to beat them over the head with their own shoes.

Three years of city life, shoe beatings, dismantling web cams to see how they work and drinking coffee have lead me to this blog, a guide to my favourite non-alcoholic vice