The Best and Worst in Seattle Espresso: 2011 Edition

This year I drank a lot of espresso. The Coffee Club of Seattle visited 113 different coffee places in 2011. Some of the places we visited multiple times. And that doesn’t count the places I went just by myself.

The 5 Best Espressos of the Year

  1. Victrola Coffee (February 5) –Sumatra Lintong-Triple Picked SO Espresso. 15th Ave.
  2. Cortona Cafe (May 24) – Espresso blend by Herkimer Coffee.
  3. Caffe Vita (October 28) – Caffe Del Sol by Caffe Vita. Pike.
  4. Victrola Coffee (August 5) – El Salvador SO Espresso by Victrola. Pike.
  5. Tougo Coffee (July 21) – Malabar espresso by Oslo Coffee.

streetbean espresso

The Worst Espresso of the Year

(tie) Katy’s Corner Cafe and The Good Coffee Company Espresso Blend #90

The 3 Best Decaf Espressos

For a few weeks this summer I did an #unplugged project where I sampled many decaf espresso options around Seattle.

  1. Espresso Vivace
  2. Equal Exchange
  3. Stumptown Coffee

Highlight of the Year

The 2011 Northwest Coffee Festival and the week of events leading up to it. Wonderful event. I look forward to attending next year.

7 Comments

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  1. Why do you list Caffe Umbria as “avoid” in the spreadsheet? I went there recently and thought it was good.

  2. @Becka – I posted about it in 2009.

    https://criticalmas.org/2009/10/espresso-forgiveness/

    Also note that I only drink espresso. They may do a great job with other drinks.

  3. Any list that doesn’t include All City Coffee in Georgetown is either wrong or incomplete. I don’t live or work in Georgetown anymore but visit whenever I can because it is quite simply so much better than anywhere else. I asked the barista why that is, but she just kind of smiled dismissively.

  4. @Greg – I didn’t make it to All City in 2011. It was much easier to visit them when they had their Pioneer Square location. Their roaster Caffe Vita did make my top 5 list above.

  5. Mas- Good to know. Makes me more inclined to trust the rest of your picks if you aren’t comparing to All City. I thought maybe we just had different tastes. I would be very interested to hear what you think. I used to work nearby in Georgetown. I am in Bellevue now and crave All City sometimes! Good vibe in the place most of the time too.

  6. I’m a Bostonian, and have only been to Seattle once this millennium, and of these, I’ve only been to Vivace. I’ve probably had espresso almost as good (at Lenox Coffee in Lenox Mass. and Barismo in Arlington Mass) but I’ve never had any that was better. I was there twice in early May 2012. It was like a Beethoven symphony going off in my mouth.

  7. Awesome. Your post insisting me to go for good espresso in Lahore Pakistan.

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