The Caffeine Chronicles: Sans Pere (CLOSED)

UPDATE (August 2018): Sans Pere has now permanently closed.

Is it a coffee shop? Is it a patisserie? Is it a lifestyle boutique? How about an estate agency? If you're at Sans Pere in Shoreditch, then it's all four, among diverse other identities. Named for owner Barney Goff's late father, Sans Pere occupies a bright, airy space on the corner of Old Street and Great Eastern Street and it's a welcome addition to the area.

There is a seating area on the broad pavement, under a canopy of large umbrellas, which is a great spot for people-watching on warmer days. Inside, you first reach the 'home' section, which includes homewares for sale (I liked the colourful cups and stacks of notepaper), homemade food to consume, and, in the back, the estate agency, which looks much like the rest of the space. With high ceilings and light interiors accented by cheery pops of colour and some very cool, oversized pendant lamps, it's a lovely space.

Over to the left, the café section serves up espresso-based drinks, hand- and batch-brewed filter coffee, non-coffee lattes (matcha, beetroot and turmeric) and various breakfast and all-day food options. The breakfast menu — including eggs and soldiers, and avocado toast — and the post-noon selection of salads, tartines and daily specials also sounded delicious. 

I had already eaten but it didn't take much to persuade me to order one of the delicious choux pastry bites on display on the counter (£2). The only problem was deciding which flavour to order; I went for the chocolate popping candy pastry (because of course) but the hazelnut and the caramel–vanilla both sounded fab too.

They had an Origin Los Altos coffee from Nicaragua in the hopper and I ordered a piccolo (£2.80). The trend for charging the same price for all white coffees seems to be growing, which is great for latte and flat-white lovers, although less good for us piccolo/macchiato aficionados, sadly. Nonetheless, my piccolo was well prepared and the chocolatey notes of the coffee came through very nicely.

The coffee also paired nicely with the chocolate popping candy pastry, which was a delicious sensory journey with the smooth, rich filling contrasting perfectly with the popping sensation. I probably could have managed another one (or two), but it's good to have something to look forward to for the next visit.

The staff were all really friendly and it was a wonderfully calm but cool place to relax with a coffee, sweet treat or light meal. Just be aware that with all the beautiful goods in the 'shop' section and a small but well-curated selection of retail bags of coffee beans from Origin, Assembly and Colonna, it may be difficult to leave Sans Pere empty-handed.

Sans Pere. 84 Great Eastern Street, London, EC2A 3JL (Tube: Old Street). CLOSED

The Caffeine Chronicles: Workshop Coffee, Fitzrovia (CLOSED)

UPDATE: Sadly, Workshop's Fitzrovia cafe is now permanently closed, but you can still visit them in their Belgravia coffee shop.

When I decided to revisit some of my 'old favourites' from London's specialty coffee scene last year, Workshop Coffee's Clerkenwell café was high on my to-do list. Sadly, that branch has now closed and although there's a new location in the White Collar Factory in Old Street, its weekday-only opening hours mean I haven't had the chance to stop by. Instead, I returned to one of the company's more established coffee bars, in Fitzrovia, which I've been to many times before but have never written up for this blog.

The Fitzrovia coffee bar is on Mortimer Street, just off Upper Regent Street and not far from BBC Broadcasting House. It's only a few blocks north of Oxford Circus, but the small, elegant café feels a world away from the hubbub and the hullaballoo. 

Each Workshop coffee bar is beautifully designed but I love the way that each one retains its own specific character. The first room, which houses the espresso machine and brew bar, is long and narrow with a stunning Madagascan granite counter. The colours pair nicely with the vibrant teal coffee cups and saucers (which would also go very nicely in my kitchen, incidentally).

It was late on a Saturday afternoon when I arrived and Workshop was relatively quiet. As usual, the coffee selection was excellent. There was a delicious-sounding Cedral from Costa Rica available as a batch brew but I was in the mood for the floral and green-tea notes of the Ethiopian Beyene, so I ordered this brewed through the Aeropress (£4). I also ordered a piccolo (£2.80) — there were two Central American varieties in the hoppers, but I'm not sure which one I got.

I took a seat on one of the comfy teal sofas in the back room, which feels like being in the living room of a friend with exceptional, Scandinavian mid-century taste. The coffee tables here are made with the same Madagascan granite as the counter. There's room for about 10 customers — depending on how friendly everyone gets — and a little more perching room the hallway between the brew bar and the seating area.

While I waited, I nibbled on a brownie bite (yummy, and just enough of a sweet treat for me that afternoon). They also had a few other cakes and pastries, as well as a couple of sandwiches on offer.

Both of my coffees were really good, but the filter coffee was particularly well brewed, with the subtler flavour notes of the Beyene coming through very nicely. It was a very refreshing brew for a warm afternoon. The presentation was excellent, of course, with the teal crockery coordinating nicely with the furniture.

I paused to admire the 'merch' on my way out. I rather liked the stackable mugs and was interested to see a Pump Street/Workshop coffee–chocolate collaboration.

Sad as it was to see the Clerkenwell Workshop go, it's great to know that there are still other great Workshop options around town — including a new one for me to try out.

Workshop Coffee. 80 Mortimer Street, London, W1W 7FE (Tube: Oxford Circus). Website. Instagram.

For 150+ more of my favourite coffee shops in London, check out my London specialty coffee guide.

The Caffeine Chronicles: TAB x TAB

As regular readers know, I rarely visit West London these days, mainly because it isn't very convenient to get there from Bermondsey (I am spoiled living relatively centrally, which means I tend to walk or take a single bus almost everywhere). But when I lived in Marylebone, I used to enjoy strolling over to Westbourne Grove on a Sunday morning for brunch and a spot of shopping. Now, the opening of a new design-conscious specialty coffee shop, TAB x TAB, on Westbourne Grove has wooed me back.

The Caffeine Chronicles: Attendant, Shoreditch

I reviewed the original branch of Attendant back in 2013, soon after the public-bathroom-turned-coffee-shop opened its doors in Fitzrovia and have been back a few times since then. There are now two further branches, one near Old Street in Shoreditch and the newest one on Leather Lane in Clerkenwell, which share the original's quirky décor and impeccable tiling, if not its convenient provenance.

Boston Briefly: Exploring New Neighbourhoods, Shopping and Eating

During my recent trip to Cape Ann, I went into Boston with my family on four days: a day trip, an evening at Fenway Park, and a day-and-a-half at the end of our stay. The weather ranged from cool and incredibly rainy on the day trip, to warm and sunny at the baseball game, to extremely hot on our penultimate day and hot, humid and sometimes rainy on our last day. Ah, New England summers!

Two Weeks on Boston's North Shore: Bex's Guide

I'm a city girl and tend to fill two-week holidays with multiple destination and many activities, but when my parents suggested a family holiday at a beach house near Gloucester, 40 miles northeast of Boston, the idea appealed greatly. We spent two weeks in Cape Ann 24 years ago and I was keen to return as an adult. I thought I'd spend time on the beach, read and write a lot, and take advantage of the regular trains into Boston. The weather was gorgeous so I did get lots of beach time but very little writing time as there were so many other things to do. Apparently, some 2,000 words' worth of things to do, thus this is a long read.

The Caffeine Chronicles: Gracenote Coffee, Boston

On our penultimate day in Massachusetts, we packed up our rental house and drove into Boston, dropping off our luggage at the hotel and the car at the car-hire office. It was a swelteringly hot afternoon and I wasn't planning to visit Gracenote Coffee's Boston coffee shop until the following day but when I realised I was so close to its location in the Leather District near South Station, it would have been silly not to go.

Coffee Extraction Class with George Howell Coffee, Boston Public Market

One of my favourite coffee shops from my visit to Boston in February was George Howell Coffee's beautiful flagship café in the Godfrey Hotel on Washington Street in Downtown Coffee. Last time, I didn't have chance to stop by their first Boston café at the lovely indoor gourmet-food market, Boston Public Market, next to Haymarket station, but I made it a priority on my recent trip.

A Perfect Day in Portland, Maine: Coffee, Food, Shopping, Lighthouses

The city of Portland, Maine, lies about 100 miles north of Boston and is the Pine Tree State's largest city, although still compact and easily explorable on foot or bike. The route from Gloucester, MA, where we are staying passes by Portsmouth and Kittery, which we visited last week. But I wanted to spend a full day in and around Portland and it's a relatively straightforward two-hour drive up the I-95, so we decided to make two separate trips. If you are car-free, the train from Boston takes about 2h30, so it's just about do-able as a day trip, although there's enough to do in and around Portland to keep you occupied for two or three days.