Like craft beer and chef-driven restaurants before it, specialty coffee is having its moment, finally, in Dallas: Davis Street Espresso, in Oak Cliff, has found that a lack of Wi-Fi and to-go cups has not meant a lack of customers. Ascension, in the Design District, hums all day, despite limited…
All week, we’re bringing you stories from Dallas’ burgeoning roasting community. See other entries from the series in our coffee archive. Kevin Betts and Ryan Smith are chasing the perfect cup. This never-ending pursuit eventually pulled these two brothers-in-law into forming Novel Coffee. Both have been involved in the coffee…
There is no day on your future schedule, none whatsover, in which you will get more work done than the day you sipped a Kyoto Brew from Ascension. You know that level of caffenination when you find yourself saying words at ten times the normal volume, and your laughs burst…
All week, we’re bringing you stories from Dallas’ burgeoning roasting community. Monday we introduced you to the guy behind Oak Cliff Coffee Roasters, and yesterday the guys behind Tweed. Jonathan Meadows was 18 when he started working at White Rock Coffee and fell in love with coffee culture. “A big…
All week, we’re bringing you stories from Dallas’ burgeoning roasting community. Yesterday, we introduced you to the guy behind Oak Cliff Coffee Roasters. When it was announced, almost a year ago, that the original Pearl Cup coffee shop on Henderson Avenue would close, highly caffeinated tears were shed: It was…
Shannon Neffendorf’s entry into coffee roasting came out of selfish necessity. His job with Blockbuster (remember that) required work trips to Milan several times a year, and he soon found himself meeting with friends for cappuccino in the morning and taking a break for an espresso in the afternoon. “I…
On Saturday afternoon, the smoke was a beacon, luring cars and trucks from nearby Beckley Avenue as they drove towards Urban Acres. One truck hit the brakes hard to pull into the lot before passing by as owner Steven Bailey tended the coals that were putting up the thick, white…
It’s become an annual tradition, and I’m not sure how. While other food-freaks try to consume deep-fried everything at the State Fair of Texas, I get to know one dish — always the winner of the Big Tex Choice Awards — a little more intimately. So far my experiences haven’t…
It started with a simple desire to steer State Fair goers away from lesser grub. I was ready to take things one step further than Alice Laussade, who opined in her State Fair guide that the Big Tex Choice Awards for most creative were fried bullshit. In fact, I wanted…
Ever wanted to make your State Fair trip a little… competitive? Yeah, we got you. Right here at the top of this post you can find your very own State Fair bingo card, and clicking on the little words below it will pump it up to size. Print several, hand…
If The State Fair of Texas is Fried Christmas, Abel Gonzales Jr. is its Fried Jesus. The first year of the Big Tex Choice Awards, he won with Fried Peanut Butter & Jelly Sandwich. The second year, he won with Fried Coke. Third year: Fried Cookie Dough was his winner…
The 10th Big Tex Choice Awards were held inside the Tower Building at the State Fair of Texas this year. Unlike in previous years, there was a huge crowd; usually it’s just the finalists, the judges, their families, and media, but the State Fair sold tickets to the public to…
Remember when I ate that fried Cuban thing that was more of an egg roll and less of a sandwich? Remember when Hanna Raskin hurked after biting into a ravioli of deep-fried beer? Remember when Alice Laussade pointed out that this whole oil-logged Big Tex Choice Awards were getting a…
America’s number one source of minor heart palpitations just got a little more expensive. Food manufacturer J.M. Smucker recently announced a 9-percent price increase for Dunkin Donuts and Folgers (the bestselling brand in the U.S.) coffees. Thanks to stockpiles of Arabica, Smucker has been able to delay passing costs onto…
If coffee is important to you in a biological or emotional way, then you probably have an attachment to a coffee shop. If your love/addiction runs deep, you have a go-to place in every neighborhood in town. But what makes a coffee shop really good? The kind of good that…
People take their coffee very seriously, or at least take their coffee ritual very seriously. For me, coffee is a part of the rhythm of my life. Drinking coffee is my first order of business every morning without exception. I begin looking forward to that first sip of coffee in…
An important thing to remember about science is that, like a good soap opera, it’s never really finished. No issue is really settled as long as there are more people capable of asking more questions and doing more research. This is a good thing. It’s what keeps us from accepting…
It’s not easy to be in the coffee-shop game these days. Craft coffee isn’t cheap, and if you don’t have something else with decent margins to sell alongside it, you could be in big trouble. This has led many a business-minded person to create their coffee program in tandem with…
Back in July our erudite food critic Scott Reitz put out the call that there was prime coffee shop real estate waiting on Ross Avenue for someone to move in and make a decent cafe out of it. At least one person was paying attention. The intriguingly named Method: Caffeination…
Big shake up news in the world of Dallas coffee: not only is Austin-based Houndstooth Coffee coming to Dallas in 2014, it’s going to be replacing Pearl Cup on Henderson Avenue. Pearl Cup has been in its Henderson location for five years, and its lease is up at the end…
For a city that’s quick to tear down most any building, Dallas has embraced its history with gusto. Not that it’s possible to pretend that the Kennedy assassination never happened, but across the city people are enthusiastically touting their history and connections to event. Really, it’s a surprise we haven’t…
New research out of Harvard is strengthening the argument that coffee helps curb the risk of Type II diabetes. So coffee is alongside nuts, citrus, leafy greens, beans and sweet potatoes on the list of super healthy foods that help prevent diabetes. According to the Harvard research, the main reason…
