V – Lugz

No coffee Sunday was a bad idea. Drinking coffee everyday leads me to believe that if I stop, I will never work another day in my life.
Today, I would have stopped in at Sunny Spot Café, but it was closed. Jeesh what kind of café is closed on a Monday!

So I hit the next coffee place over… Lugz, the 1st and oldest café on Main St. Before I entered they have a good sign that makes a lot of things clear what kind of café this is… “Get in off the main path, support the local and boycott the multis”. Well not very humble but this is pretty much what I’m looking for. They state their specials… 2$ Lattes from 6-11pm. I liked the “Rain, rain go away” comment. Shows fun and expression! Extra bonus points for discounts to students and bus riders!

Within 5 minutes of entering the place, I realized that this place has the potential of being my place. I was immediately hit with “Find my way” from Tribe. The only guy working, Jark, was the environment, and conversing with everyone. He had his own mix playing… hip hop, reggae, industrial electronic stuff... But also, what a nice guy… he gave a girl a medium instead of a small cuz “it was Monday”. He had a sense of humor writing “We now have 4 sizes.. small medium, large and Chuck Norris”. He called everyone “Big Guy!” He gave a guy a free Green Tea just because it was “his” green tea. He truly was the café and he was cool so this place already tops the others.

The place is decorated in music and definitely speaks to the alternative. They have a nice big bulletin board with lots of music posted. However, there were fewer personal communal events posted compared to Bean Around the World, so a little less popular. Well let’s find out why…

This place has free internet, 6 computers, sofas and funky space chairs by two long bars (I sat in one of the space chairs. It was broken and I almost fell over… ya this place is kind of rough). The next space chair to the right was open and it worked…

The coffee… pretty normal. Jark says it comes from Lugz’ own organic coffee beans, that are roasted in Richmond… well obviously not as fresh as JJs then. But they have a water cooler, which has free water, not like the other places that sell water or give you tap.

Lunchtime

Jark tells me to get a pannini which seems to be the food of choice in the cafes. I told him to set me up and the one he made me was full of mushrooms, pretty ballsy considering not everyone likes mushrooms… I guess I just look like a mushroom type of guy (he he he). Very good. Nice and saucy! The award winning chai was also very good, but a little too mild. He said that he can also make it strong if I ask.

It is worth noting their bathroom. Straight out of Trainspotting… they only have one that was very small. It was kind of uncomfortable as it was also the water heater room. But “whatever” if you are me… I got the job done. However, they were also out of soap… yikes!

The end of my day

My bill

Americano 2.65
No visa
Pannini and Chai 14.10 (tip included and well deserved)


Rating

Coffee B
Service A+
Atmosphere B
Music A+
Bathroom D
free internet +1 bonus point

IV – Bean Around the World (with guest Oliver)

A magestic tree, in the school field I peculiarly noticed on my walk to Main street, said something to me... Already there was an electricity in my blood that followed my instincts to go to “Bean Around the World”. Am I ever in the prophetic zone… it’s amazing what a woman can do for a man (but that’s another blog).

The only spot available for me to plug in was available beside a new 6 month baby girl Claire and her mother Kerry with friend Sharon. I invited myself to set up next to her and what a bonus to be able to share glances with the chubby lil’ muffin… which leads me to my next discovery… BATW’s low-fat muffins. I ordered a large Americano in my roommates BATW mug, and a Poppyseed Raspberry Lemon Muffin!!! Woot Woot… a new taste! What a muffin… I might be making a switch from the cookie (sorry Ginger Snap ☹… you’ll always have a place in my heart) I ate it so fast I forgot to take a picture, and I had to order another one…

The coffee… what can I say. Talking to Oliver’s girlfriend Lindsay (and professional coffee drinker) last night at “Public”, she was right on the money that their coffee is a nice change from her regular preference of JJ Bean… I totally agree. Very mild but there was some definite flavor.

The next big thing hit me while I waited for my Americano, and exploration of the wall. I saw on the wall that they have LIVE music Saturday nights, and who else would play tonight but “Jennifer Lauren”… HOLY SCHNIKEYS! The one out of two girls that I know personally that sing professionally. I guess I will have to delay my Halloween extravaganza until a little later than expected. Oh well, pirates aren’t supposed to come out until after midnight anyways right? Oh, maybe that’s just vampires. I can be a vampire… check out my vampire smile.

OK, so I wonder over and about to second check this place for power to plug in, the one thing that has been a disappointment here. And to my pleasant surprise, there are two more. So maybe… just maybe. They even have free internet here, well… unfortunately it is not working today… too bad. I talked with the tall neurotic guy who was working and making fun of his co-workers. A good sign of sense of humor within the place… a definite plus. I don’t know if the girls like him though, so that could easily change to a minus. Anyways, he said that they have a bakery with here in shop… hence why that damn good muffin!

Along with a plentiful collection of newspapers, comes the bulletin board. What a nice touch to a café! Man I am loving this place more and more! It’s full of concerts and community activites and services.
12 noon

A visit from my good friend and roommate Oliver. He is the one who told me to inform people of newspapers, bathroom cleanliness and what not... ahhh, I'll let him do that if he wants to write some posts.
He’s starving so I show him to the display case of fresh baked goods and sandwiches. We get into the consistently long BATW line, and we nervously notice that there is now only 3 Tomato, Spinach and Boccoccini sandwiches left from the recently made 6.

Luckily we get them and they’re pretty good. I personally think they might need a sauce in there… like pesto or balsamic vinegar… maybe I could have ordered that on the side?

1pm

After Ollie leaves, two people have approached me to see if there is WIFI here. I told them that it was not working today and they split. Sorry management, but that’s a pretty big faux-pa here in the city. Not that I care that much but these people obiously needed their crackbooks logged in, and you probably lost some minor profits today, but I think more so the loss of these people on a regular basis scale… whatever the hell I am talking about, I’m sure you get what I mean.

2pm

I am now bothered by something. There is a smell of mold. It could be the wood. This place is totally wood everywhere and the floor kind of looks nasty… anyways I really notice it now but not enough to keep me away. I don’t think most people will notice this, but I am impressed with myself that I am picking up some little things that might disturb people to a different level.
My 2nd Americano which they filled up for me double-time, is now cold but still tastes really good. This could be the sign of a good coffee as I noticed my coffee at Waves yesterday did not taste good cold.

8pm

NO JENNIFER LAUREN - Brutal false advertising!!! I made an effort to go out of my way because it said that Jen was playing here tonight. I even asked one of the girls how she would be setting up and they said she would set up right where I was sitting. It was some other guy... Man if you are going to advertise your LIVE music once a week, it doesn't take much to write it on the wall properly. Get with it management! Horrible loss of points!!!


My Bill

Large Americano and Muffin = 3.60ish
Tomato and Boccoccini Sandwich = 6.45ish (sorry forgot to grab the receipt)

My Rating

Coffee A
Service B
Atmosphere A-
Music B

III – Waves

Another sunny day… 2 in a row! Whoa Vancouver! Maybe this talk about a warm winter in true.

So with the sun I fly down to Waves on my longboard… HeHeHe. But definitely not a surfer café. The place is sleek! Black leather and granite tabletops with a 50” plasma displaying CNN news over a fireplace, I felt like I was in yaletown needing to check if the Dow was up or down.

I ordered a large Americano since they didn’t have anything special to their name. I have to say that now that I know what good coffee tastes like, this wasn’t anything special. It was good, but maybe like a Starbucks bitter taste that didn’t have much flavor. It was a big cup, much larger than JJs so that won some points as sometimes I like quantity over quality especially on coffee as I don’t really care too much about the taste as long as it doesn’t stink.

I was excited about the music. They were playing hip hop for the first couple of hours. Good stuff too… but a weird thing happened and it changed to some weird elevator music and then to C-isle 650 oldies... by night I requested a change again and they put on some electronic stuff. Oh well… it started out really well but then disappointment, as I realized the staff had nothing to do with the playlist, they just change the satellite channel. NOT GOOD! If the staff is about the music, people will converse with them... maybe even spread some decent music culture around... get with it all of you trendy cafes.

The place was so busy that I felt like a fly on the wall. Which was good. I got a lot of work done, and so did everyone else. Window bar was full of labtops and I got to meet another video editor sitting next to me. He was a SFU film graduate working on a wedding. Jeesh, people need SFU Film Graduates to make their wedding video exciting… get a life! (That was a joke in case you don’t know what my main source of income is).

But anyways, check out this pic. They designed the whole wall for labtops to be able to plug in… and FREE wireless internet with no password (sweet).

I ordered a HEALTHY flax seed salmon roll which were very unique but kind of smelly and I dared not talk to any of the beautiful girls that were coming in off the street from shopping at all the cool clothing stores on the block. They were kind of annoying anyways. Also annoying was a bum that walked in off the streets to ask everyone for change and another sketchy dude that was randomly loud… I guess I can’t complain, since it is main street.

After a very productive 8 hour work shift, I decided to explore the place. The girl I had asked about the music gave me a nice smile so I asked her if there was anything yummy. She said the chicken pesto sandwich so I ordered again. The bread was a bit stale… oops. But the place is really nice, clean and stylish. I would definitely come back for a coffee date, and possibly another productive work day once every so often.


At the end of the day

My bill

Large Americano 3.23
Salmon Roll with Limonata 6.48
Chicken Pesto Sandwich 6.35

Rating

Coffee C+
Service B
Atmosphere B
Music C+
free internet +1 bonus point
Open 24/7 +2 bonus points

II – Café Rustico (Main and 15th/16th)

A nice day to start my search. I wanted to set-up shop in “Bean Around the World” but at 9:30 it was just packed and with only one electrical output taken by two different people, I had to move on.
When I saw “Café Rustico”, I immediately said “get the camera”. Not because I’m Italian… in fact I do believe that most Italians go a little overboard with their Patriotism, but this place has unique Italiano Cappuccino Café feel.

10:00am

I arrived and the place was just dead… not a soul except for the two girls working. I ordered the advertised special, and set myself up in the back corner on a sweet 70s couch with my Cappuccino. Sweeeet... Eat your heart out Costanza.

Had to get the Cappuccino… no sugar right? I guessed that that is how you are supposed to drink it, and I was right. The nice oriental girl told me that you aren’t supposed to put sugar in a cappuccino. She said it was especially imported coffee from Italy and the owner, orders the coffee especially strong. A little bland actually... better buy your own coffee roaster Mario.

But the placed was so nice to work in. There was only Italian music playing… mostly classical and opera which I didn’t mind but non-distracting and easy to zone out of... so no complaints there. The one complaint I had was that the ceiling fan was much louder than the music.
In this relatively small place, 10 tables with amazing Venice-like porch outside, there were only two electrical outlets to plug into. I was able to connect to the internet for free without any password… very cool!

12:48pm

The girls were nice. One of them told me to get the Caprese because it was spicy. But they were a little too shy. As I waited, I noticed that they call the Americano coffee… “Canadiano”. Right on.


It made me ask them about the owner, and apparently he works the night shift. Sometimes he closes at 9pm and sometimes at midnight... so it might be a nice date. But I like how the owner works at his own café. It makes me want to come back and get to know him.

The food tasted really good. The panini was different and probably homemade. It was a good price and this café has the potential to get me regularly.

At the end of the day…

My Bill

Special (Cappucino, Panini, and pasta)
With a Limonata 12.00 even (I love this tax included thing)

My Rating

Coffee C+
Service B
Atmosphere A-
Music B
free internet +1 bonus point

I - JJ Bean (with guest Jeff)

12:39pm
I’ve been here for about three hours now and Jeff will come visit me soon as I told him how good the coffee is. So let's start my review other than what I've said about the problems of the JJ Bean music in the Problogue.

It’s big. It has nice high ceilings where the birds seem to like to fly around when it’s raining outside. It’s nice and bright as the walls have huge windows. The coffee bean roaster is pretty cool (see pic).

There’s chessboards and a nice selection of seating from a booth in the back to big soft chairs by the fireplace, tables, window bar looking onto the street, and lots of tables outside covered by a roof so you can sit outside when it’s raining. I really like how there is so many electrical outlets so you have no problem finding a plug in, however there is no wireless internet so if you’re are a crackbook victim, you’ll have to log on to the Bell system from Starbucks across the street that has a weak signal.

1:07pm

While forced to listen to “Blame it on the rain” (milli Vanilli?), “Baby baby” (Amy Grant) and “Never gonna get it”, I ordered a sandwich that went surprisingly weird.
Knowing now that I would now be a critic, I decided to ask the tall blond girl with huge blue eyes what she thought about the sandwiches…

“What do you think about the Chicken Pesto sandwich?” I asked.
She gave me a snobby look and told me “I have no idea.”
“Well, what do you eat when you’re here?”
“I don’t.”
Awkward pause…
“Well can you recommend anything I could have for lunch?”
“People seem to be eating the sandwiches.”

I felt like telling her to go straighten out her panties, but I remained polite figuring it was probably just that time of the month, so I just smiled and ordered the chicken pesto. She grilled it for 5 minutes and it hit the spot… cheesy, big chucks of chicken, and a powerful dill pickle, but a little small and pricy for 7.50$.


2:00pm

Jeff finally arrives. He’s in a bad mood.

Jeff's Opinion
my americano was really good, lots of flavor, strong body, simlar to the one I had at the locust lounge on king ed, and main. I already ate if I didn’t I would have one of the pesto chicken sandwiches on a chili cheese bread. looks good!!!



At the end of the day...

My Bill

Large Americano 2.85
Croissant 2.00
Large Chai Latte 4.05
Pesto Sandwich 7.50
Limonata 1.50

(taxes included in the price… cool! No Pennies!)

Rating

Coffee A+
Sevice C
Atmosphere A
Music F-