Also, there is a huge difference between coffee art and latte art. The biggest is that with latte art you build the design using simply the pour of the milk. With coffee art typically an instrument is used to draw on the foam or sprinkle nutmeg or cinnamon. Just thought I would clarify that.

Does Wireless Internet Influence Coffee Shop Choice: 57% say yes.

Every last Saturday of the month, for the last 3 months and ongoing they have events. There are 3-5 artists each month.

Last Saturdays is the brainchild of local performer Doug Bale, who wanted to start a regular night of laid-back performances.

“I’m 37 now, and I don’t want to bang my head against the door at a rock club where there are crazy metal bands,” Bale said. “People who come here are interested in something new and are interested in actually listening to the music.”

The event is now in its third month and features three to five artists a night that Bale picks.

Bale performs in each showcase and for this month’s event he hosts local musicians Mike Montoya (guitarist/vocalist of Fatigo) and Rocky Yazzie (guitarist/vocalist of Skinwalkers), as well as poet Shawnte Orion.

This is Montoya’s second performance at the showcase, which he said is a good fit for him because he is gearing up to release a solo album. Last Saturdays was Montoya’s first solo performance that he has made recently and he said he enjoys the singer-songwriter vibe because of the relaxed atmosphere.

This month he’ll play a mix of old and new Fatigo songs in addition to his solo material.

Read the rest of the article on AZ Central.

Drip Coffee Lounge
2325 N. Seventh St.
Phoenix, AZ 85006
Phone: (602) 795-9905

One of our own has passed away. Bill McCauley, the owner of Red Rock Foods and Daily Buzz Coffeehouse passed away on Monday morning. You may know Bill on this web site as “AzBill.” He was a regular contributor, and a sponsor.

If you’d like to read more about what happened, you can see the original article on the Tribune web site (with a few photos). Or watch the original television broadcast on AZ Central. Lastly, a follow up article was posted late Wednesday with additional details.

Important: Daily Buzz Barista’s Need Jobs

An unfortunate side effect of this is that Daily Buzz, which only opened 2 months ago in Queen Creek will be closed. This is really unfortunate.

One of the baristas emailed me to ask if I could post something about them looking for work. Here is what he said: “The Barista’s including myself are out of work and need jobs. I myself have a son and wife and others including the Manager Carla Zacher as well are hurting over the situation and need jobs. Contact me at jason_casale@fastmail.fm if anyone has jobs for us. I can pass the info to the other baristas and Carla.”

Jason Casale (Barista) — Phone (480) 654-3690 or email jason_casale@fastmail.fm
Carla Zacher — (General Manager / Barista) Email carla@dailybuzz.com
Logan (Barista) — Email jason_casale@fastmail.fm
Anthony (Barista) — Email jason_casale@fastmail.fm

I really hope that a local company can offer these people jobs or at least something temporary. If you can, kudos to you!

Red Rock Foods future…

Ron Cortez passed along that “Red Rock Foods has decided to be closed by Bill’s relatives, however business as usual will be taken by a new company called Arizona Coffee Source. Bill’s cousin who is a lawyer has everything set up and is going to operate even with the same employee and inventory (orders are being filled and delivered as now) I got my order today.” If you have an account with Red Rock Foods, just call them and they’ll take care of you.

I’d like to close by quoting Griffin911 (from the forum) when he said: “[T]he AZ coffee community lost a great friend and advocate this week. He will be missed.”

Here is a 20 second video clip I took:

Jolta Java
14418 N. Scottsdale Rd.
Suite 185
Scottsdale, AZ 85254
SW Corner of Scottsdale Rd. and Acoma
Phone: (602) MY JOLTA

The coffee chain has four Valley franchises with plans to expand by 25 stores in the next several years. A Scottsdale store will open in September on Granite Reef Road and McDonald Drive.

Torkelson said the Valley market is desirable because it “isn’t as saturated with coffee providers as other cities.”

Most of the coffeehouses have no sit-down area. Instead, customers get their fix via drive-through windows.

There is no “order box,” so transactions are quick and intimate, Torkelson said.

“We want to maintain a relationship between the barista and customer,” Torkelson said. “We’re targeting commuters and people who might not have time to get out.”

If I remember correctly, this location was going to be a Coffee Plantation at first, but then plans fell through.

The Human Bean Fountain Hills
17257 E. Shea Blvd.
Fountain Hills, AZ 85268

Thanks for the tip Tomas!

This week is the 2008 United States Barista Championship (USBC). There are a couple of people attending from Arizona and we wish them safe travels and a good time.

Jason Calhoon who represented Arizona at the SWRBC is going and will be competing in the barista competition. We wish him good luck!

From their MySpace page: http://www.myspace.com/cartelcoffeelab

We’re a new coffee roastery located in Tempe, Arizona. We are excited to offer our customers quality whole bean coffee as well as brewing equipment and grinders. Curious what our coffees taste like? We’d love to serve you a drink at our espresso bar, or brew you a fresh cup of coffee on our Clover. We’re located on the southwest corner of University and Ash, just around the corner from buffalo exchange.

Cartel Coffee Lab
225 W. University Dr.
Suite #101
Tempe AZ 85281
Phone: (480) 225-3899

Waverly’s Premium Coffee Roasters is located at 5775 E Broadway Blvd. Donna Hammond emailed me to let me know that they are planning a grand opening in May. I believe they are now open for a soft launch. Waverly’s is a coffee company based in Spokane, Washington.

The Tucson location was also featured in the newspaper on April 2nd.

According to Ellsworth, there are 40 coffee stores in Tucson, but only 12 have drive-throughs for a metro area with 1 million people. Spokane has half the population but 160 coffee companies — and most have drive-throughs.

“This market is hurting,” Ellsworth said. “The goal is to open one and continue to open places until the market says it is saturated.”

Ellsworth said they hope to open five to 20 Waverly’s in Tucson, all drive-throughs only, within the next few years. The company is named after Ellsworth’s father, Waverly J. Ellsworth.

Waverly’s Premium Coffee Roasters
5775 E Broadway Blvd.
Tucson, AZ 85711
Phone: (520) 777-6773

I took a video of the Daily Buzz Coffeehouse and wanted to post it here on the site.

Daily Buzz Coffeehouse
22721 S. Ellsworth Rd.
Queen Creek, AZ 85242
(in the new Village Shops at Queen Creek)

A few weeks ago I drove down to Queen Creek to check out the new Daily Buzz Coffeehouse. For people who live or work in that part of town, you are lucky.

Their are two things you need to know: First, the coffee is exceptional. They import all of their coffee from PT’s Coffee in Kansas City. It’s very smooth yet flavorful blend. Along with that, the owner, Bill McCauley is also experienced in food distribution, also managing Red Rock Foods. What does this mean? It means that they know their products and how to make them taste the best.

Carla Zacher is the manager at Daily Buzz, and prepared both a latte and a double espresso for me to taste. I’ve got to say, both were quite good — I drank them both in just a few minutes they were so delicious. I forgot to take a photo of the espresso, but here is a photo of my latte.

The second thing you need to know is that the building and interior are all custom designed and perfect for hanging out. There’s a section in the back that is geared towards laptop users. There are even plugs and wires if you want to plugin, or use their wireless internet (which is free). I hear that they’re installing televisions in this back area, too, so you can watch the news.

In the middle are some comfortable lounge chairs and then in the front are tables. A huge outdoor patio is also available when the weather is nice.

Beautiful outdoor signage. Some of the best I have ever seen on a coffee shop.

A shiny silver La Marzocco two group espresso machine takes center stage on the huge granite counter top. There is also room for a second espresso machine. You can also see the grinder and when I visited they ground and dosed for my shots.

A closeup of the La Marzocco espresso machine.

The front of the La Marzocco.

A view from the front counter — lots of tables for seating. I should also mention that Daily Buzz sells fruit smoothies which I understand are to die for. They make them with fresh fruit. Plus, they have breakfast bagel sandwiches and I understand more food is on the way.

Another view of the front counter.

Here is a view of the back room where there are stools and a counter for resting your laptop. Cool place to work for sure.

As you can see, they have a huge patio. Too bad the weather is turning warm. Overall, Daily Buzz is exceptional and if you’re in the area, or even want to try a new place then head down to Queen Creek and give it a try. Now, I just hope they open one up close to my office!

Daily Buzz Coffeehouse
22721 S. Ellsworth Rd.
Queen Creek, AZ 85242
(in the new Village Shops at Queen Creek)

View Larger Map

I was at the Jamaican Blue last night and heard they are closing for good on May 1st 2008.

I am looking for a place I can go to late nights - 11PM or later in the east valley/south Scottsdale area.

Wanted to check out Contraband but cannot find an address. On Ash in Tempe south of University.

I phoned Jamaican Blue and the phone number was disconnected.

It will be opening in May, 2008.

In addition, it looks like they have finally updated their web site with revised location information. Here are all of the current locations.

Shea Coffee Plantation
7366 East Shea Boulevard
Suite 101
Scottsdale, Arizona 85260

Tempe Coffee Plantation
680 South Mill Avenue
Suite 101
Tempe, Arizona 85281

Glendale Coffee Plantation
9404 West Westgate Boulevard
Suite C-103
Glendale, Arizona 85305

North Scottsdale Coffee Plantation on FLW
14144 North 100th Street
Suite B-100
Scottsdale, Arizona 85260

SOLO Cafe
107 E. Baseline Road
A-4
Tempe AZ 85283
Phone: (480) 838-SOLO (7656)

Cornerstone Coffee House
13915 N. Dysart Road
El Mirage, AZ 85335
Phone: (623) 933-1118

SOLO is located in the Mill Towne Center on the southeast corner of Mill and Baseline in between Curves and Altered Ego Salon. AndrewLiam wrote to describe their product: “Our coffee is supplied by Cortez Coffee in Tempe, our tea is from Maya Tea of Tucson, our Chai is from Third Street Chai of Boulder, CO and our pastries from Jonathan Robbins Bakery in Tempe.” I love the fact that they’ve disclosed sources. There’s nothing better to inspire confidence than knowing they’re willing to do that.

The interior is really nice. Dark stained cement floors and comfortable seating make for an enjoyable place to cozy up for a few hours or more. The free wireless internet worked great, and I was able to get online without any trouble.

I thought the red bicycle in the back of the shop over the counter was cool. That along with the colorful photography on the walls made for an interesting place to relax.

Considering they are close to ASU, I wouldn’t be surprised if SOLO ends up being one of the top college hangouts for students.

SOLO also recently acquired patio furniture - enough to seat at least 15 outdoors.

SOLO Cafe
107 E. Baseline Road
A-4
Tempe AZ 85283
Phone: (480) 838-SOLO (7656)

http://upcoming.yahoo.com/event/474099/

This caused me to wonder about good places to get donuts in the valley. For some reason Krispy Kreme closed and Dunkin Donuts is also closed across the valley (installing new lunch equipment or something).

Here are a few donut shops:

Wishill’s Donut House
1345 W Mcdowell Rd
Phoenix, Arizona 85007

Rainbow Donut
1347 E Mcdowell Rd
Phoenix, AZ 85006

Rainbow Donut
5045 W Thomas Rd #151
Phoenix, AZ 85031

Rainbow Donut
3458 W Van Buren St #103
Phoenix, AZ 85009

Karsh’s Bakery
5555 North 7th Street,
#116 Cinema Park Plaza
Phoenix, AZ 85014

Bosa Donuts
1016 N Arizona Avenue
Chandler, AZ 85225

Bunna has been open just shy of 2 years now and I’m afraid to say this is my first visit. The coffee shop is in a cozy little strip mall on the NW corner of Elliot & Rural. Bunna serves an almost exclusive organic menu. Their web site claims that 95% of their items are organic.

The coffee shop is small and only has table seating — no couches. I think it’s a wise choice considering the small space available.

Now to the coffee. I ordered a macchiato, which is two shots of espresso marked with foam. I have to be honest, it wasn’t the best. The espresso was under extracted and was very strong. The color in my photo was impacted by the tough florescent lights. I’ll be going back soon and will order a few more drinks to get a better sample.

Bunna Coffee
NW corner of Elliot and Rural in south Tempe.
7520 S. Rural Rd. Suite #12
Tempe, AZ. 85283
Phone: 480-377-2886

Daily Buzz in Queen Creek just launched breakfast bagel sandwiches.

And besides that, 100% of all coffee shops have plain bagels, muffins, and donuts. But that gets old, fast. Have you eaten any good food at coffee shops that you’d like to share?

I recently made a circuit of a few coffee shops in Tempe and Steve’s Espresso was my first stop of the day. I visited Steve’s Espresso on a Saturday in February before the weather had warmed up. One of the neat things about Steve’s Espresso is that they use a French Press for plain coffee. On a previous visit to Steve’s I had had an Ethiopian Harar made in the French Press and it was really quite good. It’s good of them to be using the French Press. Most coffee shops just do the drip thing.

But this visit was different, and based on the recommendation of a Jim Jeffers, I decided to try the Mocha Europa (pictured above). He had said it was one of his favorites from Steve’s Espresso. It was actually quite good. I don’t usually get the sweet coffee drinks. This one is definitely high up there on the sugar content. I liked how they served it in a metal cup. Classy!

I also ordered an iced toddy coffee. I found a seat on the patio. Almost all of the tables inside were taken. It’s no joke that they need more tables. There are a lot of people who stay at length working on their laptops. Toddy coffee was good.

Overall, Steve’s Espresso is a great place to hang out and get some coffee.

Steve’s Espresso
1801 E Baseline Rd.
Ste. 102
Tempe, AZ 85283
Phone: (480) 777-5373

Zelo Cosi Cafe
671 Hwy 179, Hillside Sedona
Sedona, AZ 86336
Phone: (928) 204-0051

I had a latte. Unfortunately they don’t have “for here” cups. I asked. Latte was good.

It was lunch time so I decided to try the chicken quesadilla. They warmed it up for me and served it with a cookie.

The coffee shop is very spacious. There are lots of chairs (probably a hundred?), plenty of tables for getting work done, and even several areas where you could hold a group meeting. This is (I think) the biggest coffee shop in Arizona. It’s certainly the largest I have ever seen. One interesting thing is that even though they’ve only been open for 2 weeks, the place had a decent sized crowd! There were probably 40 people there when I visited.

Oh, a note about the wireless internet: The postcard says it is free but when I tried to access it with my iPod Touch it asked for a password. You can probably get one at the front counter.

Next Coffee Company
19420 N. 59th Ave.
Building J
Glendale, AZ 85308
Phone: (623) 322-4852

Next Coffee Company
19420 N. 59th Ave.
Building J
Glendale, AZ 85308
Phone: (623) 322-4852

The Bad Ass Coffee Company of Surprise
15643 N. Reems Road
Suite 100
Surprise AZ 85374
(One block north of Greenway Road on Reems Road)
Owners: Christopher & Pauline Morrison

Royal Coffee Bar
209 W Jackson St
Phoenix, AZ 85003
Phone: (602) 374-8044

Chris,
Fantastic site. Jay Thompson put me onto your site.

I’ve written a series of reviews for coffee shops in Oro Valley. I indicate free WIFI where available.

Here is the link to the Oro Valley Coffee category. Feel free to use any information in these posts to get the word out on the great places to get a good cup of Joe in Oro Valley.

www.orovalleyhomes4sale.com/category/oro-valley-coffee/

Over roasted.

Those are a few of the words that come to mind when people talk about the coffee at Starbucks. Those words also sound like a campfire ritual! When I was a kid I liked to put marshmellows in the fire and catch them on fire. Then I’d blow them out and eat. Kind of brings back memories.

There is a new blend at Starbucks intended to remedy this situation called Pikes Place Roast. Do you think it will work? Have you or will you try it? Is this a move in the right direction or just another PR stunt?

Here’s what Sam writes:

One of my favorite coffee haunts in Tucson seems to be missing from your listing Le Buzz at the corner of Tanque Verde and Catalina Highway is really a great independent shop, coffee is all roasted in house (well it is roasted by the owner but no longer in the shop itself) the pastries are really great and it is a common meeting point for cyclists and climbers heading up Mt Lemmon. A fantastic shop http://www.lebuzzcaffe.com (site seems to be in development)

Thanks for the tip Sam!

Le Buzz Caffe
Tanque Verde & Catalina Highway
Tucson, Arizona 85749
Phone: (520) 749-3903