I recently went to meet some friends and colleagues at a nice new local coffee shop.
When I arrived, she was parked at the back of the place, surrounded by thrifted furniture. As I put down my bag and went to order, she handed me a mysterious drink wrapped in a nondescript recycled paper cup.
“I got this beat thing,” she said. “It’s really good!”
“Beet coffee?” I said.
Actually, I like beets. And like Forrest Gumpian (roasted beets, beet salad, beet juice, beet kombucha, borscht…).
“I don’t think there’s any coffee in it,” she said. “Try it.”
I did that. And it was good. It’s warm and creamy with a hint of ginger. But it’s sweet.
“That’s fine,” I said. “But it definitely has sugar in it.”
“Honey,” she said.
Potato, plop. I didn’t say it, but I thought it.
I don’t need dessert for breakfast.
The habit of drinking Frappuccinos at 7 a.m. baffles me, but the more I go to coffee shops, the more I feel like I’m in the minority.
Quay Hu, owner and founder of Qreate Coffee + Studio, assures me otherwise, and yet his stores at Mills 50 and Creative Village sell more “craft coffee drinks” than I drink.
In fact, Qreate doesn’t even do “drip” coffee anymore.
A perfect top for takeout or large gatherings. “Drip” is a modern term for something you order simply as “coffee” at Waffle House or pour yourself from a crock at Wawa.
We also don’t do “pour-overs,” which is a higher-end version of drip, where a barista brews each cup by hand.
Joe Burbank / Orlando Sentinel
Pour your coffee at Lineage Coffee Roasting in the Mills 50 District. (Joe Burbank/Orlando Sentinel)
“If you want to taste the beans and their roasting, as long as you don’t add sugar yourself, that’s what you’re looking for,” Hu explains.
When Qreate first opened, they had six to seven pour-over single-origin coffees.
“But they weren’t popular. We were making about 10 pieces a month.”
Qreate’s closest thing to plain old coffee is an Americano, made by pouring hot water over a shot or two of espresso. In some places, you might do the repairs yourself, but at Qreate, it’s full service. Milk and sugar can be added according to your order.
There’s also something called Aerocano, which is an Americano steamed and taken to the next level.
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“This adds air to the mixture, making it smoother, creamier, and a little thicker,” he explains.
It’s 10:29pm as I type this, and I didn’t get much sleep last night. It’s like heaven.
Fu says there aren’t that many places to do pour-overs, citing Downtown’s Deeply Cafe and Bottle Shop as his favorite place to do pour-overs (and one with a well-curated selection of natural wines).
So is Lineage Coffee Roasting, the original local coffee roaster for many of the city’s caffeine lovers. Quite a few shops around town are doing roasting these days.
Lineage debuted inside the East End Market in 2013, has grown to three locations with locations at Mills 50 and the University of Central Florida, and although it sells wholesale to many of the city’s culinary heavyweights (Lineage-based coffee service at The Foreigner is one of the best cups I’ve had outside of my own kitchen), it still offers both drip and pour-overs.
“What people look for when they go to a cafe is changing, but Lineage is trying to buck that trend a little bit and keep it pure coffee,” says founder Jarrett Johnson.
Lineage also takes a backseat to the recent trend of co-fermentation (mixing freeze-dried berries and other ingredients with beans in wash tanks to give them wild, fruity notes). “Because at our core, we’re cocky purists,” Jarrett jokes.
“In my eyes…in my mind, it’s no different than adding strawberry syrup to your coffee.”
While they’ve always offered seasonal coffee drinks with house-made syrups, “more and more people are coming in for an almost cocktail-like coffee experience, rather than just a drip black,” he says.
Hu agrees.
“Cafés are now more like craft cocktail bars, and have been for a long time,” he says. “Seasonal flavors…and in our case, we’re an Asian-influenced coffee shop, so we take a lot of inspiration from boba shops and tea shops.”
Brown Sugar Shake Espresso has long been one of Qreate’s most popular flavors and is inspired by the Brown Sugar Boba flavor.
I only found out about this about a week ago when the Coffeeness survey arrived in my inbox. The study analyzed Google Trends search interest to reveal the nation’s most popular festive drink and named it “Florida’s Most Popular Holiday Drink.”
We asked our Facebook readers and followers where they could find it. It probably took 30 seconds for someone to say “Starbucks.” And a minute later, “Dunkin.”
I’m definitely not a fan of specialty drinks. But it’s big. And mostly young. And while Gen Z is widely reported to consume far less alcohol than previous generations, they are very passionate about tea, boba, and coffee drinks (and in some places, hybrids of all three).
“It’s crazy what social media has done to coffeehouses,” says Michael Quigley, owner of Quigley Coffee Company in Sanford. “Now the matcha girls on Instagram are scouring all the matcha shops, stores that are just for matcha.”
Hu says social media is definitely a driver of trends, and it’s mostly about aesthetics.
“Cold drinks look better,” he says. “You can do cool things with them and decorate them really nice. Young people see it on TikTok and want it.”
In addition to drip and pour-overs, Quigley also offers a green coffee extract energy drink with fruit and herbs, and a drink called Coda Brew, a brown butter cold brew with pistachio ice cream. Both are quite sweet.
Affogato: A cool caffeinated espresso celebration
Cold foam is a hot new trend. Well, it’s cold, but you get my point.
I love the sound of many coffee drinks, but for me they work best late at night instead of dessert. One exception is Hahn Coffee’s beautifully layered iced cocktail, which combines Mills 50 espresso with elderflower tonic. Served with dried lemon wheels, it tasted grassy. Looks like a cocktail. refreshing.
But that morning, after tasting the “beet stuff” and spying some cold bubbly options and something seasonal with a gingerbread name on it, I was about to grab the counter. I was relieved until I saw two words written on the menu board.
Drip $3.50
Sold.
Are you interested in Christmas coffee?
It’s the season to get closer to friends you haven’t been able to meet throughout the busy year. Holidays are a time to relax and get together over coffee. Dozens of locations have opened around the metro in recent years. I had a few hits and more misses. Every time we catch up, another couple opens up. Below: List of old cafes, new cafes and new cafes. Whether you’re looking for cold brew or cappuccino, flat white or cold foam, or some clever concoction with a fancy name, you’ll find just about everything below.
For those interested in craft coffee…
Aguila Coffee: 1215 N. Orange Avenue in Orlando. Aguila Coffee.Square.Site
Blackbird Comics & Coffee House: 500 E, Horatio Avenue in Maitland, 321-316-4296; theblackbirdroost.com
Deeply Cafe and Bottle Shop: (Inside CIBER) 11 N. Magnolia Avenue, Orlando, deeplycafeandbottleshop.com
Dr. Drips Coffee Lounge: 1618 N. Orange Avenue in Orlando. instagram.com/dr.drip.coffee
Easy Luck Coffee & Bodega: 2425 E. South Street in Orlando. easyluckorlando.com
Framework Craft Coffee House: 1201 N. Mills Avenue in Orlando; frameworkcoffeehouse.com
Hahn Coffee: 1235 E. Colonial Drive in Orlando, 407-906-5119; Hahn Coffee.com
Harrah’s Coffee House: 1737 N. Alafaya Trail, 407-203-5002 in Orlando, and 1561 Lee Road in Winter Park (soft opening as of last week). hara’s coffee house.com
Lineage Coffee Roasting (in East End Market): 3201 Corrine Drive in Orlando, 321-236-3316; LineageRoasting.com
Mariam Coffee: 361 N. Rosalind Avenue in Orlando, 407-270-4613; mariamcoffee.com
Qreate Coffee + Studio: 1212 Woodward Street, Orlando, 407-601-1796 and 591 Chatham Avenue, Orlando, 407-286-4481. qreatecoffee.com
Quigley’s Coffee Company: 1730 Rinehart Road in Sanford, 407-687-1915; quigleycoffeeco.com
Rosso Coffee Bar: 840 E, State Rd 434 in Longwood, 407-687-8128; rossocb.com
Stemma Craft Coffee: 328 N. Orange Avenue in Orlando, 407-440-3018; 407-440-3018; stemmacraftcoffee.com
Zayn & Co.: (Degres Wine Trailer Park) 1215 Edgewater Drive in Orlando, 407-333-0543; instagram.com/zayn.and.co
