One of the great things about having guests stay is seeing the place afresh through their eyes. And when those eyes belong to a geek, it’s gold-dust, which we have to share back.
Coffee then. We said in our “One Foodie Moment” post that we love The Yellow Canary for their frothy coffees and Portuguese tarts. The tarts may well be the clincher, but we’re good with that.
Coffee-Snob Simon [his partner’s description] embraced his inner-hipster under lockdown. He left us a lovely Google Review and this piece for fellow fans of the bean….
“For the coffee geek, your essential morning ‘specialty’ coffee stop in St. Ives should be Mount Zion Coffee.
Located in a stone shack in a cobbled courtyard just off the harbour, they have a passion for good coffee and know their stuff.
Generally, they seem to specialise in lighter roasted coffees with slightly more acidity, emphasising fruitier notes, rather than the over-roasted flavours that coffee chains traditionally offer.
The house serving is a ‘tall black’ which is described as two espressos on top of hot water. Which should in fact be read as “boundary-pushing, super-bold and intense, even ‘funky’, flavours” (as was subsequently described it to me).
However [top tip], they also offer a ‘batch brew’ filter coffee. This seems to be a slightly less intense, but still flavourful coffee, described as “one of the best value drinks we do”.
They seem to rotate the espresso and batch brew on a daily basis, always with interesting roasts.
FTR I tried great coffees from Curve roasters in Margate, Round Hill Somerset and a particularly good Ethiopian natural.”
We love the Mount Zion FAQ page which pulls no punches :
2. What do you do?
sell slow, pretentious, expensive coffee.
… seriously, what’s not to love about that?
j
