#48: Broadcast Coffee - Capitol Hill(ish)

If you’ve been following along, you know that this coffee endeavor has been and will continue to be somewhat dampened for me due to the extreme amounts of parallel parking on busy streets that is required when dealing with Seattle. The experience at Broadcast Coffee was no different. Anyone who knows me knows that I have slight to severe anxiety about dealing with parking in cities. Driving in cities, driving on the freeway, doing anything else motor-vehicle related is perfectly fine; in fact, I quite enjoy it. However, parking is my kryptonite. I’m a terrible parallel-parker and have, on more than one occasion, contemplated the legitimacy of me passing my driver’s test on that fateful day back in 2005.

Anyways, I drove myself into Seattle, fearing the worst. Which, it happens, is what I got. The traffic was bad, the streets were busy, the parking was parallel, and there were no spots to be found. I would like to emphasize that what happens next is nothing short of a miracle in my life: I did not panic. I did not use a GPS. I simply drove around for a few minutes, circling back to streets I had already driven, going to areas I had never been before, trying to find a place to park. Now, normally, I would look desperately for a parking lot, even if it meant that I had to pay a ridiculous amount. In the past, I would gladly pay any amount  to get out of the “Parallel Parking with Angry Drivers Behind You, Watching You, Judging You” business. This time, however, I passed several pay lots and passed them by, determined to find a free street parking spot, determined to grow as both a person and a driver.

After about ten minutes of searching, I found what I was looking for. Although it meant having to deal with this, my least favorite intersection in the entire world. I mean, seriously, what is this? Two roundabout-esque structures with five entrances each? It’s like a small child took some molly with Miley and decided to get into the city planning game:

Okay, now that this blog has become almost entirely about driving and parking in Seattle, perhaps it's time to change gears (haha, get it?)

On my walk from my car to Broadcast, I had the distinct pleasure of walking behind two college-aged guys talking about the "chick I banged last night" until the "banger" slipped on a slick grate on the sidewalk and fell down. Justice. Anyways, it was a stereotypical, rainy Seattle day, so I found Broadcast like this:

Kristy was waiting inside Broadcast, because she was driving from Olympia and met me there. She brought me a biscuit. 

The menu is simple, which is always refreshing to me. There are about ten options. I got a nonfat latte and paid with a credit card on one of those iPads equipped with a credit card reader. Every time I use one of those and sign my name with my finger I feel like I'm using a very fake Playskool machine that is going to steal all my very real money. I don't know why. (Also, I just realized now that it is a TERRIBLE idea to spell "school" wrong on toys that are meant for children. Why, Playskool, why?)

There really isn't a whole lot to say about this place. The coffee was fine, the barista man was nice (he had a t-shirt with drawings of coffee cups on it, which gave him an air of credibility). The coffeeshop itself is pretty large with lots of tables and interesting art. Overall, it was just fine. Nothing great. Nothing bad. 

My favorite part was the following juxtaposition of hate and love on my way back to my car. People are wonderful. 

Visit Broadcast Coffee

Review of Coffeeshop #49: Uptown Espresso

#49: Uptown Espresso - Wallingford

Let me begin with a disclaimer: I am not a coffee expert. I have never been a barista. I haven't taken a trip to Guatemala to visit an organic, sustainable coffee bean farm. I don't know how to properly use the word "mouthfeel" (although, I am of the opinion that no one should use the word mouthfeel, like, ever). I am just someone who enjoys drinking coffee on a pretty regular basis. That's the extent of my credentials.

So, Uptown Espresso. 

Come to find out, there are several locations throughout the city. Kristy and I opted to go to the Wallingford location, because it is the closest to our house, and because, well, Wallingford is super duper cute. 

Some important background information: I am a terrible parallel-parker.  Like, world-class terrible. If there were an Olympic gold medal awarded for "You Absolutely Suck at Parallel Parking, and The Whole World Needs to Know In Order To Ensure The Safety of the Driving Public," I would receive that medal, every four years, no contest. Given this information, Kristy drove us to Wallingford, assuming that we would run into some parallel parking situation that would be far too stressful for me to handle. 

However, when we got to Uptown, I saw the most glorious thing I have EVER seen: a parking lot. Guys, a parking lot. In Seattle. For free. Right in front of the coffeehouse. I'm not sure that I can fully express how happy this made me. Remember in Cast Away, when Tom Hanks lost Wilson for the first time, but then he found Wilson and started laughing and apologizing and crying because he had his best friend back? Yeah. That's how happy I was.

Me, upon seeing this glorious parking lot.

After I got over the initial shock of the parking lot, we went inside. The inside is very cute and has a lot of large, wooden tables that would be perfect for studying. The barista was very nice, and Kristy noticed that she was wearing a Noah Gundersen tour t-shirt. We had just been to his show at the Neptune, and so  I asked her if she went as well. It turned out that she was also at the show, which began a discussion of how great the show was and how Abby Gundersen is pretty much a beautiful, flawless angel. (If you aren't familiar with the Gundersens and would like to be, start here).

I ordered a nonfat latte and Kristy ordered a caramel americano. The prices were a bit higher than average (the latte was $4.05 for 16 ounces), but, let me tell you, it was so worth it. The foam was so, so, so, so, so good (which makes sense, seeing as Uptown's tagline is "Home of the Velvet Foam"). The taste of the shots was also delicious. I would most definitely feel comfortable saying that this cup of coffee was easily one of the Top 10 cups of coffee I have ever had. I would highly recommend it, and I will be back there very soon, I'm sure.

So, in conclusion, if you like wonderful coffee and/or parking lots, Uptown Espresso is the place for you.

(Sad news: No sighting of attractive sweats-man today).

Visit Uptown Espresso

Review of Coffeehouse #50: Ugly Mug

#50: Ugly Mug Cafe - U District

The first, well, fifteith, coffeeshop on the list is "Ugly Mug," a place in the U-district. Kristy, my roommate, came with me to this one... well, she drove us there, so I guess I went with her. We got close to the location with relative ease, that is until the giant orange cones and detour signs blocked our path to the coffeeshop. So, we gave up and went home.

Just kidding.

We parked a block away and walked. It was unclear if we could walk around the barriers, but we saw an 80-year-old woman walking in that direction, so we were pretty confident that if she could do it, so could we. It turns out that we were right. About 100 feet after the detour, we made it to Ugly Mug.

Ugly Mug is a very small, rustic little coffee shop,with wooden tables, odd, slightly-creepy old-timey paintings, and a couch. The barista at the front was very friendly as we contemplated what to order. I ordered a 16-oz nonfat latte and Kristy ordered a 16-oz caramel americano. My drink was $3.63, a pretty standard price. As we waited for the drinks to be called out, we sat at one of the wooden tables. Next to us was another table, occupied by two college-aged girls who seemed to be going through some sort of quarterlife crisis. Kristy and I were about to be very sympathetic to their plight, as the whole, "I don't know what I'm doing with my life" trains of thought are not something foreign to either of us. However, when we started rudely eavesdropping with more conviction, we found out that they were talking about fonts. Not the insignificance of what they were doing with their lives, but fonts. Fonts. So, suffice it to say that we no longer gave a fuck about their struggles.

My drink came out first, and it looked pretty great:

It tasted.. mediocre. The foam was really nice, but the flavor of the espresso was a touch burnt. It also was lukewarm at best and cooled down even further very rapidly. I drank about 70% of it before I gave up on it.

After much debate, we decided to purchase a delicious-looking cookie from a case that we had both noticed upon first entering this establishment. I'll spare you the painful details, but it took about ten minutes to decide upon whether or not to buy this cookie. We were also distracted by a rather attractive man who entered the store wearing sweats. If you know either of us at all, sweats on men is where it's at. So, understandably, we abandoned all talk of cookies in favor of what some may refer to as "creepy staring," but I like to refer to as "admiring from afar" (although, 'afar' in this case was approximately 4 feet). After attractive sweats-man left, we continued debating this cookie. Given the amount of time it took to decide to buy this cookie, my expectations for it were through the fucking roof. Of course, this poor unsuspecting cookie did not meet these high expectations, but it was pretty decent. A bit greasy, which I wasn't expecting, but fine.

It was time to leave, but, I had to go to the bathroom. So, I did. In the bathroom I found this mirror, which says "You Look Gorgeous" on it:

I told Kristy that she had to go into the bathroom and take the same picture so I could add both of the pictures here. She did, but as you can tell, she isn't the world's greatest at getting the intended target (i.e. the words) into the picture.


So, that's about it. We left the shop just as a large group of about eight UW students came in, so, yay for timing.

You can visit Ugly Mug here:

What Is This?

I've decided to try out every single one of the Top 50 Coffee Shops in Seattle of 2013 (as chronicled by Seattle Coffee Scene in the following article): clicky clicky click here

So, I'm going to write about every coffeeshop I visit, starting from number 50 and down to number 1. That's it.