{ Coffee Thirsty | Refill }

Last weekend a friend and I made the 3-hour drive down to Portland, Oregon to catch Interpol last Friday night.  Portland is always a cool place to visit – cooler than cool.  The center is comprised of smaller-than-standard city blocks that make getting around really easy.

 It was a rainy, chilly weekend in Portland, but we made the best of it.  My friend remembered a neat-looking cafe that we had walked by before on previous visits, but had never tried out.  So we made it a point to go there this weekend.

 The place is called Northwest Coffee (how is that for a generic name?) and is located on Burnside, about a 10-minute walk from Powell’s books.  It’s a very old place, with fairly large gaps in the very unfinished, very original wooden floor.  But the place oozes very subtle cafe-cozy charm for sure.  On a cold rainy day, I don’t think we could have picked a better place to duck into for a latte.

Along with the charm of the original floor, exposed brick and support beams, they do a mean cup of joe there as well.  The two guys behind the bar were pretty intense.  We took our lattes and sweets (see picture below) to the antique sofa at the end of the cafe and enjoyed the patter of the rain and soaked in the place.  Man, the lattes there were pretty perfect….good incorporation of coffee/milk…good stamina…good temperature.  I wish I were there now.

They were playing some cool tunes as well.  On our way out, we checked in with the dudes running the place to ask the name of the band that they were playing.  The answer?  “Java”.  Go figure.