Comments on: Italian coffee culture in the UK

By: Patrick

Patrick — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 21:04:24 +0000

What a great topic! It’s one that I have given much thought about, and tried to explain to a number of people. I think there are a few forces at play. I always considered the strong tea drinking culture (particularly afternoon tea) had a strong influence in coffee not being taken as seriously. I think the weather also has something to do about it. In Australia, it’s easy to sit al fresco with a coffee reading some papers. In England, you have to make the insides comfortable and welcoming which, to be honest, isn’t a common thing amongst most cafes.

There’s also the strong pub culture working as a strong competitor to the coffee one. In Australia, it’s super common to meet a friend for coffee during the day. The equivalent would be a pub in England.

Either way, it’s hard to ignore the strong impact antipodean run coffee stores have on (at least) London’s coffee scene. And something to be celebrated as well!

By: Electrical Test Equipment

Electrical Test Equipment — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 05:57:44 +0000

Is there a tipping point in all of this? Could we work on one small area (let’s take East London for example) and build up a pocket of great coffee. Once this pocket got dense enough would it then be able to spread and have impact on a larger scale?

By: James Hoffmann

James Hoffmann — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:43:43 +0000

Cool! I bumped into Fabio in the street a couple of months back and he told me about it – I didn’t know they were open. I must visit!

By: Jonathan Lister

Jonathan Lister — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:40:27 +0000

He's opened a street stall, which is part of the Alto franchise - apparently the first in the UK (they're French).

By: James Hoffmann

James Hoffmann — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:32:07 +0000

Do you know the name of the shop on Strutton Ground?

By: Jonathan Lister

Jonathan Lister — Mon, 09 Mar 2009 15:09:33 +0000

I'd agree with Bill that there are scattered outposts of good coffee to be found in London. Time Out maintains a useful guide here: http://www.timeout.com/london/restaurants/features/6361.html I'm not so sure that East London is the last word in great coffee in London, as Soho has a high density of awesome coffee shops. Sadly, we recently moved office to Victoria Street and suffered with a 20-minute walk to decent coffee in the form of Tomtom. Fortunately, Brazilian master barista Fabio Henrique Ferreira has just opened up shop on Strutton Ground.

By: Bill

Bill — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 19:24:31 +0000

I think there has been phenomenal change in coffee in the UK in the Last five years.. Wandering the streets of London, I must have visited dozens of cafes, searching for anything that resembled what I craved in an espresso based drink.

Then the brave Flat White appeared, and rumors of Taylor Street began to emerge… To reference your question, I think we are already at that tipping point, where good coffee in the UK is beginning to get recognized and enjoyed. The number of places still serving consistently good espresso in London, you can probably count on one hand, but that goes for many coffee cities world-wide.

The scattered outposts seem to be raising the general standard of coffee and have done so for the last few years. East London is blooming, and the standard is high, lets hope the expectation of the consumer is raised and met in East London, and this spreads steadily throughout London and the UK.

As for the Italians, well, they kicked the Aussies out of the world cup, nuff said really.

By: ant

ant — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 05:01:18 +0000

Last year I heard second hand that a green bean broker from a very reputable company lamented the fact that some of the worst coffees he’d drunk came from italian owned roasteries around the world. They were stuck in the past and didn’t know what good coffee was anymore. Conversely he was happy to see the experimentation and innovation that he’d seen in both the Australian and especially NZ market in some of the boutique coffee roasteries that he visited. That was a pretty high compliment for all of us anzacs.

By: espressoSquirrel

espressoSquirrel — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 11:30:26 +0000

the antipodean influence at least in and around soho is quite strong now, and seems to be spreading, maybe this is the pocket of coffee expertise developing, and I think its only a matter of time until places like bar italia will actually be learning from those around it.
I’m quite sure the italians that immigrated to the UK and Australia both had to adapt heavily to the local culture, wasn’t the flat white drink originally developed because frothy milk wasn’t really appreciated and people just wanted flat milk.

However the UK which has always had a massive influence from America was just getting introduced to the american army ration… freeze dried instant coffee

By: Ken

Ken — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 09:33:38 +0000

I have been a barista in London and Melbourne, and grew up with Italian cafes in the UK.

Italian migrants in the UK have always catered to a post war Britain, I think any hopes they had of bestowing us with their food and coffee culture were dashed by a lack of good fresh ingredients a truly terrible service/ hospitality culture.
Italian migrants in Australia had a much bigger investment in their new life, new communities and new businesses, which have thrived in the booming service/ hospitality culture in Melbourne and Sydney. This has led to continually increasing expectations by the customer.

I would guess there are around 20 cafes in the UK serving really descent espresso, London accounting for nearly half of those, compared to at least 20 in Melbourne alone!