Creama Coffee Co. (53 Bloor St E)

This is the second location opened by these guys. This one in particular is situated within a Freshii salad bar - I suspect that the brands are owned by the same company. It's interesting to have a coffee joint with a salad place.

As soon as I walked in I noticed the Clover machine - super cool. The all chrome espresso machine is unique too - it can pour up to 3 shots at the same time. After a wee bit of research, I learn that this machine is a Mirage Triplette Classic by Kees van der Westen. What a Cadillac of a machine.

With this post I am going to attempt to standardize the review of the actual coffee I order. I am going to switch to double espresso shots, served 'for here' in a ceramic cup. I'll use three criteria (borrowed from Starbucks) to describe the drink, they are: 1. Aroma, 2. Appearance, and 3. Taste Profile.

Epic Espresso Roast

Aroma
Deep, caramelly and roasty. I pick up a strong earthiness of intoxicating goodness. Perfect.   

Appearance
As the beans are roasted really dark for espresso and even with the added water this brew is very dark, black gold. The creama (no pun intended) swirling on the top looks like a burnt marshmallow colour.

Taste Profile 
This is full-boded coffee and the flavour resembles the aroma - I pick up deep layers of caramelly sweetness with the roasty rich flavour. It floods my palette and I find that the sweet flavour lingers (so high acidity) all over my tongue with each sip. 

Overall, this is great espresso. I really enjoyed it. Cafe number 3 is complete.

Red Rocket Coffee (Wellesley St E)

Taking full advantage of the maximum $5 drink cost of using the coffee passport, I ordered a large americano at RRC with my buddy Daniel. Daniel ordered one of their italian sodas - pina colada flavour - this is not for me! 

I don't think the espresso here is worth raving about, I found I had a really watered down americano compared to what I have had elsewhere. Hopefully the drip coffee has more to stand on in terms of richness. 

This place is small with limited seating, but does have a chic feel (it's located in the verve condo building). It looks like the bench seating against the wall was salvaged from a church and the glass sculpture above the seating area is eye catching.

This place has been open less than a year, and location #1 is in Leslieville. 

As for the coffee, there's just not enough flavour in the brew here for me.

2 of 24 complete. 

Manic Coffee (426 College St W)

First up is Manic Coffee (just east of College and Bathurst Streets) - they sold me my official coffee passport and with excitement I got my first coffee (americano).

Manic has always been my favourite place to go for full-bodied dark espresso - it always exceeds my expectations. Lots of flavour (deep caramelly, roasty goodness, and lots of kick.

I chatted it up with the friendly staff about the passport program and they say they have a hard time keeping the cards in stock and have sold the most out of the slew of 24 participating cafes.

One down, 23 to go.

Indie Coffee Passport Toronto

I was overjoyed to find out today that the Indie Coffee Passport is being offered again. (Thanks for the heads up Edwin!)

The way it works is that you buy this $20 membership card which entitles you to a free coffee at 24 Toronto independent cafes. It expires March 31, 2011 so that's roughly 7 months of time to get to each shop.

I'm off to Manic Coffee (College St W) today to hopefully pick up one and this will give me a lot of material to blog about for the next several months.

Here's more info: Indie Coffee Passport Toronto

Jet Fuel (519 Parliament St) - Revisited

I headed back to JF for the first time in a long time and it was well worth it.
I bought a $4 large latte and enjoyed every delicious sip - perfect.
The artwork currently on display is of homo-erotica wrestling - looks like oil on canvas, forgot to check out who the artist is, but it's very provocative! There are also some original hand drawn sketches on display - very cool.
As always I love the uncomplicated-ness of this cafe, I liked the chilled staff. I was overjoyed to eavesdrop and hear a conversation about Harvey Milk :) This place rocks.