(Barista Magazine, June/July 2007)
by Liz Clayton
Nick Brown,
ready to clean up some coffee grounds.
Photo by Liz Clayton.
Introducing a taste for
exceptional coffee to a province which essentially bases its national identity
on donut shop drive-thru drip has not been an
easy struggle. But in the past 18 months, the biggest city in Canada has
at last started to show signs of cluing in. It won’t jinx things at
this stage to formally call it: modern-day good coffee, and the culture that
supports and is enthusiastic about it, has finally come to Toronto.
As specialty coffee went, Toronto was until recently a one-bar town, with
the old guard held up by Bull Dog Coffee, an inconspicuous shop a stone’s
throw from Maple Leaf Gardens that caters largely to the high-volume footfalls
of the city’s Gay Village. Stuart Ross — known both as Stuart
and as Ross, depending — drew his inspiration from Italy and the Pacific
Northwest, and will be quick to let you know he’s pulled shots under
the mentoring eyes of the David Schomers and Sammy Piccolos of the world.
Ross’ shop, which opened in 2003, was the first to bring latte art
to Toronto, shaking awake a city of Tim Horton’s and Second Cup drinkers
who would have probably been just as surprised to see crema!
Yet in 2006, Bull Dog finally got a little friendly competition. Perhaps
not the friendliest if you consider that two of Toronto’s newest cafes
were actually opened by pinkslipped Bull Dog employees — but as anyone
who loves coffee will attest, having more choice can’t be anything
but a good thing.
March 2006 saw the opening of Mercury Organic Espresso Bar in a former sub
shop in the just-burgeoning Leslieville neighborhood. Matthew Taylor, ex-of
Bull Dog as well as local roaster and café Balzac’s, launched
the shop with co-owners Doug Tiller and James Feistner, whose Morning Glory
eatery had found some local success a few neighborhoods over and wanted to
invest in a niche Toronto had only barely begun exploring. Mercury’s
philosophy of environmentally conscious everything — from napkins to
cups to floor cleaner — was paired with a neighborhood-focused, attitude-heavy
vibe (think: dumpy couches and loud rock and roll). Taylor tapped local roaster
Dark City Coffee Company for his smoky, milk-friendly organic espresso — and
began belting out shots almost as soon as paint was on the walls.
For the city, the sudden move from one progressive cafe to two was its tipping
point: by fall of last year, a few other serious cafes had emerged as contenders,
most notably Dark Horse on Queen Street East and a cozy shop in Dufferin
Grove called the Common — one of the few cafes even attempting to serve
Toronto’s more traditionally hipster west end (Other new, takeaway-only
boîtes Ella’s Uncle and Cherry Bomb have yet to truly hit their
espresso stride — but are getting close.)
For Edward Lynds and Deanna Zunde of Dark Horse, opening a café that
promoted
good coffee and superior café culture were parallel concerns. Their
sunny corner shop boasts Toronto’s brightest and most biggest communal
table, a 12-seater made of massive recycled wood — no small psychological
step in a city known for a polite restraint that shuns eye contact with strangers.
Lynds — the other Bull Dog ex-pat — sees the Dark Horse vibe
as part of a coffee geek fabric that needn’t be intimidating to the
customer.
“Find that balance, and convince people that you know what you’re doing,
but still have fun with it too,” said the café owner.
“We’re not going to poo on your head if you ask for decaf.”
But as exciting a time as it is, few will argue that Toronto’s coffee
scene is anything but just budding. The handful of exciting new cafes notwithstanding,
there are still huge strides to be made in the realms of equipment, consumer
education, and most of all, the quality of the coffee itself. Toronto is
served almost exclusively by two coffee roasters — Classic Gourmet
Coffee and Dark City — both generally accepted as long on roasting
consistency but sometimes short on flavor profile and bean selection.
“I think we’re just not looking into the best quality green beans,” said
Mercury’s Taylor, whose eco-conscious approach makes him wary of the
current need to look out of province for the single-origin coffees and espresso
blends he likes to feature.
“I would love to be able to buy these Ethiopian Idido Misty Valleys from
Dark City instead of having to bring them in from Intelligentsia,” said
Taylor, who cites the environmental cost of transportation as well as the
simple nuisance of shipping expenses as part of the frustration.
“The best thing we can do, like the slow food movement, is buy local.
I think what we need to do is get the local roasters into buying direct, or Cup
of
Excellence, just buying the best quality green beans.”
Fortunately Matthew Lee, a Toronto native who gigged as a Barista at the
Elysian Room in Vancouver, is back in town to shake things up a bit on that
front — as Toronto’s Intelligentsia rep, Lee’s been mysteriously
lurking about the Toronto coffee scene for months now. You might see him
delivering a Mazzer grinder or a few bags of Kid O to one of the cafes around
town — but more likely he’s busy in his downtown apartment fine-tuning
the only Clover in the city, or trying to decide whether he likes his 2-group
Synesso or his 4-group La Marzocco better! When Lee finally opens his long-awaited
Manic Coffee retail shop (fully Intelligentsia-fied, naturally), the Toronto
roasting scene will find itself challenged by one of the bigs — hopefully
raising the bar in a city that could definitely benefit from a little constructive
competition.
Another important stage for Toronto’s coffee culture will be the introduction
of a wider variety of equipment than currently seen in Hogtown. Mercury Organic
expects to have their Clover by year-end, after they’re done renovating
their shop for a more ergonomic bar, and Lee’s will likely be the first
serious café to introduce something new to a city held almost entirely
in a headlock by Elektra machines — alleged by some to be one of the
few brands that can easily withstand Toronto’s hard water, and alleged
by others to be simply what we’re used to.
And of course there’s the most important ingredient of all in nurturing
a city’s coffee culture — the coffee professionals themselves.
It’s a changing time in Toronto’s barista scene — from
baristi beginning to work across multiple cafes to newcomers placing highly
in regional competitions, to simply the idea of camaraderie becoming more
and more important.
And for a city that constantly compares itself to New York — it’s
no surprise that the coffee scene is using that “other” city
as a barometer of our own achievement in this arena. From a culture that
started out as relatively disconnected, Toronto is slowly building a coalescing
community of baristas and café owners that are curious and supportive
of each others’ shops. Slowly.
Ex-Vancouverite (and Dwelltime blogger) Nick Brown says he was pretty surprised
at how unreceptive the Toronto scene initially was to the elbow-rubbing geekouts
he’d been accustomed to while working at Artigianto, or even traveling
the west coast.
“I was having a hard time really feeling a lot of enthusiasm from the baristas
that I was coming across,” said Brown, who now says he’s watched
the timbre of excitement gradually blossom in the year he’s lived here.
“I’m quite positive about it because I see what happened in the last
two years ago or so in New York,” said Brown.
“Up until recently there was hardly anybody doing things right in New York,
and they were fighting a pretty tough battle trying to get people to appreciate
what they were doing. A few enthusiastic souls that really tried to bring
the community together. I remember talking to Chris [Owens] awhile ago and
him saying things were so fractured and fragmented in New York, and I remember
looking at things and thinking wow, things sure seem pretty good, you hang
out in each others’ shops, you go out for beers, this is a good thing,
this is better than here! It’s stil got a long way to go, but I’m
pretty optimistic that things are going to change here,” said Brown,
who’s threatening to open a shop of his own with Cherry Bomb barista
(and skateboard pal) Samuel James later this year.
And so it’s an interesting time for coffee in Toronto, not just from
the slow swell of enthusiasm among those in the industry but from the perspective
of the consumer. Toronto’s coffee drinkers are still highly impressionable — they’re
eager, they’re learning, and they’re only at the beginning of
finding out about truly exceptional coffees. (Again, there’s a shortage
of adventurous stuff to drink even with the blends and varietals the locals
manage to produce.)
And in terms of philosophy and taste, Toronto is just on the cusp of things
to come. The city’s already embraced latte art — enough so that
the practice already has detractors from people who would like to see the
focus shift from potentially misleading style back to flavor substance — and
the obvious next steps are refining the city’s palate away from the
bitter brews it’s been complacent with. We have so much yet to learn — I
for one can’t wait to see what happens next!