A day in the city

Vienna sausage cans in the rain on a paper Trader Joe’s bag

 

 

 

Another great drink from MA’velous:   Stumptown Hairbender Cappuccino

 

 

 

A walk up polk st

 

 

 

bike lane, covered.

 

 

 

WE ROCK  HARDEST Ben Eine – bad ass.

 

 

 

Giraffe

 

 

 

googly eyes on BART

 

 

 

got off at ashby bart

 

 

 

Ma-Velous in San Francisco

We finally got to check out Ma-Velous the other day.  Here are some photos from the experience.  The place is swank with an eddie colla mural to complete the interior.

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Mr. Ma himself

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Custom espresso machine with see-through glass panels.  Some cool work by espressoparts.

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The siphon brewers_1030386dm

Peering in through the side of the espresso machine.  La Marzocco guts.

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TCHO hot chocolate

_1030392dmand of course the tim wendelboe norwegian espresso

list of bay area coffee shops – with a bay area coffee map

here’s my subjective ranking of the best espresso/coffee in the san francisco bay area, complete with a google map.

[googlemap width=”640″ height=”480″ src=”http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF8&hl=en&msa=0&msid=112896448665808697633.00048fe8838715e9e8af6&ll=37.823616,-122.306671&spn=0.2689835,0.371824&z=11&output=embed”]

key: more crema = better.  empty cup =  not so good.  Sorry about the funky anti-aliasing.

excellent:

enjoyable:

not bad:

drinkable but not pleasant:

  • farley’s (san francisco/oakland/emervyille, farley’s blend from sunshine? in san leandro)  Recently had a not good one from the 65th st emeryville location.  doh.
  • peerless (oakland, peerless)
  • woody’s cafe (oakland, ?)
  • crepevine (oakland/berkeley, ?)
  • riva (berkeley, ?)
  • starbucks (starbucks)
  • peets (peets)
  • uncommon grounds cafe (berkeley, uncommon grounds)

not drinkable:

  • none yet.  Maybe I have a high tolerance?

credit for working the google maps/wordpress hack: http://digwp.com/2010/01/google-maps-shortcode/ if you want to try this, don’t forget to add the &embed at the end of your link.

a ride to pt. reyes station

We finally got back on the bike and did a long ride last weekend.  ~88 miles to Pt. Reyes Station and back.

fog in the morning in the Presidio:

fog on the golden gate bridge too, of course.  It cleared up as soon as we were finished crossing.

The Nicasio reservoir.  Our group split soon after – we went to Pt. Reyes Station, the rest to Petaluma and then Santa Rosa.

Old St. Mary’s church + Corvette

Riding back across the bridge that afternoon was a little hairy and a little wet, but this scene was absolutely wild:

this part was a bit scary with the tourists and the fog:

Chrissy field on the way back:

Latte at Blue Bottle in the Ferry Building to end the day:

from the archives: ritual bike cart

a friend sent me this new york times post about kickstand, who have a mobile, bike-transported iced coffee and single-serve drip setup.

I’ve only seen the ritual bike in the bay area:

Ritual coffee bike cart

This guy was selling iced coffee at sunday streets in the mission last july.

ritual coffee bike cart at eat real in oakland

and these two were selling ritual coffee at oakland’s wonderful eat real festival last august.

farm:table

went to farm:table this past weekend for a quick breakfast and coffee.  the cereal and yogurt was enjoyble, the latte was pretty, and the ristretto of an espresso, while lacking some crema, was still very satisfying.

latte art from farm:table on post st.