Friday 29 July 2011

Monmouth Montage

Monmouth Coffee, Borough Market, London, UK




Let us start with some transparency. Monmouth is my favourite coffee in the world. It is the one I base my judgement of all others on. If you go back to my 1st post you will see it was finding Monmouth that stopped me logging coffees in my book and loosing Monmouth that made we start up Damn Fine Joe.






Damn Fine Joe was started in Brighton. A place with such an incredible coffee scene, I feel so lucky to have been there whilst it went through such a strong period of growth. Wow, have I drunk some great coffees down by the sea. 


But Monmouth holds a spiritual place in my heart, the original mind blowing coffee and that can never be taken away.


So 3 years later how does it fair? Still excellent, still great attentive baristas, a lovely refit on the Borough Market store and some old faces working the machines.



The coffee is always strong at Monmouth and always made short. They roast their own beans at the Covent Garden roastery and perhaps this is part of the secret, those beans are fresh. 


You get plenty of flavour from their espresso blend and the coffee comes out hitting all the right notes.   It smells right, not stale, it tastes strong but is not bitter and at the end the sign of a great coffee, without any aids you are left with a sweet taste in your mouth.


Lets neg on something. Back in the day they kept their espresso and americano at an incredible £1, then finally it went up to £1.50. Now for some reason I pay an extra 35p for my hot water in my americano over my espresso. A minor grumble and I don't really care. It is still cheaper than most foul chain cups but I had to have some kind of counter point here.

  • Double shot black Americano, take away
  • Very strong
  • Full rounded and sweet
  • Thick healthy looking crema
  • Small cup
  • £1.65
  • Beans: Monmouth Espresso Blend









A full flavour with a rounded smooth taste which leaves a lovely sweetness behind. This is as close to perfection as coffee gets. I look forward to becoming a regular again and having them remember what I drink.


A huge thanks to the excellent Casey Fulton who made this an extra special post by coming and taking photos for me. You can check out more of Casey's great photographic work here: 



Saturday 23 July 2011

Competition: Cafe Coho Prize Draw Winners

The winners of the Cafe Coho prize Draw are:

Brianna Beck - 1st prize: 10 free coffees
Liam Kelly - 2nd prize: 4 free coffees
Lucy Fowler - 3rd prize 2 free coffees
Rachel Dey - 4th prize: 1 free coffee
Swisscub Janlove (Greg) - 5th prize: 1 free coffee
Simon Lewis - 6th prize: 1 free coffee
Tom Ewing - 7th prize: 1 free coffee

Well done to the winners and thanks to everyone who spread the word on Facebook and took part.

Joe will make contact to explain how you can claim your prize. Sorry this took so long.




The Review: http://damnfinejoe.blogspot.com/2011/02/cafe-coho-brighton-uk.html