My medical school journeys bring me to Pittsburgh, PA for my Internal Medicine rotation.
The hospital I'm rotating at is Allegheny General and I am staying at student housing (ironically a nursing school) in bloomfield.

Here is my modest coffee setup at the housing:

Coffee is not Zoka, just using the bag for my home-roasted Costa + Brazil blend
It's my second week here and already starting to explore the coffee scene.

First up is 21st street coffee. I was really blown away by this place.
They are located in the strip district: 50 21st St, Pittsburgh, PA 15222
http://21streetcoffee.com/



Inside I found a 2 group Synesso, a robur and an SJ


They were using the robur for Intelly Black cat and the SJ for their "featured espresso" which was also an intelly

If you look closely at the coffee counter you can begin to notice something odd for a coffee shop. Yes that is a scale!

The barista made coffee the same way us home-barista coffeegeeks do! She dosed into her bottomless PF, weighed it out, added a bit more (didn't ask what dose she used) and then pulled the shot.

As the shot was pulling, the espresso cup was sitting on another scale measuring the extraction ratio.

I have never seen this amount of perfection ?OCPD-ness? in a coffee shop! VERY IMPRESSED!

It didn't take very long either - so it is in fact possible in a commercial environment.

I also had a Colombian pour-over which was also weighed and tasted great. You can see the pourover scales in the forefront of the picture they are black and have the steam pitchers on them.

Another Place I checked out was Big Dog Coffee
2717 Sarah Street, Pittsburgh, PA
http://bigdogcoffee.net


The shop uses a Black matte SJ as their main grinder and has a Nuovo Simonelli machine.

I tried a french press and the GF had a cap there. A medium cap comes in a humongous soup sized cup and has 3 shots + a crazy amount of milk. There was some mediocre heart-shaped latte art and I personally did not like the taste.

The French press I got came in a fancy stainless steel FP and was an ethiopian yirg. Absolutely DELICIOUS!



Two Bodum cups were given which had the rubber grips on them. I had to ask for the cups to be pre-warmed (this should be standard procedure??) and both cups were chipped to the point of possibly causing a small laceration on one's lip. NOT GOOD. You can actually see the chip in the picture!

My job takes me to Pittsburgh occasionally, but I'm not able to visit any shops until after dinnertime. Many of the shops are closed by then. I found Tazza d'Orro in Highland Park was open late (that was apparently before they had a Carnegie Mellon location). I don't recall what kind of equipment they used, but I recommend it.

Jack

The journey continues!

First up is Tazza D'orro.
http://www.tazzadoro.net
412.362.3676
1125 North Highland Avenue Pittsburgh, PA 15206
Mon-Fri 7am-10pm
Sat/Sun 8am-10pm

The shop is located in a quiet area so street parking is easy to find.



The first thing that struck me! Wow! You can get a french press, a chemex or a pourover! Why not try all 3?!



The barista was very nice and he had a anatomical heart tattoo which was cool. I got a shot of their Guatemalan espresso and it was ok, nothing too exciting.

The main problem with this coffee shop is that it is always busy inside - It was nearly impossible to get a table and there were a lot of families/kids inside so it was way too loud to study.

I would recommend this place for dropping by getting coffee and going for a walk (the area around there is really nice) but not for studying [Which is what I usually do in coffee shops]

Next Up is Coffee Tree Roasters:
http://www.coffeetree.com
5524 Walnut Street Pittsburgh, PA
(412) 621-6880
Monday-Sunday - 6am-Midnight



I saw this place while driving by and the first thing that caught me is the name. Do they roast themselves I wondered?
Also I saw the flash of a LM Linea!




Unfortunately I quickly learned that this was not a "3rd wave" coffee shop.
I asked where the coffee was from and the barista had no idea.
I asked for a french press and they did not offer that option - only drip or americano.
The barista was nice enough to let me try all of their drip offerings and they were all fairly 'burnt' tasting but I did settle on one.

In the meantime I saw a barista make a latte for a customer.
First she steamed the milk and left it on the counter
Then she dosed the coffee into PF, barely even touched it with the tamper before giving it a nice tamp.
She then inserted the pf into the machine and turned around to do something else

45-60 sec later she pushed the shot button and pulled the shot into 2 shot glasses.

She then got a latte cup and poured the milk into it. After that she dumped the 2 shot glasses into that cup.

It looked fairly miserable


However for studying this place is just unbeatable! There is sooo much room and it is very quiet in there.

Unfortunately I would say that I will likely be going back just due to the excellent studying environment!

Next up is Orbis Caffe.
675 Washington Road Mt. Lebanon Pittsburgh, PA 15228
412 563 1220
Monday to Saturday: 6.30 am to 9.00 pm
Sunday: 8.30 am to 4.00 pm


The equipment is a 2 group AV LM Linea, 2 super jollys + 1 mini for decaf.
They offer both french press and pour-over as well.
The coffee they serve is both intellegentsia and several coffees from 19 coffee roasters [ http://www.19coffee.com ]




I had a guatemalan and Ethiopian Harrar FP there and WOW the ethiopian harrar was absolutely wild. It smelled and tasted like Blueberry Jam! Was absolutely the most blueberry coffee I have ever experienced.
The barista (Max) was a really nice guy and was definitely "into" coffee.

I showed him a few of my machine rebuilds and my friend and I started talking to him about 'coffee'

He was nice enough to pull us a shot of the ethiopian harrar and their espresso blend (40% sumatra, 40% guat, 20% papa new guinea). The shots were excellent and It was awesome to have a barista that cared the loved what he did.

I would HIGHLY suggest going to orbis and specifically asking for max.

Nice write up, for sure.

Make sure you get to Espresso A Mano, Commonplace and Voluto as well.

Next places to check out:

Commonplace
61c Coffee
La Prima

Oops, I just realized this is in Phillidelphia, not Pittsburg.
You might check out La Colombe Torrefaction.
A friend from high school is a barista there, from some of her comments on face book, it looks like they make alot of coffee.
"Stats: Today, my coworker and I served more than 500 drip coffees in 6 hours. Including espresso drinks, this means we saw more than 100 faces per hour. That's a lot of faces! That's more than 100 "Hello how are you"'s per hour. That's about 50 "Happy Groundhog Day"'s per hour and 25 mentions of Bill Murray per hour. You're welcome, Bill Murray. And Happy Groundhog Day, everyone."

EDIT: I just realized I had the wrong city.

I was going to suggest Aldo coffee. Visited them many years ago when I was in town for a week class. Stopped by nearly every day but I see from their web page, they are no longer Aldo coffee. Orbis bought them... O well.

I was reading over Aldo's web page and surprise, they have me on the web page from way back when I visited them. Dont know if Bella is still there but she was an exceptional barista when I visited and the owners husband made killer cannoli's from scratch.

Next up is Espresso A Mano
3623 Butler Street Pittsburgh, PA 15201
(412) 918-1864
They serve counter culture coffee and offer espresso based drinks, pour over and french press






They have a nice 2 group Paddle La Marzocco



Here is my nice Ethiopian Yirg french press which was full of fruity notes!

Would definitely recommend this place although it is usually busy and not easy to find a table there (on weekends at least)

Next is the other Tazza D'oro location which is in Carnegie Mellon university
Gates Center 3rd Floor
Computer Science Building
Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

This place has TWO 2 group LM Lineas! When I asked the barista why they didn't just get a 4 group LM - he was kind of clueless that a 4 group existed. Thankfully one of the other employees knew what I was asking and said they started off with 1 and then were given another by someone - with the high demand (they are located inside a college computer science building) they actually do use both machines. Usually 2 baristas - 1 manning each.




Those with a good eye will notice that one Linea is AV and one EE
This place has a lot of room to sit (as compared to the other Tazza), but being inside of Carnegie Mellon - there is no free wifi and you must be a student with login info to get onto the CM wifi network. Also there is nowhere to find street parking and paying $5.00 at a parking lot is kind of steep just to grab some coffee and study.

Next is The Commonplace Coffee Company
5827 Forbes Ave.
Pittsburgh, PA 15217
(412) 422-0404
Monday-Friday 7am-10pm | Saturday & Sunday 8am-10pm


This place is a coffee geek's heaven. They have a 3 group LM strada (manual pressure profiling) and they even have a Clover!
The barista's here were super nice (ask for Meghan or Brad). Their cash register system is an ipad where you swipe your credit card and sign with your finger!

We tried 2 cup of excellence coffees on the clover (a bolivian and Colombian) and tried their espresso blend + SO espresso.

They have 3 super jollys and a Major and usually run 2 single origin espresso + a blend.

And of course - they roast their own beans in Indiana, PA.



Effects of caffeine on your body broken down by organ system

Straaadaaaaaa

Brad manning the Clover

Good amount of seating in this shop, it's located in squirrel hill so a lot to do in the area and they are open till 10pm - definitely check them out.