Five Brooklyn Coffee Bean Shops

If you're a fan of coffee You'll want to try out the coffee shop. These stores offer a wide selection of whole beans from all over the world. They also sell unique trinkets, kitchenware, and other products.

Some of these shops offer subscriptions to their coffee beans. Others sell the beans in bulk at their retail locations.

Porto Rico Importing Co.

Veteran coffee vendor specializing in international brews and a variety of loose teas

When you step into this old-fashioned West Village shop, the aroma of freshly roasting beans fills the air. The shelves are packed with jars, sacks and dark brown beans, along with coffee-making equipment, tea accessories and sugar.

Porto Rico, originally opened in 1907 by Italian immigrants Patsy Albonese. At the time, Greenwich Village was seeing an influx of Italian immigrants who opened businesses to serve their culinary requirements. Albanese named her shop after the famous Puerto Rican coffee she imported (and sold) the beverage was so famous at the time that even the Pope consumed it.

Porto Rico offers 130 different varieties of beans, which includes beans from all over the world, at three locations, including Bleecker Street, Essex Market and online. Porto Rico also roasts their own beans and offers wholesale distribution for 350 restaurants in NYC, Brooklyn and Brooklyn.

Peter Longo, current owner and president, was raised in the family bakery located on Bleecker Street, where his father ran Porto Rico. He runs the shop in the same manner like his father and grandfather.

Sey Coffee

Sey Coffee, a coffee shop and roaster, is located along Grattan Street, in Morgantown. This Brooklyn neighborhood, in the Bushwick district is situated on Grattan Street. Tobin Polk, Lance Schnorenberg and their co-founders of 33 years, began roasting coffee in the loft on the fourth floor just across the street in the year 2011. They called it Lofted Coffee. Local clients included Greenpoint's Budin, best tasting Coffee beans and Soho cart services Peddler and Peddler.

Sey's preference for buying micro-lots, or even entire harvests from single farmers has earned it the praise of New York City coffee enthusiasts. In 2011, Sey purchased a six-bag micro lot of Danilo Dones Sitio Catucai from Brazil's Espirito Santo region. The beans were handpicked at their peak ripeness, floated to remove defects, then dry fermented for a period of 36 hours before being dried on the farm. The result is a cup with hints of berry melon and lemongrass.

Sey's dedication to holistically improving the wellbeing of employees, customers and growers extends beyond the retail store. It makes use of composts and biodegradable disposables to ensure that waste is kept out of the garbage dumps. This helps to reduce greenhouse gases and helps nourish the soil. It also prevents gratuities. This allows baristas to focus on their craft and support their livelihoods.

La Cabra

La Cabra, a modern specialty-coffee company, was founded in Aarhus in Denmark in 2012. The company began with a small shop and a team of dedicated employees. Their open and creative approach to providing an exceptional coffee experience earned them a following that was not only in their hometown, but globally.

La Carba follows a strict procedure to find their perfect beans. They scour through hundreds of varieties each year to select the beans that best tasting coffee beans match their ideals. They roast them in a light style, dialing the roast to create their desired flavor profile. This gives the coffees a more vibrant taste and clarity.

The East Village store opened last October, with a minimalist and sleek design, and has been praised by coffee bean club aficionados for its exacting pour-overs and baked goods, which are overseen by head baker Jared Sexton, who's previously worked at Bien Cuit and Dominique Ansel.

The shop uses the La Marzocco Modbar, and the cups, plates, and bowls are custom-designed by Wurtz ceramics, a father/son studio in Horsens. In a recent interview, Atlanta Coffee Shops General Manager Ian Walla revealed that La Cabra serves 250 different coffees per day and has typically seven or eight varieties available at any one time.

The Roasting Plant Coffee

The Roasting Plant, a multi-unit retailer of coffee roasts and brews coffee on site. Each cup is brewed and roasted according to your specifications within less than a second. It scour the globe for the finest specialty beans that are sourced directly, giving customers the choice and quality.

Their roaster on site is a fluid bed machine which is different from traditional drum machines that are used in UK coffee shops. The beans are blown around in an enclosed box heated by high-speed air that keeps the green beans suspended and allows them to be roasted in a steady manner throughout the machine.

I tried the Sumatran coffee and it was delicious with a velvety mouthfeel. Dark chocolate scent was present, and the coffee began to cool as you sip delicate citrus flavours fruit were evident.

The coffee is whisked to the store's Eversys super-automatic brewing machines and brewed to your specification in under a minute. Customers can choose from a selection of nine single origin choices and a range of blends.

Parlor Coffee

It was founded in 2012 in the back of a barbershop equipped with one espresso machine in a single group, Parlor Coffee has become a rapidly growing roastery whose beans can be found in top restaurants, cafes and home brewers across the city. Parlor Coffee is committed to sourcing the highest-quality beans, that have all undergone a long journey before they reach its roasters.

According to their own words the owners "have an unrelenting love of craft and believe that good coffee should be available to everyone." They do just this with their earthy area on a residential street. Think compost bins, chalkboard welcome handmade up-cycled items, and a minimally-decorated space.

They roast their own blends (there were six at the time I was there) and single-origins. However, they also have cuppings on Sundays, which are open to the public. Imagine it as an artisanal tasting room in which you can smell and taste the beans, ranging from chocolaty earthy (one was very tomato-like!). It's a little away from the main roads, but well worth the trip.