Five Brooklyn Coffee Bean Shops

If you're a lover of coffee, then you will want to check out a coffee bean shop. These shops offer a variety of whole beans from all over the world. They also have unique kitchenware and trinkets.

Some of these shops offer subscriptions to their coffee beans. Some shops sell the beans in large quantities.

Porto Rico Importing Co.

Veteran coffee seller specializing in international brews and a selection of loose teas

The scent of freshly roasting beans fills the air as you enter this West Village shop. Unopened bags of dark brown beans line the shelves, along with jars of sugar coffee-making equipment, tea and other accessories.

The first restaurant opened in 1907, Porto Rico was founded by Italian immigrants Patsy Albanese. Greenwich Village at the time was witnessing a surge of Italian immigrants, who established businesses to cater to their food needs. Albanese named her shop after the famous Puerto Rican coffee she imported (and sold) the beverage was that was so well-known at the time that even the Pope drank it.

Today, Porto Rico sells 130 varieties of beans from around the world at three locations in New York City including their Bleecker Street location, Essex Market and online. Porto Rico also roasts its own beans and provides wholesale distribution to 350 restaurants in NYC and Brooklyn.

Peter Longo, current owner and president, grew up in the family bakery on Bleecker Street, where his father ran Porto Rico. He continues to operate the shop in a similar way to his father and grandfather.

Sey Coffee

The shop is located along Grattan Street in Morgantown, Brooklyn's Bushwick neighborhood, Sey Coffee is both a coffee shop and roaster. Co-founders Tobin Polk and Lance Schnorenberg, both 33 started roasting in the fourth-floor loft across the street from their new location in 2011 under the name Lofted Coffee (with local clients including Greenpoint's Budin and Coffee bean Shop Soho cart service Peddler).

Sey's focus on purchasing micro-lots, or even whole harvests from single farmers--has earned it the acclaim of knowledgeable New York City coffee aficionados. The last time Sey was in the market, he purchased a six-bag micro lot of Danilo Dones Sitio Catucai, a Brazilian coffee from the Espirito-Santo region. The beans were picked at the peak of ripeness, then floated to remove defects and dried fermented for 36 hours prior to being dried on the farm. The result is a coffee that is a little melons and berries.

Sey's dedication extends beyond its shop to improve the overall wellbeing of growers and staff, as well as customers. It makes use of biodegradable disposables and composts, preventing waste from landfills and converting it to substances that help reduce harmful greenhouse gases and nourish soil. It also reduces gratuity. This lets baristas focus on their craft and to earn a living.

La Cabra

La Cabra, a modern specialty coffee brand, was founded in Aarhus in Denmark in 2012. It started with a small shop and a dedicated staff. Their open and creative approach to delivering a truly exceptional coffee experience earned them a following not only in their hometown, but globally.

La Carba has a rigorous process to find their perfect beans, by scouring through hundreds of different varieties a year to find the ones that match their ideals. They roast them in a very light manner before dialing the roast to create their desired flavor profile. This gives their coffees a brighter taste and clarity.

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

The shop uses a La Marzocco modbar, and the cups and plates are made by Wurtz ceramics in Horsens, a father and son studio. In a recent Q&A interview with Atlanta Coffee Shops, General Manager Ian Walla reveals that La Cabra serves approximately 250 different coffees per year, and usually has seven or eight varieties available at any given point.

The Roasting Plant Coffee

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

The roaster they have on site is a fluid bed machine which is different from the traditional drum machines commonly found in UK coffee coffeee shops. The beans are blown about in the heated box by high-speed air that keeps the green beans in suspension and allows roasting to happen in a steady manner throughout the machine.

I tried the Sumatran Coffee and it was smooth and rich with a rich and velvety taste. Dark chocolate was evident in the aroma and as you sip the coffee, you could taste subtle citrus fruit flavors.

The roasted coffee is then whisked to the Eversys super-automatic brewing systems and it is brewed to your requirements within less than a minute. Customers can pick from nine single origins and different blends.

Parlor Coffee

Parlor Coffee was founded in 2012 behind a barbershop, equipped with a single group espresso machine. It has since morphed into a bustling coffee roastery, with beans that are available in top cafes as well as restaurants and home brewers in every city. Parlor is committed to procuring high-quality coffee beans from all over the world, each of which has had to endure a lengthy journey before it reaches the hands of its roasters.

In their own words, they "have an unstoppable passion for craft and a belief that great coffee should be available to everyone." They accomplish that by creating a simple street space, which includes compost bins, a chalkboard welcome, handmade up-cycled products and low-frills deco.

They roast their own blends (there were six at the time I was there) and single-origins, but they also hold cuppings on Sundays, which are open to the general public. Imagine it as a brewery tasting area where you can smell and taste the beans in the ground. They range from earthy to chocolatey (one was almost like tomato!). It's a bit off the beaten path, but worth the trip.