Genteel Coffee

Justin owns Genteel, and the El Salvador that has become its drip staple grows on a volcano he hiked in 2014 while he was teaching in the country: this year the shop secured 1,380 kilos off that lot, most of a year on one coffee. There is no founder page on the site, so the story turns up in the bag copy instead, signed with a first name, a roaster writing about the coffee rather than about himself.

Roasting happens in the building every Wednesday, and only three of the eight bags on the retail list say anything about the coffee inside, one of them naming Diego Guardia as the grower of its $23 honey natural Sonora from Costa Rica and another a $22 washed decaf from Medellín; the other five are a title and a price. Espresso pulls on a La Marzocco Linea Classic S through Mahlkönig grinders, the filter side runs a flat-bottom brewer through the rotating single origins, and no bag prints a varietal or a roast date.

The bar is a single pale plaster counter with rounded edges, hand-troweled plaster walls behind it, a terracotta arch at one end, black floating shelves holding ceramics and a cactus, and a custom angled pendant of wood and metal hung over the work surface. The side patio is wood decking under a cream shade sail with a bentwood bench, umbrella tables and a row of planters trailing down the plaster, and the shirt behind the bar carries the shop's own line, A PLACE FOR US.