Modu Cafe

Jiyoon Jang spent two years selling perilla tarts and black sesame mochi bars out of a studio-apartment kitchen before she had a room to put them in, and when she finally got one she wrote the drink program herself instead of handing it to someone else. Modu is the Korean word for "all", and the bar behaves like it means it: Proud Mary's Ghostrider on the house espresso, Onyx, DAK and Nomad rotating through the single-origin slot, Kettl matcha for the lattes.

Modu is a multi-roaster shop and roasts nothing itself. The house espresso is Proud Mary's Ghostrider, a blend of naturals from Brazil and Ethiopia, and the rotating single-origin slot has run Onyx Coffee Lab, DAK Coffee Roasters and Nomad Coffee, each posted with its origin and process when it lands on bar. One coffee usually shows up three ways at once: as the single-origin espresso, on batch drip until noon or sold out, and on single-origin cold brew. Matcha is Kettl's Hinata, a Fukuoka blend poured only in the lattes. Nothing leaves in a bag; the whole program lives on the bar.

Proud Mary's Ghostrider is the house espresso, a blend of naturals from Brazil and Ethiopia, and the single-origin slot rotates through Onyx, DAK and Nomad with the origin and the process posted each time it turns over. Filter is batch drip rather than a pour-over bar, hot until noon or sold out, and the One and One pours the current single origin twice, once as espresso and once as a cortado, with sparkling water alongside.

The syrups are made in the shop: vanilla bean for the vanilla latte, chocolate for the mocha, Korean black sugar for the Modu Latte under a cinnamon-dusted cream top. Matcha and hojicha lattes can be built on Koatji, a koji oat milk, which is a fussier choice than any of this strictly needs.

A wooden communal table runs down the middle of the room, flanked by small tables, with the ordering counter and Jang's case at the far end. Tall glass windows carry daylight across all of it, and that light is most of the design: white walls, light wood, and the Korean characters for Modu set through the space. The objects in the room are made by the people who work there rather than bought in, down to the first ceramic cup, thrown by Madi, one of the bakers.

• Minimalist
• Daylit
• Communal table
• Korean