Flowing from a shade of Vitosha Mountain, Bulgaria’s 9,000-year-old collateral mixes buckling sidewalks with consistent revitalization. In Sofia, we will find solemnly exploding buildings perched alongside complicated qualification drink shops and a newly designed fast movement metro using in tandem with rusting trams. Out of these competing eras has emerged the specialty coffee scene.
The Sofia coffee community has many tiny groundwork roasters and online-only retailers, though few specialty cafes. Though some coffee roasters source high-quality beans and have apparatus to broach a smashing cup, a routine from fry to descent mostly lacks a hint of a specialty shop. The cafes that do overcome this plea find they face a direct problem. For now, these shops tend to concentration on education, training a art of qualification coffee, and that black can ambience improved than white.
Here are a few places where we can find a formidable crater in Sofia.
Dabov Specialty Coffee
Brainchild of five-time Cup of Excellence decider Jordan Dabov, Dabov Specialty Coffee has been operative to move a world’s best coffee to Bulgaria given 2008. They sell roasted beans to over 100 shops in Sofia and recently began to make their symbol on a city’s cafeteria scene. While a designed churned cafeteria space including a roasting trickery and cupping area waits on permits and construction, their tiny space west of a National Palace of Culture has non-stop a doors to business and coffee enthusiasts.
The pop-up character emporium aims to build recognition and business for a subsequent call of specialty coffee to strike Sofia. Pulling shots with a Sanremo Opera, Kees outpost der Westen Mirage, and Mahlkönig EK 43, Dabov doesn’t skimp when it comes to carrying a best coffee gear. Most importantly, they wish each shot they lift to be your best ever. With peculiarity beans—including a 2016 Guatemala Cup of Excellence winner—and singular origins from all over a world, Dabov has one of a widest selections of coffee in Sofia. In further to classical espresso drinks, a pop-up offers liquor-based coffee cocktails, season coffee, and a welcoming atmosphere.
This emporium seeks zero reduction than to lift a bar for a Sofia qualification coffee scene. If we wish to see what Sofia’s splendid specialty coffee destiny looks like afterwards overhanging by Dabov is a must.
Chucky’s Coffee Culture
Chucky’s Coffee Culture prides itself on being a initial qualification coffee emporium in Sofia. Owner Ivan Chavdarov worked in coffee in Athens for 8 years before returning to Bulgaria and opening “Chucky’s Coffee House” nearby Vitosha Boulevard in 2014. The emporium started as an experiment, something Chavdarov never saw succeeding. He remembers meditative he’d be forced to tighten it in 3 to 6 months. To his pleasing warn it took off. Using educational workshops to deliver a new multiply of business to qualification coffee, a emporium fast became a success.
Chucky’s offers a Bulgarian-style espresso mix and a few singular origins on bar. They also offer a accumulation of decoction methods from AeroPress and V60 to Turkish coffee. The tiny downtown plcae fills adult around lunchtime and weekend mornings with people overhanging by for a discerning takeaway coffee or a longer discuss with a friend. There is a second shop, called “Chucky’s Coffee Store,” outward a city center.
Chucky’s represents a aged ensure in a scene, a image of where specialty coffee in Sofia began.
Fabrika Daga
Fabrika Daga, “Rainbow Factory” in English, also pennyless onto a qualification stage in 2014. The name joins dual concepts: “Daga,” definition rainbow, a curtsy to a 1979–1992 dear comix repository of a same name, and “Fabrika” emphasizing their “we-make-it-ourselves-mindset.” Located tighten to a National Gallery of Art, a executive plcae creates it easy to squeeze an espresso, latte, or brewed coffee while walking about a city or streamer to work. The emporium draws a vast throng during lunch and for brunch on a weekends. They offer adult a series of Bulgarian classics all done in-house. Don’t let good food dope you; they are critical about coffee, too. A group of dedicated baristas pulls shots on a La Marzocco Linea Classic.
With first-time specialty coffee drinkers frequently walking in on hearing rumors of illusory coffee, Fabrika Daga has turn a end for people all over Bulgaria. After tasting a mix or one of a 3 singular origins on bar, all supposing by Dabov, these business frequency leave disappointed.
Its consistent routine of expansion has done Fabrika Daga a contingency stop on a Sofia coffee tour.
Matthew Simmons is a freelance journalist. This is Matthew Simmons’ initial underline for Sprudge. Photos by Elizabeth North for Sprudge Media Network.