In what we hope will become a semi-regular feature here, we present our first Fort Greene Guide, a view of the cafes in the hood and their prices. We focused on the three items we figure most people are likely to get: a small coffee, a medium cappuccino or a baked good of some kind. Not every place we went to offers all three — Smooch, for instance, only does Americanos, and the type of available baked good varied widely, from croissants to lemon bars. When possible, though, we asked about that cafe staple, the muffin. Our results are below, but we’ve also made a handy Google Map if you’d prefer the geographic view. [View a Map]
Are you a regular at any of these spots? Leave your feedback in the comments! And if you know of a place we missed, send in your own data and we’ll try to add it to the chart above.
General Nathaniel Greene, our namesake. Read more about him 
You missed Urban Spring which serves the best coffee drinks in the neighborhood. Why not rate these according to taste and service? Most on this list are undrinkable and the service at Tillie’s is unspeakable.
Nice list. marquet across street from Provisions also has good coffee. $1.40 for a small. They just raised prices. But Provisions definetly a better cup for an extra 35 cents.
my favorite coffee is bittersweet
fave muffin is choice
fave non- coffee drink is urban spring
and allover favorites are choice and lil pig
Bittersweet is my favorite as well. I’ve tried going to smooch (before bittersweet opened) and it always seemed to take 10 minutes to get my over-priced super bitter americano. And then they charged me for milk.
Nice list tho… keep it up!
Choice is clearly Clinton Hill! Anyway their service is so slow it’s surprising that human beings can even move that slow! But they are less awful than the supremely awful staff at Tillie’s.
Pretty disappointing that service seems so unimportant to the shop owners in our neighborhood.
The small coffee at Greene Grape Provisions is 12 ounces – many other shops have a 10 oz small. The beans are roasted to order every week and we serve the same espresso that is used at restaurants like Babbo. Also in your notes you mention a fishy smell – we have stopped cutting whole fish in the store, which was causing that issue. We get fresh fish delivered every day but it is cut to order for us offsite.
Urban Spring has delicious coffee, although you gotta make sure it’s still hot — they don’t have a turnover like Bittersweet in terms of coffee drinkers, so sometimes the coffee’s been sitting in their thermos for a while. The lattes are phenomenal.
Since I’ve stopped drinking coffee recently (screws up my skin), I started drinking their brazil nut chai which is insane: dangerously addictive and gets me as high as coffee without that inner trembly feeling that I always get with coffee.
Bittersweet is a weird place — all my friends go there for coffee but I find the service unhappy (best way I can describe it), and the general vibe depressing. The coffee is really bitter, so I guess it’s strong but it’s not at all smooth or delicious — just burnt/starbucks tasting.
They do have amazing looseleaf teas though.
Wow I just wrote a novel! sorry. Must be that chai.
I appreciate that the proprietors of Green Grape Provisions are working to keep their customers happy/ paying attention to comments in forums like this. Places that work hard to keep customers happy are much needed in this neighborhood!
Nice chart! Had never heard of Marquet. Must be spending too much time east of Clinton Ave these days!
The best cup of coffee is the Starbucks in the Atlantic Center. Consistently high quality coffee and espresso and friendly staff. I am 100% serious.
Don’t forget about the Academy Restaurant on Fulton and S. Elliot, cheap coffee and very tasty corn muffins (amongst other muffin options) at this long-standing Fort Greene staple.
smooch may be 100% organic, but the hygiene practices there are unspeakable. remarkably disgusting. i once saw the owner bare-hand a piece of ice out of a to-go cup and pop it in his mouth before filling it with iced coffee. blech. bittersweet is my fave, but when there’s a line you want to make sure you have the heart of a saint, or something to read, or you might go insane.
[...] March 19th, 2008 by lesterhead Excellent Ft. Greene Blog General Greene has provided a handy comparison chart for many local coffee / pastry purchases. Check it out! What do you [...]
The chocolate macadamia flavored coffee at connecticut muffin is delish. Also, they have a nice selection of pastries and cakes, and the staff is great. I’m in there almost everyday. I guess the prices could be a bit lower, but thanks to the chart I see that they arent that far off the competition’s prices.
I love the coffee at Connecticut Muffin, I go there just about everyday. I would say they are notable for being super friendly and having good coffee.
outpost in clinton hill on fulton has the best coffee.
bitter sweet used to be really, really good but not so much since one of the co-owners left (who used to make the best coffee).
choice is best overall – if you want a bite, coffee, they’re all decent.
smooch, we tried going in there 3 times with no avail.
nobody came to help, had to stand their for 5 minutes waiting,
then left each time fed up.
Outpost really is the best.
and Smooch is the WORST.
while pillow rocks for atmosphere the service is hit or miss and the coffee is so-so at best. gotta say choice market wins hands down for me in terms of coffee quality.
i believe pillow cafe is clinton hill but regardless is pretty amazing for coffee and food. (the mexican hot choc. is wonderful)
tillies is still there? how? who goes there? terribe coffee, food and service? there are so many other options.
smooch was an exciting idea but the snobbery and long wait are not acceptable for a super expensive coffee. (they once took my order and never came back) (i left)
connecticut muffin is fair but i don’t love the coffee.
choice is not fort greene but pretty great for coffee and muffins.
had a chai once at urban spring (on dekalb?) it was gross.
speaking of Connecticut muffin…new location opening right on lafayette & fulton where the Chase bank used to be. Sign spotted yesterday. i think we have enough choice of muffins & coffee in the area….how about another choice opening in ft greene??
Good post/contributions, I’ll throw my hat in for Outpost and Choice. Clinton Hill wins again!
This is a very good list, but it might do well to add another column called “general experience,” which would incorporate some of the reader comments, thereby allowing us and others to adjust our expectations accordingly.
Thus, the 10 minutes’ wait at smooch can be weighed against the truly wretched coffee served at marquet, and so forth.
A good recommendation, DR, and thanks to everybody for the feedback. We’ll definitely get to work on a second version that takes into consideration these comments. We’ve thought about doing a similar thing with bars and restaurants — anything you guys would particularly like to see?
I don’t know who lena is… but she speaks from my heart.
I agree with with all she says. Clearly she has fine taste
I was not so impressed by the coffee at Marquet… but maybe I’ll put up with it since it’s one of the few spots NOT offering WiFi! Is anyone else irked by such tiny little spaces filled with more computers than the Apple Store? I wish we could maybe, talk to each other…. off our computers sometime!
Hey you missed John’s Donuts and Bergen Bagels. Sure they’re Clinton Hill but they’re closer to Ft. Greene than Pillow Cafe and Choice Market are.
For me Choice Market is the best in the area however whenever I’m over by Lil’ Pig I have to stop in for a coffee and a chocolate chip cookie.
All join the chorus…tillies should have been listed as notable for rude staff and burnt coffee.
pillow has wifi. and their service has always been great (for me…and i go there frequently, meaning multiple times per week….)
Outpost has the best coffee, hands down and it has super music and wifi. Their bagels also rock, but for muffins/pastries, I head to choice for the orange chocolate scone. mmmm.
Urban Spring? Are you people high? $6 dollars for a small “smoothie” that takes 10 minutes to make and is 75% ICE?? Explain to me the point.
Pillow has WiFi – you just have to ask them for the password of the day. Good coffee, friendly service, and booze for when you break down.
Agree with all re Tillie’s. Seriously – who goes there?
Although you don’t think of it as a coffeeshop, Ici is best in FG for a coffee and fresh baked croisant. Bittersweet second. I want Smooch to be great, but too many problems and “quirks”.
In CH, nothing beats Choice, warts and all. If they are too slow or distracted for you, just freakin chill. Or walk over to Starbucks, which does, in fact, have the most consistently terrible coffee (over-cooked because they keep it too hot, too strong because it is brewed specifically to be mixed with too much milk and sweeteners and crap) on the planet.
Urban Spring–smoothies decent at best—not worth cashing in your 401K for
Choice–yummy grub, served by dark-hearted, incompetent zombies. If you can stand watching the folks in the kitchen with their thumbs up their arses while the guys up front f’up your order 12 times, this is the place for you
Smooch–fab, if you like being hit on by naked Aussie men
Bittersweet—the one and only time i had it, their ice cream had more crystals in it than a meth lab. BOOOOO!!!
Bidonville—great coffee, fly tunes
Cafe Vino, a new and very good Italian restaurant on DeKalb opposite Brooklyn Hospital, offers breakfast lunch and dinner and has excellent coffee, espresso and cappuccino. It’s got free wi-fi.
I live on Clermont and Dekalb and there are about 4 cafes in my vicinity and I have to say I don’t think any of them make a good latte. I work near Gimme coffee on Mott in Nolita and they make wicked coffee. I go to Gorilla Coffee on the weekends and their coffee is dope…..why oh why can’t we have a that quality of coffee in our hood?! Oye Vey!
URBAN SPRING has the best coffee. Great service, great muffins and the plastic cups are biodegradable.
Seriously folks: This is about coffee drinks and baked goods. Why are people flaming about SMOOTHIES, which, incidentally, are notoriously expensive especially when they are organic?
It may not be in Ft. Green, technically, but Outpost is by far the best place for coffee within a 10-15 minute walk of any of the places listed. For starters, their coffee is better. Has a great, full flavor and is always fresh-brewed nice and strong. Second, the staff there is extremely friendly. Third, it’s teh only place around other than Tillies that is well suited for long term, cafe-style loitering. Third, in the summer they have a nice yard, which is also good for lounging about. Fourth, they even do juice drinks and a small cafe food menu.
They’re not ideal for those of you seeking top notch pastries… but their pastries are passable anyway, and besides this blog entry purports to be about coffee… of which Outpost is king of the hood.
#34 – do a wee research primero…plastic does not biodegrade. it merely turns into smaller pellets, which wonderfully enough, like our medicines, it seems, turn up in our drinking water.
i will admit that urban spring DOES indeed make a mean motor oil that you have to add two cups of milk in order to find a coffee taste, but somehow when i asked “green fabio” why the price was so high, he explained to me that i was also supporting fair trade and a family that he personally knew in guatemala or costa rica..(i forget, i was tired that day) he charged me extra for using milk once, (also organic and biodegradable) so i paid 4 bucks for a wee (6oz) coffee…i’ve never been back since….bittersweet was nice and its too bad the chubby guy who made such great coffee seems to be gone…alas.
Damn, Ederico did you miss out on your morning coffee today, wee bit grumpy are we?
I didn’t realize Bittersweet had partly changed ownership! That must explain why the Americano I got addicted to last summer is well, not so addictive anymore. Really, I think coffee taste is so personal there is no “best” out there: the problem is finding a place that will be consistent enough! For me, Choice has been consistent enough, and inexpensive enough ($2.25 for a latte!) for me.
if i order a drip coffee, any damn thing will do and rating for such an item is a little absurd as it’s all just crap. acceptable crap, but you’d be a fool to expect much. however, when one decides to crack open the wallet for an americano, expectations for a $300 (at least) drink are raised — and sad to say, there is no local option on the level of gorilla on 5th. service o/a in the area is bad — with Tillies sinking to HORRIBLE. i walk out more than i choose to wait, even though when i arrive i’m 2nd in line. the americano at pillow is closest to being worth it.
[...] a new place in the hood to get coffee, though perhaps not a great one, according to the comments in our recent survey. I snapped this on the way to work this morning so didn’t have time to look more closely. [...]
I really like Marquet.
I live right around the corner from Tillie’s but have totally given up it. Love the idea of the place: selling local artists’ works etc… and lord knows they’ve been there long before DeKalb was hot but agreed, the service is painful. And some of the staffers are flat out rude. Caught a hellacious fight between two of them— one ran out crying and the other following her outside to continue screaming at her. During morning rush. Leaving just one person behind the counter, who obliviously continued to slowly butter a bagel.
Agree wholeheartedly with prevuious Tillie’s post. A shadow of what it could/should be. I’m not a huge fan of Ozzie’s, but it would be better run if they were to take over.
[...] and neat explanations and really explore why it is that authors love the place… And so do coffee shops. You see, we used to other families set up food stands outside Bishop Loughlin highschool on [...]
marquet used to have really good coffee, around when it first opened. but it’s been terrible the last few times i’ve been there. it has a great lemon bar but i think it’s pastries have also gone downhill in the past few years.
lil pig has great coffee and lemonade.
so much hatred for tillie’s! i’m moving to carlton and dekalb so i’ll be even closer to this life-sucking coffee shop!
What about La Bagel Delite?!! That place is the best. I crave their coffee every morning and the service is happy and efficient. The owner is very proud of his store. He even can be heard sometimes speaking out to the customers: “We’ve got fresh squeezed orange juice today folks!”
Yesterday we stopped by Fresh Gardens on Fulton in Ft Greene to pick up a few items. Amongst them we wanted sugar cubes (1 lb box) and Walkers Shortbread Rounds (5.3 oz). When we saw the Walkers price tag of $6.89 and the sugar cubes for $9.99 we were astounded and figured something was amiss. We walked out empty handed and made our way to the Korean deli next to CT Muffin on Lafayette to compare. True enough, we found our Walkers for $3.89 and sugar cubes for $5.69! Buyers beware!
Oh god, I laughed at the comment about Bittersweet’s service being “unhappy.”
We’ve all worked crappy, minimum wage jobs at some time or another but the attitude from the counter staff there is UNREAL. It’s downright hostile at times. Which, of course, makes me laugh.
Tillie’s is dirty. I’ve lived in Ft Greene 8 years now and have never been in there when there weren’t flies buzzing around or the counter staff looking put-upon to take your order.
Smooch—Decent coffee, a little bitter…but you need at least ten minutes to get your beverage.
Greene Grape Provisions has good coffee but boy are the counter staff RUDE. The guys at the meat counter are very sweet and helpful but the staff at the register in front makes going in for your coffee not such a pleasant experience. Makes me avoid it sometimes and head across the street to Marquet (sweet people, Martha is a doll).
bonita now carries stumptown, in french press pots.
i just found out, super impressive
its on dekalb n vanderbilt…
great authentic mexican comida and super cool
laid back and attentive staff.
cant go wrong