Blue Bottle Coffee is part of our midtown coffee guide!  

6 words or less: Frenetic Energy, Hip Minimalism, Friendly Staff

Location: Bryant Park (54 W. 40th Street)

(There’s a second location in the basement level of Rockefeller Center.)

Hours: 6:30-7 Weekdays & 7-7 Weekends

Open Since: Spring 2015

Amenities: No bathroom, no wifi, no outlets, 6 seats at a bar

Must Try: New Orleans Style Cold Brew and Double Chocolate Cookie

Owner: James Freeman

Roaster:  They roast their own out in Williamsburg (though this is originally a west coast roaster)

Blue Bottle Coffee in Midtown, just on the southside of Bryant Park, is bringing its third wave cold brew love to the midtown crush.  Blue Bottle, originally of Oakland, but now also roasting in Williamsburg, is named after some crazy story about the first coffee shop in Central Europe named Blue Bottle.  But the craziness ends there:  the rest is passion for third wave coffee, sourced directly, roasted perfectly.

Visiting the Bryant Park location in the mid-afternoon on a weekday, a line snakes out the door and a staff of five was manning their battle stations to keep the flow moving.  There was someone on espresso, someone on milk, someone on pour-over, someone on the New Orleans style (NOLA) cold brew that they serve on a keg… The NOLA cold brew has been one of my coffee favs for a while, something about the chicory, coffee, milk seemed perfectly balanced to me.  This visit I had the NOLA with the double chocolate cookie.  The cookie was so dark and so soft and it seemed to come from the same earth as the chicory undertones of the cold brew.  A little bit of bliss among the crowds.

What’s not to love?