I really wanted to check out Burlap & Bean, but damn, they are closed on sundays. Since I had driven all the way over there, I decided to drive a bit further to Media and walk around. I usually only go to Media when I have jury duty, so it’s not too often, luckily. But Media is freakin adorable.
What can I say? Seven Stone is a little hippie cafe. They have coffees and some snacks, sandwiches, sweets, soups, etc. There’s an awful lot of reggae playing on their radio.
A bagel sandwich with ham, egg, and cheese. By the time we got there, their bagel options were slim. They pretty much ran out of everything. This was ok.
I had wanted a gingerbread latte but they ran out. So then I ordered a hazelnut and honey latte, but whatever I got had no hazelnut flavor nor honey flavor. In fact, I’m not even quite sure what I got. It was fine though. They’re flavored lattes are a bit pricey. As for the regular cup of coffee, it was really disgusting. It tasted like ashtray, really. You can’t win em all!

I’d been wishing for better coffee shops around my hood, so I was excited when I found out about Town Hall Coffee. I checked it out on a cold saturday morning.
Oh, this place is in an unfortunate location. You can barely tell it’s there. It’s in the same strip that Hymie’s is in, but unless I knew that, I would have never noticed its existence. You can barely tell from the street it’s there. There is a small parking lot behind the place, but you also have to know that’s there. Otherwise, it’s street parking on Montgomery, and Montgomery is a busy street, especially there. The place is really attractive and decorated well. You can tell a lot of thought was put into every detail. It’s a shame it is where it is. Move it somewhere a bit more easy to find and get to, and it would be doing gangbusters.
They obviously have coffee, but also have an array of teas from Steap. There’s also a little bit of food too, which I did not try.
A beautiful espresso. I especially love the tree stump tables they have. Some of their big chairs are comfortable, some are not. You have to try them out.
A latte. Their coffees are strong, which is good. They rotate the beans from various fancy schmancy places, like Counter Culture and Intelligentsia. Perhaps this is why the prices are a bit on the high side, in my opinion. I know we’re in the main line, but we’re not in the mission in san francisco. It’s kind of strange to be charging san franciso prices. J got a bagel while we were here, and he did absolutely love the bagel. We’re thinking it comes from Hymie’s or wherever Hymie’s gets their bagels from. It was also perfectly toasted, almost unnaturally so. What kind of toaster is this? Is this some industrial secret type toaster technology reserved for restaurants? All I know is i definitely want one.
I have one big bone to pick with this place – the noise due to the kids. They actually have an area in the back which seems to be geared for kids or people who want to bring their kids. But once you do this, the coffee house vibe is gone. Instead, it sounds like a freakin playground. I don’t know about you, but when I go to a coffee shop, I don’t go there to hear screaming kids, and that’s what I experienced that day. It’s a great idea to cater to main line moms, but it just seems a bit disjointed for people who want to relax on a saturday morning with some coffee and their laptop. Perhaps they need to do more work on soundproofing. It’s clear that they put a lot of love into this place. Everyone working was friendly and the coffee is quite good. Even the atmosphere totally works for me. They also have great hours. But man, I certainly won’t be coming back during the day!

It may be hard to believe, but since the last time I was in SF, at least 5 new coffee shops have opened up, in the Mission alone. You would think there’s no need for more, but they just keep popping up. And I only went down Valencia, so who knows how many more there are in other places. We stopped in BlueFig because it was small and unassuming. There is a barista, but we kept seeing a few people in chef’s outfits. We were confused. But they do have quite a food menu as well. Apparently, it’s a big lunch spot.We did not try any of the food. But we did have a coffee, a latte, and a spice cookie of some kind. They were all just fine. This place is small, cute, and unpretentious. I’ll be honest. We wanted to go to The Summit, down the street, but the place was packed to the hipster gills. I’d never seen so many Macs outside of the Apple Store. But this place was a nice diversion.

The Blue Fig
990 Valencia St
San Francisco, CA 94110