Coffee is delicious and world-renowned for its stimulant psychoactive properties, fine aroma, delicious flavor, and ubiquitous preparation methods. Gelatos, lattes, Americano blends, light roasts, medium roasts, dark roasts, decaffeinated options, cappuccino, coffee-themed snacks like chocolate-covered coffee beans, liqueurs, and the list goes on.
Different countries tend to have their own unique perspectives when it comes to coffee preparation. There’s the French press method, Israel favors a thick and sugary brew—you get the idea. Here, we’ll briefly cover four coffee destinations you’ve got to knock off your bucket list. Number four has a twist.
- Melbourne, Australia
Why aren’t Paris and Italy on this list? Because those are the places everybody knows for coffee. (Pay no attention to that “Seattle” listing below; there’s a reason it’s on this list!
Sure, you’ll find some excellent brews in Italy and Paris. However, many don’t realize that the land down under has its own take on coffee, and that take is pretty unique.
The story begins with WWII. Melbourne today has some of the best coffees in the world, but it wasn’t always a coffee destination. Greeks and Italians came through the area during the second world war, and brought with them their favorite coffee preparation techniques. The rest, as they say, is history.
- You Knew It Was Coming: Seattle, WA, USA
Sure, Seattle has Starbucks, the coffee super-corporation that is essentially caffeine McDonald’s. However, because Seattle is ground zero for that mega-corporation, there has been somewhat of a local response.
Countless little coffee shops and would-be competitors have cropped up across Seattle. Sure, there’s Starbucks. But there’s also all the other fine coffee shops.
You’d have to stay in the city a couple of months just to sample all the unique little coffee niches hidden on practically every corner. So it’s not just the fast-food coffee that Seattle is known for. There are many other options. For a coffee enthusiast with a bucket list, this is a must.
- Jerusalem, Israel
Approximately 25% of Israelis will drink most of a pot of coffee a day—the average amount seems to be between four and eight cups. If you go to Jerusalem, check out Power Coffeeworks, an outlet who practices roasting beans on-premises in the city.
This is catching on in Israel, but it’s a small country, and though you may need to spend months per city sampling coffee options, you can see most of the country with relative ease owing to proximity.
- Make Any Destination A Coffee Location
Of course, not everyone has the opportunity to travel; or perhaps the destination is more important to them than associated culinary trends such as haute coffee products. If you’re not in a place where you can travel, then top-shelf coffee options such as Good Fika can bring the foreign locales to the breakfast nook where you spend every morning.
If you are traveling around the world, but to locations not known for their coffee superiority, you might bring some quality coffee grounds with you to brew where you go. As a collateral bonus, moves like that tend to save you money.
Caffeinated Globe-Trotting
Whether you’re making any vacation a coffee destination by bringing top-tier blends along with you, exploring the ancient streets of Jerusalem, swaggering along Seattle city streets sampling sweet caffeinated confections, or seeing the way things are done in Oz, it’s worthwhile to bounce around the world a bit and see how things are done elsewhere.
Coffee lovers will likely also want to check out places like Italy, Paris, and Austria; additional locales well-known for their skill in coffee creation. But if you’re going to travel anyway, why not see some places that are utterly foreign to you in the process? Going to the remote countries of the world can knock two items off the bucket list in one shot.
