The Catalyst is a mostly vegetarian coffee shop that serves not only coffee but small food items, pastries, etc as well. It serves more natural flavored, organic coffee and the location is beautiful. A two story shop is perfect for this trendy hang out.
Today I ordered an Iced Mocha with soy. I was a bit annoyed at the Barista, which is not usually the case with this shop. She took forever filling my order and stopped several times to attend to pastries and other customers behind me. I was getting impatient because I had a dead line. It upset me that her lack of attention was also being seen in my drink and also that soy milk is an extra $.85 here when all other places are between $.30 and $60. For the $5.14 I spent there, I could have gotten a Venti blended caramel macchiato and a pastry at Starbucks.
However quality and organic and blah blah blah came into play. At first I thought the soy was a little off, but then noticed that the organic chocolate is much more bitter than the dark chocolate I am used to. I eventually settled that it wasn’t bad. The earthy flavors combined with the subtly nutty and richness of the cold espresso brought out the bitterness and dry aftertaste. I am not a fan of overly bitter nor excessively sweet coffee, but I do feel this Barista was leaning more toward the strong bitter taste.
The soy, which normally makes my coffees taste a little like sugar cookies, did nothing to enhance the flavors at all. It just seemed like someone poured the milk from their cereal bowl into my coffee and stirred in instant coffee.
Now I do have to point out that the coffee from this place is normally good. Even though I am more of a fan of the sweetened and flavored variety, the simplicity and organic side is very pleasant. However, with that said, I won’t be getting another mocha iced coffee from here every again. Best stick to my usual, which saddens me :/
I give this place 3 stars for today.
Mini Chef
Are you brain dead this cafe only has two (2) vegan items to eat in the whole place. What kind of foodie review fails epically to assimilate and understand the menu.
ReplyDeleteMoving on REAl coffee tastes like coffee not like a heap of sugar on corn syrup. Soy milk is soy and water not soy, water and sweeteners. This is a sad sad excuse for a review.
Dear "Anonymous",
ReplyDeleteWhile I thank you for posting, I feel the need to clear up a few things. The cafe started off vegan. However since their demographic changes ever year, they are more vegetarian with vegan items. I did just call them and they are not strictly vegan.
Second, you will find I was describing the coffee taste, not soy "milk". Their coffee does not have much for sweetener in it. If you have ever been there, and I am assuming you haven't, you would know.
The places I go to use flavored soy milk (which has 6g of sugar per 8 oz) and...yes...sweeteners in their coffee. That is why I mentioned it usually makes it taste like a sugar cookie, because it does. The Catalyst does not use flavored soy milk and the organic ingredients aren't pre-sweetened.
But thank you for your comment and have a nice day :)
yea, i bet you are brain dead. i'll pre-sweeten your face, and then feed you coffee.
ReplyDeletemaxi chef.
"Maxi Chef", you're an idiot. Stop using the internet to get cheap thrills by putting someone you don't even know down. Get a life, moron.
ReplyDelete