Trip Report: Nado Gelato Cafe (Coronado, CA)
Posted by TheShot on 14 Jul 2009 | Tagged as: Foreign Brew, Roasting
A recent, random excursion to San Diego produced at least this one CoffeeRatings.com Trip Report. Visiting an old friend there for this past Independence Day weekend, we literally encountered more UFOs than good coffeehouses while in town. If aliens were behind the four red UFOs we witnessed over El Cajon on the night of the 4th, they clearly weren’t coming for the coffee.
The Westernized-Italian Nado Gelato Cafe keeps a low, old school profile just before traffic enters the nearby naval base. (Miss your turn, and prepare to face the rifles.) There’s sidewalk seating on benches and at a single table with a parasol. Indoors there isn’t much more seating: random stools and two tall, small tables.
The main attraction is the gelato here, made by Seattle’s Bottega Italiana, and its flavors are all in Italian names. For espresso, the use, and sell retail, beans from local roaster, Blue Bridge Coffee, which operates next door. You can’t get any more local than sharing a wall. Blue Bridge derives its name from the nearby Coronado-San Diego bridge.
They offer a four-cup Melitta bar, and for espresso they employ a two-group Rancilio Epoca. They produce espresso shots with a thin, pale-to-medium-brown crema, with a thinner body. It has mostly a simple flavor of mild spices, but there’s a freshness you can still make out in the cup. Served in Crate & Barrel China cups.
Read the review of Nado Galato Cafe in Coronado, CA.
2 Comments »
on 14 Jul 2009 at 5:02 pm +00:00T 1.espressophile said …
Next time you’re down that way, give Caffe Calabria a try.
on 16 Jul 2009 at 10:38 am +00:00T 2.TheShot said …
Calabria sounds great. I’ll definitely have to check it out next time.
Admittedly, I spent more time being bit of a 1990s music groupie, rather than a coffee snob, when I was down there. While much of the nation back in the 90s was crowd-surfing to grunge bands from Seattle such as Nirvana and Pearl Jam , I was in awe of the scene at SD’s Casbah & Cargo Music — acts like Drive Like Jehu, Three Mile Pilot, Rocket From The Crypt, Heavy Vegetable, Creedle, etc.
I suppose every music fan needs their own Graceland (Neverland Ranch?)… San Diego is oddly mine.