A sweeter-than-usual coffee took the sting out of some not-so-sweet news when this Hungry Mum visited Handpicked Coffee Roasters.
When choosing a coffee location, it pays to check the opening hours, which is how we ended up at the above joint rather than L’oeuf as planned on Monday morning this week.
We both parked and stumbled up to L’oeuf only to realise it’s the barrista’s day off, and my friend suggested Handpicked Coffee Roasters, another Mt Albert stalwart. I hadn’t been before but she sold it well, mentioning the owners have won awards for their coffee and it was just down the road.
Handpicked Coffee Roasters is part of a burgeoning coffee culture that adds unique ingredients to the humble bean. Strawberry coffee anyone? I went for the orange coffee on my friend’s recommendation. You could put it on the blog, she said (we’re still undercover).
The cafe is small but popular and you can sit inside or outdoors on tables. The footpath’s been widened and the traffic’s constant but it’s still pleasant if you don’t mind some fumes which I’m actually okay with if there’s a coffee coming.
We were meeting because she had news to share and I wondered if she had another book deal. A published poet, and acclaimed for her work, this would be exciting and worth celebrating and so maybe I’d try the strawberry coffee too.
The coffees arrived, mine with a slice of candied orange. The coffee looked normal (not orange, thankfully). I took a sip. The owner makes her own orange juice, which she then uses to make orange syrup and this is what gives the coffee its citrus burst. Orange and coffee are happy together, like dark chocolate and orange, it just works. The coffee was slightly sweeter than what I’m used to but not too sweet (I like my coffee strong).
“Well my news is we’re selling our house,” she said. Turns out the rennovations they were looking into were too expensive to execute and they considered moving to the suburbs but why bother, really?
“We’re moving to Cambridge,” she said. Her husband’s parents live there and her mum is going to move there too. They could buy a new house and she could keep writing, travel to Auckland once a month. It made sense.
The coffee was very good, I took another sip. The orange lingered. I ate the candied slice while she told me about house-hunting. All the reasons she gave for leaving Auckland, I understood. Agreed with. It made me question why we’re still here.
Then I took another sip of the orange coffee.
Handpicked Coffee Roasters
918 New North Road