Vienna -- Coffee

Coffee in Vienna

Vienna is famous for its cafes, and rightly so. I enjoyed going back to a few of my favorites: Cafe Schwarzenberg and Cafe Frauenhuber (where Beethoven debuted his Quintet for Piano and Winds).

However, on this trip I found a few more interesting places.  Since I roast my own coffee, I was curious to see if there were any small roasting companies in Vienna.  While I certainly didn't look around that much, I did find one.

It's called Gegenbauer. They have a roaster and a stall in the Naschmarkt. I happened upon it during a stroll through the Naschmarkt to find lunch.

The espresso was a darker roast than I do, but very nice.  They sell their roasted coffee there with the date of the roast on the bag. They also roast pumpkin, almond and other seeds and sell them.  Across the alley they sell their own selections of specialty olive oils and vinegars.

However, the best coffee I've had in Vienna came at the bar in the Julius Meinl store in the Graben section of the pedestrian area in the center of the city. Julius Meinl is a stunningly beautiful gourmet grocery store that has a front section selling prepared food and coffee and lighter fare. The Grosse Brauner I had was not burned tasting like a lot of espresso, but not dull and stale like some I had in other cafes. The foamed milk was beautifully done.  Comes with a little square of fudge-like confection.