I had such a great experience at Stone Creek Coffee's N. Oakland Ave. location last night (Wednesday) that I thought I might be able to catch lightning in a bottle tonight (Thursday). The atmosphere is not quite coming across to the same extent tonight. Still, let me focus first on last night's great experience. The barista, another of my Stone Creek favorites, brewed up a soy latte that met or possibly even exceeded last week's delicious treat in Glendale. It tasted like they were using plain soy milk in Shorewood and vanilla-flavored in Glendale--or maybe I'm imagining things.
Tonight, the atmosphere has an old-skewing quality to it that seems odd for the beginning of a long holiday weekend. The background music is almost Muzak-like in both style and volume. While complaints are often voiced that the music at Alterra is played too loudly, here it is anything but that. Those who are looking for a quiet place to work or study will find it here.
I'm drinking a couple mugfuls of the Decaf Guatemala, which is pretty decent. I've explained in a comment that I find drip coffee at Stone Creek to be mediocre about 50% of the time, and this is kind of straddling the border between mediocre and good. It doesn't taste like it's been held too long. Despite this, I don't know which variables are responsible for the lackluster or at leat highly inconsistent qualities of the drip coffee here. I would think that drip would be the easiest item on the menu to master, far more so than espresso drinks.
