properly buzzed

Coffee is a beautiful thing, goes great with sweet treats and gives a nice boost of energy to help with the waking up for non-morning people and times when you need to pull an all nighter.  Those of you that know me really well know that I can't consume caffeine unless I get the wild urge to feel like having my heart explode out of my chest.  I tend to drink herbal teas more often than anything else but I do love a good coffee (usually decaf which oddly still has caffeine) with a sweet baked treat.  

Here's a list of my current favorite coffee shops and why in various spots in the US in no particular order. 

Dripalator - Asheville, NC or Blackmountain, NC

Good coffee.   The separate locations are owned by different people and they carry different beans., yet  they share a name, because someone bought the Asheville location and wanted to keep the name.. Totally a hipster atmosphere in Asheville, but good coffee and ok pastries.  Blackmountain is my preferred location of the two, hippie atmosphere great coffee and tea with oh my gosh yummy baked goods, plus they carry matte..  I love the Blackmountain location, but when in Asheville the Asheville one works as a hipster substitute.

Alterra  - Wisconsin Chain

Very good coffee, great baked treats and fancy mac and cheese at some locations.  

Kaladi Brothers - Anchorage, AK

Just dang good coffee, they distribute to places all over AK and I think they're expanding to Seattle (but that may be a lie) so if you're in the neighborhood and you see a red goat saying that they serve Kaladi Bros. go for it, the coffee will be good unless the barista doesn't know what they're doing.  The actual Kaladi Bros. cafe locations don't carry terribly interesting pastries or other treats, so going to the official ones aren't that important.  

Macrina Bakery - Seattle, WA

If I could live near this place I would eat here everyday.  Great pastries, great sandwiches, teas, coffee.. you name it I've tried them all and have yet to be disappointed.

Uptown Espresso - Seattle, WA

Home to the best freaking pumpkin pie I've ever eaten.  Although I haven't seen it available there for the last few visits to Seattle.  (I may have at one time in my life ordered a whole one and eaten if for breakfast everyday for a week.)

Alaska Coffee Roaster Co. -  Fairbanks, AK

Lots of food items to chose from, I prefer their savory treats to their sweet treats.. the sweet treats unless you know they're fresh can sometimes take on a slightly stale refrigerator flavor, yuck.  Brick oven pizza, meat pies, kosher bagel dogs and monster salads all fresh and pretty dang yum.

College Coffee House - Fairbanks, AK

I don't go for the coffee or even the baked treats, the coffee is decent at best and the only edible things worth mentioning are the cream cheese brownies (made locally but not in house) and the do it yourself waffle bar which is more just a novelty than than a source of deliciousness.  The main reason I go there is for a decadent sugar bomb drink called the "shaman matte latte" it is a beautiful thing that puts me into hyper-active energy overdrive but it's totally worth it.

Tate St. Coffee - Greensboro, NC

Definitely a college hang-out and the website is admittedly weird, but the art is usually pretty cool and the cakes are gigantic and delicious.  That's why I swear it's worth a visit..  A little disclaimer however.. if you're just going for coffee I would say that it can only be stated as decent.

Vagabond Blues - Palmer, AK

Good coffee, good baked goods best place and I think only place to go within a half hour drive.. the atmosphere is a little hippie and a little Alaskan which is maybe a. Try the vegan cookies they are like a dense granola bomb great for hiking around Alaska because I swear they will make you feel full for many hours.

Beachcomber Cafe - Trinidad, CA

If you're in the area or you're doing the highway 1 drive down the west coast this is a place that's worth a stop.  I might say this is my favorite place of them all, well maybe next to Macrina's.  Very much a hippie cafe.  I love how environmentally aware they are.  They have an assortment of miss-matched coffee mugs and plates you can take with you and bring back if you feel like walking the beach which is down the road.  All the baked items are great, especially the vegan brownies that have a hint of coffee and lavender (really I would have never guessed that vegan baked goods could be so diverse and taste so good but it seems like more and more of my favorite sweets have been of the vegan variety lately).

I'll stop here even though there are many, many more coffee shops out there that should make the list.  I think if I kept going this would become a small coffee shop travel book instead of a single post on my silly blog.   

Colin's home brewed I swear there is a smiley face in the top right corner. Yes he is a huge caffeine addict, he has his own espresso machine and makes a mean cup of joe, usually with Kaladi Bros.  

Dripalator 

Alterra