The New York Coffee Festival doesn't just have coffee.

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In New York, where coffee culture is very popular, it is said that there are more than 2000 coffee shops in the city. Coffee is the spice of New York culture, and even for a long time, you can pick people up with coffee in New York.

At the first New York Coffee Festival, which ended shortly after Alec drank more than 20 cups of coffee, he brought us a wonderful report. The time for the second New York Coffee Festival has been decided, and as a coffee addict, I am a little eager to try.

Sometimes I wonder why the city of New York attracts me.

Before I write about the New York Coffee Festival, I'd like to say something about "New York and Coffee". Although he didn't live in 1931, you can probably imagine what an exaggerated headline it was when the Empire State Building was built in New York in an era when there were no skyscrapers. Regardless of how many times it has been destroyed or guarded in the movie, it seems that this city has always been the center of the world. I'm not talking about how green the Central Park is and how easy it is to buy Fifth Avenue, but because it exports the most universal values. And popular culture that is scolded and enjoyed by the world.

The same is true of coffee. From the first time I went to this city, I fell in love with New York, not because of the luxurious skyline made up of countless rectangles (any other city in the world needed to rely on Photoshop's seal tools to achieve the shock, New York laughed without saying a word) What I really like about New York is the coffee shops, large and small, which are located on every street corner within walking distance. The coffee here is different from that of any other city in the world.

These coffee shops are the best symbol of New York's diversity. Baristas are of different shapes and backgrounds. If you go to a hundred coffee shops, you can get a hundred stories about small potatoes in Manhattan, and the coffee equipment is dazzling. You can either break into Starbucks and take away the latte ordered on App a few minutes ago, or you can slowly spend time with very good coffee. Take your time to watch the friendly shop assistant use AeroPress and take over his own cup. Even for a long time, you can pick up people with coffee in New York. For example, New Yorkers who used to be the most serious and understand the roasting quality of coffee are concentrated in downtown, and there have been more and more suit staff in the city in recent years.

What I want to say is, just like nothing is the best in New York, so is coffee, and it's full of good coffee, and there's no one that stands out; it's very much like the "ownerless city" of New York. Every guest who stays here in a variety of ways from his own country ends up becoming the spice of New York culture, unlike New York, where they are called New Yorkers again and again.

Therefore, it is worth looking forward to holding a coffee festival in such a city. The long opening remarks came to an end.

To get to the point, this is the first time that New York has held a coffee festival of this scale, and Allegra Entertainment & Events has brought it from London to New York (it seems that the coffee festival has now become a standard for a cosmopolitan city). The whole event lasts only three days, that is, September 25-27, and the venue is in 69TH REGIMENT ARMORY, where anyone can buy tickets through the official website or on-site (I later found out that there is a discount code in the Time Out New York distributed free of charge on the New York subway). I bought an adult ticket on the official website (www.newyorkcoffeefestival.com), and if you happen to be a coffee fanatic, you can also buy a gift package, a book about coffee, and an eco-bag printed with coffee festival logo.

This year, the coffee brands participating in the exhibition are very luxurious, nearly 70, ranging from Starbucks to Chalait, as well as the newly popular Stumptown Coffee Roasters and Gregory's Coffee. In short, apart from not seeing Blue Bottle Coffee, they have basically gathered a large number of new and old coffee forces in North America. In addition to setting up booth at the exhibition site to provide their own concept promotion, there are also rich coffee equipment exhibitions, some of which are for store use, and some are personal appliances that can be purchased on the spot.

The coffee brands at the scene basically provided guests with small cups to try drinks, especially the huge Starbucks booth, which probably smelled the threat from California. In recent years, they have been emphasizing their high-quality background, for fear that everyone will form the impression of "Starbucks = ordinary office worker coffee", so it can not be said that the Starbucks Starbucks Reserve Coffee ‎ booth (Starbucks' top coffee brand line) was set up at the scene. Dozens of bags of fine raw beans collected from different places are listed, and the platforms are all the best baristas from various New York stores, using various hand tools and siphons to cook a cup of warm taste with a strong sense of community for the coffee-loving believers at the scene.

Not only Starbucks Reserve Coffee, but also other coffee brands have invited baristas (and even founders). The scene is simply a show of creativity. Basically, you can see how countless barista men with different temperament can get along correctly with Lahua.

In what the New York Times calls "labor-intensive, low-profit, small and serious coffee brands", you can basically smell all kinds of smells from New York. The seriousness of the financial district, the ordinary casual nature of Midtown, and the literary and artistic character of Brooklyn are all well presented. In fact, this trend was considered incredible a few years ago, because traditionally, making a cup of dripping coffee quickly was based on high rents and coffee shops had to make choices, but now, more and more coffee lovers want to drink more time-consuming espresso or hand-brewed coffee, along with the barista's slow neighborhood smile. This sense of conflict precisely reflects the degree of relaxation in New York.

In New York, you can find good coffee at will, and if you really want to talk to the barista, you can also ask the source of the coffee beans. In this respect, New York appears to be more mature than other cities-people can always kindly trust the taste of baristas.

Among the many coffee brands to learn from, one is Chalait, which combines coffee and oriental tea culture, whether lattes or other coffee drinks, to find the entry point for tea elements, and even the world's dominating matcha latte (hot drink with milk without a trace of coffee), Chalait has handed over a very different answer from Starbucks, which tastes very good. As West Village's newly popular store, you might as well have a seat next time you go to New York.

As of this year, there are more than 2000 coffee shops in New York City, and they are growing steadily. After writing these words, I happened to receive an official email from the New York Coffee Festival, announcing that a new one will be held from September 16 to 18 next year, and to seek ideas to make it the most distinctive urban coffee festival in the world.

I think the reason why New York attracts me is that I can be asked when drinking coffee: which kind of sugar substitute do you choose? Then behind the cooking table, there is a gentle smile that is always reasonable.

Write _ Alec Junhao (media man, YOHO! Human, Captain 25AM, heavy coffee enthusiast)