Communal Coffee

I'm not sure what was here before...

but the southwestern corner lot on University and Texas is now a hybrid coffee and florist...

I was curious to come here since they recently opened five days ago...

The coffee place is called Communal Coffee while Native Poppy serves your floral needs. There is seating inside, as well as outside and in a nice twist, seating in the back patio which shares space with neighbor North Park Nursery.





As expected the decor is minimalistic. Their coffee comes from Sightglass, a roaster from San Francisco. I saw on their IG's that they also have "guest roasters" with local roaster Dark Horse Coffee being a recent one featured.  Their pastries are from local cafe, Cardamom, also in North Park but on the southern end.

While perusing their interior, I snapped a quick shot of someone else's hipster toast (avocado with egg).

Cute cactus wall motif.

I guess macrame is hip again?  Bert's family used to have a macrame plant holder in their front yard, which ended up being stolen. This wall hanging is above their sugars, coffee stirrers, etc.

Stem bar?



It was crowded inside and a longer line had formed so we sat outside.  The photo below was taken at the bathroom near the nursery.

Our drinks plus almond croissant:

This was served as is, not warmed up (it probably would have tasted better if it was). It wasn't as flaky as I would have liked but it was still rich and buttery with some almond filling within.


Bert's Sea Salt Carmel Mocha (I hate that spelling, CARAMEL please!), and my Cortado. Notice anything? They are in fkg papers cups. Plus their latte art sucks.

But did it taste good?   To be honest, it wasn't that great. We've had better (WestBean, Bird Rock, and Cafe Moto to name a few).  Bert's drink was on the "thin" side.  At the very bottom was the chocolate that settled. Maybe it wasn't mixed very well or Bert was supposed to mix it (but in the past he's never had to mix his mochas).  My cortado was okay but what killed it for me was the presentation. It wouldn't hurt serving these drinks in actual ceramic cups.


If you want to maximize your time in the area, right next door is the North Park Nursery for your garden needs. If you are hungry, across the street is Olympic Cafe, as well as Golden Donut (their toasted coconut donut and Vietnamese iced coffee are great!).

I haven't tried Sightglass Coffee from SF before today but just because a place uses a "name brand coffee doesn't mean it will taste good.  Like how some coffee kiosks will advertise beans from "Cafe Moto", "Virtuoso" or "Westbean", but in reality, it tastes like swill because of poor execution.  This place wasn't swill-like, don't get me wrong, but I guess I was expecting more. On another note, Sightglass Coffee is located in the SoMa district and maybe during a future road trip, we'll have to try their coffee at it's source.

Article:
"New North Park Cafe brewing SF Sightglass Coffee", May 12, 2016

Communal Coffee
2335 University Ave
San Diego, CA 92104
(619) 920-7887

fb page + reviews from you know where (only 5 so far at time of this post)

I sure wish they didn't serve their coffee in crappy cups though. I really wasn't impressed with how it looked and that made me a bit biased.  To be fair,  a future visit or two is in order to properly their their other drinks.