Jump to content
  • Welcome to the eG Forums, a service of the eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters. The Society is a 501(c)3 not-for-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of the culinary arts. These advertising-free forums are provided free of charge through donations from Society members. Anyone may read the forums, but to post you must create a free account.

Best place to read a book


Vancouver

Recommended Posts

So what do you think is the best place to settle in for a while and nurse a cup of coffee while reading a book - the type of place where you aren't going to feel rushed out by the high turnover or crowds. The type of place with chairs that aren't designed to make your bum hurt to get you out. Bonus points for pleasant background music and a nice view.

Thoughts?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anywhere along the Steveston harbour, early on a sunny, weekday morning (the weekend crowds are just to much) before the throngs of people take over the place. Just beautiful. Try the little coffee shop right on Moncton (forget the name...something like Steveston Coffee Co. (?) ) walk up to the pier and just sit and relax on any of the very comfy benches. Boats, water, people, sun....and a book if you like!!

John

It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top.

Hunter S. Thompson ---- R.I.P. 1939 - 2005

"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society."

--Mark Twain

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Come try our Hastings street location of Caffe Artigiano. It's at 740 W. Hastings, across from the Sinclair Centre. It's our largest location and it offers free WiFi. Ask the manager for the password. We have quite a few readers at this locations. The other locations are a little smaller and busier.

vin

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Our Town Cafe on Main Street, but sometimes it gets distracting when they put on a good movie on the wide screen plasma TV.

i like SOMA on Main as well.. but my favorite is in my house when no one is here.. and that unfortunately is never!

DANIELLE

"One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well."

-Virginia Woolf

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah, those were the days, when I had time to nurse a book reading coffee - I mean read a book nursing a coffee.

If memory serves me well, I used to hang at the Calabria bar on Commercial Drive. You can park there hassle free as long as you order a cappuccino or two. And who can resist those pastries?

S

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Reading a book. I have heard of that. I know people have done it. I recall a couple myself. Unless "The Cat in Hat" or "Go, dog, Go " count, there has not been time to sit and read a book. I rely on others for their interpretation and nod stupidly.

Coffee. The shooter, right ?

This post has made me so jealous. Reading and drinking coffee. I can only imagine those two activities going together.

Neil Wyles

Hamilton Street Grill

www.hamiltonstreetgrill.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kits Beach in the Fall, Winter or early Spring. Beautiful view, quiet & calm.

Serenity.

Ciao

Yes. That would be my favourite place as well. I have a friend who loves going to coffee shops to read, but I find the goings-on too distracting. Kits beach off-season is very soothing.

I'm gonna go bake something…

wanna come with?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This post has made me so jealous. Reading and drinking coffee. I can only imagine those two activities going together.

Schedule an hour a week on your PDA and you can too! :wink:

Cheers!

Ha! I was about to say the same thing! Better yet, dowload a book and read it on your PDA!

We're SUCH geeks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

No one else has said it - but I always really like the backroom at Irish Heather. You can get some nibbles and a coffee (or a Guinness) and just hang. It is a good thing.

Hey what is that car driving by my house? A young woman with an egullet cap? RAT TAT TAT TAT TAT TAT TAT!

Another casulty in the Vancouver 'troubles'....

Link to comment
Share on other sites

How about Provence Marinaside for their pretty patio, and their excellent breakfasts and coffee? And, besides the view of both attractive marine architecture and that of the local citizenry, the next door store offers superior papers, and both open early.

from the thinly veneered desk of:

Jamie Maw

Food Editor

Vancouver magazine

www.vancouvermagazine.com

Foodblog: In the Belly of the Feast - Eating BC

"Profumo profondo della mia carne"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Along the same lines of Jamie's suggestion, there's also BoJangles Cafe on Marinaside for more casual fare, 1/2 a block east of Provence. In inclement weather, there are cozy club chairs by the fireplace, perfect for leisurely literary pursuits.

The Mouse family stopped at BoJangles for lunch today midway through our seawall bike ride, and we lucked into one of the best sunny tables out on the patio. Food always tastes so much better eaten al fresco, particularly with the knowledge that our countrymen to the east are still freezing in their boots. God, I love this city!

Joie Alvaro Kent

"I like rice. Rice is great if you're hungry and want 2,000 of something." ~ Mitch Hedberg

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Kits:

Pane from Heaven, Cypress & 1st - grab a paper and head down for breakfast if you're free on a weekday. Sadly they nixed their brioche but there are many other selections to enjoy.

Viva, Yew & York - honourable mention. Not so much for the food, but for the location & patio. Actually there's too much distraction here to get any real reading done (girls headed to the beach), but then again who cares.

Marpole:

Characters, Granville & 69th? - combined used book store and coffee shop. I love it here, but the only thing is, I don't know how the owners make any money as you can sit there and enjoy yourself for less than a dollar per hour! (Not that I do, but you know theoretically you can.)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Cafe Artigiano coffee... mmmmmmmmmm is all I can say! I am too scared to think how much money I've spent there (one or two lattes a day for 3 years working near that place!).

But back to the original question. When I first moved to this city 10 years ago, I was excited that Vancouver was a coffee loving city. The only thing was, people were referring to more of a "pick up and go" type cafes like Starbucks, Blenz etc... But at the time I was fresh out of university so I wanted to hang out in coffee houses you would commonly find in college towns with comfy couches where there are writers scribbling their inspirations, a girl reading Philip Roth, hipsters dressed in Harajuku fashion (long before this Gwen Stefani insanity) etc... Like the one where Mike Myers character on I Married an Axe Murderer hung out or even like Central Perk Cafe on Friends!!!

My suggestions would depend on what time of the day you're going and what your noise tolerence is. Personally, I don't mind trip hop tunes in the background and banging noises made by baristas. It's the solitude you get amongst people that's fun! So with that in mind, I would suggest Benny's Bagels for late night reading and post lunch hour reading would be great at Cafe Artigiano on Robson - those banquette seats are comfy but the patio is nice too. Also, Higher Grounds Cafe (I think that's the proper name) on Broadway and Vine St. is great for reading.

Happy reading!

ahh where's the button for the fries?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yes, you've certainly got the image of the type of place I'm looking for. :smile:

Cafe Artigiano on Robson? The one around the corner from Robson on Hornby you mean? Or is there another location actually on Robson that I haven't scouted out yet?

Characters is also sounding pretty promising. I'm going to have to wander on down to Marpole to check that out!

Cheers!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Picnic in the Rain

I apologize for the length of this post. Yikes! I'm moving into Blog territory here. But the gist of it is, for both a place to read the papers, and a child-friendly place, don't forget Picnic on South Granville.

I was listening to The Roundup on CBC radio the other day and the guest was Don George, a contributor from the new Lonely Planet Guide to Experimental Travel. He talked about some of the offbeat ways in which he devises methods of acting as a tourist in his home-city of San Francisco. He is a man after my own heart, as I am always trying to see Vancouver through fresh eyes, even though I have only lived here about eight years. Since I grew up on the prairies in a town with only seven people, I experience a bit of culture shock every time I walk out the door in this city, but I like being surprised and I like being culture shocked. Why walk through life with blinders on?

So Saturday is my day off. They let me out of the cage, and I can follow my heart's desires, which often follow the desires of my gullet. Today I have my culinary destinations planned out, and I get to make up the route as I go along. I decide to start with Picnic on South Granville. On my journeys, I try to walk as much as possible. Apparently Margaret Trudeau walks for two hour every day. Wouldn't I love to do that! If canoeing makes you a child of nature, as Pierre Trudeau once said, then I say walking in the city makes you a child of the city. I also say walking is good for the soul.

I take the bus to Granville and 25th where I can walk down the hill. I walk past the Chinese embassy, curious to see if there is a member of the Falun Dafa in the little protest booth. The embassy is heavily gated and the outside fence is covered with the posters of protest from the peaceful Falun Dafa society. There is a serene senior lady meditating with her eyes closed in a booth with barely enough room to sit down in. I walk past her and look at the poster of a Falun practitioner being subdued by Chinese authorities. The contrast between the tranquility of the woman with the violent nature of the image of the man being dragged away brings tears to my eyes. I'm also thinking of the dying Catholic pope, who can no longer sustain the fire in his belly, and is finally letting go of his ailing body. Whether you see him as a tyrant or a saint, I marvel at how a human can be so powerful in life and yet so inevitably fragile in death.

However, the living must eat, and today I am gonna suck the marrow out of the bones of life. I'm headed for Picnic. Picnic is an unusual concept in the upscale shopping district of South Granville. The food is posh deli from the Meinhardt's store on the corner but the odd thing is that the tables are literally communal table benches. Eating here is always an adventure, and if you come here with children, you're bound to strike up a conversation with a stranger. Today I order a tomato and spinach ricotta quiche ($8.51), and I am reminded of how child-friendly it actually is. It's also a great place to come and read the papers, which are provided on wooden rolls. A young couple across from me share the Globe and Mail as they nurse their lattes. A mom and her four year old son sit across from me and we chat a bit as he settles into painting on one of those marvelous "Buddha Boards" put on the tables for diners to use. This is an ingenious board that you can "paint" on with a brush dipped in water. The pictures appears and then disappears as the water dries. My delicate crustless quiche hits the brunch-lite spot and it comes with a spunky side of greens in what I think is a ginger tarragon vinaigrette.

I sit and plot out the rest of my route for the day. My next stop is the Firehall Library, where I'm going to pick up a couple of books, then I am heading to Pane from Heaven to try the mythical chocolate ganâche cake. After that, I plan to visit Marquis wines to pick up a bottle of the Joie 2004 Pinot Noir Rosé. We'll see what happens along the way. Meanwhile, I pause to think about the time I was in Bath, England, looking for a good place for lunch.

I stumbled upon a tiny French-style restaurant above a cheese shop that was so busy there was only room for me to eat if I shared a table. An elegant older woman asked me to join her, and she proceeded to tell me stories of her life in Paris, which touched and entertained me for a good two hours. The food was also incredible. I believe that sharing a meal with someone is one of the most spiritually fulfilling things you can do, no matter which religion you belong to. The best thing about the churches I went to on the prairies were the fowl suppers-no doubt about it! I wish we could all just eat together in peace.

Amen!

Sister Zucchini

"I used to be Snow White, but I drifted."

--Mae West

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...