RabbitHole Coffee & Roaster  

I went there for first time yesterday. Place looks decent with lots of very professional looking machines & lovely coffee aromas.
Quite a lot of coffee choices & we choose a 單品 Siphon to try for starters. It came abt 10mins later in a glass pitcher, & abt 1/3 already poured into 2 cups. The waitress gave them to the two gweilos sitting next to us. Not realising it's not theirs, they each drank a bit from the cups. Then the waitress realised the coffee should be ours, she took the coffee & the two cups (which the 2 gweilos already drank a bit of) & gave them straight to us!!! I looked at her in horror, & said the two cups hv been drank from already!! She shrugged her shoulder, took away the two cups & gave us 2 new ones. But 1/3 of the coffee already gone! She didn't even offer us a new pot... Unbelievable!!!
Hope this is just an one off incident. The waitress looked quite young so maybe not very experienced...
Back to the coffee. The costa rica we had was very weak, a lite brown color, very little/subtle taste. The barista said coz they use light roasting & not dark roasting so a but different fr what we normally used to. Anyway, not my cup of 'coffee'....

Rabbithole has become my recent favourite. Great coffee, nice people, cosy environment, what more can I ask? Whenever I was at the Mid-levels, I could not help dropping by and had a coffee break.

First encounters with cafes are always crucial - just like the first date. Rabbithole certainly left a good impression on me by a splendid cup of flat white. As Gabbi the barrister recommended, I picked Nicaragua, one of my favourite beans for milk coffee. Its nutty taste blended perfectly with the milk and had a nice hint of chocolate finish. The espresso base was by no means overwhelmed by the milk and the froth was decent. During another visit I had a flat white with Sumatra Permata Gayo. The honey sweetness of Gayo bean was perhaps a bit too weak, as it failed to balance the cherry taste. Rabbithole also offered good Cappuccino. This time, I picked Guatemala, better than Gayo but hardly able to challenge the position of Nicaragua in my heart. Apart from the single-origin, Rabbithole had its own blend. I tried a blend no.3 latte. My taste buds were embraced with a distinctive sweetness. Acidity came out only when the cup was half finished, but not much there. This blend was sweet and straightforward but perhaps lacked a bit of complexity. After all, I prefer those single-origins.

When I started to get serious about coffee five years back, my regular haunt is Fresh/hkcoffee in North Point. Not only I get the freshly and locally roasted coffee bean, a gold standard for coffee enthusiasts, I meet lots of coffee lovers over there which allows me to explore various aspects of coffee, be it green coffee from exotic locales, roasted coffee from various parts of the world at its prime condition, ie less than 1 month after roast date and various coffee gears. The problem is that hkcoffee is a roaster so it's not very convenient for most to participate. Besides, as a roaster, they only do it when they have time as the roasting comes first, making it difficult to recommend other coffee enthusiasts to try it there though I have been visiting hkcoffee for most of my coffee until these days and I still recommend most enthusiast and newbie to do so. I've been wishing hkcoffee diversify into doing cafe and such; however, they are quite content and happy to do whatever they are doing.This brings me to coffee places which were inspired by hkcoffee and everybody can drop by these places for everything coffee. The concept of hkcoffee.com is broad that I think it can be diversified into various cafes/outlet that takes different parts out of hkcoffee.com playbook. I know two of them so far; one of them is Knockbox Coffee Company in Sheung Wan which picks up and further improves on the coffee beans side of hkcoffee.com, ie coffee tasting, from all over the world all the time with transparency you know the beans on offering before any visit, at least saving your time and energy on cafe choices, and this one that I want to talk about for so long but really have no time to put it into words until today, Rabbithole Coffee & Roaster in Central. Rabbithole took up the machine and roaster part of hkcoffee.com and makes it much more accessible than what hkcoffee.com left out and preferred to keep a low profile on the issue.An experience at Rabbithole is what I call "machine tasting". No, they won't invite you to chew, gnarl and taste it literally but they offer a combination of machines and grinders for you to experience and figure it out how each set performs by yourself. No other cafe in Hong Kong has ever gone this far before, IMHO, with a prime location, bean and machine quality. Through four espresso machines and three grinders, you can have twelve different styles of coffee in one go if you feel like it.

There are always people saying that one can adjust each machine setup to fit each coffee style. However, to me, time passed from those kinds of thinking. This is the age of origin appreciation, everything progressive roasters will do to preserve the nature of its selected beans, the lighter roast of the current coffee from Indie cafe, those that is much talk about and in the news about the renaissance of good coffee. All these current trends make each set of machine shines in a different way so much so that one may like one set more than another, an unthinkable for coffee drinkers a while back. And, as a consumer, not an operator, you should try it to see how it works; don't let others talk you into "this is the best setup as I try lots of it" as it's now possible at Rabbithole.Starting with the basic home espresso machine setup, Gee machine (a basis for the famous Crossland CC1 in the US) + Eureka Mignon grinder. With the Yirghacheffe Full City roast for all setups below, the cup had a noted acidity and jammy sweetness with spicy tones but quite flat. I will be very happy if any home barista can achieve this kind of profile with this entry-level setup. However, the cup got more of the same tasting note but more distinct when moving up the ladder with Expobar Markus and Anfim Super Caimano which I consider representing the setup at most cafes in Hong Kong, i.e. basic commercial machine. Not bad and tastier cup with the same profile, i.e. round and subdued/easy to drink.

But when one lands themselves into the high-end realm of Synesso, one can easily get a super clear cup from the same coffee and the somewhat subtle wine note that were there with the two previous setups was 'unveiled' with this setup, thanks to the rock solid temperature Synesso was renowned for. I changed the grinder from Anfim to the $$$ Eureka KR conical; I get an even clearer cup, not thin, with a very strong spice note which is not for the faint of heart. Delicious and interesting for experienced drinkers though newbie might be better off staying away from this setup unless curiosity gets the best out of you then be my guest.
The last one is via the current "IT" thing in Single Origin espresso, the pressure profile enabled machine. The resulting cup is similar to Synesso + Eureka KR, i.e. very clear tasting note but it was much more balanced in taste that can be drunk with ease. Mind you this is not the typical rounded and easy cup one gets from lever machines out there that share the same concept as the modern pressure profiled machines that is available at Rabbithole for your hands-on experience. You gotta try this to appreciate how pressure profile is much talked about. Best of all, get a group of friends to run through various combinations.The machine tasting won't be completed without choice coffee beans, aka "Rabbithole Army". Its coffee is roasted in house at its own roasting facility with the roast profile created specifically for Rabbithole by hkcoffee.com. The "so-called" high temperature profile that was designated for Rabbithole was aimed to make an easier to drink cup with a clear nuance. For Mocca Harar, you sense its trademark "blueberry" tasting note which is well documented worldwide both in human tasting and scientific papers for coffee from this area, following by floral notes and sweetness. For Yirghacheffe, this year it does taste closer to last year's Sidama with nice jammy sweetness and ending spice.

Those who enjoys mostly mouthfeel/big body from the coffee will have these tasting notes as a bonus as the roast profile was catered to these types of coffee lovers too which is unlike the high resolution/nuance/revealing coffee much talked about on the current renaissance trend and is available if you order coffee directly from hkcoffee.com which does 'low temperature profile' for its roasting. Both roast profiles are different in the cup and very good in its own way. I suggest you try both to see which one fits you.Also, don't look down on "locally roasted beans". Rabbithole's roasted coffee was at time available at selected cafes including Coming Soon Coffee at Barbican in London, UK. Recently Rabbithole's coffee was featured at the London Coffee Festival 2012 at Curator Coffee that Coming Soon Coffee matched Rabbithole coffee beans with the high-end espresso machine La Marzocco Strada and Eureka Conical via a manual pressure profiling for all cups. The setup on Strada and Rabbithole coffee was within hours or a day but the response was positive customers even followed to Coming Soon after the festival was over. For those who continued to import coffee from your country/hometown, give locally roasted coffee in general a try and you can start your journey at Rabbithole before moving up the steps to hkcoffee. With all this complicating matter one would have thought this is the place catered specifically for 'coffeegeeks'. On the contrary, as earlier reviews before mine can attain, Rabbithole does take any level of coffee drinkers in mind too. You can easily google good words from write-up via experienced and newbs on their experiences at Rabbithole, either in blogs, comment on the internet, etc.

If you want to know more about coffee, Rabbithole also offered coffee classes. These days, classes at café in Hong Kong are almost a dime a dozen but these classes can be very expensive, particularly teaching by a not so capable person. The simple tip I like to suggest is to just drink the coffee from the café. No matter qualification the guy claimed, if the coffee does not fit/taste good, just toss that class no matter what qualifications the guy has as the cup proved those are just a piece of paper. Unlike lots of café out there that opted for a ‘hired gun’ as an instructor, staff at Rabbithole runs the class themselves so you are sure to get the cup and hospitality exactly what you have on a regular basis. Mind you that the class that runs in “cooperation” was not that bad but more complicated to choose from vs. cafes that taught the class themselves like Knockbox and Rabbithole. You gotta taste the coffee that served by that trainer/trainers first or at least cafés that that trainer helps set up to see whether it holds water at all. I believe the better way to describe what Rabbithole did is that Rabbithole takes the coffee as far as you want to go. You can go machine tasting which is a unique for Rabbithole or just sit down, relax and order a cup of your favorite coffee, being espresso, latte, or filtered coffee and the staff there are more than happy to talk you through various coffee beans from different origins on offering that moment or just leave it to barista's hands. If you are regular there, ask your preferred barista to prepare the drink for you. Also, you might get a chance to try new drinks you would never order for yourself. Quite a few times, some will ask you whether you want a sip or two of the coffee he or she orders. Served in the small carafe, anyone can pour out a little coffee for you to have a try. One can easily compare a tasting note to each other on that particular coffee and, to me, that's a great learning experience not many cafe out there can offer. You might get to comment on a set of a machine some people wants to buy by getting a sip or two of that coffee. Isn't it nice potential buyers and regular coffee can share an opinion with no bias/commercial basis and that's what Rabbithole is trying to be, a fully immersed coffee experience.With lots of possibilities at Rabbithole, it's quite easy to get confused what this coffee place really is. I said just go with the flow at this place and you will have fun with great coffee too. You sit and mingle with people in the table in the middle of the room and may possibly get some drink to try. You see barista brew coffee almost every position available and the cups I drank (I would tell you I went this place a lot before this writing) have no significantly different cups from cups I had from any other cafe with fixed positions, as much good and not so good cups on average any time. If you were to move around or took a look at the shop, just tell the barista you want to do so so that they arrange to make sure you got your seat back when you finished. If you love more privacy, there's more space at the back both in and outdoor for you to sit and talk. Lots of possibilities and great coffee at Rabbithole I've been visiting over the past four months and it is going strong so much so I called Rabbithole and Knockbox extraordinary concept cafes one must visit when they are in Hong Kong no matter where they are.To me, I consider Rabbithole and Knockbox a one-two punch to the cafe scene in Hong Kong. The varieties both cafes offer should make you look at your regular haunt in a new light. One can easily appreciate why the regular place chooses the coffee the way it is and why the machine is what it is and whether it can be better adjusted or tuned or that's the way the owner of that cafe want it to be/taste like. For a traditional cafe out there, both Rabbithole and Knockbox helps boost a general public to another level of the coffee appreciate and both Rabbithole and Knockbox allow customers to venture out of those try and true recipes which could be a dream for those cafes in the past but now is likely to be more acceptable once the consumer opens up more with experiences at these two extraordinary concept cafes. I see overall improvement, not competition, with the entry of these two coffee places to Hong Kong's coffee scene.

To sum it up, Rabbithole is a one of a kind coffee place coffee drinkers both new and experience should drop by and get a new thing or two no matter what background they are from. Rabbithole takes coffee as far as you like to go so why wait! Rabbithole Coffee & Roaster -- Highly recommended and a must stop by no matter where you are in Hong Kong!

My blood type maybe coffee, here I got the very nice red berry brew in ice drip smell is awesome taste clean and sweet !Even this is not the sidamo style but its smell as a flora mouthty smooth as silk .staff all friendly professional ,that all and that's all I need .