Coffee shops in Itabashi are crowded with unique and well-known coffee shops. Along with the delicious and aromatic coffee, there is a unique culture and individuality nurtured by the city and its people.

Can the Tobu Tojo Line and the Toei Mita Line, both of which cross Itabashi Ward, each have a color that could be called the culture of the line? What color is it?

It would surely be interesting to visit a coffee shop in ITABASHI with this in mind.

A small journey on the "Tobu Tojo Line" around a cup of coffee is about to begin.

Coffee grown by the hill tribes of Thailand, roasted in house.

From the first time I traveled to Thailand, I was instantly hooked by the country's atmosphere and the Thai people's personality, which was something like nostalgic Japan. At first, I only knew Bangkok, but the further north I went, the more simple and kind the people became, and I fell in love with Thailand even more.

It has been six years since I opened my store, and I import coffee beans from local farms in Thailand, roast them myself, and sell them myself.

I didn't know much about coffee, so I just thought, "Oh, they make coffee in Thailand," but then I started thinking, "I wonder if I can somehow introduce it to Japan, or bring it here. I started to see the world in a different light. I was working as an office worker at the time, but I had a vague desire to start my own business since college, so I wondered if I could make importing coffee beans my business.

The characteristics of coffee produced in the mountainous regions of northern Thailand are, first of all, clean and light, with a good acidity. It is "Forest Fruit Coffee," a bean produced by the Akha tribe, a hill tribe in Thailand, which I named. Recently, more and more customers come to me to buy beans with this name.

I first discovered coffee in Thailand because I liked Thailand, and I studied coffee on my own later, but I happened to meet two farms by chance, one of which was a technically excellent farm that won a prestigious award, and the other was an at-home producer, and we had a good relationship with them. This leads us to the present.

In the beginning, there were times when I didn't receive the quality of beans I wanted, but now I trust them. Last year, we held an event where customers and I visited a local farm to experience the harvest.

Herbal teas are also available from Thailand, and there is a local way to drink Thai espresso with mango or guava.

They also make several handmade sweets, including their "espresso cheesecake. We serve coffee in mugs because we want our customers to feel like they are getting a great value for their money, which is typical of Nakaitabashi.

Traditional souvenirs and other items of the Thai hill tribe people are also available.

First of all, I want people to know that coffee is also made in Thailand. Furthermore, many of the people who work there are not very wealthy, so I want to give them a helping hand, even if only a little.

In the beginning, I was selling it at a low price to spread the word, but that was not enough to keep it going. My future goal is to work out a mechanism for this.

First of all, I would be happy if this store can serve as an opportunity for people to learn a little more about Thailand, which I love so much.

We want to live up to the expectations of the people who come all the way to our house.

I worked for a coffee wholesale company, but my father taught me not to quit any business for three years. That was 23 years after all. At first all I did was sales, but then I started roasting, and I learned how interesting and profound it is to see how the taste of the same bean can change dramatically with just a little bit of roasting.

Carioca" means "born in Rio de Janeiro," and this year marks the 24th year since we opened our doors in 1998. I have been trying to make the restaurant as friendly as possible, so that anyone can come in.

We stock beans with the idea of serving something to suit everyone's taste, no matter who comes in. Currently, we have 19 varieties, and if we increase the number any more, we cannot keep the beans fresh. Coffee is first and foremost about freshness. Next comes quality.

We don't have a set type of coffee, so we test new ones, taste them, and try different roasting conditions. That is why we have a "sample roaster" that can roast from 100g. The machines for the real thing start at 2 kg, so it's difficult to try many times to get the best roast.

If a customer prefers a very unique taste, we sometimes roast only 200g for that person and give it to him or her.

Our specialty is slow roasting at a lower temperature. We lower the heat and take our time. If you raise the temperature, you can shorten the time, but the finished product will vary.

The temperature, humidity, and the strength of the wind also affect the degree of roasting. The air inside the roasting machine is pulled in, making the fire stronger. Anyone can roast coffee using a machine, but it takes experience to maintain the same quality at all times. It took me 10 years to gain some confidence. In the beginning, I roasted the same beans over and over again to achieve the desired result.

What do you recommend? If asked, we first ask the customer's preference. In that sense, I answer, "I have no recommendation.

For those who don't know what they like or how to describe it, we first ask them to try a bean with a good balance of bitterness and acidity. For this reason, we start with 100g of beans. That is roughly 10 cups.

Nowadays, information is readily available on the Internet, but we want people to try it for themselves first and then decide whether it suits their palate and tastes. That's why I ask people who live far away from me to call me first, have a conversation, and consult with me. I think I have accumulated the knowledge and experience for this purpose.

I want to meet the expectations and commitment of people who come all the way to buy from us instead of supermarkets. I want to be useful.

We have a 30% off discount sale on the 5th, 15th, and 25th of every month, and we set this up by trial and error on the cycle from roasting to sale so that we can keep the freshness and sale sales. We want you to shop with the best taste and at the best price possible.

To prevent the spread of corona infection, we are now closed for coffee shop use in the store.

I was born and raised in Itabashi and grew up in a shopping district, so when I came home from elementary school, I would go to the neighborhood grocery store and help out. I liked interacting with customers. I think my desire to open my own store may have come from that time.

So I am looking forward to the day when I can reopen the coffee shop and customers can drink coffee in peace.

Enjoy an authentic cup of coffee in a relaxing retro cafe.

You opened the restaurant in 1988 (1988), so it's been more than 30 years. I was 38 years old when I quit my corporate job and started this place.

This place was originally a garage or a hobby room. There are several old motorcycles, tin toys, monsters such as Godzilla, and enamel and tin signs.

I loved old toys and collected them even after I grew up. My friends would often come over and we would talk over a cup of coffee, and eventually I thought, "Why don't we open a coffee shop? I started talking about it with everyone. I had a cooking license before that, so I went to a coffee school in Shinjuku to further my education.

At the time, there was no retro boom, so why do they have all these old things? It was such a time. About five years after I started the store, the TV show "Nandemo Kanteidan" started, and people started to understand me a little more.

I am attracted to old things because of the quality of construction, style, and texture of each item.

I had a customer who is a jukebox fanatic and found a good one at a place that specializes in jukebox repair and sales. This dome-shaped jukebox, which resembles a space suit, symbolizes the time when the U.S. and the Soviet Union were actively competing in space development.

It contains 100 singles, mostly oldies from the 50s and 60s, but I think there are about 200 other single discs. The Beatles are in there too, but they too are attractive in their early years. Early models are the best, whether it's cars or anything else (laughs).

Maintenance is difficult because of the vacuum tubes inside, but nowadays the Internet allows me to look up information from all over the world, so I order parts from overseas and repair them myself. If I don't have access to new information, I can't maintain the old ones.

We make coffee one cup at a time, drip style. 30 years ago, there were not many hand drip coffee shops.

We choose cups based on the customer's image, and since 60% of our customers are women, we try to use different cups if they come back several times, so that they can enjoy the experience each time.

I am also proud of my cocoa. I make it by slowly simmering it for a little over an hour. There are many instant places, but the flavor is totally different when it's simmered.

Recently, people come from far and wide on weekends after seeing pictures of our store on Instagram. Last week we had a visitor from Shonan.

You can use the pink phone at the entrance. It rings when you call the store. When little kids come in, I let them use it, but nowadays they have to press the dial hole with their fingers. I think we have about the same number of older customers who come here because they miss the atmosphere, and young customers who come here because they think it's stylish. Everyone says they feel at home here.

One of our occasional customers is a person with a disability. They have a cup of coffee or cocoa and a short chat, but when they leave, they are all smiles. I think that old things and good coffee make people feel better.

Collaboration expands possibilities for coffee shops

I used to work for a coffee bean wholesaler, and the previous owner of this store, to whom I went to wholesale coffee beans, asked me if I wanted to take over when he retired. This store has been open for about 38 years, I think. The machines and the store are still here, just as they were, and have remained the same throughout the years. The roasting method and blend recipes are the same as those taught to me by my predecessors.

I don't think there were many stores that roasted their own coffee when they opened. I think it was a store that was very particular. However, I myself am more interested in collaborating with various people through coffee than in pursuing coffee itself. I decided to take over because I thought I could use this place to connect with various people.

It has been five years since I took over this store, and I have become friends with the people of the Happy Road Oyama shopping street, and naturally started holding events and workshops. It's fun to talk with the shopping district, customers, and various people around me and come up with ideas that I had never thought of. We also collaborate with Itabashi Pro Wrestling and have them on our YouTube channel.

I think there are very few stores where home-roasted, authentic coffee and collaboration with other companies coexist. But I don't just want to sell coffee; I want to create and tell a story with it. I am not at all concerned with "style.

We also make and sell drip bags in collaboration with artists and NPOs. We are also working on a system to donate the proceeds from those sales to social contribution activities. We also stock cookies and bread made by people with disabilities for the purpose of supporting their employment, and have them sell them using this location. Using this store and coffee as a tool, we would like to continue to collaborate more and more with such social contribution elements.

The customer asks, "Do you have any recommendations?" When asked, I recommend what is freshest at the time. We promote not only specialty coffees, but also delicious commercial coffees for everyday use. We also keep the minimum blends that we have inherited from our predecessors, but we want to be free to change them depending on the ardist, myself, and collaborations.

It is interesting to see how collaboration expands ideas that cannot be done or created by a coffee shop alone.

I was involved in the coffee business, but it was only recently when I started working here that I realized how wonderful coffee itself is. People around me say, "You should take your coffee shop more seriously! I have to enjoy it to keep going, so I take it easy and do it without getting scolded by my predecessor.

Text and photographs by Tsutomu Ogasawara