As a European correspondent for the new travel website Travora dot Com I'm contributing articles from Paris and Rome. Here's my latest, a paean to the great Caffe' Sant'Eustachio in Rome.
"Okay, let’s agree to potentially disagree: if you’re one of the millions who think the best coffee is brewed in Naples, Trieste or maybe Chicago or Seattle I will wrestle you to the colorful tile floor of my favorite café-roasting establishment in Rome: Caffè Sant’Eustachio.
Yes, you can find great coffee in many cities these days. But the most balanced, flavorful and highest-quality organic beans, perfectly roasted, their essence extracted and served in the form of peerless espresso or frothy cappuccino, comes from Caffè Sant’Eustachio.
To call this pilgrimage site unknown would be criminally misleading: equidistant—about 200 yards—from Piazza Navona and the Pantheon, it’s Rome’s most self-consciously celebrated coffee house. Arabica connoisseurs hang out here by day and far into the night. Don’t even mention the word “Robusta”—the dread coffee bean variety that’s often bitter and nearly always cheap."
Rome- and Paris-based writer David Downie is the author of “Quiet Corners of Rome,” “Food Wine Rome,” and “Paris, Paris: Journey into the City of Light.” His latest book, “Paris to the Pyrenees: A Skeptic Pilgrim Walks the Way of Saint James” is published in April, 2013.
Downie is also a guide, creating custom tours of Paris, Rome, Burgundy and the Italian Riviera for private clients. His websites are www.davidddownie.com and www.parisparistours.com.
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