One Line Coffee & Sourcing opened its doors at 745 North High Street July 18th without the typical perks of cafes in the Short North, wifi, comfy seating or snacks. Setting them further apart from the city’s status quo, is they have no intention of ever having them.
“We want to do everything we can to keep our focus on coffee… and realize that we’re doing something a little different at this shop,” explains One Line’s founder, Dave Forman, as he waits for the water line to drop through his individual drip coffee filter through to the cup below it.
“There are a lot of great restaurants here, great bars too. We feel like people who love food can love coffee with the same passion” he adds.
That focus goes even further as Forman explains the second half of One Line’s name- sourcing. Forman’s concentration, along with his direct Fair Trade distributors located in Pennsylvania, is to specialize in roasting single-origin coffees, rather than blend of beans from various farms.
The selection process is much different and diverts efforts from finding the perfect mix, to the much greater feat of selecting the perfect harvested bean, whose terroir, or geological and meteorological aspects of a growing region, can affect the quality of the crop each year and thus affecting the consistency of the coffee he serves everyday.
To ensure that quality, Forman receives samples from each harvest to conduct a cupping, a multi-part process to evaluate the beans’ brew abilities and flavors, through a series of dry, wet and taste evaluations. A time consuming process,
“With blends, which some roasters have available year-round, you may be constantly looking for coffees with specific flavor attributes.” Says Forman of the nuance of having single bean brews. “We can focus on finding and roasting the best coffees without having to worry about looking for certain flavor profiles to match a blend.”
One Line plans to offer 12-18 coffees per year. One of which currently is a bean from Kenyon, whose harvest produced 14 bags- total. One Line bought 5 bags, and the remainder, Forman says, could be at anywhere in the world right now.
Although single-origin, hand poured cups of coffee is novel to Central Ohio, Forman takes note from self proclaimed obsessive sourcers such as San Francisco’s Blue Bottle and Stumptown of Portland. Both share the philosophy of serving only coffee hand-poured brewed from beans roasted less than 48 hours before- a tell tale to do, in the next wave of caffeine fiends café etiquette.
In addition to coffee, One Line specializes in espresso drinks, iced coffees and hopes to offer their expert sourcing, as a service to other cafes located in central Ohio. One Line as invites the public to follow them on twitter for group cuppings, in which they may evaluate a new roast, coffee or favorite for fun.- any yes- there’s seating.
So if you’re ready to judge a café on its coffee, and not the speed of its wifi or cushion of its chairs, step in One Line Coffee & Sourcing.
NeverIsSacred 