RSS

Monthly Archives: June 2024

Rise Cafe & Bakery

New Bloomfield. Most people have probably never heard of it. For those who do, it mostly means the county seat of Perry County, Pennsylvania. Everyone thinks that honor belongs to Newport. Newport is the cultural hub of the county, after all, home to multiple cafes and boutique shops. Newport is the hub of the hipster incursion from Harrisburg into what used to be a county with no red lights. New Bloomfield is just somewhere on the way to elsewhere. That’s what most people seem to think of it. To me, however, New Bloomfield means something else. It means freedom.

New Bloomfield was the first town I visited when we were finally allowed to, once again, take the long road home in June 2020. When the restrictions came off, I first wanted to hit the road and go somewhere new; somewhere I’d never been before. That somewhere was the Perry County Cafe in New Bloomfield. Scroll back to 2020; you should see it in its original iteration. Since then, I’ve traveled farther afield but never forgot about this beautiful little mountain town or the liberated emotions that flooded me as I gazed off into the rolling mountains beyond.

In truth, the town doesn’t feel all that little. It bustles. That’s true of all capital cities, though, when you think about it. A county seat is indeed a kind of capital. It’s the center of civic life for its county, and in a commonwealth (as Pennsylvania is), local government is the sole variety of government the average person is likely to encounter on any given day. Viewed through that lens, it shouldn’t be any surprise that New Bloomfield is full of people hurrying about looking for two things: coffee and a better world.

Perry County Cafe was always a cute little artsy place. It still is. There’s a good reason: Rise Cafe is owned by the same people. The original cafe had to be temporarily shuttered by the ownership for various reasons, but it came roaring back only a month and a half ago. Coffee is clearly a passion for these folks. So is impacting the community. From the chalkboard signs with inspirational messages and mission statements scattered about, doing good is central to the mission of Rise Cafe.

No, there was no political bent to that message whatsoever. I know you’re thinking about it. In an age where words like ‘community’ and ‘peace’ and ‘rising’ are increasingly used as dog whistles for ideological grandstanding, the kind, benevolent universality of Rise Cafe’s message of hope and civic unity was something I found even more refreshing than the coffee. You can see in their eyes and read in their words that their motives are pure. We need a little bit of ‘pure’ right now.

Speaking of the coffee, it was easily as good as I remember. Today’s house blend hailed from Papua New Guinea. Red Diamond is the name of the roaster. They’re out of Moody Alabama and are fairly well-known, though I hadn’t had any samplings of the brand until this. I haven’t had a New Guinea coffee specifically in a long time. Most shopkeepers opt for a ‘safer’ option familiar to everyone. Columbian and such are the go-to brews. This bold option was deeply complex, with very subtle notes of nut and (I think) umami I’d almost ruined with too much cream. Speaking of the cream…I was given actual cream. Heavy cream and it was glorious. My doctor will never hear of this madness; it will remain our delectable secret.

On that subject (delectable things), Rise also has a lovely selection of pastries and other sundries. Tempting as it was to sit at the broad window looking out on Main Street, I had to get going. Every weekend in June is a festival weekend these days, so I have to plan coffee sojourns around the larger events. For that, I can only grateful.

I’ve got plans. Oh yes, I’ve got plans. It’s time to start expanding the radius again. The goal is to travel to the valleys west of the Cumberland Valley or forge a northward course into the Pennsylvania Wilds. I’ll also be peppering this blog with reports on coffee from the various festivals I plan to attend, so stay frosty. Until then, stay caffeinated.

the signage…

the new seating…

the old view…

the art…

the beans…

the meaning of it…

the center of town…

the long road…

Deja Brew at Miney Branch

04 Jun

Do you get the feeling that I’ve reviewed this coffeehouse before? So did I. There’s a good reason for that. As was alluded to in the previous post, we’re back in the mountains. To South Mountain, in fact. Yes, we’ve been there before. If you’ve been reading this blog for the past two years, South Mountain has been a perennial focus. That’s because it’s recently become rich with coffee culture. It shouldn’t be surprising. South Mountain is home to a massive state park and is, therefore, an epicenter of outdoor culture.

Bikers, hikers, mountaineers, and survivalists are all fueled by coffee (at least a lot of them are), and there’s a massive crossover between coffee culture and small-town civic pride. Coffeehouses are a symbol of sophistication and civil society as a whole. They have been since the 1600s. Coffeehouses were the crucible of Enlightenment philosophical thought and thus of modernity as a concept. Wherever there’s a small town aiming at revival, a coffeehouse likely serves as an anchor point of that cultural resurgence.

No specific small town is home to Deja Brew. Miney Branch is a stream in Liberty Township, PA. It’s in the Carroll Valley, home to Liberty Mountain Resort, several lakes, and many Appalachian Trail hikers, especially in May and June. The tiny village of Zora is nearby, but the closest small town is Emmitsburg, Maryland. You almost have to drive through Emmitsburg to make good time. Emmitsburg is fascinating; it’s a small, historic town, but one beset by traffic. I pulled off the road into a parking spot and got beeped at for daring to open my door, as pickup trucks and 18-wheelers whizzed past me down the main drag.

Getting out of Emmitsburg, one heads directly towards South Mountain. Deja Brew sits at the mountain’s base on Route 16, offering easy access to hikers and other travelers. Although this cafe didn’t seem to be a component of any particular town, it did appear to be a fixture in the lives of everyone populating the region. I was the only person in the Cafe that day who didn’t know the owner or the barista. As I looked out the window at the crossroads of Route 16 and the road to Liberty Mountain, it struck me just how central this particular intersection is. Even so, Deja Brew is a new phenomenon. It opened on November 11th, 2023.

The architecture of Deja Brew touched on a theme I’ve seen repeated elsewhere: the juxtaposition of a very modern, streamlined interior with distinctly backcountry surroundings. Brown and cream walls gave the building a look of cultivated elegance slightly at odds with the down-home exterior. Again, there’s a juxtaposition, but not an unexpected one. Those walls bore posters of local hiking events…and a Biblical performance. There was a well-stocked bookshelf…featuring philosophical and historical pieces from a libertarian press. Deja Brew sells coffee…and local beef jerky. As we’ve often found, the seamless integration of rural and urban institutions is a facet of PA’s coffee revival.

The coffee was so fascinating. Yes, I mean a good fascinating. I heard a name I haven’t for far too long: Ragged Edge Coffee. That’s a coffeehouse and roaster in nearby Gettysburg. I remember going to Ragged Edge 20 years ago when I was in college. There was a poetry reading there, and it was evident that this was a center of Gettysburg’s ‘bohemia’ back then. It’s a great local roaster, and several of their offerings were on display here. Those are pictured below, but I don’t think the full extent of the selection was displayed. Leaving a little mystery is classy.

I had the Honduran. Honduran coffees have a reputation for depth and character. Although Honduran coffees are commonly lush and nutty like Guatemalan roasts, there’s a special nuance to the Honduran. The rich nut flavor wasn’t as prominent as expected, but the complexity certainly was. If this was a breakfast coffee, it was a sturdy, full-bodied example of one. If it was a stronger concoction, that power was mellowed with a dialed-back acidity. This is the kind of coffee you’ll probably want accompanying you on a hike, should you experience a desire to explore those nearby mountain ridgelines.

I already have the next target in mind: a new branding of a cafe I visited years before during a tumultuous time. It’s up an entirely different set of mountains but on the same side of the Susquehanna River. I have no clue what I’ll find or what changes have been made. I’m not even looking at Google Maps to get a hint of what to expect. That would dampen the fun a bit, don’t you think? Until then, stay caffeinated!