I have visited the Dean & Delucas in New York on a few occasions but  never had the chance to try their coffee. To be honest, when I went into the upper Eastside store and saw their beautiful LM GB/5 with a steam wand covered in milk scale, let’s just say, I was not exactly encouraged to dish out $5 for a cap. But, this is D&D Tokyo; they are a different story.

My last night and dinner on this trip came with a surprisingly decent cup of coffee from D&D near Tokyo Station. In all fairness, they are a food specialty store and grocer, not a coffee shop. But, they do have a beautiful GB/5, single origin roasts, and other trappings that indicate a serious push towards specialization. And this cup of house blend was not cheap in yen or dollars.

For those of you who have read some of my other reviews of Japanese coffee shops, there generally tends to be two indistinct trends in flavor profiles: “Japanese coffee” style(s) (plural) and “Japanese-doing-American-3rd-wave-style-coffee.” Both are good in their own right, no doubt. This definitely falls into the first of these two categories. But, it was a huge step above “caffeine injection” and approaching decent brew. Flavorful, strong, over-roasted, but satisfying. While below par by most specialty American standards (whatever those are), I found it to be one of the better domestic style cups I had over my two week trek. Go and enjoy the station which has recently been remodeled, take some photos, and stop in if you feel the need for some coffee. It was a great treat for a send off.