Cappuccino Review #3 – Ancora

Ancora Coffee Roasters

2871 University Ave.

Madison, WI  53705

website

For an intro about how and why I am trying the cappuccinos of Madison, go here.

It was a cold morning here in Madison, but Taryn and I braved the fridged air to visit the Ancora coffee shop located on University Ave.  Unfortunatnly, I forgot the camera at home, so there won’t be any pictures of the place or drinks here.  Ancora owns a small chain of coffee shops in the Madison area; the one on University Ave. is very small and more oriented toward commuters traveling through the isthmus.  On this Sunday, it was pretty much full, but we found a couple of nice seats next to the (unlit) fireplace.  Ancora’s smallest size of coffee drink is called a ‘regular’; this comes in a 12oz mug.  By cappuccino standards this is enormous, more than twice as big as it should be, but is pretty typical among coffee shops that consider the latte to be the standard drink.  So, I ordered a dry regular cappuccino and hoped for the best

As expected, the cappuccino had too much milk.  The foam was a bit course though otherwise nice.  The real shame was that I could tell the quality of the coffee was quite good, however, it was diluted with too much milk.  Otherwise it was a pleasant cappuccino, though it more resembled a strong latte than anything else.  Here are the numbers (all out of 5):

Presentation: 3

Smoothness: 4

Strength: 3

Complexity: 3

Foam: 3

Correctness: 3

Mean: 3.17/5

SD: 0.41

Although the cappuccino was pretty average, Taryn’s chai latte was extremely good.  It was served in something similar to a water glass, and featured a head of foam that was silky and tasty.  To round it off, cinnamon was sprinkled over the foam; extra points for that!  It was bit sweeter than what many people may prefer (it is perhaps the opposite of the subdued chai at Mother Fool’s), but if you are into that sort of things it is tops.

So, there we have it; although I consider Ancora to be one of the better coffee shops in town, their cappuccino is only average.  However, their chai is probably worth a visit.