I could always go for a nice Cup of Joe. For those non-American readers, let me explain what a "Cup of Joe" means. Average Joe is a term we use in the states which means an ordinary person. Coffee is the drink of an average Joe, hence the name "Cup of Joe." There is also this historical thing of a "Cup of Joe" originating from the NAVY during of the prohibition era but I am not sure if that is really correct. Anyway, in the states, when we use the phrase "I could go for a nice Cup of Joe," it means we want a cup of coffee.
So you can imagine my surprise when I saw a café in Ibaraki with the name Cup of Joe. I had to check this place out and my wife agreed. So one cloudy afternoon in March, we headed into the café, Cup of Joe.
Cup of Joe
Cup of Joe is located in the Anbo area of Hokota city. It is right next to a Hotto Motto and it has plenty of parking. It looks more like a two story house than a café, but you can't miss the Cup of Joe sign. After doing some cherry blossom viewing at Yasuzuka Park (great place for hanami by the way), we stumbled onto Cup of Joe while driving and decided to check it out.
Inside
Inside Cup of Joe, it is a typical nice relaxing style café. My wife and I thought this place was new because everything looked new. Turns out, this place has been open for five years. The café has tables and a counter area for seating. It also has artistic photographs of New York hanging all around the walls. So if you ever wondered about New York, just look around. We sat at our table while café BGM was playing and received our menus.
The Menu
Good news my fellow Ibarakians! The menu is in both English and Japanese! I only took a picture of the coffee menu. As you can see from the picture, there are a lot of different coffees and espressos to choose from. There are even teas and smoothies. What I didn't take a picture of was the food menu. Cup of Joe mainly does sweets, but they also have soups, sandwiches, and some Brazilian pao de queijo. On the sweets side, there are waffles and cakes. We both decided to grab some coffee and split a waffle.
Wiener Latte
I ordered the Wiener Latte. To be quite honest, this may have been the first time I have ever had a wiener latte. The wiener latte is in the espresso family. The best way I can describe this espresso is that it is all about the cream. It has a lot of cream, and I mean a lot. It is kind of like a cappuccino but just more cream, which isn't necessarily a bad thing. I did like my wiener latte, but I think the espresso part was a bit too weak.
Cappuccino
My wife ordered the cappuccino. She refused to drink it at first because she didn't want to ruin the cute latte art. I mean, look at that cute bear. Would you want to drink up that cute bear? As per usual, I had to be the bad guy and take the first sip. The cappuccino wasn't too bad and the latte art didn't break on my first sip. We were able to keep that bear in its cute shape until the end. Pretty solid cappuccino.
Chocolate Oreo Cookie Waffle
I dreaded getting the waffles. Do you know how many times I have been disappointed in Japanese waffles? Japanese waffles usually taste like they just came out of a microwave. Warm and rubbery. When the chocolate Oreo cookie waffle came to our table, I had a glimmer of hope in my eye and the Oreo cookies excited me. I still had doubt though. Then, my wife cut into the waffle and I heard a small crunch. "Ok, this could be something," I thought. After the cutting was complete, my wife let me take the first bite. I was transported to waffle euphoria. This was a REAL waffle. I am sure that Cup of Joe has a waffle maker because this waffle was legit. It was a chocolate waffle which made it ten times better. All that cream with those Oreo cookies were perfect companions for this waffle. Plus, the vanilla ice cream was a nice touch. If you love waffles, then you need to try Cup of Joe's waffles. They are on a whole other level when compared to Japanese waffles. My wife loved this Oreo waffle and has made it clear that we are going to have more of these amazing waffles in the near future.
Cup of Joe was a nice little coffee and waffle break from our drive back to Tsuchiura. I would love to go back and try their other espressos or coffee, but what I really want again are the waffles. Those waffles were incredible and I still think about them when I have a sweets craving. Thanks for some delicious and real waffles Cup of Joe.
So, if you need a good Cup of Joe and would like some amazing waffles to go with your coffee, why not check out Cup of Joe in Hokota. Who knows, you might see me there, enjoying a coffee while deep into a plate of amazing waffles.
Enjoy!
For more information on Cup of Joe, check out their Instagram:
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