Elm City Roastery

Elm City keeps three fresh-roasted beans on the bar at any given time, and owner Ben does most of the roasting talk himself. The Jacksonville shop on South Mauvaisterre Street is an eclectic small-town coffee house, professional and clean and well lit, with cozy round tables on the sidewalk out front and a parking lot beside the building.

The pour over with the Ethiopian beans is the order to start with, especially if Ben is on the bar to talk through what he's pulling. The pistachio latte covers the flavored side without going dessert-only, the hot chocolate is genuinely good rather than an afterthought, and the chai tea is on the standards menu for anyone who isn't a coffee drinker.

The room reads as a conversation room more than a laptop room. Music plays, regulars talk shop with the roaster, and the sidewalk tables out front pick up the overflow on a good day. If you came here to make brewed coffee the centerpiece instead of a flavored milkshake, the menu rewards that. If you came for a laptop-only session, the energy of the room isn't built for it.

What a small-town Illinois roaster usually doesn't have is the owner standing on the bar talking about the three beans on rotation. That's the thing Elm City has, and it's the thing the regulars come back for. Ben is the difference between this shop and the next shop down the road with a similar menu and a half-decent pour-over setup.

The right fit here is the coffee drinker who wants the bean explained, the regular who wants the sidewalk table and a conversation with the owner, and the visitor who needs a Jacksonville cafe that takes the roast seriously. Order the pour over. Sit out front if the weather lets you. Talk to Ben if he's around.