Coffee, Iced or Hot and Gritty – Athens

When jet-lagged in a foreign country, easy access to coffee is priceless. Fortunately, Athens is a coffee city, so wherever we went, a caffeinated beverage wasn’t more than a coffee bean’s throw away.

David’s coffee of choice was always a Greek coffee. If you’ve never had Greek coffee, you may be surprised to find your mouth full of fine coffee grounds after a sip. The first time I had one at Kefi, my initial thought was that something had gone terribly wrong at the coffee station or the busboy was playing a cruel trick on me. After a little googling, I realized the grounds were intentional. I’m still not completely sold on this style of coffee, but David is a huge fan. He seems to think the grounds are good for him. To each his own…

The picture above is the first of David’s many Greek coffees in Athens. It was from Café Lontos in Thissio. After getting off the plane in Athens, we were directed to Thissio by the concierge in our hotel since we’d arrived before the official check-in time. The neighborhood of Thissio is packed with cafés, but Lontos was the most crowded and had the best view of the Acropolis. David’s Greek coffee (€3.80/$5.40) came hot with a foamy head and a sweet biscuit on the side. David was quite happy drinking his coffee as he gazed upon the Acropolis.

I ordered another Greek favorite, a frappé (€3.90/$5.55), a frothy iced coffee drink made with instant coffee. It quickly became my caffeinated drink of choice in Greece. There’s nothing grand about instant coffee, but there’s something about frappés that got me hooked… and it wasn’t the caffeine, at least not entirely. The best frappés have a thick, stiff head of foam, almost like whipped cream but caffeinated, and the frappé at Lontos had just that. In fact, it was the frothiest and most caffeinated frappé I had on the entire trip.

It got me thoroughly buzzed, in more ways than one.

Café Lontos
Apostolou Paylou 33-35 (map)
Athens, Greece
210-3463844