Bongo Coffee – Nashville

BONGO COFFEE – Nashville

Today’s review is a special one! First off—I’ll be reviewing this spot on my own and without the input of the true connoisseur: my father. Second of all—I’m in Nashville! And so is this cool coffee joint. And finally: I started drinking oat milk rather than cow milk in my lattes, so keep that in consideration! It definitely changes the profile of the drink.

Bongo Coffee. Where do I begin? Let’s start with how I narrowed down the taking of my Nashville coffee shop virginity to this little unassuming spot? Well, I typed “cafe” into my google maps and tried to find a spot that appeared to be conducive to click-clacking away on my little laptop and getting some good old-fashioned WORK done. Bongo fit the bill.

Usually, I preface a review by describing whereabouts the cafe is. Unfortunately, I have no idea where I am right now. I literally don’t even know where I am in Tennessee. I probably couldn’t point to Tennessee on an unlabeled map, to be completely transparent. The best I can do is: ~East Nashville~

Okay, so I walk in. It’s very big and open. Lots of tables. Exactly what I was looking for. The building is actually split into two halves; on the right, there are shelves filled with board games and on the left there is the coffee counter. There is also a poster that says “ALL WELCOME: ALL RACES, ALL GENDERS, ALL SEXUAL ORIENTATIONS” always a good sign. And always a good sign.

The barista is beaming at me like I’m her favorite person on this planet. I ordered an iced latte w 3 shots of espresso and oat milk. It came in a very typical environmental-destroying plastic cup. It was honestly hard to discern how much of what I was tasting was attributable to the oat milk (with which I am still becoming familiar) as opposed to the espresso itself.

Truly, I did not find much to be very special about this latte. It was a little flavorless. I swished it around on my tongue over and over and could not find a single adjective in my brain to describe it. However, I did find that the 3 shot:oat milk ratio was pretty solid in the medium-sized cup. As we’ve discussed time and time again, the milk:espresso ratio is one of the most common ways that a latte can be tainted. I’ve been adding an extra shot usually in all my lattes, which seems to do the trick.

So—The latte left much to be desired but I loved the atmosphere, the abundance of games that I didn’t play, and the happy barista.

Rating: 6/10.