The Bean Machine

Hub Bub Coffee

by Trey Popp

FROM THE FARMER to the roaster to the guy who pushes water past the beans, there are a lot of people to thank for a good cup of coffee. For a superior one, the list is liable to get longer. Such is the case with Hub Bub, a cherry-red truck that’s been pumping out single-estate cups and espresso drinks at the corner of 38th and Spruce since October. Philadelphians can add the Wall Street meltdown, Manhattan’s food-truck scene and the Big Apple’s daunting food-service bureaucracy to their list of thank-yous for the best joe to hit our streets in ages.

Before he rigged up his java mobile, Drew Crockett was a trader for Deutsche Bank. That was a heady job back in 2006, but for Crockett the real perk was getting his caffeine fix from a truck outfitted with an espresso machine. The Penn grad had gotten used to scarfing four-wheel fare as an undergrad, but this was a cut above.

The appeal only grew as the bottom fell out of the financial sector. Crockett looked into permits for his own cart, but New York’s notoriously labyrinthine system was discouraging. He put his name on Philadelphia’s list. “Penn kids eat out of trucks all the time,” he says, “but there was nothing on campus like a truck with an espresso machine.” Then he more or less forgot about it, got into business school, and was all set to go when Philly flashed the green light. A couple of months and one serious red paint job later, he rolled onto campus with Dave Matthews and Coldplay pulsing from a pair of exterior-mounted speakers.

If the music speaks to his student clientele, Hub Bub’s beverages and pastries are what really sing. Crockett sources his beans from Portland’s estimable Stumptown. There’s a full-flavored espresso blend, and a splendid, slightly more acidic single-estate Guatemala option featuring the low-yielding bourbon varietal. I’ve had four flawlessly brewed cups, a great value at $1.50 for 12 ounces. The espresso — pulled from a fancy La Marzocco machine — is smooth and not overcooked. The iced coffee is cold-brewed for 12 hours, which merits praise, though I’ll need warmer weather to try it. Meanwhile, I don’t treat myself to cappuccino often, but the dense foam of Hub Bub’s argued strongly for abandoning that rule.

After all, I’ve lost my self-discipline to the pastries anyway, from Narberth’s Au Fournil bakery. The marzipan croissants and pain au chocolate are merely excellent. The pastry-dough cinnamon buns — airy and crispy, not sticky and chewy — are sell-your-soul good. Their only downside is a tendency to vanish by early afternoon. But then, nothing from a truck this good and this red was going to stay a secret for long.

(t_popp@citypaper.net)

Hub Bub Coffee | 38th and Spruce streets, hubbubcoffee.com and twitter.com/hubbubcoffee. Mon.-Fri., 7 a.m.-4 or 5 p.m.; Sat., 9:30 a.m.-3 p.m.