Coffee Education: Crooked Nose And Coffee Stories, Vilnius, LT

Cool café

If your time visiting Vilnius is limited, a simple visit to Crooked Nose and Coffee Stories will likely be one of the highlights of your trip. All coffee beans here are roasted in-house and are brewed using a variety of methods including Chemex, Aeropress, and their own BRO pour over filter. Depending on the season, you can also find cold brewed coffee sold in glass bottles. Espresso machines are not used at Crooked Nose and Coffee Stories. Slow down and connect with your travel companion with an order of coffee and specialty snack, which changes frequently and are picked to compliment the flavor profiles of the beans.

Coffee tastings

I first became introduced to Crooked Nose and Coffee Stories by attending one of their excellent coffee tastings led by the friendly owner, Emanuelis Ryklys. Coffee tastings are held frequently at Crooked Nose (see their Facebook page for upcoming events) and typically consist of education about flavor profiles of beans grown in different countries followed by tastings of coffee made using the different beans. You get to try an ample amount of coffee during this tasting, so I’d suggest not drinking coffee before your scheduled time.

Dark Times Coffee Conference

Early each November, Crooked Nose and Coffee Stories hosts the Dark Times Coffee Conference that focuses on all aspects of coffee. Expect to hear from engineers and artists who work on coffee packaging, food bloggers, café owners, and coffee roasters from around the world. During the conference, there is also a gourmet market (you don’t need tickets to go to the market), selling coffee, brewing equipment, and delicious foods that make the perfect accompaniment to coffee.

Because of the international atmosphere at this conference, many of the speakers give talks in English. In my experience, if a speaker is presenting in Lithuanian or another language, one of the staff at Crooked Nose will likely be happy to translate for you.

This year, the Dark Times Coffee Conference will be held on November 4 beginning at 10 in the morning. Be sure to purchase tickets online in advance.

Unique souvenirs from Lithuania

Skip the clichéd yellow, green, red t-shirt or Russian nesting dolls in favor of unique, handcrafted items that represent Lithuania as it is today. For this, Crooked Nose and Coffee Stories is perfect. In the café, you’ll find a great selection of amazing in-house roasted coffee (my favorites are those roasted with salt or Sichuan peppers), beautiful clay cups handmade in Lithuania, and their new, handmade BRO coffee maker. When purchasing a bag of beans, notice the short story written by a local writer on each type of single origin coffee. The BRO coffee maker is an especially unique and practical souvenir, as it is locally made using wood from Lithuania for the pour over device, linen from Lithuania that is used for the reusable coffee filter, and it is locally designed.