Coffee House CHAFF — Restaurant in Otaru

I visited this coffee shop on a trip to Otaru in May 2024 golden week. For lovers of hand drip coffee, I absolutely recommend it.

The shop space is small so there may be a queue and a time limit on seating during peak times and the shop owners do their best to explain this clearly for non Japanese speakers.

I chose a light roasted coffee from Honduras with an apple-like flavour profile while my wife selected their house roast for a café au lait.

Among the coffees I had during my trip to Japan, this was the #1 most tasty. Flavour was exactly as profiled and mouthfeel was smooth and pleasant with very little unpleasant aftertaste. Japan is known for darker roasts, so to find such a pleasant light roast was a treat.

The cafe au lait was rich and sweet and since Hokkaido is famous for its dairy product, I imagine the milk was of high quality (though I do not know for sure as I did not check at the time).

We also had the pound cake. It complemented the coffee very well, but the star of the show was really the coffee after all.

I had the pleasure of watching the owner hand drip three separate V60s at the same time for the customers coming in, which is no mean feat. While not the chattiest fellow in Japanese or otherwise, his dedication to his craft and providing customers an exceptional product is clear to see. The beans are also roasted in-house which shows the extent to which the owners are dedicated to their work and the resulting coffee experience.

Jazz saxophone full of energy was playing while we were there, which may not be to everyone's taste, but we enjoyed it.

As I live in England, I was unable to buy any beans to bring back home. But since Otaru has such delicious beer, wine, whisky and thanks to CHAFF, delicious coffee, I would...

Amazing place! Small and cozy, with friendly and smiling master and his attendant, with nice music playing, with a good choice of coffee related books and magazines on the shelf, it offered really enjoyable experience. It was opened several years, in 2017, so it looks fresh and new. There is a roaster, so all the beans are fresh roasted.

There is range of straight coffees and the original blend. We tried the “Chaff blend” and liked it so much, that we bought this blend beans. Btw, the master kindly explained that “Chaff” means the thin outer skin of the coffee bean, so the name of the place has this origin. Highly...

Another small but great coffee house/roaster run by an older Japanese guy who's serious about his coffee. Nice lineup of single estate coffees for drip brewing. Most of Hokkaido likes a dark roast but his are more medium-light- fruit flavor of bean is preserved... my wife calls them sour. In the US, Burundi and Rwanda are not common, but they were excellent here. Colombian was also very good but less fruit. Both times I've had Rwandan here in Japan I've been really impressed. The banana-coconut cake was good but not much banana flavor. Quiet, very comfortable place with...