Grounds of Being: The Divinity School Coffee Shop — Restaurant in Hyde Park Township

CASH only!

MENU: Great coffee--I believe the least expensive on campus--and some yummy premade meals.

Coffee - 8oz = $1 I like the LSD blend.

CAFE: The place is pretty small but usually packed with people. It's located in the basement of Swift, so it is also rather dark. Honestly, the vibe makes me feel like I'm in a wood laden tavern in Europe... which I love. However, the darkness is not conducive for my studying; so, I usually grab a coffee and bounce.

LOCATION: When you walk into Swift, you walk in a diagonal to the left. You will see an opening to a stairwell. You descend the stairs and then turn to the left and descend a few more. It's straight ahead. There is also an elevator to the basement; when you enter Swift it's on the right.

SERVICE: I've found the staff is usually in good spirits and friendly. However, every now and again, you get someone who doesn't seem to be having a good day. It happens...

some of the student workers have negative skills to make espresso drinks. the quality of GoB ranges from 0-75 out of 100 depending on who is making the coffee. Most of the time espresso has been over extracted.

For comparison: Ex-Libris student workers tend to under-extract espresso drinks (which become sour)... Another on-campus place is Pret-a-Manger (clearly, only "ready for eating" but not "ready for drinking"), where the espresso drinks are consistently bad, for which I will give 30 out of 100. Star bucks is comparable. For Hallowed grounds, I have heard both good and bad things about them, so far my experience has been negative.

In short, near UChicago only Plein Air seems to offer reasonable coffee (not great but drinkable)... but the line is...

I had heard good things about this little basement coffee shop and decided to stop in while I was out for a walk. The atmosphere is fun and the service was fast and friendly. But the coffee was a letdown. My Americano was under-extracted and quite quite sour. My wife says I'm too picky about coffee, but this is the University of Chicago campus. If the intelligentsia aren't after good espresso, then who?

All of that being said, an espresso shot can go bad once in a while for the best of baristas. Maybe I was unlucky, so I'll give them another try and report back if the coffee is any better.

I can say one thing for sure: the price is right. But I'd rather pay a couple more bucks for something...